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It's an older code, sir, but it checks out
Tonight I had vague thoughts of writing about Die Hard (1988), which ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
rushthatspeaks and I saw earlier this evening at the Brattle, and I really need to get Chicago Calling (1951) out of my brain because it upset me, but at the moment I am just going to marvel that Admiral Piett fandom has finally gone mainstream. I realized in 2006 that it wasn't just me, but I hadn't realized it was also The Atlantic. I think it's the shadows under Kenneth Colley's eyes. The character as written is part of a plot device, a demonstration of the power and cruelty of Darth Vader. He gets maybe thirty lines of dialogue across two movies; he doesn't have to be anyone. Imperial officers don't have a great track record for personality. He might be as ruthless as Tarkin's cohort in the first movie or as stupidly arrogant as his late superior, a true believer or an opportunist or just wallpaper. Colley's tight face and wary eyes make him sympathetic. He doesn't have to say anything to look slightly haunted even before his promotion, like someone who isn't sure if today's agenda includes Force-choking or not; he only gets sharper-faced and more sleepless as he goes. "So goes life in the Empire: There's plenty of upward mobility, but job turnover is high, and workplace safety truly abysmal." It doesn't matter that we never see him do anything other than behave with the expected efficiency regarding his duties and his crew and an understandably petrified politeness around Vader, he complicates the dystopia just by not being faceless. (And not dying, even when he expects to—moments after he assured Vader its hyperdrive was deactivated, the Millennium Falcon streaks into stars and the expression on Colley's face as his spooky commander sweeps out of the room isn't so much the expected relief as blank bafflement at still breathing.) I note that even The Atlantic wants to give him more time in the story: "It's fun to imagine a strange Rosencrantz and Guildenstern-like saga playing out in the background as Piett manages the vast civil service of a galactic dictatorship while fielding orders from Vader and his Emperor." I am basically delighted.
In honor of the occasion, please enjoycucumberseed's "The Love Song of Admiral Piett." It's still the best film criticism/T.S. Eliot parody I know. Character actors forever.
rushthatspeaks and I saw earlier this evening at the Brattle, and I really need to get Chicago Calling (1951) out of my brain because it upset me, but at the moment I am just going to marvel that Admiral Piett fandom has finally gone mainstream. I realized in 2006 that it wasn't just me, but I hadn't realized it was also The Atlantic. I think it's the shadows under Kenneth Colley's eyes. The character as written is part of a plot device, a demonstration of the power and cruelty of Darth Vader. He gets maybe thirty lines of dialogue across two movies; he doesn't have to be anyone. Imperial officers don't have a great track record for personality. He might be as ruthless as Tarkin's cohort in the first movie or as stupidly arrogant as his late superior, a true believer or an opportunist or just wallpaper. Colley's tight face and wary eyes make him sympathetic. He doesn't have to say anything to look slightly haunted even before his promotion, like someone who isn't sure if today's agenda includes Force-choking or not; he only gets sharper-faced and more sleepless as he goes. "So goes life in the Empire: There's plenty of upward mobility, but job turnover is high, and workplace safety truly abysmal." It doesn't matter that we never see him do anything other than behave with the expected efficiency regarding his duties and his crew and an understandably petrified politeness around Vader, he complicates the dystopia just by not being faceless. (And not dying, even when he expects to—moments after he assured Vader its hyperdrive was deactivated, the Millennium Falcon streaks into stars and the expression on Colley's face as his spooky commander sweeps out of the room isn't so much the expected relief as blank bafflement at still breathing.) I note that even The Atlantic wants to give him more time in the story: "It's fun to imagine a strange Rosencrantz and Guildenstern-like saga playing out in the background as Piett manages the vast civil service of a galactic dictatorship while fielding orders from Vader and his Emperor." I am basically delighted.In honor of the occasion, please enjoy
cucumberseed's "The Love Song of Admiral Piett." It's still the best film criticism/T.S. Eliot parody I know. Character actors forever.
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Talk to me about Michael Pennington!
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Semi-related: I suspect it's because Lucas was making it all up as he went, but I'd forgotten until I rewatched it that at the start of A New Hope, the senior officers all seem to regard Vader as some old duffer who is humoured solely because he's a friend of the Emperor; which doesn't seem like an opinion that could long survive Vader's actual presence, one wonders where the Emperor's been hiding him all these years.
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Good point! Wedge is
I suspect it's because Lucas was making it all up as he went, but I'd forgotten until I rewatched it that at the start of A New Hope, the senior officers all seem to regard Vader as some old duffer who is humoured solely because he's a friend of the Emperor; which doesn't seem like an opinion that could long survive Vader's actual presence, one wonders where the Emperor's been hiding him all these years.
Agreed. And, yes, your Doylistic explanation strikes me as the right one, but it's one of the reasons I've always had trouble with the prequel timeline, honestly. We're given the sense in the original movies that much more than a generation has passed between the downfall of the Republic and the present-day Empire. "For over a thousand generations, the Jedi Knights were the guardians of peace and justice in the Old Republic. Before the dark times. Before the Empire." I got the strong impression as a child that the Jedi had dwindled almost to legend by the time Vader came on the scene, not that there were thriving schools of them barely twenty-five years ago. Owen Lars refers to Ben Kenobi as a crazy old wizard. Admiral Motti mocks Darth Vader's "sorcerous ways" and "sad devotion to that ancient religion." The Force has disappeared almost entirely from living memory, which especially makes no sense if fully trained Jedi Knights were running around using it in battle against some of the same Imperial officers1 who now can't credit its existence. I'm fine being told that Luke Skywalker out in the galactic sticks has never heard of the Jedi, and Han Solo probably would dismiss the Force as "all a lot of tricks and nonsense" even if the Jedi Order were alive and well and living on Coruscant because he needs to be the most seen-it-all person in the room at all times (with such success!), but the later continuity just makes everyone in that briefing room look like idiots in retrospect.
1. Or using it to save them, since the older Imperials must have started as Republic military.
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I'm not disagreeing that it would be useful—although regular propaganda strikes me as a better means than Sith mind control, somehow. Possibly I'm just not sure of its range. See previous reply, below.
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It really does seem as though the Empire is in two parts: the Emperor and Vader, dark lords of the Sith, and everybody else, a military/bureaucratic machine who don't believe any if it. I don't know whether the Emperor decided at some point that it would serve his purposes to eliminate any memory of the Jedi, or whether he made an alliance of political necessity with the military/bureaucratic types. If the latter, they may well be doing all the real work of running the Empire, and everything we see in the movies is just a side issue, although I usually hate "what if we're missing the whole point" theories about well-known stories.
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I don't see how you accomplish a galactic takeover without at least some of the military and bureaucracy on your side. Wanting to suppress or discredit the memory of the Jedi makes sense on the Emperor's part either way—the way Obi-Wan tells it, the Jedi were a key symbol of the Republic, chivalrous and spiritual; any survivors would be rallying points for the rebellion, as indeed is exactly what happens with Kenobi despite his best efforts to disappear. (He's not as good at disappearing as Yoda.) It's in the best interests of the Empire if its citizens either disbelieve in the Jedi as mumbo-jumbo charlatans or just believe that the Force was no match for the technological and military might of the Empire, which blasted those half-mythical remanants of the mystical past into bantha dust. They won't be looking for saviors. I just still feel that this argument runs into a problem when taking into account characters who were still alive during the civil war, as opposed to Luke's generation who were born in the aftermath, and it presumes that Vader has never made any major Force gestures in public where they could be unambiguous evidence rather than spooky, possibly self-aggrandizing rumors. The whole thing really does work better if there were only like five Jedi by the time the Republic fell apart and we meet three of them. [edit] The very short window of time looks like it's going to be a sticking point for me no matter what.
If the latter, they may well be doing all the real work of running the Empire, and everything we see in the movies is just a side issue, although I usually hate "what if we're missing the whole point" theories about well-known stories.
If it brings down the Empire, it's not a side issue. It's just separate from the fact that Palpatine's economic policies were crap.
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I think it might be accomplished through a mix of propaganda and intimidation -- if everyone Living under the Empire quickly realizes that if they want their career/life to continue, they'd better keep their mouths shut about the Jedi, even if they knew several personally back in the days of the Republic -- the next generation is never going to have even heard of the Jedi, except maybe as improbable stories told by their crazy uncle J'bud that time he got drunk at a family wedding and other adults were too distracted to shut him up; but who believes anything Uncle J'bud says?
I don't recall the Rebels mentioning the Jedi either way, but with no practicing Jedi in their ranks (I don't think Luke talked openly about the Force after Obi-Wan's death), they've no reason to.
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This conversation is doing nothing to disprove my long-held theory that even improvised fan theories have better worldbuilding than Lucas' prequels.
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One of those actors one is always happy to see.
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Yes. I spotted him some years ago in an episode of Ripping Yarns—"The Testing of Eric Olthwaite," as the very boring bank robber with whom the title character bonds over a proper appreciation of shovels, black pudding, and rain gauges—and he made the experience for me. I keep meaning to watch some of the Ken Russell he turns up in. I didn't know to look for him in The Devils.
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I can't wait to see what you make of Kylo Ren.
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Of course! It is one of my favorite fanworks, full stop.
I can't wait to see what you make of Kylo Ren.
I have to figure out when I'm seeing the movie . . .
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May I ask how so?
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Thanks for the explanation. I couldn't tell if you thought he was a hat-tip to a particular character (Major Major Major Major in space) or just the concept in general.
I have assumed since the first time I saw these movies that the crew of the Executor started a betting pool on Piett's life expectancy the minute he was field-promoted.
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