Surprised it's still in decent shape. Haven't used this pencil since Elementary School.
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Surprised it's still in decent shape. Haven't used this pencil since Elementary School.
Today is the birthday of actor Liam Neeson, who played Jedi Master Qui-Gon Jinn in 1999's Star Wars Episode I- The Phantom Menace, 2002's Star Wars Episode II- Attack of The Clones (voice only), 2019's Star Wars Episode IX - The Rise of Skywalker (voice only), and also 2022's Tales of The Jedi, and 2022's Obi-Wan Kenobi.
🎂 HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO LIAM! 🎂
Sitting here working from home listening to one of my many Star Wars podcasts... talking about a subject that got me thinking, how many of you were spoiled by Qui Gon's death in TPM? I was not spoiled, I did not get the soundtrack until after I saw the film, just curious...
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It is a Star Wars Siri Shortcut game for anybody with an apple device. It is based on Galaxy of Heroes. You play Qui-Gon Jinn and Darth Maul fighting each other.
Who is Maul? No, I mean it, who is he, why does he do what he does? You could say it was wrath, and slavish devotion before that. I, as the title might have suggested, disagree. From what we see as the man who would be called “Maul”, subordination does not seem like a trait consistent with who he has been shown to be time and time again – he has a deeply ingrained streak of rage, of wrath and violence for sure, but not one of servility. So why does he serve Sidious so in his first appearance?
I’ve another question, why does Qui-Gon do what he does? Why does he go against the order, and yet stay in its apparent good-graces? Why has someone like Mace Windu not censured him as yet? Yoda I can understand, being a padawan of a padawan, but why not Mace? He seems much more dogmatic than Yoda ever was, sticking to the idealised version of what a Jedi should be, ignoring what they were. Or why not any number of other much more orthodox Jedi?What I’m getting at here, is that there had to be a greater plan in place – one designed specifically to weed the Chosen One out.
The Jedi knew they were doomed, they had to. Darkness that clouds the omniscience of the Force has to count for something, growing violence in the galaxy must indicate something, a too-long run of Jedi prosperity has to count for something. Even if your average Jedi knight did not, your very greatest masters, the ones you place on the Grand Council must have seen the writing on the wall. The Order had grown too big to be functional anymore, they’d grown too unwieldy to be an effective force anymore. What was the solution? Cull it, purify themselves through flame, save as many as you can in the process – slag separates from metal only at high heat, but the master smith takes only the slag away, not the metal in the process – the Jedi Order hoped to be those greatest of smiths, the ones who could take only the slag away. Oh how they miscalculated.
Much of the blame can be laid at the feet of one man: Darth Sidious (Palpatine, by the way, entirely innocent). He schemed and plotted and planned and executed until the Jedi Order itself was no more, throwing perfectly good metal to waste, selling rock with a copper veneer instead of the real deal – oh, how proud Ea-Nasir would be. But his plan relied on pawns to do as he wished, pliant tools he could use and manipulate and discard as he wished. The final goal was Anakin Skywalker himself, the chosen one the Jedi laboured so hard to find; before him was Count Dooku, a noble soul he corrupted, a tool designed to be broken, but a very useful one. But before them all, came Darth Maul – he wasn’t meant to politick with the best, he wasn’t meant to be the Bane of the Jedi, he wasn’t meant to be ideological opposition in any meaningful way – he was meant to be a bludgeon, a brutal, inelegant weapon meant to maul his enemies. That was all.
Is it so surprising then, that Maul was a simple servile assassin?
But the Maul we see after TPM is very different, soft-spoken, hammy, villainously sadistic, and hideously focussed on one goal, and one goal only: revenge against Kenobi, the man who ruined his life, and his plans.For yes, my friends, Maul had a plan, one as devious as his master’s, perhaps even more so. A plan meant to find the chosen one, and deliver him not to the Sith, but to the Jedi. He knew that the Jedi would burn with the coming of the Chosen One, the Sith would not have to lift a finger – the Jedi would tear themselves apart on their own, they were practically begging for it.
So why did he kill Qui-Gon, the man with whom he was conspiring with? The answer’s simple: realpolitik. There was no way in hell the Jedi council would let Anakin be trained, so why not force their hand? Why not commit suicide-by-cop, and force Obi-Wan to mature and a Jedi, and allow his guidance to raise Anakin? He would be irrelevant in a world with Anakin in it, and he knew how to live on as a force-ghost, so death mattered little to him. There would need to be a reason Anakin and Obi-Wan would stick to their paths as Jedi, and his death would serve as a perfect impetus, the perfect way for master and apprentice to bond, and the perfect reason to train Anakin. His death was necessary, but only he had the courage to go through with it.
So what did Maul and Qui-Gon plan together? Well, for starters, Maul would kill Qui-Gon, and more importantly: survive, he would wound, but not kill Obi-Wan, and create a desire for revenge against the Sith in the heart of the young Jedi, creating the Sith’s own worst enemy. He wasn’t angry at Obi-Wan for cutting him in half, it was anger at betrayal. He thought Obi-Wan would have been told about at least a part of the plan, and would try to negotiate with Maul, before Maul would “betray” him. Obi-Wan attacking him right away was a problem, since it derailed the entire, carefully laid out plan that the Sith Lord and Jedi Master hammered out between them.
Notice how Maul bears only hatred against the Sith once he’s restored, and the only Jedi he truly seems to hate is Obi-Wan, the rest are hated on a more ideological level, not as deeply personal as his hate for the Sith and his hate for Kenobi. Maul is a very anger-driven person, he would throw his life away in a quest for petty revenge, as he indeed regularly seems to do. It is perfectly, consistently in-character for him to want the ultimate death of his own order just to spite one man: Darth Sidious.
Sidious decided everything in his life, choosing him as an apprentice at an early age, and running with it. Maul had no choice in the matter, traded away like tobacco for cash – he would have naturally harboured a deep hatred of Sidious, and the Sith he represented. Indeed, it would have been enough to want him dead.
To summarise, the plan was as such:
Qui-Gon would go on his quest to protect the queen of Naboo, and in the process, contrive a way to get them on to Tatooine.
Maul would ambush them, but let them escape so that the rest of the Order could be warned about the Sith before Sidious revealed himself.
Qui-Gon, Obi-Wan and Maul would meet again in Naboo itself, and a lightsaber duel would take place.
Maul would kill Qui-Gon.
Obi-Wan, briefed about a part of the plan, would try to negotiate with Maul, asking him why he betrayed his comrade.
Maul would act compliance, before wounding, but not outright killing Obi-Wan, this would not only create hatred for Maul specifically, but for the Sith as a whole.
But that’s just my two cents. What are your thoughts on the theory, are there any other ways you think the plan could have worked out? Go on, tell me about them.
Check my hub out for my past pieces, and future ones that I will write.
Thank you very much.
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Prequel fans are eating good next year! In addition to The Living Force and the Mace Windu and Jango Fett comic series’, 2024 will also bring us an all new novel staring Jedi Master Mace Windu - The Glass Abyss, written by Steven Barnes. Read the announced from StarWars.com here.
The premise of this novel is actually incredible. Exploring the relationship between Mace and Qui-Gon is a fantastic idea for a story, and hopefully this changes attitudes among the fandom on Windu, which I think tend to be too critical. This new planet sounds really cool too.
I’ve never read Cestus Deception, so I’m curious if Barnes’ writing in that book was any good. Nevertheless, it’s good to see old authors returning.
2024 is shaping up to be a fantastic year for Star Wars considering all the books, the Dark Forces remake, Outlaws (not that I’m excited for that, but I digress) Bad Batch, the Acolyte, and Skeleton Crew.
What are your thoughts on this announcement? Leave them below!
Have a good day, everyone.
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New York Comic Con never fails to bring us new and exciting announcements for the Star Wars EU, and this year, we’ve got a lot to look forward to. From the High Republic, to Mace Windu and Jango Fett, read the full list of announcements via StarWars.com here.
Man, I have missed having Star Wars books to look forward to. I’m dreadfully behind on the High Republic (partly because I haven’t liked most of what I’ve read) and the main line comics are too expensive for me to keep up with because of all the crossovers (For the love of God Marvel, release a Crimson Reign omnibus already!) So I’ve been feeling pretty alienated since basically every publishing panel for the past year or so has focused almost exclusively on those two things. There just hasn’t been as much to get excited about compared to years past.
But, boy has that changed.
I was already super hyped for The Living Force. I have no idea how Miller is going to pull off a book with 12 different POVs, but, hey, I love the ambition.
Fans of legends will know that Jango Fett has been the focus of some of the best comic miniseries’ in the franchise (read Open Seasons and Blood Ties if you haven’t!) . Absolutely ecstatic to see him get some time to shine in the new continuity. I’m a little skeptical of Sacks as a writer, but I’ll still be giving Jango Fett a shot in March.
Ever since the abysmal Mace Windu series back in 2017, I’ve been waiting for my man to get another crack at a comic run. Very excited for his new miniseries and all the other Phantom Menace-centric literature we’ll be getting next year. Hopefully there’s one or two other projects that have yet to be announced to celebrate Episode 1’s anniversary.
Also pretty excited about the Hyperspace Stories graphic novels. Those should be fun. Qui Gon being my favorite character, I’m always happy to read more about him.
I did not like Thrawn Alliances, but, nonetheless, a comic adaptation is fun, and, frankly, may end up being the ideal way to zip through that story. Jody Houser is a rockstar, if nothing else. I’d expect a Treason adaption, and even more Thrawn stories in the lead up to the Heir to the Empire film.
And lastly that ROTJ archive looks pretty sweet. Cover art is gorgeous. I have to wonder what this text will offer that the past 4 decades of reference books don’t, but time will tell.
Really great announcements here. There was a post a couple of months ago where we were talking about which characters deserved their own comics, and Mace and Jango were repeatedly mentioned by myself and others. Personally, I like to think that we here at Wookiepedia manifested these books into existence lol.
What project are you most excited for?
And the Winner of the Phantom Menace Character Tournament is... 🥇Obi-Wan Kenobi🥇. He has defeated 🥈Darth Maul🥈 by 77 votes to 34, (a similar result to the end of the film). The winner of the Bronze Medal Match was 🥉Qui-Gon Jinn🥉, who beat Sheev Palpatine. A big thank you to everyone who had their say by voting in this tournament! And finally, the first round of the Attack of the Clones Character Tournament is currently live, so get voting on that now!
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The Semi-Finals of the Phantom Menace Character Tournament are over, and the results are in! Obi-Wan Kenobi edged his master Qui-Gon Jinn by just two votes, earning him a place in the final, while Darth Maul beat his master Sheev Palpatine by a comfortable twenty-two votes, so he will face his long-term enemy in the final match, which will be open for votes tomorrow. The bronze medal match between the two masters is currently out.
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