The Empire Strikes Out - Inside the Battle of Hoth

[Syt]

Either it is an effect of simple, sheer Stalinian terror among its military (which we have no evidence of, except directly when Vader is involved. As an aside in the original trilogy novelization his casual 'dismissal' of officers for even trivial military mistakes in one big stain on his rap sheet, and a reason of dissatisfaction of officers serving under him)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0jdQqjcsfC8

[Neil]

There were at least two dozen Star Destroyers at Endor.  The loss of a few isn't really going to be decisive.

I've heard that 'force manipulation' theory before, but I've never seen much in the way of evidence to support it.  It just seems so ridiculous on the face of it, that the only way that Palpatine could get fighting men equipped with the most awesome weapons around to fight was to trick them with the Force.  Does not compute.

There are quite a few examples in ROTS of people who follow Palpatine like drones because they are demonstratively under his magic sway. For example his guests in the Opera house with Anakin, the alien chancellor who calls him master, the Senators during his discourse, and so on.

If I were an Imperial officer, deploying massive, planet-destroying resources to pursuit a 18 year old blond Ken doll- like peasant from Tatooine would certainly appear whimsical. Yet they do stupid military decisions like this without a single protest.

While technology is quite fundamental to the Empire, such a huge Empire oddly doesn't have any factionalism among its military human elements; on the contrary they seems totally subjugated to Palpatine's every whimsical order. Either it is an effect of simple, sheer Stalinian terror among its military (which we have no evidence of, except directly when Vader is involved. As an aside in the original trilogy novelization his casual 'dismissal' of officers for even trivial military mistakes in one big stain on his rap sheet, and a reason of dissatisfaction of officers serving under him) or Dark Side Magic (as in the canon totally, indiscutably exists).

We're not talking about people doing weird things or being unusually obedient though.  We're talking about naval officers with a superior fleet doing the exact opposite of what their experience and training tells them to do.  Palpatine's mastery of the Force can explain a lot of things that happened during his reign, but his death is insufficient cause for the Navy to retreat in the face of the enemy.

[Ideologue]

I'd argue that the base building blocks are so few that correspondingly few structures can be built from them.

Unlike Star Trek, that by the time of Voyager was bogged down in Prime Directive Fundamentalism and technobabble hell.

Now, now, Voyager could have been really good.  The premise was solid.  Unfortunately it was rare enough that anyone working on the show had any ideas at all, let alone coherent ones about how to advance that premise to interesting conclusions.  It's unfortunate that Moore wasn't in a position of authority with Voyager along with DS9--while Galactica veered into shittiness, in many ways it was practically the same show (starship that is a community to itself must find Earth) but it did so much more with it--invention of a strong recurrent antagonist, realistic and interesting tensions between different factions within the protagonists, and so forth.

Actually, how much fun would it have been if, like Tom Zarek, Chakotay had led a mutiny against Janeway and Harry Kim got blown out an airlock for treason?  HIGH HILARITY.

OK, NOW El Larcho can accuse me of not getting enough sunlight.

See, but Voyager was supposed to counteract the militarism and general awesomeness of DS9 and return closer to Roddenberry's original hippie-flippie vision.  It also suffered from outdated, reset-button plot and characterization.  Sure, it's alright to be episodic, but when nobody really grows or changes over the entire series run except for maybe the Doctor), that shit don't fly anymore.

That may be the direction it evolved in, but recall that DS9 started far less dark and militaristic than after, at the earliest, the first episode with the Jem'Hadar, and probably not until that one where Garak tortures Odo half to death but it's a bonding experience, and arguably not till Way of the Warrior right at the beginning of the fourth season and the reinvention of the show as a full-blown space opera and political/war epic.

I'd say it's really more the people involved in each--Behr, Moore, and Berman's lack of interest on DS9 vs. Braga, Biller, and Taylor, along with Berman's greater interest, on Voyager.  You had more talent, and better-used talent, in the latter as opposed to the former; maybe even more importantly, you also had people on DS9 who had correctly gauged that the future of television was serial storytelling.  Like, Braga could write a decent freakout episode every now and again, but he never should have been allowed to help run a show--even if he wasn't totally creatively bankrupt, he was also not especially good.  More egregiously, Berman's control and insistence on maintenance of a status quo was poison.  This Berman/Braga approach of repetition of ideas so long as they were both bad and old, was also pretty much entirely responsible for turning Enterprise, a potentially neat prequel show, into retread garbage right from take one, and it never really did anything interesting until they allowed some experimentation, and eventually let it become a vehicle for Coto's faintly entertaining exercise in inbreeding depression in the form of officially-approved fan fiction.  Anyway, it's easy to see why it floundered and ultimately failed--it was Voyager until too late.

Even so, it's difficult to argue from a pure business standpoint that DS9 was better.  Voyager, iirc, got better ratings overall.  At the same time, DS9 is remembered fondly, probably always will be, and will support arguments from fans that it was artistically the best the franchise ever achieved (despite its flaws, and even if it's a little obscure in comparison to the two pop culturally preeminent series), whereas Voyager is remembered largely as a joke and may wind up forgotten.  DS9 also, as you say, was a forerunner to pretty much the only kind of successful dramatic programming today.  (Then again--shit, Friends wasn't afraid of story arcs and character growth.  So it's not like this was totally unheard-of back in the 1990s.)

Anyway, I don't know if the shape DS9 took led Voyager to take on opposing (or if we wanted to be charitable, "complementary") qualities.  I think it was really just an accident, and the respective tones and content of each series reflect the abilities and predilections of each series' creators.

[Barrister]

Still, for all we know the fleets might still be engaged at the end of ROTJ, although the attitude of the rebels makes it seem unlikely.  The Imperial fleet seemed much larger and more powerful than the rebel one, so I would hope that whoever took command after Admiral Piett died was hanged for cowardice.  There's no good reason to pull your superior fleet back, even though you've just lost a Death Star and your flagship.

Except that the Emperor and Vader were both dead, a Death Star blew up, and several ISDs were lost or heavily damaged. Most of the sway Palplatine held over the Empire and the Imperial Moffs was thoroughly Force Manipulation from the Dark Side, as shown in the prequels. What happens to the puppet when the puppeteer gets thrown in a Death Star core?

So in essence, people on the Imperial Fleet suddenly woke up in a faze and said "Where the fuck am I? Why I'm here fighting furries? Screw that, retreat."

There were at least two dozen Star Destroyers at Endor.  The loss of a few isn't really going to be decisive.

I've heard that 'force manipulation' theory before, but I've never seen much in the way of evidence to support it.  It just seems so ridiculous on the face of it, that the only way that Palpatine could get fighting men equipped with the most awesome weapons around to fight was to trick them with the Force.  Does not compute.

Imperial Rule was entirely centralized in the personal hands of the Emperor (and Vader at his right side).  There is no other formal structure - no Senate, no imperial bureaucracy, and most importantly, no obvious line of succession.

Once the Emperor and Vader is gone, there is a power vacuum.  Sure, the Fleet could have stayed on to defeat the Rebels, but suddenly the real action is back on Coruscant.  A smart and ambitious Admiral would retreat to the capital where they assert their control over the seat of power, then deal with the rebels later.

[Neil]

That may be the direction it evolved in, but recall that DS9 started far less dark and militaristic than after, at the earliest, the first episode with the Jem'Hadar, and probably not until that one where Garak tortures Odo half to death but it's a bonding experience, and arguably not till Way of the Warrior right at the beginning of the fourth season and the reinvention of the show as a full-blown space opera and political/war epic.

It seems to me that there were some hints of what they had in store relatively early on.  Even in the beginning they were delving into Maquis terrorists and a civil war on Bajor.

[Neil]

Still, for all we know the fleets might still be engaged at the end of ROTJ, although the attitude of the rebels makes it seem unlikely.  The Imperial fleet seemed much larger and more powerful than the rebel one, so I would hope that whoever took command after Admiral Piett died was hanged for cowardice.  There's no good reason to pull your superior fleet back, even though you've just lost a Death Star and your flagship.

Except that the Emperor and Vader were both dead, a Death Star blew up, and several ISDs were lost or heavily damaged. Most of the sway Palplatine held over the Empire and the Imperial Moffs was thoroughly Force Manipulation from the Dark Side, as shown in the prequels. What happens to the puppet when the puppeteer gets thrown in a Death Star core?

So in essence, people on the Imperial Fleet suddenly woke up in a faze and said "Where the fuck am I? Why I'm here fighting furries? Screw that, retreat."

There were at least two dozen Star Destroyers at Endor.  The loss of a few isn't really going to be decisive.

I've heard that 'force manipulation' theory before, but I've never seen much in the way of evidence to support it.  It just seems so ridiculous on the face of it, that the only way that Palpatine could get fighting men equipped with the most awesome weapons around to fight was to trick them with the Force.  Does not compute.

Imperial Rule was entirely centralized in the personal hands of the Emperor (and Vader at his right side).  There is no other formal structure - no Senate, no imperial bureaucracy, and most importantly, no obvious line of succession.

Once the Emperor and Vader is gone, there is a power vacuum.  Sure, the Fleet could have stayed on to defeat the Rebels, but suddenly the real action is back on Coruscant.  A smart and ambitious Admiral would retreat to the capital where they assert their control over the seat of power, then deal with the rebels later.

That doesn't make sense though.  You have the Rebels right there, and there is political and military value in destroying them and being the guy who destroyed them.  Why not do both?

[Barrister]

Still, for all we know the fleets might still be engaged at the end of ROTJ, although the attitude of the rebels makes it seem unlikely.  The Imperial fleet seemed much larger and more powerful than the rebel one, so I would hope that whoever took command after Admiral Piett died was hanged for cowardice.  There's no good reason to pull your superior fleet back, even though you've just lost a Death Star and your flagship.

Except that the Emperor and Vader were both dead, a Death Star blew up, and several ISDs were lost or heavily damaged. Most of the sway Palplatine held over the Empire and the Imperial Moffs was thoroughly Force Manipulation from the Dark Side, as shown in the prequels. What happens to the puppet when the puppeteer gets thrown in a Death Star core?

So in essence, people on the Imperial Fleet suddenly woke up in a faze and said "Where the fuck am I? Why I'm here fighting furries? Screw that, retreat."

There were at least two dozen Star Destroyers at Endor.  The loss of a few isn't really going to be decisive.

I've heard that 'force manipulation' theory before, but I've never seen much in the way of evidence to support it.  It just seems so ridiculous on the face of it, that the only way that Palpatine could get fighting men equipped with the most awesome weapons around to fight was to trick them with the Force.  Does not compute.

Imperial Rule was entirely centralized in the personal hands of the Emperor (and Vader at his right side).  There is no other formal structure - no Senate, no imperial bureaucracy, and most importantly, no obvious line of succession.

Once the Emperor and Vader is gone, there is a power vacuum.  Sure, the Fleet could have stayed on to defeat the Rebels, but suddenly the real action is back on Coruscant.  A smart and ambitious Admiral would retreat to the capital where they assert their control over the seat of power, then deal with the rebels later.

That doesn't make sense though.  You have the Rebels right there, and there is political and military value in destroying them and being the guy who destroyed them.  Why not do both?

No matter what happens, Endor will be remembered as a massive Imperial defeat at that point.

The value is in being on Coruscant.

I know there are historical analogues, but the only one I can think of was the death of genghis khan.  The armies immediately retreat in order to determine succession.

[Neil]

But once you get there, why should anyone listen to you?  You don't have an especially large or powerful fleet, and you're only achievement is being a coward.  You're also relatively junior, since you were one of Piett's subordinates.  You need to bring something to the table.

[dps]

I'd argue that the base building blocks are so few that correspondingly few structures can be built from them.

Unlike Star Trek, that by the time of Voyager was bogged down in Prime Directive Fundamentalism and technobabble hell.

Now, now, Voyager could have been really good.  The premise was solid.  Unfortunately it was rare enough that anyone working on the show had any ideas at all, let alone coherent ones about how to advance that premise to interesting conclusions.  It's unfortunate that Moore wasn't in a position of authority with Voyager along with DS9--while Galactica veered into shittiness, in many ways it was practically the same show (starship that is a community to itself must find Earth) but it did so much more with it--invention of a strong recurrent antagonist, realistic and interesting tensions between different factions within the protagonists, and so forth.

Actually, how much fun would it have been if, like Tom Zarek, Chakotay had led a mutiny against Janeway and Harry Kim got blown out an airlock for treason?  HIGH HILARITY.

OK, NOW El Larcho can accuse me of not getting enough sunlight.

See, but Voyager was supposed to counteract the militarism and general awesomeness of DS9 and return closer to Roddenberry's original hippie-flippie vision.  It also suffered from outdated, reset-button plot and characterization.  Sure, it's alright to be episodic, but when nobody really grows or changes over the entire series run except for maybe the Doctor), that shit don't fly anymore.

That may be the direction it evolved in, but recall that DS9 started far less dark and militaristic than after, at the earliest, the first episode with the Jem'Hadar, and probably not until that one where Garak tortures Odo half to death but it's a bonding experience, and arguably not till Way of the Warrior right at the beginning of the fourth season and the reinvention of the show as a full-blown space opera and political/war epic.

I'd say it's really more the people involved in each--Behr, Moore, and Berman's lack of interest on DS9 vs. Braga, Biller, and Taylor, along with Berman's greater interest, on Voyager.  You had more talent, and better-used talent, in the latter as opposed to the former; maybe even more importantly, you also had people on DS9 who had correctly gauged that the future of television was serial storytelling.  Like, Braga could write a decent freakout episode every now and again, but he never should have been allowed to help run a show--even if he wasn't totally creatively bankrupt, he was also not especially good.  More egregiously, Berman's control and insistence on maintenance of a status quo was poison.  This Berman/Braga approach of repetition of ideas so long as they were both bad and old, was also pretty much entirely responsible for turning Enterprise, a potentially neat prequel show, into retread garbage right from take one, and it never really did anything interesting until they allowed some experimentation, and eventually let it become a vehicle for Coto's faintly entertaining exercise in inbreeding depression in the form of officially-approved fan fiction.  Anyway, it's easy to see why it floundered and ultimately failed--it was Voyager until too late.

Even so, it's difficult to argue from a pure business standpoint that DS9 was better.  Voyager, iirc, got better ratings overall.  At the same time, DS9 is remembered fondly, probably always will be, and will support arguments from fans that it was artistically the best the franchise ever achieved (despite its flaws, and even if it's a little obscure in comparison to the two pop culturally preeminent series), whereas Voyager is remembered largely as a joke and may wind up forgotten.  DS9 also, as you say, was a forerunner to pretty much the only kind of successful dramatic programming today.  (Then again--shit, Friends wasn't afraid of story arcs and character growth.  So it's not like this was totally unheard-of back in the 1990s.)

Anyway, I don't know if the shape DS9 took led Voyager to take on opposing (or if we wanted to be charitable, "complementary") qualities.  I think it was really just an accident, and the respective tones and content of each series reflect the abilities and predilections of each series' creators.

Forget Friends;  even I Love Lucy had a few story arcs.  And, heck, within the ST franchise, TNG and even TOS had some character growth.

What's really puzzling about Voyager is their failure to use what they had set up.  The whole whole point of having the mixed Fleet/Marquis crew was to set up plot lines about how they viewed things and approached problems differently--but after the first few episodes, this never comes up again;  they might as well have had the Marquis ship destroyed with all hands, or just have Voyager flung to the Delta quadrant by some non-reproducible accident or phenomena, without having the Marquis along at all.  Tom Paris is set up as a guy who nobody trusted that Janeway only brought along because he had potentially valuable skills and knowledge, but that never is dealt with, and his characterization for the rest of the series is essentially just "crack pilot".  Harry Kim is supposed to be the eager but inexperienced young officier just out of the academy, so we're supposed to be able to watch him gain experience and confidence, but it never happens.  Neelix they're letting stay on the ship mostly because they know very little about the Delta quadrant and he's supposed to be their expert local guide--but he doesn't actually know anything useful.  Let him really have useful local knowledge to impart so that he has a legit function within the show.  If you still want him to be the comic relief, you can go ahead and also have him be the incompetant ship's cook (because everyone else has more important jobs or is even worse at cooking) and make jokes about his cooking while still letting him be able to give good information on the cultures, resources, politics, etc., of the Delta quadrant.  Or go the other way, and make him a much darker, more sinister character who's manipulating the situation for his own ends--when he gives them wrong information, it's not because he's an idiot who doesn't know anything, but because he's deliberately misleading them.  (There are definately elements of this darker side to the character, but as with most other potentially interesting ideas in Voyager, the writers never bother to develop them.)

[Admiral Yi]

So much intellectualizing. 

[Neil]

Man is an intellectual creature.  This is what we do.

[grumbler]

Anyway, I don't know if the shape DS9 took led Voyager to take on opposing (or if we wanted to be charitable, "complementary") qualities.  I think it was really just an accident, and the respective tones and content of each series reflect the abilities and predilections of each series' creators.

Agreed, understanding that JMS was effectively the creator of DS9.  Had DS9 not been able to see the success of the the storytelling model used by B5 from its start, I don't think DS9 would have used serial storytelling from the halfway point or so of its run.

I also think the fact that DS9 was a syndicated rather than a network show allowed its producers more freedom to experiment with their format.

[CountDeMoney]

So much intellectualizing. 

This shit is important, man.

[Ed Anger]

I'm disappointed in a lot of you.

[Neil]

This thread makes me want to play TIE Fighter again.