[jariten]

Jejef-

The biggest letdown with these new films for me was the whole Sifo Dias thing. Although I don't think it's necessary to know who he is exactly (and let's just deal with the films themselves for a second here), watching them in sequence (as i've done a few times now) it feels like a plot thread left hanging. Its strange that in the AotC commentary, Lucas said that whole issue would be resolved in RotS, but it was never mentioned again. That EU stuff (which feels a bit weak to me) was invented to fill in the gap.

Although I do like that whole Kamino sequence. That line "they're totally obidient, taking any order without question" is great.

[barend]

that's because they were using his Sith name in ROTS

[KurganX]

Sifo Dias
Darth Plagueis
Count Dooku
General Greivous
Palpatine
the Jedi archives
the clones
the insemination of Shmi

Somehow all of this was supposed to be cleared up in ROTS, and yet none of it was ever interconnected. How did Jango Fett have dealings with Sifo Dias? Who was Sifo Dias? The origins of the bad guys were all not only left un-clear, but they were completely unrelated. They weren't recruited, they didn't come to Palpatine as a result of events, they just popped up. Or, in the case of Sifo Dias, were used as clues and excuses and then never even mentioned again. Both Dooku's speech ot Obi Wan in AOTC and Palps opera speech to Anakin in ROTS could have been used to flesh out the histpory and relations of the characters that didn't get any screen time, but this opportunity was ignored entirely.

Lucas hoped that people would buy EU merchandise that would "explain" his loose ends. I'm guessing he was inspired by the marketing of the Matrix stuff, how you were expected to watch a cartoon series and read some books or comics and play some games to "get the big picture." Thankfully ROTS was able to stand more or less on its own (well, with Episode II anyway).

Lucas supposedly purposely doesn't answer questions like this to make the story appear grander and larger than it actually is, leaving some mysteries. Then of course he ruins them by giving crappy answers from his officially liscensed products, so go figure...

From what I've gathered via EU reports:

Sifo Dias

Real Jedi, tricked by Dooku into ordering clone army then killed by Dooku and nobody ever found out. Happened around the time of TPM supposedly. Unsure if he was really a prominent member of the Jedi Council at the time, but considering how literal the rest of the stuff is, he might very well have been, though he's never identified onscreen.

Darth Plagueis

Really did have incredible powers, really was the Sith master of Palpatine. Really murdered in his sleep by Palpatine. Apparently didn't really pass on his knowledge to Palpatine or something, but Palpatine was a stinking liar, so who knows what really happened. Apparently he created Anakin, but I'm not sure if that is actually "confirmed" in the EU as fact, but considering the answers to the other mysteries.. probably. That Palpatine discovered the boy appears to have been by accident.

Count Dooku

Speciesist (hated aliens, felt humans were superior) aristocrat that got to be a count. Arrogant, rich big wig who left the Jedi order and joined Palpatine (secretly of course) as Darth Tyrannus. Apparently had ambitions beyond his role in the films and has charismatic (but hid the fact that he knew all about Sideous from those he worked with). He thought Palpatine was going to let him be captured, and was surprised that Palpatine ordered Anakin to kill him. As he has the sabers at his throat he mentions "we had a deal" they had, and Palpatine perfectly on cue says "that was only if you let me go" or something like that and then he dies before he can say anything more. After AOTC he was involved in building a sith superweapon to destroy the republic, which was dismantled and forgotten by the time of ROTS (it wasn't the death star). He was master of a lightsaber fighting style from a time long past, wherein saber vs. saber fighting was more common, while most Jedi are trained to deal with blasters. He was one of the "Lost 20"... Jedi who had left the Jedi Order, and his bust is in the Jedi Archives (though this point seems backed up by the actual DVD, since one of them looks a lot like Christopher Lee). Also his boots are rare Rancor hide, and his cape and tunic are blaster resistant and saber resistant "armorweave" fabric.

General Greivous

Godlike monster man able to move as fast or faster than Jedi and leap dozens of feet in the air and stick on ceilings, military genius, genocidal madman. Kills Jedi in hand to hand for sport and collects their lightsabers. His guards nearly bankrupted the CIS (the magnadroids). Actually he wasn't that evil, he had a cybernetic implant in his brain (put there through the orders of Palpatine/Dooku) that made him more of an emotionless killer. Dooku taught him to "run away" from battle, which is why he suddenly became a coward in ROTS. Mace Windu fought him "blade to blade" sometime in the past, and convinced Mace that he was "more than a match for most Jedi." Mace on another occasion, used the force to crush his chest armor, causing him to have a wracking cough from that point on. He was an alien who was in a devestating accident that left him nearly dead, and was "rebuilt" as a cyborg. Apparently the accident was arranged by Sideous/Dooku in order to provide an opportunity to install the bionics and also command him. He was supposed to commit atrocities to put an evil "face" on the CIS for propaganda value. Dooku was supposed to be the "good guy" face of the CIS. Kills at least five Jedi Knights in combat (some of them might be ranked as masters, but at least Knights). Four of them in the space of a few minutes, while severally wounding several others. He also kills several of them while fighting multiple Jedi AT ONCE.

Palpatine
An incredibly powerful "sith spirit". The Dark Side of the Force makes him age rapidly, causing his body to rot, forcing him to transform his soul into the body of clones that he constantly churns out in secret. These adult clones are possessed by the demonic entity that is Palpatine. Due to clone madness and the fact that his advisors (hoping to overthrow him) sabotaged his clones, they wear out even faster. Palpatine can use the Force to cause storms that can devestate capital ships in space, and can teleport people with the Force. In his young form he looks like count dracula (complete with cape). He can make lightsabers explode with his mind. This may have been retconned since ROTS, but it's the picture we're given of Palpatine! Apparently he had some illegitimate kids too. He had tons of secret super weapons built like the World Devestators that would eat up a planet and spit out droid fighters made from recycled minerals and metal, and the Galaxy Gun, which was a missile array that fired missiles which could each blow up a planet and had hyperdrive on them... a kind of galactica scale "doomesday machine" which could be triggered upon his death if he desired. Before he was finally defeated, he planned to possess Leia's infant son. Palpatine may have been anti-alien, but in reality (says the Dark Empire sourcebook) he just considered force users to be superior to non-force users, and considered the dark side superior to the light side. He has statues from the ancient Sith religion sitting in his office. A giant sculpture has a hidden lightsaber buried inside it in case of emergencies. Also his desk chair has a hidden force field projector in it. He carries an emergency medical kit with him everywhere.

the Jedi archives
A bunch of holocrons are in the archives, including a "Sith" holocron that Dooku regularly read. When he was expelled from the order his access to it was taken away. Yoda regularly probes the Dark Side and reads the holocron to try to discover the Sith's next move. All information in the archives was largely forgotten once the empire took over. Every so often a "holocron" is discovered that tells of some Jedi Lore from thousands of years before the prequel times.

the clones
Just over 3 million of them are able to fight off quintillions or quadrillions of droids. They are so amazing, they can kill 20, even 200 or 2000 droids each, and because Palpatine is such a masterful manipulator, or something. There are special "ARC Troopers" that are trained as mandalorians by Jango Fett himself. These special clones have no reduced independance, so they have full freedom of will just like Jango. They were retired before ROTS to train others, so they were not involved in Order 66. Other clones due to malfunctions in the DNA, also were able to resist their programming and did not participate in the order to kill Jedi. There are also Clone Commandos who may or may not be independant. Six of them were able to devestate various Droid and CIS installations single-handedly and carry personal shields, bacta revives and heavy weapons not seen in the movies. There are less than 4 million clones, and yet they are able to staff all capital ships (except command crew), fighters, and ground forces. Some of the clones also get jetpacks and super cool bazooka type weapons. Others are trained to ride speeder bikes and carry jousting lances. Jedi also don custom armor sometimes similar or even identical to that worn by ARC troopers and other elites. The Empire quickly switched to a new technique of cloning using "Spaarti" cylinders, that could produce an adult clone in a vat in 3 years, 1 year or even less than a month. They were then given a "Flash brain imprint," usually of an exceptional Imperial soldier or officer (possibly someone like General Veers). These clones give off a "weird vibe" in the force. The faster they grew the crazier they became, so they needed a special process involving a Ysalamiri (a lizard/slug-like tree-dwelling creature that evolved naturally to push back the force, since it was hunted by force using wolves). As a result these clones didn't go crazy, but they existed apart from the force. Before the Ysalamiri technique was used, the Empire kept the new cloning process secret and mixed recruites and/or conscripts in with the clone ranks, fooling the general populance into thinking they were not at all clones. Cloning was thought to have been forbidden after the clone wars, and so New Republic (the government set up by the former Rebel Alliance) operatives were shocked to find clones being used by Imperial remnant forces.

the insemination of Shmi
She wasn't "inseminated." Rather Darth Plagueis manipulated the midichlorians to make her become pregnant through the force, somehow... though not sure if that's 100% or just the story.

Anyway, that's the info I've gathered from the EU. I disagree with much of it and think other parts of it are absurd or contradictory, but that's what I've gathered. I haven't read all those sources (they mostly come from Labyrinth of Evil, Shatterpoint, ROTS Visual Dictionary, New Essential Guide to Characters, Medstar novel(s), "Republic Commando: Hard Contact" novel and the ROTS novelisation). I've only read the ROTS novel and the VD, and glanced over the Incredible Cross Sections all shortly after the movie came out in theaters. There's apparently also info in the video games Bounty Hunter (Jango Fett), Clone Wars (PS2), and various other games and comics. The info about uber-Palpatine is mostly from the Dark Empire series of comics, and of course the cloning business comes from our pal Timothy Zahn's "Thrawn Trilogy" and then his retconning "Hand of Thrawn Dualogy."

So take it or leave it, that's what we've been given... ;P (corrections welcome from more EU savvy readers)

This post has been edited by KurganX: 20 March 2006 - 07:17 PM

[Jejef Thgaron]

i'd say; no it's not, i just have a high post count.

Hmmm... you have a high post count like a Sith... this, however, can be imitated.

[Despondent]

If the Sith fringe benefits were good, I'd say join.

Next in line to be killed. You've got to be kidding.

Nice work, Kurgan X. Not that it's worth remembering, but thanks for the mystery lessens.

[barend]

Palpatine
An incredibly powerful "sith spirit". The Dark Side of the Force makes him age rapidly, causing his body to rot, forcing him to transform his soul into the body of clones that he constantly churns out in secret. These adult clones are possessed by the demonic entity that is Palpatine. Due to clone madness and the fact that his advisors (hoping to overthrow him) sabotaged his clones, they wear out even faster. Palpatine can use the Force to cause storms that can devestate capital ships in space, and can teleport people with the Force. In his young form he looks like count dracula (complete with cape). He can make lightsabers explode with his mind. This may have been retconned since ROTS, but it's the picture we're given of Palpatine! Apparently he had some illegitimate kids too. He had tons of secret super weapons built like the World Devestators that would eat up a planet and spit out droid fighters made from recycled minerals and metal, and the Galaxy Gun, which was a missile array that fired missiles which could each blow up a planet and had hyperdrive on them... a kind of galactica scale "doomesday machine" which could be triggered upon his death if he desired. Before he was finally defeated, he planned to possess Leia's infant son. Palpatine may have been anti-alien, but in reality (says the Dark Empire sourcebook) he just considered force users to be superior to non-force users, and considered the dark side superior to the light side. He has statues from the ancient Sith religion sitting in his office. A giant sculpture has a hidden lightsaber buried inside it in case of emergencies. Also his desk chair has a hidden force field projector in it. He carries an emergency medical kit with him everywhere.

holy freaking crap on an omlet...

where did that pile of ridiculous steaming shit squirt out from?

i don't think a guy like that would really need vader around...

This post has been edited by barend: 20 March 2006 - 11:41 PM

[Gobbler]

Heh... that's nothing at all compared to what the EU makes of Luke. "Almighty" would be an insult.

[barend]

fucking geeks, huh..


they ruin good fantasy and sci-fi...


take star trek (the original)... it was just some cool show i watched as a kid, and i loved it... they had an alien, a scottsman, phasers, they fought all manner of creature facing all maner of problem, and kirk always made out with someone and punched the crap out of someone else...

but geeks just make things uncool to like by giving everything halfway cool a greasy, slimey nerdy, social layer.

[jariten]

Like I explained earlier, everything you need to know to understand these films is in the films themselves.

[barend]

or to put it another way, everything lucas thinks is worth knowing is in these films...

but there is more there than people give it credit for...
like i said... some people just like to ignore the obvious while reading a bunch o crap that means nothing.

[jariten]

I think there’s an untapped corner of the EU market for you and your Sifo Dias theory.

Shame it wasn’t in any of the films though.

[barend]

no, i had to settle for a big barend's-theory shaped hole to pop up...

but you're right... it's a shame it wasn't in the film, along with anakins cunning, friendship with obiwan, or padme living long enough to be remembered by liea...

but if there's one thing lucas has taught us, is that film bordered by loose ends can still be very successful.

[Gobbler]

Maybe Leia was referring to her guardian-mother?

[Casual Fan]

Nice work, Kurgan X. You have just described the plots of the next half dozen MST3K movies, if they ever revive that series.

"The biggest letdown with these new films for me was the whole Sifo Dias thing."

The BIGGEST letdown? I know you liked the prequels, but wasn't Jar-Jar Binks just a little bit more of a letdown than Sifo Dias?

[jariten]

"The biggest letdown with these new films for me was the whole Sifo Dias thing."

The BIGGEST letdown? I know you liked the prequels, but wasn't Jar-Jar Binks just a little bit more of a letdown than Sifo Dias?

no.

JJ didn't let me down because I never expected anything of the character.