Why did Yoda do that? (AOTC)

[urluckyday]

Ok, while watching EP 2 I noticed something. When Dooku tries to drop that big huge thing on anakin and obi wan in the mountain hangar, and yoda pushes it away. Why does he have to drop his cane to lift it when his line in EP 5 was "size matters not". What is up with that?

[TK-8252]

Maybe he was nervous because if he were to drop the pillar, it would mean death for Obi and Anakin. Lifting the X-Wing from the Swamp was mearly showing off.

 

Or maybe at the time he didn't know that size doesn't matter. As he got older and wiser he discovered things like that.

[El Sitherino]

He just got finished concentrating a lot to use the force in battle with Dooku, he was weak. Plus like TK said, teh X-wing thing was just for show and it took him longer to do than when keeping the pillar from crushing Obi and Ani.

[Bob Lion54]

I think when he tell Luke that size doesn't matter, he is trying to make a point. Not all force sensitives have the same "strength" in the force. Even Yoda can't move an entire building. Even if he could, it would take ALL his concentration. Luke is strong in the force so a X-Wing should be relatively easy for him to move. He was trying to get Luke to open his mind and "unlearn what you have learned." Plus, as InsaneSith pointed out, he just fought a major battle with Dooku, so he was probably a bit drained. Thats my take on it anyway.

 

[Kurgan]

Makes sense. Yoda was probably tired and it caught him off guard.

 

For dramatic purposes he didn't drop the pillar on Dooku or his ship.

[Prime]

Remember, if visual effects it is not what is right, it's what looks right...

[RC-1162]

i think yoda had to concentrate a lot in aotc but not that much in tesb bcuz he had grown older. unlike normal ppl, jedi grow stronger in the force as they grow. so he must have used the new found strength. another possibility is tht the pillar was xtremely heavy whereas the x wing was very light(as compared to the pillar). an xwing is a fighter craft after all and needs to be light and agile.and the water in the swamp would lessen the weight of the xwing so yoda only needed to begin concentrating harder after the full thing was in the air.

[guybroom]

Also, you are all forgetting that the X-Wing was just sitting there, but the pillar was moving and therefore takes more energy to stop it and move it in mid air than when it is floating in the water.

 

Added to the fact that Yoda had to react very quickly to save Anakin and Obi-wan as well as stopping Dooku, I'm not surprised that Yoda looked tired.

[OmegaNothing]

If Yoda just used his one hand to stop the pillar then it wouldn't have been as dramatic, and his other hand could have been free to stop Dooku somehow.

[Kurgan]

Originally posted by guybroom

Also, you are all forgetting that the X-Wing was just sitting there, but the pillar was moving and therefore takes more energy to stop it and move it in mid air than when it is floating in the water.

 

Added to the fact that Yoda had to react very quickly to save Anakin and Obi-wan as well as stopping Dooku, I'm not surprised that Yoda looked tired.

 

You could argue the X-Wing was taking on water and sinking (into the muck of the swamp which probably wasn't just pure water anyway). Plus Yoda moves it around in the air, he doesn't just lift it up and then drop it smack down.

 

We all wonder why Yoda, in his younger (not much younger though, just a few decades) more sprightly days can "only" do this when he can apparently do more later on. Then again, in both cases he looks drained. In ESB you could say he hasn't had to really use the Force for a major feat for decades, and he's not gotten rusty...

 

My explanation is that Yoda was just tired from the big battle and under stress, not thinking clearly enough to get the job done in a way that would prevent Dooku's escape AND save his fallen Jedi comrades.

 

Lucas could have had Yoda force push them out of the way certainly. If I were Yoda, risking light injuries (compared to what they already had) on them vs. letting Dooku escape is an acceptable trade-off. He could have still shown Dooku escaping because of this action, but obviously he was going for the 'parallels' thing (like he's done with so many other scenes in the Prequel Trilogy thus far) and wanting us to immediately identify this scene with ESB.

 

Perhaps Yoda has gotten stronger in the Force over time and instead of channeling his abilities into fighting prowess he's put it into pure Telekinesis or something? Another possibility... After all Yoda seems much more anti-violence in ESB vs. AOTC where he's pretty much a warrior and war leader.

[guybroom]

Originally posted by Kurgan

Perhaps Yoda has gotten stronger in the Force over time and instead of channeling his abilities into fighting prowess he's put it into pure Telekinesis or something? Another possibility... After all Yoda seems much more anti-violence in ESB vs. AOTC where he's pretty much a warrior and war leader.

 

True, but then he does say at the end - "Victory? Victory ..." As in, he doesnt think they won.

 

Also he has seen what wars can do in ESB, he doesnt want another one to happen.

[Kurgan]

Originally posted by guybroom

True, but then he does say at the end - "Victory? Victory ..." As in, he doesnt think they won.

 

Also he has seen what wars can do in ESB, he doesnt want another one to happen.

 

True, his statement does seem to gel with his anti-war stance in the OT, but this is AFTER he's done all this fighting and soldiering stuff. He may be beginning to realize this isn't a good thing, after all. However the Jedi have always been fighting for "justice" even though they don't claim to be soldiers. Is Yoda upset because the Jedi have strayed from their traditional ways? Is he upset that Clones are being used in a war? Or that the war will be devestating? He isn't a pacifist (if he ever was one) yet...

 

His line implies that he has forseen the devestation that will result from this war, or perhaps he suspects the conspiracy (he can't seen through the shroud of the Dark Side though to see Palpatine's machinations, as we the audience know them of course).

 

I guess for now I'd say he really wished to avoid a War in the first place, but now they've got one, so even though they won (the battle) they've lost the moral victory of avoiding a large scale conflict to solve the problem (of the Seperatists).

 

Why does he call it "The Clone War"? That's my next question...

 

I mean, to us the fans, it makes sense, this is "The Clone War" that we've been waiting for, but why would he call it "the Clone War"?

 

Why not "The Civil War" or "the Seperatist War" or "The Republic's Great War" etc?

 

It's like during WWI, people didn't call it "World War I" they called it "The Great War" or "the War to End all Wars" or just "the war with ___" (fill in blank of the side you weren't on).

 

Oh well.

[El Sitherino]

The jedi have been pacifists. But they are thrown into a war and have been pretty much blinded by the shroud the dark side has thrown over them. All the confusion that surrounds them they find themselves having to fight, not because they want to, but because they have no idea what else to do. They have noble intentions to fight, but the means are not so noble. This leads to the jedi's destruction and undoubtedly leads to Anakin's turning toward the dark side. The jedi of now have ended up abandoning tradition and broken many of the rules they established.

 

Mace confronting Palpatine and deciding to kill him instead of taking him to trial. He sees Palpatine as too much of a threat to be allowed to let live.

 

 

Yoda over the many years no doubt thinks back on the wrong choices they made, and teaches Luke what a jedi must and mustn't do. Luke must control his emotions and never use the force for attack. Always be on the defensive, be a protector, like the jedi of old.

 

 

Yoda refers to it as the Clone War because the shroud has been lifted (at least some of it, but not all as he thinks). He forsees the many battles to come with use of these new clones. But their turn he doesn't see, otherwise we wouldn't be in the mess we are in RoTS. He sees clones becoming the new armies to be used in battle.

 

Plus it just sounds cool.

 

He questions the statement of victory because he knows bad things are just beginning, and not ending. And if you note in Palpatines office in the beginning of AoTC, he gives a little facial expression that looks as though he thinks Palpatine is up to something. I assume this is the beginning of his and the jedi's curiousity about the Chancellor.

[Kurgan]

I should correct what I said... the Jedi are not normally pacificists. Pacifists refuse to fight and even to use violence in the pursuit of good.

 

To me Yoda seems to be leaning that way in ESB (long after the Jedi Order was destroyed and he's been taken out of galactic affairs for decades). Yet, he trains Luke to fight and kill (he's expected to fight Vader and the Emperor, remember?).

 

This to me is akin to that sword maker guy in Kill Bill. He swore and oath to God not to take up the sword again, but he built the blade for someone else (and considered it breaking his oath).

 

Yoda of course had a lot more and better reason to break any oath he may have taken against violence for training Luke. But there you go.

 

The only other instance I can think of of Jedi being "pacifists" was what I've heard about the NJO (since I haven't read it). Apparently half the Jedi were like "let's not fight the Vong" and the other half were "let's fight."

 

In the Old Republic the Jedi repeatedly say they aren't soldiers, but they are definately police and peace keepers. They carry weapons and use them, and not always in self defense (notice how they make use of ambushes and charging their foes in battle). They even serve as soldiers in the Clone Wars (even though that is supposedly against their mandate as keepers of the peace). So at least in the Old Republic Era they aren't pacifists (or at least we don't see any of these pacifist Jedi onscreen or mentioned).

 

Yoda must have had time to reflect and decide that his rash actions and the extended role of the Jedi in armed conflict may have contributed to their and the Republic's downfall, perhaps that has softened his disposition and lead him to be more a man of peace, but he's still willing to train another warrior for a violent purpose.

 

From what I saw and heard in ESB & ROTJ, Obi-Wan and Yoda fully expected and wished Luke to kill Vader. Yet it seems it was Luke's idea and initiative, against the ideas of his masters, to try to turn his father back and resist the urge to kill in anger. He ends up not killing anyone, and Vader and the Emperor destroy one another.