LogFAQs > #913629046

ParanoidObsessive posted...

overthinking the implied finances as if it actually means anything in terms of narrative or setting is generally a flawed argument, because the people in this topic have now spent more time thinking about it than literally anyone ever involved in writing or directing a Star Wars movie ever has

So? Whether or not the Rebellion and Resistance's relative sizes makes sense doesn't in any way detract from that argument (maybe warships are more expensive in the sequel-era than in the OT era, or maybe the Resistance wasn't able to recruit enough crew from a war-weary populace to man more ships, who knows?) - it's the relative sizes of the Rebellion/Empire or the Resistance/First Order that drives the argument, and those are spelled out pretty unarguably. Are those two sets consistent with each other? No, but there's a lot of inconsistencies between all three trilogies, so that doesn't really mean much.

ParanoidObsessive posted...

I would agree 100%.

Which is what makes it so absolutely tragic that The Last Jedi somehow winds up being worse.

The characters in TLJ generally behave rationally, though, and when they don't (like Poe/Finn/Rose's Hail-Mary to try and disable the tracking device or Rey deciding she can turn Kylo Ren back to the light side), it generally ends in disaster, as one would reasonably expect.

I mean, to contrast, let me make a brief list of completely brain-dead decision various characters make in Attack of the Clones, in roughly chronological order:

-Jango Fett and Zam Wesell, supposedly two of the greatest bounty hunters in the galaxy, attempt a big, flashy assassination using a bomb, then decide to - their words - "try something more subtle", even though that's the reverse order of the way things are supposed to be done (subtlety when they don't suspect anything, big explosions when they realize what's going on). Because everyone in this movie is a moron, this actually almost works. Between the two of them they manage to come up with the only method of killing Padme that the Jedi can thwart given its reliance on unpredictable living creatures (for some completely inexplicable reason), whereas if the droid used a bomb or a blaster or even a knife, it would have killed her before the Jedi even realized anything was wrong.

-Because the Jedi and Padme's security team are just as bad at their jobs as the bounty hunters, they come up with the most slipshod security plan imaginable. Instead of moving Padme to a secure location and/or using another decoy in her place, having additional security personnel watching the building from the outside, etc., her security is essentially entrusted to a horny teenager and his surrogate father. When she disables the security camera in her room - AKA, the only thing that allows the Jedi to monitor the situation from afar - instead of knocking on her door and telling her to fix it, they just kind of shrug their shoulders and start arguing with each other instead, nearly getting her killed in the process.

-When the assassination fails, Obi-Wan makes the questionable decision to leap onto the droid, despite not knowing if it's armed or whether it can support his weight. But instead of self-destructing, carrying him off into the night, or running him into traffic, it obediently flies directly back to its owner. During the subsequent encounter, Wesell decides to attack the Jedi in the middle of a crowded bar instead of getting the fuck out of dodge (the fact they saw her isn't even all that important, given she's a shapeshifter) and when Jango decides to silence her, he opts to use the single weapon in his considerable arsenal that can be traced back to his base of operations, a secret planet that he and his employer have spent considerable time and effort trying to keep hidden.
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