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I just noticed that a lot of the fighting in the prequels has a lot of fancy jumping, flashy moves, dancing around, etc. etc. while the OT fighting, especially the duels in ESB and ROTJ, are pure power; no dazzling displays of swordsmanship, just furious, powerful strikes.

Does this trend continue in the EU?

Cyril wrote:I just noticed that a lot of the fighting in the prequels has a lot of fancy jumping, flashy moves, dancing around, etc. etc. while the OT fighting, especially the duels in ESB and ROTJ, are pure power; no dazzling displays of swordsmanship, just furious, powerful strikes.

Does this trend continue in the EU?

Simply stopping and thinking will explain this trend.

The Jedi in the new trilogy are at their peak. Physical condition, Force power, saber training. It is an artform.

In contrast, ROTJ's fight is nothing pretty: An untrained boy beating the shit out of a cripple.

As always I think our thread starter is looking for hard examples to prove one answer or another.

But yes, the EU, especially in the NJO era, have Jedi bouncing around, and kicking the crap out of people, a la stuff we see in Episode I and II.

I have no specific examples to site, but they are there. And others, better than I can certainly list them as they so desire.

I actually prefered the ROTJ fighting style...

Cyril wrote:I actually prefered the ROTJ fighting style...

Mmmm. Interesting. I though everyone liked TPM, better. AotC was more along the lines of what we saw in RotJ. Some of the EU Jedi do fight like that, but most of them are weak or unskilled Jedi going up against opponents who are not powerful enough to totally mop the floor with them.

Cyril wrote:I just noticed that a lot of the fighting in the prequels has a lot of fancy jumping, flashy moves, dancing around, etc. etc. while the OT fighting, especially the duels in ESB and ROTJ, are pure power; no dazzling displays of swordsmanship, just furious, powerful strikes.

Does this trend continue in the EU?

The old Jedi had awhile to train before coming a full Jedi, so they had time to learn such minute aspects of lightsaber fighting.
In the OT time was short and they didn't have time to fully leanr the minute aspects of lightsaber combat.
And to the last question, yes.

Master of Ossus wrote:

Cyril wrote:I actually prefered the ROTJ fighting style...

Mmmm. Interesting. I though everyone liked TPM, better. AotC was more along the lines of what we saw in RotJ. Some of the EU Jedi do fight like that, but most of them are weak or unskilled Jedi going up against opponents who are not powerful enough to totally mop the floor with them.

I like light saber fighting period. Whether it's Jedi vs. Sith or against another type of apponent I just like that stuff. I do, however like the saber action in TPM the best. I don't really like it when they get into throwing a lot of stuff around with the Force which is why I like Luke vs. Vader II from RotJ the best in the OT and like the 3-way with Maul, Obi-Wan and Qui-Gon in the second trilogy.

I orgininally liked Dooku vs. Yoda but now that I've seen it a lot it is getting annoying. Yoda is hopping around too much.
The Dooku vs. Obi-Wan is okay but way too short. Dooku vs. Anakin is good but most of it is stylized to not really show much.

Master of Ossus wrote:

Cyril wrote:I actually prefered the ROTJ fighting style...

Mmmm. Interesting. I though everyone liked TPM, better. AotC was more along the lines of what we saw in RotJ. Some of the EU Jedi do fight like that, but most of them are weak or unskilled Jedi going up against opponents who are not powerful enough to totally mop the floor with them.

I think that was the pure "Holy shit!" reaction of seeing lightsaber combat moving so quickly and deadly. I know I liked it.

Tsyroc wrote:

Master of Ossus wrote:

Cyril wrote:I actually prefered the ROTJ fighting style...

Mmmm. Interesting. I though everyone liked TPM, better. AotC was more along the lines of what we saw in RotJ. Some of the EU Jedi do fight like that, but most of them are weak or unskilled Jedi going up against opponents who are not powerful enough to totally mop the floor with them.

I like light saber fighting period. Whether it's Jedi vs. Sith or against another type of apponent I just like that stuff. I do, however like the saber action in TPM the best. I don't really like it when they get into throwing a lot of stuff around with the Force which is why I like Luke vs. Vader II from RotJ the best in the OT and like the 3-way with Maul, Obi-Wan and Qui-Gon in the second trilogy.

I orgininally liked Dooku vs. Yoda but now that I've seen it a lot it is getting annoying. Yoda is hopping around too much.
The Dooku vs. Obi-Wan is okay but way too short. Dooku vs. Anakin is good but most of it is stylized to not really show much.

Visually, the fights in AotC are quite a bit better than the ones in TPM and the OT, but they are not as well done on closer inspection as those in TPM. If you listen to the commentary with your AotC DVD, that's exactly what Lucas was trying to do with the duels.

Cyril wrote:I actually prefered the ROTJ fighting style...

Me too. Too many useless circus stunts in the PT.

Master of Ossus wrote: Visually, the fights in AotC are quite a bit better than the ones in TPM and the OT, but they are not as well done on closer inspection as those in TPM. If you listen to the commentary with your AotC DVD, that's exactly what Lucas was trying to do with the duels.

GL doesn't seem to be a fan of going through the hassel of putting actors in flying rigs. Which actually is fine with me. I liked the Maul vs. Obi-Wan stuff that had very limited flying rig assistance the best. The rest of it was just two actors taking the choreography to the max.

I like quite a bit of the stuff with Dooku, especially when he uses quick stabbing motions against Obi-Wan.

Tsyroc wrote:I like quite a bit of the stuff with Dooku, especially when he uses quick stabbing motions against Obi-Wan.

Urk. That fight should have been LONGER!

IG-88E wrote:

Tsyroc wrote:I like quite a bit of the stuff with Dooku, especially when he uses quick stabbing motions against Obi-Wan.

Urk. That fight should have been LONGER!

Yes it should have been. Especially if Obi-Wan is so into defensive fighting. You would have thought that even though he never met Dooku he would have heard about him being a Form 2 expert. He seemed to have some knowledge about how good Dooku was since he thought he needed Anakin's help to take him on.

In all seriousness I LOVED TPM Maul VS Obi and Quin-gon fight

Specficly the segmat where Maul uses the driod head to open the door and the last segmat of the fight AFTER Maul's Dual blade gets choped in half, You get the sense he's SHOWING OFF more than anything else with all the fancy moves, he has obi-won outclassed, And the Forcepush from 2 inchs? Great way of ending a fight(Well it SHOULD have ended there, silly shaft, If your not gonna put a saftly-rail around it, why bother putting handy grapping ledges two feet down the shaft?)

I love the fighting style in the Prequel Trilogy. The superhuman, fast and furious fighting. It's awesome and cool to see.

The problem is none of the duels have the emotional depth of the Old Trilogy. While spectacular they just don't have that certain spark.

IG-88E wrote:

Tsyroc wrote:I like quite a bit of the stuff with Dooku, especially when he uses quick stabbing motions against Obi-Wan.

Urk. That fight should have been LONGER!

If you go to sites like HACA you see that most duels were quite quick and both sides sustaining injury.That a skilled swordsman could dispose of Kenobi/Anakinso easily is not surprising.

That's true, but it's a movie, dammit! I wanna longer saber fight!

I look at it this way:

In the prequels, the Jedi train with Lightsaber's from about the begaining of their training(AotC, we see the children w/ saber's with Yoda). Having trained with saber's for 10 to 15 years before going out into the big bad world, would mean that most Jedi are true swordmasters and have developed styles and particular methods of fighting.


In the original triology, Luke was only trained for what, months, not quite a year? So Luke uses the Force as a crutch to make up for the fact that he lacks years of training with the lightsaber. He uses basic moves assisted by the Force to keep in the fight. Vader, who has been trained extensively, uses brute strength because of the limitations of his suit and injuries.

I have to say I liked the duels in the OT especially ROTJ. TPM looked cool, but I thought that maybe GL was trying to cash in on the whole Asian movie martal arts thing from Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon. I may get flak for that, but oh well. The duels in AOTC were a step in the right direction though. I did like the fact that Dooku was able to trade words with Kenobi about how the quality of dueling had dropped if he was held with such regard from Yoda, hen quickly disabling Kenobi with small precise slices on the arm and leg.
As for the Jedi being at their prime in this period, we know that is not true. When Yoda and Windu are talking about the dark side interfering with their use of the Force, that would apply when dueling. Yes I know they had years of training with the lightsaber with and without the Force, but that does not help them at all when they need to be almost precognitive to not only block blaster fire, but to redirect it at their enemy, or when facing the almost precognitive skills of a sith lord or apprentice. They still need the force to duel effectively. Well that was just my two cents worth, feel free to flame...LOL

desertjedi wrote:I have to say I liked the duels in the OT especially ROTJ. TPM looked cool, but I thought that maybe GL was trying to cash in on the whole Asian movie martal arts thing from Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon. I may get flak for that, but oh well.

The swordfighting in the NT was not all Eastern in origin. The choreographer added in a lot of stuff from different places. This makes sense in a large universe and an order that is very old. That take what works and incorporate a lot of different techniques.

Not everything has to come from CTHD. Heck, it wasn't even that great of a movie.

I should note that I am not a big fan of CTHD, but there were some elements of Wushu that even I recognized in TPM, that was more or less what I was talking about and yes I agree that it would make sense to mix different styles to come up with a unique system of deuling. But I guess what I was just trying to get at was that all that flasy fighting didn't relly impress me. I guess my ideal deul would be a mix of overall strength from ROTJ and the precise technique Dooku used in AOTC.

Given that the subject came up, I don't like the idea that Vader was crippled because of his injuries, I mean to me it always looked like his armored suit enhanched his physical prowess, even though technically he was crippled.

I just realized that I am a fucking idiot that can't spell for shit. This is why I shouldn't be allowed near computers during the graveyard shift... because I can't fucking spell.... LOL Duel... Deul... damn...

Mods... feel free to edit if necessary...

desertjedi wrote:I just realized that I am a fucking idiot that can't spell for shit. This is why I shouldn't be allowed near computers during the graveyard shift... because I can't fucking spell.... LOL Duel... Deul... damn...

Mods... feel free to edit if necessary...

I've seen worse. Much worse. Blatently worse. And he thought it was fine.

TPM was only showy in terms of Darth Maul and Obi Wan fighting.

Maul is self-assured and cocky and is clearly showing off and toying with them both. Obi-Wan is a young brash padawan and has a real problem with twirling his lightsabre and performing needless stunts.

Qui-Gonn however isn't nearly as flashy and fights calm and collected, with hardly any flashy moves.

In the end, Maul beat both Qui-Gonn and Obi-Wan, but for Obi-Wan pulling that lucky stunt (apparently he used the force and calmed his anger allowing him to pull that trick without Maul figuring it out).

Look at how Obi-Wan fights Dooku in Clones- just as calm as Qui Gonn. That's how it's SUPPOSED to be. Dooku also fights well. Anakin is also not nearly as showy as Obi-Wan was with Qui Gonn but then again Anakin likes his power moves. Lot's of overhead strikes.

As for Yoda, it was brought up here that the jumpiness is to counter Dooku's advantage in height/reach.