Our Ability to Use the Force Has Diminished: what does it me

[Kreller1]

And yet Luke force choked a Gammorean guard, sure not to death, but still choked the shit out of him.

He has evolved beyond what the old Jedi order would have liked at this point.

[Arawn Fenn]

Some say Palpy caused it somehow (either he's that powerful, or he manipulated the situation in some way or brought somethign to bear to cause that effect. That much was at least implied in the ROTJ novelization, I think - but it also implied Palpy was the source of it.)

ROTS, not ROTJ. When the ROTJ novelization was written the "shroud of the dark side" hadn't been invented yet.

Sidious is powerful enough to 'balance' the force, or at least get the gears moving on that.

Sidious does not intend to balance the Force; he promotes and exploits its imbalance.

[Knife]

That might be Sidious plan, not sure it's the Forces plan

[Crazedwraith]

And yet Luke force choked a Gammorean guard, sure not to death, but still choked the shit out of him.

He has evolved beyond what the old Jedi order would have liked at this point.

Or you know, he really was drawing on the darkside at that point. After all he only truly rejects it and becomes a jedi at the film's climax.

[Arawn Fenn]

That might be Sidious plan, not sure it's the Forces plan

To unbalance itself? I think we can safely say the Force's plan is not to be unbalanced. Sidious, as the heir of the Banite line which unbalanced the Force in the first place, and as a participant in a ritual which unbalanced it further, represents the imbalance in the Force. Nothing in his future plans would be likely to promote a restoration of balance. So if we assume the Force's plan to be balanced then ultimately Sidious and the Force are at cross purposes in this sense. We know that balance is supposed to be restored when Sidious is destroyed, so he's hardly an agent of balance.

[Knife]

I come at it more from a Asmovian perspective. The Republic rules the galaxy, the Republic is rotten (Yes, we've had this conversation), the Jedi serve the Republic and the Force, the Jedi serve a rotten government, the Jedi are arrogant and not pure themselves. The good guys are not that good anymore, the Sith are powerful, the Force wants balance. The Force lets Sidious take over, destroying a defunct Jedi Order, but allowing a mechanism in place to take out Sidious and start a new Jedi Order not as steeped and lock step in a tight doctrine.

And that's based on the movies and novels of the movies, I really don't give a shit about EU. My own opinion.

[Arawn Fenn]

The Jedi are not the ones unbalancing the Force simply by virtue of not being "pure". Arrogance, arguably, goes with the territory. The movies and novelizations never said the Force wanted the Jedi order destroyed, but you're free to think that.

[Havok]

Worst line of the PT.

[Knife]

The Jedi are not the ones unbalancing the Force simply by virtue of not being "pure". Arrogance, arguably, goes with the territory. The movies and novelizations never said the Force wanted the Jedi order destroyed, but you're free to think that.

No the movies never come out and say it, but the themes and dialogue can point that direction. From Yoda's speech in ESB about the Force being alive, connecting the universe together, to the very fact there is a prophecy about Anakin, to again Yoda musing that the Jedi might have misread the prophecy. And again, all the dialogue from multiple characters about the Jedi being arrogant and too sure of themselves, Sidious mentioning that their arrogance blinds them. Obi Wan's line about how 'Anakin was supposed to destroy the Sith, not join them' paraphrased, don't remember the exact quote, when in fact he does just that 20 years down the road.

[Kreller1]

And yet Luke force choked a Gammorean guard, sure not to death, but still choked the shit out of him.

He has evolved beyond what the old Jedi order would have liked at this point.

Or you know, he really was drawing on the darkside at that point. After all he only truly rejects it and becomes a jedi at the film's climax.

Absolutely, and it would not have been something Yoda or Obi-Wan would have taught him how to do.

[PainRack]

ROTS, not ROTJ. When the ROTJ novelization was written the "shroud of the dark side" hadn't been invented yet.

I'm..... not too sure about that to be honest. Star wars TCG with Obiwan Cape and etc did introduce elements of story that resembles Shroud of the Dark Side, although I don't know whether there was any true link.

Similarly, the Sons of Suns prophecies only really work if an imbalance, "shroud" of the Dark side exist.

It would be interesting if someone could ambush George Lucas and ask him whether Sons of Suns became the Chosen One after the PT came about.


I subscribe to Robert Brown "Greek hubris" for the Jedi though. The Jedi had became too proud of themselves, too stagnant, and with their straitjacketed philosophy on abducting children, they were detrimental to the development of the Living Force itself. Indeed, we do learn that Jedi of this era supposedly treated the Unifying Force as a higher.... vision, more important philosophy than the Living Force(Coruscant Nights for example).

Since Yin/Yang/Tao itself is a philosophy of dynamic equilibrium, stagnancy in the Jedi and too black/white views of the world is actually detrimental to the flow of the Force itself.

[Havok]

Do you need to "subscribe" to that? Yoda comes straight out and fucking says it. GL beats you over the head with it with Anakin as his blunt instrument.

[PainRack]

Do you need to "subscribe" to that? Yoda comes straight out and fucking says it. GL beats you over the head with it with Anakin as his blunt instrument.

I don't think they talk much about the living force/unifying force in the PT:D

Hell, I think the only thing I remember about it was Qui Gon admonishing Obiwan in TPM.

[Replicant]

I have wondered this. How much did Darth Maul scare the Jedi Council. When they had the celebration at the end of TPM you see that the entire Jedi Council is there on Naboo.

It would seem odd that they show up for a rather minor celebration and even the death of a Jedi doesnt warrant everyone showing up.

This makes me wonder if the Council was there doing an extensive investigation and trying to learn everything they can about the Sith that suddenly appeared out of nowhere.

[Havok]

I'm sure they were invited by the Queen.

[Ralin]

I'm sure they were invited by the Queen.

That doesn't mean they have to accept. Especially not the head of the whole Order, and especially given that Yoda and Windu really didn't have anything directly to do with the whole thing. So I think Replicant's theory makes sense.

[Arawn Fenn]

No the movies never come out and say it

Well, it's not just the movies. The people involved in creating the movies and the franchise EU authors don't say it either. As Lama Su might say: Curious, isn't it?

From Yoda's speech in ESB about the Force being alive

Created by life - but something can be alive without wanting the Jedi destroyed.

to the very fact there is a prophecy about Anakin

This makes no sense. The fact that there's a prophecy about Anakin means the Force wants the Jedi destroyed?

to again Yoda musing that the Jedi might have misread the prophecy.

Which does not mean that the Jedi did misread the prophecy. This comes down to the meaning of "could have". In context:

"Is he not the Chosen One? Is he not to destroy the Sith and bring balance to the Force?"
"So the prophecy says."
"A prophecy that misread could have been."

Since he did those things, and was ultimately confirmed to be the Chosen One, nothing of substance was misread.

And again, all the dialogue from multiple characters about the Jedi being arrogant and too sure of themselves, Sidious mentioning that their arrogance blinds them.

There's no evidence that mere arrogance on the part of lightsiders constitutes any kind of threat which the Force would want to see destroyed. Besides, when someone admits to arrogance, it's a sign that they are aware of their shortcomings. This is a good thing. It's known as modesty. If anything, those lacking this quality would tend to be more of a problem.

[Havok]

I'm sure they were invited by the Queen.

That doesn't mean they have to accept. Especially not the head of the whole Order, and especially given that Yoda and Windu really didn't have anything directly to do with the whole thing. So I think Replicant's theory makes sense.

Are you daft? This is the Queen that just brought down the leader of the Galaxy and now is the Queen of the new leader of the galaxy. Geezuz, pay fucking attention to the movies.

[Kreller1]

I'm sure they were invited by the Queen.

That doesn't mean they have to accept. Especially not the head of the whole Order, and especially given that Yoda and Windu really didn't have anything directly to do with the whole thing. So I think Replicant's theory makes sense.

Are you daft? This is the Queen that just brought down the leader of the Galaxy and now is the Queen of the new leader of the galaxy. Geezuz, pay fucking attention to the movies.

That, and they have confirmation of at least one of the recently revealed Sith Lords' presence on that very same planet, dead though he may now be.

[Arawn Fenn]

Indeed, we do learn that Jedi of this era supposedly treated the Unifying Force as a higher.... vision, more important philosophy than the Living Force(Coruscant Nights for example).

That's not in Coruscant Nights, but it does sometimes arise in other places due to an exaggeration of Qui-Gon's TPM dialogue. However, the dialogue in question can easily be read as saying only that one must not neglect either aspect of the Force. For the living Force and unifying Force are complementary aspects of the Force rather than competing philosophies.

Coruscant Nights does, unfortunately, insist in so many words that the Potentium belief is common among PT-era Jedi and a source of much debate. This brazenly contradicts Rogue Planet, the source which introduced the Potentium in the first place, and expresses the revisionist biases of one of the authors. As such it can be safely ignored as just another CN mistake.

[avatarxprime]

Dogma is going to play a huge role in how they approach using the force in various ways. The Prequels were rife with examples of Jedi being dogmatic, inflexible, and even arrogant, and it on more than one occasion lead to them fucking up.

Yeah, the arrogance in particular is the stated reasoning behind the Geonosis Arena debacle. The majority of the Jedi in that fight focused on Form VI, a form that leaves them time to meditate on the Force, rather than train in combat as they felt combat isn't that big a part of the role of a Jedi. Although admittedly, the form holds Exar Kun as one of its noteable practitioners so obviously if you're willing to master it rather than just be proficient with it you can be a truly powerful fighter.

"Jedi use the Force for knowledge and defense. Never for attack." ~ Yoda. Force crushing someone's skull or whatever other sneaky lethal trick doesn't really fit with that idea. It seems like the Jedi looked at any sort of lethal use of the Force as a Dark Side thing.

To further this topic, Mara Jade gives Luke a talking to in the Thrawn Duology basically about this. Luke is feeling as though he is stronger than Yoda since he rebuilt Vader's castle on Coruscant by himself when just raising his X-Wing winded Yoda. Mara tells him that his focus on power in the Force is causing him to skirt the Dark Side. Luke resists the idea at first, but eventually comes to feel she is right and that he has forgotten what Yoda told him of using the Force for knowledge and not raw power. This idea then goes further in extreme combat during the Vong Invasion and against Darth Caedus where the Jedi are described at their most powerful when they are completely calm and giving themselves over to the Force. I think that's the difference between Light and Dark Side. Is the Force telling you to stab that guy through the heart or are you directly drawing on the the Force so you can stab that guy through the heart? The Jedi hold to the former and the Sith believe in the latter.

[TheSpaceman?]

I could be wrong, but I get the sense that Lucas' vision of the Force isn't a Yin/Yang type of thing where the Dark Side and the "Light" side balance each other out, the Dark Side is an evil, corrupting force that should have as little power over Force users as possible. So I don't agree with the idea that balancing the Force is about killing both the Jedi and the Sith. The arrogance and closed-mindedness of the Jedi did lead to their downfall, but not in the sense that they were an imbalance in the Force.

[Tiriol]

I could be wrong, but I get the sense that Lucas' vision of the Force isn't a Yin/Yang type of thing where the Dark Side and the "Light" side balance each other out, the Dark Side is an evil, corrupting force that should have as little power over Force users as possible. So I don't agree with the idea that balancing the Force is about killing both the Jedi and the Sith. The arrogance and closed-mindedness of the Jedi did lead to their downfall, but not in the sense that they were an imbalance in the Force.

At least some of what Lucas has said about the Sith, Palpatine and the dark side agree with you. It is possible that he originally imagined the light side (which is never mentioned in any movie, though) and the dark side are just two sides of the same coin, but nowadays he seems to be pretty certain that there is the Force and that there is the dark side, which spreads corruption and its most powerful users, the Sith, are the cause of the imbalance and the Old Jedi Order didn't help one bit with their arrogance, close-mindedness and almost blind adherence to the tradition (it is telling that the only Jedi of the Old Order who discovered the secret of retaining his consciousness in the afterlife and could help his former friends was Qui-Gon Jinn, who was constantly at odds with the tradition-bound Jedi Council).

[TheSpaceman?]

Yeah, that's why I put light side in quotation marks, because that phrase isn't used in the movies to my knowledge. I agree with everything else you said as well, and I feel the Jedi wouldn't have had to die had they been less arrogant and obsessed with traditions. The Dark Side is the corrupting element of the Force and as it gains strength the rest of the Force becomes imbalanced. To go back to the Yin/Yang comparison, I would almost say a "balanced" Force seems to be how Yang solely is represented. Mostly light with a little dot of darkness. The Force became imbalanced when that little dot grew into an equal or greater power than the "light".

[Tiriol]

Yeah, that's why I put light side in quotation marks, because that phrase isn't used in the movies to my knowledge. I agree with everything else you said as well, and I feel the Jedi wouldn't have had to die had they been less arrogant and obsessed with traditions. The Dark Side is the corrupting element of the Force and as it gains strength the rest of the Force becomes imbalanced. To go back to the Yin/Yang comparison, I would almost say a "balanced" Force seems to be how Yang solely is represented. Mostly light with a little dot of darkness. The Force became imbalanced when that little dot grew into an equal or greater power than the "light".

I'm not so sure I'd put it like that. The way I see it Lucas considers the Force to be some sort of galaxy's spiritual presence, the sum and spirit of nature and higher ideals. When it is at balance, nature is at harmony and death and life are in equilibrium. What the dark side does is to throw everything out of balance because those who are corrupted by it seek to dominate everything else and subvert the Force to their whims. I'd say "subvert the natural order", but it has some other connonations which are clearly not present in SW - technology is never shown to be evil and corrupt in itself, or development etc., although it does, in a way, subvert natural order of things.