May the Force Be With You, or: Good (Moral) Luck With All That!

‘Sup?

So, I came across a question on Quora: “If the Jedi Masters could sense the darkness in Anakin, then why didn’t Mace Windu become his Master and teach him to use Shatterpoint?”

CCTV of me, guzzling Star Wars-discourse and meta.

Now, the answers to this question are pretty great and shout-outs to the loremasters who know their lore. But there was a bit of a tangent that I found to be ten times more interesting than the use of Shatterpoint, or Windu creating Vaapad to channel the dark side to defend against the dark side — and that IS really cool, by the way. I’m not a Windu fan but he’s objectively impressive as Jedi go, and especially Jedi of the latter centuries of the Old Republic.

“I’m tired of these motherfucking JEDI on this motherfucking COUNCIL!”

Of more moment and perennial importance to me, however, was the self-fulfilling prophecy that was Jedi Champ-pawn, Anakin Skywalker. Spoilers ahead if you’ve been in a cave for the past five decades.

Here we go! You WERE warned.

Now, there’s no doubt there was some prophecy that got self-fulfilled. But I’ve always thought that the main fulfiller wasn’t Anakin but the Jedi Order. The Jedi Order that had grown prideful and complacent, just as it had many times before in the TWENTY-FIVE THOUSAND YEARS of the Old Republic’s existence — notably, during the time of the Jedi Knight, Revan … the only other known Chosen One of the Force besides Anakin Skywalker … and who lived a VERY similar life, if on a much grander scale and three thousand years prior.

Like any agency or group, the Jedi Order, with time and power and no challenges, grows stagnant and complacent and corrupt. Dogmatic and unimaginative. With time and power the Force gets SICK OF THEIR FUCKING SHIT, and kills about ninety-odd percent of them. It’s happened more than once and, again, notably, around Revan’s time. The Jedi Order was destroyed. Then it was rebuilt by a banished Jedi —…