Skip to main content

star wars - Why didn't Vader detect the Force in Leia?


In the original trilogy of Star Wars, one of the first scenes is Leia meeting Darth Vader, as Vader is asking her where the plans for the Death Star were hidden. Leia claims ignorance and says that she is on a diplomatic mission to Alderaan. Leia was right in front of Vader. And yet, Vader didn't sense that the Force was strong with her.


Disclaimer 1: This question is not asking how he didn't realise through the Force that Leia was his daughter. Daughter or not, the Force was strong with Leia. Why didn't Vader sense that?


Some writings I've seen say that Leia never had any Force-training. And Luke was only sensed by the emperor after training with Obi-Wan and starting to use the Force. But in many instances in the Star Wars legends, and even in the first movie Phantom Menace, many other children, including Anakin were detected to be Force-sensitive without having training. That's how they single out prospective Jedi and begin training them from a young age. With Leia, it must have been even easier to sense that she was Force-sensitive, because the Force was so strong with her and Luke.


So why didn't Vader sense that she was Force-sensitive?




Answer



Just because he didn't say that magic phrase "the Force is strong within her" does not mean he didn't sense it. Also, it's entirely possible he uttered those words in some interaction not in a scene we saw. They didn't claim to follow his every utterance, 24/7.


I'd say evidence points to the fact that he did sense it. She didn't give up what she knew just being in the room and under the influence of his Sith powers/Jedi mind-tricks. She withstood the torture-bot without giving it up. I'd think that threatening and then destroying her home planet (by Tarkin) would be an indication that Vader found her to be quite formidable and was stymied.



Her resistance to the mind probe is considerable. It will be some time before we an extract any information from her.



That seems to be a pretty close equivalent, and, really, would a Sith openly admit to his supervisor about being matched in the Force by some untrained person?


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

harry potter - Do the Kwikspell courses work?

In Harry Potter we are introduced to Kwikspell course in The Chamber of Secrets (and never hear about it again). We see Filch taking courses, presumably by mail. The descriptions of Kwikspell make me think it is for people who are weak in magic (kind of like how Neville was supposed to be when he was younger), but had magic in them nonetheless. However, Ron's comments later in the chapter make it sound like it is mainly for Squibs to learn magic. However, it is strongly implied through out all the books that Squibs are essentially Muggles, and will never be able to do magic. How then is a Kwikspell course supposed to work? Do we have any information to know if it works at all? Is it a scam? An answer from any level of canon is welcome. Answer Kwikspell courses are (probably) useful to some wizards, but not to squibs. The Kwikspell course literature comes with two testimonials. Madam Z. Nettles of Topsham writes: ‘I had no memory for incantations and my potions were a family joke...
Post a Comment
Read more

futurama - How much time is lost in 'Time Keeps on Slippin''

In time Keeps on Slippin' , Farnsworth creates a basketball team which he matures by abusing Chronitons. This leads to time skipping forward by random, but ever increasing amounts. How much time was skipped in this way? Answer Unfortunately, I don't think a good estimate can be made for this, for two reasons: Many of the time skips move forward by an indeterminate amount of time. At one point, the Professor mentions localized regions of space skipping forward much more than others. We then see two young boys on the street below complaining about having to pay social security, only to suddenly become senior citizens and start complaining about wanting their money. Thus, each individual could have experienced a different amount of time skippage.
Post a Comment
Read more

languages - Do we ever see written English in the Star Wars films?

In Empire Strikes Back , we see a transcription of what R2's beeps and bloops mean, but it's not English (sorry for the low quality, it's from the 2004 DVDs): I'd assume it's what Basic looks like when written, but is there some point in the the Star Wars films we see written English instead? (This sort of spun off from a discussion in How do people understand astromech droids? .) Answer At one point there was English but it has been phased out in subsequent versions of the films. Chris Gould at DVD Active did a comparison of all versions of each of the Star Wars films, and in his comparison of Episode 4 , there are a couple of screenshots showing how the power gauge for the Death Star tractor beam was changed. I imagine there are probably more to be found in his other comparisons but I haven't got around to reading those yet.
Post a Comment
Read more

Was the "pure soul" of Harry's what had really hurt Voldemort?

In the Order of the Phoenix, Voldemort possesses Harry, and it hurts. Greatly. I think that Dumbledore explained that it was because Voldemort's rotten soul was incapable of assimilating Harry's pure soul, that Voldemort didn't understand the love and friendship etc that Harry has in his heart. But, I think it was a lie. Remember that in Deathly Hallows, while looking for information regarding Horcruxes, it is discovered that it is in fact possible to merge a soul fragment back, but that the process was extremely painful. Now then, if Voldemort tried to possess Harry, and Harry had a fragment of Voldemort's soul, I think that it could have been the true cause of Voldemort's pain: the fact of having his soul so close of another fragment. I think that Dumbledore knew that fact, but had to lie to Harry because it was inappropriate to let him know that he had one of Voldemort's soul fragments at the moment. Is that right? Or was it truly the pure soul of Harry's...
Post a Comment
Read more