4 ms·
I was shocked that the Empire's reaction to having their central secret military archive compromised was (spoiler ahead) to blow the whole base from space; more
by TuringTest 10y ago
I was shocked that the Empire's reaction to having their central secret military archive compromised was (spoiler ahead) to blow the whole base from space; more so when it is hinted that this was their only copy.
Watching the Death Star operating at low power was cool though, as well as knowing that it had undergone some "preliminary tests" before Episode IV.
- Anderkent 10y ago>Watching the Death Star operating at low power was cool though Oh yeah the slomo nuke that's literally outran by the characters. ಠ_ಠ
- MereInterest 10y agoGiven that they were a large distance away from the site of the explosion, it isn't unreasonable. From orbit, we see that the shockwave has covered a large proportion of Jedha's circumference, easily visible from space, at the time of the jump to hyperspace. Estimating the diameter at 5% of the planet's circumference, the shockwave traveled about 600 miles, which would take about 45 minutes for the shockwave to reach, assuming similar size and atmospheric density as Earth (reasonable, since humans can comfortably live there). Clearly, the stronghold is not 600 miles from the city, as the shockwave was traveling faster than the rockwave, but it gives a good sense of timing. Note that the characters were not able to outrun the rockwave without the jump to hyperspace.
- Anderkent 10y agoIt looked to me like they're literally running out of the building as the shockwave was travelling through it, and then running to the ship and getting there before it gets to them. It didn't look like they were far from the site at all. Without seeing the scene again I guess it's hard to check.
- MereInterest 10y agoGood point. I've only seen it once so far, so I will keep an eye out for it the next time. My interpretation was that the initial shockwave had hit the building, and was causing all the structural damage that we saw as they were leaving the building. The shockwave passed, at which point they were trying to get to the ship and leave before the larger danger of "the horizon is missing" reached them.
- talmand 10y agoMy feelings on it were that the building was shaking due to seismic activity at a low level on the outskirts of the rock wave. The sheer size of the rock wave might make it seem closer than it was. The problem is that we have little indication how far away the base was from the initial blast point. My thought it was quite a distance away since they had X-Wings parked out front in the open.
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- MereInterest 10y agoI saw it less as a rational move on the part of the Empire, and more as a rational move on the part of Tarkin. With the Death Star functional, Krennic would be gaining more status. Tarkin wanted to take as much credit as possible, as seen earlier in the film. Given an excuse to remove a political rival with the excuse of securing the plans to prevent any additional transmissions, he took it. Also, I had recently read this fanfiction [1] about a project manager working on the second Death Star, complaining about how much of the institutional knowledge from the first Death Star had been lost, making the second Death Star be quite rushed. The loss of the original plans made the fanfiction fit in even better. [1] https://www.fanfiction.net/s/11685932/1/Instruments-of-Destruction https://www.fanfiction.net/s/11685932/1/Instruments-of-Destr...
- Spooky23 10y agoThe whole affair was a real shitshow. Blowing everything and everyone up is good bureaucratic response when your boss has a habit of strangling people.