The Broken Lore of The Force Awakens (Part 1)

One decade ago, the Dark Times were announced. Around the year 2013, Star Wars was purchased by the  subversion entity known as Disney. ".. in addition to getting the  rights to one of the greatest family franchises and epic stories of all time .." It was announced that what they  were making would not be canon. The Mickey Mouse universe would be a reboot, a shoddy imitation of Star Wars. I knew immediately that Disney's Space  Fights would not be of interest to me. I'll stick with the real Star

Wars canon, thank you very much. The Expanded Universe, the single cohesive history  of the galaxy far far away. Later on, the first Disney  Wars movie was announced. Having just rebooted Star Trek and  driven its good name into the ground, JJ Abrams was available. Perhaps JJ and reboot have to go together, because he isn't capable of  working in an established setting. "[grimacing] Really? Star Wars? You already rebooted Star Trek.." All JJ really wants to do is blow up more planets. He only g

ot to do that once in Star Trek, so he was looking forward to doing it again. Many people believe there was  some potential to JJ's reboot. That everything was fine, until TLJ  suddenly happened out of nowhere. That there weren't even any warning signs, a bad movie was made for no reason at all. I intend to demonstrate that this is not the case. The Disney Wars reboot has  always been a rotten idea, before a single scene was filmed. The main objection I have to TLJ is that it  is a perfect conti

nuation of JJ's universe. Another key factor is related  to the Star Wars prequels. The prequels have always  been somewhat contentious. "Star Wars - Episode II: Attack of the Clones is that worst thing ever made by a human." There is a narrative accepted by non-fans, that the prequels were always unpopular, at least until recently. This is the understanding JJ and Disney  have to work with, because they aren't fans. ".. and the addition of Lucasfilm  will further our growth strategy .." Their p

erception is that the prequels  were terrible, and have to be dealt with. At this point it isn't relevant how  good or bad the prequels really are. Disney believes they were  universally despised, that's the key. After everyone was angry with George Lucas, JJ would save the day by ignoring them. Disney Wars would be made  as an anti-prequel trilogy. This new stuff would be popular with everyone, by rebooting away all the bad parts. So long as they weren't like the prequels, Disney movies would b

e a guaranteed success. There would be an emphasis on physical props, practical special effects. This is to counter the perception that the prequels were bad because  of their use of CGI effects. By doing the opposite of what an  outsider thinks the prequels did, the sequels will fix everything. Similarly, a casual observer may think  the prequels had a lot of politics. We see the inner workings of the Old Republic, and understand the state of the galaxy. The reboot would go out of its  way to a

void any such scenes. It also needs to explain  why the actors are so old. That means a hefty time skip  is required, about 30 years. In the very first Star Wars movie,  the opening text sets the scene. This story is episodes 4-6 of a larger  saga, events are already in motion. The princess has a history of dangerous  missions, because she is kind and brave. The evil Empire has caught up with her  at last, now watch the latest adventure. For the rest of the trilogy, this text  fills in the event

s between movies. These are minor updates, things  that logically would have changed. Of course the Rebel Alliance isn't on Yavin  4 anymore, Hoth is a better place to hide. Of course Luke is on Tatooine, that  was established in the last movie. Even the prequels are as expected. The first movie in both trilogies  needs to set the scene for the future. The Episode 1 opening text shows us the  pre-Empire galaxy, before the dark times. For the first Disney movie, this  text has a lot of work to do

. In order to make repairs, we need  to identify what this text does. For the title, it already sounds strange. The Force Awakens implies that  previously, the Force has been asleep. The peculiar title sets up a joke  almost as funny as the Disney movies. The three titles: The Force Awakens,  The Last Jedi, and From His Nap. Perhaps this is meant as a nod to how  long it's been since nostalgic Star Wars. An anti-prequel sentiment. More charitably, perhaps this refers to an  increase in the numbe

r of Jedi in the galaxy. I'm sure it will become clear  in future, let's move on. The first line is "Luke Skywalker has vanished". That is vague. Is he still in the same place,  but Luke is now the Invisible Man? Was Luke kidnapped by some powerful entity? Did Luke have an urgent errand to run, so he couldn't leave a note to explain himself? Let's keep reading and find out. "In his absence, the sinister First Order  has risen from the ashes of the Empire". Now, we start to see the scope of the r

eboot. Luke has remained in a vanished  state for an extended period of time. Long enough for control of  the galaxy to change hands. We're not clear on exactly how long it has been. Clearly nobody had kept an eye  on the ashes of the Empire, which is quite a strange situation. Luke shouldn't be the only one who would think of making sure there are no embers in with the ash. This is also a particularly  strange name: the First Order. It's like calling the third Xbox the Xbox  1, or calling the f

ourth Doom game Doom. Palpatine's Empire was sometimes  known as the New Order. At the very least, there was  an old order, then a new one, and then finally the First Order comes third. Perhaps "First" is supposed to imply  prime, the foremost order of them all. That doesn't sound right, though, as they  are just direct copies of the Empire. Let's continue: "and will not rest until  Skywalker, the last Jedi, has been destroyed". This is even stranger than before. We have precedent for echoes of

the Empire. In proper Star Wars, the Imperial Remnant was a powerful faction  for a long time after the Emperor died. There is no reason for Luke to be the last Jedi. That is an absurd idea, it was only the case in the Original  Trilogy because of time constraints. Luke was always going to  pass on what he had learnt. The trilogy just ended before he did that. Perhaps we are to think this First Order simply  killed all the Jedi that Luke had trained. For any of this to work, there  is a tremendo

us missing story. If that is the scenario you  want, why not actually show it? When somehow, the Empire  returns, just show us that. If Luke's temple and all his  students are destroyed, show us that. It would be far more entertaining  than what Disney chose. Next paragraph. "With the support of the Republic, General  Leia Organa leads a brave Resistance". First of all, there is a very  particular choice in this. In the Star Wars canon, Leia and  Han are married in the year 8 ABY. Four years aft

er the Battle of Endor. From then on, her name is Leia Organa Solo. Three years after that, Leia Organa Solo  becomes chief of state to the New Republic. General was the rank given to Han  and Lando during the Rebellion. Luke received the title of  general in the year 5 ABY. About one year after the fall of the Empire. Leia is not a general with support of  the republic: Leia IS the New Republic. Another strange detail here is the name. This movie tells us nothing  about the state of the galaxy.

We don't know if this First Order is  confined to a small region of space, or if there is a galactic battlefront. Did the First Order take over the  galaxy through decades of war? The term used here is "resistance". That implies a recent occupation,  in contrast with a rebellion. However, as we learn later, the First  Order has been around for decades. Further, the Republic still exists,  instead of having been conquered. This is muddled because JJ and  Disney don't know what they're doing. The

goal here is a complete reset,  to re-create the classic factions. The foundation of the trilogy is  not-the-Empire versus not-the-Rebellion. Another part also lines up: all the  Jedi have been removed from the galaxy. The prequels had many Jedi, the OT did  not, therefore Disney re-purges the Jedi. "She is desperate to find  her brother Luke and gain his help in restoring peace  and justice to the galaxy". This tells us a lot more. It confirms that Luke did not leave a  note explaining where h

e went, or why. If Luke was doing anything of value, it might  be bad for "General Organa" to distract him. Alternatively, Luke might have been kidnapped. That would explain why he ignores the state of  the galaxy: he cannot leave his prison cell. The next paragraph switches gears. Instead of rewriting the history  that the EU already covered, the final paragraph is about this movie. "Leia has sent her most daring  pilot on a secret mission to Jakku". This seems fine at face value. Pilots are of

ten sent on missions, and  Leia must have a best pilot somewhere. The text continues. "Where an old ally has discovered  a clue to Luke's whereabouts". Finally, after who knows how many years, Luke can be rescued from  where he has been imprisoned. Now, let's list every function  this Disney text serves. 1. To get rid of Luke Skywalker. 2. To create a copy of the Empire. 3. To get rid of every Jedi besides Luke. This includes Leia, who from  the text, cannot be a Jedi. 4. To get rid of Leia and 

Han's established relationship. 5. To establish that there is  an entity named the Republic. 6. To rename the Rebellion to the Resistance 7. To present a plot hook,  a path forward from here. I could write something to  replace what Disney settled on. There wouldn't be much point, though. These points are some of the  foundations to the reboot universe. To make anything better, you would need  to change these bad ideas for better ones. Either by executing the idea properly,  or replacing it wit

h something better. Keep these in mind as we go forward  through the first Disney Wars movie. The first shot is striking in  how unlike Star Wars it is. This shot is pure darkness. You cannot see what is going on,  all you can see is a dark triangle. Then, a few glowy lights, but  overall still total darkness. Nearly every pixel spends  most of its time turned off. Star Wars does not open this way,  the lighting is completely different. When a star destroyer appears, it is in full view. We can s

ee the intricacy of the surface  detail, implying how large it really is. In Star Wars, the ships are properly illuminated. We see exactly what the ship's  exterior hull looks like. There are areas that are in direct light,  and other areas that are in shadow. We can see the hull in both lighting states. When we cut to the interior of  each ship, that is also well-lit. The princess has a ship with bright  lights and walls of pure white. The Empire uses dark materials, but the  interior of the sh

ips have illumination. The audience can see what's going on in the  corridors, because the characters can see. Interior lighting is one of the oldest and  simplest technologies known to mankind. In JJ's movie, the exterior  of the hull is not lit. We cannot see what shape each ship is, we don't  even know if this is a ship or its shadow. Has a star destroyer passed  between the camera and the planet? If that were the case, we would expect  light to fall on the star destroyer. We wouldn't see a b

lack triangle, we  would see the bow of a star destroyer. Or, is it between the sun and the planet? It can't be, the shadow would  not have crisp edges like this. We know this cannot be the shadow of the  ship, because it's being cast onto a sphere. There are no speed changes as the shadow  plays across the planet's surface. It can't be the ship itself,  because of the old movies. Even if the light source wouldn't  illuminate the side we see, that's not how the dark side works. Ships can be seen

on both sides, no  matter where the light is coming from. I can only conclude someone had  this visual in his head for years. Then finally created it, no  matter what trickery was needed. We can't tell, because JJ  has done everything possible to hide the star destroyer from the audience. In fact, this may not be possible: I can't imagine a lighting  scenario that would cause this. In the OT, every movie begins  by showing us a star destroyer. That is just about the  coolest thing in the galaxy

, so showing one up front immediately  justifies the ticket price. Star destroyers are spectacular  examples of special effects work. Why would Disney want to hide one? The star destroyer that you do  not see launches smaller ships. These small ships are not visible either,  despite having multiple lights on them. The darkness continues after  cutting to the interior. These ships are full of rebooted  stormtroopers, standing in the dark. Fifteen seconds after launching, the  fluorescent tubes at

tempt to strike a light. A full 30 seconds after these ships have  launched, the interior lighting comes on. Obviously, this is not how  lights behave in Star Wars. Blatantly, all of this  lighting is for the visuals. JJ has concluded that if people can see  things, they will like his movie less. You could argue that this is due to "themes". There is a new faction that's totally  not just a clone of the Empire. When the Empire was in power, that  era was called "the dark times". Therefore, the n

ot-Empire would cause  a lack of illumination in the galaxy. The time of the First Order is dark, because of how hard it is to find  reliable lighting technology. The stars in the galaxy have all gone dim as well. We can explain why the director  might want all this darkness. There is no in-universe explanation  for why these visuals would appear. Well, there is no good explanation. One of the benefits of living in  the future is that we can find official attempts to fix these problems. In a Dis

ney cross-sections book, this question has 7 words dedicated to it. "Minimal lighting to preserve  trooper night vision". The ships are named AAL stormtrooper  transports: atmospheric assault lander. That sounds good, until you think  about its implications for a moment. First of all, this does not explain  the discrepancy in exterior lighting. In Star Wars, the closest to  JJ's darkness is Episode 2. This opens with chrome ships  above a planet at night, which is about as dark an opening  as it

is possible to create. Unlike the Mickey Mouse movie, all the  ships are clearly visible, as is the planet. In fact, in every Star Wars movie but one, we  can see the ship in relation to the planet. The reason Episode 5 is different is  that its ISD launches probe droids. It isn't in orbit of a particular planet, it  is searching an entire system at the same time. JJ's destroyer has no clear relation to  the planet, because we can't see the ship. Now for the interior lighting. The intuitive ass

umption would be that  these lights are shoddy, defective. This tells us things about the faction: the First Order doesn't have the  skills to build a Death Star. They can barely keep the lights  functioning correctly on a landing shuttle. The lights were bought for being cheap in bulk, but they're slow to activate and unreliable. Logically, the claim of the cross-sections  does not line up with the movie we see. The lighting is described as  minimal, but that isn't correct. The lighting is of a

fairly normal intensity. The lighting is not minimal: it is slow to  activate, and prone to intense flickering. Once the lighting is stable, it will  do nothing to help with night vision. The lighting depicted is about as bad as  you can possibly design, for night vision. For that matter, why would stormtroopers  need help with their night vision? If the shuttle lights can be harmful, surely  a flashbang would also get through the helmet. Young Luke is not a particularly  rich chap, wouldn't yo

u agree? Let's take a look at an iconic bit of equipment. Luke has a set of electrobinoculars  on the moisture farm. These were what he used to watch the  battle between Tantive 4 and Devastator. He has another model of electrobinoculars on Hoth. A set without the electronics  would be called macrobinoculars. The features of electrobinoculars  are quite relevant here. They are equipped with dampeners, very  useful in a desert environment such as this. That's to make it damp again,  whenever the

binocs start to dry out. They also have dampers, which  automatically filter out excess light. The First Order shuttle says it has  searchlights to dazzle the enemy. Electrobinoculars protect against  spot lumas and flash grenades. They offer 500x magnification,  rangefinding, and light compensation. In brightest day, in blackest night,  no bantha shall escape Luke's sight. Stormtroopers helmets have similar functions:  protection from bright lights included. The other critical one is the abilit

y  to see through fog, and light or dark. Flash protection is normally  mentioned as "polarised lenses". Polarised sunglasses use a linear filter. Because LCD screens also use linear polarised  light, they interact with the glasses. If an LCD screen is meant to be rotated,  it may be polarised at 45 degrees. Otherwise, the sunglasses would completely  block the screen in portrait mode. Stormtrooper lenses must be double-polarised,  so they can block all light. Light enhancement allows  for visio

n in near-darkness. Does the First Order have helmets as  good as Imperial stormtroopers did? It's hard to say, this text implies they don't. Compare this to the prequels, where  some clone helmets have modified visors. These are said to be macrobinoculars. The primitive version, without  light compensation subsystems. That's because the anti-flash and  auto-brightness are built into the helmet. Issuing electrobinoculars would be  double-handling, a pointless additional cost. It isn't just Imper

ial stormtroopers and  poor farmers who have this technology. Once upon a time, Princess Leia  disguised herself as being Ubese. A particularly Ubese individual  by the name of Boushh. This costume includes a fancy  hat named Neuro-Saav NiteSite. Both "night" and "sight" are spelt incorrectly. This is an infrared motion sensor,  allowing vision in total darkness. It also includes a flashguard  to ward off bright lights. Boba Fett has similar functionality in his helmet. In theory, this means the

stormtroopers  could have no interior lighting at all. They can function in pitch dark, they  can find a black grue in a coal cellar. They could function in a  blindingly bright interior. These both seem a bit silly, though. We would expect to see what we  always see: stable, even lighting. Especially in a manmade room, where  flickering lights are obviously faulty. You might say this is all a bit of a nitpick. Perhaps your thoughts dwell  on another internet video. Remember that this is the  f

irst thing JJ showed us. There have been three visuals here, and  the lighting has been wrong on all of them. A star destroyer exterior, a shuttle  exterior, and a shuttle interior. Every single one of these has been too dark  to actually present anything to the audience. This is the best foot forward, a  new era, Star Wars is being "saved". The only three visuals so far have all  suffered from the same exact problem, which is nowhere to be found in the OT. There is no basis for this scenario in

the lore. Luma technology does not have  the flaws depicted by JJ. Star Wars has solved the question of calling  a handheld light a torch versus flashlight. These are called glow rods or lumas. They function by releasing chemical  reactants to generate light. An alternative technology involves  power cells and lightbulbs. We would not expect luma technology  to flicker, for either mechanism. There isn't even a thought given  to what the characters would do. Why would the not-Empire install faul

ty lighting? It can't be that much cheaper. Is it to make your stormtroopers  irritable as they go into a fight: are they set to strobe mode on purpose? The solution is so obvious, too. If you ask the right question, what JJ asks for  is a flickering light inside the landing shuttle. To accomplish this, just add windows. The change in light intensity doesn't come from  faulty lighting, it's from the world outside. Sunlight, interrupted by the landscape:  trees, mountains, anything you like. Ther

e is just one limitation: JJ  cannot have his pitch darkness. Interior and exterior light  must be at Star Wars normal. It could happen in the desert,  but it cannot be at night. Again, JJ will have to live without the darkness. Unless. Perhaps there is another way to  get flashing lights at night. Perhaps there are street lights in a city. This planet is not known for its large  and prosperous cities, so that's unlikely. Another option might be  thunderbolts and lightning. We will later discove

r that  this Jakku is a desert planet. So it seems unlikely that there would be  rainclouds to create a conventional storm. You might be able to get lightning from a  dust storm, which could happen on Jakku. The problem with adding a dust storm is that  the ground scenes would be inside the storm. It would be so much easier to just  have the sunlight for the lighting. One more thing. The only thing we see after  the lights come on is a lurch. The stormtroopers all sway to the side. This might be

quite a hard technique to pull  off, needing an entire set that can move. Doing this has implications, though. When the ship is rocked in Star Trek, it usually  happens from weapons fire hitting shields. That is the case in Star Wars as well, negating  a turbolaser bolt causes the ship to lurch. This is a feature of ray shields,  to explain the special effects. For these troopers to sway like that, would  imply the inertial compensators aren't working. That is no minor detail, it has  serious i

mplications for every vehicle. Flight does not work as depicted  in Star Wars, in space or in air. Adding repulsorlifts does  help, but only near a planet. To get the flight characteristics we see, they would need extremely powerful engines. A very high thrust-to-weight ratio,  specific power you might say. Cross-sections for the prequels state that  ships sustain hours of thousand-G accelerations. This would liquefy the passengers,  without inertial dampers. The lowest listed is 30G, on Dooku's

  ship, for the backup engines. Anakin's stolen airspeeder can pull 70G,  due to using jet engines like a podracer. Pilots pass out after a few seconds of 7x gravity. Next lowest are droid gunships  and escape pods at 100G. Then the Trade Federation core ship, 300G. Jedi interceptors are the  fastest, at 5000G of acceleration. In the Disney cross-sections  book, these numbers are removed. We don't know what sort of acceleration  to expect from its engines. However, the inertial compensators  sho

uld still hold the occupants steady. No lurch would make it through, unless  the shuttle was hit by a blaster cannon. This one only exists because JJ  is copying World War 2 movies. There were no inertial dampers on the D-Day  beaches, so there are none in JJ's galaxy. People complain about RJ and his  useless bombers being a bad reference. This is exactly the same thing, a war movie  reference that has no place in the setting. The next scene is much less strange. This shows a new droid that Dis

ney has invented. It is supposed to be the  reboot's equivalent of R2-D2. Let's analyse the design. First and foremost, this is designed  for the purpose of being cute. That is its primary function,  the only thing that matters. No matter how inept it may be at any other  tasks, it would not be considered defective. The moment it is insufficiently  cute, the droid must be replaced. I hope I don't need to explain the little  round bundle of joy with a big eye. In both its body size and head size,

  BB-8 is more like a baby than R2-D2 is. This is the official description,  the new robot being cute is canon. Hang on, you might say. R2-D2 is equally cute, and  you don't complain about him. You're right, R2-D2 is a very  strange design for a robot. Instead of shouting "Danger,  Will Robinson", he beeps. The ancient robots are 2 metres  tall, Artoo is 1 metre tall. Overall, an R2 unit has as humanoid  a design as it possibly could. Right down to the giant neotenous radar eye. The first time I

heard the word  "torso", it referred to Artoo's body. After the spaceships, the first thing  in Episode 4 are these two droids. Nobody ever considers that Threepio  might decide to eradicate all life. That wasn't standard at the time. The moment we see these two droids,  we can tell they are harmless. Lock them in a room with the princess,  and only the droids are at risk. You'd never find Threepio's hand on  her neck, or Artoo's for that matter. And not just because Artoo can't  reach all the

way up there. In fact, the droids seem very humanly  concerned for the princess's safety. I'm very aware that R2-D2 is endearing,  because I have two favourite characters. One is a droid with no arms or ability to speak. The other is a wise old Jedi  knight, master of the Force. Ben Kenobi is a great man, but is he my favourite? I cannot put these two into order. These are popular choices, easily in the  running with Luke and Han and Chewbacca. We like Artoo for his actions,  but also for his de

sign. Every little hatch on R2-D2's  body represents possibility. If that panel swings open, almost  any device could come out of there. There are even several tools under  the same door, from time to time. This design is clearly practical for a  droid, it's good enough to work in reality. The head and body articulation allows for  any field of vision the R2 unit might need. The droid isn't up on stilt legs, an R2 droid is as compact as  possible for the capabilities it has. Artoo's design is el

egant and  clever, especially the legs. An R2 can walk or roll on anything from  sand to stairs to starship deck plating. The "feet" of the R2 are said to be  motorised treads, like on a bulldozer. In the original movie, we can see  that the prop has tiny, narrow wheels. Those might exist for high speed,  but they would sink into the sand. Locomotion must include a  broader footprint, as in treads. We also know that they can drive  on a starship's exterior hull. That means a magnetic component t

o an R2's feet. The design of BB-8 is less practical. Whether there's a mechanism in the head or  body, it can't have all that much traction. A rolling ball like BB-8 might  seem better on sand than an R2, but worse on every other surface. That's only true with the narrow  wheels used behind the scenes. If we assume an R2 has full width wheels, it  would have lower ground pressure than BB-8. Sand is particularly bad, because  it covers the entire ball. Somehow, the head rides on  top, despite al

l the grit. R2 treads are contained, all the  sand stays in the feet modules. There's also far less internal volume,  maybe one third of Artoo's size. It's clear that a BB droid has  far fewer tools than an R2. Even then, the tools it has  are behind the circular panels. That means the propulsion machinery has to  avoid the back side of all the retracted tools. Also far less room for power  systems, and drive machinery. Perhaps JJ's droid is newer, more advanced. Miniaturised technology means th

e little man  inside can be removed from the blueprints. If that were so, then a droid smaller  than an R2 could be just as capable. By that logic, one the same size could  be even more capable than an R2 unit. This is what happened in Star  Wars, quite unlike in JJ's movie. Industrial Automaton created  a new model to replace the R2. A pair of designs, in fact: the R6 and R7. The IA company suggested the New Republic pay for a new model of military astromech droid. With the fall of the Empire,

the  New Republic did not get complacent. Certainly, the Republic would  not retire its military. In the real continuity, they  designed a new E-Wing starfighter. The Republic allocated the credits  for the new droid at the same time, to be designed together. Industrial Automaton took this money, and used it to tool up manufacturing of  a completely different design: the R6. Using the profits from the R6, IA  continued development of the R7. The R7 is far more advanced than the R2. The R6 is des

igned to match the R2 in  features and functionality, but for cheap. Retail price is lower than the R2, so  manufacturing costs must be even lower. There's one more droid I need to mention. Before the R6 was another model, the R5. This is the Windows 8, Vista, or ME of droids. Nobody likes the R5, they are cheap and nasty. One significant change is that  the vision system was replaced. Normal R-series astromechs use a dark "radar eye". The R5 replaced it with three photoreceptors, which are used

on every other droid in the galaxy. Disney, in their infinite  wisdom, failed to copy this lore. In copying R2-D2, they gave BB-8 a black eye. Despite being a copy of the radar eye, they call it a "black photoreceptor". The R2 equivalent in a series of  sequel movies could be either R6 or R7. The age of the actors means these droids  will both exist, that late in the timeline. These two droids are clearly related to R2-D2, but a refinement of the design. It depends how the droid is  related to

the other characters. Astromech droids are built to be  compatible with military starfighters. There is a standardised droid socket behind  the pilot on most ships of that size. If your best pilot flies an E-Wing, he  will naturally have an R7 astro-droid. If he flies an upgraded X-Wing or Y-Wing, then an R6 would be the logical choice. Why is an R6 better than BB-8? For a start, one comes from good old  proper Star Wars, the other from JJ. Yet despite its age, I bet 70%  of you weren't aware of

the R6. There's no need to reinvent the R2 when there's been a perfectly good R6 in canon all along. For those who didn't know about  the R6 it would be a good design, for all the reasons an R2 is. Those who would recognise it will not  be upset to see the R6, I guarantee it. Most of all, the R6 is better because of its size. I declare that the R6 is the perfect size. The fact that BB-8 is a different size  means that BBs are defective by design. Why is that? Because the R6 is exactly the same 

size as the R2, and the R2 is perfect. Before the R2 unit was developed, only military astromech droids  could fit in a starfighter socket. The R2 was the first mass-produced astromech  droid of its size, to be sold to the public. The diameter of the torso  matches a standard droid socket. BB-8 does not match that size. It is the standard for a reason. Being smaller than the droid socket  is not as bad as being too large. It could be that the BB is designed  for a narrow-gauge droid socket. Per

haps to fit in a miniaturised starfighter, where the standard astromech  socket is unacceptable. The Expanded Universe established  the size of the T-65B X-Wing already. In Star Wars, it is 12.5 metres long. The Disney T-65 is 13.4 metres long. Their T-70 X-Wing is 12.48 metres long. The original Koensayr BTL-S3  Y-Wing is 16 metres long. Disney's BTA-NR2 Y-Wing is 18. 17 metres long. The Naboo N-1 is an example of a ship almost  too small for a droid socket: 11 metres long. The A-Wing notably l

acks an astromech socket. The A-Wing is 9.6 metres long. Though if you ask Disney, they will insist  A-Wings were 6.9 metres long instead. Then Disney invents a new A-Wing,  the RZ-2 at 7.68 metres long. None of this supports the idea  of a miniature astromech socket. If you were to design a droid looking like BB-8, it would be the same diameter as an R2 unit. They fit in the same astromech sockets, so they would naturally be the same size. The other big change to make would  be to ditch the rol

ling locomotion. Spinning that body is a terrible idea, it would  drag mud or sand up to where the head sits. You could retain some rolling style by having  wheels built into the surface of the body. Or, you could just give the droid repulsorlifts. We know that a droid this size  can be fitted with repulsorlifts. The IT-O interrogator droid is  about the same size, and it floats. So do Darth Maul's probe  droids, and the Empire's probot. Putting repulsors on also offers the  most unique spin pos

sible on the design. You hold the napkin the other way up, and the 8-BB has a head on the bottom. That's unique, quirky, and  completely unlike R2-D2. If anything, it reminds me of the  Omnidroid from The Incredibles. There is a concern there, in that the repulsors won't  work if there's no gravity. The same applies to BB-8 though,  you can't roll without traction. In zero-gravity, an astromech  uses manoeuvring jets anyway. These have been part of Star Wars for ages,  they weren't invented by t

he prequels. It would also be unsurprising for an R2 to have an inflatable life raft and underwater propellers. The same goes for an R6, but a BB model? I don't trust them. You couldn't sell me a BB for one  credit, I'll buy the genuine article. The BB is just a cheap imitation of the  Industrial Automaton R-series, and we all know it. This is also a perfect example of the  worldbuilding deficiencies in the reboot. The new droid, JJ-8, is a fundamentally  different design from the old astromechs

. The natural assumption would be  that it's a competitor to the R2. A different approach, made by a different company. Instead, the wiki claims Industrial  Automaton made both the BB and R-series. Where there was potential for  something new, Disney copied the old. When filling out the form, "manufacturer"  was copied from R2-D2's info card. Whatever the shortcomings of the ball  design, it could have made sense. A different droid company trying to  compete with the R2 might create a ball. For

IA, their astromech design  is the industry standard. Industrial Automaton would never discard  that iconic R-series droid shell.