Friday’s Geeky Post
Posted by Eric Seymour on 22 July 2005 | 2 responses
A friend pointed me to an essay by Bob Hayes on why the battle of Endor (for you non-geeks, that’s the part of Return of the Jedi where living teddy bears are using primitive weapons to blow up giant mechanized war vehicles) demonstrates the evil nature of the rebellion. A fun read to kick off your weekend.
(For you non-geeks who are still reading this, the main part of Hayes’ blog features some cute baby photos!)
2 Responses to “Friday’s Geeky Post”
Sorry, I think Hayes is way off on this. If you read even the “good” Star Wars books (basically, the Timothy Zahn trilogy), then you’ll see plenty of data on things that are left up in the air by the movies. I think the books show clearly that while the Jedi weren’t perfect, they were generally good, and that the Empire was in fact generally bad.
You can find plenty of info to disprove Hayes’ ideas in books that Lucas called canon – and to head off the argument before it happens, no one can argue that the books can’t be canon because some things in the movies contradict the books (e.g., Boba Fett’s origin) mainly because the movies contradict themselves at some points.
I have not read any of those books, but from the movies alone, it is obvious that Hayes is wrong. The use of mind control against innocent people is a problem, even for a good cause, but I do not think it was improperly used in the original trilogy. Also, I think he dismisses that whole “Death Star” thing too quickly (and bases this dismissal on assumptions that are untrue or invalid). I assume that he is joking about most of this, because otherwise, I do not think he would have made so many flawed arguments.