The Mandalorian Discussion Thread (spoilers and such)

[chimericoncogene]

I agree, but the hangar between the mandibles simply doesn't square with what was shown in the Rebels cartoon.

That is, unless a Sentinel-class shuttle is significantly larger than the Lambda that landed inside Gideon's cruiser.

Yeah, but going by that Rebels depiction, a Sentinel has a 100-meter wingspan and the main cargo bay is ~25 meters wide - big enough to fit an A6 Juggernaut.

The Arqueitans is 300 meters long and a hundred meters wide.

Rebels is the one with the scale ludicrously wrong.

[Rogue 9]

Gina Carano is fired.

Gina Carano Is No Longer a Part of Star Wars

Germain Lussier

Gina Carano, who plays Cara Dune on The Mandalorian, will no longer be on the show.

In a statement obtained by io9, a Lucasfilm spokesperson said the following: “Gina Carano is not currently employed by Lucasfilm and there are no plans for her to be in the future. Nevertheless, her social media posts denigrating people based on their cultural and religious identities are abhorrent and unacceptable.”

The news comes after a day in which the hashtag #FireGinaCarano trended on Twitter for hours. The night before, the actress shared an anti-Semitic story on her Instagram. It was soon deleted but many fans captured it and shared it on social media.

That, of course, came after months of complaints about Carano’s online presence, including mocking covid mask mandates, spreading conspiracies about the United States election, liking posts disparaging the Black Lives Matter movement, and deriding pronoun usage.

Carano’s character, Cara Dune, was one of the main characters on the award-winning Disney+ show. And it was assumed, though never confirmed, that she might play a role in the upcoming Star Wars: Rangers of the New Republic show. That, apparently, is not happening anymore. Even if it was.

[Galvatron]

I am Jack's complete lack of surprise that she kept skating on the thin ice, as if she was daring Lucasfilm to shitcan her.

And now the usual right-wing grifters will storm social media and once again to betray their misunderstanding of the First Amendment.

[bilateralrope]

Or maybe she didn't fear being fired because she already knew that her role on The Mandalorian was over. That her character was never planned to appear in season 3.

[Broomstick]

Free speech has consequences.

[Gandalf]

Or maybe she didn't fear being fired because she already knew that her role on The Mandalorian was over. That her character was never planned to appear in season 3.

News here is reporting that Disney had plans to put her into a spinoff of her own.

[LadyTevar]

Or maybe she didn't fear being fired because she already knew that her role on The Mandalorian was over. That her character was never planned to appear in season 3.

News here is reporting that Disney had plans to put her into a spinoff of her own.

There were a lot of rumors to that effect. Not gonna happen now, her mouth got her fired.

[Gandalf]

There were a lot of rumors to that effect. Not gonna happen now, her mouth got her fired.

It looks like a gamble of "They'll never fire me!"

Own the libs by getting fired from an award winning show I guess.

[bilateralrope]

Or maybe she didn't fear being fired because she already knew that her role on The Mandalorian was over. That her character was never planned to appear in season 3.

News here is reporting that Disney had plans to put her into a spinoff of her own.

I haven't seen anything saying that beyond speculation based on the name of the new show.

Still, it's clear that if Disney were even thinking about casting her at any point, they aren't anymore.

[Knife]

Sure, no legal document out there shows she signed a contract for a new show. That said, it was pretty obvious they were building her up for the Republic Rangers bit they have in development. It is a shame, I liked the character. I wonder if they will recast? There is a fan movement out there, or at least the beginnings of one, to get Lucy Lawless.

[Big Orange]

So Operation Cinder gets name dropped (alongside Grand Admiral Thrawn) and we get more insight into how the New Republic, despite winning the wider galaxy, was still in a comparatively weak military state decades later against the First Order and Sith Eternal from their redoubts in the Unknown Territories - I got the impression Operation Cinder (in my head canon) was Darth Sidious attempting to not only spite the galaxy but to also recruit the die hard fanatics loyal to him for a possible new Empire .

But amid galactic scale anarchy with many Rebel factions advancing fast, unruly civilians rising up enmasse, Imperial troops mutinying enmasse, and Imperial warlords like Gideon carving out their fiefdoms (in my head canon), Palpatine's scorched earth plans did not go smoothly.

Some core worlds got BDZed, industries wrecked, much of the Old Republic bureaucracy/infrastructure got ripped out when the Galactic Empire imploded and exploded, and the galactic economy may have been ruined for a century.

It ended up in a the New Republic that was a popular government and nation crippled by a small military, while the First Order was a still relatively massive military without a legitimate government and nation, with the Sith Eternal being the true Sith Empire reborn....

[Patroklos]

So Operation Cinder gets name dropped (alongside Grand Admiral Thrawn) and we get more insight into how the New Republic, despite winning the wider galaxy, was still in a comparatively weak military state decades later against the First Order and Sith Eternal from their redoubts in the Unknown Territories - I got the impression Operation Cinder (in my head canon) was Darth Sidious attempting to not only spite the galaxy but to also recruit the die hard fanatics loyal to him for a possible new Empire .

But amid galactic scale anarchy with many Rebel factions advancing fast, unruly civilians rising up enmasse, Imperial troops mutinying enmasse, and Imperial warlords like Gideon carving out their fiefdoms (in my head canon), Palpatine's scorched earth plans did not go smoothly.

Some core worlds got BDZed, industries wrecked, much of the Old Republic bureaucracy/infrastructure got ripped out when the Galactic Empire imploded and exploded, and the galactic economy may have been ruined for a century.

It ended up in a the New Republic that was a popular government and nation crippled by a small military, while the First Order was a still relatively massive military without a legitimate government and nation, with the Sith Eternal being the true Sith Empire reborn....

Everything but the bolded part is basically how I see it. The bolded part still doesn't fit into the rest.

[Cykeisme]

The new article states Carano posted an anti-Semitic story on Instagram, which I think is referring to this:

"Jews were beaten in the streets, not by Nazi soldiers but by their neighbors… even by children,” the post began.

“Because history is edited, most people today don’t realize that to get to the point where Nazi soldiers could easily round up thousands of Jews, the government first made their own neighbors hate them simply for being Jews. How is that any different from hating someone for their political views?"

https://thebrag.com/people-pissed-at-gina-carano/


I can see how it's extremely risky for a public figure to make such a politically-charged post, but is that actually anti-Semitic?
Looks more like anti-whatever the opposite political view from hers is.

[chimericoncogene]

It's a bit insensitive, and rather risky, but probably not anti-Semitic.

[Solauren]

I believe it was a several of her posts, considered together, that got her fired.

[Broomstick]

The new article states Carano posted an anti-Semitic story on Instagram, which I think is referring to this:

"Jews were beaten in the streets, not by Nazi soldiers but by their neighbors… even by children,” the post began.

“Because history is edited, most people today don’t realize that to get to the point where Nazi soldiers could easily round up thousands of Jews, the government first made their own neighbors hate them simply for being Jews. How is that any different from hating someone for their political views?"

https://thebrag.com/people-pissed-at-gina-carano/


I can see how it's extremely risky for a public figure to make such a politically-charged post, but is that actually anti-Semitic?
Looks more like anti-whatever the opposite political view from hers is.

The difference is that you can change your political views. You can not change your ethnicity or race.

[Khaat]

Carano tried to equate "cancel CONSEQUENCE culture" with "ethnic cleansing". She can fuck right off. Her rights end when they tread on mine.

[Solauren]

Carano tried to equate "cancel CONSEQUENCE culture" with "ethnic cleansing". She can fuck right off. Her rights end when they tread on mine.

Agreed.

[Galvatron]

I'm glad someone finally made a video about this:

[Gandalf]

I guess if the stormtroopers killed someone on screen, it might affect their weird rehabilitation and then they might move less merch?

[Vance]

Sorry if this has been discussed/should be obvious, but how does the stormtrooper armour being shattered by blunt forces like in this show relate to the effectiveness of the armour against bullets?

Does it show us now conclusively that the armour would not present significant protection against more conventional firearms/"slugthrowers"?

And what about a shockwave in an explosion?

Some examples appear to show stormtroopers surviving explosions, like that blast in the Rebels short. Does this jive with the melee stuff we've been seeing?

[Batman]

I think part of the issue is that the armour was shattered by a pathetic amount of blunt force as the blow wasn't delivered by a superhumanly strong entity. And while stortrooper armour is likely not optimized to protect against blunt force the fact that it shattered at all when medieval real world armour would've survived it just fine (the wearer might not but I doubt the armour would've even been dented) and Star Wars is supposed to be the tiniest bit more advanced than that

[Gunhead]

Sorry if this has been discussed/should be obvious, but how does the stormtrooper armour being shattered by blunt forces like in this show relate to the effectiveness of the armour against bullets?

Does it show us now conclusively that the armour would not present significant protection against more conventional firearms/"slugthrowers"?

And what about a shockwave in an explosion?

Some examples appear to show stormtroopers surviving explosions, like that blast in the Rebels short. Does this jive with the melee stuff we've been seeing?

Short answer, yes. If your armor can be shattered by a melee weapon wielded by a human strength opponent, your armor will do jack shit against any kind of projectile intended to kill.
As to over pressure, that's highly situational. Pressure is more about intensity than anything else so in theory very hard but brittle armor could offer protection against explosions as pressure doesn't want to go through things. That said, it would silly to make armor that is very resistant to explosions but wouldn't function at all against shrapnel.
Btw. Long answer to your bullet question is long because then we get into, energy of the impact, momentum, hardness and other things that affect penetration.

-Gunhead

[Juubi Karakuchi]

I've been doing a little more light reading on stormtroopers, and I learned something quite surprising. In the Fantasy Flight RPG game, the stormtrooper stat line is the same as that of clone troopers. Clearly they're being treated as capable soldiers, but still minions for all that.

On that basis, if nothing else, I'd be inclined to say that stormtroopers are perfectly capable after all. Their problems can be explained by realism (real-life soldiers miss a lot more than you'd think), and plot armour in the vast majority of cases.

If anything, the famous and much-cited corridor scene in ANH marks the Rebels as the mole-eyed incompetents. There were something like ten rebel troopers in that corridor, and maybe three or four managed to duck into the side door or retreat round the corner. The best I can suggest is that the smoke and blast from the door being blown open (which forced the rebels to look away) may have messed with their vision. It would also explain why the stormtroopers didn't throw a flashbang in; the door explosion did it for them.

That said, the Mandalorian does offer a couple of explanations for incompetent stormtroopers, both of which the video ignores AFAIK. During that scene with the two scout troopers, when one of the scouts shakes his blaster, it audibly rattles. Tvtropes had this to say;

It's also worth noting that one of the troopers shakes his pistol and it makes a rattling sound. As anybody who has dealt with precision weaponry can attest, loose parts inside a weapon is a sign that something is seriously wrong with it. This is also the explanation Star Wars Rebels used; Clone Trooper Rex complained that his marksmanship went in the toilet when wearing a shoddy Stormtrooper helmet.

https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/ ... hipAcademy

The other one is much broader, and I got it from doing some reading on the Chinese Warlord period. Seriously, I can't help but think that this must have influenced Star Wars - at least via the early EU writers - because so many of the negative tropes associated with the Empire apply to the warlord armies. Chinese warlord armies were on the whole terrible; made up of whatever unfortunates could be lured or dragged from their homes, shoved into a uniform (if available), handed a rifle (if available) and herded into line. The warlords themselves were every bit as colourful, extreme, and in some cases downright psychotic as their Legends counterparts.

So in this case, Gideon's troopers are lousy because he needs numbers more than he needs quality. His troopers are whoever he could bribe, con, or force into his service; maybe given some brief flash training if only to make them obedient. Factor in shoddy equipment, and one should not expect too much of them.

As for the armour, the best I can suggest is that it's optimised for dealing with energy weapons - maybe some kind of heat-resistant ceramic - on the assumption that the primary threat they have to deal with is blasters; with countermeasures against other threats left out to cut costs. In short, stormtrooper armour is cheap and nasty.

[Gunhead]

As for the armour, the best I can suggest is that it's optimised for dealing with energy weapons - maybe some kind of heat-resistant ceramic - on the assumption that the primary threat they have to deal with is blasters; with countermeasures against other threats left out to cut costs. In short, stormtrooper armour is cheap and nasty.

Which would be fine if there was any notable incidents of stormtrooper armor actually doing this. The stupidity is made worse by the fact that we know armor that does protect against blasters do exist in the SW universe, as shown by the original armor worn by Djarin and other mandalorians. Even with that, we know blaster bolts have a thermal and a mechanical effect which would require the armor to able to withstand kinetic impacts, at least to the extent that basic melee weapons wouldn't be able to damage the armor to any meaningful extent.

-Gunhead