#Grand Inquisitor

[apas-75]

So last night I finished reading Rise of the Red Blade for TotE Vibes Research purposes and the two Inquisitor characters in it really illustrate exactly why I think Barriss is going to survive and escape them.

Because the thing is that there are two kinds of Inquisitors! The ones who volunteered, and the ones who...didn’t. Iskat (RotRB’s focus character) perfectly exemplifies the first type: she had some traumatizing experiences at a young age, fell through a number of institutional cracks in the Order, had a really terrible master (meet me in the pit, Sember Vey), everyone was too busy to give her the follow-up they would under normal circumstances, Palpatine had an agent actively gathering information about her and pushing her to become Worse—she was a pre-selected candidate who was offered the choice to come quietly when Order 66 hit, and she took it. By that point all of her issues and doubts had been exacerbated to the point where it wasn’t hard for her to make herself hate the Jedi, and then she rationalized her way through any indication that her freedom was a lie and doubled her way down right into hell.

By contrast: Tualon, Iskat’s crechemate situationship guy. He had some issues but was not someone on Palpatine’s radar; Iskat left him to die in Order 66 and he survived getting shot by darksiding out about her betrayal. Because of that he was taken alive and they did some shit to him. When Iskat runs into him at the Inquisitor HQ after he’s freshly-inducted he can barely remember why he hates her, or anything else from before he was taken. He woke up in the room where you fight Trilla and they fully shattered him and glued a semblance of a person back together out of the wreckage, just COMPLETELY Winter Soldiered the guy, and the only way he had to cope with it is to lean into a weird codependent situationship with Iskat.

And that distinction’s always been there with the Inquisitors; you have the true believers who ended up hating the Jedi or wanted to go on a power trip (or had the kind of revenge plan only a 12 year old could come up with and then stick to for a decade, in one case) and didn’t need any additional coercion to volunteer, and you have the ones that they broke. In the former group you’ve got the Grand Inquisitor, Reva/Third, Lyn/Fourth*, Fifth, and Iskat/Thirteenth. For the most part they’re certified freaks, but they came by it naturally. (Reva’s a different flavor.) In the latter, you’ve got Trilla/Second, Seventh, Masana/Ninth, Tualon, and probably most of the others. They all got disassembled and reassembled without much care given to the process and are all Coping with it badly in different ways, whether by deciding it’s Empowering, Actually (Trilla & Seventh) or by becoming completely jaded about everything (Masana & Tualon).

(*We obviously don’t know a lot about Fourth yet, but the fact that she shows up to recruit Barriss while rocking yellow dark side eyes before ROTS is even over tells me she’s definitely a volunteer.)

All this is to say: The Grand Inquisitor is making a colossal mistake with Barriss from the drop, and it’s why I think she’s going to win their battle of wits and escape. Because he is treating her like she is an Iskat and she could not be any farther from it.

He sends Lyn to get her to come quietly! They actively withhold information from her about what happened to the Jedi and what her expected role in it is! That’s not how they recruit the ones they think will be a problem; if that were the case she would have been stunned out of hand and woken up on a rack.

Instead, he’s giving her special attention,, he’s training her—he doesn’t think they need to break her. She’s just got a few...pesky hang-ups from her time as a Jedi that need ironing out**. He’s projecting on her; he doesn’t just want an empty shell holding a lightsaber—he wants Barriss Offee, loyally kneeling at his side, fully believing in their mission. She’s his favorite.

(**That “mercy only breeds defeat” line isn’t just a generic darksidism; I’m pretty sure he’s directly critiquing how Barriss got caught because she showed mercy to Asajj Ventress.)

And surely that's something he can turn her into, right? Because she hates the Jedi, right? She attacked them, she outsmarted them, obviously she’d be down for wanting to wipe them out! He was there when she confessed and, like pretty much everyone else in the room save for Ahsoka, he didn’t hear a single word that she said—just what he wanted her to be saying. He’s got a deeply incorrect idea of her, and that idea is “she’s just like me for real.”

And he’s wrong, because the Inquisitorius is everything she feared the Jedi Order was becoming—literally, an army fighting for the dark side—and the Empire is everything she knew the Republic was becoming. She might be prone to despairing, it might in some hypothetical be possible to get her into the same resigned despair trap as Anakin, but she would never actually want to serve the Empire, and they don't think they'll have to try hard to convince her to.

She loves the Jedi, she loved being a Jedi, she wanted to save them. She wants to be one again more than anything even though right now she thinks she doesn’t deserve it, thinks that she’s already too broken to reclaim what she was. But I think being surrounded by actual fallen Jedi and being told over and over again that she’s like them is, in the end, going to be what reminds her that she never stopped being a Jedi in the first place.

And as long as she can make sure her captors don't realize that's true until it's too late, she'll be home free.

[ventresses]

Star Wars + Text Posts & Headlines

Obi-Wan Kenobi (2022)

[gffa]

Rebels 10th Anniversary Cover Variants | by Caspar Wijngaard

[soranatus]

Barriss Offee & The Temple Guard/Grand Inquisitor

The Wrong Jedi (2013) Tales of the Empire (2024)

[dindjarism]

Mercy only breeds defeat. But I will help you overcome this weakness. Attack! BARRISS OFFEE and GRAND INQUISITOR STAR WARS: TALES OF THE EMPIRE Official trailer | May 4, 2024

[billykcplan]

STAR WARS CHARACTERS ↪  animation to live action

[pileofsith]

watchful

[bisexualvader]

Star Wars - Tales of the Empire (2024)

[aaeeart]

(commission info)

Screenshot redraw of that one very cool duel <3

[ihaveastarwarsobsession]

Reva: I survived getting stabbed

Grand Inquisitor: I survived getting stabbed

Anakin: I survived getting all my limbs chopped off

Maul: I survived getting cut in half

Sabine: And now I survived getting stabbed

Qui-Gon and Satine...

[inquisitorius-sin-bin]

"Why are we here?"

"Because Master Drallig said my Form III was 'less than ideal'."

"...It could be improved. But you misunderstand. Why are we here?"

"Well... none of the others will spar with me outside designated training. They say I should focus elsewhere, that there's more to life than combat. That I should take up some study. Only you said yes."

"It never hurts to be prepared."

"Especially now! I'm glad you understand."

"Understand? Yes. However, our companions are not wrong. Not all training happens here."

"Yet, here you are. Is there somewhere else you'd rather be?"

"...I go where I am needed. But, yes... there is."

"And that is?"

"The Archives."

"Truly? And what sort of training do you get there?"

"There is much to learn. Things that could improve our knowledge of the Force. Insights into our enemies. The wisdom of ancient Force-users come and gone."

"Aha, I see. I believe you and I are alike."

"How so?"

"We both want more. To be stronger. You wish to practice your mind out there, and I want to sharpen my skills in here."

"To protect the Order, we must be well rounded in all aspects. I'm sure we have been placed accordingly."

"I suppose... but shouldn't we be prepared for a Separatist attack?

"We are. That is what your training hours are for. You would never have been allowed into the guard if you were not capable."

"Do you really believe that?"

"Lower your blade. We can continue some other time."

Taglist (ask to join):

@oh-three @nobody-expects-the-inquisitorius @keebeees @stardustbee @askthewhiteboard @dukeoftheblackstar

[ventresses]

Star Wars + Text Posts & Headlines

Obi-Wan Kenobi (2022), pt. 2

[gffa]

Obi-Wan Kenobi Covers by Phil Noto

[disast3rtransp0rt]

Grand Inquisitor: Why are we going after one singular old-ass Jedi when we could be wiping out an entire branch of Rebel intelligence?

Darth Vader: I am the manager of this flying Hot Topic and you will do as I fucking ask, do you understand???

[soranatus]

hey you don’t think…

[masterjedilenawrites]

Discuss!

And yes I'm putting Grand Inquisitor under the Gs, he doesn't have a name and he isn't just any ol' inquisitor soo..