Anakin and the prophesy of the chosen one and TFA kylo ren

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redpill
roll eyes (sarcastic) confused if anakin is the chosen one who was to bring balance to the force roll eyes (sarcastic) confused how do you explain the events in tfa? roll eyes (sarcastic) confused specifically his grandson kylo killing all of luke's students, and paving the way for the rise of snoke. if anakin brought balance to the force, whence cometh snoke and kylo ren roll eyes (sarcastic) confused

Bentley
That's because TFA has an anti-Star Wars plot and cheapens the original trilogy.

**** Lucas.

Ushgarak
'Balance to the Force' doesn't mean "There will never be any bad guys ever again."

In any case, the backstory is far from finished as of yet, so wait out the other films to get the background.

queeq
He brought balance 30 years before. Now we need someone else.

The whole prophecy thing was stupid anyway. We still don't know what the prophecy says exactly or where it's from. The TFA makers based themselves on the OT and moved from there.

Darth Thor
Originally posted by queeq
The TFA makers based themselves on the OT and moved from there.


And yet in the first lines of TFA they brought up the whole balance to the force issue again. That wasn't in the OT.

queeq
So? It's not like they totally ignore the PT. But they do stay away from it.

And from Lucas' point of view: balance=light. And without Jedi who will guard the light. It makes sense from a simple POV.

It's not like they start counting Rey's midichlorians.

Darth Thor
So they've clearly acknowledged the PT canon, just taken most their inspiration from the OT is all.

No need to have another dig at midi-chlorians mad

queeq
Of course the PT is canon. Who ever denied that?

Lord Lucien
He brought balance to the Force. Now it's out of balance again. What's so difficult to understand about that?

redpill
Originally posted by Lord Lucien
He brought balance to the Force. Now it's out of balance again. What's so difficult to understand about that? did he now? where was snoke when this so called balanced occured?

Bentley
Originally posted by redpill
did he now? where was snoke when this so called balanced occured?

He was a store cleric.

Edit: sh_t I forgot the spoiler tags, fixed now.

ares834
Originally posted by redpill
did he now? where was snoke when this so called balanced occured?

Who knows?

What we do know is Anakin brought balance to the Force, whatever exactly that means.

Beniboybling
Originally posted by queeq
Of course the PT is canon. Who ever denied that? I think his point is is that they are not pretending PT concepts don't exist, or somehow shying away from them as you are suggesting. The idea of prophecy through bringing balance to the Force for example has been acknowledged.

Really, the only reason the PT doesn't feature at all heavily in TFA is because it's not relevant, and they wanted to recreate the feel of the OT.

Nibedicus
From my POV, life tends to be in a constant state of flux. Balance doesn't mean static. I see Anakin as a major "correction" of the force. From the way I saw it, too much control and order created a state of apathy/indiferrence prone to greed, pride and corruption which needed to be reset. Anakin reset it and now, as with life, natural forces start to pull from every direction. I might be way off but that's at least how I see it.

Did Lucas actually acknowledge in-canon that light=balance. Shouldn't "balance" actually be equal weight between light and dark?

Beniboybling
Originally posted by Nibedicus
Did Lucas actually acknowledge in-canon that light=balance. Shouldn't "balance" actually be equal weight between light and dark? He's said balance = light and dark in equal measure several times tbh. And that's how its made out in TCW.

However it appears to be a controversial topic, with differing opinions.

Ushgarak
Originally posted by Nibedicus
From my POV, life tends to be in a constant state of flux. Balance doesn't mean static. I see Anakin as a major "correction" of the force. From the way I saw it, too much control and order created a state of apathy/indiferrence prone to greed, pride and corruption which needed to be reset. Anakin reset it and now, as with life, natural forces start to pull from every direction. I might be way off but that's at least how I see it.

Did Lucas actually acknowledge in-canon that light=balance. Shouldn't "balance" actually be equal weight between light and dark?

No, the imbalance was caused by the Sith. Anakin didn't reset anything- he destroyed the evil power that was causing the imbalance.

But that's not to say there cannot be more such treats to come later. We'll need to see more of Snoke's backstory before we can really answer this one.

Without the Jedi, there is no balance. They are the ones that strive for Balance in all things.

Besides which, we have the very simple thing that evil is undesirable. All of Star Wars is about good guys fighting bad guys. TFA makes that pretty clear.

quanchi112
Originally posted by Bentley
That's because TFA has an anti-Star Wars plot and cheapens the original trilogy.

**** Lucas. How does bringing balance to the force mean forever and ever ?

Darth Thor
Originally posted by Beniboybling
I think his point is is that they are not pretending PT concepts don't exist, or somehow shying away from them as you are suggesting. The idea of prophecy through bringing balance to the Force for example has been acknowledged.

Really, the only reason the PT doesn't feature at all heavily in TFA is because it's not relevant, and they wanted to recreate the feel of the OT.


Yeah exactly. We just need to Look at Rebels being almost a sequel series to TCW to know Disney isn't running scared from the Prequel era.

Of course TFA itself was a homage to ANH and not TPM. But that's just the route Abrams decided to take for this particular film IMO. Doesn't mean Disney's running from the Prequels, hence the Prequel references.

Beniboybling
I would also think the fact that they considered Hayden making an appearance in TFA, and still might in Episode 8 is pretty telling as well.

Its obvious they've taken the criticisms of the PT onboard, but honestly bar midi-chlorians I can't think of any concepts the trilogy introduced that where particular poorly received by the fandom, there is no reason they'd avoid referring to them.

I mean TCW is among the most successful and critically acclaimed content the franchise has produced, and it's entirely grounded in the PT, there is nothing to be afraid of here.

redpill
so if anakin said kylo ren can achieve more power by bringing balance to the force by embracing the light and destroying snoke what will kyo do

queeq
Originally posted by Beniboybling
I would also think the fact that they considered Hayden making an appearance in TFA, and still might in Episode 8 is pretty telling as well.


That was only a suggestion by one of the production designers, Iain McCaig in the very early designing process, when they were just exploring possibilities from a design point of view. McCaig did two design concepts in that direction. As far as we know this was never seriously considered for the script.

Get your facts straight!

Beniboybling
Inb4 Anakin in Episode 8. eek!

queeq
Inb4?

Lord Lucien
Originally posted by redpill
did he now? where was snoke when this so called balanced occured? In art school? I don't kfucing know, wait for the next film to tell you.



Goddamn Lucas and his retarded ass prophecy bullshit. Fans have been scrutinizing and analyzing it a helluva lot longer than Lucas took to think of it. It was a shitty plot element that lead nowhere and meant nothing except in George's simplistic mind.

Beniboybling
Originally posted by queeq
Inb4? Is the term unfamiliar to you?

Lord Lucien
Originally posted by Beniboybling
Is the term unfamiliar to you? He's like 85, leave him alone.

Bentley
Originally posted by quanchi112
How does bringing balance to the force mean forever and ever ?

Does Snoke seem like someone less than 30 years old to you? Because if he was disbalancing the force at the time, Anakin never fulfilled the prophecy to begin with.

ares834
Unless he wasn't unbalancing the Force at the time. Dark siders merely existing does not unbalance the Force as seen with both the Son and the Nightsisters.

Bentley
Originally posted by ares834
Unless he wasn't unbalancing the Force at the time. Dark siders merely existing does not unbalance the Force as seen with both the Son and the Nightsisters.

Sure, but if he started to unbalance it say, five years after the death of Palpatine, you can make an argument for the prophecy still being major bs.

queeq
Which it is.

redpill
Originally posted by Bentley
Does Snoke seem like someone less than 30 years old to you? Because if he was disbalancing the force at the time, Anakin never fulfilled the prophecy to begin with.

thats why i started the thread.

Darth Thor
Who knows, in Disney Canon they might alter Lucas's vision of the Prophecy. It could be the whole Skywalker line who are the "Chosen Ones."

Remember the line:"The Prophecy misread may have been," in ROTS gives wiggle room for that.

Beniboybling
Originally posted by ares834
Unless he wasn't unbalancing the Force at the time. Dark siders merely existing does not unbalance the Force as seen with both the Son and the Nightsisters. Well, the Son's presence was balanced out by the Daughter. When she died the planet fell out of balance, and it was implied the entire galaxy would as well. Not that we can really tell considering the Force was already out of balance.

queeq
That was such a weird storyline.

Ushgarak
My impression from TFA is not that the Force is unbalanced but that it is in dangere of becoming so. After all, at this point, the First Order is a menance but not actually in control; there's a whole Republic out there living a (relatively) safe existence (until the FO starts blowing up planets of course).

The point simply is that without the Jedi to defend the Balance, it WILL be lost again.

That's all it needs to be.

queeq
Makes sense... I never really got the idea that bringing balance was the crucial challenge of TFA or the entire ST anyway.

Ushgarak
It's simply synonymous with the defeat of evil. People look too much into it.

queeq
I agree.

Bentley
Originally posted by Ushgarak
It's simply synonymous with the defeat of evil. People look too much into it.

It's Star Wars, of course people will look too much into it, that's the point!

Anyways, I'm half hoping for a new movie explained that the prophecy was tampered by Plagueis so it explains any further inconsistencies.

That will maybe apease Plagueis fanboys that want him to be canon into the series 131

queeq
But they won't. So the fanboys can speculate all they want.

Darth Luminous
And from Lucas' point of view: balance=light.

No, Lucas never expressed that view anywhere. It's the view of fans, with Lucas' name attached to it. It is contradicted by TCW which Lucas supported. The balance is between the light and dark sides.

Originally posted by Bentley
That will maybe apease Plagueis fanboys that want him to be canon into the series

Plagueis is still canon, he was mentioned in ROTS. It's just the old EU material about him that isn't canon.

Originally posted by Beniboybling
Well, the Son's presence was balanced out by the Daughter. When she died the planet fell out of balance, and it was implied the entire galaxy would as well. Not that we can really tell considering the Force was already out of balance.

With all of the Force Wielders dead, the imbalance in Mortis disappears. ( But in the temporal universe the Force is still out of balance. )

queeq
Balance is light... Lucas said so himself on numerous occasions.

Introductory documentary for VHS A New Hope Special Edition:
" Which brings us up to the films 4, 5, and 6, in which Anakin's offspring redeem him and allow him to fulfill the prophecy where he brings balance to the Force by doing away with the Sith and getting rid of evil in the universe..."

And I think he does a similar explanation one of in the Making of documentaries of the PT.

Beniboybling

Ushgarak
That's really just semantics in the end, though. If winning is defeating evil and making sure its power no longer applies, the sense in which the Dark Side is 'still there' is pretty vague. We're not really interested in immaterial concepts in the films- it's the people we look at. Every single Dark Sider we've seen in the films needs to go- and it's the good guys that need to get rid of them. On the idea that the Dark Side has an existence in the cosmos- which we can see, for example on Dagobah, and it's not as if the Jedi nuke the planet or anything- what we certainly see is that it should never be embodied in people. Else- suffering.

The problem is when people take GL saying 'balance between good and evil' as meaning equal amounts of both, whereas as we can see from the films, it's really about good guys defeating evil, in whatever its current embodiment is (as TFA repeated). Balance is achieved when evil is defeated. I'm not really sure what 'destroying the Dark Side/evil' could even be beyond that unless you are at the end of a Japanese RP and its time to kill god and remake the universe, or some such thing. But what is desirable in the films is that the good guys win and create a world of balanced symbiosis and not evil parasitism.

The Clone Wars arc complicated what is a simple thing- good guys defeat bad guys. Really, just keep it to that. The sense in which there could ever be 'too much' Light Side is so metaphysical, vague and, based on what we see on film, ridiculous as to hardly be worth considering. Light Side is the good guys. The good guys keep it balanced. The Dark Side is the bad guys. They keep messing the balance up. That's literally what the films show us.

Beniboybling
Nah, TCW gave it depth. It demonstrated that you can't "other" the dark side as some distanced evil that the good guys need to destroy. But that it's actually a part of you that needs to be confronted and acknowledged.

I find that a lot more naunced, the alternative is too dogmatic if not naive. The ying and yang concept, that good and evil define each other and can't exist without each other, also makes a lot more sense in regards to balance.

Nonetheless this is very much a question of opinions and interpretation, and I'm happy to keep it that way.

EDIT: And if you consider Sith to be an excess of darkness, it makes sense that they are agents of imbalance, whereas Yoda though an agent of light, has a dark side, but he rejects its control over him, ergo he is balanced.

And an excess of light isn't that hard to get ones head around, the light is all about peace and serenity, and yet the passions and emotion the dark side embody are an important part of anyone's character or any society. Imagine if we couldn't be passionate about things? That would suck.

Ushgarak
Opinion away, of course. But personality I don't call throwing out a few unsupported maxims 'depth'. I also don't think the films ever really showed the Jedi as fanatical in that sense (though it does seem to be a very common interpretation people have, like the Jedi are the Knights Templar or some such thing, which is very far indeed from what I think GL showed). Like I say, they don't nuke Dagobah; they aren't holding inquisitions to destroy all in contact with the evil heresy.

But when the Dark Side shows itself, it has to be stopped. It's basically why the Jedi are there- and why they are needed back in TFA.

EDIT: And whoever said the Light Side was only about peace and serenity? That's the EU's blunt force interpretation coming in there. Light Side isn't Vulcan-esque denial of emotions- it just means you are in control of the emotions and not the other way around- because you are in balance. As specified, Jedi can feel love. We see Obi-Wan get angry, but he is its master, not the other way around.

The Dark Side isn't feeling emotion, it is letting emotion control you. Not feeling anger- giving into it.

The Light Side is shown as what is desirable, the Dark Side as what is to be avoided. Remember it's not just the Jedi on the Light Side- though they embody it more directly. ALL of the good guys are there. Your Han Solos and your Poe Damerons- and they are not wanting for passion.

Darth Thor
Would have been interesting to see the repercussions of the Son dying and not the Daughter in the Mortis arc. Because I have a hard time believing that would be some big problem for the Galaxy.

As for the Prophecy, one thing was made clear, that the "Sith" needed to be destroyed to make balance (Although that might have been specific to Palpatine's Sith Order).

Beniboybling
Originally posted by Ushgarak
Opinion away, of course. But personality I don't call throwing out a few unsupported maxims 'depth'. I also don't think the films ever really showed the Jedi as fanatical in that sense (though it does seem to be a very common interpretation people have, like the Jedi are the Knights Templar or some such thing, which is very far indeed from what I think GL showed). Like I say, they don't nuke Dagobah; they aren't holding inquisitions to destroy all in contact with the evil heresy.

But when the Dark Side shows itself, it has to be stopped. It's basically why the Jedi are there- and why they are needed back in TFA.

EDIT: And whoever said the Light Side was only about peace and serenity? That's the EU's blunt force interpretation coming in there. Light Side isn't Vulcan-esque denial of emotions- it just means you are in control of the emotions and not the other way around- because you are in balance. As specified, Jedi can feel love. We see Obi-Wan get angry, but he is its master, not the other way around.

The Dark Side isn't feeling emotion, it is letting emotion control you. Not feeling anger- giving into it.

The Light Side is shown as what is desirable, the Dark Side as what is to be avoided. Remember it's not just the Jedi on the Light Side- though they embody it more directly. ALL of the good guys are there. Your Han Solos and your Poe Damerons- and they are not wanting for passion. Never said they are, but "everything dark side is evil and must be destroyed" as an interpretation suggests they should be.

And I would definitely agree that as enemies of the Sith the Jedi are agents of balance, just like the Daughter was on Mortis. But that doesn't mean they are as you say on some crusade to eradicate the dark side from the universe entirely, just an excess of it.

And the light side is about peace and serenity, yeah Obi Wan gets angry, and Jedi can feel passion, but does Kenobi use his that anger to call on the light side? No. Those emotions are part of a Jedi, part of people, but not part of the light side, they are aspects of the dark side.

And the dark side isn't a philosophy, being Sith is about giving in to your emotions, the dark side is just an aspect of the Force that arguably exists in all living things.

So again my point is that good guys are more complex and far less pure that this hard and fast distinction between light and dark implies, they all have their light and dark sides. So branding the dark side as something 'other' that is to be avoided is essentially to ignore a part of yourself.

Ushgarak
Star Wars is a story about clear good/evil distinctions- black hats and white hats. That's how GL always talked about it and wanted it.

You say that the light side is just peace and serenity. That's not in the films. Like I say, it's an EU assumption. What we see in the films are good guys with a sensible range of emotions. All we are told is that the Dark Side- no, not the Sith; the Dark Side is talked of in general with these things (there is no specific philosophy assigned to the Sith at all, because they are never explained, which is always a problem))- comes from giving in to your emotions. This is said specifically-- 'Don't give into hate; that is the path to the Dark Side.'

No-one ever says "Use just the right amount of the Dark Side". It's about rejection of letting it conquer you.

Absolutely everything about the plot and thrust and meaning of the films- of the entire Star Wars story, and the behaviour shown by all the characters within- is about defeating evil, which is synonymous with the Dark Side.

The balanced universe is the one where evil is defeated. The Dark Side has never been shown as anything other than something that must be stopped at all costs.

Honestly, you just stretch credibility if you watch Star Wars and don't get the impression that the Dark Side is evil. All the people associated with the Dark Side are evil. Everything the Dark Side does is evil. Everything associated with the Light Side is good. It's wilfully obtuse not to see that.

Beniboybling
Tbh I'm just gonna agree to disagree, you're not really understanding my point.

queeq
You have an opinion based on something you seem to agree with in our universe. In the SW universe it's simply: evil unbalances, light balances.

Originally posted by Beniboybling

I don't think its fair to cherry pick sources. Especially when a Lucas helmed animation, supports the above.


Actually, it's quite relevant. Because you see the chronology in these quotes. And again, we see Lucas' lack of balance: he keeps changing his mind. That is what is fogging up the SW geofiction.

Besides, I quoted that line because Luminous said Lucas never said something to that extent. And as I showed: he did. Nothing to do with cherry picking.

But one thing remains: in the SW universe the light side brings balance, the dark side disturbs it. In other words: what Ush said.

Beniboybling
Originally posted by queeq
But one thing remains: in the SW universe the light side brings balance, the dark side disturbs it. In other words: what Ush said. I can agree to that at least.

Darth Luminous
Originally posted by queeq
Balance is light... Lucas said so himself on numerous occasions.

No, he never said that anywhere.

Originally posted by queeq Introductory documentary for VHS A New Hope Special Edition:
" Which brings us up to the films 4, 5, and 6, in which Anakin's offspring redeem him and allow him to fulfill the prophecy where he brings balance to the Force by doing away with the Sith and getting rid of evil in the universe..."

For one thing, he never mentions balance at all in that quotation ( or "light", for that matter ). But it looks as though you're equating the light and dark sides with good and evil. Unfortunately, taking the above quote literally is a non-starter - because doing so makes no sense at all. Doing away with the Sith does not somehow magically remove evil from the universe. Not only is there an entire galaxy full of various evil characters ( not to mention some kind of Imperial remnant ), but the sapient capacity for evil remains unaffected by the events of ROTJ. Palpatine and the Empire are the standard bearers of evil, not the totality of evil itself; defeating them merely removes evil from a place of primacy, as opposed to removing it from the universe wholesale. Any time the post-ROTJ period has been depicted in any medium ( including the old EU, the new-canon EU, or Episode VII ), there has always been evil.

Originally posted by Ushgarak
Light Side is the good guys. The good guys keep it balanced. The Dark Side is the bad guys.

The light and dark sides are parts of the Force as opposed to groups of people.

Originally posted by queeq
And again, we see Lucas' lack of balance: he keeps changing his mind.

To assume that he actually changed his mind here is to assume that he literally believed that killing Palpatine magically rendered the universe free of evil or even the capacity for evil. That seems... unlikely.

Darth Luminous
Originally posted by Ushgarak
On the idea that the Dark Side has an existence in the cosmos- which we can see, for example on Dagobah, and it's not as if the Jedi nuke the planet or anything- what we certainly see is that it should never be embodied in people.

But it's always going to be embodied in people, and other life forms. As you said:

Remember it's not just the Jedi on the Light Side- though they embody it more directly. ALL of the good guys are there. Your Han Solos and your Poe Damerons- and they are not wanting for passion.

The same goes for the dark side. When it comes to imbalance, the problem is not with Muggles but with uber-Sith.

Originally posted by Ushgarak If winning is defeating evil and making sure its power no longer applies, the sense in which the Dark Side is 'still there' is pretty vague.

It's a part of the Force. It doesn't disappear if the Sith cease to exist. It continues to be generated by living things as a part of the living Force. Evil's power, such as it is, will always "apply" regardless of whether or not there are dark side Force adepts around.

Originally posted by Ushgarak The problem is when people take GL saying 'balance between good and evil' as meaning equal amounts of both, whereas as we can see from the films, it's really about good guys defeating evil, in whatever its current embodiment is (as TFA repeated). Balance is achieved when evil is defeated.

The Sith are only the most prominent embodiment of evil, not the only embodiment. "Defeating evil" in all its manifestations never literally happens. The Sith, on the other hand, can be defeated - and that returns the galaxy to the default situation of a natural balance between good and evil.

Ushgarak
See, again, you are going for intangibles here that really don't matter- mostly irrelevant really. The Light and Dark sides are part of the Force, sure, but the only way that is ever relevant for us, in any way at all, is in ho that relates to their representation by people. And in that respect, all we ever see- absolute 100% not contradicted- is that the Light Side is good and the Dark Side is evil, and those who have the most power with the Dark Side-which in the original films are the Sith- must be destroyed. Yes, it may well continue to be embodied in people. And this will continue to be a very bad idea and such people must always be stopped.

The balanced galaxy we are shown is one with the Light Side completely triumphant and the Dark Side completely defeated. This is the 'balance' between good and evil. Evil exists, evil goes on existing, but it is good that we must be overwhelmingly favouring; it is evil that destroys balance.

To show one of my points- you say:

"It doesn't disappear if the Sith cease to exist."

To which my answer is- so what? Who cares, if its not being embodied in any way which has power? It's literally irrelevant at that point. Like I said, the existence of the Dark Side in this form is vague; it is taking things to a philosophical level that is so far detached from any worthwhile analysis of film events as to be not worth it.

I'm not really sure what your last comment is getting at at all. I said 'current embodiment' which clearly implies more than one over time, which TFA stated directly. And I will remind you that GL directly and unequivocally stated that balance is restored by getting rid of evil in the universe. Sure, we don't have to overdo it in taking that literally- he doesn't mean the entire concept is annihilated from the cosmos- but it does reinforce the basic point here. He talks of 'dark forces' that destroy the balance of the cosmos- there has never, ever been anything approaching a 'light force' that could do the same, because all the light ever does is aim to restore the balance. What there has never been in the SW story, at any point, ever, is any suggestion or demonstration that the Light Side could ever be a problem in this cosmic equation.

The Light Side is represented by the good guys. They are the ones who do things right. And to remind again: there can be no balance without the Jedi- the champions of the Light Side. They are the ones bringing balance. With their opposite number, the Sith, it's the other way around- the Sith must be destroyed for there to be Balance. So if the champions of the Light Side must exist for balance, and the champions of the Dark must be destroyed for balance, what does that tell you? The connection between the Light Side and balance is so staggeringly obvious that, as I say, it is being wilfully obtuse to deny this. If all we ever see is the Light Side trying to keep the balance and the Dark Side trying to destroy it, then what possible tangible or useful definition or viewpoint can there possibly be other than to say that Balance is represented by the Light side? That is the entirety of the presentation. All that stuff about evil/dark side still literally existing in the balanced cosmos- well, sure. But for any practical purpose- irrelevant. The 'natural balance between good and evil' appears to be one where evil is defeated and good has all the power. Well- that's exactly what it should be. It's only a mistake to see balance as some sort of equal sharing between the two. As we see that evil keeps messing the balance up, that is clearly not the case. Allowing evil such power would leave no hope for balance.

So- the Light Side is represented by good guys. The Dark Side is represented by bad guys. The good guys defeat the bad guys- balance is achieved. Evil might not be literally destroyed but it is defeated, and that is highly significant. And that evil always - always- comes from the Dark Side... because the two are synonymous. Balance is when that evil has no power. Allowing it any power- every time we see it- brings imbalance. That balance is represented by the Light Side.

That's Star Wars- good guys and bad guys Light Side and Dark. Good/Light must defeat bad/Dark. The successful outcome of that- is balance. Complicating it beyond that is to lose your way.

queeq
SW is not a lesson in philosophy, Luminous. It's SW and SW=simple.

Like this:

Good=light side of the Force
Bad=dark side of the Force

Balance= good only = Jedi
Unbalance= bad around/in charge = Sith.

That's it, man. If you want to discuss the better and lesser angels of our nature, there's probably a forum or a thread around to discuss philosophy. Or maybe you can start one. But not here in the SW forum. wink

Ushgarak
To try and be fair, I'll briefly engage with the philosophical idea that the Light Side could cock balance up.

If, in some future story, we have a Jedi who actively declares that he is going on a crusade to eradicate the entire concept of evil from the cosmos for all time so that only good would ever exist... ok, THEN, that's the point where the other Jedi would be going 'whoa there...' because that could be seen as a balance breaker- evil has to be stopped, but it exists as part of the fabric of nature and can't be removed from creation.

Problem is, that's only a far more convoluted version of Anakin's story- trying to use power to bring good but ending up being evil. I would say our theoretical crusader Jedi here has gone Dark Side in any case.

What would we see on screen, anyway? Another bad guy. Back to SW basics again- good guys and bad guys. Light Side and Dark. Balance- the victory when the Light Side wins.

What we never, ever see is any indication that we should be worried that the good guys will do 'too well' and so mess up balance. Their desirable actions only ever make the balance stronger.

Darth Thor
^ That makes sense.

Beniboybling
Originally posted by queeq
SW is not a lesson in philosophy, Luminous. It's SW and SW=simple.

Like this:

Good=light side of the Force
Bad=dark side of the Force

Balance= good only = Jedi
Unbalance= bad around/in charge = Sith.

That's it, man. If you want to discuss the better and lesser angels of our nature, there's probably a forum or a thread around to discuss philosophy. Or maybe you can start one. But not here in the SW forum. wink Can you really claim the philosophy of Star Wars is so simple to the point at which it shouldn't even be discussed, when your incapable of factoring the Mortis arc into your assessment of it?

Seems to be there is discussion value there, as opposed to writing it off as a weird outlier. I think Star Wars has a lot of philosophical discussion value actually, considering its grounded in metaphysical concepts.

Ushgarak
Well it IS an outlier, because it's different to every other presentation we've seen.

That doesn't necessarily mean writing it off, though. If you think that view of things is better, that's no problem at all. I'd even agree there's a lot to discuss with that sort of philosophy. People are very much entitled to make their own creative interpretations of Star Wars.

I just don't feel it is what mainstream Star Wars is, and its canonicity is troublesome when you have two different creative takes in the same continuity.

Beniboybling
Originally posted by Ushgarak
Well it IS an outlier, because it's different to every other presentation we've seen.

That doesn't necessarily mean writing it off, though. If you think that view of things is better, that's no problem at all. I'd even agree there's a lot to discuss with that sort of philosophy. People are very much entitled to make their own creative interpretations of Star Wars.

I just don't feel it is what mainstream Star Wars is, and its canonicity is troublesome when you have two different creative takes in the same continuity. That seems fair, though I think there is room for the various presentations of balance to be reconciled with one another.

As for the mainstream interpretation, I think Star Wars is very much what you make of it, TCW is very much mainstream, and considering Lucas' involvement, we can't even be sure his opinion aligns with the one your proposing.

Might it be the interpretation of the larger fanbase? And those working on Star Wars moving forward? Possibly, maybe even probably. At least in a practical sense i.e. good guys beating bad guys. But again when the very concept remains muddied within the SW continuity, we can't expect a clear cut "mainstream" interpretation to emerge either.

Darth Thor
Well remember the final TCW arc split the Force up into 2 aspects- The Living Force and the Cosmic Force.

The impression I got is The Force Wielders on Mortis were more concerned with the Cosmic Balance, in which the Light Side and Dark Side need to both exist equally, so living beings can make their own choices with which path to follow.

Whereas the Jedi view of bringing balance was focused on more on the Living Force, where the Light Side should be more the prominent use of the Force within living beings, and as a result having a relatively stable Galaxy.
In fact even the Sith refer to that as Balance, as when Darth Maul gets revived in TCW he notes the Force is out of balance, to which Opress responds that there is a Galaxy wide conflict causing that.

Ushgarak
Originally posted by Beniboybling
That seems fair, though I think there is room for the various presentations of balance to be reconciled with one another.

As for the mainstream interpretation, I think Star Wars is very much what you make of it, TCW is very much mainstream, and considering Lucas' involvement, we can't even be sure his opinion aligns with the one your proposing.

Might it be the interpretation of the larger fanbase? And those working on Star Wars moving forward? Possibly, maybe even probably. At least in a practical sense i.e. good guys beating bad guys. But again when the very concept remains muddied within the SW continuity, we can't expect a clear cut "mainstream" interpretation to emerge either.

One out-of-step story in TCW is not remotely mainstream though. It's definitely the outlier, and we can see GL;'s views all through the main franchise.

I don't really think it will be the view going forward, no- TFA is taking a straight 'Jedi = balance = good guys' take.

I still don't see why we can't just say that the Force guys on Mortis had an opinion but were, ultimately, wrong.

queeq
Originally posted by Beniboybling
Can you really claim the philosophy of Star Wars is so simple to the point at which it shouldn't even be discussed, when your incapable of factoring the Mortis arc into your assessment of it?

I agree it's an outlier.

But SW is in the end nothing more than entertainment. How serious do we need to take it as a philosophy?

We hardly have anything to go on. If anyone would be an expert, or a guru, it would be Lucas. But Lucas keeps changing his mind about the Force works. And clearly, Lucas only wanted to use to Force as a metaphor, as something that would make people think about life, things we cannot see, spirituality, God or the supermatural. Nothing more. Certainly not intended to deep into Forceness...

So yes, it IS so simple. Talk about religions of philosophies that have more to go on, like hinduism, christianity, islam, boeddism, Scientology whatever... and there's a forum for that outside of the SW forum. Check that out.

Lord Lucien
Originally posted by queeq
But SW is in the end nothing more than entertainment. How serious do we need to take it as a philosophy? Well, yea--um....

Beniboybling

Darth Thor
The Jedi view of balance clearly differs with The Fathers view.

At least both view points agree that the dark side having more power is the Force being out of balance. So the Jedi are definitely required to keep that balance. And any darksider threat needs to be kept in check for balance.

Ushgarak
If you are just going by number of viewers, the films have WAY more viewers (and are far more significant) than TCW. But it's irrelevant anyway- this is one small storyline that says something in contrary to the entire rest of the saga. That is, factually, the outlier- NOT mainstream

You saying those beings have the ultimate right/wrong authority is only opinion. I see no reason to think that at all.

As DT says, the positions cannot be reconciled. They openly contradict. I think you will most definitely see the simple Jedi/good guys/light/balance view going on.

Also, please don't mis-quote queeq. He didn't say not to take SW seriously (though it has limits). He said not to take it seriously as philosophy.

queeq
I take SW seriously as a movie, movie franchise, entertainment etc... But indeed, NOT as a way of life.

Or as a lot of first generation SW fans used to say to the Trekkies: it's just a movie.

Beniboybling
Originally posted by Darth Thor
The Jedi view of balance clearly differs with The Fathers view.

At least both view points agree that the dark side having more power is the Force being out of balance. So the Jedi are definitely required to keep that balance. And any darksider threat needs to be kept in check for balance. Seemingly, but the Jedi are biased for obvious reasons.

But that is also true, which in my opinion is how the two stances can be reconciled. If we consider the dark side growing in power and attempting to disrupt the balance as evil, restoring balance involves good guys doing away with evil from both points of view, which what happens in Mortis.

The only way they differ is that the Jedi seem to think the dark side needs to be destroyed entirely, and can't exist in a symbiotic state, but even that isn't explicitly stated and drawn into question by Yoda's dark side in the Mortis arc.

I think overcomplicating it is assuming an irreconciable difference between the two stances tbh, they are really not that different.Originally posted by Ushgarak
If you are just going by number of viewers, the films have WAY more viewers (and are far more significant) than TCW. But it's irrelevant anyway- this is one small storyline that says something in contrary to the entire rest of the saga. That is, factually, the outlier- NOT mainstream

You saying those beings have the ultimate right/wrong authority is only opinion. I see no reason to think that at all.

As DT says, the positions cannot be reconciled. They openly contradict. I think you will most definitely see the simple Jedi/good guys/light/balance view going on.

Also, please don't mis-quote queeq. He didn't say not to take SW seriously (though it has limits). He said not to take it seriously as philosophy. Whose suggesting we treat Star Wars as way of life? Lol. Obviously this has no impact on my personal philosophy/morality.

All I'm suggesting is the concept of balance and the Force can be considered more complex and possessing greater discussion value than you think. And pointed out if "it's just a movie", why discuss any of it in serious depth at all, as we do across these boards.

However this is obviously not a discussion you're interesting in having, so I won't waste any more of your time. smile

Beniboybling
*by Yoda's dark side in the Mortis arc. Yoda arc.

Ushgarak
Originally posted by Beniboybling
Seemingly, but the Jedi are biased for obvious reasons.

But that is also true, which in my opinion is how the two stances can be reconciled. If we consider the dark side growing in power and attempting to disrupt the balance as evil, restoring balance involves good guys doing away with evil from both points of view, which what happens in Mortis.

The only way they differ is that the Jedi seem to think the dark side needs to be destroyed entirely, and can't exist in a symbiotic state, but even that isn't explicitly stated and drawn into question by Yoda's dark side in the Mortis arc.

I think overcomplicating it is assuming an irreconciable difference between the two stances tbh, they are really not that different.Whose suggesting we treat Star Wars as way of life? Lol. Obviously this has no impact on my personal philosophy/morality.

All I'm suggesting is the concept of balance and the Force can be considered more complex and possessing greater discussion value than you think. And pointed out if "it's just a movie", why discuss any of it in serious depth at all, as we do across these boards.

However this is obviously not a discussion you're interesting in having, so I won't waste any more of your time. smile

I think you have a mistaken notion of the value of 'complexity' as applied here. In fact, I think GL's notion is far more interesting than the rather boring (and done to death in other stories) shades you're putting forwards. SW is refreshingly distinct here. Besides which, whilst the good and bad guys are clearly defined, GL's notion of symbiotic balance (as represented by the Light Side) can be considered in tremendously complex detail, if one had the desire. You don't need what you propose for complexity, and not all complexity is good.

As for treating SW as a way of life- go back and you'll see queeq's thrust was that you seem to be applying principles from the real world and not from the larger mythos of SW itself.

As for reconciliation- well, you can write in anything you like, but writing in an unneeded complication and then writing it back together again achieves very little in this case- easier just not to consider the outlier.

You talk about the Jedi destroying the Dark Side completely- that's going into 'vague cosmos'; territory again. Like I say, the Jedi don't nuke Dagobah. They acknowledge the Dark Side exists. What they do is stop it at all times. Render it powerless. And little wonder, because it brings nothing but pain and evil. We have never seen any person on the Dark Side doing anything at all to exist within balance- they are 100% wrecking it.

If you want to take the remote philosophical view in a galaxy where the Dark Side has to exist, then the purpose of the Dark Side within balance is to be stopped- it is something that needs to be overcome to achieve balance. People will be tested by the Dark Side but find balance when they overcome it (we saw Anakin fail this and Luke succeed). The same concept can be applied to biological systems, societies and the cosmos at large. If there was no Dark Side, you would not be able to find this balance within yourself. But that still means the balanced universe is one where the Light Side has defeated the Dark.

I think calling the Jedi 'biased' is a big mistake as well. Again, SW is not that sort of story. The Jedi aren't adhering to dogma; they don't have pre-set views they impose regardless of the truth. Their views are based on their genuine understanding of the cosmos. Seeing as the Jedi always bring good results and the Dark Side always brings, from what we have seen, genocidal evil, I think it's hard to argue the point with them.

Do you honestly think the films going forward are going to be based at all on that Mortis thing? I mean, they're barely based on the PT either but at least it was acknowledged.

Darth Thor
Originally posted by Beniboybling
Seemingly, but the Jedi are biased for obvious reasons.

But that is also true, which in my opinion is how the two stances can be reconciled. If we consider the dark side growing in power and attempting to disrupt the balance as evil, restoring balance involves good guys doing away with evil from both points of view, which what happens in Mortis.

The only way they differ is that the Jedi seem to think the dark side needs to be destroyed entirely, and can't exist in a symbiotic state, but even that isn't explicitly stated and drawn into question by Yoda's dark side in the Mortis arc.



I think The Father's view of balance was a more cosmic view tbh. That both Light Side and the Dark sides of the Force need to exist pretty equally. Whereas the Jedi are more concerned with not letting a bunch of darksiders grow too powerful.

Also you're right, the Jedi Prophecy never mentions destroying the Dark Side completely. Just the Sith. And there obviously wasn't going to be balance while the Sith dominated. So In-Universe there's no big contradiction really.

As for the Yoda facing his demons thing, IIRC The Mortis arc pointed at Anakin's destiny being to face his demons for him to bring balance.

Darth Luminous
Yes, it may well continue to be embodied in people. And this will continue to be a very bad idea and such people must always be stopped.

It will always continue to be embodied in people; this is inevitable. As such I don't see the substantive meaning in calling it a "very bad idea". It is the way things are - unless every living thing in the galaxy is forced, somehow, perhaps by magic, to become uniformly good. And while stopping the Sith is a practically achievable outcome, "stopping" every living thing is not, even if one were to focus only on stopping those who actively promote more evil than good. There would simply be too many of them.

The balanced galaxy we are shown is one with the Light Side completely triumphant and the Dark Side completely defeated.

But we are shown no such thing - unless you're using "Dark Side" and "Light Side" as code words for "the Sith" and "the Jedi". If a phrase such as "completely defeated" could be taken to mean "put back in equilibrium", that might work, but it really doesn't sound like it is meant that way. The very definition of the Force argues against the idea that it would be uniformly good in its natural state. It is supposed to be an energy field generated by all living things - in essence, generated by the act of living. It has been described as the combined vibrations of living things. In what universe would the energies generated by living things ever be uniformly good in nature?

Who cares, if its not being embodied in any way which has power? It's literally irrelevant at that point.

You seem to act as if Jedi and Sith are the only relevant beings, as if the light side is generated solely by the Jedi and the dark side is generated solely by the Sith. But Force adepts constitute a vanishingly small percentage of the living things in the universe. The dark side does not have to be "embodied" in Sith to have power, or else there would have been no reason for anyone to become a Sith in the first place.

What they do is stop it at all times. Render it powerless.

It's far more widespread than anything that could be stopped by the Jedi at all times, isn't it? There are only so many Jedi, while there are uncounted planets out there with vast numbers of lifeforms on them.

And I will remind you that GL directly and unequivocally stated that balance is restored by getting rid of evil in the universe. Sure, we don't have to overdo it in taking that literally- he doesn't mean the entire concept is annihilated from the cosmos

It makes no sense at all to take that literally: to act as if "evil in the universe" means "all evil in the universe" or, even worse, the capacity for evil which arises from free will. On the other hand, if we interpret "evil in the universe" to be a verbal shorthand representing only the leading forces of evil - namely the Sith/Empire - not only does it then match what we see happen in the films, but it also matches every other statement Lucas has said on the topic, including all the ones which outright contradict the nonsensical overly-literal reading. For if we take the indefensibly literal approach it means that Lucas - for one brief shining moment - believed one thing in 2000 but believed the exact opposite in, for example, 1975, 1977, 1980, 1983, 1999, and 2002. As a hint toward what Lucas really means when he says "evil in the universe", we might inspect the "Birth of the Lightsaber" featurette: "So he was fighting as hard as he could; he was fighting the man who killed his father; fighting the man who killed Obi-Wan Kenobi; fighting the man who would personify evil in the universe." We can say that Sith "personify" evil in the universe without making the mistake of treating them as though they are the aggregate totality of all evil anywhere.

What there has never been in the SW story, at any point, ever, is any suggestion or demonstration that the Light Side could ever be a problem in this cosmic equation.

That's not true. It was suggested outright by the Father in TCW's "Overlords". That it is not something which happened in the saga we have so far does not mean that it is impossible in the SW universe.

And to remind again: there can be no balance without the Jedi

Of course there could be balance without the Jedi. ( And if we're going down the road of character infallibility, there are other characters who might be considered. ) Take a hypothetical condition of balance, such as the one which is supposed to be restored as a result of ROTJ. Now assume that for some abstract reason the remaining Jedi are removed from the stage. Is there not still a balance between the sides of the Force at that point? Or consider the time before the Force-using orders arose in the first place, or a time before the emergence of higher-order sapient life forms. Do you assume that the Force could not be balanced in these cases? In practical terms the Jedi are only required for balance in the sense that they are ultimately, for narrative reasons, the only ones who can be expected to successfully defeat powerful darksiders... when such darksiders are already running amok.

The 'natural balance between good and evil' appears to be one where evil is defeated and good has all the power.

A balance between them would imply that they would have equal power. Certainly having "all the power" connotes the exact opposite of the intrinsic meaning of the word balance.

Balance is when that evil has no power.

Hardly. Balance connotes that evil is merely not dominant, that it does not have more power than good. Not that it has no power at all.

Allowing it any power- every time we see it- brings imbalance.

Based only on what we see, there is no particular reason to assume that imbalance is so easy to come by. Lucas said that the Force is thrown out of balance as evil begins to take over. There is quite a large gap between evil taking over and evil having no power at all.

That's Star Wars- good guys and bad guys Light Side and Dark. Good/Light must defeat bad/Dark.

Don't conflate the sides of the Force with the Force-using organizations. These are not equivalent. The balance of the Force is not the balance of the Force-users; Force-users are not the Force. Making an invalid substitution typically leads to an invalid result.

One out-of-step story in TCW is not remotely mainstream though. It's definitely the outlier, and we can see GL;'s views all through the main franchise.

The outlier is the "gets rid of evil in the universe" quote, and only then if it is interpreted in a way that makes no logical sense. TCW's Mortis arc is fully consistent with everything else that Lucas has said, in addition to being consistent with everything in the filmic canon. It is in no way out of step with the franchise, as it concludes ( inevitably ) by reinforcing and foreshadowing what Anakin will do in ROTJ. Similarly, its prominent usage of the yin-yang symbol that represents Taoist duality is mirrored by the appearance of the same symbol during AOTC.

you seem to be applying principles from the real world and not from the larger mythos of SW itself.

This involves the issue of verisimilitude in fiction. No matter what fictional universe you're dealing with, including this one, there will always be a manifestation of principles from the real world. As an analogy, gravity exists: if you stand on the surface of an Earthlike planet and drop a rock, it falls to the ground. Anything being argued here that seems to you to be imported from the real world is only being suggested because it stands to reason that it should hold true in the SW universe as well, barring any compelling evidence to the contrary.

The only way they differ is that the Jedi seem to think the dark side needs to be destroyed entirely

They don't actually think that. It's a belief in the fan base that has been erroneously attributed to them. They only ever speak of the destruction of the Sith, not the dark side itself.

But Lucas keeps changing his mind about the Force works.

No, he doesn't - as far as we know. He only added content about the overall structure of the Force and the mechanism for Force sensitivity, but these facts ultimately changed nothing about what had already been established. They only added to it. What previous statements by Lucas about "how the Force works" are no longer to be considered true?

I think The Father's view of balance was a more cosmic view tbh. That both Light Side and the Dark sides of the Force need to exist pretty equally. Whereas the Jedi are more concerned with not letting a bunch of darksiders grow too powerful.

No inconsistency there.

The Jedi view of balance clearly differs with The Fathers view.

That's not true. As far as I know, the only things we have to go on to determine the Jedi view of balance are the things the Jedi say about balance, yes? Well, what do the Jedi say about balance? As a percentage of their overall dialogue it is fairly little. They link balancing the Force with destruction of the Sith. They say the prophecy tells that the Chosen One will bring balance to the Force. Et cetera. How do any of the specific things which they say about balance differ from the Father's view?

Ushgarak
You need to be far less bitty when posting a big argument like that you know- it's close to unreadable, and you have fallen into the inevitable problem with that approach of only looking at one small part of an argument at a time rather than a connected whole, which distorts things. That's why, for example, you spend a bunch of time saying not to take something literally when that's precisely what I said as well, only you waffle on about it for no good purpose.

Your major problem here is that you seem very much to be attaching non-film ideas onto the films; if you feel I am largely equating the Jedi with the Light Side and the Sith with the Dark, well that's pretty much because that's how the films do it- the champions representing each point/ But I am definitely not using 'the Dark Side' to represent 'any evil thought in people ever'. When I talked of the Dark Side being represented in people, I meant when people have the power of the Dark Side- like Vader and Palpatine and Ren, and here is where I can continue to state with absolute certainty that the films show us that having the Dark Side embodies in such a state is incredibly bad and must be stopped at all costs- else there is suffering.

I also say you are completely incorrect in any claim that the Jedi cannot stop the Dark Side- seeing that is literally the plot of the first six films. You can refer back to the earlier statements about that in detail, and why I feel the Mortis arc in TCW is the aberrant story that needs, effectively, to be ignored, or considered to be an incorrect in-universe position.

For the rest of it, you really just need to read back what's already been said- particularly about the definition of the word 'balance' and how you have got this all wrong. You're mostly just bringing things around in circles there.

queeq
True...

Lord Lucien
Originally posted by Ushgarak
I feel the Mortis arc in TCW is the aberrant story that needs, effectively, to be ignored, or considered to be an incorrect in-universe position.
thumb up


The moral relativism or greyness of the Force belongs to the EU, which is where TCW should have stayed. Dark Side=Powerful but Evil is the realm of the films.

Bashar Teg
sentence by sentence quote dissecting ping pong is especially silly in the way it starts like a dozen separate and simultaneous threads of discussion in each post, each thread becoming more and more absurdly off the general point.


nah, luke could whoop him


i never said the dark knight was a crappy movie. liar


whatever man, i drive a heavy duty truck because i need it for work.

queeq
Oooh. word fight!

relentless1
Originally posted by Ushgarak
No, the imbalance was caused by the Sith. Anakin didn't reset anything- he destroyed the evil power that was causing the imbalance.

But that's not to say there cannot be more such treats to come later. We'll need to see more of Snoke's backstory before we can really answer this one.

Without the Jedi, there is no balance. They are the ones that strive for Balance in all things.

Besides which, we have the very simple thing that evil is undesirable. All of Star Wars is about good guys fighting bad guys. TFA makes that pretty clear.

the Jedi aren't a balance of anything...they were the reason the Force needed balancing in the first place...with rules about no possessions and no personal love how could the Jedi be balanced?

queeq
You seem to disagree with GL's view on the Force and how te Jedi go about keeping balance. However, disagreeing doesn't change the way it is in SW.

relentless1
things that are put into balance can become unbalanced, the balance had a good 20-25 year run most likely

queeq
Err ..???

Darth Luminous
if you feel I am largely equating the Jedi with the Light Side and the Sith with the Dark, well that's pretty much because that's how the films do it
I also say you are completely incorrect in any claim that the Jedi cannot stop the Dark Side- seeing that is literally the plot of the first six films.

You seem to be going in circles at this point. You insist on using "the light side" to mean the Jedi and "the dark side" to mean the Sith, despite the fact that the light side and the dark side are parts of the Force ( an energy field ) while the Jedi and Sith are groups of people. In doing so, you enable yourself to claim that stopping the dark side is the plot of the first six films - when in fact the overarching objective was stopping the Sith, not the dark side. TESB Yoda even says as much: Stopped they must be.

Hiding behind a deliberate abuse of nomenclature achieves little.

the Mortis arc in TCW is the aberrant story that needs, effectively, to be ignored, or considered to be an incorrect in-universe position.

There's no reason it should be ignored, other than it rustles people's jimmies because it stepped all over the popular revisionism which took over the fanbase prior to the release of the arc. It's fully consistent with everything in the films and with Lucas' own position which can be gleaned from his various statements about the Force. And it's deeply intertwined with events in the films that presumably are not viewed with the same degree of contempt, such as the notion that Anakin brings balance to the Force by destroying Palpatine.

Star Wars has always been more fundamentally Daoist in its concept of the Force than many people would care to admit. That's why Lucas literally put a yin-yang symbol in the sky hovering over everything.

you really just need to read back what's already been said- particularly about the definition of the word 'balance'_

My position is 100% consistent with the traditional, dictionary-based, old-fogey definition of the word balance. On the contrary, it's the revisionist position which has tried to make "balance" include "all light side and no dark side". That's hardly a respect for definitions of words.

Lord Lucien
See, George? See why you need to actually think about which words you use?

Ushgarak
Ok look, I am tired of heated debates (about this or any other subject). But I will just re-iterate the following points:

- As to Luminous' first claim above- again, all I can sa is that what I said matches the films; it is you providing what I feel is unnecessary complication, likely from other sources. I think Yoda saying 'they' doesn't really change the situation at all- obviously they are talking about things in the embodiment of how the threat is currently represented, but that doesn't change that the overall theme of Star Wars is the triumph of hood over evil, hence the Light Side over the Dark.

- This is still in contradiction of the Mortis arc and I'd rather ignore or rationalise that arc than that of the films. If you like the Mortis arc, all the more power to you

- It's not a good idea to use a 'I looked it up in the dictionary' argument- I am reasonably well acquainted with this area as a subject and that kind of argument is always a mis-use of a dictionary. Words have multiple meanings and there is no sense in which GL's use of it is inconsistent with that multiplicity. I am afraid the only abuse of meaning is from those who say that 'Balance means X, so no matter what GL says about what he means by it it can only mean X'. That's the mis-use of language.

As I said before, George Lucas explained pretty clearly what he meant by balance- that the Light Side is about balanced symbiosis and the Dark Side is the parasitic, unbalanced force. 'Light Side' is his embodiment of balance and the dark side of that which tries to stop it. At least, that has always been my understanding of what he said and remains so to this day. If you are taking something different from it, again, fair enough. Regardless, that is the basis of the idea that Balance, within Star Wars, means all Light Side.

- As to whether GL needs to be more careful with his language- well, god, yes; his failure to explain his concepts on-screen (he doesn't even define what a Sith is) is definitely an issue with the Prequels I acknowledge. None of balance, [prophecy, midi-chlorians, Sith... for that matter, even, really, 'Force' (a particular issue seeing as he claimed. you are meant to be able to start at Episode I) get any adequate treatment. Even how the Jedi work within the Republic has to be deduced.

So no argument from me there.

Mind you, TFA did a pretty poor job of explaining its new concepts as well.

queeq
I don't like explaining in movies.

Ushgarak
Well it doesn't have to be a half-hour lecture. ANH only took about 15 seconds to explain what a Jedi was. How difficult could it have been to define a Sith?

Bashar Teg
it really doesnt help that TPM jedi council believes in a coming savior who will bring balance to the force...in a time when the sith are presumed extinct and there is peace in the galaxy with the exception of some far-off trade boarder dispute.

queeq
Originally posted by Ushgarak
Well it doesn't have to be a half-hour lecture. ANH only took about 15 seconds to explain what a Jedi was. How difficult could it have been to define a Sith?

Fair enough. I'd sure have liked to know what they wanted revenge for. The relationship between the two is never very clear. Only: one is good (sort of... the Jedi don't come off very weel in the PT) and the other is just bad.

Darth Luminous
it is you providing what I feel is unnecessary complication, likely from other sources.

What other sources? It does not require any source other than the films to recognize that the Sith and the dark side are not the same thing ( just as, more generally, Force-users and the Force are not the same thing ), and thus eliminating one does not eliminate the other. This seems sufficiently obvious. Calling it "unnecessary complication" is about as accurate as calling all light side and no dark side "balance".

but that doesn't change that the overall theme of Star Wars is the triumph of hood over evil, hence the Light Side over the Dark.

Yet you appear to misconstrue this. The "triumph" of good over evil in this context is not the complete elimination of evil or the capacity for evil, but evil being put back in its place, removed from a place of primacy or dominance. The same is true for the dark side. What we witness on screen is the defeat of the story's antagonists, certain specific evil beings and groups, as opposed to the entire aggregate of evil beings in the universe ( an unlikely goal in any event ).

'Light Side' is his embodiment of balance and the dark side of that which tries to stop it. At least, that has always been my understanding of what he said and remains so to this day. If you are taking something different from it, again, fair enough. Regardless, that is the basis of the idea that Balance, within Star Wars, means all Light Side.

Some things he said about balance:

"He is to bring balance to the Force; but at this point, we don't know what side of the Force needs to be balanced out." ( The Making of Episode I )

"The overriding philosophy in Episode I - and in all the Star Wars movies, for that matter - is the balance between good and evil." ( The Making of Episode I )

So it seems that in Lucas' own words the overriding philosophy of the SW movies is, in fact, a balance between good and evil. It soon becomes evident that the balance of the Force is between the light side and the dark side, making a claim such as "balance = light" nonsensical on its face.

"As evil begins to take over, it pushes the Force out of balance." ( "Flaws in a Good Heart" )

Here we are told that evil taking over, assuming a position of dominance, is what pushes the Force out of balance, as opposed to evil pushing the Force out of balance by merely existing. Thus we see that - by the same token - evil existing at a comparable level with good, while not being dominant or taking over, would not push the Force out of balance.

"The core of the Force, I mean you got the dark side and the light side. One is selfless, one is selfish. And you want to keep them in balance." ( "George Lucas on the Force 2010" )

"The film is ultimately about the dark side and the light side, and those sides are designed around compassion and greed. And we all have those two sides of us, and we have to make sure those two sides of us are in balance." ( "The Mythology of Star Wars" )

So we see that, in his mind at least, balance involves both light side and dark side, which is coincidentally the same result we might have arrived at if we had consulted that wascally dictionary!

queeq
Lucas also said this:

"Which brings us up to the films 4, 5, and 6, in which Anakin's offspring redeem him and allow him to fulfill the prophecy where he brings balance to the Force by doing away with the Sith and getting rid of evil in the universe..."

Grand-Moff-Gav
Originally posted by queeq
Lucas also said this:

"Which brings us up to the films 4, 5, and 6, in which Anakin's offspring redeem him and allow him to fulfill the prophecy where he brings balance to the Force by doing away with the Sith and getting rid of evil in the universe..."

I've just read that a 'leaked script' suggests Luke tells Rey that Anakin was never the chosen one but that she may be... I'm not sure I put much credence in it but it came after reading an interview Lucas gave before the release of FA where he said Disney abandoned his idea that Star Wars was the story of 'Grandfathers, Sons and Grandsons' and took things in a totally different direction, which might suggest they are prepared to retcon the whole thing...

relentless1
Originally posted by queeq
Err ..???

what about that statement doesn't make sense to you?

queeq
Originally posted by Grand-Moff-Gav
I've just read that a 'leaked script' suggests Luke tells Rey that Anakin was never the chosen one but that she may be... I'm not sure I put much credence in it but it came after reading an interview Lucas gave before the release of FA where he said Disney abandoned his idea that Star Wars was the story of 'Grandfathers, Sons and Grandsons' and took things in a totally different direction, which might suggest they are prepared to retcon the whole thing...

Personally, I always liked the idea that Anakin was not really the chosen one... After all, Luke did all the hard work in destroying the Sith. Vader just gave the last nudge. But Luke was tempted and didn't give in to the Dark Side, Anakin did.

So Luke always felt more like a chosen one than Anakin (although I never liked that whole concept of a chosen one in SW). So maybe they're doing that idea with Rey. I guess it all depends a little on who Snoke is.

Plus... this may all hark back to the original set up of the SW franchise. At the time ESB was made, Luke was not to take out both Vader and Palpy in one movie (i.e. ROTJ). He was to defeat Vader as a conclusion of this trilogy. The second trilogy was Luke trying to find the 'another' Yoda was talking about: not Leia, but a sister that lived somewhere hidden. And together they would defeat Palpy at the end of the second trilogy. It might just be that with a little detour and some changes, they're reviving the original plot line.

Darth Luminous
Originally posted by queeq
Lucas also said this:

"Which brings us up to the films 4, 5, and 6, in which Anakin's offspring redeem him and allow him to fulfill the prophecy where he brings balance to the Force by doing away with the Sith and getting rid of evil in the universe..."

...Which is, presumably, misunderstood to mean "all evil in the universe", despite the fact that the word "all" was not used? The problem is that such an overly literal interpretation makes no sense at all and conflicts with everything else that Lucas has said on the topic. Which is more reasonable: to assume that "evil in the universe" refers specifically to the evil of the Sith ( and the concomitant rule of the Empire ), or to the aggregate sum total of evil everywhere? Which alternative really lines up with what we saw happen in the film?

We see nothing in ROTJ to make us believe that the death of Palpatine somehow leaves us with a universe completely empty of evil ( or worse, with the very capacity for sapient evil stripped away ) as though Palpatine is literally Satan in a Christian sense. The old post-ROTJ EU, for example, depicted no such thing, nor does Disney's sequel trilogy. And really, who would have expected it to? We know that Lucas had his own ideas for possible sequels. If these were meant to take place in a universe without evil, what would have been the point? What kind of conflict would have driven the story? In the words of ghost Ben from Heir to the Empire, "The Emperor is gone, but the dark side is still powerful."

ROTJ provides a cinematic "happy ending" and a win for its protagonists, but the galaxy we're left with by the end of the film is still inevitably full of various sinister, nefarious characters all over the place. The remaining Imperials are only one example out of many. It's a big universe and there would still be a lot of evil.

Lucas has said that the Force is pushed out of balance as evil takes over. Surely there are more possibilities at hand than would be provided by a false dichotomy of evil either being in a dominant position or not existing at all. There is a middle ground. I realize that people are uncomfortable with a 50%/50% breakdown but the point is that 100%/0% ( or 0%/100% ) is entirely unreasonable.

"Without darkness there can be no light." - fortune cookie, "The Disappeared Part 1", The Clone Wars

queeq
It's a fairy tale. In case of SW: evil=Palpy/Sith.

People tend to overthink it and do not realise SW is simple.

Bashar Teg
NO, IT'S A HISTORICAL DOCUMENTARY!!!

Lord Lucien
It's um, and allegory for um, like, the dangers of um, moral absolutism, and stuff.

queeq
Um um...

phinney6
um

queeq
Amun.

Lord Lucien
Amun-Ra.

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