Star Wars spares no expense in making any sides involved in belligerent actions as morally unambiguous as possible - you have the squeaky clean Rebels, and then you have the Empire that destroys planets, subjugates and occasionally massacres civilian populations, names its roving superweapon installation 'Death Star', and emulates Nazi fashion almost to a tee.
That being said - do you reckon, perhaps in the style of TIE Fighter where Imps are somehow portrayed as enforces of peace in a turbulent galaxy, that something could be made involving the Empire that doesn't involve them being murderous and colossal asshats?
Think it's a bit too late for the same possibility to be floated for the First Order, considering.
>>13671709
That's not the point of Star Wars.
>>13671709
Human Centrism Strong
>>13671834
And I don't care, because lord forbid someone tries to stir up some mild creativity.
>>13671840
>>13671709
It's a fantasy story in space, you faggot.
And there are plenty of Imperial characters in both EUs who were good people. They just usually ended up defecting or being killed by the empire because the empire is run mainly by assholes.
Probably some dick rebels, too.
>>13671840
I think you're not understanding that Star Wars is sci-fi only in that it takes places in a galaxy far, far away and has spaceships and aliens.
Aside from that it's more akin to a morality tale, a revival of the stories of ancient myth. It's why Luke's arc through the 3 movies follow the hero's journey, aka the monomyth, almost to a t.
>>13671921
>>13671865
>>13671840
SPACE
OPERA
note the 'opera'. Star Wars has more in common with Don Carlos than Gundam.
>>13671955
>Star Wars has more in common with Kurosawa films and spaghetti westerns than Gundam.
ftfy
>>13671709
Would be kind of difficult with the whole dark side/light side thing in place. Not sure what point there would be of shoehorning this sort of thing into Star Wars, though; there's plenty of other works that allow for or have this sort of storytelling.
>Imps are somehow portrayed as enforces of peace in a turbulent galaxy
They already perceive themselves as something like that. Of course, one only needs to look at history here on Earth how that tends to work out.
>>13671709
the Pentstar alignment, the Fel empire and the Empire of the Hand
inb4 not cannon
I think OP is an asshat but what the fuck ever
![star-wars-7-stormtroopers-image-slice-600x200[1].jpg](https://i.imgur.com/XkUbjqR.jpg "star-wars-7-stormtroopers-image-slice-600x200[1].jpg")
>>13671709
The Imperials weren't full-on space Nazi until they became the First Order. In the original trilogy they don't have a lot of on-screen villainry besides killing Luke's parents and blowing up Alderaan, which is after all a Rebel world.
It seems like you're kind of hoping for a more sympathetic portrayal of the Imperials that highlights how good could be done within the system as well: after fifty billion "Zeon fanwank" threads you should know better than to look for moral ambiguity on /m/.
>>13672131
god I hate english majors
>>13672165
Hey fuck you man, not all of us are endlessly pretentious.
>>13672129
>Alderaan, which is after all a Rebel world.
No, Alderaan was an Imperial world whose leadership was working with the Rebel Alliance. A sane government would do something like, arrest that leadership for treason, not immediately go, 'Let's just kill everyone!'
>>13672193
>>13672129
>>13672131
>starts out talking about Actual Gods and deus ex machina
>ends by slamming sci-fi for having the highest potential for either of these
If SF has a problem, it's actually bothering to explain rather than letting everything stand as a happy coincidence or a preordained capability of some character. I know Lowe's read a boatload of sci-fi, but he should also have enough of a background to see how prevalent all of this is in every other style. "Things must happen like this for this other thing to happen" is part of all imaginative storytelling, no matter the genre.
>>13672129
And at the same time Republic politicians are a bunch of corrupt retards and Leia needs to start her own Resistance because they refuse to do anything.
Both sides are bad.
>>13672245
I'm gonna let you in on a crazy secret. Don't check out this spoiler if you don't want a whole bunch of other stories ruined for you, because you'll see this little factoid applied in all sorts of different shows or books, even reality! You ready?Any bureaucracy or system of government run by humans (or entities with emotions) will always have an element of inefficiency and corruption.
We can say "that's bad" of one of these the same way that we can also say stubbing your toe against the desk leg or stepping on a Lego is painful, but neither of those comes close to, say, getting shot in the gut or having your arm hacked off by an ax.
"The government is corrupt" is not a good moral justification for an equally corrupt (if not moreso) group to swoop in and murdalize a bunch of people.
>>13672219
>If SF has a problem, it's actually bothering to explain rather than letting everything stand as a happy coincidence or a preordained capability of some character.
This. Magic is only magic when it's something mysterious, and that's what makes it special.
It's why a lot of people liked Dragonball's explanation of Goku pre-DBZ. Originally he was a kid who was crazy strong because....he was Goku. The kids was just kind of a freak in-story that let him overcome any challenge through sheer force and keep getting stronger. Then the Z part of the manga came and said "nope, he's just a member of an alien race where all of its members are super powerful"
>>13672245
From what I can tell, the First Order has some kind of political treaty with the New Republic and thus the two groups are not at war. The resistance was formed to actively fight the First Order and the New Republic secretly arms and supports them, but can't in any way do so publicly because that would be a massive breakdown of international treatries. Kinda like how the US poured 100 million into arming and training the Mujahideen (using soviet weapons the Israelis stole, firing egyptian-made rockets for even less chance of being seen as involved) in order to fight the Soviets in Afganistan.
>>13672265
>system of government run by humans (or entities with emotions) will always have an element of inefficiency and corruption.
Not him, but the corruption part is actually not true in the case of full totalitarianism. In authoritarianism yes, corruption is insanely high. But in totalitarian governments the people are taught from childhood that the supreme leader is god, the state is the only thing that keeps you safe, working for the state is the greatest honor a person can have. The beauracracy in that system has shown to be among the lowest in any recorded form of goverment because the people are working for the thing they have been brainwashed their whole lives into believing is the most important and sacred thing on the planet.
>>13672279
the corruption in the beauracracy*
>>13672279
That, in and of itself, is still a form of corruption. There are people who know better and perpetuate that belief because it keeps the cattle in line. Whether that leads to fewer middle managers who are embezzling or whatever is beside the point. There's always going to be people doing "unfair" shit for personal gain at the expense of others, and we shouldn't really use this truth as an excuse for why, say, the genocidal space Nazis weren't completely wrong for trying to blow up X government and replace it with their own.
>>13671709
There are stories featuring members of the Empire who believe what they are doing protects civilization from pirates, barbarians, and Rebels out to tear down order and safety. The Imperial recruitment machine is built around convincing people of this, especially people from underprivileged communities that see becoming a stormtrooper as the best way to a better life.
The Empire, as an institution, only does these things when they happen to benefit its interests, and often as a pretense to engage in xenocide under suspicion of harboring Rebels. The higher in the organization you go, the more open they are with their true motives and priorities. Imperials can be good people, but if they think that working for the Empire is a good thing, they're very clearly wrong.
>>13672313
>at the expense of others
>keeping cattle in line
It's called giving the peoeple a common purpose, a unified culture, and a strong sense of national identity.
>>13672412
It's called that, but that's not what it is.
>>13671709
For movies it was always that innocent child-like excitement.
>>13671955
Space Opera used to be called Space Fantasy, which is a more fitting term in my opinion. That said, I wouldn't even say that Gundam was particularly sci-fi and fell more under the space opera/space fantasy umbrella too, since it's scientific elements exist purely to facilitate the human drama and not to make any kind of point regarding human nature or to posit the direction or uses of possible technologies and how they'll affect humans. Which is why society never changes in Gundam. It's always exactly the same, even after thousands of years.
>>13671818
As autistic as Star Wars fans can get, the clever and talented ones make it worth it.
>>13675332
ISD Macross, coming to a tv near you
>>13676085
a Resistance cell operating ywings and vintage xwings and freighters jury rigged as assault shuttles out of a wrecked ISD, Victory, or Venator would be pretty cool actually
