Question: When C-3PO meets Luke, he says that R2-D2 claims that they are both the property of Obi-Wan Kenobi. Since both of their memories were erased at the end of Revenge of the Sith, how could R2-D2 remember belonging to Obi-Wan but C-3PO doesn't?
Tailkinker
1st May 2014
Star Wars (1977)
Answer: At the end of Revenge of the Sith, Bail Organa said to wipe 3PO's mind. He didn't say anything about R2. In fact, R2 laughed at 3PO's reaction. Why would he do that if he was being wiped as well?
Answer: R2 D2 did not have his memory intact. Princess Leia gave him specific orders to find Obi-Wan and give the information to him and him alone. Since the information is in the Droid and it belongs to Obi-Wan, therefore he belongs to him.
This is speculation. If we consider Revenge of the Sith, it's plain R2's memory was not wiped. If we only look at what's in A New Hope, there's nothing to indicate it was wiped. In fact, R2's behavior suggests he knows far more about what's going on than C-3PO.
6th Apr 2012
Star Wars (1977)
Question: When Luke has an argument with Owen and Beru and storms out, Beru says to Owen "He's too much like his father", to which Owen says "I know. That's what I'm afraid of". But if Luke is like Anakin (as Owen and Beru fear), then what caused Luke to not go to the dark side like his father did, if Luke had all this frustration of wanting more control in this movie like his father did when he was younger?
Answer: Luke, despite his typically youthful frustrations, has been raised in a loving family environment. Compared to his father, who was separated from his mother at an early age, leaving her in slavery, raised by the strict Jedi Order, ended up in a secret marriage that he was unable to acknowledge and had a Sith Lord working on manipulating him from the age of ten onwards, Luke's frustrations are nothing.
30th Sep 2010
Star Wars (1977)
Question: I submitted a mistake where the soldiers hear the blockade runner docking with the star destoyer before they come into contact. Someone corrected me saying that they were hearing the effects of a tractor beam on the ship. Does the book mention a tractor beam being used to capture the ship?
Answer: The blockade runner's not going to be docking willingly with the Star Destroyer that's been shooting at it. Something has to be moving the runner into the docking bay, and use of a tractor beam to capture ships is established elsewhere in the movies. It's a reasonable assumption that the same system is used in this scene.
18th Sep 2009
Star Wars (1977)
Question: I read that Mace Windu was originally going to be in this movie. Does anyone know if this is true?
Answer: Sort of. The name "Mace Windu" dates back to the very first story treatment that George Lucas wrote in 1973, however the character bears no resemblence to the distinguished Jedi Master of the prequel trilogy. In the rough draft, the name is given to a brother of Leia's, while a later draft has the character as a friend of Luke's. The name was ultimately dropped from the script entirely, only to be reintroduced when choosing names for the Jedi council members decades later for the prequels.
29th May 2009
Star Wars (1977)
Question: Why isn't Darth Vader's and Obi-Wan Kenobi's duel aboard the Death Star as good as the lightsaber duels in Episodes 1, 2, & 3? Is there any reason?
Chosen answer: In reality terms, fight choreography was simply not as advanced in those days. From the story point of view, neither man is exactly at their prime any more. Vader is more machine than man and Kenobi is simply getting old and has not been practicing the Force regularly for nearly two decades. When the prequel trilogy was being put together, it was recognised that the story would be dealing with Jedi at the height of their abilities and thus the filmmakers developed a much more complex and detailed combat form for the Jedi characters to use.
Answer: They had to hold their lightsaber props at a certain angle for the specific effect. Because of this, they couldn't move their props like in later movies.
5th Apr 2009
Star Wars (1977)
Question: There's a line in this movie - I think - in which Obi-Wan mentions that Yoda was his master. But wasn't Qui-Gon Jin actually Obi-Wan's master?
Chosen answer: Yoda isn't mentioned in this film - you're actually thinking of The Empire Strikes Back, but I know the line that you mean - Obi-Wan refers to Yoda as "the Jedi Master who instructed me". While Yoda was not "his" master (as you say, that was Qui-Gon), his description is technically accurate - Yoda is a Jedi Master and, as we see in Attack of the Clones, appears to take responsibility for training the young Jedi hopefuls, the younglings, as they're referred to, so would undoubtedly have had a hand in Kenobi's training at some point.
And he was instructed to complete missions by Yoda.
29th Mar 2009
Star Wars (1977)
Question: I never understood why the officer who is disrespectful to Vader in the meeting (on the Death Star) calls the Force an "ancient religion". If I remember correctly, at the moment, Vader only mentions the Force, not the Sith or Jedi. Since it has only been 19 or 20 years since the Jedi were defeated, wouldn't the Force still be something that a lot of people, around age 35 and older, could remember and have knowledge of?
Answer: Following the Force has been going on for millenia - "ancient" by any standards, so his description is hardly unreasonable. Yes, there will be plenty of people old enough to remember when the Jedi were around, but that doesn't mean that they're under any obligation to show respect for it, particularly as the public perception is that the Jedi died as traitors. Motti regards Vader with contempt, seeing him as a throwback, clinging to an ancient, outdated and reviled superstition. Hence his disrespectful and insulting attitude.
I believe Palpatine also took steps to discredit the idea of the Jedi as superhero with Force powers (pretty sure I read that at some point). If Motti had never seen a Jedi in action before, he might have bought into those ideas and not considered the Force to be a real thing, or at least not what it is was said to be.
6th Nov 2008
Star Wars (1977)
Question: If characters such as Luke and Obi-Wan are human, how come they are in a galaxy far, far away?
Answer: Well, it's also a "long time ago", so it doesn't rule out the possibility that the human inhabitants of Earth travelled here from there. Could also be a simple case of parallel evolution and the filmmakers refer to the species as "human" for convenience, in the same way that the standard Star Wars language is represented as present-day English, despite the fact that it obviously wouldn't be.
Answer: Why shouldn't humans be there? Maybe a god/gods created humans on multiple planets. Maybe humans have evolved and developed on multiple planets, multiple times. In the Battlestar Galactica series, it's established that "all of this has happened before" - the human race advances to a certain point, then they create the Cylons that destroy nearly all of them. The survivors find a place to start over and produce new generations, who will create Cylons again someday. You could imagine something similar about the Star Wars universe, or imagine any other explanation.
Answer: We don't know they're "human" as we understand it anyway, despite the use of the word which may be a translation, as mentioned already (their alphabet isn't Roman, for a start). Like The Doctor or any number of humanoid races in sci-fi who resemble us externally but aren't homo sapiens.
6th Nov 2008
Star Wars (1977)
Question: If dates in the Star Wars universe are based on when events took place in relation to the Battle of Yavin, what date system was used up to and during the battle?
Answer: The Galactic Standard Calendar has been used consistently in the Star Wars universe for thousands of years and is, from its alternate name of the Coruscant Standard Calendar, probably based on the Coruscanti year length. Each new regime that has ruled the Star Wars galaxy has tended to reset the clock, as it were, so the Empire tended to count years from when Palpatine declared himself Emperor in 19BBY, during the events of Episode III. The Old Republic started their count thousands of years earlier, when it was founded. When the Empire fell to make way for the New Republic, they chose to start their calendar from the year of the Battle of Yavin, the year when they struck their first huge blow against the Empire.
19th Dec 2007
Star Wars (1977)
Question: This goes for Episodes IV, V and VI. What are the little droid things that roll around on the ground in the Death Star?
Answer: These are the MSE (or Mouse) droids, who typically carry out minor maintenance or cleaning procedures but can also be assigned other tasks, such as carrying messages in the event that a comlink system is considered insecure, or leading individuals or groups to a particular area. Because of their occasional security related functions, they are designed to self-destruct in the event of capture, accounting for their somewhat nervous disposition.
10th Nov 2007
Star Wars (1977)
Question: Is there any information, either from the the films or EU, about the specifications of the various weapons in the saga, such as Solo's blaster, or the Stormtrooper's rifles? How do they work? What do they fire etc?
Answer: Being fictional weaponry, precise details can be hard to come by and may potentially be contradictory as different authors provide different interpretations. Much information on the different types of weaponry used across the Star Wars universe and what's known about how they operate (often very little) can be found here.
14th Jun 2007
Star Wars (1977)
Question: I haven't read all of the Star Wars books, but one mentions Prince Xizor being involved in Owen and Beru's death. Was he?
Answer: No, he wasn't. Xizor didn't learn about Luke until the events of The Empire Strikes Back, when he listened in on the holocomm conversation between Vader and the Emperor, a couple of years after Owen and Beru were killed by the stormtroopers. He had no reason to be interested in a couple of moisture farmers.
18th Mar 2007
Star Wars (1977)
Question: Does anyone know how or if Obi-Wan was going to pay Han for taking him and Luke to Alderaan, if they had gotten there? If he had 17,000, why didn't he just pay the 10,000 that Han originally wanted?
Answer: In the next scene, after leaving the bar, Obi-Wan says, "You'll have to sell your speeder" to Luke. He replies, "Good, I'm never coming back here again." He also agrees to the price for passage, the extra is to insure that Han delivers them. No double crosses or selling them out to the Empire.
Answer: He didn't have it - he was presumably expecting that Bail Organa would provide the money on their arrival. That's why he upped the fee, to get Han to take him and Luke despite not receiving much money up front.
Answer: Obi Wan does not know or trust Han Solo. He had no money other than the 2,000 for Luke's speeder, but even if he had the full amount, he would not have paid Han the additional 15,000 until he had safely delivered him, Luke, and the droids to Alderan. He offers the higher amount knowing it is less likely that Han will just take the 2,000 and run out or turn them over to the Empire for a reward. Obi Wan had no doubts that the Alderan government would pay the remainder of the fee, considering he was there at Princess Leia's request and how important the information was inside R2D2.
11th May 2006
Star Wars (1977)
Question: What's with Obi-Wan disappearing when he dies? I mean, I've never seen anyone else in the Star Wars 6-logy do it.
Answer: Yoda does it as well. This is linked to the bit at the end of Episode 3 when Yoda tells Obi-wan that his old mentor Qui-gon has managed to 'return' through the Force and instructs him to learn how this can be done. As such, when they die, both Yoda and Obi-wan are, in some unexplained manner, absorbed into the Force - this is what allowed Obi-wan to continue to communicate with Luke during the subsequent films.
2nd Feb 2006
Star Wars (1977)
Question: How long is it between the three films, "A New Hope" and "Empire Strikes Back" and then "Return of the Jedi"? Did it take years or merely months? I'm sure they wouldn't wait for a year to save Han Solo from Jabba the Hutt.
Answer: There's about three years between ANH and ESB, with the best part of a year elapsing before the events of ROTJ - it was indeed that long before they were able to break Han out of captivity.
3rd Aug 2005
Star Wars (1977)
Question: How was it possible for Vader to survive when his ship was dashed out into space from the Death Star before it was destroyed? When the TIE fighter crosses Millennium Falcon Obi-Van says "A fighter that size couldn't get this deep into space on its own" and "It would be as well to let it go, it's too far out of range" and Vader's ship is about the same size. Could we assume his ship was some sort of special long-range fighter, or that he was lucky enough to reach an imperial base or catch up with a convoy?
Chosen answer: Vader's ship was a prototype of the TIE-Advanced, an enhanced model that ultimately proved too expensive to be mass-produced. Part of the reason for that expense was that the fighter was equipped with a hyperdrive, allowing Vader to reach safety with little trouble.
6th Jul 2005
Star Wars (1977)
Question: There's a HUGE rumor that's been going around since Return of the Jedi came out: There's actually three more scripts (besides the prequels). Is there, in fact, a Star Wars: Episode VII, Episode VIII, and Episode IX? If so, what are they about?
Answer: While planning Star Wars, Lucas had a vague notion of doing a long series of movies inspired by old serials, then dropped that idea in favor of just one. When Star Wars became a phenomenon and sequels became feasible, Lucas revisited the idea. He thought of three trilogies along with some stand-alone "in-between" stories for a total of 12 films. By the time of The Empire Strikes Back's release, this was pared down to the 9 mainline films, going by interviews with Lucas and the cast at the time. By Return of the Jedi, Lucas had decided to end the saga there, with the option that he could revisit the first three at some later point. It's unclear if Lucas ever had any specific story ideas for the proposed sequel trilogy, and they never had any scripts. Producer Gary Kurtz suggested in an interview they would've been about Luke's twin sister (not Leia), though many fans are skeptical about just how much he would know about them. Of course since this question was asked a sequel trilogy was written and released.
Answer: This was long a long-standing rumour, but George Lucas always denied it. He allowed various authors to cover the history of that time period in book form - if he'd had any serious intention of doing films set in that timeframe, he wouldn't have done that. Since that time of course Disney took over the franchise and has announced new films, but entirely separate from the previous "expanded universe" of the novels, and not involving any ideas George Lucas may have had in the past.
Answer: I'm not sure how old this question is but it is a sequel trilogy. Episode VII : The Force Awakens is about a scavenger and former stormtrooper teaming up the Resistance to attempt to defeat the new First Order and Kylo Ren (Ben Solo). Episode VIII : The Last Jedi is about Rey finding Luke Skywalker who is in exile hoping that he would be left alone, and he tells the story of how he tried to murder his nephew who in retaliation, turned to the dark side. Episode IX : Rise of Skywalker is about the return of Emperor Palpatine and recovering Sith Wayfinders that will lead them to Exegol and kill him, with Billy Dee Williams returning as Lando Calrissian.
13th Jun 2005
Star Wars (1977)
Question: How is it that Princess Leia, in the hologram, knows who Obi-Wan is? And yet Luke doesn't. How could she possibly know who he is when, in Episode III, the only time she "sees" Obi-Wan is when she is an infant.
Answer: She's never met him, but has been told about him by her adoptive father, Bail Organa, who gave her the mission to go and collect Obi-Wan.
14th Dec 2004
Star Wars (1977)
Question: One of the corrections says that there is a scene where Obi-Wan talks about duck with Luke. Where is this scene? I can't seem to find it.
Answer: There's no version of the film that this appears in, and I've checked the original, the special edition and the DVD release. I believe that it was in the original novelisation, but that the scene was either cut before release, or the author simply added it to flesh things out. In any event, it shouldn't be considered a canonical scene, so the correction in question should probably be considered invalid.
16th Nov 2004
Star Wars (1977)
Question: Did they change the CG Jabba the Hutt's appearance? It looked like he was a lot more green than in the original special edition. If they did, then why? I thought he looked fine in the original.
Answer: Yes, they have altered Jabba a bit - after he appeared in Episode I, they tweaked the model used in the special edition to bring it closer to what we've seen elsewhere.
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Answer: Only C-3PO's mind was wiped - if you listen to the dialogue, the order given specifies "the protocol droid" for memory erasure; R2-D2's memory remains intact. That being said, as neither droid in fact ever belonged to Kenobi, it's fairly clear that Artoo is simply being devious in the hope of being taken to the intended recipient of the message that he's carrying, a lie that he could have told quite readily even if his memory had been wiped at some point.
Tailkinker ★