Earn your lightsaber, Luke

I'm going to echo that entire thing whole-heartedly. You're spot on about Luke and his earning of the lightsaber. In fact, to hammer it home more I'd mention the point in ROTJ in which he turns himself in, with the officer explaining to Vader "He was armed only with this."... 'this' being his lightsaber -- no pistol.

For my part, I'm hoping the lightsaber action in the ST is short but incredibly sweet. Essentially the OT presence but with the better choreography and graphics of the PT. Furthermore, like you said they need to be personal. The Vader-Luke duels may not have been as flashy or visually quick as the PT, but I'll be damned if anything can so easily top the level of intensity in they had.

 

I doubt Luke would need to earn his second lightsaber since TROTJ, I admit he messed up losing the first one.

 

Agree with everything. But I'm not too hopefull about the lightsaber regaining its mystery and power in the ST. We've already been over saturated. Based on the trailers, Kylo is always waving that thing around. I guess we'll see. If there is only one Jedi left, that probably means we'll have only Anakin's, Luke's and Kylo's sabers in the movie. I don't like the idea of Kylo whipping out the saber to kill a bunch of villagers. Vader never pulled his saber unless he was gonna duel someone.

 

I've always thought the scenes cut from TESB which showed Luke training with his saber sounded great. I mean, in a way I'm glad they were cut from the film, but it would be great to see whatever footage was shot for them one day...

Anyway, that's kind of by the by - getting back to the topic, I totally agree with what you are saying. To simplify it even further still: Luke was this guy who happened to have been given a lightsaber, but for a while, his blaster was still his go-to weapon. It's kind of symbolic of the journey he is on, to eventually stop relying on the quick and easy path...

 

That's deep man.

 

He did put it to good use before the dagobah cave when he used the lightsaber to open a hole in the belly of the At-At before he threw a concussion grenade inside. Just saying...

--- Double Post Merged, Oct 6, 2015, Original Post Date: Oct 6, 2015 ---

I think Luke apart from a quick lesson from obi wan onboard the millennium falcon hadn't got the first clue how to fight with a lightsaber before meeting yoda. At that point he probably felt he had more experience using a blaster and therefore more confident with it than the lightsaber. As for the trash compactor scene I think in the sheer panic and with a dianoga wrapped very tightly trying to drown him I doubt very much it was because he felt unworthy to use it. More likely he probably didn't think a lightsaber would do anything to a magnetically sealed trash compactor and when the dianoga was trying to drown him he needed both hands to stop it from strangling him to death. It is a shame we didn't see him have lightsaber training from Yoda in TESB because it really makes no sense that he could fight against vader at all in a duel later on. Vader had years and years of jedi lightsaber training. Realistically that duel wouldn't have lasted a second. That really highlights my biggest problem with the OT. How could Luke become a Jedi Knight at all with very little training from Yoda. He didn't even complete his training. Despite TESB being hailed by many as the best star wars movie, why in the hell didn't it show more of Luke's training with yoda? Why didn't it show Luke complete his training. It's the one thing about the OT that really annoys me.

 

I agree with your sentiment about using the lightsaber infrequently and having respect for it. It seems like the way of the samurai. One's honour is said to reside in one's own lightsaber. Like the samurai, the jedi should try to find a peaceful solution first and only draw their lightsaber when necessary.

--- Double Post Merged, Oct 6, 2015 ---

I know as little as anyone about how the ST is going to play out but my hunch is Kylo Ren won't be like the Sith of old. I've read that Kylo Ren is going to bring something new to the saga so even though he is a devotee of the late Darth Vader I don't believe he will be cut from the same cloth. The Sith as I understand it are no more. Kylo Ren belongs to an order called the Knights Of Ren. I don't know how much he is devoted to the order but I get the feeling Kylo Ren hasn't had the same discipline imposed on him as Vader would have as a sith apprentice. I don't think he will adopt the same Sith lightsaber etiquette his dark side forbears would have. I think kylo Ren might be the type of guy to slaughter indiscriminately and hack up as many villagers with his cross guard lightsaber as possible. I think he might have anger issues and might not be one hundred percent in control of his powers all of the time. I could be wrong about that but I hope I'm not.

 

While I like the idea of earning the lightsaber, the reason that the lightsabers are cheapened in the PT is because that there are simply more of them in the lore. During the OT, there are barely any lightsabers left.

 

Of course there are more lightsabers in the PT. There are more Force users in this trilogy.

Luke had to create his own lightsaber. Why are so many people obsessed with Anakin's second lightsaber. It's just a damn weapon. Worse, it was used in the Jedi Purge. J.J. Abrams and/or Rian Johnson should have left it lost to all eternity.

 

this thread makes no sense.

A lightsaber is a weapon of the jedi and the PT showed the Jedi at their prime (or past their prime ....), but they were still around in big numbers so how do wanna do movies with jedis in action and not use the lightsaber?

In the OT and ST the Jedis are
extinct, so its freaking obvious that the numbers of lightsabers are way less than in the PT and that they also become kind of
mysterious and magical.





While we are on it, I would rather see how powerful lightsabers are, remember the scene when Qui Gon is melting the door in TPM? Exactly, we need more of that stuff imho.

 

Gosh

 

I think that is very much up for debate. I think the fights in TPM are excellent, but I don't like a single light saber battle in the other two movies. I think they are awful to be honest.

I think the new movies have done a good job at doing just that. They have taken the less is more approach and late saber fights actually mean something again. How often they were you and all the flipping and twirling is a good representation of what is wrong with the prequels.

 

Reminds me of this excerpt from one review of the PT films:

 

Excellent observations, well written.

Let's get back to 1980 and the extensive ESB review in Fantastic Films (IIRC Bill Hays). One major point of criticism (I remember up to this day) had been the use of Luke's lightsaber in the Wampa cave, its use by Han on the Tauntaun and by Luke to open the belly hatch of the Snow Walker.

The reviewer felt that the elegant weapon of a Jedi Knight had been downgraded to a Swiss Army knife tool, but your observations seem to indicate it had been a deliberate choice (the reviewer apparently didn't catch).

Furthermore, the scenes you observed did help to set up ROJ, from "a certain point of view". Once Luke realizes that there is no point negotiating with Jabba he grabs a blaster.
Given events in ESB it didn't seem to be out of character (and conveniently obfuscated any possible questions about the whereabouts of his lightsaber which he originally had been assembling in the cave)

But apparently Lucas felt that wasn't good enough and kept the whole lightsaber a secret until it was finally needed on Jabba's sailing barge.

 

I don't know, I thought Christopher Lee was perfect as Dooku. I just think that Dooku shouldn't have been in a lightsaber fight to being with, instead playing from the shadows like a pseudo-Palpatine.