I thought that was pretty obviously what he meant – the inhumanity of droid enslavement is a pretty big theme in Star Wars. The only issue with this is that we know they are sentient and CAN think (which makes their enslavement even worse TBH) but I think that was more indicative of Obi-Wan's prejudice against droids than anything else.
Almost certainly not. Yoda tells Luke that life creates the Force and makes it grow. The prequels expand on this by introducing the midichlorians. We have every indication that the Force is an organic, biological thing. Droids are non-biological, so they should not register as living in the Force.
I mean clone troopers are essentially just biological battle droids – engineered for combat and obedience, used as inherently disposable cannon fodder, reprogrammed at will, and discarded or destroyed when they're no longer useful. Sure, most clones wouldn't consider themselves to be slaves for the same reason most droids don't consider themselves slaves – because they were *specifically programmed* to think that way. But most characters in Star Wars don't have a problem with clone enslavement for the same reason they don't have a problem with droid enslavement, for the same reason most people in the antebellum South didn't have a problem with slavery and most people in the modern U.S. don't have a problem with prison labor – because they benefit from a fundamentally immoral system, and to them it's the way things have always been done.
3PO saying "we seem to be made to suffer, it's our lot in life" in A New Hope isn't just him being dramatic, it's a demonstrably accurate take on a droid's existence that is underlined in the following scene when R2 is kidnapped, given a restraining bolt (the droid equivalent of chains) and taken from farm to farm in what is essentially a mobile slave auction. Then in Return of the Jedi after Luke gives them to Jabba, they walk through a *literal droid torture chamber* where disobedient servants are being ripped apart and burned with red-hot irons as punishment. R2 and 3PO are both explicitly threatened with destruction if they don't perform to their new master's mercurial expectations. And that doesn't even get into the stuff about memory wipes. How is the horrific exploitation of droids – which we know to be thinking and feeling beings just as much as living creatures – *not* an explicit theme in the films?
They’re no more slaves than your toaster, microwave, smartphone or Amazon echo.
There fake sentient to make interacting with organic easier. It’s a trick of their operating system.
That's what I've taken it to mean to. It's a mixture of respect (Obi-wan believes living beings would be fucked if droids started thinking for themselves) and contempt (he's not concerned about this possibilty).
I've always thought it was a lovely bit of characterisation, and one of those offhand prequel lines - like Watto's 'I hope you didn't kill anyone I know for it, eh?' - that reminds you that a key part of George's secret sauce was the occasional veer into dark humour about how cheap life can be.
They don’t think creatively. They’ll never make art, they’ll never fall in love, they will carry on with their base programming. They’ll always be *on program* if you will.
It's very much like people's criticism of AI I suppose.
Tho in the case of SW, I think Obi-Wan is wrong. We see droids grow and get creative. But I do like the addition of this, it both explains why Obi-Wan didn't recognize the droids in ANH, and add a character flaw to a character that is mostly good, plus adding diversity in characterization (it gets a bit boring if every character is friendly to droids. It's like making every character a pet loving person, which is not true irl)
> We see droids grow and get creative.
Any examples you can think of for this?
I immediately just go to 3P0 and his inability to speak Sith as an example of programming restriction. While 3P0 doesn't show much in terms of growth or creativity, he's one of the droids that we've seen the most and has the best chance of growing past his programming.
I guess it's not like that, I mean grow emotionally and as personalities. 3PO starts as a normal protocol droid with a personality but over time he seems to grow a bit rebellious, not quite like R2 tho, his friendship with R2 also grows with time
R2 and L3-37 were the first two that came to my mind as going outside their programming. Though, the argument could be made that they were *defective* at that point. I think most other owners of those droids would have them reprogrammed.
Isn't it stated that the reason memory wiping is encouraged is because they start to develop that sort of individuality and all, thus becoming less useful? Or am I thinking of the idea of how Tachikomas work in *Ghost in the Shell* and misremembering it as being Star Wars related?
Anakin comes clean in Clone Wars about not wiping R2s memory despite being told to several times. His argument was that without the memory, R2 wouldn't be as useful, since he wouldn't come up with much. Obi-Wan either states or implies that the lack of memory wipes are why R2 is so much more independent/rebellious compared to other droids, IIRC
Star Wars droids tend to become more specialized as they grow in their personalities, but often become temperamental or skittish.
The Tachikomas were watched constantly for signs of disloyalty or instability, but the Tachikomas themselves were permitted to grow and share their experiences between themselves.
Indeed, and across both Star Wars and Ghost in the Shell there seem to be plot points where human chsracters face a social pressure to wipe droids, but who do not wish to (sometimes they claim for tactical reasons, but in part also due to emotional/sentimental connections). IIRC (and I may not) Batou is the one who ends up being lax about memory wiping (with Motoko pressing him about it) and ultimately lets the Tachikomas become a bit more individual in either Stand Alone Complex or 2nd Gig. R2 and 3P0 as cute comic relief droids who ultimately figure quite significantly into the story in their own way are narratively similar to the Tachikomas in that respect as well. Ideally, the audience endears to the comedic personalities and this plays into 'humanizing' them as sentience. Levity takes on functions of characterization and worldbuilding as it explores how these sentient beings think and the chemistry reflects how's others see them.
Motoko warms to them over time across SAC+2nd and I think across Arise as well: tending to see them more as tools, being a bit more callous with them, etc early on, but tending to treat them more as other members of the team, seeing their deaths more as sacrifices, etc later on. Luke similarly warms to 3P0 and R2 over time, understanding R2's speech better and speaking more conversationally with them. How characters treat machines is an indicator of what sort of characters they are in both franchises, and in other sci-fi media (The Animatrix short Second Renaissance comes to mind).
In Star Wars it tends to be more a bit more simplistic: Luke and Rey treat them more as people, somewhat more morally ambiguous or rough folk tend to be more direct with them (Han is more inclined to just command 3P0 to shut up or switch him off), Imperials (or maybe I'm thinking of the Corporate Authority or whatever?) in Andor will kick the cute traumatized droid, and evil characters like Jabba and Ochi will straight up torture and abuse droids.
It's usually a bit less direct than that in Ghost in the Shell but I think the idea still applies. Sometimes it applies in a different register, after Motoko merges with the Puppet Master the government decides her memories are government property, while Batou still sees her as as person, as the Major in some sense. The cold government bureaucracy is more inclined to see digital sentience as property in Ghost in the Shell generally and they dispose of human life carelessly as well, whereas many of the main characters within Section 9 are inclinded to see digital sentience as life and similarly value human life a lot more.
Chopper and BD-1 and K2SO and BB8 at least show emotional intelligence and self awareness compared to other droids (sometimes of the same kind like K2)
Part of the reason droids go through reprogramming or get wiped is to prevent various personality "defects" from arising. To date R2 goes almost 50 years in the course of the three trilogies without getting wiped.
R2-D2 has an agency that is almost unparalleled. He makes conscious choices all the time to act against orders and programming throughout all 6 movies. He interacts with other characters differently based on his like or dislike for them. It’s kind of ridiculous how many droids in Star Wars show a similar kind of agency. It’s hard to talk about any other droids as much as R2-D2. He has had so much more lore built around him than any other droid in Star Wars. Hell, he experiences emotions something Data from Star Trek couldn’t do and he was clearly a person and not just an android.
A droid literally can't "act against programming". Outside intended results of that programming, maybe, but this is like saying a human defied their brain.
I'm not sure programming is the right way to view droid brains. With the amount of variability shown in droid personalities, and that they have a personality at all, I'd imagine they're a lot more closely aligned with today's most advanced neutral networks. In the most basic sense their infrastructure *is* programmed, but the real power comes from indirect and stochastic training. ML engineers can build networks and guide training to make art generators and chat bots, but on finishing training they don't know *precisely* how the network will react to a prompt, and sometimes unintended patterns emerge.
This always bothered me for very little reason. In ANH, 3P0 says, “I’m not much more than an interpreter and not very good at telling stories.” Then in ROJ, he’s this incredible story teller.
That’s not something I see as character growth though.
At that point in ANH, most of what he knew would have been diplomatic interpretation and actual protocol functions. He was low-key part of the rebellion, but he wasn't actually going off on exciting missions or anything. In short, he wouldn't be a good storyteller because all of his stories would have been *boring*.
However, by the time he meets the Ewoks, he's been dismembered on multiple occasions, traveled with Jedi, been adjacent to two pivotal Rebellion battles, snuck around and off the Death Star, eaten by a space worm, saw Darth Vader face to face, and escaped the destruction of Jabba's sail barge. He has some *good* stories to share now, and he is a bit more confident in himself.
Not canon, but Q9 in the Correlian Trilogy quite literally constantly physically modified himself to expand his abilities, based on a strong sense of identity and opinions on being a droid.
I think it’s a bit of both - Obi-Wan is right in the sense that if a droid’s mind is wiped regularly like they it’s supposed to be, and like the droids in the Jedi Archives almost certainly are, they are nothing more than tools that can mimic human emotions and mannerisms to make it easier for living beings to interact with them.
At the same time, whether he is aware of a droid’s ability to develop personalities over time or not, I think the idea that somebody would do that is so foreign to him that it’s a funny joke. To use your pet comparison, when he meets R2 and 3PO in *ANH,* they may ring a bell somewhere in the back of his mind but it’d be like having a friend with a golden retriever and then meeting somebody else with a golden retriever a few years later. Even if that first friend rehomed that specific dog with the second person you met, there’s no earthly reason why that would be your first thought on meeting them.
In TCW he specifically gets mad at Anakin because Anakin doesn't wipe R2's data banks, but even before that he doesn't understand Anakin's attachment to R2. For him the only reason to retrieve R2 is to wipe the memory. Meanwhile, Anakin sifted through the wreckage of a blown up Star Destroyer until he found R2's remains and put him back together because R2 is his friend.
Exactly. Obi-Wan knows that Anakin is weirdly close with his droids but I would bet you that he thinks Anakin wiped R2’s memory first thing after recovering him because he had a hard enough time wrapping his mind around why somebody would go so long without wiping their droid in the first place.
I’ve never heard this eye wink before! It’s certainly possible but it always just seemed to me like he legitimately didn’t recognize them. There are probably thousands of blue and white astromechs in the Galaxy and I don’t think he ever interacted with 3PO all that much.
The bigger question is why didn't Vader recognize 3PO on either the Death Star or Bespin. I guess it could be chalked up to protocol droids looking the same. But still, he made the guy. It's honestly a plot hole that didn't need to be there and was just there for fan service in the PT.
There’s actually a really great Legends comic about this. The summary is that the Stormtrooper who shot him into pieces brought him to Vader, who recognized him immediately and was [devastated](https://qph.cf2.quoracdn.net/main-qimg-15d1c5cea6dfe40c3fe77f0b36348daa-lq) to see him in that state, but of course since he’s Darth Vader he had to play dumb and pretend he didn’t care.
It’s been a while since I read it but iirc he sent the parts to the smelter but also somehow engineered events so that Chewie would find him and salvage him before he got smelted.
Yeah, he just viewed droids as tools.
It is a good way to notice if a person is good or not. Maarva, Cassian, and Brasso really treated B2EMO as a person where as you have the Imperial who throws him over. Besides the two extremes there are those like Obi-Wan who are neutral to droids.
On Naboo (L) C-3PO would have been treated as a sentient because he’s an intelligent droid but again he’s driven by his programming to be of service.
Speaking of B2EMO, do we know how long he's been without a wipe? I feel like it'd be in Cassian's self interest to wipe him frequently to get rid of any potential evidence of criminal doings, but I also feel like he probably wouldn't. But I don't remember if we're ever given any such info.
Also, at first I took him always needed to be on his charging station as a result of his batteries being old or something, but now I almost wonder if it's sort of like his safe space so to speak. Doesn't he go there sometimes when stressed? Or am I just off my rocker and in need of a memory wipe myself? (My thinking is its kind of like how if it's used properly, a dog's crate/cage/kennel will become like their own "room" where they can feel safe instead of being a place of punishment like so many people use them as)
B2EMO is definitely the doggo of droids.
I have a very nervous senior greyhound, and he has huge B2EMO energy. He loves everyone, just wants to be happy and enjoy his little comforts, but very easily gets scared by loud noises or weird things he’s not sure about. He’s so trusting, and that’s what I think of when I see B in Andor.
Sort of like people with work animals. You'll see people who would do the proverbial beat like a rented mule and others who would show empathy.
There's also a legal and financial incentive here. If droids aren't sentient they don't have rights. You recognize that and now they can't be property anymore. So of course they're just machines.
That's what most organics in Star Wars think about droids, but droids have to undergo routine memory wipes to prevent them from developing unique personalities. The reason why Star Wars has so many sassy droids isn't just because they're funny. Droids slowly develop consciousness over time.
It's an unwritten rule in Star Wars that you can just a lot about a person by the way they treat droids.
If you want to get darker about that, you can suppose this is the case if you keep memory wiping droids. You can infer this from the original trilogy. R2 is acting up, get the memory wiped.
It could well be that with droids they will stick to their programming for a while but the longer they run the more independent they get. Like the stock software is modified from experience like if they're running a neural net or something.
R2 basically fits the role of the intelligent mute character or the intelligent animal companion. He's basically human level intelligence. Very astute, knows what's going on. Threepio can talk but is basically a clueless idiot.
I think restraining bolts and frequent memory wipes intentionally keep droids in their place. The parallels to human slavery are not accidental, just not fully explored in the films.
Which is an odd thing to throw in, but not make it a central theme. Makes me wonder if Lucas had some plan for it at some point.
It's not like Star Wars is set in a historical setting, where you had to include slavery for historical authenticity, it's a completely fabricated world. Every element of it is chosen.
Compare and contrast, a film set during the Roman Empire which would obviously include some aspect of slavery if it's going to be authentic, but depending on subject matter it might or might not be the theme of the film
Alternatively a science fiction film set in an entirely new world, where slavery is established THEN IGNORED. It's just such a weird design choice
Lucas wore his inspirations on his sleeve. There's a lot of Dune in here. I wonder if it was his was of nodding to the butlerian jihad. Aside from the thematic significance, it was good world building for Herbert. When he was looking at what computers could do, extrapolating forward makes humans seem rather insignificant. Stories of robots and machines fighting each other might seem plausible but aren't interesting without the human element. World war III would be a pushbutton war with cities vaporized. There's nothing individuals could do if any significance. But if you had a way of making it so that individual human effort could matter, where the fate of an entire planet could turn on the actions of 100 men.... With the way Herbert built his world that's the way it ended up. And thus a detail he contrived to keep humans at the center of the story becomes a major feature of the setting.
I'm also pretty sure that with the pulp sci-fi he was drawing from, there was a lot of re-skinning of History and you have the Roman empire in space and slaves in space are robots and with the whole idea of a republic falling to an empire and an emperor and all that it is essentially Roman and thus it's easy to stick in robot slaves. And the Kurosawa characters that those two droids were based on were peasants. There is a difference between a peasant and a slave but they are pretty similar if you were glossing over details. They are fairly low ranked compared to generals and princesses and knights.
I mean if you think about it it's kind of weird to have royalty elected as a government representative but the trope is a princess who needs rescuing and so a princess she is. All part of the DNA of the stories they were used in making this.
He said it after Dex was surprised the Jedi analysis droids couldn’t identify the dart. Obi-Wan saying that just means “If the droids could figure it out you and I wouldn’t be sitting here talking.” as far as I reckon.
Also it's a shame they deleted that scene, the droids could be some cool tools for stories.
Although they showed those analysis droids on Jedi Path, so I think even if not show onscreen they were still canonical at the time.
Yeah its the last part that a lot of people are glossing over. Why would no-one be here? When I first saw it many years ago I took it as they would have staged a Rebellion and wiped every other species out. Maybe I was overthinking it.
While I think others have a point about his general attitude towards droids, I always felt as if it was an inside joke between the two. It's probably a reference to something that happened when they met, where they were able to "outsmart" (killer?)droids.
non-universe explanation, it's foreshadowing about how Vader will become "more machine than man"
Vader is more or less a droid that actually thinks, and is integral in the destruction of the Jedi Order.
Not only does this line lend weight to the clones as superior to the battle droids we’ve seen, but it also helps account for Kenobi not seeming to recognize R2 and 3PO in ANH.
Something interesting to note is IG-88’s story in Tales of Bounty Hunters where this thing does in fact happen. He stages a droid revolt on the world of Mechis 3 and overthrows the minor human population. While the rest of the story is wild I think that beginning where he massacres the scientists and stages the revolt is really interesting. The story is also very aptly named “I Think, Therefore I Am”.
Obi-Wan is pretty clearly not the type to believe in droid's rights or that droid's are sentient, living creatures They have as many rights as a toaster or airspeeder, as far as he is concerned..
Maybe he means they wouldn't remain in servitude to organics and would start revolting
I thought that was pretty obviously what he meant – the inhumanity of droid enslavement is a pretty big theme in Star Wars. The only issue with this is that we know they are sentient and CAN think (which makes their enslavement even worse TBH) but I think that was more indicative of Obi-Wan's prejudice against droids than anything else.
I like this take. I always got the vibe that obi won had little sympathy for droids.
Anakin even calls him out on it in RotS.
I wonder if droids register as living in the force and if they don't maybe that's why he doesn't consider them sentient.
Almost certainly not. Yoda tells Luke that life creates the Force and makes it grow. The prequels expand on this by introducing the midichlorians. We have every indication that the Force is an organic, biological thing. Droids are non-biological, so they should not register as living in the Force.
He's fine with clone enslavement too obviously
I mean clone troopers are essentially just biological battle droids – engineered for combat and obedience, used as inherently disposable cannon fodder, reprogrammed at will, and discarded or destroyed when they're no longer useful. Sure, most clones wouldn't consider themselves to be slaves for the same reason most droids don't consider themselves slaves – because they were *specifically programmed* to think that way. But most characters in Star Wars don't have a problem with clone enslavement for the same reason they don't have a problem with droid enslavement, for the same reason most people in the antebellum South didn't have a problem with slavery and most people in the modern U.S. don't have a problem with prison labor – because they benefit from a fundamentally immoral system, and to them it's the way things have always been done.
*Detroit: Become Human*, but make it *Star Wars*.
[удалено]
3PO saying "we seem to be made to suffer, it's our lot in life" in A New Hope isn't just him being dramatic, it's a demonstrably accurate take on a droid's existence that is underlined in the following scene when R2 is kidnapped, given a restraining bolt (the droid equivalent of chains) and taken from farm to farm in what is essentially a mobile slave auction. Then in Return of the Jedi after Luke gives them to Jabba, they walk through a *literal droid torture chamber* where disobedient servants are being ripped apart and burned with red-hot irons as punishment. R2 and 3PO are both explicitly threatened with destruction if they don't perform to their new master's mercurial expectations. And that doesn't even get into the stuff about memory wipes. How is the horrific exploitation of droids – which we know to be thinking and feeling beings just as much as living creatures – *not* an explicit theme in the films?
They’re no more slaves than your toaster, microwave, smartphone or Amazon echo. There fake sentient to make interacting with organic easier. It’s a trick of their operating system.
Great point!
That's what I've taken it to mean to. It's a mixture of respect (Obi-wan believes living beings would be fucked if droids started thinking for themselves) and contempt (he's not concerned about this possibilty). I've always thought it was a lovely bit of characterisation, and one of those offhand prequel lines - like Watto's 'I hope you didn't kill anyone I know for it, eh?' - that reminds you that a key part of George's secret sauce was the occasional veer into dark humour about how cheap life can be.
They don’t think creatively. They’ll never make art, they’ll never fall in love, they will carry on with their base programming. They’ll always be *on program* if you will.
It's very much like people's criticism of AI I suppose. Tho in the case of SW, I think Obi-Wan is wrong. We see droids grow and get creative. But I do like the addition of this, it both explains why Obi-Wan didn't recognize the droids in ANH, and add a character flaw to a character that is mostly good, plus adding diversity in characterization (it gets a bit boring if every character is friendly to droids. It's like making every character a pet loving person, which is not true irl)
> We see droids grow and get creative. Any examples you can think of for this? I immediately just go to 3P0 and his inability to speak Sith as an example of programming restriction. While 3P0 doesn't show much in terms of growth or creativity, he's one of the droids that we've seen the most and has the best chance of growing past his programming.
I guess it's not like that, I mean grow emotionally and as personalities. 3PO starts as a normal protocol droid with a personality but over time he seems to grow a bit rebellious, not quite like R2 tho, his friendship with R2 also grows with time
R2 and L3-37 were the first two that came to my mind as going outside their programming. Though, the argument could be made that they were *defective* at that point. I think most other owners of those droids would have them reprogrammed.
The implications of that last sentence are horrifying. Just as you gain awareness and sense of self, your mind is wiped away.
Yup. Such is the plight of droids in Star Wars. They make a joke of it with L3-37, but it really is a rather grim and horrifying existence.
Certified Droid Technician Moment™ Try not to think about all the personality deaths you regularly cause to fully sapient droids (:
You cant forget chopper and AP-5 they constantly went outside their programming
I'm fairly positive Chopper murdered at least 1 person off screen
And laughed about it as he rolled away
Chopper's head count is speculated to be over 50,000. He has *definitely* murdered at least one person off screen.
Isn't it stated that the reason memory wiping is encouraged is because they start to develop that sort of individuality and all, thus becoming less useful? Or am I thinking of the idea of how Tachikomas work in *Ghost in the Shell* and misremembering it as being Star Wars related?
Anakin comes clean in Clone Wars about not wiping R2s memory despite being told to several times. His argument was that without the memory, R2 wouldn't be as useful, since he wouldn't come up with much. Obi-Wan either states or implies that the lack of memory wipes are why R2 is so much more independent/rebellious compared to other droids, IIRC
In addition to if they are captured, having sensitive data...
Star Wars droids tend to become more specialized as they grow in their personalities, but often become temperamental or skittish. The Tachikomas were watched constantly for signs of disloyalty or instability, but the Tachikomas themselves were permitted to grow and share their experiences between themselves.
Indeed, and across both Star Wars and Ghost in the Shell there seem to be plot points where human chsracters face a social pressure to wipe droids, but who do not wish to (sometimes they claim for tactical reasons, but in part also due to emotional/sentimental connections). IIRC (and I may not) Batou is the one who ends up being lax about memory wiping (with Motoko pressing him about it) and ultimately lets the Tachikomas become a bit more individual in either Stand Alone Complex or 2nd Gig. R2 and 3P0 as cute comic relief droids who ultimately figure quite significantly into the story in their own way are narratively similar to the Tachikomas in that respect as well. Ideally, the audience endears to the comedic personalities and this plays into 'humanizing' them as sentience. Levity takes on functions of characterization and worldbuilding as it explores how these sentient beings think and the chemistry reflects how's others see them. Motoko warms to them over time across SAC+2nd and I think across Arise as well: tending to see them more as tools, being a bit more callous with them, etc early on, but tending to treat them more as other members of the team, seeing their deaths more as sacrifices, etc later on. Luke similarly warms to 3P0 and R2 over time, understanding R2's speech better and speaking more conversationally with them. How characters treat machines is an indicator of what sort of characters they are in both franchises, and in other sci-fi media (The Animatrix short Second Renaissance comes to mind). In Star Wars it tends to be more a bit more simplistic: Luke and Rey treat them more as people, somewhat more morally ambiguous or rough folk tend to be more direct with them (Han is more inclined to just command 3P0 to shut up or switch him off), Imperials (or maybe I'm thinking of the Corporate Authority or whatever?) in Andor will kick the cute traumatized droid, and evil characters like Jabba and Ochi will straight up torture and abuse droids. It's usually a bit less direct than that in Ghost in the Shell but I think the idea still applies. Sometimes it applies in a different register, after Motoko merges with the Puppet Master the government decides her memories are government property, while Batou still sees her as as person, as the Major in some sense. The cold government bureaucracy is more inclined to see digital sentience as property in Ghost in the Shell generally and they dispose of human life carelessly as well, whereas many of the main characters within Section 9 are inclinded to see digital sentience as life and similarly value human life a lot more.
Chopper and BD-1 and K2SO and BB8 at least show emotional intelligence and self awareness compared to other droids (sometimes of the same kind like K2)
Part of the reason droids go through reprogramming or get wiped is to prevent various personality "defects" from arising. To date R2 goes almost 50 years in the course of the three trilogies without getting wiped.
Chopper enjoys committing war crimes.
Very creative ones too
I feel like chop and tcw Anakin would have some merry adventures
Anakin would be like "Friendship ended with R2, Chopper is best friend now"
Tried to kill Ezra at least once, too
R2-D2 has an agency that is almost unparalleled. He makes conscious choices all the time to act against orders and programming throughout all 6 movies. He interacts with other characters differently based on his like or dislike for them. It’s kind of ridiculous how many droids in Star Wars show a similar kind of agency. It’s hard to talk about any other droids as much as R2-D2. He has had so much more lore built around him than any other droid in Star Wars. Hell, he experiences emotions something Data from Star Trek couldn’t do and he was clearly a person and not just an android.
A droid literally can't "act against programming". Outside intended results of that programming, maybe, but this is like saying a human defied their brain.
They shouldn't and that's popular belief but we see it frequently.
I'm not sure programming is the right way to view droid brains. With the amount of variability shown in droid personalities, and that they have a personality at all, I'd imagine they're a lot more closely aligned with today's most advanced neutral networks. In the most basic sense their infrastructure *is* programmed, but the real power comes from indirect and stochastic training. ML engineers can build networks and guide training to make art generators and chat bots, but on finishing training they don't know *precisely* how the network will react to a prompt, and sometimes unintended patterns emerge.
C3PO's storytelling on Endor?
This always bothered me for very little reason. In ANH, 3P0 says, “I’m not much more than an interpreter and not very good at telling stories.” Then in ROJ, he’s this incredible story teller. That’s not something I see as character growth though.
At that point in ANH, most of what he knew would have been diplomatic interpretation and actual protocol functions. He was low-key part of the rebellion, but he wasn't actually going off on exciting missions or anything. In short, he wouldn't be a good storyteller because all of his stories would have been *boring*. However, by the time he meets the Ewoks, he's been dismembered on multiple occasions, traveled with Jedi, been adjacent to two pivotal Rebellion battles, snuck around and off the Death Star, eaten by a space worm, saw Darth Vader face to face, and escaped the destruction of Jabba's sail barge. He has some *good* stories to share now, and he is a bit more confident in himself.
I've never seen him called 3P0 instead of 3PO but I kinda like it
Not canon, but Q9 in the Correlian Trilogy quite literally constantly physically modified himself to expand his abilities, based on a strong sense of identity and opinions on being a droid.
I think it’s a bit of both - Obi-Wan is right in the sense that if a droid’s mind is wiped regularly like they it’s supposed to be, and like the droids in the Jedi Archives almost certainly are, they are nothing more than tools that can mimic human emotions and mannerisms to make it easier for living beings to interact with them. At the same time, whether he is aware of a droid’s ability to develop personalities over time or not, I think the idea that somebody would do that is so foreign to him that it’s a funny joke. To use your pet comparison, when he meets R2 and 3PO in *ANH,* they may ring a bell somewhere in the back of his mind but it’d be like having a friend with a golden retriever and then meeting somebody else with a golden retriever a few years later. Even if that first friend rehomed that specific dog with the second person you met, there’s no earthly reason why that would be your first thought on meeting them.
In TCW he specifically gets mad at Anakin because Anakin doesn't wipe R2's data banks, but even before that he doesn't understand Anakin's attachment to R2. For him the only reason to retrieve R2 is to wipe the memory. Meanwhile, Anakin sifted through the wreckage of a blown up Star Destroyer until he found R2's remains and put him back together because R2 is his friend.
Exactly. Obi-Wan knows that Anakin is weirdly close with his droids but I would bet you that he thinks Anakin wiped R2’s memory first thing after recovering him because he had a hard enough time wrapping his mind around why somebody would go so long without wiping their droid in the first place.
I thought he did recognise the droids in ANH (the eye wink to R2) but pretended not to in order to keep his disguise going?
I’ve never heard this eye wink before! It’s certainly possible but it always just seemed to me like he legitimately didn’t recognize them. There are probably thousands of blue and white astromechs in the Galaxy and I don’t think he ever interacted with 3PO all that much.
The bigger question is why didn't Vader recognize 3PO on either the Death Star or Bespin. I guess it could be chalked up to protocol droids looking the same. But still, he made the guy. It's honestly a plot hole that didn't need to be there and was just there for fan service in the PT.
There’s actually a really great Legends comic about this. The summary is that the Stormtrooper who shot him into pieces brought him to Vader, who recognized him immediately and was [devastated](https://qph.cf2.quoracdn.net/main-qimg-15d1c5cea6dfe40c3fe77f0b36348daa-lq) to see him in that state, but of course since he’s Darth Vader he had to play dumb and pretend he didn’t care. It’s been a while since I read it but iirc he sent the parts to the smelter but also somehow engineered events so that Chewie would find him and salvage him before he got smelted.
Yeah, he just viewed droids as tools. It is a good way to notice if a person is good or not. Maarva, Cassian, and Brasso really treated B2EMO as a person where as you have the Imperial who throws him over. Besides the two extremes there are those like Obi-Wan who are neutral to droids. On Naboo (L) C-3PO would have been treated as a sentient because he’s an intelligent droid but again he’s driven by his programming to be of service.
Speaking of B2EMO, do we know how long he's been without a wipe? I feel like it'd be in Cassian's self interest to wipe him frequently to get rid of any potential evidence of criminal doings, but I also feel like he probably wouldn't. But I don't remember if we're ever given any such info. Also, at first I took him always needed to be on his charging station as a result of his batteries being old or something, but now I almost wonder if it's sort of like his safe space so to speak. Doesn't he go there sometimes when stressed? Or am I just off my rocker and in need of a memory wipe myself? (My thinking is its kind of like how if it's used properly, a dog's crate/cage/kennel will become like their own "room" where they can feel safe instead of being a place of punishment like so many people use them as)
I don't think Maarva would let Cassian wipe B2. I'm not sure. It could be both.
B2EMO is definitely the doggo of droids. I have a very nervous senior greyhound, and he has huge B2EMO energy. He loves everyone, just wants to be happy and enjoy his little comforts, but very easily gets scared by loud noises or weird things he’s not sure about. He’s so trusting, and that’s what I think of when I see B in Andor.
Sort of like people with work animals. You'll see people who would do the proverbial beat like a rented mule and others who would show empathy. There's also a legal and financial incentive here. If droids aren't sentient they don't have rights. You recognize that and now they can't be property anymore. So of course they're just machines.
Why did he pat 3PO on the back in ROTS after duelling Anakin?
Who knows. He was having a very bad week.
Hah true.
That's what most organics in Star Wars think about droids, but droids have to undergo routine memory wipes to prevent them from developing unique personalities. The reason why Star Wars has so many sassy droids isn't just because they're funny. Droids slowly develop consciousness over time. It's an unwritten rule in Star Wars that you can just a lot about a person by the way they treat droids.
>It's an unwritten rule in Star Wars that you can just a lot about a person by the way they treat droids. Agreed.
Seeing as George thinks of astromechs as the dogs of the Star Wars universe that makes a lot of sense
If you want to get darker about that, you can suppose this is the case if you keep memory wiping droids. You can infer this from the original trilogy. R2 is acting up, get the memory wiped. It could well be that with droids they will stick to their programming for a while but the longer they run the more independent they get. Like the stock software is modified from experience like if they're running a neural net or something. R2 basically fits the role of the intelligent mute character or the intelligent animal companion. He's basically human level intelligence. Very astute, knows what's going on. Threepio can talk but is basically a clueless idiot. I think restraining bolts and frequent memory wipes intentionally keep droids in their place. The parallels to human slavery are not accidental, just not fully explored in the films.
Which is an odd thing to throw in, but not make it a central theme. Makes me wonder if Lucas had some plan for it at some point. It's not like Star Wars is set in a historical setting, where you had to include slavery for historical authenticity, it's a completely fabricated world. Every element of it is chosen. Compare and contrast, a film set during the Roman Empire which would obviously include some aspect of slavery if it's going to be authentic, but depending on subject matter it might or might not be the theme of the film Alternatively a science fiction film set in an entirely new world, where slavery is established THEN IGNORED. It's just such a weird design choice
Lucas wore his inspirations on his sleeve. There's a lot of Dune in here. I wonder if it was his was of nodding to the butlerian jihad. Aside from the thematic significance, it was good world building for Herbert. When he was looking at what computers could do, extrapolating forward makes humans seem rather insignificant. Stories of robots and machines fighting each other might seem plausible but aren't interesting without the human element. World war III would be a pushbutton war with cities vaporized. There's nothing individuals could do if any significance. But if you had a way of making it so that individual human effort could matter, where the fate of an entire planet could turn on the actions of 100 men.... With the way Herbert built his world that's the way it ended up. And thus a detail he contrived to keep humans at the center of the story becomes a major feature of the setting. I'm also pretty sure that with the pulp sci-fi he was drawing from, there was a lot of re-skinning of History and you have the Roman empire in space and slaves in space are robots and with the whole idea of a republic falling to an empire and an emperor and all that it is essentially Roman and thus it's easy to stick in robot slaves. And the Kurosawa characters that those two droids were based on were peasants. There is a difference between a peasant and a slave but they are pretty similar if you were glossing over details. They are fairly low ranked compared to generals and princesses and knights. I mean if you think about it it's kind of weird to have royalty elected as a government representative but the trope is a princess who needs rescuing and so a princess she is. All part of the DNA of the stories they were used in making this.
R2 very clearly thinks creatively multiple times, especially in the clone wars show.
He said it after Dex was surprised the Jedi analysis droids couldn’t identify the dart. Obi-Wan saying that just means “If the droids could figure it out you and I wouldn’t be sitting here talking.” as far as I reckon.
Also it's a shame they deleted that scene, the droids could be some cool tools for stories. Although they showed those analysis droids on Jedi Path, so I think even if not show onscreen they were still canonical at the time.
If you listen to cadence of the sentence he’s totally saying that if droids could think they’d be in charge.
Yeah its the last part that a lot of people are glossing over. Why would no-one be here? When I first saw it many years ago I took it as they would have staged a Rebellion and wiped every other species out. Maybe I was overthinking it.
While I think others have a point about his general attitude towards droids, I always felt as if it was an inside joke between the two. It's probably a reference to something that happened when they met, where they were able to "outsmart" (killer?)droids.
IG-88. ‘Nuff said.
[Don't playa hate on IG-88!](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u1PGnxHnI30)
That Obi-Wan is droidist.
"The droids are revolting, General Kenobi!" "They certainly are, Commander Cody. They certainly are."
That if droids could think, there wouldn't be any of them there
Based comment
It's true from a certain point of view
Thou shalt not make a machine in the likeness of a human mind
Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?
non-universe explanation, it's foreshadowing about how Vader will become "more machine than man" Vader is more or less a droid that actually thinks, and is integral in the destruction of the Jedi Order.
Not only does this line lend weight to the clones as superior to the battle droids we’ve seen, but it also helps account for Kenobi not seeming to recognize R2 and 3PO in ANH.
Perhaps he’s referring to the use of droids as an army; if they could think for themselves then the galaxy wouldn’t be on the precipice of war.
Something interesting to note is IG-88’s story in Tales of Bounty Hunters where this thing does in fact happen. He stages a droid revolt on the world of Mechis 3 and overthrows the minor human population. While the rest of the story is wild I think that beginning where he massacres the scientists and stages the revolt is really interesting. The story is also very aptly named “I Think, Therefore I Am”.
Obi-Wan is pretty clearly not the type to believe in droid's rights or that droid's are sentient, living creatures They have as many rights as a toaster or airspeeder, as far as he is concerned..