How is it ever explained...


that Leia had memories of her mother? When we later learn in the Anakin trilogy that their mother died in childbirth, how could Leia remember her?

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For the same reason that Luke could become a full-blown Jedi with two days training under Jedi masters, when all the other Jedi had to stay Padmawans for about twenty years.

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Even though it wasn't 2 days (convenient rey defender memory retcon logic), it is still INFINITELY longer than it takes rey to do all of the things that surveyed audiences identified as being a core part of the Star Wars(tm) brand.

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Bullshit..

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This.

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It is believed by some hardcore fans that after the events of Empire Strikes Back, before the events of the beginning of Return of the Jedi, Luke went back to Yoda and got more training from him.

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I've also read that the Falcon could have been en route to Bespin for weeks or even months. Remember that the hyperdrive was broken so they were moving at sublight speeds in a very large galaxy.

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Yes, its be nice to think that Luke had enough time on Dagobah to get some proper training, and I like to presume he did, but that is speculation and not canon. What IS canon is that Luke arrived on Bespin shortly after Han and Leia... and Han and Leia NEVER changed their clothes while they were fleeing in the falcon!! So their broken-hyperdrive time must have been of short duration, because Han had to have some spare clothes on the Falcon, and they were not used.

So there we have it, its actually canon that it's possible to learn Jedi skills in a very short period of time, even though the old Jedi used to apprentice for decades. I dont think thats what Lucas intended precisely, but that is what ended up in the finished films.

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I think your estimation of the elapsed time is just as much speculation as mine.

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Oh yes, but I'm trying to back up my speculation with canonical evidence! (Or "evidence".)

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It isn't speculation on Otter's part. He's going with what is shown in the film. Luke wakes up one morning with zero knowledge of The Force, but before bed that same night he's mastered it enough to the point where he can destroy the Death Star with a single shot. You can imagine that maybe a lot of things happened offscreen, and there was a lot of downtime we never saw, but the film is shot and edited to convey the notion that this all happened in about 12 hours, give or take.

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We were talking about Luke's training in ESB, not ANH, and I still stand by my position. The only real fact here is that there was never an explicit, on-screen explanation, so it's all speculation.

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Not only did Leia change her clothes, she changed her hairstyle too.

Han didn't change his clothes but he never does in the entire series.

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Leia changed her clothes and hair when she got to Bespin, but not while they were running and hiding with no hyperdrive.

Now of course we don't know how long they were held prisoner on Bespin, but it wasn't long enough for Leia's hair and makeup to suffer.

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Leia didn't exactly have a chance to take her luggage when the Empire came straight to the Rebel base. She likely only had the clothes on her back and nothing else when she got to the Falcon and had to run for her life.

As for her hair and makeup not suffering, that's pretty common in film.

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Her hair and makeup didn't suffer when she was held prisoner on the Death Star either. She may have been using her innate Force powers for that, because... how else?


As for the harum-scarum time of indeterminate length of the Falcon, well, if it really was all that long, then I'm sure she could have changed into some of Han's clothes, and looked very fetching with rolled-up pants and a man's shirt wrapped around her waist. IF, that is, Han actually had spare clothes, and wasn't really wearing the same outfit for the whole saga.

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The thing about her hair and makeup can be applied to nearly every movie ever made. Hollywood wanted their women looking hot at all times back then (ever hear Carrie's take on the metal bikini from ROTJ?). If it helps, I don't think the torture sessions lasted for more than a day or so.

And I'm not sure Han had much in the way of spare clothes and Leia isn't the sort to care too much about looking "fetching". She's a badass military leader, not some spoiled rich girl. She's not gonna worry about dolling herself up when she has to repair the Falcon and avoid getting captured/killed by the Empire in the process, to say nothing of the various creatures and monsters that always show up to try to eat the heroes.

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IMHO Leia is one of those women who seems not to care about her looks and would deny caring about her looks if asked and who are never seen putting any visible effort into their looks... yet who always look absolutely stunning. I don't know how they do it, but I suspect they just do all their primping and polishing where nobody can see.

And yes, that's true of most Hollywood leading ladies, yet most of those who face abuse and torture at least take the trouble to put on a lighter shade of lipstick and muss their hair a little. Not Leia!

As for Han's clothes... we can only speculate wildly. Maybe he's got a whole wardrobe full of identical outfits, maybe his clothes are made of some magical space-age sweat-repelling material. It's an eternal unanswered mystery.

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He was described as scruffy looking for a reason.

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Maybe Nerf-Herders are famous throughout the galaxy for having only one set of clothing?

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Lol it's Canon in your own head.

Plus it might be possible to be taught, but not invent techniques you never knew existed ... In 2 hours.

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No, really, review the original films, and see how much teaching Luke was actually shown to get before he started going around calling himself a Jedi. It's minimal, a few hours on the Falcon trip to Alderaan, and however much time he spent on Dagobah. We even see him go back to Dagobah intending to get more training, and finding Yoda dying.

As for a person inventing Force techniques without being taught... I would actually expect that to happen. Routinely.

Of course this is pure speculation, but I would absolutely expect that if some random young person realized they had superpowers, they would immediately try to use them for petty selfish ends - reading the test answers in the teacher's mind, changing the TV channel with your mind, using your power over weak minds to get dates, settling grudges, etc. A person with these powers would try to use the powers for getting what they wanted, whatever that is, and if they had no training they'd try on their own. And IMHO that's probably why the Jedi got their conscripts painfully young and spent 20 years drumming ethics into their heads.

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How do you know that Han and Lei never changed their clothes on the trip from Hoth to Bespin?

Suppose that you see a soldier wearing their uniform in one scene in a movie, and the the same soldier wearing what appears to be the same uniform in another scene in the movie, would you assume that the soldier wore the same uniform continuously for the entire period between the two scenes, and then try to deduce the maximum period that the soldier could have worn the same uniform without changing?

Or would you suppose that the soldier had several identical uniforms in his closet as well as pajamas, and wore several different uniforms and possibly washed them from time to time, and thus that the soldier's uniform was not a good indication of how land a time had passed during the period between the two scenes?

Han usually lived in the Millennium Falcon. It is quite possible he had a number of sets of clothing stored in it. And possibly Han may have had some unique sets of clothing and several identical sets of clothing. I, for example, have two each of several identical items of clothing.

I don't think Leia brought any luggage aboard the Millennium Falcon. But possibly Leia locked herself in the laundry room, got undressed, washed and dried all her clothing, got dressed, and left the laundry room, several times during the voyage.

Furthermore, countless millions and billions of persons in history have normally worn the same clothes straight without changing or washing them for months at a time.

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And if they were twins, why couldn't Luke remember her as well. Maybe when Return of the Jedi was made, the two were only bro and sis but not twins, and the dying in childbirth wasn't established until the prequels. I don't know enough to say whether this is true or not, I've only seen the movies, but don't really know any of the backstories and such.

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"And if they were twins, why couldn't Luke remember her as well."

There are two possible explanations:

1) Leia didn't realize she was remembering her adoptive mother, the Queen of Alderaan we saw at the end of "ROTS". She kept referring to "my father" Senator Bail Organa during the original trilogy and not her mother the queen, so maybe Queen Whatshername died comparatively young and Bail was regent or something.

Or...

2) Luke didn't remember as much as Leia, because he has about 1/10th of her IQ.

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Unless Leia was older then Luke

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Luke was born a couple of minutes before Leia in ROTS

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It is not explained. I guess one possible explanation could be that Leia is extremely powerful with the Force and maybe saw Padme through the Force such as a vision or early memory during her birth. Padme doesn't die until shortly after both children are born in ROTS. It really isn't explained, but somebody could just draw up some Force hocus pocus to explain it.

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Because it hadn't yet been decided that their mother would die in childbirth. Remember the writers changed the storyline to make Luke and Leia brother and sister.

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Leia was adopted as was Luke. It is possible that Leia's adopted mother passed away when she was young - hence the confusion.

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That's a good theory. I NEVER would've thought of that. Good call.

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That's a plothole problem with the prequel trilogy. One of many.

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False memories. Or she sensed her mother and had an image of her via the force somehow.

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I could be wrong but in ROTS I believe Leia was born with open eyes and Lukes eyes were closed. Maybe with the force that image has stuck with her.

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Right. In the SW universe, it's possible.

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