With a universe this big, it's no surprise there's some misinformation!
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00:00Let's say you've gone on a search across the globe, checking under rocks and in caves,
00:04trying to find the most remote hermit in the entire world.
00:08When you finally stumble across them, you might ask, oi, have you heard of Star Wars?
00:13Thinking they'll not have a clue what the hell you're on about, but it is a 100% chance
00:17that they would probably clap back with, of course I have, it's Star Wars, what are
00:21you talking about?
00:23With a reach as far as that then, it's no wonder that little tidbits and factoids about
00:28this series have become universal knowledge.
00:32But that fame has also brought plenty of misinformation as well, leading to many so-called well-known
00:38facts being totally misunderstood.
00:41With that in mind then, I'm Josh from WhatCulture.com, and these are 10 Things Everyone Always Gets
00:46Wrong About Star Wars.
00:4810.
00:49The Ewoks are Friendly Little Teddy Bears
00:51Yes, alright, I'll be the first to admit it, Ewoks are incredibly cute, adorable even.
00:57But so are bears, honey badgers, and dare I say even wookies.
01:02And that doesn't mean they aren't going to try and rip you to shreds if given a chance.
01:07The general consensus on these little fellas is that they are the sweet, helpful and friendly
01:13types.
01:14But that conclusion ignores plenty of warning signs given in Return of the Jedi.
01:19Assuming the best from these creatures completely forgoes that they are dangerous warriors with
01:24a penchant for devouring any meat they come across.
01:29And let's not forget that the first thing they tried to do with Luke, Han and Chewie
01:33was to scram them down.
01:35Their more dangerous nature isn't even hidden, it's right there on the surface.
01:40If you look around the ensemble of these Endor Moon inhabitants, you'll see that plenty
01:44of them have adorned themselves with skulls and bones, using them for primitive tools
01:49and even decoration like a predator.
01:53You know, from the movie Predator.
01:55They are indeed cute, but what kind of friendly creatures kill skin and keep the trophies
02:01of those they have defeated?
02:03Simply put, the Ewoks are deadly, which is why those stormtroopers never stood a chance.
02:089.
02:09Starships travel at lightspeed
02:11Everyone is familiar with the iconic visual of a starship flying off at lightspeed.
02:16Ever since Star Wars graced the silver screen, viewers have been obsessed with the image
02:20of the stars themselves pushing back as Han and Chewie punched the hyperdrive.
02:24However, a lot of those people interpreted this incredible form of space travel in the
02:29wrong way entirely.
02:30That's because most viewers, myself included, saw lightspeed and assumed it was the ship
02:36moving across the galaxy faster than light.
02:38But that's not what actually happens.
02:40Instead, the ship jumps in and out of an alternate dimension known as hyperspace.
02:46So rather than travelling across the real galaxy at breakneck speeds, you simply jump
02:50to this alternate plane of existence and then jump back out where you need to be.
02:55As a form of fast travel, this is by far the best way to do it.
02:59Travelling at lightspeed would undoubtedly move you places, but in the vastness of the
03:03universe, even a ship travelling faster than light would still be a stone's throw in
03:08the ocean.
03:09Movies themselves even corrected this by switching from calling it lightspeed to hyperspace,
03:14but the confusion still remained.
03:168.
03:17Rey shouldn't have stood a chance against Kylo Ren
03:21The frustration that some viewers felt when Kylo Ren lost in a lightsaber duel against
03:25the newly force-sensitive Rey was well-founded.
03:29At least if you take that final scene without context.
03:32On paper, it makes very little sense for a force-wielder and experienced lightsaber handler
03:37at his best to lose to someone who'd barely even touched and activated a blade before.
03:43But the thing is, this scene does have context, and most people forget that Kylo Ren was not
03:48at his best during this fight.
03:51There were plenty of reasons why Ren and Rey's odds were on par.
03:55For example, bear in mind that Ren was spotting a few nasty injuries, including a side wound
04:01from Chewie's bowcaster and a slice on the arm from Finn.
04:05The bowcaster itself was repeatedly shown absolutely annihilating First Order soldiers
04:10with a single blast, and Kylo took a direct hit.
04:14The chances are he was also probably pulling his punches as well, as he openly told Rey
04:18that he wanted to train her.
04:20Thus, killing her wouldn't have been his primary intent in this scene.
04:24Finally, while he was experienced with his lightsaber, he'd never actually fought a
04:29fellow force-saber wielder before, meaning it was entirely new territory for him to go
04:35head-to-head in a mortal battle.
04:37And all of this is without saying that Rey herself was presented as a capable fighter
04:41from the very beginning, especially with her quarterstaff.
04:44Myths about movie franchises get tossed around a lot, especially when the creator of that
04:53series adds fuel to the fire.
04:55This fate certainly befell the big bad of the original Star Wars trilogy, as it became
05:00common knowledge that Darth Vader's name offered up a massive clue about Luke's parentage.
05:06The idea goes that Vader's name can be translated in German to mean Dark Father, as the German
05:12word for father is Vader.
05:14But this falls apart almost entirely when you find out that the German translation for
05:19Dark is Dunkel, and Dunkel Vader…yeah, it's not quite right.
05:24There's also a claim that you can do the same thing in Dutch, as the word for father
05:28is Vader pronounced Varder.
05:31And again, that sounds quite like the English word for father, but again, Dark in Dutch
05:37is Donker.
05:38So Donker Varder, I dunno Jim, these translations seem a little bit shaky to me.
05:44Now this myth of course is certainly entertaining, but it can also be burst right away by the
05:48simple fact that George Lucas himself didn't even intend for Darth Vader and Anakin Skywalker
05:54to be the same person when he wrote Star Wars.
05:57This iconic plot twist was conceived during the creation of The Empire Strikes Back, meaning
06:01any vague translations are just pure coincidence.
06:04Cool coincidences, but yeah, coincidences.
06:086.
06:09Captain Phasma was the first female Stormtrooper
06:12When fans found out Disney would be creating an all new trilogy, it was obviously a cause
06:17for great excitement.
06:18The idea of more Star Wars films meant a chance to flesh out slash diversify the galaxy, and
06:24that's why it was so exciting to see the first female Stormtrooper in Gwendolyn Christie's
06:28Captain Phasma.
06:30Except she wasn't technically the first.
06:33That's because the first named female Stormtrooper to appear in Star Wars was actually called
06:37Jess Gistang, and she was part of the comic book series Star Wars Legacy.
06:42But on top of this, there were also plenty of references to female troopers across the
06:46expanded universe novels, and even the female death trooper DTF-16 in Star Wars Rebels.
06:52Additionally, while the Stormtrooper extras were played by men in the original trilogy,
06:56there's no storyline implication that they were all male in those movies.
07:01Their armour is completely uniform, meaning any of those troopers could be women underneath.
07:05So yeah, this is nothing to take away from Phasma, who was undoubtedly the first on-screen
07:10live action female trooper, it's just interesting that canonically it was a little bit of a
07:15different story.
07:165.
07:17Hayden Christensen was the wrong choice for Anakin Skywalker
07:21Casting, as we all know, can be a very subjective matter.
07:24I mean, when Robert Pattinson was announced as the Batman, a huge portion of the internet
07:28lost their minds, and then the movie came out and everyone realised that, oh, this guy
07:33is awesome!
07:34Still, what works for some might not work for others.
07:37However, there are those rare occasions when everyone does collectively agree that someone
07:42was miscast.
07:44And unfortunately for Hayden Christensen, he found himself at the tail end of this,
07:48being universally loathed back in the day for his performance as Anakin.
07:53But did he deserve that backlash?
07:55Well, the title to this entry of course reveals that no, he didn't, and time has been kind
08:01to this actor.
08:02The prequels back then were mocked relentlessly for their wooden acting, and Hayden Christensen
08:07seemed to be at the height of that revolution.
08:11Critics everywhere criticised his whiny voice and teenager-like personality, claiming that
08:15he was not a good depiction of a young Darth Vader.
08:19However, while it is true that his acting was wooden in those movies, he's hardly
08:24alone in that boat.
08:26So much of the acting in the prequels came across as awkward and stiff, with even decorated
08:31performers like Natalie Portman and Samuel L. Jackson struggling to reach their regular
08:36standard.
08:37And that's probably because it's been well documented that George Lucas himself
08:41cared very little about engaging with his actors in order to give them proper direction.
08:47He cared more about the visual storytelling, while the actors were mostly left to fend
08:52for themselves, hence why there are so many performances that fall flat across those three
08:57movies.
08:584.
08:59Kyber Crystals Power Lightsabers
09:01Star Wars is a series populated with some of the coolest things sci-fi has to offer.
09:07From space battles, blaster rifles, gargantuan monsters, it really does have it all.
09:12Yet despite all of those mind-blowing science fiction treats, it's the humble lightsaber
09:17that is undoubtedly the most iconic part of the series.
09:21Now the inner workings of this remarkable weapon don't tend to bother most viewers.
09:26You just turn them on, make the noises and voila, an instrument of death is born.
09:31However, one thing most people do know about the technical side is that they of course
09:36need Kyber Crystals to power up.
09:38And consequently many have interpreted this to mean that said crystal is actually the
09:42power source of the saber, but that's not quite right.
09:47The Kyber Crystal is indeed the beating heart of the weapon, but it's not the mechanism
09:51that actually powers it.
09:53Instead, it's a component of the blade that has energy transmitted through it by the actual
09:57battery of the machine, the Diadium Power Cell.
10:01So if you want to put your own lightsaber together, and first off good luck with that,
10:05you'll get nowhere with just the crystal and a hilt.
10:08So don't forget that power cell.
10:103.
10:11Vader's Body Didn't Disappear After His Death
10:14This point of contention has bothered fans since Return of the Jedi.
10:19The climax of the original trilogy of course saw the death of Darth Vader slash Anakin
10:23Skywalker.
10:24Yet something felt a little bit off with it, as while the bodies of Obi-Wan and Yoda disappeared
10:30upon their deaths, the same thing didn't happen for Vader.
10:34While Anakin's body did disappear, it just took a little bit longer than the others.
10:40When looking at the funeral pyre Luke made for his dead father, you'll notice that
10:44it's only Anakin's mechanical components being burnt, with no biological part of him
10:49shown at all.
10:51Now this evidence admittedly might feel a little bit tenuous as there's a chance that
10:54his body was still underneath his mask, but that's where the Expanded Universe comes
11:00in.
11:01It's confirmed in the book Champions of the Force by Kevin J. Anderson, and the original
11:05databank formerly from the Star Wars website, that Anakin's biological body did disappear,
11:11and that the items Luke burned were in fact Vader's suit and mechanical features.
11:16Of course, the introduction of the Disney sequel trilogy officially ended the canon
11:20of the EU, but despite that there have been no retcons for this detail in the new trilogy,
11:26so that canon should stand.
11:282.
11:29Stormtroopers Can't Aim
11:31There are plenty of in-jokes among Star Wars fans.
11:35Poking fun at Darth Vader's dramatic NOOOOO imitating Yoda and joking about Luke and Leia's
11:42accidental incest are chief amongst the best.
11:46But nothing compares to the mockery that stormtroopers get for their so-called terrible aim.
11:52And at a glance it does make perfect sense to accuse these soldiers of being poor shots,
11:56as yes, they never actually managed to hit any of the main characters, but let's not
12:01forget that these troopers are the standing army for the most powerful empire in the galaxy.
12:07And there's plenty of evidence to suggest that clone-slash-stormtroopers are decent
12:11shots and good shots at best.
12:14The iconic Order 66 for instance showed them hitting their targets with stark precision
12:18for the most part, plus in A New Hope they managed to kill plenty of Jawas, with Ben
12:23Kenobi even uttering the meme-able phrase, only Imperial Stormtroopers are so precise.
12:29And those are just a few examples.
12:31The truth is, they're only bad shots when it comes to catching the central characters.
12:35Because of course they are, if they shot them all there'd be no movies and you can never
12:39underestimate the power of plot armour.
12:421.
12:43Luke, I am your father
12:44No, being a franchise fan often brings about plenty of debate, with one of the most compelling
12:49questions being, what is the series' most iconic moment?
12:53But while most fandoms can argue about that until the sun goes down, pretty much every
12:57Star Wars fan knows that it's the shocking reveal that Darth Vader is Luke Skywalker's
13:03father.
13:04This moment had a huge impact on popular culture at large, with parodies all over the place
13:09and almost everyone remembering that iconic line, Luke, I am your father.
13:14Except of course, that's not actually what Vader says at all.
13:18But instead, this line seems to be a big ol' slice of the Mandela Effect.
13:22And that's because the actual dialogue went a little bit something like this, Luke says
13:26that he told me, he told me you killed him, and then Vader replies, no, I am your father.
13:32Cut to poor mind-blown Luke having an absolute screaming fit.
13:36So yeah, while it might not sound as cool in isolation, the line was a response to something
13:40that Luke had said, rather than being an explicit declaration.
13:45Even so, it does feel strange to say the line without the name included.
13:48So yeah, this is a weird one.
13:50It's a truly bizarre example of everyone getting something wrong, but all just agreeing
13:54to do so together because it sounds a little bit better.
13:57So that's our list.
13:58I want to know what you guys think down in the comments below.
14:00Did you already know about all of these Star Wars facts and are there any things that people
14:04get wrong that I missed off here?
14:06While you're down there as well, could you please give us a like, share, subscribe and
14:09head over to What Culture Star Wars for more lists like this on the regular.
14:12Even if you don't though, I've been Josh, thanks so much for watching, and I'll see
14:15you soon!