Rogue One - Why was Vader seem so much more impressive than Prequel-era fighters?

[Silent Protagonist]

Ray's arc is complete after all

You what now? It is about as complete as Luke's was in ANH. We know that he's force sensitive and he's achieved his immediate goal of joining the Rebellion, but we are still in the dark as to what he'll do with that force sensitivity (and the light saber he never used). Rey has joined the Resistance and found Luke, but her arc is about her learning the ways of the force, so all that's complete is the set up of her arc. She and Ren have also been set up as rivals and that has yet to play out.

Rey doesn't need Luke to show her the ways of the force, she has already mastered them. She is so force sensitive that the force itself taught her everything from force powers she had never seen or even heard of to advanced lightsaber fighting techniques. She's a quick learner too given she had only known the force was more than a fairy tale for about 48 hours. If anything she has a thing or two to show him.

Maybe when she's done she can also give him a few pointers about being an ace pilot, having extensive knowledge of engineering, repair, and maintenance of complex machinery, hacking, having everyone you meet instantly like you, being really annoyed when people hold your hand while the area you are in is currently the target of a series of air strikes, and never displaying any emotions.

 

[Zontar]

. The EU was so obsessed with the Empire that it had the clone of the Emperor return with a interstellar cannon that could destroy planets.

As opposed to the interstellar cannon that could destroy entire systems that we got in TFA?

The state of the Empire in the EU actually made sense. 5 years after the battle of Endor the Empire's fragments collectively are more powerful then the New Republic, with the New Republic only gaining ground due to the Imperial Civil War between different Moffs and Admirals. It took 15 years after the Battle of Endor for both the New Republic to get into a strong enough position to make a peace treaty and for the Imperial Admiralty to purge the warlords who would oppose such a peace to occur. 15 years and a peace treaty. That makes sense.

You know what happened in canon? 1 year after the Battle of Endor the Empire surrendered. Not a peace treaty, not a cease fire, surrendered. The only reason the Imperial Remnant in canon is a Republic puppet state instead of being annexed was because the New Republic didn't have the manpower to occupy the worlds loyal to the Empire. 1 year, 1 fucking year, after most of the Rebel fleet was annihilated and should have, with only 1 year to recover, been smashed to pieces at Jakku just from sheer numbers. And then the First Order was formed when the Imperial Navy realised "wait a minute, we've got then outgunned and outnumbered, that's bullshit" and decided to take off for uncharted space because I guess someone at Disney is a Battletech fan who likes the Clans.

TFA was worse then that?

Yes. A supercharged Galaxy Gun built by a nation so small most didn't believe it even existed had said Galaxy Gun taken down by a dozen pilots because its weakness was not only the same as its two predecessors but its location was not even a secret.

Being impulsive and acting rashly was always the Luke thing to do.

And that was always as a means to the ends of doing the right thing. It would have actually made sense if Luke had taken the New Jedi Order with him to train them away from the influence of the Republic and the Imperial Remnant, but instead he just ran away in a move completely out of character with how he was portrayed in the original trilogy.

You realize that the movie makes it explicit that Han left because he couldn't be near Leia after Ben became Kylo, right? 'nuff said.

Which is fucking bullshit as an in-universe explanation and exists only to justify a general who had gotten far beyond the point of returning to crime to do just that only to give reason for why he and Chewie where hunting for the Falcon, a ship they never would have lost to begin with and had countless ways of justifying the two being on Jakku with the ship if the writers had actually cared.

That we see on screen. We don't know the full strength of the Resistance, only that its' top leadership is being threatened by Starkiller base and that their deaths would be the end of the Resistance. The movie also implies that no one really believes the First Order to be an actual threat, hence why the Resistance operates on a shoestring.

You're telling me that despite explicitly having official support from The Republic they are so lacking in resources and manpower that their entire starfleet is explicitly less then two dozen outdated starfighters, something Leia's own personal fortune alone would have been more then enough to buy multiple times over?

Even if it was just her own personal band of mercenaries with no other support they'd still be smaller then one could justify and would be so small the First Order wouldn't even recognise them as anything more then another irrelevant band of pirates with delusions of grandeur who don't even have a proper ship. The Ghost was more of a threat then The Resistance.

You mean like in A New Hope, when a lesser amount of fighters managed to take down a moon-sized battle station that knew they were coming? TFA at least provides the excuse of a surprise attack and a ground party that enables the fighters to get a shot.

A New Hope was also a hail mary throw by the Rebel Alliance where they threw every fighter and bomber they had into a hopeless last stand that had a 95% mortality rate after a million to one shot by a force sensitive took down an otherwise indestructible battle station.

Rogue One retconned this into being every fighter and bomber they had after their raid on the outpost the Death Star was designed at and the Battle of Scarif, at which most of the Rebel fleet that wasn't just fighter sized craft where destroyed and most of the rest damaged. And even that changed the critical design flaw as being an intentional part of the design for such an attack.

TFA had an even larger battle station had the literal same design flaw that was exploited in the same way but with an even smaller force against a more heavily defended station. One which should have known they where coming just by virtue of the shield being down (and the fact Phasma was willing to take it down is bullshit, as is the fact she alone could instead of it requiring multiple locations to independently do it together).

De-masked Ren's lack of menace is arguably plot point, but don't let that stop you.

It's a weak plot point. He shouldn't have taken his mask off until his confrontation with Han. In fact him being a pretty boy emo ***** in that one scene alone would have worked. Hell remove the interrogation scene and have the lightsaber battle have the two characters change their place in the script for that scene and he's actually be a decent villain instead of the laughing stock he is.

You what now? It is about as complete as Luke's was in ANH.

No it isn't. Luke didn't know shit about how to use the force, he didn't know shit about how to fight, he didn't even know how to properly use a blaster. All he had going for him was that he was a good pilot and was starting to learn the ways of the force.

Ray was already a good fighter by the start of the movie, she was an ace fighter pilot equivalent before ever setting foot in a cockpit, and 5 minutes after learning of the existence of the force she's already using it at the same level that a master would in previous movies, and this culminated in her defeating the villain of the movie in their head of fight. She has nowhere left to go. She knows how to use the force as well as masters do already, she already is a better fighter then her nemesis, she's already an ace fighter pilot, to be blunt there's a reason why those who understand how characters are supposed to be made called her a Mary Sue and those who don't understand that a female character who's perfect is a bad character pretended that fact isn't true.

He tried something new, lost the soul of his old work and burned miserably in the process. TFA might be threading water and revisiting old beats in some respects (though the extent of this is way exaggerated by grumpy internet denizens), but at least it understood what made ANH a good movie, unlike Episode I which couldn't decide what kind of movie it wanted to be or what its' focus was. And that was the best of the prequels.

If TFA understood what made ANH a good movie then why the hell did it gut all that stuff out and only leave what didn't work well in it? Why didn't scenes logically flow from one to the next? Why did characters have no consistency to them (like a man who wanted to run away from the fight because he doesn't want to kill anyone then in the next scene gun down unarmed deck hands who posed no threat to him, or the poor starving scavenger who had enough time to learn how to maintain ships she never had reason to work on, pilot things she never touched or languages of species she's never met)? Why wasn't the villain's goal and motivation made clear, or hell even what their position was given in ANH we at least knew the Empire was large and in charge while the Rebels where a small group resisting them. Can't even pretend anything on screen explains the relationship between the Republic, the Resistance and the New Order. I only even know the Imperial Remnant exists because of other sources, and that's not even getting started on the fact that's what you need to understand the totality of the relationship the powers have to each other is, to say nothing of the villain's motivations.

I've got to say though that I am amused by how much shit you give TFA when most of the criticism comes from a lacking understanding of the actual plot and the remaining is shitting over it for things it did that ANH also did. What's good for the goose and all that.

Actually the more one thinks about the plot of TFA the less sense the whole damn thing makes and the more clear it is no one's actions make any sense at all and YouTubers like RedLetterMedia and E;R put more thought into their analysis of the movie then the writers did into the script. Though in all fairness I think Disney corporate likely had a heavy hand in how bland and bad the movie's story was. I'm 90% sure the movie was doomed to be shit because of that alone and whether it was the case or not doesn't change the fact it was of comparable quality to the prequels no matter how shiny the special effects used to distract people from that fact where. As someone who does not care about the quality of effects that stuff never works to distract me from what I'm really there for.

 

[Zontar]

Rogue One was a mess.

That doesn't mean my statement about it being better then TFA is wrong. Both our claims can be true at the same time and I'd say both are given I won't disagree with the claim Rogue One is a mess.

If I were Disney, I would have ignored the expanded universe too. Their goal should be to make a good story, not to incorporate the stories that have been written over the decades into a work that's made redundant by the source materials. I know little of the Thrawn trilogy, but I dislike the idea of Leia having twins, as if all Skywalkers have to have twins, and of Luke's story continuing. He had his character arc. His friends too. Let someone else be the hero. Thrawn also seems overpowered, controlling an entire army with the Force.

Yes it makes sense that Disney created a new canon, but you'd think they'd take what worked and what was loved in the old EU and bring that over. One could argue that is happening but given how many books and comics the new continuity launched with and how little from the old EU was brought over, coupled with the fact it's only recently the biggest villain of the EU has begun to show his face the pace is slower then it should be.

Thrawn should have been if not the big bad of the sequel trilogy then at least one of the villains who was there. Sure, some of the stories overblow his reputation (this even becomes a joke in-canon) but he was the best written villain the IP has had since it started. I'd also like to point out he wasn't force sensitive, him menace came from his tactical abilities such as creating the Marg Sabl (before it was retconned as being his popularising its use) and that when Leia had her twins the prequels had not retconned Luke and Leia as being twins instead of her being the older one by years.

I don't want a repeat of Vader

We don't need a repeat of Vader. But if we're going to get a Vader wannabe, then one with a halfway decent execution would have been nice. And if he wasn't the antagonist of the movie, then the organisation of the New Order itself was given it certainly wasn't Phasma, Hux or Snock.

Ray's arc is complete? I don't know about that.

She's using the force like a master, already defeated her nemesis and is basically perfect at everything she tries. She's got nowhere left to grow as a character unless you consider her confused fishface she kept making something that she needs to grow out of. Though I think that was more a case of bad acting and/or bad directing then a part of an arc.

Maybe Luke doesn't have the power to take on Snoke alone, who could be ancient. The legacy of his family has taught him that the Jedi way is flawed. He is trying to fix the mess he made, which is why he searched for the first Jedi temple. I don't like the emotionless monks the Jedi became in the prequels, so I'm looking forward to Luke hopefully training a new order of Force users, a better one. Training another generation of Jedi would be retarded after what happened to his father and nephew.

I'm pretty sure that most of his students where not messed up lunatics before the one messed up lunatic slaughtered them all. And if he did run away to try and figure out what he did wrong before trying again, the movie did nothing to imply that in the slightest. Hell it was just shy of explicit in painting him as wanting someone to come after him given that stupid map which makes no sense if you think about it at all.

I disagree. Like I said, the prequels are rather pointless for focusing so much on Anakin, whose story we already knew. The end feels unrewarding. I thought Episode I benefited from focusing less on Anakin. I recently rewatched the prequels. Episode II and III were letdowns. I wrote a little about them.

I'm not defending the prequels. I'm just pointing out TFA is on their (low) level.

 

[Queen Michael]

It's exactly because he doesn't move around as much as the prequel fighters.

They went all Cirque du Soleil every time there was a fight. Vader doesn't need to.

 

[Zontar]

Also, how are the new X-Wings outdated?

In canon the very reason they've been supplied to the Resistance is because they're outdated models compared to the modern ones being used by the Republic. Don't ask me the logic of how a fighter developed after episode 6 is already outdated by episode 7 30 years later, but then it's not as if we see any Clone War era fighter craft during the Original period.

 

[Madner Kami]

Spoilers below.

So, at the end of the latest Star Wars movie, Rogue One, we get a truly memorable moment that has, perhaps gone down as audience's favourite scene of the entire film; Darth Vader, strolling down a hallway while slaughtering every Rebel in his path. It's a gripping and thoroughly enjoyable moment, reminding everybody watching why this guy has gone down as one of the truly great villains of cinema. He says nothing, yet we know just from looking that he's an unstoppable force of destruction, with the good guys unable to do anything to halt his advance.

And yet, as I watched it, I couldn't help but feel something odd. The Prequels, while certainly flawed, nevertheless had spectacular fight scenes and choreography, creating fighters that appeared to be of a calibre that simply could not be matched. The fluidity of their movements, the style of their lightsaber duels, the way they flipped and kicked and jumped, just made the fights of the original trilogy looks like childsplay by comparison.

And yet, here was Vader, fighting in a manner that was far more restrained and basic than those of the Prequel-era, yet he, for whatever reason, seemed to come across as not only more intimidating, but also like an overall better fighter than those who came before. This is what struck me as odd because those who fought and duelled in the Prequels were clearly made to appear as though they had skill that far outmatched those of the OT, and in a lot of ways, they did. But even so, there was just something about the more simple way Vader fought in Rogue One that just seemed to overshadow those more choreographed fights.

Do you agree? Disagree? Or perhaps share some other viewpoint I had not considered?

It's fairly simple and you already stated why: The prequel-fights are either against CG-robots or coreographed fights that are, in essence, a complicated sequence of two or more people dancing with each other with swords in their hands. Vader, in that scene, fought to kill.

 

[Sniper Team 4]

See, the thing is, all those lightsaber fights we see in the prequels are against other lightsaber experts. The way lightsabers work, and by extension lightsaber duels, is that the Force guides your movements. It's been described as seeing into the future in a certain way, where you can sense your opponent's move a brief moment before he makes it and the Force guides you to block, dodge, or counter attack.

You made me realize that everyone in "For Honor" is using the force.

<_<

Well, it is in all living things, so... ;-)

 

[Diablo1099_v1legacy]

I feel they made him far more menacing as a means of redeeming him as a badass/ villain once again due to this in the prequel

Well that's how my bro see it. I mean remember to those who actually went to watch A New Hope at the 80's, Vader was such an intimadating character back then!

I know everyone gives that scene shit but it really does show the final phase in Anakin/Vader's fall from grace, the realization of just how royally he fucked up and how he has damned everyone in his life not named Palatine.
As the little green midget put it:

I mean, I get why it's hated, but like with Kylo Ren, I kinda like how they remind that there is something human behind that mask.

 

[Diablo1099_v1legacy]

Snip

As I've heard from others, Vader changed his combat style after he was cyberneticized. He's encased in a sturdy heat-resistant suit of armor which increases strength, but makes him heavier. It's harder to do the same stuff he did when his body was unencumbered. So, because of his dramatic life change, he altered his way of doing things, moving from the swift killing machine to the ever-intimidating and unstoppable juggernaut of the Empire.

Rogue One is great stuff.

Yeah, it's really clear in stuff like Star Wars: Rebels where he barely moves his legs when swinging and why a lot his attacks have a slightly stiff feel to them.
It's totally fucking badass though and, if they actually do put Star Wars characters into Mahvel Vs Capcom: Infinite, I want Vader to have that same style in his animations and moves.

 

[Diablo1099_v1legacy]

Also, how are the new X-Wings outdated? We've been using the same military helicopters and fighter jets for thirty to forty years. The F-16 and Black Hawk are still in service after forty years.

Could be a case in advances being made in that field after the Empire fell, or rather that Empire plans that were once private were made public.
Besides, The First Order managed to improve the Death Star to become the RYNO from Ratchet and Clank so there might have been more advances in that universe's technology then you'd think.

 

[Zontar]

Also, how are the new X-Wings outdated? We've been using the same military helicopters and fighter jets for thirty to forty years. The F-16 and Black Hawk are still in service after forty years.

Could be a case in advances being made in that field after the Empire fell, or rather that Empire plans that were once private were made public.
Besides, The First Order managed to improve the Death Star to become the RYNO from Ratchet and Clank so there might have been more advances in that universe's technology then you'd think.

The galaxy advanced more in the 50 years after the rise and fall of the Empire then in the 5000 years before that.

 

[Diablo1099_v1legacy]

The galaxy advanced more in the 50 years after the rise and fall of the Empire then in the 5000 years before that.

Possibly? I would say that we advanced more in the last century technology wise then we did in the 1000 years before that in real life.
Add in with the fact that the Empire could have been hoarding technology en mass once they were in power to stay that way and it's possible that the peace after the original trilogy was one full f technological advancement.

Not sure if it's the case or not, just being devil's advocate

 

[Zontar]

The galaxy advanced more in the 50 years after the rise and fall of the Empire then in the 5000 years before that.

Possibly? I would say that we advanced more in the last century technology wise then we did in the 1000 years before that in real life.
Add in with the fact that the Empire could have been hoarding technology en mass once they were in power to stay that way and it's possible that the peace after the original trilogy was one full f technological advancement.

Not sure if it's the case or not, just being devil's advocate

While the Empire did try to hoard technology (the X-wing was originally commissioned as an Imperial space superiority fighter before those who designed it defected after all) it should be noted that they even had technology to hoard in the first place. That isn't something the Old Republic could claim, as between the Great Hyperspace War all the way to the end of the Clone Wars the speed at which technology advanced was so slow one not only can't identify the century something was made without the use of an archive, one couldn't even identify the millennium it was made.

Hell over the multiple centuries that saw conflict between the Old Republic and the Sith Empire, including a decades long war, decade long Cold War and another decade long period of warfare both between the two and the Eternal Empire, technological progress was so slow that the first ships built by the Sith Empire 300 years before the start of that warfare in the first initial phase of construction of the grand Sith Imperial Navy where indistinguishable from the latest fresh off the line vessels at the death of the Sith Empire, and Republic warships where similarly impossible to notice change for.

Hell just compare the Hammerhead-class cruiser from 4,000 years before the Battle of Yavin:

to the Hammerhead Corvette from during the period of the Battle of Yavin:

Hell, the Hammerhead-class cruiser was a mainstay of Republic military vessels for nearly 3,000 years before finally being phased out, and even then they still could be found in service amongst local Defence Forces even in the dying days of the Clone Wars.

 

[Zontar]

As far I'm concerned, Knights of the Old Republic is a fan story. It's too ridiculous to be true.

You know the only reason one can't say the same for TFA stems from the fact that 1) it's not well written enough to be compared to the Old Republic games, and 2) it's too much of an unabashed ripoff of ANH for a fan to have ever conceived of it.

 

[RJ 17]

And yet, here was Vader, fighting in a manner that was far more restrained and basic than those of the Prequel-era, yet he, for whatever reason, seemed to come across as not only more intimidating, but also like an overall better fighter than those who came before. This is what struck me as odd because those who fought and duelled in the Prequels were clearly made to appear as though they had skill that far outmatched those of the OT, and in a lot of ways, they did. But even so, there was just something about the more simple way Vader fought in Rogue One that just seemed to overshadow those more choreographed fights.

I'm sure some of the things below have been mentioned, but I'm too tired to read through all the responses thus far. So apologies if these things have already been brought up.

Reasons why "The Hallway Scene" shows off what a badass Vader is/why it was a scene that so many people say was one of the best parts of Rogue One.

Quite simply: it shows off why Vader is considered an absolute terror to the common rank'n'file of the Rebellion.

Just as a quick aside, the atmosphere of the scene is perfect. A bunch of rebel soldiers fleeing for their lives in a corridor that has lost power. Then they all hear that iconic breath. They turn to the darkness of the end of the corridor...only to see it suddenly lit up in a dim, red glow as Vader ignites his crimson lightsaber. The darkness still surrounds him, but that dim red light makes him all the more menacing.

From there we see what a badass he is, the kind of badass that was hyped up in the original trilogy. What follows is an absolute slaughter. Despite the fact that there's only one target being focus-fired on in a tight space by numerous blasters, he doesn't take a scratch. He massacres them all with the greatest of ease, proving that to normal people he is truly untouchable.

One of the reasons this is such a great display is because he pretty much uses his entire "kit". In his Vader body, he's not as agile as he was when he was in his fully human form, so he can't really do all the ninja flips and what-not. But he shows off his deflection capabilities with a few twirls of his lightsaber, he shows of his "fuck you I'm Darth Fuckin' Vader, Son!" ability by stopping a couple blasts just by sticking up his hand (as seen when Han first sees him in Cloud City and tries to blast him). He flings people around with the Force and even employs Force Choke. In the original trilogy, people talk about Vader like he's this unstoppable juggernaut of death, but we never really get to see it. This is the first time we've gotten to see Vader just wipe out a group of cannon fodder to earn that badass reputation.

The reason he accomplishes this without all the ninja flips and what-not from the prequel is because he really doesn't need those things anymore. I don't care what anyone says, I think the Vader vs Obi fight at the end of Revenge of the Sith is one of the best fights in the franchise (yes, I've seen the gif that shows that they were literally swinging at air...still, I really enjoy that fight in the context of the actual movie). But post Episode III, there aren't any Jedi left that are as skilled as Obi in his prime. That is, there aren't any Jedi capable of the ninja flips/etc that we saw in the prequels which were filled with youthful and athletic Jedi. As such, Vader no longer needs such agile movements to wipe out a squad of common soldiers.

But yeah, in the end, the reason that scene works so well is mostly because of the first two reasons I mentioned.
1: The atmosphere of the scene strongly supports his presence as The Big Bad of the franchise.
2: This is the first time we get to see him unleash his full kit of power against common rank'n'file Rebellion soldiers, fully proving why he is considered an absolute terror amongst them.

 

[Tanis]

Because prequel movies he was a kid.
A spoiled brat because of his 'status as the chosen one'.

Rouge One he was an old man who had been though hell, matured, and was at that point...basically pure.
No conflict on if he was Jedi or Sith.

When one is pure, even if it's evil, their actions can be FAR...far more impressive due to that focus.

 

[Kyrian007]

Mostly because Vader felt more like a Star Wars villain than a Star Wars prequel villain. Or hero. Meaning that he's just more impressive. Like everything was than the prequel series... including lightsaber duels. The prequel lightsaber fighting looked neat, sure... but did it complement the movie? No it did not. They flipped and they spun and they jumped and it was all really pretty... and utterly stupid. There's a 4 or 5 second bit in the Obi-Ani fight in ep 3 where they are waving and spinning their lightsabers (again for 4 or 5 whole seconds) and obviously are doing so outside of each other's range because they make contact with absolutely NOTHING. 99% of the movement in the prequel lightsaber fights is absolutely wasted movement with no purpose than "we have to make it at least look cool."

Vader on the other hand in Rogue One... wasted very little movement. With almost everything focused upon either advancing or killing. Not twirling his lightsaber like a rhythmic gymnast. Its an action sequence that compliments the movie very well by comparison.

My personal theory is this. The technology of the time made it easier to animate the lightsabers in a more grand, sweeping, broadsword stagefighting style in the original movies. But that kind of slower, more deliberate movement actually makes sense even though by its nature a lightsaber would be nearly weightless. Because they actually weigh more than a broadsword. And that weight is responsibility. A blade that instantly cuts through anything, has to be wielded with the utmost care and absolute precision to avoid killing or injuring bystanders or even yourself. Even Sith have to avoid damaging the terrain to their detriment (cutting the floor out from under themselves) or lopping their own arms or head off. The wirefu flipping bugouts of the prequels totally undercut that visual theme. I was really glad to see the classic style return in ep 7.

 

[EbonBehelit]

The scientific explanation where it didn't belong... namely in a space opera... right.
You know, I don't see people complaining about genetics and all that jazz being constantly mentioned in The Witcher and stuff, but people can't stop complaining about how having a pseudo-scientific explanation for something in Star Wars "ruined it", as if the Force being absolutely unexplained was the only thing that ever mattered in the damn story.
Woulda been a fair point... if the simple matter of being or not being "strong in the Force" and thus the very same power level didn't already exist in the originals.

Scientifically explaining everything is fine in a work of science fiction.... except the Original Trilogy was much closer to fantasy than sci-fi. The Force is a combination of magic and faith - both of which only work effectively when not explained in detail.

Anakin: a hero who manages to destroy a droid mothership at the age of eight, overpowered and killed a Sith lord whose combat experience is nothing to be laughed at and whose fear of loss became his downfall. And yeah, since Padme DID die through childbirth...

He destroyed the mothership in TPM because Lucas wanted a throwback to what Obi-Wan said in ANH - 'he was the greatest starfighter pilot in the galaxy'. I mean, c'mon, the kid barely knew what the fuck was even happening, and somehow destroyed the mothership accidentally. Y'know, like Jar Jar would've done.

Beating Dooku says nothing of Anakin's character. Killing him on the spot does, though.

Padme only died due to her grief at losing Anakin. Which is still ridiculous.

Blinding everyone with his Dark Side abilities was all but stated outright as one of Palpatine's powers.

When? Everyone?

I know Yoda and Windu converse about their minds being clouded, but the idea that practically the entire galaxy has been rendered blind/stupid by Palpatine is far too much to swallow. Why even bother writing the Senate into the film at all? The film would've panned out the same way even without it.

That's... some interesting logic on display. 'cause it seems to me that in the end of the day, size matters not, as long as you work on compensating for your disadvantages. His size and him "compensating" didn't make him any less of a fearsome duelist.

What Yoda was getting at in TESB was that the Force completely transcended the physical. The problem with the prequels is that every single Jedi/Sith uses a lightsaber in combat, even when their physical structure would give them a serious handicap when swordfighting. Handicaps which have to be compensated for. Which means that the physical does matter after all.

The beef I have is that Lucas was basically coming up with excuses to bring out the lightsabers. Ancient masters like Yoda should be so powerful in the force that they basically transcend even needing a melee weapon. Palpatine in RoTJ portrayed this well: he looked at Luke's lightsaber as a novice's tool that he himself had long since outgrown.

I'm probably going to get a groan from you for saying this, but I get the impression that you either haven't seen the Plinkett 'reviews' or disdain them. Not that I needed to have seen them to rip the prequels to shreds, but they are kinda useful in picking out the more pedantic inconsistencies.

 

[Redlin5_v1legacy]

He seems significantly more terrifying because he's killing human rebel fighters and not easily defeated robots or clones with masks that effectively make them robots. Even when Anakin went full dark side, he slaughtered the children off-screen and only murdered the Separatist leaders in wide angle shots featuring alien victims who we had no empathy for.

Rogue One had close ups of people clearly shitting themselves with fear, who are defenseless and mercilessly mowed down as Vader makes his way to his objective. He's just as unstoppable as he was in that Mustafar scene but the closed hallway nature of the fight and the empathy we have for his victims makes all the difference.

 

[Laughing Man]

When? Everyone?

I know Yoda and Windu converse about their minds being clouded, but the idea that practically the entire galaxy has been rendered blind/stupid by Palpatine is far too much to swallow. Why even bother writing the Senate into the film at all? The film would've panned out the same way even without it.

No the stupidest part of the entire prequel set up was the continued use by the Jedi's 'bringing balance to the force'. Now correct me if I am wrong but a balance of something means equal weighting on both sides, in this case the force having a dark and light side, if the Universe has hundreds of Jedis, (the light side) then surely the only way to bring balance to the force would be to either bring in a whole bunch of Sith Lords to make up the difference or kill off a huge number of the Jedi and well that's kinda what happened, leaving essentially Obi wan and Yoda on the good side and Vader and Palpatine on the other, i.e balanced.

Your talking about a Universe that has a group of light saber handling, mind reading, object manipulating space wizards who are the go to guys when the shit hits the fan but they are so dumb they don't understand what 'balance' means?