gridlore | More obsessing about Star Wars as I sit here sick.

More proof that George Lucas can't write his way out of a wet paper napkin.

OK, we start "Episode IV" with Princess Leia being chased down by a Star Destroyer with Darth Vader aboard. Knowing hse's about to be captured, she gives R2-D2 the plans and a message for Obi-Wan Kenobi, and shoot him and the gayest robot ever off to Tattooine.

Which means she knew several things. Obi-Wan survived. Obi-Wan is hiding on Tattoine. R2-D2 was once once associated with Obi-Wan. And Darth Vader picks up on none of this. Does the Empire not have intelligence officers? did nobody ask "why did she run here?" "Who lives here?" Hell, you thinbk maybe Darth Vader might have wondered why, out of all the star systems in the galaxy, she chose to come out of hyperdrive in his old home system? Hell, several times in the films Darth and Leia with face to faceplate and he never grokked the connection?

But let's move on. Obi-Wan looks everyone in the eyes/optical sensors and flat out lies about the droids. Why? Meanwhile, stormtroopers are shooting up Jawas and the Skywalker residence. Now back in my Army, we did a little thing called reporting.

"Lord Vader, we determined there were two droids in the escape pod. Both droids were acquired by an indigenous races known as Jawas. Examination of records show the two droids were sold to the Skywalker famil.. *urk*"

"Who? There were sold to who?"

"Sky..walker.. s..sir.. There were two adults at the residence.. they resisted.." *snap* *thud*

"Subcommander, access the planetary census. How many people lived at the Skywalker holding?"

"Three, my Lord. Owen Skywalker, Beru Skywalker, and a nephew named Luke."

"Captain! Send out a priority signal! Summon the fleet! Nothing leaves this world!"

Of course this could have been avoided if anyone with brains existed inside the Jedi Temple. At the end of Episode III, we have the infant twins, Senator Organa, Obi-Wan, and Yoda, the centuries old utter master of Jedi training. Why not send Obi-Wan and Yoda off with the twins to Dagobah so they can be trained from birth? When the time is right, move them to Alderan for further training.

But I think logically.

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Technically speaking, it was Owen and Beru Lars, but that still should have been a red flag.

I've made the contention that Lucas might not have written the best screenplays ever, but he clearly had some of the "revelations" that we get in Ep1-3 in mind when he wrote 4.

Owen clearly recognizes C-3PO in the first "introduction" scene. And goes so far as to test him.

"You?!" he asks. "Well... I bet you're programmed for protocol and etiquette, aren't you?"

The surprise in his voice is the tell. He never expected to see that droid.

Like it or lump it, that scene was clearly planned.

I disagree. For one thing, all 3P0-series protocol droids were basically the same chassis. Look at the droid that greets Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan at the very beginning of Ep 1. Different voice, shinier, but the same model.

Sure, Owen would know a protocol droid when he saw one, but I doubt he'd say, "Hey, this is the exact same 3P0 droid that my crazy stepbrother brought here for a couple of days, 20 years ago. When my stepmother was kidnapped by Sandpeople. And my dad lost his leg."

Ah! I have this base covered as well.

C-3P0:

A: Has gold casings - which we are told "earlier" is unusual and not very common (Ep1)

B: Has an uncommon voice (Most other Protocol droids we see have a decidedly more neutral [if just as uppity] voice)

C: Is standing near a rather familiar looking Astromech

I'm willing to believe that Lucas had that in mind, on some basic level, when he wrote it.

Plus a silver shin plate that never got replaced in 20 years...

I've always assumed that the 4 character alphanumerics for droids were series numbers rather than unique identifiers. There's only 1,679,616 unique letter/number combination in that range, and there have to be a hell of a lot more droids than that in the galaxy. While it might have seemed unusual for _an_ R2-D2 to be involved, he'd have no reason to assume it was the same R2-D2.

But what about the number of times R2D2 was referred to as an "Artoo unit"? I think that the first two characters are the series number and the last two are the identifier.

Still only 1,296 two-character combinations available. If every droid has a unique designator, they'd have to be a lot longer than 4 characters, unless droids are extremely rare. Or maybe the Star Wars galaxy is less populous than we've been led to believe.

I posit that there are other droids with names that are longer than 4 characters.

Or that the commonly used "names" are shortened forms of the longer Series/Model/Modification/Serial Number that is normally just broadcast by droids as a low-powered radio signal.

Then why did all the droids we see on-screen have the short designators? Seems statistically unlikely.

but easier on the writers and actors

writing/saying C3PO is much simplier than
C3P0-1239482/BH239/333A9X222567801-399B

Disregard my above comment. After researching Threepio on Wookiepedia, I found this:

...three years [after Anakin left Tatooine], Shmi, who was still in the possession of Watto, was sold to Cliegg Lars, a moisture farmer who lived with his son Owen on a farm in the Great Chott Salt Flat near the city of Anchorhead. Lars married Shmi and freed her from her bonds; Shmi brought C-3PO with her, and the droid served the Lars family at their home for another five years. In 22 BBY, shortly after Shmi was kidnapped by a group of Tusken Raiders, C-3PO was working on a moisture vaporator on the property when Skywalker, now a Jedi Padawan, arrived...

You know, I hadn't actually looked at Wookiepedia... I was just going on the whole "He worked with this droid for a decade or so, as we see in Ep1" angle. :)

"You" is said in a tired, almost sneering voice. As in "Oh, god, look at THIS thing. What use is it?"

This fits with the situation and Owen's character as presented.

There is *ABUNDANT* evidence that Lucas didn't have any such ideas when he started the series. He had no idea that Vader had any connection to Luke, and in fact didn't even know that he'd have any other movies to MAKE. The success of Star Wars took everyone, including him, by utter surprise. You can even look up the original drafts of "The Star Wars" and see just how completely different his thinking was. Some particular names and such showed up later in the prequels that were originally in his first draft, but other things were entirely changed. Most of it, in fact.

Once he realized he had a monster by the tail, he started thinking longer term. His main plan for a long time was that the two droids would turn out to be the ONLY connecting thread between a triple trilogy, but then in the end he decided to make it All About Annie. Which sucked.

Partly he may have been seduced by the ~~Dark Side~~ babble about Campbellian Heroes; he certainly played up that angle later, but at the time it's clear he wasn't going there at all; he was just combining the old 1930s adventure serials with Kurosawa's Hidden Fortress and a few others like the Lensman series to produce a slam-bang adventure.

I'm willing to go with almost all of that, actually. But I take Owen's exasperation in a different manner than you do. I also take Lucas at face value when he makes mention of thinking through most of the story (all the way through ep9) whilst coming up with the Star Wars "plan" - rewrites aside, that indicates to me that he had some overarching idea of what was going on. This is made clear when Owen and Beru have their sideline discussion about Luke's father, when Ben makes it clear that he's been watching Luke, and the mention of Vader in relation to killing Skywalker the Elder.

Really, though, it's just my opinion, and as you've said below, looking at ep4 from the 20/20 fore-sub-hindsight of ep1-3 kind of turns it all on its ear.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bbmqnINyLXM at about 2:00

Hrm... I'm not so sure. Owen Lars' 'You!' sounds more like an address to the droid, rather than an expression of surprise.

More obsessing about Star Wars as I sit here sick.

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