Mrebo

timdiggerm said:

I'd disagree with Mrebo's assessment of the situation. Tarkin & Co are distinctly military leaders. They refer to the Senate (the political power) as being quite separate from themselves. They have titles like "Commander" and "Admiral". They use possessive pronouns like "your" when talking about the starfleet. They are the military.

I totally agree. I only meant to draw a distinction between Vader's executive role and the governing role of the moffs. In the Empire, the military and the government are one entity. But I never got the sense in any of the movies that Vader was deciding anything about governance. Tarkin references the "regional governors" but even those would fit into the same militaristic hierarchy as the moffs.

Vader, on the other hand, is a bit of an outsider. He's not subordinate to them, not even to Tarkin, but he's not exactly above them in the chain of command either. He's separate from both the political and military structures, except that it's well known that his authority comes from the Emperor. The script goes so far as to call him "right hand of the Emperor". As the films progress, particularly in ESB where he's been given use of the fleet to hunt down Luke, he has greater explicit command of the military, but he's never actually part of their system. As the Emperor's right hand man, however, he's almost always obeyed.

I think this is a good way of describing Vader's role.

My interpretation is in line with ender's. It struck me that Vader was purely a military leader, while Tarkin and the other Moffs were more political figures. In the Empire, the line between political and military leaders was greatly blurred, but not non-existent. Consider Vader the highest ranking general while the moffs are secretaries of the navy, army, airforce, etc with Tarkin as secretary of defense.

Vader was not a vice-emperor or a political leader in any sense. He couldn't go around killing high-ranking members of the imperial hierarchy. Vader carried out military orders. He did so ruthlessly and with a certain amount of latitude, but they were orders handed down by others (the Emperor, the Moffs).

Tarkin was clearly the leader of the decision makers (beneath the Emperor). He had the power to order the destruction of Alderaan (perhaps after conferring with the Emperor). Tarkin and Vader simply played different roles.

The fact that Vader's role was somewhat limited does not at all diminish his character. Throughout history, great military leaders have had to answer to those who govern. After the Senate was dissolved, after Tarkin was killed, it certainly created a vacuum for Vader to fill and exercise even greater power.

That Vader should embody pure evil and total power is one of my SW pet peeves (a thread topic I've been meaning to make). Vader was the main villain in SW, but the universe was richer and more complex than it might seem at first glance.

So OTCon in Tenn? :p

New Yorker living in same state as CP3S.

Weekend Home Alone at Bernie's

Kevin is left behind, again, when the McCallister family wraps up an enjoyable Caribbean vacation. Harry and Marv are on the run from the law, of course, and find themselves on the same island as Kevin. While they hatch their plans for revenge, the corpse of Bernie Lomax finds its way into Kevin's life. Kevin does his trademark scream when he realizes it's a dead guy. But then puts Bernie to use, having him dance around the living room when Harry and Marv show up, tumbling down the stairs, spinning around slapping the bandits, etc. At some point Harry and Marv believe they have killed Bernie and are distraught about how to handle the situation, since despite all their talk, they've never committed so serious a crime as murder. While they fight about what to do, Bernie dances his way to his feet. The bandits go wide-eyed and flee. [Feel free to finish the story!]

P.S. ender, my significant other has found your ideas very funny.

P.P.S. maybe this thread's title should be 'movies that absolutely should be made'

I watched part of it, I couldn't continue. I couldn't believe there was something about Star Wars that I couldn't stand to watch.

Old Spice Denali (I like to call it "Denial"). I usually go with regular or sport Old Spice but decided to try something different.

Article

Express your fondest memories

Okay, thoughts on this guy?

Can you imagine going into the jungle, grabbing a monkey out of a tree and taking him home? He'd rip your face off as he should, as he should.

From researching the possibility of having a capuchin as a pet.

TV's Frink said:

none said:

...and then the game began:

http://content.usatoday.com/communities/campusrivalry/post/2011/11/jerry-sandusky-admits-to-showering-with-boys/1

Oh boy, that doesn't sound good.  What was his lawyer thinking, letting him be interviewed at all?

Significant facepalm

leo87 said:

It's like he just gives it 2 seconds thought and laughs it off. Wouldn't he be like "whoa whoa, how the hell did that happen?" and "You made out with your brother!" It's always disappointed me, but I know it happened at the end of the movie and there wasn't enough time to go into that.

 

He didn't just laugh it off, he was all like whaaa

And it is super very obvious that the kiss was only to make Han jealous. It was a show. It was not an intimate and sincere kiss. I'm sure later they would have a good laugh about it, but even in Empire nobody took that kiss seriously.

There could have been an extra scene where Leia explains her family tree to Han, but not really necessary.

Also, I love Carrie Fisher. Her performance as Princess Leia in Empire is great. But, every time I watch ROTJ, I feel like she didn't deliver in the scene where Luke reveals they are twins. It's an important scene for the franchise and I think her performance in that scene is disappointing and not what was needed.

I agree that scene was on the weak side.

misfire, meant to edit, don't have any more roasting today. Roasting myself for posting incompetence.

O RLY?

Like CP3S, I have little to no interest in sports (I type this while wearing a Cubs t-shirt). For all I know, Knute Rockne is Nute Gunray's cousin. I think Warbler has offered a thoughtful comments on this subject. Warbler isn't saying that he would tell the students they are correct (just the opposite, in fact), but that he sympathizes with the sort of familial connection they have with Paterno and their school.

So, wasting more time than usual today, I started clicking around, wondering if I should have a user title and whatnot. I discovered that one person added me as a friend, that I have added nobody as a friend, and that this Jedi Temple34 guy is ignoring me. I went through several stages of grief before finding this thread. Now going through further stages of grief for unnecessarily going through them the first time.

Happy Belated Birthday! That is an awesome cake. Your age vs musical taste is mind-boggling to me!

Moth3r said:

georgec said:

You know, the dust has settled after the BR release, but seeing that image made me shudder. How awful! Not only that, most people have been raving how great the movies look on BR but it's obvious that these transfers are extremely faulty.

Come here... put your hand on the desk.

*picks up hammer*

Now then, which two fingers will it be?

I'm proud of you georgec :'D

And Amy and Rory are their children. It's really messed up. jk, go catch up, people!

Puggo - Jar Jar's Yoda said:

I liked Tennant himself as the Doctor.  I just didn't like many of the Tennant episodes.  The partners, and all the soap opera drama.

Absolutely, I stopped watching the Tennant series because of that. I never cared much for Rose and she got unbearable with Tennant.

Matt Smith has had his weak moments and compared to Tennant, I really didn't like him at first but he's grown on me. And Amy and Rory are great. I agree with CP3S about River being annoying, for some of the same reasons Rose was annoying. And Smith's lacking gravitas is accentuated by having someone like her. And I still have no clue why they had to get married.

It's not like we can search on youtube for "A New Hope Part 1" and watch the entire movie or anything...

And a stupid bill is in Congress that would allow copyright holders to shut down websites that do not take down content when requested by requiring payment processors to cut off support within five days of notification.

Jedi of Oz

Liam Neeson finds himself in Oz, takes down many Oz villains with a lightsaber and sings "Somewhere Over the Rainbow"

Much cuteness.

McFlabbergasty said:

I began the process by looking over other fans' prequel rewrites. I quickly realized that I didn't like any of them because they tried to stay too close to the Lucas PT.

A good number of people here agree with you.

And here is what I am going to include in my PT rewrite that will spice the story up and help connect it to the OT more firmly than Lucas did...

- A female villain. And no, her name does not begin with "Darth". However, Vader does eventually claim her lightsaber for use in the OT. Also, she is not conspiring with Palpatine.

Will be interested to see how this plays out.

 - An interesting cast of new characters. The central protagonist of the series is not Anakin Skywalker, but his apprentice Ben. Through a long series of events, Obi-Wan will eventually respect young Ben enough to adopt his name as a disguise when he has to go into hiding on Tatooine. I'll get deeper into that later.

Also interested in seeing how this works. Very important to have a new and dynamic cast of characters so this is more than a pathetic shadow of the OT.

- Anakin's love interest AKA Ben's former love interest AKA Luke and Leia's mother, who I have named Jeni, is a much more action-oriented character than Padme. She is part of a spice freighter crew captained by Ben, the up-and-coming Jedi. 

Love triangle does add depth. By "Ben" do you mean apprentice Ben or Obi Wan?

- Jedi are infertile. And this fact is believed to hold fast and true for all of them until it is revealed in Episode II that Jeni is carrying Anakin's children. I will not explain this scientifically because that would lead us into midi-chlorian territory. Just chalk it up to the mysterious workings of the Force.

This raises a skeptical eyebrow for me as it seems pretty arbitrary, but always curious to see how a seemingly wacky idea might work.

I'll start posting an outline of Episode I: Rise of the Witch if there's any interest. 

peace 

There definitely is interest in these parts. I suspect difficult for many of us to maintain a passion for our own rewriting. I will sometimes think about my ideas for days at a time, write a few scenes, and then drift away for awhile. Seeing people's work can help inspire more passion!