Deathwings said:
Talk about killing the Mandalorians
But...I like Canderous. Can we keep the KotOR era's Mandalorians at least ?
I definitely want to keep the Mandalorians, because without them we don't have a lot of the cooler things in the Expanded Universe, like Delta Squad and Canderous Ordo. Also, Revan and the Exile are not nearly as badass if there are no Mandalorians around.
My solution is simple: have them fucking die. They were a broken, dying people in the Exile's time. There's no reason in bloody hell for them to somehow magically hang on, surviving but not prospering or expanding at all, for a thousand motherfucking years. The Mandalorians get one last hurrah, are all badass and stuff, and then die so we don't have to put up with Jango and Boba's bullshit pseudo-superpowers a thousand years later. All the hard-liners out squatting in the backwater wildernesses of wild worlds die, and the rest of the Mandalorians disseminate into the general human populace, dispersing the Mandalorians as a distinctive human race into the oblivion that is the much larger human gene pool.
To justify Delta Squad, just have Sidius discover some old cache of stuff from the eras when they were still around. Maybe he discovers a sample of Canderous's blood, and uses it to make elite clone commandos to supplement the Grand Army of the Republic that his plan requires building. Then, when he pulls his gambit off, the Canderous clones get turned into the 501st and Sidius's personal Elite Guard.
Boba and Jango are mere footnotes in the lore, Canderous is a boss, we get to keep Delta Squad and Vader's Legion, and the entire Clone Wars metaplot is freed up to be occupied with something cooler and more logical than "some random ass Jedi Master from twenty years ago that we forgot about put in a massive goddamn order for a massive army of supersoldiers that we again somehow forgot about, OH WELL AT LEAST WE HAVE AN ARMY NOW."
Maybe the threat from the Trade Federation is a ploy by Sidius to get the Jedi to campaign to unite the rest of the galaxy against them. The Jedi do all of the work, and all Sidius has to do is shoot them in the back on the eve of victory, stick a crown on his head, and call it a day. Getting the Jedi to do your own work for you before betraying them sounds exactly like something a Sith Lord would do. We get to see two movies of the Jedi fulfilling their role as warrior-monk
diplomats and uniting disparate factions together in between scenes of them kicking ass, and then the third movie has Sidius being all Imma totally let you finish, but I run the entire universe now. Stage a disaster coup, pin it on the Jedi, exterminate them, and then blame the entire thing on alien extremists, thereby paving the way for his human-dominated, human-centric Galactic Empire.
As an added bonus, this setup gives Anakin a much better, less pussy-ish reason for his defection and transformation into Vader.
"Yes, Anakin. The Jedi say they do not rule. And yet they sit in a palace built and paid for by the people, place themselves above the laws of others, can take control of any investigation or crime scene just by demanding it, claim diplomatic immunity in all places on all matters of import, are the only ones who police themselves, and sequester themselves away in silver towers to hold councils that other, lesser men are not privy to, free to promote or condemn whoever they so chose, without ever having to be held accountable for that power. And in times of war? They claim themselves the de-facto leaders and generals, and guide the armies that they have no true experience commanding or controlling. Why? Because they believe their powers give them that right. It is as simple as that.
"They are a ruling class in all but name. This war has nothing to do with Light and Dark, Anakin. It has always been about power, and who possesses it. The Jedi? The Sith? Back and forth, back and forth, always turmoil, always
war. How many of your friends are dead because of this war, Anakin? People you knew? Perhaps even people you cared for? I seek nothing less than an end to that war, Anakin, and for that to happen, the Jedi must, regrettably, be destroyed. A power base must be created that is so powerful that they cannot hope to overthrow it. Their true natures must be laid bare to the public, and exaggerated with propaganda if necessary, to prevent any from helping them or attempting to restore their legacy. I do not seek to destroy the Jedi as people, or even as an Order. I am not so crass, or so unambitious. No, we will only have peace if the
idea of the Jedi is killed. This plan of mine will do what no gun or blade can. It will slit the throat of the very concept of the Jedi, destroying them as they are, salting the earth so that none might return, and enforcing order and justice through power in case they do. If to do so makes me a Sith, then so be it! I will proudly bare the name.
"Do you not weep for your fallen comrades, your brothers and sisters, who were thrown into a war by terrible old men who did not explain or justify their actions with anything but cryptic words and riddles of darkness and light? Do you not wish to seek revenge, to claim retribution? Join me, Anakin! Join me, and stand by my side as I bring down this facade of gentle wisdom and guidance, and usher in an era of prosperity and social justice, the era of the first Galactic Empire! Was your mother, a slave, not a kind and honest woman? Did she ever do anything to deserve her lot? And what did the Jedi do to help her?
Nothing. They did nothing to help her escape the injustice of her fate, or save the countless others who languished in similar ends. They even went so far as to steal her child away from her, just as they have done to innumerable other mothers and fathers across the galaxy! They are petty tyrants in crystal towers, lording their powers over others and claiming themselves to be the only true voice of wisdom in the universe. Ask yourself, what do the Jedi believe? Balance. Why? Because balance most easily creates conflict, is the most easily disturbed state of things. Who benefits from these eternal wars and disturbances caused by such Balance? The Jedi, who can use it forever as leverage for their power and influence, funding their citadels and palaces even as they excuse their actions and potency as being necessity, a requirement for hope to exist in a world constantly fraught with conflict. A conflict which
they themselves encourage! The Jedi Order seeks to cause conflict by extolling balance, because only in conflict can they justify their existence.
"The Jedi and their tyranny of 'light' and 'balance' have stood in the way of true peace long enough. What we do is the right thing to do. It is the
just thing to do. It is the only thing that can be done."
