SPECULATION Who is the Ancient Fear?

I'm hoping to see a whole new villian, nothing close to any of the previous canon and non-canon characters.

 

Wow... good idea! The one that started the Sith order and managed to suvive thousands of years, would be a strong villan. But for me it would be even more interesting if they found a way to bond Plagueis and Palapatine to the story of Ruin. It would make him even more consistent.

 

Also, I'd like the villain to be introduced early in the story. I'm getting tired of all these flicks hiding the face of the threat for intrigue you see from a mile away. Show us how truly terrible the bad guy is, make us love to hate him!

 

Here is a theory that I have not heard discussed. The most fearful thing for a Jedi would be loose his connection with the force (In some cases they wish they could turn it off). Thanks to TPM we know about midi-chlorians in the blood they they communicate with (The scientific side of the force). What if The ancient fear is not a who but a what? A disease (biological warfare) that strips the midi-chlorians from the blood, leaving them force-less.

 

Sorry, nothing personal my friend but I think everything remotely related to "midichlorians" should be flushed into the deepest hole.
It literally castrated the SW lore and turned it into "not really sci-fi, and yet not fantasy"...

 

I agree, the force has become a religion now that all jedi knowledge and possible sith knowledge of them are suppressed. Sidious had all jedi knowledge from the jedi temple and what ever sith knowledge he already had. What happened to all that once he was destroyed?

 

Whilst I totally agree with you, CeruleanLord, that the whole midichlorian thing was an effort too far to take the whole explanation of the Force to a scientific perspective for the viewers, I also think that probably the only way to truly bring a proper, measured and even balance to the Force is to remove its use (abuse?) from everyone. And the only real way to do that, short of some bizarre divine intervention, is through some awful biological event that causes the midichlorians to die in their hosts, irrespective of their allegiances. Plus, imagine how bizarre the battles would be with previously accurate and adept fighters having lost their foresight for blocking blaster rounds or saber swipes.... It'd surely mean that both sides would have to be far more certain of their tactics and potential to win before they blustered into a full-scale assault on a location, rather than going with the principle of "throw enough s**t and something will eventually stick". Hmm, not sure I'd like that, but an interesting concept for the SW universe as a whole.

 

What if Leia, without Luke around, is tempted by the dark side and becomes the puppet of the big baddie. Perhaps they control both sides in the conflict just like Palpatine did. Daisy has to go find uncle Luke because she discovers mom is being controlled by the big baddie.

 

What about Abeloth as the Ancient Fear? As I understand it, Anakin ran into her family (The Ones) during the Mortis arc of the Clone Wars. I could be way out in left field here, but thought I'd mention it for discussion.

http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Abeloth

 

Good theory, but does that (Abeloth, I mean) fall under canon (as it is a part of the "Legends" universe)? I am skeptical of that.

 

I could also see the Ancient Fear being that rule of 2 being broken and now we're dealing with multiple Sith Lords or apprentices. Or the Ancient Fear could be that Palps found a way to become the first Sith force ghost.

 

Darth Tenebrous intended to break the rule of two by "Possessing" the chosen one and "cheating death". Not a Force ghost, but more like a demon.

 

Tying together my theory with this.

The Ancient Fear is an ancient third order separate from Jedi and Sith, they took the understanding of balance in the force to mean that the Jedi and Sith should be balanced (not realizing that the Sith themselves were causing the unbalance). So they operated behind the scenes keeping the Sith from getting wiped out. But following the death of Palpatine they have decided to take a more proactive approach in the ensuing decades. It has come time for them to leave their shadows and restart the Sith order.

 

Technically the force is an energy field created by all living things; killing midichlorians wouldn't do anything to the force because midichlorians aren't the force. But it would make it so no one could hear the will of the force. What does that mean? I don't know. It sounds to me like the force-users would still be able to use the force but not in matters of knowledge. There would be no guidance in the sense "the force will guide us" but you could still force push people and force jump and force lightning and everything?

But I do like the ideas about the 'hidden villain' that could be really cool.

 

I agree... It kinda' takes away from Vader's self-sacrifice.

 

I hadn't heard about the Ancient Fear before but for some reason I can't help to think that an ancient character like Maz Kanata has to have something to do with that.

I don't believe that the story just introduces a 1000 year old character for show ("we exceeded Yoda...") unless the character is that old to be able to inform and/or instruct the protagonists, because the character "was there when it happened".

 

Well, some label Snoke as being an ancient being strong in the dark side. Maybe he’s the manifestation of that ancient fear?

… and Maz being something like a watcher and ancient keeper of lore (of the Whills).

 

I really like the concept of an ancient fear.. fact that Jedis where maybe guardians of peace too, but keepers of something more dangerous.. Sidious was a great Dark emperor, but is schemes made him on the long run pretty petty if you consider that there could be more.. Yoda tells us many time tat the force unites the universe.. so yeah a Darth Sauron of some sort that has awaken now that the jedis are not around anymore?