#inquisitorius

[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.

[vaders-georg]

“the inquisitors are genuine threats and they all have rich, complex histories” “the inquisitors are a lesson in obsolescence because they’re flagrant and useless by the time of the OT” “the inquisitors are probably so cringefail because vader allows them to be to amuse himself” consider. three things can be true at once.

[gffa]

I can’t be mad that the Inquisitors seem to have figured out who Darth Vader really is because the show explains exactly how it happened:  They’re all vying to be the one to bring Obi-Wan Kenobi in, they’ll literally stab each other for the chance to be the one to impress Vader, which means that Vader is just as obsessed with Obi-Wan as he ever was, and no former Jedi turned Inquisitor can hear Darth Vader talk about Obi-Wan Kenobi, can hear him bring up Obi-Wan in every single goddamned conversation like he does in the movies despite that nobody was fucking talking about him, and not get smacked in the face with it like a giant wet dish rag like “ohhhhhh I have heard this monologue before, goddammit, that’s fucking Anakin Skywalker, isn’t it, isn’t it”.

[cosmic-herbal-tea]

Those takes about the Jedi Order requiring you to “forgo your heritage” never made actual sense; we ARE introduced to Jedi characters who do things according to their people’s cultural tradition to the point of dressing or tattooing themselves accordingly. Sometimes a combination of both. Being a Jedi doesn’t actually mean forgo those connections.

You literally see a whole-ass government that actually suppresses the very things they attempt to blame the Jedi for & see it in how they dress. The Empire actively stomped out cultural traditions & had people ESPECIALLY in their military to conform to certain dressing standards deliberately.

[animatedjen]

"Rethinking your allegiance?"

Inquisitor Cal Kestis seeks redemption through his fight against the Empire.

[tesb]

“You’re supposed to be dead. Looks like I shall be rewarded.” TALES OF THE JEDI: "RESOLVE" (2022)

[nobody-expects-the-inquisitorius]

you

you could say

nobody expected the inquisitorius

I'll show myself out

[inquisitorius-sin-bin]

He's back...

Print Shop | Commissions

Taglist (ask to join!):

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

[chronozen]

Dissecting Tales of the Empire (Barriss stuff)

So let's break down all the Barriss stuff in the trailer:

There's an Inquisitor Shuttle approaching Our - likely after she is freed from prison

When Barriss is freed from her cell

This little bit is actually quite interesting. First of all Barriss is wearing a prison symbol with the emblem of the Jedi Order on the shoulder.

The clone troopers are Republic Shock Troopers, The Coruscant guard.

Fourth Sister is actually wearing Jedi robes not an Inquisitor uniform, she's already fallen to the Dark side as evidenced by the eyes.

This is suggesting that Barriss is freed from somewhat close to the end of Revenge of Sith

Also the framing of Barriss in prison is very similar to Luminara's hologram in Rebels.

Barriss's eyes are really blue in this scene. Like more so than other ones.

Barriss walking down a hallway

Pretty self explanatory. She's walking down a hallway. She's wearing Robes that a likely Inquisitorius initiate robes. (Or maybe it wasn't Laundry day and Barriss's uniform wasn't ready)

The Clones are just Regs in Phase 2 armour. It looks like Fortress Inquisitorius on Nur.

Speculation: Barriss is giving a little side glance, she's either taking her environment or she's plotting something.

The Grand Inquisitor scene

When then see the Grand Inquisitor leading Barriss into a room with several lightsabers

None of the Lightsabers are Luminara's (Trust me i double checked Weapon's Factory.) They are most likely reused models and generic sabres - because animation and props design is hard and short cuts should be taken whenever you can.

.....but two of those lightsabers are very close to Barriss's lightsaber.

The one in the middle doesn't seem to hold a significance (The bottom of the hilt slightly resembles Ahsoka's Padawan lightsaber, and you could go Green symbolic of Luminara.)

....wouldn't it be just awful if its Tutso Mara's lightsaber?

Inquisitor and Barriss have a sparring session, he tries to get her to use Anger and slams her into the roof, she's noticeably angry.

"Mercy only breeds defeat, i will help you overcome this weakness."

This line is interesting because it's not the usual only your Hatred can strike me down line, the Grand Inquisitor is actually being polite and offering a twisted form of assistance.

Which brings me to a thought - The Grand Inquisitor was right beside Barriss during her big confession at Ahsoka's trial, he's probably going to see her as someone that they don't have to break or torture.

Fourth Sister using Spinning Lightsaber

So this is a very short sequence. The Fourth Sister is in an area with a Rock wall, jumps down, glances around nervously, spins her blade and looks up.

Speculation: Something hasn't gone to plan, maybe the Jedi later in trailer is tougher, or maybe someone else has swapped sides...

The Jedi Fight

This shot opens with Barriss in a proper Inquisitor Uniform and her own useless spinning lightsaber running towards Fourth Sister and an unknown Jedi with a blue Saber

During the fight we can see ITS NOT LUMINARA, this Jedi has a different facial structure, skin tone and likely human.

We can also see who i assume is Barriss looking like she is hesitating on what to do.

We then cut to a different seen of a hooded figure using the force to blow away B2 Super Battle Droids. This implies its during the clone wars and the hooded figure is very likely Barriss cause that silhouette is very similar.

The figure is illuminated by a white glow and it's probably a part of sequence meant to show Barriss before she went nuts - cause its been 11 years so new viewers might not know this character who only appeared in technically 7 eps at most is...

FIGHT TO THE DEATH

Fight to death between Barriss and an unknown initiate.

Grand Inquisitor throws a lightsaber between the two - no its not Barriss's lightsaber

Ray shields go up. Initiate who i'm calling Glup, goes for the Saber. The crystal has been bled so it's red.

Glup and Barriss fight and Barriss goes for the sky high kick or possibly punch to the head.

THE NEW MASTER

'it is time to meet your new Master."

This implies the initiates don't meet Vader until they're full members.

We see Barriss lined up with the other Inquisitors - she's in full uniform. Really hard to tell if her eyes are dark side yellow or not. (They still look Blue compared to Fourth's)

Also it's really funny to me that she's lined up with Bird face Inquisitor, Marrok and Fourth Sister, cause everyone said all of those Inquisitors was Barriss Offee.

They all kneel, Barriss goes down first.

Vader walks past and Barriss looks up slightly and watches him...and she immediately frowns and furrows her eyebrows.

She's plotting something....

Interesting note: Since bird face is alive and has his head perfectly attached to his neck still, This places Barriss's eps of Tales of the Empire prior to Ahsoka's last ep of Tales of the Jedi

Look i can hope for Barriss to escape and then we seen the back of Ahsoka walk into frame....

[inquisitor-apologist]

hi I would personally LOVE to read thousands of essays on your thoughts about the inquisitors, so if you feel comfy posting them just know they will be received with gratitude :)

Alright, I’ve got a 4-hour car ride, so nothing but time.

The first thing that I’d say is absolutely essential to my understanding of/obsession with the Inquisitorius is that they’re expendable. Both in-text and out-of-text, they’re disposable and that is absolutely essential to their whole existence.

On the Doylist level, the Rebels team created them/reincorporated them to canon to be the replaceable early series antagonists. They're there to build the characters up to face the real threats of Maul’s temptation to the dark and Thrawn’s existential threat to the Rebel cause. The rest of the Star Wars media that shows them only reinforces this.

In Kenobi, they're there in the background, to set up Reva (who is, in the show, functionally not an Inquisitor) and Vader, in J:FO they're scary bad guys meant to be defeated and killed for Cal's growth (though, notably, J:FO is one of the only pieces of Inquisitor media that views them as victims worthy of empathy), and, while I haven't read (all of) the Vader comics, they're in the Vader comics, not in their own stories.

On the Watsonian level, they’re a sort of… buffer between the true power of the Sith and the public. They’re the one attacking the regular Force-sensitives and taking babies (someone much more qualified than me could probably talk a LOT about the very interesting ways the Jedi, Empire, and Inquisition (like, come on) parallel and draw from Judaism and historical antisemitism) and they’re the ones the Rebellion direct their anger about the Jedi Purge at. It’s easy for the two masterminds and main perpetrators to hide behind the atrocities of a dozen faceless subordinates.

This is really clearly shown in Kenobi, where the Inquisitors are dismissed as “Jedi who turned to the dark side. Now, they hunt their own kind”. They’re not seen as victims who’ve been forced into self-destructive monsters, but as the perpetrators of their own genocide, personas that they readily claim. I mean, Reva is literally a survivor of the Temple Massacre who was turned into one of the Inquisitors that Obi-Wan dismisses as traitors. They’re very convenient, effective, scapegoats.

That’s honestly a very underrated part of Palpatine’s genius; one of his most important traits is his ability to manipulate the media. By creating the Inquisitors and delegating most of the work of completing the Purge to them, he distances both himself and Vader from any public outcry against the actions of the Inquisitorius (and, to some extent, their own actions), allowing Vader to be seen as a more legitimate military officer and extension of the Emperor’s will, which is itself legitimized by that distance.

The lines between the Emperor, Vader, and the Inquisitors are also very important. There's a very clear distinction between the Sith and the Inquisitors in of autonomy, which is the second thing that defines my view of the Inquisitors. The Inquisitors are largely pawns for Palpatine’s ends, manipulated and indoctrinated kids, and as such there’s kind of a spectrum of the Empire’s Force-sensitive hierarchy between Sidious, Vader, and the Inquisitors.

Sidious is the first extreme, where he chose everything; he Fell on purpose, became a Sith on purpose, consolidated power and killed the Jedi on purpose, became Emperor on purpose. And then there’s Vader, who very much chose to Fall, kill the Jedi, and become a Sith, but he was manipulated and pushed to it by Sidious. He chose, but Sidious kind of underlies all those choices, driving him to them. Lastly, the Inquisitors chose nothing; they were hunted and persecuted by Vader and the Sith, then tortured and indoctrinated to serve Sidious, brainwashed into continuing to serve. It’s really a gradient of autonomy, if you think about it; Sidious is the only Dark Sider afforded full choice, both by the narrative and in-universe.

The Inquisitors are, fundamentally, kids ripped from their family and people, tortured and indoctrinated into self-loathing and anger. They don’t get names; they’re told they were born wrong and tortured until they believe it, then pressed into service, because, while they might have been born wrong, they were also born useful.

This is why I kind of hate the idea of Inquisitors who choose to join, and one of the reasons I’m not particularly inclined to read the new Inquisitor book (also it apparently implies that the tortured inquisitors were actually just. Force-brainwashed??). One of the most interesting and most fundamental things about them is that they are victims of horrific genocide coerced into becoming their own oppressors. If you take that away, you make them so much less interesting—they turn into stock evil traitors.

The protagonist of the new Inquisitor book is, from what I’ve gathered, a jerk who was already half-fallen in the Clone Wars and who seized the chance to gain more power with the Empire. That’s just diet Vader, and I, personally, have seen too much of both real Vader and diet vaders, so I’m not interested.

So, uh, @stellanslashgeode, you asked me for my thoughts on Iskat Akaris, here they are. Sorry it’s probably not what you wanted.

So, like, there’s my opinion on the fandom-and-canon obsession with Inquisitors who chose the Empire. We literally haven’t seen pretty much anything about how the normal inquisitors join, can we focus on the actually interesting stuff? The Inquisitors' lack of autonomy, their lack of choice, is a huge part of what fascinates me so much about them, because it's very unique. Let's not take that away.

Another piece of why I think the Inquisitors are so interesting is how their abuse at the hands of the Empire shapes them, though this part has more speculation than the stuff above due to lack of clear information.

In canon, we know that inquisitors go through fucking hellish initiation criteria (“Isolation! Torture! Mutilation!”), stuff that absolutely breaks them until they no longer believe that the Empire can be stopped at all (“You can’t stop the Empire!” “She said something about becoming an Inquisitor… like it’s inevitable”). We also know that, however it happens, it's very fast and effective. The Vader Comics are set just months after Order 66, and there's already at least ten fully initiated Inquisitors.

Unfortunately, we never directly see the exact initiation protocols the Inquisitors are subject to, but we do get quick glimpses, like in the flashbacks from J:FO, and with Reva in Kenobi. Right now, I want to look at what those flashbacks from J:FO, together with the dialogue above, tells us about what exactly happens to Inquisitors.

In the flashback, we see Trilla, strapped to the torture chair that Cere's in later in the flashback, being subjected to Star Wars' favorite kind of torture, weird electricity chairs. I'm going to call them shockseats, just to distinguish them from real-life electric chairs. We transition from the torture to some time later, when Second Sister has been fully turned, wearing the Inquisitor uniform and everything.

That, annoyingly enough, is all we get to work with. It's basically the "Being tortured makes you evil" trope, but Ninth Sister's dialogue gives it some nuance. She says "Isolation! Torture! Mutilation!", and, well, we just saw the torture part, and I'm guessing the mutilation is the whole thing in the comics where Vader teaches the Inquisitors by cutting their limbs off, so that leaves isolation, which I think is probably a very significant part of the process.

Based on the vault vision and the Fortress Inquisitorius section in J:FO, most of the Fortress's prison has a kind-of panopticon feel, with see-through energy shields, guards everywhere, and several prisoners in one cell, so I'm guessing there are probably some deeper isolation cells. The isolation is probably where most of the indoctrination happens, because we never hear anyone saying anything during the torture scenes.

This is mostly headcanon from the scraps we get, but I'd say initiation probably goes something like this: 1. a survivor is captured 2. They're taken to Nur, and tortured on the way there (per Rebels) 3 The timeline here is annoyingly unclear but I think the ‘isolation’/indoctrination comes before the rest? 4. They're tortured in an attempt to get them to turn to the Dark Side 5. They're somehow fully initiated into the Inquisitorius with their full title and uniform 6. They're trained ('mutilation') 7. They're a full Inquisitor

obv I have headcanons (ie a full-on not-really canon-compliant system that I think works better than the disjointed 'being tortured makes you evil' bits we have now, but I'm trying to stay as canon-compliant here as possible) but I think this is about what we get in canon, and it’s kind of necessary to have a vague idea about what probably happens in order to understand them, and dang is this very important to basically their entire self-concepts.

In Kenobi, Third Sister is hated by all the others, probably for not going through what they did. We see throughout the show that she’s just as good, or better, than most of them, but because she wasn’t tortured (or, at least, not to the same extent), the rest despise her. She does the exact same things we've consistently seen all the other Inquisitor's do, but she's punished and derided for it. In J:FO, Second Sister goes out and threatens civilians in order to draw Cal out, and everyone’s fine with it, but when Reva does it, everyone hates her.

There’s no rational reason; she does exactly what they do , what she’s been taught to do, but she’s treated differently. The only reason for this, in-universe, is that she’s the only Inquisitor we know of that wasn’t brought in for being a Jedi—she explicitly hides that she was one. The rest of the Inquisitors clearly do hate each other, but it’s on a different level with her, because they do not see her as one of them. She wasn’t a Jedi, and thus she didn’t go through the same things they did. There seems to be a sort-of trauma-induced bond between the other Inquisitors. They hate each other, but they all see each other as Inquisitors, largely the same as them. They don’t share that with Reva because whatever happened to them didn’t happen to her, to the same extent.

Connecting to my earlier point about Inquisitors who chose to join, I think that that's WAY more interesting than a bunch of jerk coworkers who just decided to be evil.

These people were family in the Jedi, and then their whole family died as they watched and heard and felt it in their brains, and they were chased and hunted and tortured until they broke and brought back together, warped and different and told to call each other siblings—and at this point, aren’t they? They were raised together in the bowels of Nur, subjected to the same horror and misery; they’ve been through everything together, in the worst way possible, constantly competing and fighting and killing for anything they can get. Who else could understand them in any meaningful way?

I'm getting off-topic, but the physical abuse and torture of the Inquisitors seems fundamental to their identity, even if we don't know exactly what it entailed. 

So, with the isolation and indoctrination, I think it's fair to say that there's probably quite a lot of mental abuse there. The Dark Side, in itself, is pretty horrible mental health-wise (the Jedi actively use cognitive behavioral therapy just to prevent the possibility of the Dark) and being literally tortured and forced into it must be like. so much worse. Plus, isolation has been shown to be really fucking awful for your brain and the Inquisitor’s utter hopelessness (they literally do not believe that the Empire can be stopped and are really angry at anyone who tries) kind of seems like the whole being unable to believe that things can be better and getting angry at people who try to help part of depression? 

Basically I don’t really know enough about mental health to say definitively, but I’m guessing a core part of Inquisitor Initiation is like. Insane mental abuse to get them to crack.

This last bit is less supported, and I know even less about it, so I’m going to keep this real brief, but I think there’s a possibility of some sexual abuse as well? This is a pretty big thing in fanon with the Grand Inquisitor, and then there’s all the creepy pervy stuff with Seventh Sister that she did not learn from the Jedi, but that’s as much as I’ll say for that because I know nothing about this kind of thing.

So, those are really the three things that define the Inquisitors to me: their expendability, lack of autonomy, and how their abuse defines them. I could write more on this, but this post took a fucking month already, so I’ll stick to those points.

[3-pico]

Stickers. Are. HERE.

So excited to grab these off the plotter this morning! Let's see, we have:

Creatures

3D Helmets

Naughty Boy Book Club

This Dude Who Can't Stop Falling

Wamen

And "There Are Too Many of These Fuckers to Hold in One Hand Send Help"

Plus a few more!!!

Please give them a look on my Etsy Store! It really helps a new store out to click through and favorite things for later, even if you aren't able to buy! I also really appreciate shares while I'm trying to build this thing up.

Anywho, thanks for making all this possible! See y'all again soon for the keychain drop!

[wookieejamcrew]

a jedi knight and his padawan! pay no attention to the outré regalia. they can't even spell inquisitorius. totally trustworthy order 66 survivors :)👍

[vaders-georg]

i'm designing lasher's lightsaber rn and i know this is the "telekinetics wielding laser swords" franchise, but the more i think about inquisitor lightsabers the more hopelessly planned-obscolescent the inquisitors become on the whole.

like think about how fucking ridiculous it is to be wielding a rapidly-spinning circle with a diameter of 2 meters that decimates anything it touches. including your limbs. do you understand how easy it is to stab yourself in the armpit or cut your own leg off with a spinning, tall-human-sized death circle. oh, and instead of giving the user more grip, it's just the standard saber length, and that + the giant handguard makes it super awkward, if not impossible, to use with both hands. so you've got 2 meters of rapidly spinning death circle, and you can only control it with half of the weight you should be able to. you can only rotate it to a certain degree as well, again because of the handguard, so tilting it or readjusting your grip is also awkward. oh, and you can use the saber as god's deadliest boomerang, but you'd better pray to god you catch it in the dead center and don't fumble on the handguard, or else it's goodbye hand, and probably the rest of you once the saber falls. and all your peers use this weapon. seemingly it's a membership requirement. and practically no one seems to like it. i'm thinking of trilla suduri's saber forms being wide-open and sloppy. i'm thinking of how clumsy the inquisitors, beside the grand inquisitor, look with their sabers in rebels. i'm thinking of how reva barely, if ever, uses the spinning function on her saber, or even uses it as a saberstaff. spinning sabers are flashy and startling by design -- but the only smart way to use them is to not be flashy or startling with them.

like. no wonder the inquisitors suck so much. they have to put so much energy into not getting killed by their own weapons. if that's not fitting of a story about people who thought fascism would keep them alive, i don't know what is.

[nico419]

I just watched Bad Batch season 3 10 and my brain thought of this

[echtran]

Discovering in the Vader comics that the Grand Inquisitor was a massive nerd is a delight.

[nobody-expects-the-inquisitorius]

HE'S BAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAACK