The Acolyte - Disney Plus Star Wars Series

[Big s]

19 minutes ago, pengbuzz said:

And I'm a tuna sub with mayo and lettuce.

If it were Capicola then you’d be the king of subs

[Thom]

Why would they need to think they needed reinforcements? They had overwhelming numbers to go after a single Force-user who had killed two Jedi, one on one. They had no idea they would be facing a Sith-like baddie whose power is equivalent to a Master (or two.) It was literally over in a matter of minutes, Plus there was no one on the ship to bring word for help, so the only way to get help would be to get to the ship and go back to Coruscant, which maybe what Yord would have done if Mae had not turned them around.

[Seto Kaiba]

4 hours ago, Tking22 said:

If Smylo Ren is a Sith Lord, does he tie in at all to Darth Plagueis or Palps eventually? When was the rule of two made? Is he Plagueis's master? I mean, 100 years from the events of Phantom Menace, we shouldn't be too far off from Plagueis and Palps right? 

If he is one, then he has to fit into the chain somewhere unless he was a failed apprentice who died before he could usurp his master's position. 

Based on a quick Google search and one of the last episodes of The Clone Wars, Darth Bane established the Rule of Two about 900 years before the events of The Acolyte... or approximately a thousand years before the events of The Phantom Menace.

It's possible he's Darth Plagueis's master, the information I found says that Darth Plagueis was born somewhere around the time this show is set. If we assume the oldest age that's presented for him, he would be about 15 years old at the time this is set.

 

4 hours ago, Tking22 said:

As mentioned by others above, at this point, if Smylo is a Sith then Acolyte is going to have to have some more deaths to keep this Sith a secret in order to keep continuity, no survivors is the only way out at this point, but I highly doubt both sisters are dying, Sol is a goner for sure though. 

Yeah, I'm kind of guessing that Mae is going to kill Sol and then rebel against her master and get killed.

Either that or she'll kill him and steal his identity.

 

1 hour ago, pengbuzz said:

And I'm a tuna sub with mayo and lettuce.

We'll be careful not to microwave you then.

 

47 minutes ago, Thom said:

Why would they need to think they needed reinforcements? They had overwhelming numbers to go after a single Force-user who had killed two Jedi, one on one. They had no idea they would be facing a Sith-like baddie whose power is equivalent to a Master (or two.) It was literally over in a matter of minutes, Plus there was no one on the ship to bring word for help, so the only way to get help would be to get to the ship and go back to Coruscant, which maybe what Yord would have done if Mae had not turned them around.

If the Jedi were being practical about it, why would they not flood the zone with sheer weight of numbers? 

They're chasing a serial killer who has been hunting Jedi Masters. One who they suspect is a former Jedi themselves, or at the very least someone who has been trained by a rogue Jedi. They outnumber the target thousands to one. The only thing stopping them from going in there with overwhelming force is their own overconfidence. After all, green Karen wanted to make an example of the offender.

Ironically, as the movies show us, the smartest thing to do would probably have been to flood the zone with regular soldiers with rapid fire rifles and just let them gun him down en masse. 

[pengbuzz]

1 hour ago, Seto Kaiba said:

If he is one, then he has to fit into the chain somewhere unless he was a failed apprentice who died before he could usurp his master's position. 

Based on a quick Google search and one of the last episodes of The Clone Wars, Darth Bane established the Rule of Two about 900 years before the events of The Acolyte... or approximately a thousand years before the events of The Phantom Menace.

It's possible he's Darth Plagueis's master, the information I found says that Darth Plagueis was born somewhere around the time this show is set. If we assume the oldest age that's presented for him, he would be about 15 years old at the time this is set.

 

Yeah, I'm kind of guessing that Mae is going to kill Sol and then rebel against her master and get killed.

Either that or she'll kill him and steal his identity.

 

We'll be careful not to microwave you then.

 

If the Jedi were being practical about it, why would they not flood the zone with sheer weight of numbers? 

They're chasing a serial killer who has been hunting Jedi Masters. One who they suspect is a former Jedi themselves, or at the very least someone who has been trained by a rogue Jedi. They outnumber the target thousands to one. The only thing stopping them from going in there with overwhelming force is their own overconfidence. After all, green Karen wanted to make an example of the offender.

Ironically, as the movies show us, the smartest thing to do would probably have been to flood the zone with regular soldiers with rapid fire rifles and just let them gun him down en masse. 

Or nuke the planet from orbit...

 

...it's the only way to be sure.

[jvmacross]

1 hour ago, Seto Kaiba said:

 

 

Yeah, I'm kind of guessing that Mae is going to kill Sol and then rebel against her master and get killed.

Either that or she'll kill him and steal his identity.

 

 

Wait...are you suggesting that Mae at first hated the Jedi so much she murdered 2 of them, well...one and got credited for the assist on a second one.....then she hated herself more and wanted to throw herself at the Jedi's mercy...then now she is back to hating them again and wants to finish the job she started....then....she is so deluded that she will go after the alleged Sith Lord who took out the entire Jedi Posse that was out to get her aaaand take his identity just for sh1ts and giggles?

Are you secretly writing for Disney's Lucasfilm?....

[Big s]

2 hours ago, Seto Kaiba said:

Yeah, I'm kind of guessing that Mae is going to kill Sol and then rebel against her master and get killed.

I have a feeling there will be a fight, then Sol will fill her in on what really happened .  If she does kill him it would make her the most flip floppy wishy washy character ever. First she wants to kill them, then surrender to them and then to ditch her sister on a hostile planet when she wanted to be together and then back to wanting to kill Sol. I really hate bad sister. 

 

[Seto Kaiba]

9 hours ago, jvmacross said:

Wait...are you suggesting that Mae at first hated the Jedi so much she murdered 2 of them, well...one and got credited for the assist on a second one.....then she hated herself more and wanted to throw herself at the Jedi's mercy...then now she is back to hating them again and wants to finish the job she started....then....she is so deluded that she will go after the alleged Sith Lord who took out the entire Jedi Posse that was out to get her aaaand take his identity just for sh1ts and giggles?

Kind of, yeah? Mae hated the Jedi enough that she attempted to murder her own sister at the age of like 8 years old to prevent her from going with them. Then when she thought her sister had died during the incident on Brendok she hated the Jedi enough to sign on with Smilo Ren and plan the murders of all four Jedi who were involved and actually kill two of them directly or indirectly. She hesitated and even decided to turn herself in once she learned that her sister was still alive, but that resolve to turn herself in seems to have been very short-lived because she immediately resists being arrested for the murders she was planning to turn herself in for and then mood swings all the way back to murderously violent once she learns that her sister still sides with the Jedi and seemingly decides to go finish doing the murders she had previously decided to stop doing and turn herself in for.

As unstable as she is, it seems really on brand for her to murder Sol and then attempt to do in her master as well. Up to now, basically her only response to anything that makes her angry is violence. But for one or two small childhood scuffles we could say that her only response to things that make her angry is attempted murder.

 

9 hours ago, jvmacross said:

Are you secretly writing for Disney's Lucasfilm?....

No, but with that reaction maybe I should send them my CV...🤪

[Big s]

1 hour ago, Seto Kaiba said:

As unstable as she is, it seems really on brand for her to murder Sol

I’m pretty sure this show will go the simple route, but a part of me thinks that now that she’s separated from those that have been influencing her that she might not. Otherwise it’s a simple split of the “Thread” and one sister is the good side of the thread and one is the bad side and that would just be dull.

[Seto Kaiba]

10 hours ago, Big s said:

I have a feeling there will be a fight, then Sol will fill her in on what really happened .  If she does kill him it would make her the most flip floppy wishy washy character ever. First she wants to kill them, then surrender to them and then to ditch her sister on a hostile planet when she wanted to be together and then back to wanting to kill Sol. I really hate bad sister. 

Up to now, she really has been written as a crazy person so it wouldn't exactly be out of character. 

Not to mention Star Wars is a setting that runs on very basic moral absolutes and loves to play with the idea that evil makes you crazy... and not only has she been trained to use the dark side, the power of the witches she trained in before that is also dark side.

 

8 minutes ago, Big s said:

I’m pretty sure this show will go the simple route, but a part of me thinks that now that she’s separated from those that have been influencing her that she might not. Otherwise it’s a simple split of the “Thread” and one sister is the good side of the thread and one is the bad side and that would just be dull.

Looking at it, her arc feels a lot like Darth Maul's in The Clone Wars, what with her insane desire for revenge and occasional flip-flopping of priorities, her obsession with a sibling, etc.

[jvmacross]

1 hour ago, Seto Kaiba said:

Kind of, yeah? Mae hated the Jedi enough that she attempted to murder her own sister at the age of like 8 years old to prevent her from going with them. Then when she thought her sister had died during the incident on Brendok she hated the Jedi enough to sign on with Smilo Ren and plan the murders of all four Jedi who were involved and actually kill two of them directly or indirectly. She hesitated and even decided to turn herself in once she learned that her sister was still alive, but that resolve to turn herself in seems to have been very short-lived because she immediately resists being arrested for the murders she was planning to turn herself in for and then mood swings all the way back to murderously violent once she learns that her sister still sides with the Jedi and seemingly decides to go finish doing the murders she had previously decided to stop doing and turn herself in for.

As unstable as she is, it seems really on brand for her to murder Sol and then attempt to do in her master as well. Up to now, basically her only response to anything that makes her angry is violence. But for one or two small childhood scuffles we could say that her only response to things that make her angry is attempted murder.

 

No, but with that reaction maybe I should send them my CV...🤪

No...I get it....the writing is so bad that it's a likely scenario....but can you imagine the uproar from the hard-core Fandom if they actually carried this out...some nobody that somehow took down a Jedi Master...possibly a second one before it's all over...but somehow was no strong enough to elude getting handcuffed by a padawan?

And to top it off...she will somehow defeat a maybe Sithlord that just handed a half dozen (or more) fully trained Jedi there arses within minutes...

It would reignite the whole "mary sue" contingent all over again....lol 

[Mog]

Don’t sully Clone Wars Maul like that.

Dude really only had two goals:

1) Kill/hurt Obi-Wan.

2) Get back to a position of power after being cast aside.

Everything else pales in comparison to those two objectives.

Considering how dumb the original idea sounded, they actually made the horned bastard a much more interesting character in Clone Wars and Rebels.

[Seto Kaiba]

1 hour ago, jvmacross said:

No...I get it....the writing is so bad that it's a likely scenario....but can you imagine the uproar from the hard-core Fandom if they actually carried this out...some nobody that somehow took down a Jedi Master...possibly a second one before it's all over...but somehow was no strong enough to elude getting handcuffed by a padawan?

And to top it off...she will somehow defeat a maybe Sithlord that just handed a half dozen (or more) fully trained Jedi there arses within minutes...

It would reignite the whole "mary sue" contingent all over again....lol 

From what I've seen on social media - and oh what a mistake social media feels like these days - the "Mary Sue" contingent are already at least partly up in arms over the series in response to Mae easily killing a Jedi Master in the first episode and outwitting the Jedi at every turn until episode 5.  The one thing that seems to be staying their hands is that the online response to the series is already overwhelmingly negative in most of the fan spaces I've peeked into.

That said, the Mary Sue accusations seem to be almost par for the course these days when a series tries to bring more female viewers into majority-male fandoms by giving the new installment a female protagonist.  We've seen this happen so much lately that well-defined patterns have emerged.  Quite a bit of it is simply gatekeeping and misogyny, but IMO it's rare for the accusations to be completely unfounded because the writers are stuck trying to avoid offending a bunch of different groups and end up leaning on the tropes common to girls young adult fiction to sell the characters.  This tends to lead to writing hypercompetent protagonists who have to constantly establish their credentials surpass those of other characters to avoid accusations of Chickification, who have to have traumatic backstories involving the loss of their family coupled with a special upbringing that justifies their hypercompetence, and who are either not allowed to show any vulnerability at all or have to flip-flop between "badass action girl" and "fragile flower" with little to no middle ground.  The only part of the girls young adult fiction formula they tend to miss is being a self-depricating pretty girl who describes herself as plain and uninteresting but nevertheless has a bunch of hot boys fighting over her.

Star Trek and Star Wars both hit this hard in the last decade with Discovery's Michael Burnham, Picard's version of Seven of Nine, Lower Decks's Beckett Mariner, Disney-era Ahsoka Tano, the sequel trilogy's Rey, and now Mae.  That need to have the character constantly assert dominance or behave in a situationally inappropriate manner to prove they're a "strong female character" seems to be what drives a LOT of the toxic "Mary Sue" accusations.

 

1 hour ago, Mog said:

Don’t sully Clone Wars Maul like that.

Dude really only had two goals:

In all fairness, those are actually the same goal... "Get revenge".

Maul wanted revenge on Obi-Wan for his defeat and bisection in The Phantom Menace, and the reason he spent so much time building up a power base in the criminal underworld was partly to lay traps for Obi-Wan and partly prepwork for his plan to take revenge on his old master, Darth Sideous for abandoning him.

Mae is also seemingly motivated entirely by her desire for revenge.  Her first attempted murder is to take revenge for Osha "abandoning" their family to join the Jedi.  She spends the events of the in-series present day seeking revenge against the four Jedi who were once stationed on Brendok because she blames them for the deaths of her family.  Then, once she learns Osha is still alive and still loyal to the Jedi, she either switches back to her original motive of wanting revenge because Osha chose the Jedi over her or is going with a combination of her earlier two motives for revenge. 

It seems increasingly likely that, in the end, she'll be seeking revenge against Qimir and/or Qimir's master for having pulled the strings behind her birth and the destruction of the coven on Brendok.

I guess she's technically closer to Maul's brother Savage Opress then... since her motive seems to be pure mistreatment-induced revenge.  (Or at least revenge for what she herself perceives as "mistreatment".)

 

1 hour ago, Mog said:

Considering how dumb the original idea sounded, they actually made the horned bastard a much more interesting character in Clone Wars and Rebels.

Yup... but that was a painfully low bar to clear.

[Thom]

17 hours ago, Seto Kaiba said:

...

If the Jedi were being practical about it, why would they not flood the zone with sheer weight of numbers? 

They're chasing a serial killer who has been hunting Jedi Masters. One who they suspect is a former Jedi themselves, or at the very least someone who has been trained by a rogue Jedi. They outnumber the target thousands to one. The only thing stopping them from going in there with overwhelming force is their own overconfidence. After all, green Karen wanted to make an example of the offender.

Ironically, as the movies show us, the smartest thing to do would probably have been to flood the zone with regular soldiers with rapid fire rifles and just let them gun him down en masse. 

I think, to their thinking, they did flood the area with Jedi. With Kelnacca, they had a 7-1 advantage over Mae. And, not having seen a dark Force user for a long time, obviously underestimated him when he showed up. On the flip-side, they were hampered by Vernestra wanting to keep things 'in house.' But still, seven Jedi should have been enough. In some ways though, I'm thinking they over-powered Smiley and under-powered the others.

And whenever I hear the term 'Mary Sue' my eyes just about roll out of my head. Are there instance? Sure. But also instances where those complaining in such a way are clearly having mindless 'knee-jerk' reactions.

[Seto Kaiba]

13 minutes ago, Thom said:

I think, to their thinking, they did flood the area with Jedi. With Kelnacca, they had a 7-1 advantage over Mae. And, not having seen a dark Force user for a long time, obviously underestimated him when he showed up. On the flip-side, they were hampered by Vernestra wanting to keep things 'in house.' But still, seven Jedi should have been enough. In some ways though, I'm thinking they over-powered Smiley and under-powered the others.

Hm... maybe.

Considering they sent four Jedi (a Master, two Knights, and a Padawan) just to surveil some witches on Brendok, that Green Karen sent just eight Jedi (two Masters, five Knights, and a Padawan) to Khofar to deal with an assassin who'd not only killed a Jedi Master in close combat without a lightsaber but also proven skillful enough to escape capture by another Jedi Master and a half dozen other Jedi on Olega feels like an inadequate response.  Especially given that she and the other Masters were entertaining the theory Mae'd been trained by a Jedi splinter group with an unknown number of members.  They would've had nine if Qimir hadn't already killed Kelnacca, but he apparently didn't even put up a proper fight.

I think The Acolyte's fifth episode is itself a pretty good argument against the idea that they underpowered the Jedi and overpowered Smilo Ren.  He himself points out that what makes the difference between them is adherance to rules.  The Jedi learn to fight by training against other Jedi, so their experience with fighting other lightsaber users is limited entirely to other people who also follow the Jedi order's rules and philosophy.  Their style is very uniform and restrained and they're clearly being cautious not just because Qimir was an unknown quantity but because there are a bunch of them all in the same fight and they don't want to risk hurting each other.  Qimir, on the other hand, is not fighting with such restrictions.  He's swinging for the fences because he's been placed in a target-rich environment with no friendlies to worry about hurting and because he has no reason to honor the Jedi's conservative code duello or restrain himself from just going straight for the kill.  He doesn't have to abstain from using tactics and techniques that the Jedi may consider too lethal, too underhanded, or too cruel to train in.  

Jecki and Sol both manage to put Qimir on the defensive when they start attacking aggressively.  Jecki manages to force him to give ground and lands the first real hit on him by breaking his helmet with her lightsaber hilt.  He has to resort to that second hidden lightsaber to take her out and regain the initiative before Master Sol can reenter the fight.

 

13 minutes ago, Thom said:

And whenever I hear the term 'Mary Sue' my eyes just about roll out of my head. Are there instance? Sure. But also instances where those complaining in such a way are clearly having mindless 'knee-jerk' reactions.

It is probably one of the most overused and misused criticisms in fiction, yeah.

Related criticisms were bad enough that Mike Godwin coined Godwin's Second Law in 2022.

[Big s]

I get that the whole “Mary Sue” thing is an overused comment, but a lot of recent Disney stuff kinda fits the description from their characters in Marvel and Star Wars and even things like Willow. That being said, I don’t get that feeling about this show so far. It may have a heavy female orientation, but the main character OSHA is just kinda dumb, but not overpowered or particularly take charge and definitely doesn’t act like she’s out to replace anyone or even act like she’s gone through worse experiences even though thinking her entire family was killed and being a Jedi reject. It’s not a good show or a smart show, but not an example of the “Mary Sue”.

[Thom]

3 hours ago, Seto Kaiba said:

Hm... maybe.

...He himself points out that what makes the difference between them is adherance to rules.  ...

Yord's dialogue supports this, noting how Smiley does not adhere to normal rules of fighting. And yes, the Jedi have been training against equals, rather than planning to fight against a superior foe.

[pengbuzz]

On 6/28/2024 at 8:33 PM, Big s said:

If it were Capicola then you’d be the king of subs

ROFL!!
 

Actually, that sounds pretty good about now...

[pengbuzz]

3 hours ago, Seto Kaiba said:

I think The Acolyte's fifth episode is itself a pretty good argument against the idea that they underpowered the Jedi and overpowered Smilo Ren.  He himself points out that what makes the difference between them is adherance to rules.  The Jedi learn to fight by training against other Jedi, so their experience with fighting other lightsaber users is limited entirely to other people who also follow the Jedi order's rules and philosophy.  Their style is very uniform and restrained and they're clearly being cautious not just because Qimir was an unknown quantity but because there are a bunch of them all in the same fight and they don't want to risk hurting each other.  Qimir, on the other hand, is not fighting with such restrictions.  He's swinging for the fences because he's been placed in a target-rich environment with no friendlies to worry about hurting and because he has no reason to honor the Jedi's conservative code duello or restrain himself from just going straight for the kill.  He doesn't have to abstain from using tactics and techniques that the Jedi may consider too lethal, too underhanded, or too cruel to train in.  

Jecki and Sol both manage to put Qimir on the defensive when they start attacking aggressively.  Jecki manages to force him to give ground and lands the first real hit on him by breaking his helmet with her lightsaber hilt.  He has to resort to that second hidden lightsaber to take her out and regain the initiative before Master Sol can reenter the fight.

Yeah; what hamstrung the Jedi was their seeming inability to not be able to "break out of the box" until forced to. Qimir (as you pointed out) is free to pretty much fight at full potential and with everything in his repertoire.

Basically, the Jedi were fighting largely with one hand tied behind their backs while Qimir was doing his version of Mortal Kombat on them. He knows their rules and how they hem the Jedi in, and he knows how to dance right through their styles and training.

[Big s]

15 minutes ago, pengbuzz said:

ROFL!!
 

Actually, that sounds pretty good about now...

Can’t go wrong with a good Capy Sammy

 

5 minutes ago, pengbuzz said:

Qimir was doing his version of Mortal Kombat on them.

Since it was the dark side, it’s more like Immoral Wombat

[pengbuzz]

21 minutes ago, Big s said:

Can’t go wrong with a good Capy Sammy

 

Since it was the dark side, it’s more like Immoral Wombat

You have a point on both of those, my friend!

[Seto Kaiba]

1 hour ago, Thom said:

Yord's dialogue supports this, noting how Smiley does not adhere to normal rules of fighting.

Yup.

 

1 hour ago, Thom said:

And yes, the Jedi have been training against equals, rather than planning to fight against a superior foe.

Nah, Jedi would probably have LOTS of experience fighting against a foe with superior skill and/or experience by training with their instructors and masters and peers in the Jedi temple(s).

The problem I see, which got the Khofar taskforce mulched by Smilo Ren and probably accounts for every other case of the Sith beating superior numbers of Jedi too, is that Jedi train against Jedi.  Their experience is all fighting opponents who have the same reserved, defense-oriented, unaggressive fighting style they do so.  So when someone like Smilo Ren comes at them with a heart full of murder and holding nothing back they're completely out of their depth.

(You can tell in Revenge of the Sith that even though the Jedi knew they were coming to arrest a Sith Lord they did NOT expect that old man to screech like a banshee and do a 720 in midair right into a stab.)

 

33 minutes ago, pengbuzz said:

Yeah; what hamstrung the Jedi was their seeming inability to not be able to "break out of the box" until forced to. Qimir (as you pointed out) is free to pretty much fight at full potential and with everything in his repertoire.

Basically, the Jedi were fighting largely with one hand tied behind their backs while Qimir was doing his version of Mortal Kombat on them. He knows their rules and how they hem the Jedi in, and he knows how to dance right through their styles and training.

Yeah,  the "Sol Patrol" were expecting Marquess of Queensbury rules and Qimir delivered a back alley brawl.

[Big s]

18 minutes ago, Seto Kaiba said:

Yeah,  the "Sol Patrol" were expecting Marquess of Queensbury rules and Qimir delivered a back alley brawl.

They really didn’t know what to do when someone started intentionally head butting their lightsabers. They probably never heard of face to saber style

[kajnrig]

20 minutes ago, Big s said:

They really didn’t know what to do when someone started intentionally head butting their lightsabers. They probably never heard of face to saber style

Its original practitioner was an ancient master from galaxies away called Wimp Lo.

He was purposely trained wrong, as a joke,

[Mog]

Apparently, there’s a number of different forms of saber combat.  Palps was able to wipe the floor with most of the styles, except for Mace (who used a very unique form. . . aka Samuel L. Muthaeffin’ Jackson’s own personal damn style).

In the case of Smilo, it seems the High Republic Jedi emphasized Form III (the most defensive style) during those temple training scenes.  Add in Smilo’s hack, and he had the obvious advantage.

Why none of the Jedi used any Force moves on the dude is anyone’s guess though.

[Seto Kaiba]

7 minutes ago, Mog said:

Why none of the Jedi used any Force moves on the dude is anyone’s guess though.

One of the recurring problems that I keep harping on for every Star Wars title is how often the Jedi forget they have superpowers...

It's meant to be a drama preserving handicap or something like that, but it's just honestly just kind of infuriating that they keep putting Jedi in situations they could easily resolve using their powers and have them conveniently forget to use them so that they don't resolve the situation too easily.

[Mog]

^^As long as it doesn’t devolve into Force throwing big rocks at each other.  Don’t need that sort of garbage either.

I so wish Obi and Vader threw more psychological nukes at each other instead.

[Seto Kaiba]

For example, this whole series was theoretically preventable if Sol had just remembered he can use the force to lift people. He could have prevented both sisters from falling into that pit and neither of the sisters would have had to spend over a decade believing that their sibling had died that day. Mae would not have signed on with a Sith Lord thinking that she needed to take revenge for her sister's death.

[Big s]

3 hours ago, kajnrig said:

Its original practitioner was an ancient master from galaxies away called Wimp Lo.

He was purposely trained wrong, as a joke,

“I’m bleeding. Making me the victor “

[Thom]

5 hours ago, Big s said:

“I’m bleeding. Making me the victor “

'tis but a scratch. Did I win?'

10 hours ago, Seto Kaiba said:

Yup.

 

Nah, Jedi would probably have LOTS of experience fighting against a foe with superior skill and/or experience by training with their instructors and masters and peers in the Jedi temple(s).

The problem I see, which got the Khofar taskforce mulched by Smilo Ren and probably accounts for every other case of the Sith beating superior numbers of Jedi too, is that Jedi train against Jedi.  Their experience is all fighting opponents who have the same reserved, defense-oriented, unaggressive fighting style they do so.  So when someone like Smilo Ren comes at them with a heart full of murder and holding nothing back they're completely out of their depth.

(You can tell in Revenge of the Sith that even though the Jedi knew they were coming to arrest a Sith Lord they did NOT expect that old man to screech like a banshee and do a 720 in midair right into a stab.)

 

Yeah,  the "Sol Patrol" were expecting Marquess of Queensbury rules and Qimir delivered a back alley brawl.

Right, the Jedi Masters were training against themselves without trying to think outside the box, AKA, dirty fighting, and teaching that to the Padawans. Comes from centuries of not having a serious opponent and complacency creeping in.

 

6 hours ago, Seto Kaiba said:

For example, this whole series was theoretically preventable if Sol had just remembered he can use the force to lift people. He could have prevented both sisters from falling into that pit and neither of the sisters would have had to spend over a decade believing that their sibling had died that day. Mae would not have signed on with a Sith Lord thinking that she needed to take revenge for her sister's death.

I wonder if that could have been a subconscious fault with Sol? He knew Osha wanted to join the Jedi but Mae did not, and perhaps it was a flawed, instinctive response that had him concentrate entirely on Osha.

[pengbuzz]

  

10 hours ago, Seto Kaiba said:

Yup.

 

Nah, Jedi would probably have LOTS of experience fighting against a foe with superior skill and/or experience by training with their instructors and masters and peers in the Jedi temple(s).

The problem I see, which got the Khofar taskforce mulched by Smilo Ren and probably accounts for every other case of the Sith beating superior numbers of Jedi too, is that Jedi train against Jedi.  Their experience is all fighting opponents who have the same reserved, defense-oriented, unaggressive fighting style they do so.  So when someone like Smilo Ren comes at them with a heart full of murder and holding nothing back they're completely out of their depth.

(You can tell in Revenge of the Sith that even though the Jedi knew they were coming to arrest a Sith Lord they did NOT expect that old man to screech like a banshee and do a 720 in midair right into a stab.)

 

Yeah,  the "Sol Patrol" were expecting Marquess of Queensbury rules and Qimir delivered a back alley brawl.

 

I wonder how Mace Windu would have fared against Qimir?

Edited June 30 by pengbuzz

[Big s]

1 hour ago, pengbuzz said:

  

 

I wonder how Mace Windu would have fared against Qimir?

I think his wallet says it all

[Mog]

He’d probably bring some clones armed with AK-47’s, because “when you absolutely, positively gotta kill every last muthaeffin’ nerfherder in the room, accept no substitute!”

[Seto Kaiba]

5 hours ago, Thom said:

Right, the Jedi Masters were training against themselves without trying to think outside the box, AKA, dirty fighting, and teaching that to the Padawans. Comes from centuries of not having a serious opponent and complacency creeping in.

Not just dirty fighting, aggressive fighting.

You've got generation after generation who've mainly if not exclusively trained against people using the same defense-focused styles they do... leading to them getting caught by surprise on those rare occasions someone runs into a Sith Lord and learns the hard way that they're underprepared for an opponent who aggressively prioritizes offense.

 

5 hours ago, Thom said:

I wonder if that could have been a subconscious fault with Sol? He knew Osha wanted to join the Jedi but Mae did not, and perhaps it was a flawed, instinctive response that had him concentrate entirely on Osha.

I think it's more a general failure that happens all the time when writing Jedi.

There's a fantastic example in The Clone Wars where a pickpocket steals Ahsoka's lightsaber, and despite seeing the thief walk away with it in hand she chases after them on foot instead of using her force powers to grab the lightsaber and pull it back to her.  So instead of an annoying incident resolved in thirty seconds, it balloons out into an entire episode devoted to her chasing multiple thieves across Coruscant on foot.

 

5 hours ago, pengbuzz said:

I wonder how Mace Windu would have fared against Qimir?

Without an Anakin around to mess things up for him, probably pretty well considering he had Darth Sideous on the ropes in fairly short order.

[pengbuzz]

1 hour ago, Seto Kaiba said:

Not just dirty fighting, aggressive fighting.

You've got generation after generation who've mainly if not exclusively trained against people using the same defense-focused styles they do... leading to them getting caught by surprise on those rare occasions someone runs into a Sith Lord and learns the hard way that they're underprepared for an opponent who aggressively prioritizes offense.

 

I think it's more a general failure that happens all the time when writing Jedi.

There's a fantastic example in The Clone Wars where a pickpocket steals Ahsoka's lightsaber, and despite seeing the thief walk away with it in hand she chases after them on foot instead of using her force powers to grab the lightsaber and pull it back to her.  So instead of an annoying incident resolved in thirty seconds, it balloons out into an entire episode devoted to her chasing multiple thieves across Coruscant on foot.

 

Without an Anakin around to mess things up for him, probably pretty well considering he had Darth Sideous on the ropes in fairly short order.

Hmm... too bad Mace is a human and not one of those humanoid races that live 200 years or more....

[Big s]

5 hours ago, Mog said:

He’d probably bring some clones armed with AK-47’s, because “when you absolutely, positively gotta kill every last muthaeffin’ nerfherder in the room, accept no substitute!”

Shotguns would probably be great

 

2 hours ago, pengbuzz said:

Hmm... too bad Mace is a human and not one of those humanoid races that live 200 years or more....

He’s been around since before a long long time ago and still looks great today, so maybe he does live for more than 200 years