Hey what's is up with C3PO and R2D2?!

if C-3PO was made by anakin when he was 10, then wouldn't he be like, 50 years old by the time Luke got him? and by then wouldn't he be obsolete? i mean, that would be like using one of those gigantic room-sized computers instead of a laptop today, wouldn't it? And R2D2 was even older than 3PO!
Also, why didn't R2 have anti-gravity boosters in ep 4-6 when he had them in ep 1-3? Lucas shouldn't have even added them to R2 if the droid didn't have them in the other movies.

its not certain that r2 is older than 3p0. for all we know in ep1 artoo might have just came off the assembly line....not to be anal...but....yeah

also, its clear in ep4 & 5 that 3p0 is not obsolete considering that we see brand new shiny version of him on board the corellian corvette as well as bespin.

r2's gravity boots? perhaps they just stopped working? i dont know.

well keep in mind Lucas made 4,5 and 6 before 1,2 and 3 so not everything will be in place

yeah i know that he made 4 5 and 6 before 1 2 and 3, but he should not have added the antigrav boosters in the 1 2 and 3 because it did not fit with the original story displayed in 4 5 and 6. it did not contribute to the plot of the first three, either.

i completley agree, Lucas has done things like that quite often the question is why? The Obi/Darth talk in ep.4 "when I left you I was but the learner,now I am the master" made no sense in when he watched how it unfolded in ep.3 🙂

Originally posted by zhellblah
yeah i know that he made 4 5 and 6 before 1 2 and 3, but he should not have added the antigrav boosters in the 1 2 and 3 because it did not fit with the original story displayed in 4 5 and 6. it did not contribute to the plot of the first three, either.

i didnt mind the boosters as much as when he's rolling around on the ship in ep1. so....what happens when a ship has a sharp contour or dropoff? it makes little sense since the only ship on which they could possibly do this was on amidala's ship. look at all the other ships and try to picture artoo making his way around with the same efficiency.

i was happy just knowing that his sole purpose was to sit in the middle of an engine and fix it when need be.

lol yes but none of these posts answers my other question though. wouln't the droid duo be insanely obsolete?
also, how does artoo fix ships when he's glued to one stationary spot? that doesn't make much sense either.

it makes perfect sense. it wasnt his job to fix the wing on an xwing.
their purpose in the OT was to, as i said, sit in the middle of a ship's engine and fix/maintain it as well as being the ship's computer and even autopilot. thats plenty of validation for r2's viability.
it also makes perfect sense that the c3p0 model protocol remained universal (on screen) for the entire saga, PT and OT. there was nothing to upgrade imho

meh... but you'd think that there would be better models of droids that would come out. if you've seen the movie "I, Robot" you'd know that NSR came out with upgraded robots every so often, thus resulting in the newest robot, the NS-5. Shouldn't it be similar? C3PO was fluent in over 6,000 forms of communication. Shouldn't newer versions of droids have like, 12,000 forms of communication? It's like IPODS. They're always coming out with new things for them. like video capability and bigger space. Shouldn't the droids be similar to that?
Also, on another point, how in the world would a 10 year old kid create such a complex device? wouldnt that be like me (14 yrs old) creating a nuclear weapon? a droid should be insanely complex to create by oneself! especialy when you're a poor slave boy with no money to get the parts.
Also, how could anakin teach 3PO 6,000 forms of communication without knowinng them himself? unless he had some special software, which would cost a fortune, it seems impossible to me

Originally posted by sheastation
i completley agree, Lucas has done things like that quite often the question is why? The Obi/Darth talk in ep.4 "when I left you I was but the learner,now I am the master" made no sense in when he watched how it unfolded in ep.3 🙂

... Yes it does. wtf. When they last saw each other, they were fighting and Anakin was the inexperienced one compared to Obi-Wan. While they were both Knights, Anakin was clearly still learning much from Obi-Wan.

I agree about the model advancement. If you see how everything changed between AOTC and ROTS: the ships, the fighters etc. Obviously new technology developed at a staggering rate.
And then, the change from ROTS to ANH: everything has changed, the ships, the fighters etc. etc. And then there is the 50 year old Astromech, still doing it's usual business. It's like now having a Commodore 64 running these boards.

The explanation is easy: Lucas is an idiot.

Ah, yes...

The boosters looked cool on screen though. Nuff said!

queeq, its a completely flawed connection. first off, its clear that one general blueprint is followed in making ALL astromech droids, thus the one-size-fits-all r2-unit seat in every naboo/jedi/rebel ship. and though there are technological advances, those advances have purpose, for example anakins and lukes prosthetic hands. anakin's was flawed in that it was blatantly not real and also (from what can only be assumed) anakin had no artificial nerves/impulses/feeling whereas luke's new hand did. there was room for a significant overhaul is what i am saying. a practical reason to throw out the old design and start anew.

instead of thinking of artoo as an old computer, think of him as an old tractor.
engineered to ideal practicallity. old and worn yet perfectly suiting the purpose he was built for. brand new shiney tractors are basically the same ones from 50 years ago, except more streamlined and a couple of extra bells and whistles and an almost identical yet more efficient engine, etc.

your assumption is that significant technological advances would have made artoo obsolete. my assumption (which the films seem to support) is that just like in this reality, for the SW universe the saying goes "if it aint broke, dont fix it".

That is a lame argument. I'm not talking about R2 in particular, in the OT the astromech is still the going model. Within the OT tehre's no problem, but in the scope of all technological advances it's pretty odd that the astromech model has been out there for at least 50 years. It just doesn't make sense. Farmers nowdays don't generally drive 50 year old tractors, do they?

Originally posted by queeq
That is a lame argument. I'm not talking about R2 in particular, in the OT the astromech is still the going model. Within the OT tehre's no problem, but in the scope of all technological advances it's pretty odd that the astromech model has been out there for at least 50 years. It just doesn't make sense. Farmers nowdays don't generally drive 50 year old tractors, do they?

farmers will drive a tractor till it dies utterly.
and as i said there needs to be a practical reason to scrap/overhaul any
design for anything engineered, especially for a universal piece of equipment which an r2 unit clearly is.

They won't because old tractor require a lot of maintenaince, spare parts and fuel. It's a lot cheaper to update it from time to time.

Originally posted by queeq
They won't because old tractor require a lot of maintenaince, spare parts and fuel. It's a lot cheaper to update it from time to time.

i've lived by plenty of farms and have yet to see a brand new tracor. but we digress into irrelevance.

Where I live farmers update to keep up with the low pricing of farm goods. They have to save money where they can.