Question: On Dagobah, when Luke goes into the cave he finds Darth Vader and kills him, his helmet explodes and turns out Darth Vader is Luke. How does this make any sense?
Tailkinker
13th Dec 2012
Star Wars: Episode V - The Empire Strikes Back (1980)
Question: As far as I know, there were no plans for another trilogy after the first one released over 30 years ago. My question is, did Episode V always appear during the opening credits or was that added later in the special addition? If it was always apart of the credits, didn't people wonder why it was called episode V when it was the second movie? Would seem confusing.
Chosen answer: "Episode V" was in place right from the beginning, and the "Episode IV" tag was added to Star Wars in a re-release the following year. By this point, Lucas was already talking about doing a prequel trilogy covering the rise of the Empire at some future point, with allusions to a possible sequel trilogy consisting of Episodes VII though IX to follow.
18th Feb 2010
Star Wars: Episode V - The Empire Strikes Back (1980)
Question: Is it true that George Lucas will not let any Star Wars books/media reveal Yoda's species, last name, etc.?
Answer: Yes, it's quite true - for reasons that he's never explained, Lucas has always maintained a strict policy of not allowing any information about Yoda's species to be included in any publications. While he has allowed some details of Yoda's personal history to be revealed, details about the species as a whole, what they call themselves, where their homeworld is, their history and so forth, have been kept under wraps.
18th Jan 2010
Star Wars: Episode V - The Empire Strikes Back (1980)
Question: Why did Obi-wan say to Luke "You will go to the Dagobah system" as opposed to "You must go"? Was he simply giving him an order? Seems strange considering Luke was very close to freezing to death when he said it.
Chosen answer: Obi-wan's one with the Force at this point, so, given that the Force has been shown to grant precognitive visions, he may simply have seen that Luke survives and does go to Dagobah and is telling Luke that he will go there as a statement of fact. Or it could just be a bit poorly worded.
28th Jun 2009
Star Wars: Episode V - The Empire Strikes Back (1980)
Question: What is the celestial object seen at the end of The Empire Strikes Back? Is it the galaxy? Or something else?
Chosen answer: It's a galaxy. Given the distance that the fleet would have to be away from it in order to see the whole thing like that, it seem unlikely that it's intended to be the galaxy that the saga takes place in, but another one that's relatively close to it.
Answer: It is the Star Wars galaxy. Haven was the codename of the Rebel Alliance's predetermined rendezvous point far beyond the Galactic Rim, where the Alliance Fleet regrouped after the Rebellion's defeat at the Battle of Hoth in 3 ABY. The rendezvous point lay near the coordinates 2.427 by 3.886 by 673.52 above the galactic plane.
Question: Could someone please explain to me exactly how the Millennium Falcon is being flown. It appears to swoop in such a way like someone is steering it, but no one on board seems to be doing much more than pressing the odd button here or there. And it can't be autopilot because it seems to be doing exactly what those on board want. So does anyone know?
Chosen answer: Han has the control board in front of him - he has everything he needs to fly the ship to hand. We never get a particularly good look at the console, so we don't know precisely what format the controls are presented in, but that's what he's using.
11th Oct 2007
Star Wars: Episode V - The Empire Strikes Back (1980)
Question: Why was Darth Vader so intent on finding the Millennium Falcon if Luke wasn't even on it? Not only that, how could he even sense it at all, if it was only Luke's presence he could feel through the Force? Was he actually sensing Leia but mistaking her for Luke?
Answer: There are two options with regard to the Falcon; either Luke's on-board, in which case Vader needs to track it down to capture him, or he isn't, in which case the people who are on-board will be excellent bait to draw Luke into his trap. Either way, he needs to find the ship. Jedi can sense the presence of living beings, not just other Force sensitives, so there's no particular reason why he shouldn't be able to sense the Falcon's crew. There's no particular indication that he's mistaking Leia's force sense for Luke's - if he was, then he'd immediately realise his mistake and, in all likelihood, that she's his daughter when he met up with her later in the film. Which he doesn't.
14th Jun 2007
Star Wars: Episode V - The Empire Strikes Back (1980)
Question: Approximately how long does Luke train with Yoda on Dagobah?
Answer: It's never made clear. The only rough indication of time is that, when discussing which system to hide out in, Han comments that Bespin is a long way but that he thinks they can make it, which suggests a flight of considerable duration. Given that we're talking about two different star systems (Anoat and Bespin), even if those stars are unusually close together, without the hyperdrive operational, the flight must be reckoned of the order of some months. This would also tie in with Yoda apparently having taught Luke a considerable amount despite considering him too old and too set in his ways to learn properly.
22nd Nov 2005
Star Wars: Episode V - The Empire Strikes Back (1980)
Question: Is there supposed to be some kind of trivia when C3P0 says the odds of surviving are 725 to 1, 3720 to 1?
Chosen answer: No, they're just numbers.
27th Jul 2005
Star Wars: Episode V - The Empire Strikes Back (1980)
Question: How come it takes such a long time for the Super Star destroyer to be able to catch the Millennium Falcon in the tractor beam? In episode 4 when Millennium Falcon is captured by the Death Star, it is caught in the tractor beam immediately, and from a much greater distance. I understand the plot requires the Millennium Falcon to escape, but this seems a bit illogical.
Chosen answer: The sheer size of the Death Star and its colossal power generators would allow it to have a much more powerful tractor beam than any capital ship would be capable of supporting, giving it much greater range. The Millenium Falcon was caught quickly because they were unaware of what they were approaching - by the time they realised, they were already captured. With the Star Destroyer, they're aware of its presence and can take steps to avoid a tractor beam lock-on.
13th Jun 2005
Star Wars: Episode V - The Empire Strikes Back (1980)
Question: In the battle of Hoth, when Han and Leia are at the command center, we hear a voice saying "Imperial troops have entered the base" but this happens before General Veers has destroyed the power generator. How is it possible for them to enter when the shield is still up?
Chosen answer: The shield prevents ship from landing close to the base and stops any orbital bombardment; it's not designed to prevent actual entry to the base. As such, the Imperial Walkers were landed a long way out, then they simply walked in under the shield, much as the probe droid did earlier. The ground troops simply came in with the walkers, disembarked and entered the base - the shield wasn't in their way.
It got corrected on the 4K release.
13th Jun 2005
Star Wars: Episode V - The Empire Strikes Back (1980)
Question: Why didn't Luke just stay in the cave and wait until the next morning to contact the Rebel base? Isn't the cave just as adequate a shelter as what Han dug for him?
Chosen answer: There's still a very large and annoyed Wampa in there, and there could easily be others in the depths of the cave. Running out into the cold may not be the most sensible move in the world, but it's reasonably understandable.
Question: When Luke is about to take off in his X-Wing while training on Dagobah to save Leia and Han, Obi-Wan says "That boy was our only hope," but Yoda says "No. There is another." Who is this "other" Yoda is talking about?
Answer: As we find out in Return of the Jedi, Luke's twin sister, Leia.
27th Oct 2004
Star Wars: Episode V - The Empire Strikes Back (1980)
Question: Yoda always makes a huge deal about Anakin's age in Episode 2, being too old to start training as a Jedi. Yet in Episode 5, he barely hesitates before training Luke, a full grown man. We are made to think that even a young boy is a lost cause, so wouldn't a man be impossible to train? Unlike Anakin, Luke had never displayed any Force characteristics (except for piloting in the Battle of Yavin).
Answer: In Episode 1, he's clearly reluctant to train Anakin at all, obviously sensing something that troubles him. The age issue may have been something of a smokescreen, but it is clear that Jedi training starts at a very early age - Anakin is well past that age already. With training Luke in Episode 5, what other choice does Yoda have? If the Emperor and Vader are to be brought down, it's pretty much Luke, Leia (who obviously has the same age issues) or nobody.
14th May 2004
Star Wars: Episode V - The Empire Strikes Back (1980)
Question: I've always been a little confused by Luke's "failure in the cave." What exactly should Luke have done to actually pass this test? And why did his face appear inside the mask of the image of Darth Vader?
Chosen answer: Luke failed the test before he even entered the cave - Yoda tells him to leave his weapons behind, but Luke takes them anyway. Seeing his face within Vader's mask is a warning that, if he embraces the path of violence (as he has by taking his weapons into the cave with him) then he could end up falling to the Dark Side as Vader did.
12th Dec 2003
Star Wars: Episode V - The Empire Strikes Back (1980)
Question: If the rebels have an ion cannon that can disable a Star Destroyer in orbit, why not use it on the AT-ATs instead of sending pilots to their death? I know it wouldn't be as cool without the ground combat with the snowspeeders, but it is a good question, I think.
Chosen answer: The ion cannon is designed for taking out large capital ships in orbit. It's not precise enough for use in ground combat situations. It's also highly likely that the Imperial forces would have detected the ion cannon from orbit, and would send in their ground troops from a direction where the ion cannon couldn't target them, just in case the Rebels were nuts enough to try it anyway.
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Chosen answer: Luke is seeing visions relating to possible futures. In this case, it's effectively a warning that, if he embraces the path of violence, which he has at this point by keeping his weapons with him when Yoda told him to leave them behind, then he risks falling to the Dark Side and becoming just as bad as Vader.
Tailkinker ★