Star Wars PODs: Episode I

Abdul Hadi Pasha · Jul 16, 2004

WI when Qui-gon radioed back to the ship to ask Obi-Wan if he found anything of value, and Obi-Wan replied, "No, nothing of value, just our provisions, AND THE QUEEN'S WARDROBE", there had been a five-year-old child present who could have pointed out "each of those outfits is crusted with gems the size of basketballs, you twit.", and "why don't you just peel the chrome off the ship?"

Or WI, as QUEEN OF AN ENTIRE PLANET, Amidala upon returning to Naboo hadn't been cheap beyond the ability of the human mind to grasp and ponied up to buy Anakin's mother's freedom?

ljofa · Jul 16, 2004

Given as many planets have been colonised and rocky, barren planets are mined, gemstones are more common in the SW Universe and hence cheaper. Rarer crystals are the ones that are valuable and not generally the ones put on the dresses of the queen.

Perhaps the Naboo have some anally retentive accountants.

Torqumada · Jul 16, 2004

Something abotu the first movie always bugged me.

Lightsabers are basically controlled lasers right? That means they burn through things, like metal, armor, flesh etc.. What if, when Qui Gon took that lightsaber to the stomach, instead of falling the the ground like he had the life sucked out of him, realises that the lightsaber has put a hole in his body, but also completely cauterised the wound, allowing him to live long enough to continue fighting, help defat Maul and then go on to seek proper medical treatment?

Torqumada

marl_d · Jul 16, 2004

well i don't know about you, but to have a laser shoved through your gut would be extremly painful to me. even though the wounds are cauterised the pain and shock from a lightsaber shoved through it no matter how good of Jedi he is that would cause anyone to double over and fall unconsious. besides he probably went into a Jedi healing trance to get Obi-Wan to take Anakin as a padawan

ljofa · Jul 17, 2004

Perhaps it ruptured several organs at once...

Michael · Jul 17, 2004

I want to know why the lightsabers stop, if they are a laser what prevents them from shooting off into infinity?

Torqumada · Jul 17, 2004

ljofa said:
Perhaps it ruptured several organs at once...

Even so, they would have immediately been cauterized, so there wouldn't be any blood loss. We didn't get a big spray of blood when Anakin or Luke lose their hands due to the cauterisig effects. He still wouldn't have been dead immediately. He would have at least had time to leave the area and seek medical attention. People shot or stabbed in the abdomen do not die immediately, despite what Hollywood says. (think of all the scenes with people fighting over a gun, with the gun pressed against the stomachs, it fires and one drops dead. Doesn't happen that way) I have never had a pateint that has been shot or stabbed in the abdomen die on me. There aren't any destroy and you die now organs in the abdomen. There are some destroy and you die in a week or 2 organs there. Now if Qui-gon's head had been chopped off, or he took the lightsaber to the chest and it got the heart, THEN I could see him dropping to the ground dead. Heck, if he hadn't dropped down a power shaft, its possible that Darth Maul could have made it too, since all of his vital organs etc.. were intact. Just more bad movie logic.

Torqumada

Xen · Jul 24, 2004

Abdul Hadi Pasha said:
Or WI, as QUEEN OF AN ENTIRE PLANET, Amidala upon returning to Naboo hadn't been cheap beyond the ability of the human mind to grasp and ponied up to buy Anakin's mother's freedom?

Thats something I thought of too. Watto didnt take credits right? He was a junk dealer, so her planets money would do no good, and would be needed to rebuild. However, what attacked Naboo? A droid army, many droids and ships were destroyed I am sure Naboo could have spared a few parts to their destroyed ships and those parts of the droids to trade Watto for Shmi's freedom. Whats more, the Naboo could have put her up in some homestead around Theed and helped get her a job for an antique dealer or something. If all those people were killed, Im sure there were some who didnt have family to leave their homes too so there would be places for Shmi to live. Thus Anakin does not worry about his mother while trying to become a Jedi, she's safe on Naboo, free and out of danger.

Xen · Jul 24, 2004

Michael said:
I want to know why the lightsabers stop, if they are a laser what prevents them from shooting off into infinity?

basically they are frozen lasers. The original lightsabers the early Jedi used were blasters that would freeze when they reach a certain distance. Those ancient lightsabers were heavy and required a power cord and a power pack to use. With "modern" technology they figured out how to make them more compact.

Flakktrooper · Jul 26, 2004

The lightsaber system is somewhat explained in the Clone Wars mirco-series. They are powered by some specials crystals. The Jedi's protecting them on some ice world are attacked and Yoda has to bail them out.

Xen · Jul 26, 2004

Those Jedi werent the guardians of the crystals. The planet was supposed to be a secret, only the Jedi and a few trusted individuals in the Republic knew of the world. The secret was betrayed by Dooku.

I cant remember those two Jedi names, but they appeared in Episode II and fought at Geonosis.

NapoleonXIV · May 16, 2005

Maybe she couldn't afford Anakins's mother's slave price out of her allowance. How does a 14 year old girl get elected Queen of an entire planet anyway?

ljofa · May 16, 2005

She just did. Accept it.

Thande · May 16, 2005

AFAIK lightsabers work by projecting a sort of loops of energy that extends upwards from the projection crystal to a preset distance, then turns and feeds back into it (the two parts of the loop being so close together that they look like a single cylinder of light). Not sure how that's supposed to happen, though.

MrP · May 16, 2005

Science of Star Wars posits the theory that lightsabres may be plasma loops. Though it's unable to say quite why the plasma loop is in such a narrow form.

Qui Gon Jinn: Don't have t'film with me, so could somebody check if possible? Sure, being stabbed in the belly might not incapacitate. However, if the sabre perforates his spine, that's easily knock out his motor control of his lower limbs. Shock and pain could have effected him more quickly than he was effectively able to counter - leaving him literally in a state of shock, and incapable of further defending himself. We got any medics on here who could say how feasible this might be?

MerryPrankster · May 16, 2005

NapoleonXIV said:
Maybe she couldn't afford Anakins's mother's slave price out of her allowance. How does a 14 year old girl get elected Queen of an entire planet anyway?

The back-story has Padme/Amidala as a child prodigy, only instead of piano or calculus it's politics.

Besides, I think that the previous administration was REALLY corrupt, so any alternative would have been better.

Besides, owing to different orbital lengths, she was probably a bit older than 14 Earth years.

Glen · May 16, 2005

Torqumada said:
Even so, they would have immediately been cauterized, so there wouldn't be any blood loss. We didn't get a big spray of blood when Anakin or Luke lose their hands due to the cauterisig effects. He still wouldn't have been dead immediately. He would have at least had time to leave the area and seek medical attention. People shot or stabbed in the abdomen do not die immediately, despite what Hollywood says. (think of all the scenes with people fighting over a gun, with the gun pressed against the stomachs, it fires and one drops dead. Doesn't happen that way) I have never had a pateint that has been shot or stabbed in the abdomen die on me. There aren't any destroy and you die now organs in the abdomen. There are some destroy and you die in a week or 2 organs there. Now if Qui-gon's head had been chopped off, or he took the lightsaber to the chest and it got the heart, THEN I could see him dropping to the ground dead. Heck, if he hadn't dropped down a power shaft, its possible that Darth Maul could have made it too, since all of his vital organs etc.. were intact. Just more bad movie logic.

Torqumada

Organs no, blood vessels, yes. A large puncture of the descending aorta will kill pretty rapidly. It may be 'cauterized', but this is a large bore vessel that will not be sealed by the heat. He could bleed out very very rapidly, and probably would crumple even earlier.

NapoleonXIV · May 16, 2005

MerryPrankster said:
The back-story has Padme/Amidala as a child prodigy, only instead of piano or calculus it's politics.

Besides, I think that the previous administration was REALLY corrupt, so any alternative would have been better.

Besides, owing to different orbital lengths, she was probably a bit older than 14 Earth years.

That's an odd concept. I've never heard of one on Earth

It's sort of like with writing, there simply are no real child prodigies because a child can't do it, even if they had the genius with language they would lack the experience necessary to apply the concept. Form without substance, information without understanding.

However, there are exceptions. Baudelaire and Raymond Radriquet both come to mind, but both of them quit writing, then either went crazy and suicided or ran off and died young. It seems the type of thing that burns one out

I wonder, could Lucas be saying that the same thing is happening here? It might explain Padme's attraction to this strange little bad boy who grows up so quick; as well as it's tragic consequences.

ljofa · May 16, 2005

This thread appeared before, we calculated that Amidala was 16 in Naboo years or 18 in Earth years at the time of the film. When elected she was 14 in Naboo years or 16 in Earth years. She began her "political" career at aged 8 volunteering with refugees and went on to the Administrative programme. She became a regional leader and was asked to be Queen when King Veruna was forced into exile.

MerryPrankster · May 16, 2005

NapoleonXIV said:
That's an odd concept. I've never heard of one on Earth

It's sort of like with writing, there simply are no real child prodigies because a child can't do it, even if they had the genius with language they would lack the experience necessary to apply the concept. Form without substance, information without understanding.

However, there are exceptions. Baudelaire and Raymond Radriquet both come to mind, but both of them quit writing, then either went crazy and suicided or ran off and died young. It seems the type of thing that burns one out

I wonder, could Lucas be saying that the same thing is happening here? It might explain Padme's attraction to this strange little bad boy who grows up so quick; as well as it's tragic consequences.

That might work, although Padme seems to be more functional than these two folks you're describing. She does seem rather impulsive at times (the two heading for Geonosis to rescue Obi-Wan on their own, for example), but I don't see any self-destructive tendencies.

On the matter of a child-prodigy-with-politics, in an earlier threat I was under the impression you suggested the concept.