It said "a" Death Star, not "the" Death Star, so presumably there's some leeway to fix some of the design flaws, so that it's not vulnerable to a small, one-man fighter.

I have to disagree with part of the administration's reasoning. It said "a" Death Star, not "the" Death Star, so presumably there's some leeway to fix some of the design flaws, so that it's not vulnerable to a small, one-man fighter. Why is there a vent to a central reactor essentially unguarded and on the outside of the ship? No competent engineer would say "No worries, that's smaller than a womp rat!"

By that logic, they could just buy some B-2s and just call them "Death Stars".

No competent engineer would say "No worries, that's smaller than a womp rat!"

You canNOT petition the Lord with prayer...

For that design to be exploited, they needed someone in a small fighter who could get close enough to the vent, and make use of the force to nail the shot. At the time of the attack, there were three people alive in the galaxy who were known to be strong enough with the force to make the shot. One was not a fighter pilot, and the other two were building the Death Star. That they did not design something that would protect against the possibility of a new Jedi who also happened to be a fighter pilot is not on the engineers.

For that design to be exploited, they needed someone in a small fighter who could get close enough to the vent, and make use of the force to nail the shot. At the time of the attack, there were three people alive in the galaxy who were known to be strong enough with the force to make the shot. One was not a fighter pilot, and the other two were building the Death Star. That they did not design something that would protect against the possibility of a new Jedi who also happened to be a fighter pilot is not on the engineers.

My guess -- it was that damnable Admiral Ozzel who dropped the ball... everyone knows he's as clumsy as he is stupid.

At the time of the attack, there were three people alive in the galaxy who were known to be strong enough with the force to make the shot. One was not a fighter pilot, and the other two were building the Death Star.

Here's a question...why did they let R2D2 escape with plans that exposed an ACTUAL flaw in the Death Star. Why didn't they just feed him fake plans with a fake flaw? That seems kind of stupid of them.

Classic rock radio is a plague upon mankind.

"We've analyzed their attack patterns, and there is a danger." If they already knew of the flaw, they wouldn't have had to really analyze the attack patterns to be aware of the danger. This doesn't speak highly of their engineers, I suppose.

Classic rock radio is a plague upon mankind.

It is more than a little ironic that the Doors get more radio play now, many years after Jim Morrison's death, than they did in their heyday.

Because the plans weren't about the flaw, they were about the death star itself -- the blueprints had to be analyzed by the rebels to find the flaw... and they didn't feed them to him -- the Bothan spies stole them, gave them to Leia, who entrusted them to the droid.

I have to disagree with part of the administration's reasoning. It said "a" Death Star, not "the" Death Star, so presumably there's some leeway to fix some of the design flaws, so that it's not vulnerable to a small, one-man fighter. Why is there a vent to a central reactor essentially unguarded and on the outside of the ship? No competent engineer would say "No worries, that's smaller than a womp rat!"

It seems just as likely to me that someone else failed to act... and frankly, it's entirely likely that Palpatine's preference for secrecy and playing various factions against each contributed to the lack of info sharing.

I mean Journey? Styx? Steve Miller Band post-1970? That crap is classic?

Obi-Wan was a fighter pilot, although it had undoubtedly been many years since he had flown at that point. Unless you meant Yoda, but in that case, what about Obi-Wan?

The Empire built two of them and they both had a similar flaw. It seems to be inherent to a Death Star.

Obi Wan was alive, known to be alive, and was very much a fighter pilot, at least when they were building the death star if not at the time of the attack.

The Death Star may be badly designed in details like reactor vents and so on, but that is nothing compared to the stupidity of the overall design. It is a strategic weapon designed to blow up entire planets into gravel, at an enormous cost in energy. In what way is that more terrifying for those on the other side of the barrel than a weapon that simply kills all life and sterilizes a planet? Which would be an at least ten orders of magnitude or so easier task.

a weapon that simply kills all life and sterilizes a planet

That they didn't take the attack seriously nor do any kind of planning or preparation for defending the Death Star is the flaw not some exhaust pipe

Darth Nihilius could kill all life on a planet if he wanted to (and he did!).

They had probably designed the second one without such a flaw, but at the time of its destruction 2.0 was still under construction and had gaps big enough to fit a cargo ship through.

Death has always been a great career move for artists and musicians. Elvis and Michael Jackson are really raking in the bucks now.

(1) how long it had taken to build Death Star 2.0 up to the point of its destruction, and (2) was it capable of hyper speeds?

Clearly it took longer than the first one, which apparently took the better part of two decades. They might have started construction on the second one before the first was destroyed, however. You can never have too many Death Stars.

I think it was pretty silly of the Emperor to set his trap for the Rebels while the second Death Star was still so vulnerable

Classic rock radio is a plague upon mankind.


So true. The same 80 or so cuts over and over, year after year. Not even bothering with lesser known songs by the Stones or Hendrix.

The Death Star may be badly designed in details like reactor vents and so on, but that is nothing compared to the stupidity of the overall design. It is a strategic weapon designed to blow up entire planets into gravel, at an enormous cost in energy. In what way is that more terrifying for those on the other side of the barrel than a weapon that simply kills all life and sterilizes a planet? Which would be an at least ten orders of magnitude or so easier task.

Death freezes the perception of an artist at his peak and avoids the decline phase into irrelevancy.

Regarding the exhaust vent - why did Rebellion decide that they should fly down a trench at high speeds, drop a torpedo that still has forward momentum down a vent that presumably goes 90 degrees straight down to the core? Shouldn't you fly straight at the vent kamikaze-style and launch as many torpedoes directly into the vent?

The idea is presumably that the Death Star's defensive batteries can't fire into the trench, while the shaft is well-guarded by those same batteries against attacks from straight up.

Regarding the exhaust vent - why did Rebellion decide that they should fly down a trench at high speeds, drop a torpedo that still has forward momentum down a vent that presumably goes 90 degrees straight down to the core? Shouldn't you fly straight at the vent kamikaze-style and launch as many torpedoes directly into the vent?

Now I feel dirty for getting into rationalizations. It was probably just a cool effect they cooked up.

* Seen the original move well over a 100 times (mostly back in the day, but every year or so I rewatch), and if the prequals did not kill my love, nothing will, ever.

regarding the use of the "force" to hit the vent- did they ever hear of GUIDED WEAPONS, heat seeking technology? radar guided? smart bombs???? It seems inconceivable that they didn't have munitions that could be programmed to home in on the damn vent, hell the idiot aliens from Battleship the Movie* could easily take it out with one of their pegs.

'The Administration does not support blowing up planets.'

Well, that is exactly what we have come to expect from the Obama Administration. In fact, as a reason for blocking the development of a Death Star it should be challenged without delay in the Supreme Court as a likely violation of the Second Amendment to the US Constitution.

As David Keene would surely inform the President in no uncertain terms, Death Stars do not blow up planets, people blow up planets.

Did you see the kind of computers they were using? Not high-tech stuff. Plus all of this happened a long, long time ago, presumably before that technology had been developed.

but you would think with the development of droids such as R2-D2 or C3PO

and also both R2 and C3PO evidenced a level of AI programming beyond what has yet been managed

Good luck. My petition to have Jeff Francoeur released and to make George RR Martin write faster was taken down by the government after about 150 signatures. While the two things seem unrelated, sometimes you need a little bit of pork to move consensus.

At the least, just enter the trench closer to the shaft.

Winter is coming...

Regarding the exhaust vent - why did Rebellion decide that they should fly down a trench at high speeds, drop a torpedo that still has forward momentum down a vent that presumably goes 90 degrees straight down to the core? Shouldn't you fly straight at the vent kamikaze-style and launch as many torpedoes directly into the vent?

The Dam Busters (1955)

Did You Know? ...

This is one of the films that George Lucas used clips from to edit the rough cut of Star Wars (which utilizes many features of the finale of this film quite closely, notably the briefing, the ground staff waiting for news, the troika formation of the attacking aircraft and so on). In Addition, the following exchange from this film is reproduced almost verbatim (with the exception of the characters' names) in "Star Wars": Gibson: "How many guns d'you think there are, Trevor?" Trevor: "I'd say there's about 10 guns - some in the field and some in the tower". 

The greatness of Dylan and to a degree, Leonard Cohen, is that they continued to evolve and take risks into old age.

“Bob really, really hates to repeat himself. A lot of times he’d do a version of a song and he’d say, “Aw, I’ve done that already. We gotta figure out some other way.” That’s what it’s all about with him.”


“Have I ever played any song twice exactly the same?”
“No, Bob, no.”
“See? I don’t do that.”

And Dan’s like, ‘Yeah, but that song “Can’t Wait”…’ Bob’s like, ‘I did it that way, and I’m never doing it that way again.’

“For him, a recording is a document of the song at that moment in time. My favourite Bob Dylan song is probably ‘It’s Alright Ma (I’m Only Bleeding)’. He has this wicked way of playing it live now, and I saw him backstage once after a show, and I said, ‘Hey, I love the new version of “It’s Alright Ma” – but do you ever play it like the original recording?’ And he looked at me, and he said: ‘Well, y’know, a record is just a recording of what you were doing that day. You don’t wanna live the same day over and over again, now. Do ya?’

When we finished ‘Highlands’, one of the managers came out, and he said, ‘Well, Bob, have you got a short version of that song?’ Dylan said: ‘That was the short version.’”

“Bob really, really hates to repeat himself. A lot of times he’d do a version of a song and he’d say, “Aw, I’ve done that already. We gotta figure out some other way.” That’s what it’s all about with him.”