Possibly crazy musings about Star Wars

[Interference]

Did Frank do all the voices? A Miss Piggy-esque version imagine can I- Hiiiii-yah!

[Dave]

[Cayal]

There is a Yoda species on the Jedi Council in the prequels and one the Knights of the Old Republic also on the Council.

[Rodders]

I think that his name was Yaddle.

Never a more puppety looking character in the history of film IMO.

[Interference]

Cute, Dave

But, Rodders, who's to say that there isn't a race of aliens out there somewhere that looks just like puppets and sounds just like Frank Oz?

[C Of K]

Lol. Yaddle was actually female. The other one was Master Vandar, who sat on the council in the first KOTOR game. There was also a character called Minch whom I am unfamiliar with.

I have heard that their species is called the Whills, but I'm uncertain if that is canonical.

[Dave]

Originally Posted by C Of K

I have heard that their species is called the Whills, but I'm uncertain if that is canonical.

Isn't that the brother of Prince Harry?

Accordingly to Wookieepedia, Whills are not the name of Yoda's species but just a kind of Force Shaman or learned priest/monk. Apparently, originally Lucas planned the Whills to be something similar to the midichlorians, but then he changed his mind to the Force being some disembodied God-like higher power, and then again finally to the one all-powerful Force controlling everything and a mystical energy field controlling all our destinies. The references made to the 'Journals of the Whills' and the 'Ancient Order of the Whills' were kept in even though it was no longer relevant.

[Culhwch]

Originally Posted by Dave

Isn't that the brother of Prince Harry?

Strong in the Force is he, hmmm. Yes, strong in the Force.

[C Of K]

Originally Posted by Dave

Apparently, originally Lucas planned the Whills to be something similar to the midichlorians, but then he changed his mind to the Force being some disembodied God-like higher power, and then again finally to the one all-powerful Force controlling everything and a mystical energy field controlling all our destinies.

I do say, a smart move on George's part. Why he decided that bringing the whills back under an alias would be a good idea is beyond me. Sometimes I'd like to weep for the days when the force was just a mystical energy field and George Lucas could do no wrong. I just can't bring myself to do it.

[Rodders]

Ah, the shattering if our naiveté.

[thesoothsayer]

Back to the original topic of midichlorians, did the movie come first or the books about detecting force in people? I remember one of the Star Wars books having a story where they found a device to detect force levels in people. Think the Empire used it to find and kill potential jedi. Not sure if they used the word midichlorians, though. The other way they used to detect a person with force capabilities was for a jedi to reach out into his/her mind to get a reflex reaction from the force. The stronger the reflex reaction, the stronger the person is in the force. Its been years since I read the books, so I can't recall which came first - the books or the movie? Anyone know? I think that the reflex reaction thing would have been better than midichlorians, which just made me give up on the prequels (I watched Ep 2 and 3 on a plane a few years after), and would have been a shame not to use it if the books were already out before the movie.

As for whether it's inherited or random, well, I think there's a chance of both according to the those books. I remember an alien clone that actually has the force while his predecessor and successor did not.

I thought in the prequels the jedi were not meant to fall in love and reproduce, rather than they could not reproduce. Imagine if they had changed the rules earlier. Anakin wouldn't have had to go all angsty and evil since he could have started a family with Padme. In the later New Republic books, I think many jedis had families. Although I only followed the series until Han and Leia's twins were born, I know that Luke married Mara Jade and they have a son too.

Anyway, I too will accept the theory that Qui-Gon Jin was crazy to make the prequel and midichlorians more palatable, and will propagate it to all my Star Wars loving friends.