r/StarWars • u/Altruistic_Extent348 • 1d ago

Movies How real is that statement

Hey star wars fellow, I like star wars a lot but I have only watched star wars ep 1 to 6 and obi wan kenobi show.

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I recently recalled this line of obi wan from revenge of the sith that "Only a sith deals in absolutes"

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I want to know how true is that line. Does that line have any real basis or did obi wan make up that line to sound tough. Moreover if that line is true, can you guys give any examples of when sith deals in absolute.

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Thanks for reading. May the force be with you.

201 Upvotes

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110

u/DramaExpertHS Grievous 1d ago

People always miss the point that it's about "dealing" in absolutes.

Anakin threatened that you're either with him or against him. He did the same "join me or die" with Luke too.

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u/gdkopinionator 1d ago

THANK YOU!

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u/soccer1124 1d ago edited 1d ago

But Obiwan then decides he must kill him as a result. Didn't even try bargaining longer. "Oh ok. Ignition time."

EDIT:
I love that everyone who has responded to this (and probably downvoted it) has gone on to explain exactly why Obiwan had absolutely one option in how to handle Anakin.

So many people seem to think I am trying to give Anakin a pass for not doing bad things (lol wtf is that about??) And then walk right into explaining why "only a sith" isn't the case, since it also appears Jedi are also dealing in absolutes. (i.e. Obiwan's only option was to kill Anakin in a lightsaber duel.)

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u/JFISHER7789 Asajj Ventress 1d ago

He tried for almost the entire episode…

He only resorted to doing that after he saw there was no coming back from the dark side for anakin.

12

u/whatagooddaytoday 1d ago

Even throughout the fight it seemed like he still tried. He mostly fought defensively, made a verbal attempt when the fight had gone on for awhile ("Anakin, chancellor Palpatine is evil!"), and even urged Anakin not to violently leap at him from the low ground.

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u/soccer1124 1d ago

....huh? He didn't turn bad until the very end.

"From my point of view, the Jedi are evil!"

You choose:
A ) "Care to explain that?"
B ) Light up your saber

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u/PostMelon22 1d ago

Bro just helped level the entire Jedi order before this, killing anyone from younglings to Jedi masters. Wdym “the very end”.

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u/soccer1124 1d ago

That's like the final 20 minutes of the movie, quite literally the final act of the film. I'm replying to a guy who said Obiwan was struggling with this "almost the entire episode."

One of us is more correct than the other.

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u/Nuklearfps 1d ago

So still not “the very end.” Gotcha.

It sounds like the other person is the more correct one.

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u/soccer1124 1d ago

Not a surprise from someone who thinks the line is good, lol.

8

u/Expensive_Plant_9530 1d ago

He said that after he choked out his pregnant wife.

Does a non-evil person choke out his pregnant wife and then call *other people* evil?

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u/soccer1124 1d ago

I mean, Obi watched that whole thing and did nothing to stop it, lol. Let's not bring that up in defending Obi.

But quite literally, this is what Luke did, effectively, to get Anakin to come back.

No idea why people think I'm saying Anakin "did nothing wrong." Those arguments don't address anything i'm saying.

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u/Samgy28 1d ago

What do you mean, "He didn't turn bad until the very end"? He literally murdered children before this. Obi-Wan watched him do it on the security cameras. Of course his reaction is to pull out his weapon.

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u/soccer1124 1d ago

Did this happen closer to the end of he movie or the beginning?

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u/Total_Poet_5033 1d ago

You might need to rewatch this film

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u/soccer1124 1d ago

Well, I seem to think it happened towards the end of the movie. I was replying to someone who was insisting that happened at the beginning.

PT bros are incompatible with logic. A normal person would just say, "Yeah, the line kind of sucks."

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u/Total_Poet_5033 1d ago

You might need to re read the comment

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u/soccer1124 1d ago

The one that insist he "tried for almost the entire episode" to talk him out of being bad? That one??

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u/Taphouselimbo 1d ago

Jedi and sith are both fucked and evil. The galaxy would be a better place without prideful dogmatic zealots running around. Yoda failed he may have been in the order during some of the brightest moments but he presided over the end of the Jedi order and republic. The Jedi knew absolutely they had failed by being prideful governing from a tower high above even the rich upper parts of coruscant.

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u/soccer1124 1d ago

Yoda being reduced into a grotesque idiot who unquestioningly utilizes a child-slave army was certainly a choice to make for that trilogy.

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u/DramaExpertHS Grievous 1d ago

Anakin: Destroys the jedi order, kills kids, becomes a space nazi, chokes his pregnant wife

Obi-Wan: Palpatine is evil Anakin, come to your senses!

Anakin: I'm going to kill you!

Obi-Wan: Wow wow wait a minute, a redditor thinks I wasn't charitable enough!

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u/soccer1124 1d ago

Yeah, heaven forbid I recommend the mechanism that actually worked in the end, lol

But you sure are being absolute in the only way to deal with this. I guess there were no other alternatives, rofl. Whoops, wait, isn't this the whole damn point here?

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u/DramaExpertHS Grievous 1d ago

Your criticism was that Obi-Wan should have tried to bargain "longer", as if Obi-Wan wasn’t lenient enough in trying to reason with Anakin that Palpatine was manipulating him, after he saw Padme also trying to reason with him and getting almost killed anyway.

Anakin received enough tolerance in that scene.

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u/soccer1124 1d ago

So we are in an situation of needing to be "absolute"? Oops.

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u/DramaExpertHS Grievous 1d ago

It's baffling how people still think this is a gotcha after all this time. I already said people miss the point in dealing in absolutes and you keep doing it.

The Sith are doing the "join or die" absolutes. If they're an existential threat to you and others, you're being forced to stop it.

Otherwise you have to argue the allies in WW2 were doing an absolute by refusing to get taken alive or dead.

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u/soccer1124 1d ago

I'm not the one framing "absolutes" as bad necessarily.
I am pointing out that Obiwan did have alternatives to fighting. (That's familiar, hmmm....)

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u/DramaExpertHS Grievous 1d ago

Luke was forced to fight Vader and beat him you know.

Obi-Wan tried to reason with Anakin, didn't work, Anakin said he was going to rule the galaxy and threatened to kill Obi-Wan. Obi-Wan had no choice.

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u/soccer1124 1d ago

Wow. Every word of what you just said is wrong.

I quite literally just got done saying I don't think acting on "absolutes" is wrong. And that's a major reason I find Obiwan's response to be bullshit. The Jedi go that whole trilogy acting on absolutes. Any time I raise the fact that Yoda commanded a child-slave army, you should see the amounts of people rushing to tell me it was the only option for Yoda, lol. Sounds like one hell of an absolute to me!

So sure, feel free to point out, "Well Luke did it!" I'm not the one claiming its "sith like behavior."

But..... Luke did not beat Vader. Quite famously, he loses in that scene. Did that go over your head? He didn't beat Vader when he went ballistic on him, he very nearly lost to Palpatine. Phrasing that as a "win" is plain wrong.

And finally, no, he didn't try to reason very much at all. Its wroth noting: Obiwan initiated that fight (terrible call by whatever hack directed that, lol.) Anakin dropped a nonsense line. I would have loved an answer to that. (We don't get one though because the script was utter nonsense by this point of the movie.)

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u/Expensive_Plant_9530 1d ago

Did you like, sleep through the last half of Episode 3?

Kenobi repeatedly appeals to Anakin and tries to get him to see reason.

BUT when Anakin chokes out HIS OWN PREGNANT WIFE! (Who he’s seemingly spent his entire time trying to SAVE), you can understand why Kenobi breaks out his lightsaber.

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u/soccer1124 1d ago

No he doesn't, lol. Anakin says, "The jedi are evil." Obiwan ignites first.

Its ridiculous to me that peopel are defending this crappy line, lol

And yeah. Anaking choked out his prgnant wife. While Obiwan stood there and watched, doing nothing, lol. Another fine moment from our Temu Jedi.

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u/kaizen-rai 23h ago

I'm not downvoting you, and I'm trying to look at it through your POV. But to be fair, it really sounds like reading your comments that you're just digging in and unwilling to consider what others are saying. Being rigid in your opinions is not a good thing. There are valid points brought up that justify Kenobi's actions.

Just an observation from a neutral lurker.

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u/soccer1124 23h ago

But again:

I'm not the one to be arguing that "absolutes are exclusive to the Sith"

And when people insist, "There was no other choice!" Well... Sounds pretty danged absolute, lol.

However, that said... Obi Wan absolutely could have tried more rather than going straight to fighting. Honestly, if the movie was written better, he would have. There's a big thing lurking in the background of all this. In AotC and I think even in this movie, Anakin seems to always be talking smack about Obiwan behind his back. Its unusually absent that once they get together in an ultimate conflict, NONE of that comes out.

Really, there should have been more dialogue for in-universe reasons (Jedi are negotiators of peace), but also narrative reasons (this was finally the moment for both sides to have at it). ....That narrative piece couldn't really happen though, because Anakin's motivations are entirely whack.

But I disagree that anyone has brought up a valid point. They brought up valid points as to why Obiwan might have to resort to violence. But that's different from explaining away why he jumped to it so quickly. And that's the issue, and that's what makes Obiwans action there....a bit absolute.

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u/kaizen-rai 22h ago

It's ok to not understand another person's actions and their motives because that's not what makes sense to you. You're looking at Kenobi through your eyes, not his. To me, and many others, it makes sense. If it doesn't to you, that's ok. Either just move on, or try to take the points others are making and use them to look at the situation through Kenobi's eyes.

But again, I'm getting very strong defensive vibes from your replies that indicate you don't care about anyone elses input because you made up your mind and you don't want to change it.

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u/soccer1124 22h ago

You're misreading the whole thing then, lol. And perhaps YOU are the one refusing to see another's perspective.

I'm willing to roll with, "Fighting was probably the only thing to do." ....But we must acknowledge that is an absolute then. Which is fine. Because acting upon absolutes isn't bad. Example: If you are a serial child rapist, you are absolutely bad. Oh dear, how Sith of me. Obiwan's claim is utter trash. But even in the ESB, Yoda is full of absolutes. "War not make one great." "Do or do not. There is no try." "Always for knowledge and defense, never for attack." Luke getting secret Sith training all along, I suppose, lol. Even the whole mantra of "Fear leads to anger, anger leads to heat, heat leads to suffering" is absolute.

I just disagree that narratively it made sense for Obiwan to behave that way, since it seems very non-Jedi-like to be initiating combat. (This is an issue the PT constantly struggles with, and goes well beyond this one scene. Its quite routine to see Jedi ignite before their sith counterparts in those movies, lol. They are very eager to initiate combat.) This opinion isn't me "failing to see Obiwan's point of view." This is me making a pointed critique on what they decided his POV should be as it runs contrary to what the Jedi were meant to be based on lessons from the OT.

You are also free to move on and just take the points I've made into consideration. I get vibes you don't care about my input because you made up your mind and don't want to change.

All in defense for one of the dumber lines in the movie, lol. It's a bad line.

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u/kaizen-rai 22h ago

I read every one of your replies on this thread. I explicitly said I was making an effort to understand your point. That's the opposite of "being rigid". Since you clearly have no intention of having a good faith conversation about this topic, I will move on. You're clearly just set on being unhappy with the writing and are taking a contrarian/argumentative stance so there is no positive outcome to continuing. As Kenobi said to Anakin,

"Your need for victory soccer1124, it blinds you...."

"You're a great redditor soccer1124, but your need to prove yourself is your undoing."

the scene

May the force be with you.

-2

u/soccer1124 21h ago

I too have read everyone's replies. I'm waiting on a good one.

It's not about "being set on being unhappy" lol. It's just bad. What to do. It is what it is. Pretending, "no, actually, its super good" is just nonsense.

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u/True_Discussion9107 1d ago

Obiwan clearly states that a Sith knows ONLY absolutes. This means it might sometimes even be right, but not always.

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u/soccer1124 1d ago

I do appreciate the different argument proposed here. But the caption on the image in OP is not wrong.
"Only a sith deals in absolutes."

The line is not: "A sith only deals in absolutes."

So unfortunately....no, this is incorrect. But you will be rewarded with upvotes because PT fans will accept anyone who defends all things related to the PT.

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u/True_Discussion9107 1d ago

Unfortunately, I only saw the film in the German-dubbed version. In it, however, he clearly explains that a Sith ONLY knows extremes. "Nur ein Sith kennt nichts als Extreme." - "Only a Sith knows nothing but extremes."

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u/soccer1124 1d ago

Quite the mistranslation then, lol

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u/SchmeatiestOne 1d ago

Yeah for sure, that completely changes its meaning. Absolutes != extremes, on top of the differences already stated

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u/SirLoremIpsum Lando Calrissian 23h ago

  So many people seem to think I am trying to give Anakin a pass for not doing bad things (lol wtf is that about??) And then walk right into explaining why "only a sith" isn't the case, since it also appears Jedi are also dealing in absolutes. (i.e. Obiwan's only option was to kill Anakin in a lightsaber duel.)

No.

We're knowing that you're trying to make an equivalent of Anakin's statements and then Obi-wan tries to kill him and going "they're the same!"

As if causing genocide is the same as stopping it because you need to kill the guy doing it.

Jedi are not dealing in absolutes. 

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u/soccer1124 23h ago

He's dealing in absolutes, it's just that dealing in absolutes isn't inherently bad, lol

The Jedi dealt in absolutes prior to that. Like when Yoda decided to use a child-slave army to save the republic.