Latest / Aggressive Negotiations: A Star Wars Podcast / Issue 336: The Maul Principle

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Issue 336: The Maul Principle · Aggressive Negotiations: A Star Wars Podcast

0:04
Welcome to the Node polity. Hi, this is Nick Nastasu, story editor
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on Star Wars, the Clone Wars and Star Wars bad Batch, and you
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are listening to Aggressive Negotiations. Well, hello, and welcome to Aggressive Negotiations,
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the Star Wars podcast that just gives you something a slightly different every week.
0:36
And I'm just one of the hosts, Matthew Rushing and with me coming
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at you from just the wonders that are Naboo, the beautiful, brilliant dare
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I say, magnificent Jedi Master John Mills. Yeah, but let's be clear,
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I'm not on Naboo by choice. My ship broke down. I'm looking
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for a way back to Al Hutta, where I have an open sabic game
1:02
going. And yes, I've been using the force to read people's minds and
1:06
I got a great hand, and I'm really mad that I'm here. So
1:10
let's just get this over with, Okay, I guess I can we do
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that? Yeah, I mean I guess I should admit that I've been,
1:15
you know, using chance cubes and betting and of course manipulating them with my
1:22
force. And let's just say I've got more credits than I know what to
1:26
do with right now, don't you? Don't you love it when you sit
1:29
there and it's you got to say it, just as a tribute to old
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Wato who started the whole ball rolling. You just go, We'll let fate
1:34
decide you, Okay, exactly, exactly, Yes, that's what we're doing.
1:38
Oh goodness. Well, as you let fate decide, please secure your
1:44
fate and the fate of this podcast by following us all over social media.
1:49
We're on Twitter at the Jedi Masters and get the entire network at joint nerd
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Party. Of course, you can subscribe wherever you're listening to this and you'll
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get our episodes as soon as they drop. You can find the our network
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at the Nerdparty dot com on line where you can see all of the different
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shows we do. You can also follow us over on Facebook. If you're
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old like John and I and you know, you can enjoy us at Facebook
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on Instagram at the Nerd Party as well. I'm so old you could find
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me on MySpace still probably, I mean, if they if my Space is
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still an attainable website, which of course I have not tried to go to
2:30
forever. Yes, you could one hundred percent do that, but I kind
2:34
of wiped all my stuff off of their years so and hopes that their servers
2:37
would get replaced. I don't know if I did or not, but that's
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a whole other question. But John, so something that we were actually talking
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about the other day, just behind the scenes, you know, I know
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listeners know this, but we're talking all the time with each other, and
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you brought up this really interesting idea, and part of it has to do
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with, of course, we know your beloved Quai gone, which I'm a
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massive fan as well. Everybody knows that, but he is your beloved,
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whereas obi Wan is mind and you brought up this really interesting thought as to
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Okay, so we know how Qui Gon dies, which is getting stabbed in
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the gut by a lightsaber by of course Darth Maul on Naboo. And yet
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now it seems as though in Star Wars one can get stabbed in the gut
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with a lightsaber and survive aka the Obi Wan series where Reva pretty much gets
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stabbed exactly the same place and somehow seems to survive. And I don't think
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that's her hate that's keeping her alive at that point. And so why why
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is this the case that we're seeing a lot more lightsabers, stabbings, and
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now people are somehow surviving. Well, I mean because amputating stuff has been
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done, I guess, and you know, we know we can bounce back
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from that. I will say that, Okay, let's approach this because we're
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not the first ones to sort of like openly say like that. I think
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somebody even did a joke video. It's like Qui Gon watching the Obi Wan
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series and Reva survives the gut shot and he goes, what the hell is
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that? He's like, what, I could survive this? And I think
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with Reva that one, let's table that for now, I will say,
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was sabine at the very least, we see that she's immediately grabbed and put
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into a medical facility like instantaneously. So there are people who get what should
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be life ending wounds but slung they get to medical care quickly enough, they
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pull through. And this happens even in real in our lives. Well,
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and I would argue where she gets stabbed is different. So you know,
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getting stabbed kind of right in the middle of your gut is basically going to
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hit all of your major organs. And we know, of course lightsabers do
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carterize, but that's still I mean, you're going to impact some some organs
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that are vital to keeping you alive. Whereas Sabine gets kind of stabbed on
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the side, which you know, we've seen plenty of movies and things where
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people get shot in that type of area, or you know, Rambo three,
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he cauterizes it with gunpower and a rock or does he then takes on
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the entire Russian army in Afghanistan and win means? And so, I mean,
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which should be our standard for all things is Rambo three? But honestly,
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yes, salone movies are now the standard by which Jedi live and die,
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and we know they're now impervious. Reva's a tougher one for me because
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Riva has no visible medical facilities. She has no I mean, the bigger
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question with Reva is how the hell did she get off that planet? Like
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did they leave her a ship just because they figured out maybe she does?
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So that one I can't really talk my way through quite as well. So
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being I think there's some on screen stuff that gets us to where we need
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to go. I think with Qui Gon, it really is as simple as
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a fact that, like you're saying, he's stabbed basically center mass. Let's
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say that humans are arranged the same inside there as they are here, then
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at least his pancreas and his liver are pretty much done. Hey, you
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know that's pretty fatal for a person. He's not near medical equipment, he's
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already weak in the force. But you can also say, essentially with Qui
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Gon, the Force has decreed at that moment who's going to live and who's
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going to die. Because you hear the voice of the dark Side swelling,
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we know that the dark Side is ascendant right now. And Quais Wound could
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literally let me throw this out there to you, it's a lot like padme.
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The force is simply decided it's your time to go. And so there's
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almost a spiritual sort of thing where you've reached the end of where the force
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needs you, and so the force says, okay, it's time for you
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to bow out of the play because what we've got going on, this bigger
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plan you can't even conceive, is now in motion. You're off the playing
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field. Do you think that's a possibility. Yeah, So I think that's
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interesting because the way I was thinking of it was in a slightly i guess
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even more spiritual bent, which is that for Qui Gon, because we know
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Qui Gon's journey after this, you know, in the sense of where he
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goes that Quigan doesn't have any fear of death. Qui Gon almost is is
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it a place where spiritually with the Force, he's going to welcome death,
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he knows that it's not the end for him, And so that's that's kind
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of where I took it. But I mean, you know, I don't
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think that what you're saying or what I'm postulating actually, you know, in
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any way has to be an either or because I think in many ways,
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you know, when we're talking about the way the Force is working in the
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prequel trilogy and the swirling of the Force that's happening because as the dark Side
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ascends and the Jedi kind of find their twilight, I think all of these
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things could be at play in that. But I truly believe that, you
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know, Qui Gone, if he had wanted to, could have survived in
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much the same way that Darth Maul does. But the problem is is that
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again, he's a completely different person in the sense that he doesn't fear death
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the way that Maul does, see, you know, and so his approach
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is completely different. It's interesting you bring up All because everybody fixates on Riva
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and Sabine getting gutshots. Maul gets literally severed. We see that red mist
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when he's cut in half. Originally, Lucas said was because he wanted to
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remove any any idea that Mall survived and Mal survives. He gets talked into
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bringing Mall back. He's like me, sure, whatever, And they never
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explain it on screen how the hell had happened. I don't think there's any
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source to this day that directly explains it in a very clear fashion. I
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mean to b C No, I mean, what we get from the Clone
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Wars and it's it's nebulous. Is the idea that it's his hate and rage
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that keep him alive, that the force, you know, allows him to
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be able to survive, and that it's by pulling on the dark side of
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the force. The way that he does that in the end creates the you
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know, the spider body that we get and the insanity that we get as
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well. And he does get a little Zagy. I mean, he definitely
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is insane by by that point, and of course you know he's he's not
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fixed until the death Mirry Witches then, you know, use their magics to
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clear his mind and to heal his body in a way that will allow him
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to basically regain what he wants was in the sense of at least his mind.
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Of course his body will never quite be the same. But you know,
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but I your point is well taken in the sense that exactly how that
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works. Will never know why, because what we're dealing with is something that
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is so enigmatic because it's the force, and it's in some ways better that
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they don't try to fully explain that. But but that but that's the thing
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is I think maybe we've get that this might be one of our short episodes,
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because we're sitting here and we're like, oh, well, you know,
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gut shot, this gut shot that it might have taken us an episode.
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It didn't take me an episode. I was thrilled when it happened,
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but like it might have in an episode or two, maybe a full story
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arc before people just said okay, fine, I guess he's back. But
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right there, the guy who killed Quigan with a gut shot, gets cut
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in half and thrown down a bottomless pit and survives, And everybody's getting hung
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up on the idea that Reva bounced back from a gut shot. It's like,
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I don't know, guys, there is precedent here that the force can
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be a fickle mistress when it comes to these sorts of things. You can
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sort of be like, yeah, you live, somehow mal survived. Yeah,
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you know, I think. I mean, essentially, it's basically very
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SI, damn it. Now you've boxed me in. I know. Now
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I can't be mad at that line anymore. I'm kind of like, oh,
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well, yeah, I guess there's a precedent, so they don't even
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try to explain it. However, that as much of that Death Star surviving,
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that cannot be explained. No, that's the part that I can't get
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to, and I will hold onto that very Yeah. No, we saw
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that thing disintegrated, you know, so there were no pieces flying off of
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it, no major superstructures. Yeah, but so I believe that the term
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you're looking for is atomies. Yeah, pretty much. Yes, you could
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bottle that and spray it on yourself, you know. Essence of Death Star
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who All right, that's gonna be another show topic. So but you know,
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it's funny because when you mentioned this and I was thinking about it,
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there doesn't really necessarily seem to be quite a good reason. And I think
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when it comes down to it, I think the one that for me personally
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that I still struggle with the most, there's not the fact that Quigan died,
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because I can completely see again with who he is as a character.
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He embraces death. You know, he's he's like the third brother in the
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Harry Potter film. He embraces death as a friend, right because he knows
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that death is not the end. At the same time, though, I
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think the one that is very difficult for me because it doesn't quite make sense
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with just even the weird rules of Star Wars is Reva because she doesn't have
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the rage to keep her alive, but she also doesn't have I think,
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the will to survive enough that it feels like the Mall thing where you're just
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driven insane with hatred because you thought you were an unstoppable force and of course
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you know, you came up but against Obi Wan Kenobi and realized you weren't.
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And then that just kind of drives you to this point of utter absolute
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hatred. You know, those are the things that we don't see with a
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character like Reva because she's not that type of character, and so it makes
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it very difficult then for me to understand how and why she survives. Let
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me let me throw this out there. That probably what they should have done
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if they wanted to keep Reva alive. It's just not had the coda where
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she goes back to tat Oweene, leave her there and then do like a
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show where she comes back. I think that's why we all sort of like
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wind up rolling with mall Is. We're kind of like, Okay, it's
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been a while, maybe something, you know, dark magic sort of thing.
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But leaving those story mechanics aside, I agree with you Reva's tough because
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she doesn't seem to have that the will to survive in the same way that
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the others do. So the only thing that I can possibly say is,
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well, if we're going to say that the force can keep somebody alive,
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I could see it being something where Reva is the force, the light side
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of the force or whatever is able to exert some influence to redeem her because
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she serves some sort of greater purpose later, and so mall was kept alive
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by drawing on dark Side energy, and then in sort of like a switch,
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light Side sees a chance at redemption to show that it's possible, no
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matter how lost somebody might be. I mean, I'm sort of stretching a
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bit there. I don't think that's in the writer's intent. I don't think
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that's in the show's expression, but I think I can probably head cannon my
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way into it. Likewise, Palpatine staying alive, I can. They've done
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it before in the comics and nobody batted an eye right. Yes, they
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clunkily do it in the movies, and they have the famously clunky line somehow
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Palpatine returned anyway, next scene, Like, it's just clunkily delivered, and
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it comes out of left field, because Palpatine is a non factor until that
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movie. But the Dark Side bringing somebody back, I actually think I might
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have rolled with Palpatine coming back. You know, this is tangential, I
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guess or whatever. If again, I know I was making jokes earlier.
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If they hadn't had parts of the Second Death Star survived, if they had
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simply had him come back, I'm playing ball. But bringing that back,
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I'm like, oh, come on, right, it's just like everything made
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it through. Like I can even see like if they had anyway, you
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can Monday Morning Quarterback everything to your heart's content. But I guess if we're
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gonna maybe it's maybe that what we should call this show is the mall principle.
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That the Mall principle shows us that if the people creating the story see
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a need or a desire to have that person survived the thing that happened,
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that's what happened. Yeah, just like thrown and Ezra surviving a deeply damaged
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Star Destroyer getting dragged through super hyperspace by a giant whale to a second galaxy.
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Yeah. I mean, obviously there's so many crazy things that can happen
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in Star Wars, And you know, I think that that's one of those
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things where I think in the storytelling, right, you have to do it
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in a way I think that makes fans be able to accept the crazy.
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You know, you do it, you do it in a way that that
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that fans like, oh I can see that, you know, or it's
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it's so well done you're not even thinking about that. And I think that's
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the thing where you know, these different ways in which these things have been
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done. I think that that's the case in many of them, where it's
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like I don't even care to think about it because I'm like, wow,
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you know this is okay, Yeah, that makes sense. I can roll
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with that. And so yeah, I think I think that's the thing that
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I'm I'm really interested in. And regardless of where we come down on all
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of this, I'm not going to get too upset about who they decide who
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should live or who should die, because in the end, it all comes
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down to this type of story you're trying to tell, and you know,
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and sometimes I think that works better than others in some areas because the stories
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themselves are more interesting, right, And so yeah, I mean I think
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that's where it comes down to me. You know, if if the story
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grabs me emotionally and you know, everything that it needs to, I'm not
18:26
going to care. And so it's the places where that doesn't happen where I
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then have the other reaction, which is huh, what, why? Where?
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And again, it just comes down to storytelling and how it's executed.
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Well, if somebody wants to grab you virtually online in an emotional or other
18:45
belligerent ways. Where can they find you? Of course, you can find
18:48
me all over social media under the name out or two. You can find
18:52
me here on the network doing Outpost with Treya Kaufman talking about every single chapter
18:59
the Harry Potter series One Chatter of Time. You can find me over on
19:02
the TFM network in the six or two Club talking about all the franchises that
19:06
we love the most. You can also find me on Literary Tricks, the
19:10
Orb Warp five, Artificial Tango and Saddle Up. But John, if people
19:15
wanted to catch up with you and see what else you've got going on,
19:18
where can they find you? Well, gosh, I've got nothing else going
19:22
on that aside from occasionally appearing on Assembling Avengers on the sixth or two Club
19:25
with you, And of course you can find me here on the network co
19:29
hosting a show called house Lights with Tristan Riddell and Darren Moser, where we
19:33
look at the work of directors and just look for me as castle junkie out
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there. But I'll tell you what I think. My rides come in.
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I think this game is still going on. I've got a shot at winning
19:42
the big Jackpot, so master Rushing, I think it's time to close these
19:47
negotiations. John, negotiations are clothes. Join the Revolution, Join the Nerd Party.