Oh geez...
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You and me both...
I don't think she did. I may have missed something, since I dropped LOTF after
Bloodlines as I mentioned previously, but so far as I've read, nothing that any of her characters say is particularly illogical or unreasonable considering the characters who are saying it.
The best of my recollection, she didn't get much in the way of constructive criticism, just a lot of autistic screeching.
Well, they may not have deserved it, but the extinction of the old Jedi Order was nonetheless arguably necessary in order for Luke to begin afresh.
The catalyst was supposed to be the Seventh Battle of Ruusan which brought about the end of the New Sith Wars. Prior to this, Jedi married, wore battle armor, held formal military ranks, sometimes acted as political rulers and began their training as (young) adults rather than infants.
le sigh...
I can see why you generally stick to spamming the "dumb" response at my comments rather than trying to respond argumentatively, when the only things you seem to have in your rhetorical toolkit are naked projection and the rather bizarre insinuation that the only reason that I defend Traviss's writing is some strange, childhood infatuation (it's cute that you tried to so precisely pin down my exact age, though).
They weren't all Padawans. I can't find a specific source for Stratus killing six Jedi Knights in the "Jabiim" arc of Dark Horse's
Republic imprint, but he does kill at least one Jedi Master and briefly fights off Anakin Skywalker. He's also shown to be deliberately targeting the Jedi among the Republic forces and at one point it's mentioned that eighteen Masters and Padawans have been killed in the fighting on the planet up to that point. Later, another Padawan calls him "Jedi killer" and just before his death, Stratus manages to wound another Padawan with his blade and kill another with a blaster shot despite the Jedi sensing that the Separatist leader is "too tired to fight." Not bad for an untrained man with a common metal sword.
I've never bought that. It's always looked like an
ex post facto rationalization to try and minimize one of Jango's more impressive on-screen feats.
Their fanbase is a bit of a cult, I guess.
Yes, it's just, as you said, a little unfortunate that it all ended up having to be crammed into LOTF instead of being set up in an earlier, separate novel or series of novels (and Traviss certainly had enough hanging Mandalorian plot-threads left over from
Republic Commando to address).
I'd recommend starting with the Bounty Hunter Wars trilogy by K.W. Jeter, as that's probably his single biggest EU appearance prior to LOTF and also an extremely good extrapolation of the cold, calculating and ruthlessly efficient Fett as seen in ESB, as he goes about maneuvering and manipulating the machinations of the Emperor, Darth Vader, Prince Xizor and the Kuat Drive Yards corporation to his own ultimate benefit.
Indeed. It's too bad that there was never a
Crimson Empire NJO tie-in.
Yeah. The latter incident especially was permanently burned into my brain as one of the most genuinely heart-wrenching images I've ever come across in a work of fiction.
Current Year fiction, I surmise, tends towards the masturbatory like that. There's no sense of genuine trauma or suffering on the part of the characters because it's written by sheltered UMC kids as a self-congratulatory exercise in right-thinking.
I'm definitely going to have to hunt down a copy.
Mostly though outlandish hairstyles, it seems.
Agreed. There's definitely an uphill battle to be fought in getting a broader recognition of this fact, however.
I can hear the italicized section in Mike Stoklasa's "Plinkett" voice.
I don't find the Jedi/Sith
uninteresting but I do think they need to be subject to limitations in how they're used, or else you end up with something like Kevin Anderson's
Tales of the Jedi where the Force-users are all stupidly overpowered space wizards (casting literal spells) and the Muggles might as well not even exist for all of the impact that they have on the plot (Hoggon the Spacer in
Redemption is basically just there to play the dumb, uncomprehending nigger so as to better highlight the tragic nobility of Massa' Ulic).
One of the reasons that I like the Mandalorians is that they're somewhat separate from all of that. They can participate in the forever war between the Jedi and Sith, or not, as the mood takes them, but conceptually, Traviss's post-Crusader, movie-era-and-beyond Mandos are mostly free to just tool around the Galaxy having random adventures, hearkening back to the wild, carefree days of the early EU and specifically the Han Solo and Lando Calrissian trilogies of Brian Daley and Neil Smith.
Look no further than
@LORD IMPERATOR for an example right her in this thread.
I'm finding that the Dark Horse comics weren't averse to showing the PT-era Jedi in a less-than-idealized light, either.
I've argued that it's not realistic for Catherine Halsey to be both a "nice person" (as people in-thread have put it) while willfully performing extremely painful, sometimes fatal experiments on children for the purpose of turning them into cyborg super-assassins, yes.
In retrospect, though, I don't think there's much if any conflict between Nylund's and Traviss's portrayal of the character. Even before Traviss was brought onboard as a novelist for the franchise, Bungie had been moving towards making Halsey a less friendly, idealized mommy-figure, as in
Halo: Reach and the accompanying
Diary of Catherine Halsey, both of which Nylund co-authored. In the former, she's shown to be aloof and hostile towards the Spartan-IIIs, hypocritically scolding them and trying to use her reputation to threaten them until Carter very politely tells her, in essence, to go fuck herself, noting that the planetary defense directives that Noble Team is currently operating under supersede whatever authority she thinks she has. In the latter, she is revealed to have repeatedly flash-cloned herself to create Cortana, killing those clones which proved unsatisfactory, a process which she coldly acknowledges is blatantly illegal and medically unethical, but carries on anyway, pretty much simply because she can. In Traviss's books, Halsey isn't portrayed as a psychopath, but rather as someone who, now shorn of the power and influence that she previously wielded, is forced to examine her life (for want of much else to do while cooling her heels in an ONI prison) and consider in light of her actions whether she is, in fact, the good person that she had previously seen herself as.
Bad faith defense of Jedi mistakes and missteps.
It's rather terribly ironic that you fastened on
exactly that post from Traviss's blog, because you're doing exactly what she uses it to criticize, namely fans twisting themselves into semantic knots to avoid even the appearance of the Jedi engaging in wrong-doing or even making mistakes.
Again, Traviss doesn't say in that blog-post that the Clones are the legal property of the Jedi. All that she says is that they "accepted" them as war-fighting resources.
The movies are rather more nuanced than you think. The relationship between Qui-Gon, Obi-Wan and (eventually) Anakin is a good example.
No, to
avoid the conclusion "slave army" you have to counter-intuitively impose certain assumptions.
In TPM, Padme voices disbelief that slavery exists on Tatooine, citing "the Republic's anti-slavery laws," and of course, Anakin mentions his desire to return someday and free all of the slaves. The central crisis of the following film involves the revelation of a slave-army made-to-order for the Republic, with the Republic's (and the Jedi's) willingness to make use of the same when push comes to shove showing how hollow the idealistic facades of both institutions have become.
Not so with Best Grievous:
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As far as the topic of the Clone army is concerned, you
are arguing that the Jedi are flawless. And in bad faith.
The Clone army was ordered up in the first place by a Jedi Master acting in (what he thought was) good faith, so technically, the Jedi
did enslave them.
Don't be dishonest and try to wriggle away from the comparison. Lucas is not shy about using real-life inspirations to inform the structure and events of the Galaxy Far, Far Away (albeit in a much more subtle and tasteful fashion than Kennedy and her retarded minions).
I reject your premise that unwillingness is required to fulfill a practical definition of slavery, and am frankly creeped the hell out that you keep harping on this point.
LOL
To quote the dear, departed Admiral, "it's a trap." The whole thing, the whole arrangement of the war, is a gigantic and admirably-designed tar baby intended specifically to distract, weaken, and ultimately destroy the Jedi by using their own ideals and beliefs against them
Traviss's Jedi Padawan character Bardan Jusik kind of has some vague inkling of this, and consequently resigns his position in the Order out of protest against the war and the exploitation of the Clones. Unfortunately, almost all of the Jedi are too wrapped up in their attachment to their own self-image as protectors of the Republic to question whether they should be fighting the war for the Republic in the first place, and as for those who might be tempted to think that perhaps the CIS has some valid reasons for opposing the Republic, the knowledge that the Sith seem to be involved with the Separatist is more than enough to poison that well for most of them. Quite elegant, really.
It's like
Wargames: the only way to win is not to play.
Again, you should try actually reading Traviss's books.
There are five books, actually.
Any self-respecting author would formally tender his resignation after most of his contributions to the SW universe were overwritten to please a certain smug, cowboy hat-wearing greaseball.
Yes.
Truth!
You have not established that. Like
@Oaat said, it's weird that you're so fixated on this point.
You have not established that, either.
I really don't think that we do. I can't think of any other authors who put as much thought into clone psychology as Traviss did, both in terms of being regimented soldiers and also indoctrinated, vat-grown human beings who have known only military routine for their brief lives and gradually begin to rebel against their circumstances as their knowledge of everyday life in the broader galaxy gradually grows and expands.
No, it merely requires that you just take a chill pill and not be an asshole Jedi supremacist.
Anyway, you're allowing yourself to fall victim to anti-Traviss tunnel vision. Everything that you seem to hate about Mandalorians was well-established before Traviss began writing for Lucasfilm. The Mandalorian as space-Viking who fights Jedi and doesn't afraid of anything is more the collective brainchild of David Michelinie, Kevin Anderson, Haden Blackman, Drew Karpyshyn, Chris Avellone, John Wagner and others. Traviss merely took everything that had gone before and used it to write stories that more prominently showcased a Mandalorian POV, rather than restricting them to the status of secondary or tertiary characters in the adventures of yet another Jedi protagonist (although Haden Blackman had previously done this on a more limited scale with
Jango Fett: Open Seasons).
As a faction, the Jedi lend themselves to being berated quite organically.
It's an interesting point that for all the pharisaical umbrage leveled at her for supposedly ignoring other writers' contributions, Traviss is apparently a better team-player than Zahn.
But that's what made it feel so real, like anyone could potentially die. There was an aura of uncertainty hanging over the whole story, where, while you knew that the Big Three were going to make it through and somehow eventually save the day, you didn't know how and you couldn't guess how many brave souls might be lost along the way...
It's funny how, despite being a weird, three-eyed goatman with sausage fingers, the Gran is still easier on the eyes (no pun intended) than Disney's apparent replacement design.
Nu kyr'adyc, shi taab'echaaj'la.
I would say it began when Filoni showed her taking down Droidekas (you know, those things that the Jedi
run the hell away from every time they encounter them in the Prequels?) or when she survived a fight with General Grievous, whichever happened first.
Ah, Nen Yim, I had such a crush on you... and then you died.
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