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Ville Saalo, moi! 👋

Interested in tech, reading, LEGO, and some such random stuff. ("moi": Finnish for "hi", "hello")

Star Wars

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    Star Wars trivia

    I’ve got a couple of little Star Wars fans at home, playing lightsaber fights and making LEGO Star Wars stop motion films. As such, I’ve recently been subjected to a lot of Star Wars trivia. This can happen at any time, like at the breakfast table (Star Wars is currently a banned topic at the dinner table). Here’s just a small sample of all the SW facts that I’ve recently learned:

    So, that’s a few pieces of Star Wars trivia you’ll most likely never need, but who knows. Hopefully the links above didn’t send you too far into any rabbit holes – or rather any worm holes.

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    Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones in 100 words

    In my previous post I suggested that fewer words is always better. This is, of course, only true to a certain point. You should absolutely use as many words as necessary to deliver your message, just not much more. And even then, you can always count on Wiio’s Laws, the fundamental one of which goes “Communication usually fails, except by accident”. So, no matter what you write, someone will still, anyway, understand it wrong, so you might as well just relax. But, here goes the summary for the Attack of the Clones:

    Amidala’s assassination attempt has the Jedi chase the assassin, who is assassinated herself with a Kaminoan dart. Obi-Wan goes to Kamino where a clone army has been commissioned for the Republic. Clone template Jango Fett escapes to Geonosis. Obi-Wan follows, sees separatists, but is captured by Dooku. Anakin visits Tatooine due to nightmares about his mother, who dies. Anakin kills a Tusken tribe in revenge. Anakin and Amidala go rescue Obi-Wan but are almost fed to beasts, when other Jedi and the clone army intervene. Dooku escapes after lightsaber fights. Anakin and Amidala marry. Dooku presents superweapon plans to Sidious.

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    Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace in 100 words

    Happy May the Fourth! Here’s a 100 word summary of the first Star Wars movie of the prequel trilogy, The Phantom Menace (1999).

    This is the third such summary I’ve written. Writing a 100 word summary is a really quick thing to do, so where the time is actually spent is when I’ve finished the initial version that’s exactly 100 words, and then I notice I’ve missed or misrepresented some plot twist and fixing that would require an additional five to ten words. Then I just need to go through what I’ve written and try to think of synonyms or other ways to say the same things with fewer words.

    This reminds me of a pattern I’ve encountered at work: when I need to send an email (largely replaced by Slack nowadays) to someone I often read and reread my message a couple of times so that I can remove unnecessary words and make the actual subject more clear. Contrary, you can often tell if an email was written in a hurry if it’s a long and rambling one, when two or three sentences would’ve been enough. Key takeaway: prefer fewer words. The French mathematician Blaise Pascal even has a famous quote about this.

    But, I digress. The point was (or was it?) to just summarize a movie:

    Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan attempt negotiations at the Trade Federation blockade over Naboo but are attacked. They meet Jar Jar and save Queen Amidala. Running the blockade R2-D2 saves them. They land on Tatooine where slave boy Anakin with Jedi reflexes wins freedom in a pod-race. Moving to Coruscant, Amidala pleads Naboo’s case. Jedi Council denies Anakin’s training, but Qui-Gon disobeys. Senator Palpatine becomes Chancellor. Returning to Naboo, the Jedi face Darth Maul. Qui-Gon dies but Maul is cut in half by Obi-Wan. Meanwhile Ani accidentally launches in a fighter. He destroys the command ship, shutting down the attacking droid army.

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    Rogue One: A Star Wars Story in 100 words

    I recently watched Rogue One for the first time again after seeing it in a theater in 2016. Needless to say the details were a bit fuzzy in my mind already, but here’s a 100 word summary I’ve now written about the plot – full of spoilers:

    Flashback: Empire captures scientist Galen Erso, daughter Jyn escapes. Present: rebels find Jyn to reach extremist Saw Gerrera in Jedha. Saw holds a defected Imperial pilot with a message from Galen, whom Cassian is ordered to eliminate. Jyn sees the message, revealing Galen sabotaged Death Star with a hidden flaw. Death Star destroys Jedha City, Jyn and Cassian escape to Eadu where Galen dies. Rebels mount an attack to Scarif to retrieve the Death Star plans, managing to transmit the plans to Leia’s ship after blind monk Chirrut saves the day. Scarif base is destroyed, attacking rebels die, hope survives.

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    Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope in 100 words

    I figured it would be an interesting little challenge to condense the plot of the original Star Wars into a very short format, but with as many spoilers as possible. I settled for a limit of one hundred words. Here goes; maybe you can use it as a refresher if you haven’t seen the movie in a while, but quit reading now if you haven’t seen it and want to watch and fully enjoy it later: 🍿

    Vader intercepts Leia’s ship seeking stolen Death Star plans. R2-D2 and C-3PO escape to Tatooine, are captured by Jawas and sold to Luke. R2-D2 shows message from Leia and goes looking for Obi-Wan Kenobi. Stormtroopers kill Luke’s family. Luke joins Kenobi, meets Han and Chewie in Mos Eisley. They flee in Millennium Falcon but find Alderaan destroyed. Death Star captures Falcon. Kenobi shuts down the tractor beam while the others rescue Leia, visiting a trash compactor. Kenobi faces Vader, is struck down, becomes one with the Force. Falcon escapes, rebels mount an attack, Luke uses the Force, Death Star explodes.