Hurin

Has it occured to all us psuedo-philosophers that how a person sees himself and his motivations is ultimately irrelevant when judging someone's actions? Generally, you can mark the low point in any discussion when Hitler is mentioned, but since he's already been mentioned. . . Hitler had a point of view. He thought what he was doing was a good thing. That's his view. But he was objectively evil. He's probably the last example of evil that the Left is willing to concede actually exists. Everyone else simply has a "point of view" that differs. It doesn't matter how or why a villain such as Vader rationalizes what he does, it only matters that he is murdering children, subordinates, and knowingly, actively, and enthusiastically supporting and enforcing a regime that murders billions or even trillions (these are planets we're talking about, not cities or even continents), enslaves even more (wookies, etc.). Vader may have convinced himself that he is doing the right thing (though I would debate even this because at this point, I don't think he cares what the "right thing" is anymore). . . but his viewpoint can also be wrong. Just because someone is convinced what they are doing is good or right, doesn't make it so. We don't have to just get all Hippy-ish and say: "Well, if he thinks that, there must be some truth to it and who are we to judge?" At some point, there is a line. At some point, as the actions become more atrocious, morality moves out of the "majority rules" or "shades of grey" realm and become objectively, starkly concrete. I'd say Vader's actions obviously fit into this latter category as downright friggin' evil. His motivations stop mattering after a certain point. . . I seriously worry about people who say that they would have done exactly what Anakin did. It's also funny to me that you guys seem to see Vader as someone who is only seeking power to do good (at least in his own mind). It is obvious by just Anakin's tone in EpIII prior to the duel that he now simply wants power for its own sake. . . for his sake. Regarding Yoda giving bad advice to Anakin (someone mentioned it along with the Jedi mistreating Anakin): Keep in mind (as we've said before) that the advice Yoda gave Anakin would probably have worked for a Jedi who had taken the Jedi Code more seriously. Yoda didn't know Anakin was married and had grown that attached to anyone. . . because he shouldn't have. Aw screw it, I'm just going to paste what I wrote to a friend (in a light-hearted tone). . . From the Jedi Council's point of view. . . Anakin has whined and moaned that he's being "held back" since before they were doing anything that could even remotely be seen as doing so. Hell, they did him a friggin' *favor* by allowing him to become a Jedi in the first place (which was, in hindsight, a mistake where the Jedi Order is concerned even if it did eventually lead to the destruction of the Sith in RotJ). How does he repay their kindness of overlooking the age restrictions and just plain bad vibe they were getting off of him? Oh, well, he pretty much breaks every "thou shalt not" in the Jedi rulebook. First and foremost, he takes a wife. . . and, of course, that *leads* to him having to come to Yoda about a problem that he shouldn't even have and can't even be honest with Yoda about. The kid wasn't a very good Jedi. I'm glad he's dead. H Edit: Very, very (years) late edit to fix the apostrophes in the purple quote above. At some point they had all been converted to "question mark symbol thingies" (been known to happen when MySQL databases are imported into certain versions of MySQL).

Opus, I think this is what you're trying to say:

Rommel was out in the field in Africa or preparing the defenses in Normandy. He wasn't standing next to the Commandant of Aushwitz while the Commandant was pulling the lever in the gas chambers. Rommel is a bad analogy. Vader is not Rommel. Vader is the Commandant of Aushwitz, the person Palpatine turns to when it's time to commit unspeakable acts. Of course, murdering your subordinates every time they screw up isn't exactly "good" either. Taking pleasure in it (as he obviously does) makes you downright evil. I'm surprised A1 is taking this particular angle at stirring things up. . . knowing his politics, I'm disturbed that he'd get onboard with the "evil doesn't exist, it's all in your point of view" hippy band-wagon.

But you have to ask yourself if Anakin truly loved Padme selflessly. Or did he love her jealously? Did he love her or how just how she made him feel. . . the though to possessing her? Did he love her unconditionally? The book demonstrates the nature of Anakin's love pretty clearly: Edit: And if a friend of mine killed 10 billion people in order to save me from death, I think I'd shoot my "friend" myself.

Well, we did debate this at length. Start reading here.

Thanks J... You just saved me a sh!tload of typing. Hurin, read that again and think of me. Come on now, nobody actually believes that you would have typed all that! And, in case you hadn't noticed, I've responded. H

DVD Decypter's website was recently shut down by its creator because The Man has been hassling him. I have updated the link in the tutorial above so that it points towards a good source for the (final) build of that software. H

But, well, I don't think Vader truly has good intentions. By the end of the film, he's obviously just in love with power and the aquisition of more. He talks of overthrowing Palpatine and then, as an after-thought, sorta throws in the part about "making things the way they should be" to Padme so that he doesn't sound too megalomaniacal (after he realizes he's losing her). He's clearly not thinking of all the wonderful things he'll do for the galaxy when he's in power, he's just in love with the idea of being the one in power. It was the lies of Palpatine that Vader used to justify his transition over to being that person. He needed them to get over that hump and to bury what was left of his "good side". . . but once there, he fell hard and fast into evil. . . as Yoda would have warned. The book explains this all very well actually. When he awakens and realizes that he killed Padme, he realizes all the lies he told himself to justify what he had done. . . and that it really was all about him. It wasn't about saving Padme, since he thought nothing of choking her to death as soon as she didn't want him. . . etc. H

Well, I think you're kidding. But on the off chance that you're not. . . I didn't realize that you were initiated into the "Cult of Vader." He's the bad guy. He's the villain. He may have had reasons for becoming the bad guy. But that doesn't change the fact that he eventually lost sight of even those reasons and was consumed by greed, a lust for power, and his own fear. I just posted this at originaltrilogy.com. But it seems appropriate here as well:

Dogs and cats. . . living together! MASS HYSTERIA!

Some people aren't comfortable with reality. But, in this case, reality = GBP has to fit existing 1/48 valkyrie. If they could have made it completely anime-accurate, they would have. But they couldn't make the 1/48 valkyrie 100% anime-accurate. . . so how can we expect its armor to be?!? This all goes back to the fact that "anime magic" is necessary in order to make Valkyries look so good in the anime (nose shrinking in battroid, etc.). Most agree that Yamato did an incredible job getting their 1/48 as close to anime-accurate as possible given these limitations. Yet, somehow we now expect the armor that needs to fit on these same valkyries to be anime-accurate?

My Dear Lord! You're right! H

Well, he never fully turned to the Dark Side, as we saw in ROTJ. Or maybe he fully tunred, but was never really evil. I think that distinction is there. The story arc is about redemption. You can't be redeemed if you weren't evil. I think people make too much of the "Once you start down the Dark Path" thing that Yoda always says. . . it's obviously not the case, given what Vader does at the end of RotJ. Yoda has been wrong before. It looks like he was wrong about that too. But it's pretty f'ing clear that Vader was evil. You don't go around sabering scads of "younglings", killing everyone you used to care about (or attempting to) and taking part in the destruction of whole planets (the scale of this is often overlooked since planets seem like cities in SW) unless you are E-V-I-L. H

Saw it again for the second time too. . . it's a much different movie the 2nd time around now that you can relax and take in the subtleties (and your adrenaline isn't still pumping after turning around to tell an entire row of punk kids to STFU). Of course, one of my problems with Lucas's later movies (and the retro-fitted old ones) is that he adds so much distracting stuff that you almost need to see them twice just to follow the story completely because you're too busy watching two droids argue in the foreground while the heroe's are doing something behind them. Of course, this works in the OT because we know the plot. But in the newer movies, it can be disorienting (but, I accept that most people are there to be dazzled and that the plot now comes 2ndary). Hehe, just at the point where Anakin and Obi-Wan are dueling, after they've gone across that tight-rope catwalk/pipe. . . did anybody else notice that little floating droid wander onto the screen, sorta look at them, turn towards the camera, and then wander off. . . that's classic neo-Lucas. But I digress. . . I was startled to see that Anakin was crying in that scene after he slaughters all the seperatists. He's already completely given himself over to the Dark Side at this point. . . yet, when they come up on his face as he's just standing there gazing over the lava, you can see tear streaks running down his face. I was surprised to see that he still had conflict and remorse at this point. Even though he was obviously committed to seeing this path through. H

What?! I read that comic a long time ago, and you've suspected, Max, I believe he meant to say "Leia and Han's unborn child." H

I'm going to brief, as a special treat to everyone: Sellers are people too. Sometimes they want to get as much as possible for their item. Sometimes they don't want to use Ebay. If a seller is dishonest, he'll be dishonest no matter what type of sale he carries out. If someone doesn't like how a seller is doing things, well, don't buy anything! If someone doesn't like a certain type of sale because it tends to make the item more expensive or allows someone who wants it more to pay more. . . I can't say that I see that as a bad thing. To the seller, that's a good thing. Stop Communism! H

Wasn't he sorta referring to it being a hot combat zone?

My guess is that he's just reading the same stuff we are. I'm not sure Toy-wave (nice as he is and as good a retailer as he has been to us) is an authority on the subject. H

He's not threatening you at all. He's merely stating that, were you to meet him in person, you'd see that he's exactly the same person that he appears to be here on MW. Whether that's a good or a bad thing is, of course, still open to debate. H

FROM a certain point of view. Yeah, I wondered if that was valid. . . but I think Palpatine says: "In your anger. . . you killed her." So, I think he was most likely referring to his fit of rage where he strangled her. But you could also say it was his anger that turned him towards the Dark Side, or that she died because of the hurt she felt when he turned on him and finally showed his true nature by choking her "in his anger."

And thus ended the Great Anti-A1 Revolt of '05. . .

I don't think Palpatine was lying to Vader when he said that Vader had killed Padme. To the best of his knowledge that was the case. All Palpatine knows is that Vader chocked her, and that Obi-Wan rushed off with her. . . and that she died. In the book, Obi-Wan and Yoda even have the foresight to make it look (at the funeral) like she died while still pregnant. How is Palpatine to know that she got to medical care that "repaired all the physical damage". . . but she just "lost the will to live." In fact, unless Vader was able to tell him some things before or durin his rebuilding procedure, I'm not even sure how the Emperor knows anything about Padme. But he had to know something in order to tell Vader anything that would jive with what Vader actually recalls. Maybe news has already been transmitted to Naboo or Coruscant that their Senator is dead? H

I don't see any reason they couldnt levitate. They use the force to make huge leaps like Luke jumping out of the cabon-freeze chamber in ESB and Obi and Qui Gon jump all over the place in Ep1. I think flying might be a bit too much though. Actually, once Anakin and Obiwan were above the lava on the wreckage, weren't they both levitating whatever they were standing on? I mean did anyone notice they were flying upstream on the lava flow and not towards the dropoff? Anakin was standing on a flying robot, but what about Obiwan? He was on a large piece of wreckage, so I assume he was levitating it. The part that bothers me is that when Obiwan says I have the high ground, why didn't Anakin just make whatever he was floating on just float even higher or take it up a little upstream so he could just walk over and kick Obiwans ass? I guess we can chalk it up to Sith overconfidence. Obi-Wan is standing on a repulsor-lift enabled lava miner/harvester. Man, my geek quotient just went up a point having said that. And here I thought I was already maxed out. As for Anakin just being able to use his droid to acheive the high ground. . . presumably, Obi-Wan would have just countered by leaping ahead to the even higher ground. H

I don't see any reason they couldnt levitate. They use the force to make huge leaps like Luke jumping out of the cabon-freeze chamber in ESB and Obi and Qui Gon jump all over the place in Ep1. I think flying might be a bit too much though. In the book for EpIII, I believe that Dooku uses it to "glide". . . but not quite fly. Edit: This is in the very beginning when Dooku enteres the room where Palpatine is being held. In the movie, he jumps/flips/somersaults down. In the book, he Force-glides. H

This is, of course, true. But Lucas's re-envisioned Star Wars now asserts that the differences can actually be explained within the fictional continuity by Vader being half-machine. Whether we like it or not, that's now Star Wars canon. Really, we're not even discussing whether that's the case or not, since Lucas is now very clear on it. But I think it's obvious that this is a change in the character (even for Lucas) while others have asserted that Vader has always been obviously crippled and slow. . . therefore no change has taken place at all. And finally, we can debate whether the change is necessary and/or whether its "residual effects" on the characters and story outweigh the actual value of explaining the disparities in the lightsaber duels. But. . . Lucas has spoken, and this is just now the way it is (and, in a sense, was). Well, I'd disagree with that. Vader was looking forward to deposing the Emperor and taking control himself since even before he donned his mask. I know that's in the book. I think it might even be in the movie. And, of course, he openly speaks of deposing the emperor to Luke in ESB.