The topic of young Jedi knight Dooku training Qui-Gon Jinn is a favorite. My sister and I discuss it constantly.
count dooku
“Your flaw is your need for connection to the living Force. Qui-Gon, the galaxy is crowded with beings. The Jedi Order is here to support you. Nevertheless you must carry the following knowledge in your heart,“ Dooku said. “You are always alone, and betrayal is inevitable.”
FUCK
You know what, Dooku; you really got him for a while there. For a long while there; for the years and years of ‘fuck it i can’t believe i let this happen i am NEVER teaching again no Yoda you CAN’T make me; i will come and watch your stupid kids exhibit every year only because i have to but i won’t be leaving with one so stop trying to convince me to do this thing i cannot do, will never do; am afraid to do, because i am a failure and master dooku was right”
and then suddenly there is this one particular kid
and that lonely cycle of heart-hardening and self-recrimination just – stops
and well you know I just find that really compelling, I guess.
#……me too # and yet…I want to know MORE #I find the Dooku-Qui relationship absolutely fascinating #and this is the quote that defines it #and it explains so much about jedi apprentice-era Qui-Gon
Didn’t think I’d find myself agreeing with Count Dooku but here I am.
Okay but he’s honestly 100% right.
This is, incidentally, part of how the Jedi screwed themselves over with Anakin.
TPM Anakin had a firm moral compass with only a slight tendency toward us-vs.-them (or rather the tendency was mitigated by Anakin viewing people as an Us until proven otherwise). And one of the core tenet was “people should help each other”
And then he gets to the Jedi, whose life mission is supposed to be helping people and they won’t help the slaves.
Situations like that are complicated, they probably say. And the galaxy is too big and the Jedi too few for them to ever be able to help everyone who needs it.He needs to accept that. Moreover, the Jedi go were the Force (or more accurately the Senate) tells them to go, to go on a mission because of personal feelings is bad, no matter how righteous the cause may seem.
Worse than that, when push comes to shove and they need access to Outer Rim trade routes, they ally themselves with the Hutts.
Now they’re not happy about it, but it’s a war, sacrifices need to be made, they probably say. The need of the many outweighs the need of the few.
(They probably never realize that they are just as prone to the slippery slop where “need of many outweighs the need of the few” becomes “need of the powerful outweighs the need of the powerless” or “need of the Us outweighs the need of the Them” as the rest of the galaxy)
and so on and so forth, that situation repeated over and over, for 13 years. One day, Anakin will understand. He’s young now, and impatient, impulsive and too emotional, but when he can be objective he will understand the Council.
Well, Darth Vader understands.
Things I think about at night:
a) The Star Wars prequels had both Christopher Lee and Liam Neeson, two excellent actors, in its cast
b) Their characters had an established relationship as Jedi Master and (ex-) Padawan
c) Would it have been THAT HARD to write a scene between them? Christopher Lee and Liam Neeson onscreen together, acting their hearts out? WOULD IT, GEORGE
So can you imagine trying to fucking feed Qui-Gon fucking “I’m actually five men and a bear strapped together" Jinn when he was a twiggy teenager? And then when he moved beyond being a twiggy teenager and started trying to fill that frame out? Especially since this is Qui-Gon so equal chances he could probably be distracted from his stomach by a tree if food wasn’t placed directly in front of him. He’s got life to live, dammit, he doesn’t have time to digest.
Like, really. Dooku deserves some serious props.
Which makes me think that at some point Dooku’s having a conversation with another Master who’s bemoaning their own bottomless pit of a teenager and Dooku’s just standing there with the utmost discipline but also clearly increasingly exasperated to anyone who knows him and Qui-Gon, oblivious, wanders up at just that exact moment like a cat deigning to return indoors for your own sake and not because it happens to be snowing outside and Dooku just reaches into his cloak and extracts–I don’t know, a nutrient bar or some shit. Something edible and disgustingly healthy–and hands it off to his Padawan without even looking around.
Then he just returns his hands to their neat fold over the hilt of his cane-saber while Qui-Gon idly inhales the thing in about half a second.
Still staring.
Judging so hard.
Because yeah Qui-Gon’s dietary requirements might be the actual bane of his entire existence but damn if anyone’s gonna see him sweat.
Yoda has a question he likes to ask: What are we, think you, Dooku? Every time the student tries a different answer: We are a knot tied in the Force or We are the agency of Fate or We are each cells in the body of History… but tonight a truer answer comes to him. In the end, what we are is: alone.
– Yoda: Dark Rendezvous