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Issue 337: What Makes a Master? · Aggressive Negotiations: A Star Wars Podcast

0:04
Welcome to the ned Palty. Hi. This is Nick and Ostasu, story
0:10
editor on Star Wars, the Clone Wars and Star Wars bad Batch, and
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you are listening to Aggressive Negotiations. Thank you for joining Aggressive Negotiations, the
0:27
Star Wars podcast on the Nerd Party network that is dedicated to exploring all of
0:32
the nooks and crannies of a galaxy far far away and possibly other galaxies farther
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and farther away too, who knows. I am one of your hosts,
0:42
the humble Jedi Master John Mills and joining me as I demand, no as
0:48
I absolutely force him to do on a regular basis is Jedi Master Matthew Rushing.
0:54
Matt are you enjoying your time in servitude to my whims? For I
0:58
have commanded you to be here. Well, I don't know where you've gotten
1:03
up with this big head of yours. I guess you must think yourself some
1:07
sort of Palpatine or something like that. But dude, you're not even like
1:11
Padawan level right now. So give it a break, man, give it
1:15
a break. Interesting. Interesting, I really find that interesting. But what
1:19
I also find interesting is that we could always use some more reviews over on
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You can find the network at Joint nerd Party, and you can find
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on any more of them, so appreciate you. Please find us there if
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you can, and of course the nerd party dot com slash contact we'd love
2:06
to interact with you over there as well. Now, this is one of
2:07
the trademark surprise topics, and it's something I was pondering because of the series
2:14
Ah Soca, and it has to do with something that is a little bit
2:17
of a quibble, but it's an odd one and it's something that for some
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reason my brain has really fixated on Matt. Now, we all know that
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the Jedi Council does not bequeath upon Anakin Skywalker the rank of Master, and
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that irks him somewhat. In episode three, he's outraged by it. In
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fact, however, he has had a potawan. This podawan called him master.
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Thrown himself refers to Anakin as Ahsoka's master. So what is it that
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would prevent him from being a master? Obviously not every Jedi Master is on
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the Council, and not everybody on the Council has been a Jedi Master so
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far as we know from Expanded Universe stuff. So what criteria am I missing
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here? Shouldn't Anakin have been irked several years prior to the fact that they
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didn't give him the rank of master. He's had a padawan, he's been
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a teacher. Mm hmm, yeah, I mean, I guess that's one
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of the things that Star Wars hasn't really answered ever as to what makes somebody
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go from a Jedi Knight to being a Jedi Master. Uh, because obi
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Wan Kenobi is of course taken up the rank from padawan to Jedi Knight,
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and then he's given Anakin as a padawan, but that doesn't immediately make him
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a master, And so I think that's you know, we don't actually have
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a story. I don't think anywhere as to win obi Wan transcends from Jedi
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Knight to Jedi Master. He just is at the level of Master by the
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time we get to Revenge of the Sith, and so so it is one
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of the criteria that that your potawan has to become a Knight. That could
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be a possibility. It could be a possibility, which means that Anakin would
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never have been able to become a Master because Ahsoka leaves the Order and therefore
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never becomes a Knight. So I think that is a really interesting question though
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to ask, and I'm sure you know, you could probably go on uh,
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you know, Wikipedia and kind of read about things that maybe didn't done
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in the EU or maybe they're being somewhere in the comics as to what it
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is that creates a Jedi Master. But it almost seems to me the difference
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between to kind of take it in a in a religious sense, you know,
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being a priest and then you know, being something like a bishop,
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you know, uh, and then a bishop puts you in the place to
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possibly become you know, a cardinal, and then you know, so there's
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there's all these different levels that you have throughout the specifically the Catholic and it
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seems like the Jedi Order kind of has that same level type of system and
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that there's something that would and maybe it's a level of enlightenment and the force,
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you know, maybe it's just the will of the council who elevates people
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to master level, which then gives them the ability to be people that would
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be considered to be someone you might have sit on the Jedi Council then,
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And so yeah, I mean, I think that's actually a really interesting question.
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I like the fact that you go for the hierarchy of the priesthood,
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because that is an important distinction where there are certain responsibilities, where it literally
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is a rank, if you will, But at the core it's the same
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role. It's just one has more bureaucratic responsibility. And that would likely seem
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to get at why the Jedi, more than any other religious order you might
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look at a fantasy setting, should have stayed out of the bureaucratic business to
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begin with. But that then begs the question of how would the rank of
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master or the designation of Jedi master have been achieved in the less orderly days,
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when there were simply practitioners out there, when it was a little bit
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more the way people imagined it was before the Prequels came about where you would
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have a Jedi over here, or I guess what you would have called in
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the Ahsoka series boken Jedi where they're just out there being Jedi. How do
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they like was it a term that even existed before the Order came about?
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I guess would be the question? Or it simply simply or would people simply
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have been Jedi, no night, no master, just Jedi was the only
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necessary appellation for what you were. It does seem like that there is something
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to age with it, because, you know, and Anakin's complaining about the
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fact that, you know, he's not being made a master. You know,
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obi Wan mentions that that being on the Council at his age is an
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incredible honor, and so that based off of you know, of course species,
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right, you know, Yoda lives much longer than say Anakin or obi
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Wan, that there is some sort of like experience level based off of age
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that may you know, kind of get you to the master level. So
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you've been a Jedi night for a certain amount of time, is long as
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you're seen as somebody who's you know, truly following the tenets of the Jedi
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Order and the will of the Force, than then perceived by the Council,
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you would be you know, you would transcend from one level to the next.
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You know it. It's interesting too, because you know, I was
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we just rewatch. I had some people over and we watched episode one,
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and you know, one says, you know, you would be on the
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council if you would just be obedient basically, And so it seems to be
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that that, you know, Qui gon Jin is not just a Jedi knight,
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but he is a Jedi master and and and that he could be elevated
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even higher if he would be obedient. You know, if he would,
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he would be seen as as following the unwritten rules of of the Jedi Order.
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In some ways, I feel like that's almost what he's breaking, and
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so therefore U that that's where the issue comes in. But but is it
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a possibility here that we've accidentally given an headcanon reason if we bring in the
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quasi official backstory of Qui gon because I don't know if that got wiped away
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when Disney threw away the old EU or not. I think we agree that
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the prequel era EU seems to have survived relatively ish intact, and we know
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that Qui gon because we've been reading the Jedi Apprentice series had a student before
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Obi Wan. So if we say, well, your potawan has to graduate
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tonight, then you wound up answering why he wouldn't have been a Jedi Master
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because he hasn't had anybody ascend to knighthood yet. Obi Wan still on his
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way, and Xanatos is his first student who falls to the dark Side,
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but I don't think he ever became a Knight. So maybe that is really
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the distinction is you have to see a student all the way through. But
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again, it seems like such a bureaucratic distinction. What you're saying there,
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though, in some ways does make sense because when you think about this idea,
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you know, they say that one of the best ways to be able
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to learn something is to be able to teach it, and so it would
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it would almost make sense as to why the Jedi Order then would require somebody
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to have brought somebody to full completion of their own Jedi Night journey to then
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be able to be a master, because then becoming a Jedi Knight is your
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undergraduate degree, but becoming a Jedi Master is being able to teach somebody else
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to get their undergraduate degree. But they would have, and again this speaks
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to the bureaucratic nature of it, they would have that alternate path to being
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a master could be being placed on the Jedi Council because maybe the Force never
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called somebody to be a teacher, but they've been long enough. And so
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Anakin understands previously why he isn't being given the rank of masters because Ahsoka left.
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That stings, but okay, and then he's given the opportunity to be
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put on the council. And since there's a limited number of people who can
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be on the council, then Anakin that would explain why Anakin is like,
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oh, yes, this is my shot to be a master is to get
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on the council. And then they say, but we're not going to give
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you that rank. So basically the two different ways he could get it,
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he's now been robbed of it a second time. And the thing is,
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if we go with this explanation, that makes his indignation, that makes it
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sting a little bit more. I kind of like the headcanon we're building right
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here that the ambition in Anakin is he thought he found an alternate way to
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get what he wanted, and it gets taken away from him again. Well,
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and I think that actually speaks what you're saying, actually speaks to that
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idea, because you know, one of the things that that you know,
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Windu says in the Council itself says is that you know, you're on this
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council, but we're not giving you the rank of master and so. And
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it partially it's because their hand obviously is being forced by the Supreme Chancellor at
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this moment, and they don't have the resources to fight a two front war.
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And in fact, they see this as an opportunity, hopefully to keep
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it from being a two front war by you know, quickly ending any threats
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from the Chancellor's office through Anakin and so. And what's interesting is that if
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Anakin actually followed through, he would have been made a Jedi master. Yes,
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if he had helped them capture Sidious, you know, he would have
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been made a Jedi Master. He would have proven himself to be loyal to
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the Jedi code and what the Jedi stand for. And instead, of course,
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he gets trapped in emotion and he gets trapped in possession, and it
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makes it even more not tragic, but even more I don't know whether ironic
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or not, because you know that the cannon I subscribe to is that the
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line in the original Star Wars that I've argued with a number of friends where
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he says, when I left you, I was but the learner. Now
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I am the Master's vader is supposed to be. He's like, I'm on
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the Death Star. Death Star is operational. Guess what I'm going to take
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over. I'm going to become the Sith Lord. I'm going to become Emperor
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of the Universe. Now I am you know the forces on my side.
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And so both in Star Wars and Empire, he's got two more shots at
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becoming in the case of the Syth, the Master, and he fails at
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those two. So it's a really interesting legacy of denial for him. He
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just keeps trying the wrong way to get what he wants. But then of
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course he winds up, you know, making good and having one heck of
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a Canero appearance in the Soka series. And I do think that that's the
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interesting thing is that through the whole sequence is that he actually, I think
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finally is able to be the person he was, always always could have been
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if he had made the right choices. And I think that's the beauty of
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that whole sequence, you know, and therefore allows us almost to have a
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fully realized arc for Anakin Skywalker, and gosh, I think this is just
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one of the reasons why, you know, I've railed against the sequels for
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so long because of their inability and unwillingness to use force ghosts the way they
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should have, because the whole point of becoming a force ghost was to be
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able to impact what was happening in the physical world from the outside like you
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were still like that was the whole point of that, and so never using
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that is frustrating. But I think, you know, we see Filony just
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perfectly utilize what what you know, force ghost could be, and it allows
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Anakin that almost full redemption, right because he's not only completed the task that
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had been set before him by Yoda all those years ago in the Clone Wars,
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but he's helped Ahsoka overcome her own demons, right, and finally,
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I think, in many ways fulfill who she can be in a fully realized
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way. And so it's almost like, you know, he's able to transcend
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to master in the Force that way, and so, you know, I
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think it's really interesting though, the idea of what would be able to create
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somebody to be a master, because I think the other question that does you
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know get to me in this then, is what specifically if somebody never had
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a pad of one, you know, what would their service need to be
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or or what type of person would they need to be to be able to
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transcend to master? Would it be their understanding of the force? I mean,
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would you know? That? I think raises a lot of really interesting
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questions because there have to be Jedi that have never trained a padawan because that
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was not what they felt called to do through the will of the force.
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But well they need Jedi like but like a Jedi like that First and foremost,
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I think that there's a compulsion among anybody that studies a subject to become
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a teacher in some respect. Yeah, but I think they the compulsion to
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share your knowledge, I think is an innately human Yeah, good point and
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man Kalamari and Issue Tibbian and all of those, hahaha. But it's an
16:48
innately human thing to want to share your knowledge with people, right, And
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I think that a selfless sharing of the knowledge is the trick. But I
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think I think that to your point about not taking a student. You could
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make an argument that, for instance, Ezra living what is very obviously the
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example of a Jedi life out in the wild, still being who he is
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and modeling a good life that is with the people of that planet, almost
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like a missionary. I would think you could wind up being designated a rank
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of master. But I think that what I would rather flip that around and
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say, somebody like Ezra out there living the life doesn't care about the rank
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anymore. He doesn't even care about being a Knight. It's not about that.
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It's about being in tune with the Force. And I would argue that
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it's almost like, in a sense, ideally, somebody who becomes a quote
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unquote Jedi Master would be the person who's not seeking it at all, and
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it's just something that the Force would wind up bestowing upon them in a sense
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because they would because at the end they would understand that the rank doesn't matter
18:03
and it never would matter. Well, I think that you just answered a
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great question in what I asked. I like think you answered the question in
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the sense that I think what would allow somebody to transcend from night to master
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is humility, like being a Jedi of of complete humility and never thinking of
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yourself more than you ought, always thinking out of others first, you know,
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the purity of the Jedi code right in that sense, and I think
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that's exactly you would be able to have Jedi that maybe you know, they
18:42
didn't have a pad on. Maybe you know they worked in the temple training
18:45
younglings and that was their job, so they never actually had the opportunity,
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or maybe they were a Jedi who you know, you could almost see Qui
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Gon going down this road of studying the mysteries of the force in depth,
18:59
you know, around the galaxy and not having a pad of on because he's
19:02
always on the move and you know, but yet there's a deep sense of
19:08
humility that the Council recognizes, and therefore that sense of being and recognition of
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one's being would then allow the Council to be able to say, yes,
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you should be a master because of that. And I think then you might
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actually even see that person be sought out by other Jedi to learn from,
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even if it wasn't specific you know, master apprentice role. So you know,
19:41
I think I think that's something that you know, just these are all
19:45
things that you could to totally dig into. And I think this is also
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one of the things that this equels unfortunately, I think fail out in many
19:52
ways too, is that we never got this type of discussion of Luke trying
19:57
to figure out, you know, what was the right path to move forward
20:03
in creating a new Jedi order, you know, because it seems like that
20:07
would be something that would be heavy on Luke's heart to make sure he did
20:11
not repeat the sins of the past, and you know, so it's just
20:15
one more place where that kind of fails. But I think, you know,
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again, as we're talking about Ahsoka seems to be touching on, Rebels
20:22
seem to touch on you know, and I mean, I think it's it's
20:27
it's an incredibly beautiful thing to to to be able to see some of those
20:32
questions being answered in interesting subtle ways. And it's one of those places where
20:37
you know, if you're telling the story right, it answers questions you didn't
20:41
even know you had. And that's the beauty of something like you know,
20:47
the Rebels series or what we're getting in Ahsoka so well being the person who
20:53
likes to do bad comedy. In my brain, I also envision say,
20:59
oh Dies and his ghost is freed, and he shows up on Dagaba and
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he's like, Yo, what's up, Yoda, I'm a ghost now,
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And Yoda looks at him and says, happy to talk to you. I
21:08
am given the way things went, You're not a master anymore. You're a
21:12
Jedi night. I want to get that straight with you right now. Punk
21:15
Anakin might have never finished training, but I wish you hadn't finished training.
21:19
You finishing training ruined every like. I would love to see like an argument
21:25
like that between obi Wan and Yoda, and then obi Wan could flip it
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around and be like, oh really, oh really, do we want to
21:30
talk about Dooku. Guess what? You're not a Jedi master either, right,
21:34
It's just so it's like something you can revoke. So in their darker
21:37
moments, they're pulling the rank of master away from each other. Oh man,
21:41
yeah, you know, just just you know, I think it would
21:47
be interesting and kind of funny almost to have like a comedy bit of the
21:52
tutors sitting on uh you know, a log in the forced spirit realm,
21:56
you know, just shooting the crap with each other and you know, bickering
22:00
back and forth or whatever. Yeah, it could be pretty funny. So
22:03
oh man, no, you could actually have a series, a short series
22:07
where the two of them are like walking through the world between worlds and then
22:10
like they you know, they happen across those portals where historical events are happening,
22:15
and uh and Yoda's like, oh see this, I wish to and
22:18
Obi Wan looks and he's like no, no, no, no, no,
22:19
no, keep moving, keep I'm going down to this one. I
22:22
don't even want to. I don't even want to see this one because like
22:26
flashes of his life of like you know, the chase of a zam wessel
22:30
on U on Coruscant, And Obie's like, no, no, no no.
22:36
I was picturing them more like uh, you know the Peanut Gallery and
22:40
the Muppets, you know, the old guys, oh Satlar and well yeah
22:44
that wouldn't that be funny those two, you know, like you just want
22:47
to see just like making fun of future Jedi, like yes, well see
22:55
then you have Yeah, okay, anyway, I could go to a lot
22:59
of interesting places, but you know what else you go in a lot of
23:00
interesting places, it's reaching out to you online and giving you crap about all
23:04
of these ideas that we're discussing. So, Matt, where can people reach
23:08
out to you? Find you out there in the nether world of the Internet
23:15
force. Yes, well, you can find me all over social media under
23:18
the than Matt Rushing zero two. So just try the different social media platforms.
23:22
You'll find me there. If I'm there. You can also find me
23:25
here, of course, on this network, talking about Harry Potter each and
23:30
every chapter one chapter of Time on OWL posts with Drag Coffman. You can
23:33
also find me over on the TFM network with a bunch of shows. You
23:37
can find me in the six or two Club talking about all of the franchises
23:41
we love. Outside of Star Trek, you also find me talking a lot
23:44
of Star Trek and literary treks, the Orb Warp five, Saddle Up and
23:48
Strange New Worlds. But John, you know, maybe people want to pitch
23:53
their art for our wonderful idea of Obi Wan and Yoda. Where would they
23:59
be to find you? Well, Gosh, you can find me out there
24:02
is Cassel Junkie out in the wilds of the Internet, unable to quit X
24:07
even if it changes its name to Why, I'll still be there and you
24:11
can find me right here on the Network co hosting a show called house Lights
24:15
with Darren Moser and Tristan Meddell, where we look at the work of directors
24:18
and blah blah blah all of that stuff. We have a really good time
24:22
on that, and won't you join us and have a good time too.
24:26
But speaking of good times, I think that they are serving some Coarellian brandy
24:30
over at the Jedi Temple cafeteria, Matt, So why don't we go ahead
24:34
and close these negotiations, John, negotiations are closed. Join the Revolution,
24:45
Join the Nerd Party.