This clever Star Wars fan theory suggests the Death Star was sabotaged from within
Was the ultimate weapon built with a flaw on purpose?
- Huw Fullerton
Published: Monday, 11 January 2016 at 4:55 pm
It was one of the most uplifting moments in 1977’s original Star Wars film, as Luke Skywalker (Mark Hamill) tapped into the Force to fire his proton torpedoes into a small exhaust vent and destroy the planet-killing Imperial superweapon the Death Star.
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Since then, numerous fans have wondered why the jewel of the evil Empire’s military might was built with such an obvious design flaw (X-Wing size trenches leading to a hole that if shot would blow up the entire base) – but one new fan theory suggests that the mistake was actually a carefully planned piece of sabotage.
You see, as noted by reddit user Bleevocker, the Death star was originally designed by the weaponsmiths of Geonosis, an arid world seen in prequel movie Attack of the Clones back in 2002. The future Emperor Palpatine ended that film with the plans in his possession (see above) – but relations between the Sith Lord and the insectoid Geonosians would soon sour.
Canonical spin-off novel Tarkin (about the early days of Peter Cushing’s Imperial Grand Moff from the first film) revealed that after the events of 2005 film Revenge of the Sith the Empire captured and enslaved vast swathes of the Geonosians to build their Death Star, later gassing the remaining inhabitants of the planet after finding no valuable resources to mine on it.
Geonosian ruler Poggle the lesser
So what we have left are a bunch of angry, homeless Geonosians with a grudge against the Empire, and both the knowledge of and access to the construction of the Death Star to build in a fault to their original design. Is it so far-fetched to think that the whole defeat of the Empire in A New Hope could come down to the delayed vengeance of these enslaved engineers?
In other words, the destruction of the greatest weapon in the galaxy might well have been brought about by the actions of some annoyed cowboy builders. Can’t wait to see THAT spin-off anthology movie.
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Star Wars: The Force Awakens is in cinemas now
Authors
Huw FullertonCommissioning editor
Huw Fullerton is a commissioning editor for Radio Times magazine handling comedy, entertainment and specialist drama. In a previous regeneration, he covered all things sci-fi and fantasy for RadioTimes.com.
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