A question for Star Wars fans.

[Cowabungaa]

Because it turns being a Jedi from a personal journey of self-discovery, discipline, and spirituality and turns it into an accident of birth. A strong Jedi is no longer someone with the stronger focus or will, just someone with more bugs in his blood. In short, it cheapens the mythology.

If you grew up on the first trilogy, you're more likely to hate midicholorians with a passion.

I disagree. All that's canonically known, is that there is some connection between midi-chlorians and the Force and that a high midi-chlorian count is an indication that a being is Force-sensitive. No canonical information says that midi-chlorians create the Force, are the Force or make a Jedi strong. It just indicates potential to use the Force.

So it's not like the Force is explained all of a sudden, midi-chlorians just provide a way to detect (amongst others) Force-sensitive beings. Plus, don't forget about the difference between a Force-sensitive being and an actual Force-user. That personal journey of self-discovery, discipline and spirituality is still needed for a Jedi to be an actual good Jedi.

You can have an amazingly high midi-chlorian count, but all that that says is "He could use the Force really well" and nothing more. It doesn't guarantee that that person becomes a good Jedi (there's more to being a Jedi than using the Force, way more) or even becomes a Jedi at all. Just look at Anakin "My life sucks so much" Skywalker. Lots o' midi-chlorians, crappy Jedi.

Thus, tl;dr, I see no reason why someone who grew up with the original trilogy would have to hate midi-chlorians with a passion. They're not what you think they are.

 

[Captain Wes]

When I was younger I used to play Star Wars and I would always pretend to be a jedi, I knew I wasn't really using any magic powers but a little part of me always thought that in time I could. Because of the prequels kids can never believe that they can use the force because they know they dont have midichlorians we can prove it.
It destroys fantasy and any ability to connect with the jedi.

 

[The Candyman]

I don't like it because the force was cool because it was mystirious and you had no Idea how it worked. But It's not like I cared. But then they explained it, and with tiny micro-organisms in your blood, and it still wasn't explained how that let you move X-wings out of swamps! They said, Hey, You can move things with your mind because you got germs. >_<

 

[Renset]

I didn't see anything wrong with it when I first saw it, but I was only about 6 or 7 at the time, and I don't think I had seen any of the original ones. Looking back at it now though, I can see how it would probably ruin part of what had been build up about the force from the original trilogy.

Also, it feels kind of pointless to mention, considering it was just brought up once or twice and didn't actually serve any purpose to the plot.

 

[Good morning blues]

I don't like midi-chlorians for the same reason I don't like Star Wars video games: I don't need to know everything about the setting. Knowing that the force comes from midi-chlorians or that the primary currency is republic credits and that they're worth x amount of goods just sucks the magic out of the series.

 

[Captain Blackout]

You know what pissed me off about it the most? They just mention it once. They don't even explain shit about it. And then they never even talk about it ever again.

"Oh let's see, we need to get back to Naboo and participate in this huge battle for political dominance and--oh, and the Force is just microscopic bacteria. Alright, now that we've ruined everything you love about Jedi, let's get going!"

God, it's like a drive-by franchise murder.

QFT. That was the briefest and best explanation I've seen so far, for conciseness far better than mine....

 

[The_root_of_all_evil]

Han shot first!

Oh, sorry...the M word.

OK...imagine saying that religious belief is formed by particles in your blood. And that while it surrounds everything and makes up everything, it's purely due to how much is in your blood stream that allows it.

Let's also say that this makes incest the way to go, doesn't produce midichlorian donations, and also applies to things without blood and everything is PURELY biological.

That's right. Faith is biological.

See why people get miffed now?

 

[Grey_Focks]

prequel trilogy? Star wars never had a prequel trilogy.


OT: As said before, it took away from the whole mystical fantasy aspect of it, which is something I have against most modern sci-fi. And no, Jar-Jar was far from the worst thing about that movie. The script that sounded like it was written by an 8-year old was, along with that whole "plot", and the shitty characters that were an insult to the originals.

 

[PhunkyPhazon]

I really have no problem with midi-chlorians. Aren't they just supposed to be what links a person to the force? I never really cared whether or not the force was magic or not, either way it still allows you to do awesome shit.

 

[Nigh Invulnerable]

I really like the idea that I think someone above mentioned and I'd thought about before. That is, midichlorians have nothing to do with the Force in a direct way, but are merely bacteria that live inside people who are more Force sensitive, perhaps they feed on the energy of the Force as the person channels it. So this makes the midichlorians nothing more than an indirect measuring stick for the Jedi to determine someone's potential. It's still a silly thing that kind of distracted from the original concept, but I like my explanation.

 

[grimsprice]

I could really care less about the midi-chlorian and Greedo-shot semantics. It's a movie.

How dare you realize the truth! Now how are major corporations going to suck the money out of your pockets? Witch!!! Find out if she weighs less than a duck!!!

 

[PhunkyPhazon]

I really like the idea that I think someone above mentioned and I'd thought about before. That is, midichlorians have nothing to do with the Force in a direct way, but are merely bacteria that live inside people who are more Force sensitive, perhaps they feed on the energy of the Force as the person channels it. So this makes the midichlorians nothing more than an indirect measuring stick for the Jedi to determine someone's potential. It's still a silly thing that kind of distracted from the original concept, but I like my explanation.

Yeah, this. I'm pretty sure this is the exact definition given for midichlorians on Wikipedia. (And as we all know, Wikipedia is fact! Mostly)

 

[Kukakkau]

It distracts from the magical, spiritual heart of the series, which is the victory of faith and uncertainty over cold mechanical oppression.

It just makes them boring!

>Implaying that a magical mystical power can be scientifically analysed through some blood.

This. I guess the thread is over?


Yoda just presents it so beautifully. Like a dream we all share but not all over us can remember. It's such a migthy scene. You cannot believe in the force, you must know it. As soon as you start mixing in science it gets boring. Explaining the force was the stupidest thing Lucas could've done. Why not leave it to the audience to figure out if it really is magic or some kind of gadget they use etc.

He destroyed a beautiful illusion. That Jedis were these higher beings, but chose to serve instead of ruling. Kinda like Superman I guess :S Damn you Lucas. But oh well

Yeah I also love the fact they establish that the size of the object you try to move doesn't matter. Yet in the newer ones they need to strain themselves and use 2 hands for anything big.

And "that.. is why you fail" is such a burn!

 

[TylerC]

It distracts from the magical, spiritual heart of the series, which is the victory of faith and uncertainty over cold mechanical oppression. If you want to see a religious subtext in this, go ahead.

It reduces a series that is totally about fantasy to plain logic, and by doing that, you make it boring. I mean, it's a series for escaping from this worlds certainty about everything into a world we can't explain!

In short:

It just makes them boring!

Pretty much right on point, like always Furburt.

I've always been a Star Wars fan, but I was too young when the movie came out to really understand what was being said. Now that I understand it's just like George Lucas went to every fan and punched them in the face with a Jar-Jar Binks hand puppet, screaming, "HAHA!" I never wondered why the force was stronger in some beings, and not so much in others, and I never wondered why it could do the things it did...and that was one of the things that made Star Wars great. We don't need everything explained to us, people like speculation and interpreting things in their own way.

Plus the movie was a total disaster in so many ways, thinking about all of the poor choices made in all facets of the process of making the film makes me want to cry (not literally).

Off topic:
This is coming from a huge Star Wars nerd. I have clothes, the Original Trilogy on VHS, DVD, and The Special Edition Original Trilogy, the new trilogy, Mr. Potato Heads of Vader, a stormtrooper, and R2D2, along with xmas vader and C3PO bobble heads, a bunch of Pez, and more than 30 books. It's really really sad, but I know there are others worse than me.

Oh, by the way, Han shot first.

 

[WhiteFangofWhoa]

Midi-Chlorians didn't really bother me, even though I've been a Star Wars fan for the majority of my life. Their name could have used some work though...

They way I understand it it's just something in the bloodstream that allows one to potentially feel the Force more acutely than another with the same training, applying a bit more detail to the ambigous 'the Force runs strong in my family'. There's still no scientific explanation as to how being able to feel the Force grants one telekinesis, telepathy, superior reflexes, what-have-you. It remains to this day a mysterious power not even the Jedi fully understand, and most people prefer it that way. It would, however, seem very odd if the Jedi had not found some way of detecting Force-sensitive children to train as per their pre-purge traditions (just how ethical those traditions are considered to be by others is another story).

It is not even entirely dependent on bloodlines all the time either; often in the EU characters will appear with high MC counts or potential power, despite their parents never having shown such potential (possibly because no one tried to teach them). The cynical explanation is that writers wanted to create Jedi unrelated to previous ones. The explanation I like is that the seeming randomness of the galaxy generates new founts of awareness from newly-born seeds of life. So no matter how hard certain people *cough* Palpatine and Darth Traya*cough* try, Force sensitivity and the Force itself can never be fully extinguished unless the Galaxy itself was purged of life.

 

[userwhoquitthesite]

The way I reconcile the midi-chlorian nonsense is this: the biological aspect only increases the ease of access to force power. Anyone who is sufficiently attuned can learn to channel the Force, but someone with a high midi-chlorian count will have an easier time getting past that mental block. Like, Yoda has the high count and jedi tranquility, and so he can manipulate the force almost any way he choose. Anakin, on the other hand can easily grasp the lesser abilities of the force (especially the psychokinetic aspects) but until he learns to chill the fuck out, he never has anything like yoda's power.

Did that make sense? I fear i may not have explained properly

 

[Premonition]

I can only think of one reason for the invention of Midi-chloreans and that's to please the religious people around the world, as The Force was too godlike in the original trilogy.

 

[Raven's Nest]

Okay, here's something I've always wondered about. I'm not trying to troll here, but I was always confused about this and I'm hoping someone can clear the issue up for me.

I understand most of the reasons why people didn't like The Phantom Menace, except one. I've heard a lot of people get pissed about how The Force was linked to midi-chlorians, giving it a sort of biological explanation (i.e., Jedi can use The Force by communicating with the midi-chlorians, or whatever).

It seemed perfectly reasonable to me that there would be some kind of explanation for why some people are Force-sensitive while others are not. Yet, this seems to be one of the points of the film which generates the most ire from the fanbase.

So why all the rage over the midi-chlorians?

In short, people get pissy because they completely failed to grasp the concept of midi-cholrians.

Midi-chlorians do not generate the force, they are a symbiotic lifeform commonly found living in force-sensitive person. The more of them a person has indicates (not dictates) the power of that person...

The explaination of this shouldn't cause any fuss at all. It's just a scientific way of differentiating the potential power of one force user compared with another...

It's weird how The Jedi order is practically a religion and there is a legion of fans screaming about how we shouldn't scientifically prove the existence of the force...

Now take those same people, who especially here on the escapist, and watch them scrutinise Christianity or the concept of God because of a lack of scientific evidence! Fucking hypocrisy at it's best...

 

[Hollock]

I'll admit that these two ideas aren't mine but I totally agreee with both of them. 1. It ruins the sense of wonder and reduces the power of the force to a number. If someone has more midochlorians, they're better than you and you will never be better than them because they were born with more bacteria in their blood. It's not about gaining a knowledge about yourself , and the mystery of the unknown, you'll just suck. And 2. It's pretty much a throwaway line. The Phantom menace, Attack of the clones, and Revenge of the sith would not have been any worse, or made no less sense if they didn't explain away the fun.

Also when I first saw the phantom menace as a little kid I threw up. Coincidence?
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No I had like four kit kat bars.

 

[Captain Blackout]

Because it turns being a Jedi from a personal journey of self-discovery, discipline, and spirituality and turns it into an accident of birth. A strong Jedi is no longer someone with the stronger focus or will, just someone with more bugs in his blood. In short, it cheapens the mythology.

If you grew up on the first trilogy, you're more likely to hate midicholorians with a passion.

I disagree. All that's canonically known, is that there is some connection between midi-chlorians and the Force and that a high midi-chlorian count is an indication that a being is Force-sensitive. No canonical information says that midi-chlorians create the Force, are the Force or make a Jedi strong. It just indicates potential to use the Force.

So it's not like the Force is explained all of a sudden, midi-chlorians just provide a way to detect (amongst others) Force-sensitive beings. Plus, don't forget about the difference between a Force-sensitive being and an actual Force-user. That personal journey of self-discovery, discipline and spirituality is still needed for a Jedi to be an actual good Jedi.

You can have an amazingly high midi-chlorian count, but all that that says is "He could use the Force really well" and nothing more. It doesn't guarantee that that person becomes a good Jedi (there's more to being a Jedi than using the Force, way more) or even becomes a Jedi at all. Just look at Anakin "My life sucks so much" Skywalker. Lots o' midi-chlorians, crappy Jedi.

Thus, tl;dr, I see no reason why someone who grew up with the original trilogy would have to hate midi-chlorians with a passion. They're not what you think they are.

Yes they are: They are a McGuffin, a tool George wrote in to simplify the prophecy regarding Anakin, and its a really poor writing technique. Susan is right on the money from within the myth, and from outside the bad writing is why she's right on the money.