By Chris Snellgrove
| Published
The Star Wars prequels always portrayed Yoda as different from politicians such as Palpatine…while the future Emperor mostly hatched schemes from the shadows, this Jedi warrior leapt into danger with nothing but a lightsaber and some bad CGI. And it’s easy to root for this little green guy because he is presented as the ultimate force of good fighting against Palpatine’s plans to take over the galaxy. However, the fact that Yoda lived for nearly a millennium and led the Jedi for centuries like a way-past-their-prime American politician makes him just as culpable as Palpatine in the destruction of the Old Republic.
Despite what cranky fanboys say, Star Wars has always been political: George Lucas explicitly based Emperor Palpatine on Richard Nixon and used the Ewoks as symbols of the Viet Cong resisting the mighty American war machine. Therefore, it’s not that crazy to compare our own ancient politicians to those in Star Wars and discover some similarities…for example, certain American politicians have been in power far longer than Palpatine’s 23 years. But it turns out that Yoda is worse than both American politicians and Palpatine himself when it comes to staying in power too long and dooming everyone they were supposed to protect.
Now, some would say it’s not fair to compare Yoda to a politician, so here’s another hard truth: not only were the Jedi politicians, but they were the most corrupt in a galaxy far, far away. These are galaxy police with godlike powers, effectively representing billions of beings as governmental ambassadors…yet they have no real external oversight and, as The Acolyte showed, are willing to cover up heinous crimes when someone tries to investigate them. And presiding over all this incompetence for centuries was Yoda, who hid the existence of his diminishing Force capabilities until it was too late for Jedi everywhere.
In canon, Yoda has been a member of the Jedi Council for over 350 years, meaning that he has had a place of leadership in this elite group for longer than the entire lifetime of various galactic aliens. On paper, that’s fine because he is both powerful and wise…the kind of leader that can offer sage advice and still kick butt with a lightsaber. But by the time of the prequels, this ancient alien is keeping a pretty awful secret from everyone: that his ability to use the Force has diminished along with everyone else’s. And it’s this failure that most makes Yoda seem like a doddering American politician.
If you look beyond the janky plot of the prequels, Yoda is revealed as an aging de facto politician who has been in power for centuries and refuses to step down when he realizes that he’s losing command of the Force…you know, the thing that makes him both powerful and wise. It’s entirely possible that a newer, younger leader could have identified this Force problem and possibly even deduced that Palpatine was a Sith Lord. But like countless real-world politicians before him, Yoda refused to cede his power, leading to an outright Jedi genocide that could have easily been prevented.
None of this is to diminish the evil deeds of Palpatine or his evil interns, of course, but the point is that Yoda should have been able to sense this predatory politician’s intentions, especially after he knew a Sith Lord was hiding in plain sight. In all likelihood, the Yoda of years past would have been able to do so, but the prequel-era Jedi Master no longer had enough control over the Force. Had he been willing to step down or even just work alongside some youngbloods with new ideas (like Ahsoka), Order 66 could have easily been prevented.
At this point, Yoda lovers may be screaming at the screen that he’s better than geriatric American politicians and that he tried to do his best to stop Palpatine’s plan. But the little green guru had to learn his most famous lesson in the most painful way: do or do not…there is no try.
