Villains revealed?

[Brandon Rhea]

http://makingstarwars.net/2014/06/6-13-14-now-podcasting-episode-37/

Making Star Wars.net has a news story with potentially HUGE information about who the villains are.

POTENTIAL SPOILER ALERT

To make a long story short, the villains in Episode VII are reportedly a group of Jedi hunters, sort of like Inquisitors (but their source didn't call them that). These are apparently adepts of the Emperor from the time of the Empire. The Jedi hunters were never Sith, but they were powerful. Their goal is to resurrect the Sith. Post-Endor, they are the ultimate evil power in the galaxy.

Apparently, according to this story, there is no New Republic, and the Jedi hunters are the reason for it. Luke Skywalker, and presumably any disciples he has (such as Solo kids), have been fighting the Jedi hunters for 30 years. The report says that they presumably never went after Luke Skywalker during the original trilogy because Darth Vader said he was off limits, but now that Vader is ead and the hunters become the stewards of the Sith, they're going after the new Jedi hard. The Emperor also apparently left a plan for them if he was to ever die.

These villains will reportedly be played by Lupita Nyong'o, Adam Driver, and David Oyelowo,

Take a read of the story in the link. What do you think?

 

[Kaeb]

This literally the exact idea I posted for the ST when we made threads about what the story could be a couple of months back.

Emperor acolytes and everything.

 

[Insoulent]

Think they're too young to be hunting down Jedi for 30 years. Also don't like the idea of having a group of main villains, since they'll be presented as lackeys in one form or another, and that's pretty weak to me. BUT, I do like the casting for the villains so I'd overlook my grievances for that, especially if they're rather strong. With the cast right now, it seems like this is turning out to be a 2-hour movie experience at least.

 

[Brandon Rhea]

Think they're too young to be hunting down Jedi for 30 years.

That assumes they're the only ones. Presumably, the Emperor had many acolytes - there is an Inquisitor in Star Wars Rebels, after all - so these are probably a newer generation of Jedi hunters.

 

[Cortan]

I would say... there's probably a mixed bag of truth in here.

Firstly because well, as the whole thing admits, this is what they've gleamed off people working behind the scenes, and haven't seen the script. What this could mean is if they've seen anything, its been without proper context, and things have been extrapolated from there. Second, I... feel like I doubt the notion of there having been some evil that set upon Luke again quickly within the time after Endor. I dunno, feels like it loads the backstory a tad much. That might just be me being influenced by, as I've expressed previously, disliking the idea of making Endor turn out to 'not really' matter.

I mean, another way you could spin some of what's said in the article is that the Jedi Hunters, like Palpy before them, have been more behind the scenes but something Luke's been looking into. He's finally figured out who and what they are by the time of the current film (thus the scene where they get revealed, however that plays out), and things go from there.

My question would be, if this were true, what exactly took them thirty years to prep? Were they just generally hunting Luke and only recently discovered a breakthrough for their plans? Have they been constantly blocking a New Republic from forming as part of goading Luke into the open? Or are we literally going to start out OT 2.0 with Luke hiding away on Tatooine and calling himself Ben Skywalker?

 

[Galavant]

Hmmm.

Not that bad I guess, really interested in seeing what the heck happened during the thirty years though. Even if there's no New Republic, I at least hope the Rebels have at least gotten SOMEWHERE in that time. It'd be kinda cheap if it's just "Oh they went and lost big time after Endor off-screen" but still a great distinction from what we got with the EU.

 

[Brandon Rhea]

I could see there being some sort of new proto-government at the very least, even if it's not a galaxy-spanning New Republic yet. The concept for the sequels always included seeing the rise of the New Republic, even back in the 80s. It'd be a little anti-climactic to just start with the New Republic.

This literally the exact idea I posted for the ST when we made threads about what the story could be a couple of months back.

Emperor acolytes and everything.

It kind of goes back to something I said I liked too, about turning Endor on its head. That it would still be consequential, but perhaps it wasn't the victory they thought it was. Perhaps they learn that there were failures on Endor that they could not have foreseen at the time, or that there was an evil still lurking out there. After all, Endor ended a little too happy go lucky, with the unrealistic notion that the end of the Emperor was the end of the Empire or the end of evil. This, if it's true, ties into that as almost like a meta commentary.

Imagine how you could open the film too. You give it a cold open after "A long time ago..." but before the opening scroll (shut up, purists). It starts with footage from Jedi. It opens on Luke burning Vader's armor. Then he goes off to join the celebration in the Ewok village. We see him embracing Han and Leia, and he sees the ghosts of Anakin, Obi-Wan, and Yoda (this would be cut down for pacing, so we wouldn't see EVERYTHING from the celebration). The celebration music plays over it. But then the music grows darker, and we move away from the celebration. Away from Luke and co, away from the ghosts, into the forests. There are figures standing there, disciples of the Emperor. They are watching. They are waiting.

Then the camera tilts up towards the stars, hangs there, and then the words STAR WARS come blaring across the screen. The crawl tells us what's happened since. When the crawl ends, it's 30 years later.

 

[Cortan]

...Alright, I'll confess, as openings go, that could work. Even generally, since the force allows for sensing over great distances and all, so you could have some hidden apprentice somewhere mid-meditation, then suddenly realising that their master is now blown to bits.

 

[Brandon Rhea]

...Alright, I'll confess, as openings go, that could work. Even generally, since the force allows for sensing over great distances and all, so you could have some hidden apprentice somewhere mid-meditation, then suddenly realising that their master is now blown to bits.

Or maybe they were on Endor the whole time. Maybe the Emperor wanted there. He was an arrogant son of a bitch who thought he was above death, but he was also intelligent. Perhaps he had a backup plan for, what was to him, the extremely unlikely scenario that he died.

 

[Kaeb]

Too on the nose for my tastes, sounds like a Saturday morning cartoon.

You can be a little more subtle than that, simply having mysterious figures revisiting the areas (or just one area like Endor) of interest for the last films immediately after the battles that took place, the losses that were lost, the victories that were won, but I feel like that is something they'll probably reveal later into the story and not right away.

Reusing and expanding on old musical queues is always thematically effective though, TV does it a lot nowadays and I'm always a sucker for it.

 

[Brandon Rhea]

You're a Saturday morning cartoon.

Your idea works too. I do, though, like the idea that they were right there when the heroes were there. That just like Palpatine was blinded by his victories, so too were the heroes blinded by what they accomplished on Endor.

 

[Cortan]

Which is why I say having the Jedi Hunters be kind of a known part of why the Republic has been screwed over in the timeskip seems like it loads the backstory too much. Admittedly, if it were true, we're technically aware of spoilers, but it does feel like the sort of thing that's more fitting of a reveal - hence the example I gave of Luke looking into them and finally figuring out what's going on.

Mind you, Jedi Hunters could always just be a casting nickname. Ie, so people behind the scenes know whats being talked about without giving so much away.

 

[Brandon Rhea]

Which is why I say having the Jedi Hunters be kind of a known part of why the Republic has been screwed over in the timeskip seems like it loads the backstory too much. Admittedly, if it were true, we're technically aware of spoilers, but it does feel like the sort of thing that's more fitting of a reveal - hence the example I gave of Luke looking into them and finally figuring out what's going on.

Mind you, Jedi Hunters could always just be a casting nickname. Ie, so people behind the scenes know whats being talked about without giving so much away.

I could see Luke having been aware of them at the very least. Maybe he's spent his years trying to go after them and deal with them, and there's no New Jedi Order yet as a result.

 

[Kaeb]

Don't think it makes any sense tbh, if they were there, why wouldn't they do anything?

It makes more sense to me that the villains are created as it were, as a result of that conflict, rather then having been there, done nothing, then waited thirty years to do something.

And they don't have to be blinded, I don't think at any point they declared their victory over the Empire or that it was gone, they were celebrating a huge victory, but they can sure as as hell establish that it was simply a victory in an ongoing conflict. During this time, Luke trained Jedi, and the enemy trained Jedi Hunters using the Emperors teaching passed on to them.

The possibilities are numerous yes, but there's also a much simpler way of approaching it that allows for more sensible and engaging narrative.

 

[Brandon Rhea]

Don't think it makes any sense tbh, if they were there, why wouldn't they do anything?

They could be following whatever instructions Palpatine left for them, or decided to regroup, bide their time, and then **** with people from the shadows as they try to figure out how to resurrect the Sith.

 

[Kaeb]

Seems a little convoluted to me, mate.

 

[Cortan]

...Now I'm vaguely reminded of the Green Lantern Animated Series. The show there started off with things looking like business as usual in Guardian space, till it turned out that the lanterns they had situated at their farthest reaches ('Frontier Space') were being axed off by someone, and so Hal Jordan and Kilowog went off to investigate.

 

[Cainhurst Crow]

Everything sounds pretty good right up to the no new republic bit. The rebels weren't developed much during the original trilogy, and no new republic could mean we once again get no real development for them, they just didn't get anything done because 30 years of force sensitives stopping them. The emporer and vader both dying on endor should have had some impact in weakening the empire, even having a set up like the one we had in game, where the empire and republic both have territory they control and are fighting to maintain and expand themselves.

It could just be a victim of abbreviation in order to give a short summary of things from a semi-reliable account, and that things aren't as stagnant sounding on the rebels front as it seems. I really hope thats the case.

 

[Cainhurst Crow]

They could be following whatever instructions Palpatine left for them, or decided to regroup, bide their time, and then **** with people from the shadows as they try to figure out how to resurrect the Sith.

We're assuming this group of jedi hunters were as large 30 years ago as they are now. Could have been we only had 1 jedi hunter, who used the instructions to go off and train more, and to find those powerful enough to beat luke skywalker and the other jedi. 30 years of hellish training, conditioning, and preparation later, the 1 is now 3, and they're ready to take the galaxy.

During this time, Luke trained Jedi, and the enemy trained Jedi Hunters using the Emperors teaching passed on to them.

Pretty much like what kaeb said.

 

[Brandon Rhea]

Everything sounds pretty good right up to the no new republic bit. The rebels weren't developed much during the original trilogy, and no new republic could mean we once again get no real development for them, they just didn't get anything done because 30 years of force sensitives stopping them. The emporer and vader both dying on endor should have had some impact in weakening the empire, even having a set up like the one we had in game, where the empire and republic both have territory they control and are fighting to maintain and expand themselves.

It could just be a victim of abbreviation in order to give a short summary of things from a semi-reliable account, and that things aren't as stagnant sounding on the rebels front as it seems. I really hope thats the case.

I think people are getting too caught up in the semantics of "New Republic." There would probably be some sort of proto-government, an alliance of planets or something like that, that just hasn't grown into a New Republic yet.

Look at the United States. After 30 years, there were only 20 states. It took 115 years to stretch across the entire continent, and 172 years to have all 50 states it has now. I think it makes a lot of sense that it would take awhile for a proper new galactic-spanning republic to rise, especially when there's still likely some sort of Imperial Remnant out there.

I think people have been given an unrealistic expectation about a New Republic because the EU basically blinked one into existence after only a few years.

Seems a little convoluted to me, mate.

Seems pretty straight-forward to me. They, or s/he (depending on whether there was one or many), wouldn't have been in a position to strike on Endor, and they would've been doing what their master told them to do.