#like. before you tell me i'm wrong name ONE single reason that the separatists had for not immediately annexing mandalore | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

bolithesenate · 27 days

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Satine Kryze should not be a sympathetic character.

A complex and tragic one? Sure. Every day of the week.

But she did not 'have a point', neither in-universe, not outside of the sw framework. She isn't a hero, neither of her own story, nor of someone else's. There is no way she wasn't a tool. You should not look at her and think 'this woman has done nothing wrong and what ultimately happened to Mandalore was to no part her fault'.

Because guys. Friends. Strangers on the interwebs.

Pacifism doesn't work.

And it certainly wouldn't have worked in motherfucking Star Wars – the 'wars' is literally in the title – for a system or series of systems who wanted to stay neutral.

YOU DON'T STAY NEUTRAL FOR LONG BY JUST SAYING 'YEAH, NO THANKS <3' TO A LARGE-SCALE CONFLICT.

source: I am Swiss, we've looked at this in history class. Extensively.

Satine was a dreamer (thanks Obi-Wan) who was allowed to keep her delusions because they actively benefitted Palpatine's plans. And that's something you can quote me on. There is literally no other reason (apart from supremely bad writing but we'll leave that aside here) for her and her little friends' 'Alliance of Neutral Systems' or whatever to be allowed to exist.

Not that they were neutral in any way, shape or form, by the way.

So yeah sorry to the Satine stans, but you're idolizing a character that was written exclusively and specifically for Obi-Wan's manpain and who, in-universe, was a supremely bad politician. Because the level of mental dissonace needed to factually be a Republic System, have a seat in the fucking Republic Senate, rely upon their military for aid while actively proclaiming that All Violence Is Bad And Barbaric one sentence later AND THEN CLAIM TO BE NEUTRAL IN THE WHOLE CONFLICT – it's just mind-blowing. Even moreso that people actually look at this character and see something aspirational in her.

Again, I'll gladly dissect her character any day of the week. She is fascinating because of all the implications her existence as a head of state carries with it, as well as her deeply complicated family history and her relation to mandalorian culture.

But it just grates on me personally that that all gets ignored in favor of her being some sort of icon of white american saviorism (bc that's literally what she is) and her objectively bad political takes being treated like they are the only correct stance to be taken during the Clone Wars/Mandalorian Civil Wars.

If you think pacifism works and actually lets you stay neutral, I desperately urge you to open a history book. Because those two are mutually exclusive. Especially in the scenario that Star Wars paints.

#you know i would have LOVED actual neutrality be explored in sw canon #but noooo #we got satine and her judgmental draft dodger club #give me neutral systems that ARENT having a happy fun time #that are shooting down republic and seperatist crafts alike when they cross their borders #that are struggling to stay self-sufficient during the wars and that have to make questionable deals with both sides to afford supplies #you know. things based in reality #there is no moral way to wage war #and there is no moral way to stay out of it #its a lose lose situation and i WISH tcw had treated this as such #random boli thoughts #just some meta ramblings to satisfy the blood demons #satine kryze critical #satine kryze #like. before you tell me i'm wrong name ONE single reason that the separatists had for not immediately annexing mandalore #or the 'neutral' systems in general #you dont stay neutral by just saying 'not my business'#you stay neutral by being too fucking annoying to annex #that is literally the only way #star wars #star wars meta

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minnarr · 3 years

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Don’t Talk to Me About Naboo’s Moons

Last month, I had a little too much time on my hands when I ran out of things to do at work, so I made a Powerpoint. I did not expect to have 20 slides worth of yelling about Naboo’s moons, but here we are.

[ID: PowerPoint slide. The title, in big letters, reads “Don’t Talk to Me About Naboo’s Moons.” In smaller letters, the subtitle: “(Star Wars Writers Sure Didn’t Talk to Each Other About Them, Either)”. /end ID]

And now I’m adapting it to a Tumblr post, because why not.

How many moons does Naboo have?

I'm glad you asked

Three

Inside the Worlds of STAR WARS Episode I (2000) stated that they had one moon, and from TPM footage it’s hard to claim for certain there’s any more than that. Apparently taking their cue from Secrets of Naboo, a supplement to the WOTC Star Wars RPG, later sources have run with three moons

Source: https://www.theforce.net/swtc/orbs.html#naboo

Thrawn: Alliances (2018) compares another system’s moons with Naboo’s: “They were small moons, smaller than any of Naboo’s three…” (Ch. 15)

Nexus of Power (supplement to the Star Wars Force and Destiny Roleplaying Game) says Naboo has “three small moons”

[ID: Moonlight over Theed, The Phantom Menace. One obvious moon shines in the sky over Theed palace. Another bright object in the sky may also be a moon. /end ID]

[ID: Amidala’s starship passes a moon of Naboo, The Phantom Menace. The moon in question is tan and barren-looking. /end ID]

So, we have designations for three or fewer moons, right?

Wrong

There's five candidates: Ohma-D'un, Onoam, Rori, Veruna, and a “nameless mass”

Sources and Canon in Star Wars

Before we go on, let’s look at how we get information about the Star Wars universe, and how I select from contradictory information. If you’re familiar, obviously, feel free to skip ahead to the next section. The imaginary audience for the PowerPoint might not have been.

The old EU passes into Legends

On April 25, 2014, in the leadup to The Force Awakens, Lucasfilm announced that all previous Expanded Universe material would now be published under the Legends banner. All six previous movies plus The Clone Wars series “are the immovable objects of Star Wars history, the characters and events to which all other tales must align.” Novels, comics, and other expanded universe material published after the changeover to Legends is now known as New Canon (or Disney Canon).

Every fan ultimately comes to their own arrangement with what they consider canon — which pieces of New Canon and Legends they stitch together to come to a satisfying understanding of the Star Wars universe.

Canon status of roleplaying game materials

The canon policy of Wookieepedia is fascinating and I have not even scratched the surface, but the section on roleplaying games makes for especially convoluted reading. Both the West End Games and Wizards of the Coast licenses for RPGs ended before the Legends changeover; these are firmly Legends.

Fantasy Flight Games, however, gained the license to card, board, and roleplaying games in 2011, just three years before the switch to New Canon. Lucasfilm Story Group has made no public stance on whether their material is canon.

For this reason and because their publishing time for the RPG sourcebooks stretches before and after the changeover, Wookieepedia has gone case-by-case and selected which books apply to Legends, Canon, or both for article-writing purposes.

Mainstream solutions to the three-moon problem

[ID: A quote from Nexus of Power: “Three small moons - Ohma-D’un, Rori, and a nameless mass that is little more than an overgrown asteroid - house small colonies as well as a handful of offworld and orbital shipyard and factories.” /end iD]

Nexus of Power is an FFG sourcebook that was determined by Wookieepedia’s standards to apply to Canon as well as Legends articles. Its entry on Naboo, however, differs from the later sourcebook Rise of the Separatists, which Wookieepedia deems canon and cites in its selection of moons.

The Rise of the Separatists entry reads:

Three moons—Ohma-D’un, Rori, and Veruna—orbit Naboo. They host small colonies with shipyards, orbital dockyards, and factories.

So even within one publishing license and one context, different moons have been attributed to Naboo.

Wookieepedia

Wookieepedia’s Canon page for Naboo lists Ohma-D’un, Onoam, and Veruna. Each of these comes from a different source:

Ohma-D’un cites Rise of the Separatists

Onoam cites Leia, Princess of Alderaan

Veruna cites Star Wars: The Visual Encyclopedia

They’ve made a choice—but it’s definitely not the only plausible choice. Each of the four names we’re given for Naboo’s moons has at least some backing in New Canon.

Onoam

Onoam is the only moon on this list that is fully and non-dubiously canonical, as Leia spent some time there in the 2017 novel Leia, Princess of Alderaan. It is, however, the funniest name choice: someone recently pointed out to me that it’s just an anagram of “a moon”

I love this, but Claudia Gray sure muddied the Naboo Moon Name Waters by making this the only choice it is impossible to reject. No shade, though. I loved the LPOA Naboo crumbs.

Onoam has both mines (plagued in the Imperial era by corrupt leadership and miner safety issues) and luxury housing. Before his assassination, Moff Quarsh Panaka resided in a chalet on Onoam, and Queen Dalné had a home there.

Sidebar: The Mining Moons

When discussing the assassination attempt on Padmé in Attack of the Clones, Mace Windu says, “Our intelligence points to disgruntled spice miners on the moons of Naboo.”

Leia, Princess of Alderaan establishes that Onoam was one of these moons; it mentions strikes and minor political violence a generation before Leia’s. It also establishes that Onoam is mined for medicinal spice, which by law can only be mined by humans, not droids

In Queen’s Shadow, which takes place in 28 BBY, the mining moons “struggle to maintain the balance between the rule of Naboo and their allegiance to filling their quotas”; the mining jobs are much less lucrative than farming on Karlinus

Veruna

[ID: a rather barren, tan-colored moon /end ID]

Star Wars: The Visual Encyclopedia (2017) identifies the moon pictured above as Veruna. The same moon was identified as Ohma-D’un by The Complete Star Wars Encyclopedia (2008), according to Wookieepedia. I have access to neither, but it looks like the moon the ship passed in TPM. For being one of Wookiee’s choices, the evidence for this name is astonishingly thin, but the same can be said of some of the others

Sidebar: King Veruna and his moon

The likelihood is that Veruna (the moon) was named for Ars Veruna, Padmé’s predecessor as Naboo’s monarch in Legends novels Darth Plagueis (2012) and Cloak of Deception (2001)

It is very probable that Veruna is no longer canon, and it is certainly impossible that he served a decade-plus term that ended shortly before Padmé’s reign:

Padmé’s immediate predecessor, according to Queen’s Peril (2020), was Queen Sanandrassa

Sometime during Eirtaé’s childhood, Réillata served a single two-year term, according to Queen’s Shadow (2019)

Even if he’s placed somewhere before Sanandrassa, there’s not really room for him to have reigned that long unless there are two monarchs between him and Padmé

Rori

Rori was named and fleshed out in the 2003 game Star Wars Galaxies, which is now Legends. While it is one of the names given in the Fantasy Flight Games sourcebooks, it doesn’t seem to have a source anywhere else in New Canon.

Ohma-D’un

Ohma-D’un has one New Canon source outside of RPG sourcebooks: the 2018 reference book Star Wars: Smuggler’s Guide. In Smuggler’s Guide, Tyro Viveca (one of the owners of the in-universe book) mentioned seeing bursa-baiting on Ohma-D’un. Bursas are bear-like creatures originally from Legends material, where they were known to attack and destroy Gungan settlements.

I had a picture of a captive bursa for illustrative purposes, but honestly it made me too sad so I deleted it. Nevertheless, that’s stronger detail and evidence than we have for either Rori or Veruna.

Bonus fact: Naboo officially has no such thing as prison. When Panaka mentions this to Rabé, she says, “Only because we send everyone to the moon” (Queen’s Peril). Enjoy those implications!

TL;DR

While Onoam is definitely one of the moons, what you call the other two is up to each person’s discretion until something else is stated. Personally, I prefer Ohma-D’un and Rori, rather than Veruna. This partly because I don’t like Veruna the Legends figure (petty) and partly because Rori has some interesting Legends lore that could be drawn on in a pinch, which as far as I can tell Veruna does not.

#star wars #naboo #star wars meta #my headcanons #the subtitle isn't like. a real dig.#there isn't a lot of info about them! kudos to gray and johnston for picking up on mace's comment abt miners #there are so many little details i miss in the movies they've made interesting in books

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