Mace called Depa "Padawan" in a real stern voice once during a Council meeting, to which she, completly flabbergasted, replied "Im 42?!"

This lead to all people on the council laughing and the meeting being completely ruined because every time one of them said something they had to start laughing again.

thinking about how so many parents who give their children to the jedi order did so because they want their kids to be raised safely, to have the care that their first family can’t give them, to be loved and understood by their peers and teachers and guardians; how much devotion and pain goes into that decision; and how that means so many jedi become part of the order due to the ultimate expression of love without possessive attachment

The "Strictness" of the Jedi

Ahsoka Tano: I was just reckless on the battlefield, violating orders to retreat and had to be forced to pull out.

Mace Windu: You'll be performing extra chores at the Temple for a little while.

Ahsoka Tano: I just lost my lightsaber and am too embarrassed to tell my Master about it.

Jocasta Nu: Well that's alright dear. Here, why don't I introduce you to Master Sinube our expert on the underworld, he'll help you find it. We won't even tell your Master.

Ahsoka Tano: *Spends the investigation threatening people, beating them up, and being consumed with impatience and fear.*

Master Sinube: That's alright, we'll use this as a learning opportunity. I'm going to teach you patience! Then bring you to a youngling class to pass the lesson on.

Ahsoka Tano: I lied and snuck my way onto the Citadel mission purely because no one had done it before and I wanted to be apart of it.

Plo Koon: No problem, I'll cover for you.

Ahsoka Tano: I just spoke out of turn to the Jedi Council.

The Council: Whatever. And we blame you for this, Anakin.

Ahsoka Tano: I muddled an investigation into a bombing, beat up Clones who tried to arrest me, worked with a known Sith Assassin, and broke out of prison.

Jedi Council: We award you with Knighthood at the age of sixteen.

Ahsoka Tano: I demand an army to invade a neutral planet because an ex-terrorist asked me to do it!

Obi-Wan Kenobi: Okay sure, let me talk to the Council.

Ahsoka Tano: What? The capital's under attack? I don't care! Just give me the army already!

Anakin Skywalker: Here you go.

Ahsoka Tano: I'm not apart of the Jedi Order anymore.

Jedi Council: We'll still share relevant intelligence with you while you deal with the crisis in Mandalore.

Here's a funny idea for you. The Clone Troopers figure out they have chips in their heads and splice their way into the orders, and instead of trying to deal with it politically (and accidentally revealing themselves to whoever ordered them put there), or doing an army wide medical brain surgery procedure (and accidentally revealing themselves to whoever ordered them put there), or asking for help (and having the people who are trying to help, accidentally revealing themselves to whoever ordered them put there)...

...they just kidnap all their Jedi, and go dark.

It's all very polite and efficient. Some of the Jedi do need to get shot with stunner bolts until there's time for silly things like explanations (Rex is kinda mad he lost that bet to Cody, maybe once Commander Skywalker wakes up it's time to finally follow Kix's increasingly more weighted hints about the need for therapists aboard their ships), but there are a lot more clones than there are Jedi and anyway most of them trust their men far too much to do all that much arguing.

This doomed them all in a different world. It saves them in this one.

(Somewhere on Coruscant Sheev Palpatine gets a bad feeling and orders someone to check out the Jedi temple, - someone who's not a trooper, because there seems to be a very large absence of clones suddenly, not even CC-1010 can be gotten a hold of.)

(This is because a tiny little Twilek youngling is chewing on Fox's vambrace at the moment somewhere in hyperspace. Also, he smashed his comlink 238 galactic standard minutes ago).

The Jedi Temple is empty.

The Force is not screaming with the sound of thousands of lights being extinguished all across the galaxy. And Fives deserves a well earned nap.

I love the Jedi Temple. It must have been breathtaking, beautiful, jaw-droppingly gorgeous- the Jedi Temple must have been everything. A little taste of paradise, hidden in plain sight, the beauty of a thousand dreams nestled in the hearts of the Jedi. It was a home, a school, a place to be safe, to be whole.

ugh one of the most tragic things about Order 66 and the Jedi Purge is the erasure of all that history by the Empire and by time. More than just history, it's the erasure of culture, the purposeful cleansing of the Jedi ways and people from the Galaxy. All these stories and people were lost, not to time, but by the intentional extinction of everything they ever were. In Crimson Reign #3, The Archivist (written by Charles Soule) puts it in a way that genuinely struck me when I was reading it.

You don't have to read all that, but I feel like it drives the point across wonderfully. The Jedi Order not only died because of Order 66 and the Purge, but the very idea of it was also made into a death sentence. Each Jedi's life, before the Empire, was preserved through the seemingly eternal memory of the Order, the Jedi Archives, or their lineage, and those who took their path. The Empire erased any trace of that memory, collapsing the tradition of millennia. As a Jedi, you are almost ensured to be remembered, and your actions are certain to have echoes throughout the ages. The Empire, and more specifically Palpatine I should probably say, did everything to take it away. What's left of The High Republic? What's left of the heroics of generations of Jedi? What's left of their life stories? Their meditation or lightsaber techniques? It's the tragedy of the Jedi order, and it goes so much deeper than the awful loss of about 10,000 Jedi during Order 66 and the purge (not that that should be underestimated).

Plo Koon: What would you say if I took in another mentally ill trooper?

Mace: What's in the box?

Plo Koon:...

Mace: Master Plo, what's in the box

Plo Koon, opens a 5.11 box: His name is Fives, found him wandering around lower levels of Coruscant

It would be important to understand that Jedi Knights are not supposed to do the job of the social services, the security force and the law enforcement. They're not supposed to run democracy for the people. They're not supposed to hand out peace and justice. They are supposed to guard the galaxy, not infantilize it.

Jedi June 2023

A creative fandom event dedicated to appreciating the Jedi, taking place during the entire month of June! Each week will feature two prompts, around which people can create fanwork (of any kind – fic, art, cosplay, edits, anything you can think of) or meta focusing on the Jedi and the Jedi Order. All eras and continuities are welcome; OCs, established characters, doesn’t matter – it just needs to be about appreciating the Jedi!

Rules:

If you are participating, please tag your work/meta with #jedi june and/or @ this blog so that I will see it and reblog it here. All work must be your own. Feel free to crosspost it off-site.

This is an appreciation event, focusing on what we love and enjoy about the Jedi – not what we don’t. This is not the place to air your grievances with the Code, take potshots at the Council, prop certain Jedi/certain eras of Jedi up at the expense of others, or disparage the Jedi Order or their philosophy (including the concept of non-attachment) and way of life in any way. You are free to do that on your own time if that’s your thing, but it has no place within this event.

AUs and crossovers are allowed, with caveats: again, the purpose of this event is to appreciate the Jedi as Jedi, so sticking your favorite Jedi characters in something like a modern AU or making them all Sith or Mandalorian is not really within the spirit of this event. However, AUs such as making a non-Jedi character a Jedi, having a character survive their canon death, giving a character a different teacher or padawan, or killing Palpatine off-screen in an unspecified yet embarrassing and painful manner, would all be perfectly fine. Use your best judgement to determine whether an AU fits the spirit of the event or not.

Ships are allowed as long as they’re not between a child and adult, and following the above rules.

Following the prompts is encouraged, but not required. Any sort of pro-Jedi content is encouraged all year month long, and if tagged (and following the rules), will be reblogged. Note that there is a change in the event this year - previously, prompts were associated with Saturday and Sunday of each week. Going forward, the prompts will be associated with the week in general, rather than the weekend specifically. As a result, we have a total of 10 prompts this year, instead of 8!

As another change, we have an AO3 collection this year!

Prompts:

Week 1 (June 1 - 4):

Prompt 1: Guidance

Prompt 2: Knighting

Week 2 (June 5 - 11):

Prompt 1: Diplomacy

Prompt 2: The Force

Week 3 (June 12 - 18):

Prompt 1: Visions

Prompt 2: Confronting Fear

Week 4 (June 19 - 25):

Prompt 1: Focus

Prompt 2: Gathering

Week 5 (June 26 - 30):

Prompt 1: Friendship

Prompt 2: Tragedy Averted

If you have any questions, don’t hesitate to ask! I hope you will have fun participating!

Static banner credit @independence1776​​

gif banner credit @trickytricky1​​

'I had a mother who loved me'

(aka, the Jedi Order is NOT Anakin's family)

This is a topic that I've seen discussed elsewhere and I felt compelled to add my own thoughts. I've seen some takes I vehemently disagree with, especially regarding Shmi and Little Ani in TPM, and Anakin's 'decision' to leave with Qui-Gon. It's crazy how some people will blame little Ani for 'wanting' to be a Jedi, yet apparently Luke in ANH is allowed to want this, even though Luke likewise barely knows anything about what being a Jedi entails, and even though it's much more risky (and, frankly, far more unrealistic) to dream of becoming a Jedi in the Dark Times era?? As if a nine-year-old slave-boy wanting to take part in his new-found freedom by learning to be something he associates with heroism means he somehow 'should have known' he wasn’t going to be a ‘good fit’ for the Order. My argument is that there was nothing wrong with Anakin, and there was in fact no legitimate reason for him or ANYONE ELSE to believe he'd not be good at using the Force to help others (which is what the Jedi are supposed to do), especially when he had literally just done so in the pod-race. The whole reason Qui-Gon noticed Anakin was because of how strong in the Force he already was, even untrained. Qui-Gon has faith in him, it's just the Jedi Council that doubts him. Because, unlike Qui-Gon who perceives Anakin's positive qualities and potential, Yoda and the Jedi Council are afraid of him. Because Anakin is basically an 'unknown' (read: uncontrollable) entity suddenly in their midst.

While the Prequels film-canon stands on its own in this regard, we can also look to the novelizations for even more emphasis on this topic. In the TPM novelization, several things are noteable: first of all, even before Qui-Gon arrives, Anakin has had prophetic dreams about becoming a Jedi. And since Shmi is aware that Ani's dreams and visions do often come to pass, when Qui-Gon appears and offers to take him away to be trained, why wouldn't she think that maybe this was somehow Force (or Fate) ordained? And that therefore it was the right thing to do to let him go? And the second thing, is while it's also clear that Little Ani (like Luke!) has a romanticised view of what being a Jedi might be like, his actual motivation for becoming a Jedi is not simply because he 'selfishly' wants to embark on some fun adventure without his mom. On the contrary, every. single. time. little Ani thinks about the possibility of becoming a Jedi or leaving Tatooine, it's directly in relation to eventually returning to FREE his mother and the rest of the slaves:

He was several things in the course of his dreams. Once he was a Jedi Knight, fighting against things so dark and insubstantial he could not identify them. Once he was a pilot of a star cruiser, taking the ship into hyperspace, spanning whole star systems on his voyage. Once he was a great and feared commander of an army, and he came back to Tatooine with ships and troops at his command to free the planet’s slaves. His mother was waiting for him, smiling, arms outstretched.

and

He gazed skyward, his mother's hand resting lightly on his arm, and thought about what it would be like to be out there, flying battle cruisers and fighters, traveling to far worlds and strange places. He didn't care what Wald said, he wouldn't be a slave all his life. Just as he wouldn't always be a boy. He would find a way to leave Tatooine. He would find a way to take his mother with him. His dreams whirled through his head as he watched the stars, a kaleidoscope of bright images. He imagined how it would be. He saw it clearly in his mind, and it made him smile.

Anakin wants to escape slavery and train as a Jedi so he can come back and continue helping his friends and family on Tatooine. So he can return to free the slaves. Little does he know that he won't be allowed to do that... :'(

It's important to note as well that at this point, Anakin *also* has no idea that, as a Jedi, he won't be allowed to get married and have a family. Even though he is already naively imagining himself someday marrying Padme. So he doesn't know that not only will he not be permitted to return for his mother as he'd always hoped, but he will also technically not be allowed to even have a family of his own even when he's old enough to do so.

And what of Shmi's thoughts on Anakin becoming a Jedi? At the start of the AotC novelization, she is trying to be happy with the thought of it, but ONLY because she believes he must be living his best life as a Jedi. She has no idea that he had to go through rejection first before being accepted into the Order. The AotC novelization shows that as Shmi is being held captive and tortured by the Tusken Raiders, she tries to comfort herself by holding onto her imagination of what Anakin's time as Jedi is like:

All those times staring up at the night sky, she had thought of him, had imagined him soaring across the galaxy, rescuing the downtrodden, saving planets from ravaging monsters and evil tyrants. But she had always expected to see [Ani] again, had always expected him to walk onto the moisture farm one day, that impish smile of his, the one that could light up a room, greeting her as if they had never been apart.

Heartbreakingly, as Shmi is being brutalised to death, she clings to the hope that her beloved Ani's life is now better than it was before, and that it was worth saying farewell to him all those years ago, even while simultaneously desperately longing to see him again.

As an aside, it aggravates me to no end that *cough* certain parts of this fandom perpetuate the idea that Shmi is just some blank, wholly selfless entity with no wants or desires of her own. That she's the ‘perfect’ example of a Jedi with no 'attachments' (aka an Old Order Jedi), and that somehow Anakin is a just a 'failure' compared to her. Yes, it could be argued that Shmi is shown to be a better or truer 'Jedi' than most of the other Jedi in the story (aside from Luke in RotJ), but guess what that would mean in that case? (Hint: it has to do with love and family.) Because first and foremost, Shmi is a MOTHER who is trying to do the best for her son, even though a piece of her heart is always missing while he is gone. The AotC novelization shows repeatedly that she tries to assure herself that she did the right thing by letting Ani go, but the human mother side of herself also cries out for him and misses him desperately. She might have let him go in TPM, but in AoTC she wants to see him again. In fact, she believes strongly that she will see him again (because she loves him and he’s her hero because she’s his mom and she trusts he will eventually come back to find her), which is the only thing keeping her holding on until he arrives. How can Shmi be a perfect example of an Old Order Jedi when the motivating factor for even her most selfless actions is her personal FAMILIAL attachment to and unconditional LOVE for Anakin?? Also, how insulting is it to claim that Anakin is a 'failure' in comparison to his 'wonderful, perfect mother', and then proceed to place all the blame on him for being said 'failure'....when he was shown on-screen to be doing just fine in taking after his mother prior to his time in the Jedi Order????

As another poster noted elsewhere, Shmi Skywalker is the only person responsible for the truly good person Anakin Skywalker was.

This is the heart of the entire saga. Anakin's True Self is good because of his mother. Because of how she raised him (to be selfless and to want to help others) and because of the unconditional LOVE she had for him. It was the Jedi Order that failed to provide that for Anakin, and Sidious who manipulated the situation to his advantage.

(And if Shmi was the only person who truly solidified Anakin's inner goodness, then Qui-Gon was the only Jedi who was presented as being equipped to bring out the best in Anakin when Shmi wasn't around. The only one who was prepared to act as an openly warm and compassionate parental figure to Anakin, the only one who could have properly mentored Anakin and helped him navigate both his Force powers as well as the Jedi Code, and the only one who was shown to be willing to stand up to the Council on Anakin's behalf. The tragedy is not that Qui-Gon found Anakin or even that he offered to take him to train in the Force. Rather, the tragedy is that Qui-Gon is slain in the Duel of the Fates, which leaves Anakin without a true protector and advocate in the Order, and allows Sidious an 'in'.)

So the idea that the Jedi Order is Anakin's ‘replacement family' is simply not true—certainly not in the way the story actually pans out. It's telling that, in the original Prequels-era EU, Anakin ran away from the Jedi Temple multiple times. That is NOT the behaviour of a happy child. (It is, however, typical behaviour for children who are struggling in institutionalised care.)

And indeed, the very first paragraph of the AotC novelization opens with Anakin dreaming that he is part of a warm, loving family:

His mind absorbed the scene before him, so quiet and calm and...normal. It was the life he had always wanted, a gathering of family and friends—he knew that they were just that, though the only one he recognized was his dear mother. This was the way it was supposed to be. The warmth and the love, the laughter and the quiet times. This was how he had always dreamed it would be, how he had always prayed it would be. The warm, inviting smiles. The pleasant conversation. The gentle pats on the shoulders. But most of all there was the smile of his beloved mother, so happy now, no more a slave. When she looked at him, he saw all of that and more, saw how proud she was him, how joyful her life had become.

Why would Anakin be dreaming longingly of being part of an openly loving, happy family if he already had that at the Jedi Temple? (Tellingly, he notes that this seems like something normal, as if he's aware that it ought to be commonplace despite the fact that it's currently missing from his own life.)

And later on, when he's visiting Padme's parents' house for dinner, he sees this exact type of scene he's been longing for play out right in front of him, and he wishes that his mother could be there to enjoy it, too:

Anakin took a good helping of several different dishes. The food was all unfamiliar, but the smells told him that he wouldn’t be disappointed. He sat quietly as he ate, listening with half an ear to the chatter all about him. He was thinking of his mom again, of how he wished he could bring her here, a free woman, to live the life she so deserved.

Note that Anakin is thinking about his mother, and putting her first in his mind. He can barely enjoy the meal while he believes his mother could be out there, suffering.

Later on as he and Padme are heading to Tatooine to search for Shmi, they bond over the fact that both their mothers told them the same nursery rhyme ('home again to rest'). It means a lot to Anakin that he can bond with Padme over this similar childhood memory. (No doubt something he would not have had in common with his peers in the Temple, since their only childhood memories would have been within the Jedi Order, rather than in a true home. And certainly not with a mother.)

Finally, we get to the RotS novelization. Yes, THAT one. The one in which we see that Anakin was perfectly willing to walk away from the Order the minute he returned from the war and discovered Padme was pregnant. Willing to walk away to start their FAMILY together. But then his nightmares began, and he reluctantly stayed just a little longer, thinking the Jedi (whom he originally joined with the express intent of wanting to help his loved ones) could offer him some solution to the horror his nightmares were showing him:

If not for his dreams, he’d withdraw from the Order today. Now. ...Let the scandal come; it wouldn’t destroy their lives. Not their real lives. It would destroy only the lives they’d had before each other: those separate years that now meant nothing at all.

To drive the point home, we also have the pivotal scene where Obi-Wan—speaking on the Council's behalf—tries to convince Anakin to spy on the Chancellor. Their exchange says it all:

"He's my friend, Obi-Wan." "I know." "If he asked me to spy on you, do you think I would do it? You know how kind he's been to me. You now how he's looked after me, how he's done everything he could to help me. He's like family." "The Jedi are your family." "No. No, the Jedi are your family. The only one you've ever known. I had a mother who loved me."

Anakin's story breaks my heart because all he wants—all he has ever wanted—is a family. Not to just to 'have' one in a vague sense, but to be PART OF ONE. He wants this, because even when he was slave living an unfree life, at least he had his mother. At least he could feel his mother's love, and could openly demonstrate his love to her in return. For Anakin Skywalker, being a Jedi was never the goal in and of itself. In his mind, it was always primarily a means to save those he loved. To save his family. This is simultaneously the most tragic and the most beautiful thing about his character. It is both his fall AND his redemption.

And those who insist on ignoring Anakin’s deep-seated longing for a family and want to act as though he should just be content with the Jedi Order instead are willfully missing the entire point of his story.

Jedi reacting to news of Commander Fox killing the chancellor (aka the Clone Uprising)

Mace Windu: ughhh, that’ll be so much paperwork.

Yoda: knew it would happen, I did.

Plo Koon: oh that’s fine, I just hope no one was hurt.

Ki Adi-Mundi: oh he actually did it? I thought he was joking.

Kit Fisto: Is Palpatine that old guy in the senate??

Depa Billaba: * too busy to give a statement *

Shaak Ti: that’ll do it.

Anakin Skywalker: oh my god, I just, oh my damn, that’s like, wow holy shit-

Obi-Wan Kenobi: oh WHAT that was today?! I missed it?!

Ahsoka Tano: wow dunked on

Aayla Secura: lmao

Quinlan Vos: lmao

It's funny how certain elements of the fandom are so resistant to the idea that Mace Windu defeated Palpatine fair and square... When I thought the entire purpose of Palpatine's plan was to avoid detection and infiltrate the Republic specifically so the Jedi wouldn't catch on and come for him?

Like if Palpatine really is just so stupidly powerful that nobody could ever defeat him there wouldn't even be a purpose to his big plan. He would just attack outright at the head of the Separatists or he'd order the Clone Army for himself or something. The fact that he didn't shows that he knew the Jedi were a threat to him.

So surely Mace Windu, the second most powerful Jedi after Yoda and the one who specialized in anti-Sith techniques would be able to defeat him in battle. If he couldn't and Palpatine was just playing him, Anakin's decision served no narrative purpose because it wouldn't have changed anything anyways.

Obi-Wan (according to the wiki) was 25 when he was in his last year as a padawan under Qui-gon Jinn. (So presumably he was 14/15 when he started).

Anakin on the other hand was exceptionally young when he started at 9. (And finished at 19). Usually they start at 14ish (like Ahsoka).

Padmé was 14 when she was elected queen of Naboo.

Cal Kestis is presumably somewhere between 11 and 13 when he became a padawan to Jaro Patal.

Like I'm sorry, but it is insane if you think about it. That children are either elected into office (Padmé) or recruited and sent out into war or 'peace missions'(Ahsoka, Anakin, to an extent Obi-Wan). And have that be par for the course in a universe.

And I know it's science fiction, I know these things happened in our past too. But forgive me for adressing these problems in my own fanfics. Because fuck me.

Do the jedi have like. the star wars equivalent of sword dances? I mean lightsaber fights already look like dances, but like what about the ones that are actually intended to be dances? like imagine dancing with a lightsaber- that would be sooo pretty to look at. I imagine that obi-wan isn't like super good or an expert or anything, but there's a couple that he knows and loves and does really well, especially when he's on his own. Qui-gon was really good at many and taught him to do them and it stuck, and on those nights he was grieving he just dances listening to the force. Nobody dances quite like obi-wan, though. Like he doesn't know a lot of dances but he's really really good on the ones he does know, and plus points to the fact that obi-wan is probably also musically inclined.

Anakin is really good, too, like qui-gon, he caught it much more easily than obi-wan did. It probably started out as him accidentally seeing obi-wan do it when he was younger, and then trying to emulate and failing lmao, and then it became like, and alternative way of meditating for Anakin? like at some point Obi-wan realized that dance could totally work as a way of moving meditation and decided to teach anakin himself and enroll him in classes, and I think anakin would really get into it especially during the war. Padme would like it, she has an eye for stuff like this so sometimes she helps point out details to anakin.

Ahsoka learns from anakin because anakin is definitely the type to add sword dance into ahsoka's curiculum, but he prefers teaching her himself because he just so happens to be really good at it. Ahsoka would like it! like she's not as into it as anakin is but sometimes she practices when there's a lot on her mind or like, when she wants to show the clones what she learned. oh, the clones would absolutely enjoy watching ahsoka dance, and ahsoka would totally convince anakin to do it with her. Sometimes they'd convince obi wan. When she leaves the order she still practices, it's her way of staying connected even though she'd never come to realize it herself. And when (if?) the whole oder 66 thing happens, the sword dance is one of the few jedi culture bits that not many outside of the order knows, and she preserves it.

I like to think that she'll teach luke, one day. like maybe directly, or maybe she'll leave him a set of holo-recordings that he finds, and then luke would try to emulate and learn, and because he's Padme's and Anakin's son, he'd catch on and learn quickly. It won't be a perfect imitation, so Luke just uses his gut (the force) and adds new bits into the missing portions of the dance. He'd teach leia too, like leia is not super interested as luke is, but this specific aspect is actually super fascinating to her, so maybe she'll learn a bit, while also assisting him in doing some research about it. It surprised her how it helps her clear her mind.

Me: Why do i love making myself sad by thinking about the clones and order 66 and the jedi so much?

Also me: Captain America: The Winter Soldier is my favourite movie of all time.