#star wars: living force spoilers

[charmwasjess]

Okay, I finally finished The Living Force, and as promised, I have thoughts. These are just my musings as a fan and a reader - if you enjoyed the book more than I did, I'm really glad! If you hated it, good for you too! Let people like things, let people not like things. <3 My feelings with this book were somewhat down the middle. I'm interested in reading it again in a couple months and seeing how I feel.

Overall: a fun, engaging read, genuinely hard to put down once the action starts going. The book isn’t afraid to be funny. SO MUCH GOOD JEDI CONTENT! Miller takes on a huge task trying to write perspectives for all twelve Council member characters and does a pretty good job bringing them to life. Mace and Depa steal the show. I had a hard time with some of the meta plot and overriding messages about the Jedi Order.

Andddddd the long version:

The entire conceit of the book comes about when Qui-Gon goes head to head with the Council, who are bogged down in committee red tape Senate paperwork disconnection, and challenges them to “help one person.” So inspired, the Jedi Council in its entirety goes to the planet Kwenn to help close down a hundreds-year-old Jedi Outpost. 

Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan serve as the book’s inciting incident, our quest giver NPCs, who hang around close enough to the action to keep the readers who bought the book only for them engaged. It reminds me a little bit of a spin-off TV show where the fan favorite character from the original series shows up to boost ratings, saying their classic catch phrase while the live studio audience goes crazy. Look, Qui-Gon is Being Kind to Pathetic Lifeforms! Obi-Wan drops a “hello there” in the first scene! Oh, them!

Lest you think I’m being shitty, let me say that it was actually great to see Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan on the eve of TPM working together well and having a blast. Both in Padawan and Master & Apprentice, they are still very much figuring out their relationship, and now it’s clearly evolved to its final magnificent form. They’re utterly corny together - I love that for them. This is the same pair that gave us “the negotiations were short” and the baffling “there’s always a bigger fish!”

I’ll talk a little bit about Sifo-Dyas because of course I will. He appears only in mentions, but so many of them, he's a huge part of the subtext of the book as he's recently left (been fired) from the Council and been killed - he's apparently on everyone's mind. I’ve posted about this before - I love the Seeker Sifo addition, and further, letting him be a rightful problem, a true pain in the Council’s ass and who ultimately got himself fired for not following the rules. Of course I have sympathy for him: this is a person who is beyond desperate to save his world and willing to try anything at this point in his life. And I think it’s worth mentioning that this is well within Cavan Scott’s characterization of him as a natural born troublemaker. I mean, he’s on screen for about two pages in Dooku: Jedi Lost before he just fucking literally steps on Yoda. Apparently, he never stopped. 

The book is oddly complimentary of him in weird places. Canon is inconsistent about Sifo-Dyas and how much his visions were impacting his judgment or even his simple ability to function. The last we heard of him in the Yoda comics, Sifo-Dyas was so routinely incapacitated by them that he was traveling with Lene full time. So it was cool to see that he had apparently gotten in control of them enough to be a super crucial member of the Council. Mace complains about Sifo’s absence and how that has directly impacted their entire ability to perceive the future, an acknowledged blind spot that comes up quite a lot in the prequel films and Clone Wars. Yoda goes on and on about how what a powerful Jedi he was.

...I don’t think the scene where the ENTIRE FUCKING Council round robin style takes potshots at Sifo-Dyas for *checks notes* rescuing some orphans was particularly successful. Of course, accuse me of bias, he’s a favorite character of mine, and it’s rough to see his colleagues - who are also his only friends and family - sitting around talking shit about him (to a bad guy no less!) for a page and a half, when he literally just got violently killed. (And they know he’s dead, at least, if not the circumstances. Killed on Felucia was the official story reported to the Council per wookiepedia.) Just tonally weird.

But really, I think what actually bothers me about that scene is the treatment of the baddie, Zalestra’s motivation as in any way legitimate, credible, or worth an apology by the narrative. Wow, the villain had a good point! To be clear, her issue with Sifo-Dyas taking her friends away to be Jedi is not that it changed her situation in any meaningful way in terms of care provided. It was a crime of omission. And these friends were so dear to her that she goes around indiscriminately killing Jedi of their exact generation? I suspect Miller liked his cool Nautolan Pirate Joker OC and wanted to give her a sympathetic excuse for why she was going around torturing and murdering Jedi (and just random people, including children) for fun, and “I got separated from my friends as a kid because of a Jedi” was the best he could do. Of course, it sets up Depa for a really beautiful line about not using other people as a canvas to paint grief on. 

The question of Attachment is a strong theme. Depa seems to be Going Through It - about attachment in particular, but also generally in the book. She’s shown relying a little too firmly on the no attachment cause in the wake of grief for a lost student. For example, she is quick to volunteer that Zalestra’s friends who were brought into the Temple together would be immediately separated so as to not form attachments - without pointing out the rest of that, that this separation would be specifically into Creche clans so they could bond with other Jedi kids and grow up in a community. Mace’s reaction to Depa’s attitudes make me suspect this is a Depa character growth thing, not something we’re supposed to take as a face value fact about the Jedi Order. Indeed, she ultimately overcomes her fears about this and decides to take a Padawan. And the final lines of the book include Qui-Gon defining for us that it isn’t attachment that’s a problem for Jedi – it’s indifference. 

Mace and Depa are the clear stars of the book. The Shatterpoint lineage vibes are immaculate. I’d read that the Living Force is supposed to set up an upcoming novel about Mace, and I am legitimately thrilled for it after reading this. Anyway, their dynamic is fantastic. Mace treats her 100% like a respected colleague, no cute Padawan infantilization tropes, even when he is put in situations like rescuing her after weeks of prolonged torture. Instead, he gives her his lightsaber to use, since hers has been taken. A really powerful and beautiful moment of support, while still recognizing her strength and agency. 

That said, if you’re looking for a deep dive into more obscure members of the Council or an EU/Legends junkie looking to see your favorite backstory pulled from the fire, this book might not be it.  With his five wives and seven daughters in old EU, Ki-Adi-Mundi might be the least likely Council Member to be the comedic butt of a bit revolving around awkwardness around women, but Miller goes for it, and there’s no mention of his family situation. 

Another odd reference, this time to current canon: the civilians the Council are working to help are mentioned as being the relocated survivors of the Protobranch disaster. It’s an ironic choice to frame the narrative of “the Jedi have been too focused on the big picture/the future at the expense of their duty to ordinary people” and then set the story in a community of people that the Jedi literally saved after getting a vision of the future disaster. The fact that it was our problem child Sifo-Dyas’s vision, and the rescue only happened after he and Lene outright defied the Council to get the gears moving is never mentioned or addressed, despite its seeming supreme relevance to the other themes in the story. 

For a time, I thought the narrative tension there between those two truths - that the Jedi should be concerned about ordinary people and living in the moment, but that this doom future is truly about to be a huge problem for the Jedi Order and the galaxy - was intentional. Having now finished the book, it doesn't seem to have actually been. Maybe someone else has a different perspective.

In truth, I didn’t understand what I kept reacting negatively to about with some of the meta themes of the book until the literal last page, John Jackson Miller’s author’s note where he says it outright. He talked about the other Star Wars books he has written over the last decade - how they all have depicted (Jedi) characters who are off on their own, away from the Order, “loners like Luke Skywalker,” and how his depiction of the Jedi Order from that perspective has been very critical. With this book, he decided that ALL Jedi couldn’t be bad, and that “Qui-Gon Jinn was the greatest symbol (of diversity of thought in the Order)” so he wanted to explore that. 

I closed the book and gently placed it in the trash can.

No, I’m kidding. Kind of. You know that I love Qui-Gon Jinn, he is my first favorite character, but this take exhausts me. That he is the magical exception to all of Jedi’s problems leading up to the prequels, and that if he were somehow not a direct product of that same Jedi Order, which encouraged him in his particular way of thinking almost to a fault, starting with Dooku.

In the final scene, with a magical twinkle in his eyes, Qui-Gon explains his own “defiance”of the Council: “I’m not insubordinate. I’m unorthodox. The insubordinate are ignored. The unorthodox are heard - grudgingly.” So the book finally resolves for us the narrative confusion in the difference between Sifo-Dyas’s bad future-fixated rulebreaking, which is shown to create villains and piss off his colleagues alike, and Qui-Gon’s good Living Force-serving unorthodoxy, which creates friends for the Order and moments of spiritual understanding for the Council. 

...Smashcut to six months later when Qui-Gon himself is outright defying the Council’s decision on Anakin and sidelining Obi-Wan because he’s convinced the Chosen One prophecy is just that important. 

Star Wars: The Living Force by John Jackson Miller, 6.5/10 stars, would have been 7 if I hadn’t read that asinine author’s note and gotten all mad again. 

[gffa]

The funniest thing about this scene is that there is zero pre-communication about doing this bit, Obi-Wan just 100% flings himself into pretending that Qui-Gon is a notorious sadistic killer, like this horrible gremlin is faking LOOKING SICK at just the THOUGHT of what Qui-Gon might do if someone crossed him and Qui-Gon is playing right along, THESE TWO ARE THE WORST I LOVE THEM. (Star Wars: The Living Force | John Jackson Miller)

[cloned-eyes]

pspsps techgirlies, i saw your man on pabu

[itsjml]

[vivaislenska]

Maybe one day they’ll be able to flip through their scrapbook and laugh about it all

🥲🤞

[honeybuns-bb]

wow that was simultaneously an extremely satisfying and extremely unsatisfying ending

[juliberrylive]

"It's showtime, CX-2..."

something something about the puppet and the puppeteer, but i couldn't get Ultron's version of "I've got no strings" out of my head while sketching this

[fellthemarvelous]

Without hope, we have nothing.

(Spoilers and speculation included a bit further down)

This is actually a post about the Bad Batch and not Star Wars Rebels, but this bit is important so...

Try not to cry when you remember that Tech is the one who taught Hera Syndulla how to mask her ship's signature, a move that made her a massive threat to the Empire and a move that she often used to her advantage. She was such a threat to the Empire that they wanted to capture her alive so they could make an example of her for her years of defiance.

And then also try not to cry when you remember that when Hera was taken prisoner by the Empire, Kanan Jarrus sacrificed his life to free her and save the future of the Rebellion. Try not to cry when you think about the fact that Kanan Jarrus aka Caleb Dume was the Jedi padawan the Bad Batch protected (except for Crosshair) from the Empire during Order 66 by claiming Hunter killed him.

Hunter, Tech, Wrecker and Echo lied to the Empire to protect a Jedi.

And Tech taught Hera how to evade the Empire when the Bad Batch helped her family (Chopper included) escape Ryloth after being accused of treason.

Clone Force 99's actions had a direct outcome on the success of the Rebellion. They refused to commit treason against the Republic and all they did was commit treason against the Empire. They were strong enough to resist the effects of the inhibitor chip (Crosshair and Wrecker for awhile), outright ignored Order 66 (Hunter and Tech), or were tortured and turned partially into a machine against his will by the Techno Union and used as a weapon against the Republic who, upon rescue, immediately jumped back into Separatist territory and fucked their asses up (Echo). Luckily, with the help of Rex, they got their chips removed after Wrecker tried to kill all of them.

Everything under the cut is pure speculation. I'm having a galaxy brain moment, I just have no idea if it's pointing me in the right direction or not lol.

If you disagree with me, I don't need you to rudely tell me why.

After his time on Tantiss, Crosshair can now identify with Echo more than anyone else in the Bad Batch (and Tech if CX-2 is Tech).

When they went to rescue Echo, Crosshair is the one who snidely told Captain Rex that he would have left Echo behind too.

Which is exactly what happened to Crosshair when the Empire turned him into a weapon against his own brothers. He had no choice because the Empire attached him to a machine and amped up the effect of his inhibitor chip so he could not disobey orders.

Rex told Cody "I think Echo is still alive" and Cody told him that was impossible. Anakin accompanied him on this rescue mission with The Bad Batch (we know Cody would have too if he hadn't been injured).

I think that if Tech is CX-2, Crosshair already knows or highly suspects it. He's terrified of Tantiss. I think we're going to have a parallel moment of Crosshair possibly saying the same thing, knowing that he could never leave a brother behind again after what he went through, especially if CX-2 is Tech. (I also wouldn't be surprised if Omega suspected something after her trip back to Tantiss with CX-2.)

We never saw Echo's body after the explosion. Instead we got this image. An empty helmet and a droid arm.

Crosshair defected from the Empire when he witnessed the Empire tell him that Mayday was only a clone and not worth giving medical attention to. Those actions resulted in the death of Mayday and that's when Crosshair chose to shoot an Imperial officer between the eyes (similar to Dogma's execution of General Krell in many ways).

If Tech is CX-2, that is the second Bad Batcher the Empire has turned into an enemy against his brothers.

This is the last we saw of Tech.

Hemlock was fucking lying when he said that Tech's glasses were all they recovered. Why the hell would he have found Tech's glasses and not Tech? All we see below him are clouds. And this is the last bit of Tech we see. That gun is in the shot with his glasses for a reason.

I feel like this is going to parallel Echo's rescue from Skako Minor. Tech and Echo are both highly intelligent huge ass nerds (remember that the battle plans being used against the Republic were written by both Rex and Echo, and Cody acknowledged that Rex was one of their best strategists in the GAR) who always ended up working best together.

Part of me wonders if we are heading into a show centered on the clone troopers in a post Order 66 world going up against the Empire as they try to rescue more of their brothers. Enough to become a problem for the Empire.

Part of me also wonders if the inclusion of Force sensitive children in the Bad Batch means Rex will need to call Ahsoka into the fray. Wolffe has only appeared once so he hasn't even switched sides, let alone even started blocking Ahsoka's messages to Rex yet. During the Clone Wars she had to save Force sensitive children from Darth Sidious. During the Rebellion, the saved more Force sensitive children from Darth Sidious. It makes me wonder if she is also going to save Force sensitive children from this too? I might be reaching a bit too much here, but it could be a possibility! She seems to always show up when Force sensitive children need to be rescued from Darth Sidious.

No matter what ending we get for the Bad Batch, I know it's going to leave us with hope for the future because the message in Star Wars has always shown us that hope will always be stronger than fear.

A simple act of kindness can fill a galaxy with hope.

Without hope, we have nothing.

These episodes are all relevant to Echo's journey. The Domino Squad was referred to as a bad batch and Echo was the one who seemed to struggle the most with orders that conflicted with doing what needed to be done. He is the one who memorized the regulations manual after all. And now the Bad Batch are on a similar journey because they have never trusted regs before, but now it seems they might have to trust the regs to come to help them the way they helped Rex and Echo before the war ended. The way they helped Gregor after the war ended.

If I'm wrong, I'm wrong, but that's a fanfic I can always write!! I don't want to get into who I think is going to die or survive, but I have my suspicions there too and I'm already in too much pain to keep going.

[cross-kimmy]

I think I know why Tech’s death is particularly painful for some of us.

Aside from the misleading marketing and the way the creators led us on, Tech’s death stings even more because we’re not going to see his face again. Think about it. When a character dies in live action media, there’s a part of us that draws comfort from the fact that we’ll still see the actor in other projects. But in this instance, Tech is an animated character. Dee Bradley Baker isn’t going to use his Tech voice for some other character. This is it, no more Tech. We’re not going to see his face in another movie or series. His death feels far more final simply because of the fact that he’s an animated character.

This phenomenon was observed in critically poor audience reception to the original ending of the 1986 Little Shop of Horrors musical film adaptation. The original ending was filmed identical to the stage version - the main characters being eaten by Audrey II. When this grim ending is presented on stage, the audience knows they’re going to see the actors at curtain call. In fact, they even get to see the deceased character’s faces in the blooms of Audrey II’s flowers during the final number. So why did the audience hate this same ending when it was adapted to film? Because the deaths were much more difficult to handle and accept. They felt more final. There wasn’t going to be a curtain call where the audience gets to see the characters one more time. So the filmmakers reshot the ending where the heroes lived and Audrey II was defeated.

In Tech’s case, we don’t get a curtain call. And we don’t get to see his face portraying other characters in new projects. It makes his death feel far more real. As if we’ve buried a loved one that we’ll never see again. I think that’s at least part of the reason so many of us are bothered, angered, and even triggered by his death.

[gffa]

I cannot BELIEVE we actually got an answer to the question, "Do Jedi testify as witnesses in legal matters of the Republic?", because that is a thing I have had conversations about! AND YADDLE STRAIGHT UP TELLS US THAT THE ANSWER IS THAT THE COUNCIL DOES MAKE SURE THEY PROVIDE TESTIMONY. I WANT TO KNOW SOOOOOOO MUCH MORE ABOUT HOW MUCH A JEDI'S ABILITIES WITH THE FORCE ARE TAKEN INTO ACCOUNT, LIKE CAN THEY TESTIFY ABOUT INTENT IF THEY'RE A PSYCHIC EMPATH WHO CAN FEEL OTHERS' THOUGHTS? OR WOULD THE REPUBLIC SAY THEY HAVE NO WAY TO VERIFY THAT IF THEY'RE NOT A FORCE USER AS WELL SO THEY CAN'T BE SURE. I WANT TO KNOW ALL ABOUT THIS. *SHAKING JOHN JACKSON MILLER* TELL ME EVERYTHING ABOUT THE JEDI TESTIFYING IN COURT CASE THIS IS THE SHIT I AM HERE FOR!!!! (Star Wars: The Living Force | John Jackson Miller)

[griffin-stone]

Healing Light

Lemme just... just fix this here. Acolyte spoilers below the cut.

Yeah, so it took me all of ten minutes to go, "nah, they didn't really die" and start writing it. It's messy but have a lil balm for ep. 5.

----------

  Breathe.

   Just breathe.

   Easier said than done. Breathing shouldn’t have been so difficult, but… but her lungs wouldn’t obey her. Nothing obeyed her orders, not her lungs or her closed eyes or…

   She felt only one thing. Her heart thudding dully in her chest. Slowing and slowing…

   She heard voices over her. Loud and angry, pounding upon her ears with the icy darkness pressing upon her aching chest.

   Then, silence.

   Silence and ice and nothingness and…

   “Breathe.”

   Her lungs spasmed, then dusty air touched her tongue and throat. She wanted to cough, but her weak lungs only took in more of the filthy, cold air.

   Air slid from her lungs, then back in. Each slow breath came easier, charged by the silent command she felt rather than heard.

   “Breathe.”

   Her eyes didn’t obey her, but she realized they were open and the darkness was above her. Not in her. The ice receded with each slow breath.

   “Breathe.”

   Finally, Jecki blinked. Her vision cleared somewhat, so the dark shadows became branches and trees and leaves. And a face.

   “Breathe.”

   Jecki blinked again, and she could see the dust and mud and tears streaking the face over hers. She seemed to have control of her lungs for the first time, as her exhale was a sigh and her eyes fell so they were only halfway open.

   “Yord.”

   Yord offered an exhausted smile, then slid to the side. Jecki heard him thump to the ground beside her. 

   Turning her head, Jecki saw Yord’s ignited lightsaber. That explained why she’d been able to see again. 

   For several moments, padawan and knight laid silently side-by-side, just breathing. 

   Yord was the first to move again, sitting slowly up. He looked back down at Jecki.

   “Still here, padawan?” Yord asked slowly, his voice rasping.

   Jecki blinked slowly. “You’re supposed… to be on… the ship.”

   “Osha came back.”

   Jecki snorted, a little impressed with Osha.

   “He was going to kill you.”

   Jecki hummed. “I kind of... thought he did.”

   “Yeah. Same here.”

   The two of them didn’t move for a moment longer. Then something clicked in Jecki’s mind, and she sat up enough to look down.

   Three holes were burned into her padawan robes, as well as on her chest. But when she touched the wounds, she found rough scars. She looked at Yord.

   “What happened?” Jecki asked.

   Yord shrugged, apparently too tired to be his usual knowing self. “I don’t know. We were fighting, I think, then… then it was dark and cold…”

   Jecki nodded slowly. “It was the same for me.”

   There was another long silence, then both of them looked sharply at the other and yelled in unison.

   “Master Sol!”

   Jecki scrambled to stand up, but her legs gave out and she fell. She cried out when the impact sent a blaze of pain across her chest, and quickly rolled over to relieve the pressure on her chest.

   “Slowly,” Yord said from where he still sat. “I think you just came back from the dead.”

   “People don’t come back from the dead,” Jecki said. 

   Yord shrugged. “You just did.”

   Jecki looked skeptically at Yord. But with the location of her wounds… how did she survive?

   “What happened to you?” Jecki asked after a moment.

   Yord’s gaze became distant. “I’m not sure.”

   “You? Not sure?”

   “Are you wanting to relive that fight?” Yord asked.

   “Okay, okay…” Jecki sighed and laid back. Then she took a determined breath and made herself sit up. “We’ve got to go. I don’t know what happened to Master Sol or Osha or…”

   “The guy from the apothocary,” Yord muttered. “How? What was he?”

   “He had a lightsaber.” Jecki tested her arms’ strength, finding them still too shaky. “A Jedi?”

   “He didn’t fight like a Jedi… or anything I’ve ever encountered,” Yord said.

   The two were silent again. The forest was dark and foggy, and they seemed to be the only things living in the whole forest.

   Yord’s lightsaber deactivated, throwing them into darkness. Jecki inhaled sharply before she could stop herself.

   “Those moth things,” Yord’s voice came out of the darkness. “If they come back…”

   Jecki made herself breathe out slowly. Everything was so dark that she didn’t realize right away that her eyes were closed. She tried to open them, but didn’t have the strength for even that.

   Everything was so dark… so cold… and the two of them were laying there defenseless. The forest was dark and dangerous, and they couldn’t move.

   Jecki let out another slow breath, trying to center her thoughts. She reached for calm, remembering the lessons from Sol. Trust in the Force.

   An unexpected peace came to Jecki. She forgot about her missing master and the stranger with the blood-red blade. It was just her and Yord, and the little pool of light and calm.

   “Jecki.”

   Jecki slid from the calm with a slight groan of protest. She could feel things again, and there was nothing but more pain than she could bear.

   “Jecki, wake up.”

   Jecki opened her eyes to find the forest bathed in light. She was confused briefly, then realized it was morning. The air was cool and clean, and the trees didn’t seem so sinister anymore.

   And Yord was still alive beside her. She could live with that.

--------------

I might keep going, and get a cleaned up version that goes on a bit further and includes Osha to post on A03, but for now, this'll do.

[theyabooklover]

My BINGO sheet for The Bad Batch series finale

Crosshair will be fine ❤️

Happy Final Bad Batch Eve!

[lothcat-lothcat-lothwolf-run]

I wast the tech/CX-2 thing so bad. So bad. They could even kill him off again, I just want to see my baby boy again :(((. It would be heartbreaking and tragic and so painful for both the audience and the batch themselves but I need it. It’s the best option possible, aside from a spin-off

[bananasugarwarrior]

Tech Returns?

So yeah, people are freaking out because there's only 4 more episodes left in The Bad Batch :( but more importantly is that enough time to bring Tech back?

If the answer is yes you might be delusional. Emphasis on might, it could happen, and Tech can live happily ever after with Phee but honestly, when has romance ever worked out in Star Wars?

If the answer is no then listen to this: Crosshair had two season’s worth of redemption, the tale of the brother who willingly killed and burned down innocents for the Empire of His own free will. If Tech is CX-2 then he could be the reverse of Crosshair, the brother stripped of personality who willingly(?) kills and burns down innocents for the Empire of free will(?) but instead of redemption they never get him back. Again they have to live with having their brother trying to kill them knowing they can't get him back.

[theres-no-such-thing-as-luck]

Shout out to Dave Filoni for giving the fans a happy ending. He really said "they suffered enough let's let them have this one".

[the-little-moment]

At this point, if Tech comes back, I'm worried it will be in a way that I'd personally find less fulfilling. What if one of the last scenes is something like Crosshair telling Hunter they got a comm. Long pause. "It's from Tech." Or he magically appears at the very very end, but we don't get to see any kind of a reunion? I mean, I'd be happy to know he's alive in any case, but I think we all wanted an actual satisfying reunion and we're running out of time for it.