#well clearly I’m going to have to rewatch their andor scenes | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

soloorganaas · 11 months

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*wip game chanting* kleya mon part 2 kleya mon part 2 kleya mon part 2 👁️👄👁️

Mon’s penthouse is packed full of people Kleya doesn’t know. That would never usually be a problem - after all, her job involves her slipping in and out of unfamiliar places every day, being exactly who people need her to be to get what she wants.

Except here there’s someone who’s seen the grim, grimy truth of her that only war brings out and so putting on such a brazen act just feels embarrassing. She has to toe a fine line between assimilation and fraudulence, and the extent to which she’s playing cards with a hand Mon dealt her traps her breath in her lungs.

Then Mon sails in from the next room in a wave of alabaster chiffon and Kleya feels her blood set on fire. Suddenly she’s back in the old shop, holding together a careful mask of deferent nods and polite smiles whilst Mon smirks uninhibitedly at her.

It’s the same smirk gracing her face as she catches Kleya’s eyes and saunters over to her. “Kleya! How good to see you.”

Kleya swallows, resolutely keeping her gaze up from Mon’s sinfully low neckline, and holds it together only with the help of years of training in subterfuge.

“Thank you for the invite.”

“I’m surprised you came. I didn’t think this would be quite your crowd,” Mon says, an unmistakably mischievous twinkle in her eye.

“Well, I couldn’t miss a last chance to enjoy the New Republic’s finest before they head off to Chandrila,” Kleya says smoothly back.

Mon’s gaze falters just slightly, a shade of fear and desire flashing through her eyes. Kleya’s lips quirk.

“Well then I can hardly leave you standing here all alone, can I?” Mon says charmingly, and then she’s offering a slim, elegant arm to Kleya and she’s faced with an onslaught of creamy skin that seems to go on forever.

Kleya dutifully slips an arm through hers and Mon pulls her close, her skin unbearably soft against Kleya’s and her perfume washing over her in an intoxicating wave.

“Come, I’ll introduce you.”

wip ask game

#i love them #i love them so much #kleya marki #mon mothma #asks #macy tag #i need an otp tag urgh #well clearly I’m going to have to rewatch their andor scenes

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sdotwomackart · 1 year

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Tis the season and I’m bored so here’s a fun thing I noticed on my last Star Wars rewatch.

For background, I usually just watch the Lucas stuff, so episodes 1-6. I do so in a modified “Machete” Order (4-5,1-3,6) because treating the prequels as an extended flashback to explain the whole “I am your father” revelation works really well and the themes of Sith are reinforced well by Jedi. If you haven’t tried it like that give it a whirl, it’ll change your life. (Episode 1 is technically skippable but I didn’t this time).

Anyway I make it to Return of the Jedi and it’s the opening scene. And, as I’m watching it with someone, I’m about to open my mouth and make the joke that I’m sure everyone thinks of. Palpaptine is slithering next to Darth Vader looking like this:

How is no one in the room thinking something like "Are we the baddies.gif?" You know...true believers and hostages to fascism aside. I go to make the joke but I stop dead in my tracks, instead I just go, unprompted "Oh my GOD....THAT'S WHY!!" Because it finally fucking hit me

Let's remember that I JUST watched Revenge of the Sith and it's also worth noting that I have been watching the movies in this particular order for longer than some of you reading this have been alive. This is all to say that I totally should've put this together sooner but I want to share this feeling with some of you out there who may have been like me.

What slapped me in the face that day was George Lucas had answered that particular question. I was just being too much of a cool kid to see it. See, a little more background, I had always disliked an aspect of this scene:

I always thought it was stupid that Mace Windu melts Palpatine with the force lightning. It always struck me as too much. I thought of it the same way I thought of C-3PO and Chewbacca being included in the prequels, another example of George rushing to get the stuff people recognize into the movies he was dog paddling his way through. "Why couldn't he just get old and gross because it's been 20 years and he's evil?" was basically how I would frame it...because I was an idiot. At the very least, I was not really aware of what backslides into fascism look like, which is not a problem I had in America in 2022.

See it all comes together in THIS scene:

youtube

GEORGE HAS PALPATINE USE THE BURNS TO JUSTIFY ORDER 66. Here I was thinking it made everyone in the galaxy look like a dumdum because he's clearly just an evil wizard now. No, he wasn't making Palpatine Hitler in this moment. He was making him John fucking McCain (McCain wasn't a fascist per say he was just a war hero who used that to launch himself into politics). In this moment he’s using the truth, another really fun thing I noticed is that Palpatine (almost) never lies, to play on people’s sympathies and patriotism. They just GIVE HIM the power that he wanted because he rallied them behind a common enemy. In this scene he’s doing what all authoritarian strongmen do, he’s creating a mythology about himself to sell to people and he’s using the truth, or a twisted version of it, to do it. It’s fucking brilliant.

So that brings me back to the deck of the Death Star. The way I read the scene is completely different now. He's not this weird slithering space wizard, he's a fucking war hero. Every step he takes is a show of strength in the face of the enemies of the Empire. Everyone in that room would be filled with either fear for their life or a deep sense of pride in their Emperor. If George had actually come up with any of the prequels ahead of time he would have showed an officer tearing up at the Emperors bravery. Because by now we’d have a room full of guys who only know the myth.

Quick Sidebar: What's funny but not terribly surprising is this detail has been basically memory holed within the myriad of new material since the buyout. Credit where it's due, stuff like Andor and The Bad Batch have been doing a pretty good job of illustrating why people wouldn't be having the best time living under The Empire. But even Andor is falling into the trap of painting the people who operate under that regime as either under duress and secretly gumming up the works or just cartoonishly evil middle management bullies who love being in charge. This isn't wrong, but there's a missing component isn't there? Where are the MAGA hats in the Star Wars universe? Where are just the normal people, the small business owners, the farmers whatever who are just 100% bought in? I'm not saying there should be a series about this or whatever but it would be a fun detail if there were people who believed what Palpatine told them to believe about the Jedi instead of just skipping to the part where they are just an urban myth.

Think of all the rich, real world parallels you could draw! Maybe in a world where we didn't fuck up the notion of younger actors playing legacy characters we could have got a Leia story about how her Force sensitivity wasn't hidden but repressed because Jedi were despised and sent to re-education camps that they never return from. I can't think of any useful real life analog for parents having to worry about hard liners turning their force sensitive children over to the Inquisitors because they've bought into the line that Jedi are evil, can you? Either way I digress. End Sidebar

I was an idiot not to put this together sooner. But I was mostly an idiot for being so hard on George. We all were. The prequels weren't perfect, they aren't even very good, but what they are way more thoughtful and interesting than we gave them credit for at the time.

May the Force Be With You.

If this gets even one like next year I'll tell you guys how I would have fixed Episode IX.

#star wars #may the force be with you #may the 4th be with you #palpatine #are we the baddies #film #george lucas #return of the jedi #revenge of the sith #We should have been nicer to George

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