Not-particularly-spoilery FORCE AWAKENS question

[xiphias]

Did it seem to you like droids were treated in a way less slave-y way than in either of the previous trilogies? It seemed like people were treating them just like, y'know, people, with agency and lives of their own and stuff. It seemed like they were treated less as property than before. Do you think something encouraging happened in the thirty years between the events of JEDI and FORCE AWAKENS?

Comments

[captainsblog.livejournal.com]

Well, other than Unkar Plutt (Simon Pegg, which I totally missed) considering BB-8 to be complete chattel and more than willing to cart him off.

[xiphias.livejournal.com]

Sure -- and I'm sure that the other bad guys ALSO don't have a problem with slavery.

But I'm sure he would be happy to buy and sell other sophonts, too.

[greybeta.livejournal.com]

I wondered why they just didn't grab the map data from R2-D2's dats banks, like some kind of emergency option. But perhaps droid have rights nowadays...

[jazzfish]

I was rather surprised when Rey liberated BB-8 from the (Jawa?) who captured zir; that was not at *all* in the spirit of the previous movies. Snapped my disbelief suspenders something hard.

Edit: to clarify, the surprise came from a) Rey willing to fight someone over what was clearly their scavenged property and b) the someone just sort of going along with it, "yeah yeah you got me here you go."

[sinanju.livejournal.com]

Eh, chalk it up to "the guilty flee where no man pursueth." The Jawa knew it wasn't HIS droid--so when Rey objects strenuously, he decides against fighting and goes to look for easier prey (also, he may have seen Rey use that staff on other people in the past).

[gingicat]

I did! I think about personhood in the Star Wars universe a lot. The Clone Wars television show (available on Netflix streaming) addresses it directly.