Star Wars +/-

In hockey they keep track of a player’s +/- by adding 1 when the team scores with a player on the ice, and subtracting 1 if the other team scores. This is a way to see how beneficial that player is to have on the ice. I’m gonna do something similar for some main characters in Star Wars for each episode. The scoring won’t only be +1 or -1. Depending on the good or bad action they take, any number of points can be added or removed. I’m not gonna explain in detail what happens between actions by each character, you can watch the movie if you want to know that. The hardest part of this post was choosing which pics to use and which to save for the next one.

Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope

Obi Wan Kenobi (Old Ben)

Old Ben saves Luke from the Tusken raiders because he knows they are easily startled.	+1  Overall +1
Ben fudges the truth about Darth Vader, really setting Luke up for a surprise.	-1  Overall 0
Ben doesn’t get Luke back in time to save his Aunt and Uncle, which may not be his fault. But he’s not very sensitive about it either. Luke just saw the burnt remains of his only known relatives and all Obi Wan says is, “you’d have been killed too.”	-1  Overall -1
Uses a jedi mind trick on the storm troopers. "These aren't the droids you're looking for."	+1  Overall 0
Obi Wan shows he still has a little fight left in him by cutting a dude’s arm off in the Cantina	+1  Overall+1
Obi Wan talks Han into flying them despite paying him very little up front with the promise of a whole lot more later.	+1  Overall +2
He sneaks through the Death Star by himself and disables the tractor beam.	+1  Overall +3
Sacrifices himself to become “more powerful than you can possibly imagine.”	+2  Overall +5
Gives Luke advice a few times throughout the remainder of the movie. He is especially helpful during the Death Star trench run.	+1  Overall +6

Final Thoughts: I’m only including Ben because if I do scoring for the new trilogy, he will come out really high overall.

Darth Vader

Enters like a BAMF after capturing the Tantive IV Rebel Blockade Runner. Lifts a guy off the ground with 1 hand, chokes him to death and throws him against a wall.	+1  Overall +1
Fails to get any info from Princess Leia and listens to the guy who doesn’t want to fire on the escape pods.	-1  Overall 0
Comes up with a pretty good scheme to hide his involvement in the capture of this consulate ship, which was in clear violation of the imperial senate rules. “Set a distress signal then inform the senate that all aboard were killed.”	+1  Overall +1
At the Death Star meeting he uses the force to choke General Motti for his “lack of faith.”	+1  Overall +2
Gets scolded by Grand Moff Tarkin and has to let go of Motti. In the next 2 episodes (when Vader becomes a main character and his theme song is introduced) he is the highest ranking officer and is free to kill anyone.	-1  Overall +1
Fails to get any information from Princess Leia again, then Grand Moff Tarkin shows Vader how it’s done and gets her to talk with an “alternative form of persuasion.”	-1  Overall 0
Comes up with a plan to track the rebels back to their actual base.  “You're sure the homing beacon is secure aboard their ship? I'm taking an awful risk, Vader.”	+1  Overall +1
Talks trash to Obi Wan, then finishes him off with a chop.	+1  Overall +2
Opens up shop in the Death Star trench, destroying ship after ship. He also has his own special TIE fighter. You can see throughout all the movies, piloting is his greatest strength.	+2  Overall +4

Final Thoughts: Despite capturing the audience’s attention throughout the movie, he doesn’t do much. He even gets talked down to by Grand Moff Tarkin, who is “holding Vader’s leash.” Tarkin is the one who gives the order to fire the Death Star’s beam at Alderaan. He is supposed to be the main villain, but he’s not as captivating as Darth Vader, so he gets overlooked.

I almost took a point away for Vader's ship getting shot by Han Solo at the end, but he doesn’t even get hit by Han. His own scrub teammate crashes into him. The job of his wingmen is to absorb any attacks from behind so that he can get off a clear shot. It's great strategy by Vader, but poor execution by his lackeys. One of them gets shot and the other just panics immediately. If he had been watching his radar maybe he would’ve been prepared. It’s not like the Falcon wasn’t on their radar, it’s widely known that no ship that small has a cloaking device.

Luke Skywalker

Luke observes the red droid has a bad motivator and after listening to C3P0, suggests Uncle Owen consider “that blue one”.	+1  Overall: +1
Luke gets tricked by R2D2 into removing the restraining bolt. It turns out to be a good thing cause he isn’t there to be burnt to death and he meets Old Ben Kenobi, but still, being tricked and outrun by a droid that can’t go up stairs is ridiculous.	-1  Overall: 0
Luke catches up with R2D2	+1  Overall: +1
Luke gets snuck up on and wooped by a sandperson, but is rescued by Obi Wan.	-1  Overall: 0
Luke is a shrewd bargainer. He tells Han straight up that his prices are too high. He is ready to leave negotiations and fly a ship himself.	+1  Overall: +1
Luke learns to use the force and successfully completes the training session onboard the Millennium Falcon.	+1  Overall: +2
Luke comes up with a plan to get into the detention area by using Chewbacca as a prisoner.	+1  Overall: +3
Luke contacts C3P0 to save everyone from the trash compacter	+1  Overall: +4
Yelling “No!” at Darth Vader before making their escape is not a good idea. Although it could be a hereditary trait. Stormtroopers begin firing in their direction.	-1  Overall: +3
Luke destroys 2 TIE fighters while fleeing the Death Star.	+1  Overall: +4
Luke shows confidence in front of the other pilots. He can bullseye a wamprat and is certain the Death Star trench run can be successful.	+1  Overall: +5
Luke’s callsign is Red 5 during the attack. Which means they consider him the 5th most skilled pilot on the red squad. When Red Leader is killed after his unsuccessful shot, Luke assumes command (even though Red 2 (Wedge) and 3 (Biggs) are still alive). He starts issuing commands and developing plans for attack. “You worry about those fighters, I’ll worry about towers.” Just before the attack Red Leader was asking Luke, “You sure you can handle this ship, Do you even lift?” Who’s laughing now?	+1  Overall: +6
Luke makes a 1 in a million shot, blowing up the deathstar. Receives medal like a boss.	+5  Overall: +11

Final Thoughts: Luke is overlooked by a lot of people, but he is actually one of the strongest characters. He has no fear from the beginning. When he thinks there might be sandpeople, he goes for a look. When it gets real in a battle, he doesn’t panic. He’s a quick learner, a quick thinker and a natural leader. He’s quite clever for a human. His main downfall is that he isn’t as handsome as Han Solo.

Princess Leia

Before she’s captured, she gets the Death Star plans hidden and safely away from Darth Vader.	+1  Overall: +1
Her resistance to the mind probe is considerable.	+1  Overall: +2
Gives Grand Moff Tarkin a decoy rebel base (Dantooine), knowing that it’s too remote to make an effective demonstration, instead of the actual base (Yavin). Tarkin was going to destroy Alderaan no matter what answer she gave, so I’m not deducting points for that.	+1  Overall: +3
Leia comes up with an escape plan when they are trapped in the detention area. Someone’s got to save their skins.	+1  Overall: +4
She’s pretty good with the blaster, nails a couple enemies.	+1  Overall: +5
She leads the Empire to the actual Rebel Base even though she knows they are being tracked. It’s the only explanation for the ease of their escape.	-1  Overall: +4

Final thoughs: She gets it done, but the story doesn’t completely depend on her. Still, she’s a strong female character who keeps her clothes on (for now).

Han Solo

He gets a good bargain from Ben for simply flying them from one planet to another. “Who’s gonna fly it, you?”	+1  Overall +1
Shoots Greedo and leaves him there, but does tip the bartender. “Sorry about the mess.”	+1  Overall +2
Smooths things over with Jabba, even calls him a “wonderful human being”, even though it’s not in the script. This scene was cut from the original but added back in.	+1  Overall +3
Outruns the Imperial Star Destroyer with his maneuvers. “Don’t everyone thank me at once.”	+1  Overall +3
Hides the crew in his smuggling compartments to avoid being caught on the Death Star. He also forges the ship’s log to say they abandoned ship just after takeoff.	+1  Overall +4
I love that he tells the Imperial officer that the elevator is full and points to Chewbacca.  He blasts everything in sight in the detention area, then has a hilarious ad libbed conversation to buy Luke some time. “Boring conversation anyway.”	+1  Overall +5
Charges a couple of storm troopers and sends them fleeing	+1  Overall +6
Realizes he was in way over his head when he runs into hundreds of troops, then runs away	-1  Overall +5
Destroys 2 tie fighters while fleeing the Death Star	+1  Overall +6
Stays for the whole battle plan speech, then leaves right before the battle like a dick	-1  Overall +5
Comes back at a critical time in the Death Star battle and saves Luke. I knew there was more to him than money.	+3  Overall +8

Final Thoughts: He’s so cocky and self confident that he quickly becomes your favorite. He can speak Wookiee, Huttese and whatever language Greedo speaks. He has his own ship and is good in a firefight. He’s a quick thinker, smooth talker and a good leader.

R2D2

He holds the death star plans and gets into the escape pod.	+1  Overall +1
Gets zapped and captured by the Jawas	-1  Overall 0
Tricks Luke into removing the restraining bolt so he can go looking for Obi Wan. “I’ve never seen such devotion in a droid before.”	+1  Overall +1
He cleverly hides when the Sand people attack, he is the only one left unharmed. He plays the message for Obi Wan.	+1  Overall +2
As soon as he gets on the Imperial network he alerts everyone to Princess Leia’s location.	+1  Overall +3
Artoo reminds C3P0 to check the comlink so he can rescue Han, Chewy, Leia, and Luke from being crushed to death.	+2  Overall +5
Gives the plans to the Rebels and possibly is the one to provide the location of the Death Star’s weakness.	+1   Overall +6
Locks down a stabilizer for Luke during the Death Star battle. Also takes a shot to the back of the head during the battle.	+2  Overall +8

Final thoughts: R2D2 is a driving force throughout all the episodes. He solves everyone’s problems and saves the day numerous times.  Hardly ever making a mistake, I could argue that the Force is as strong with him as with any other character.

Measurements that confuse me

    Nearly everything in the world can be measured by numbers and the higher the number the more/bigger the item is. However, some things don’t follow this obvious numbering scheme and they make my head hurt.

Women’s clothes

      Let’s assign an arbitrary number instead of a measurement. Now let’s skip every other number. And let’s make 0 a size. 

 

     How can 0 be a size? It should be the absence of a size. But it gets even worse. What if it’s smaller than a size 0? Well let’s call that a double 0. So somehow 00 is smaller than 0. Obviously the creators of this system were not mathematicians.

Bed sizes

A twin bed is the smallest bed. From the name of it, you’d think it could fit 2 people, but it can’t. 

     Then you look at the other sizes: Full, Queen, King. So maybe a twin is just half a full? That would make sense, because as we all know, a twin is only half of a full person. But 2 twins don’t make up a Full anyway. 2 twins would be wider than a full. However, 2 twins would be the same width as a Queen, but not the same length. Confused yet? At least King and Queen make sense, it’s easy to tell which on is bigger. But it gets tricky when you get bigger than King. There’s a California king that’s even bigger. So I guess everything is bigger in Cali? I thought everything was bigger in Texas. Maybe they should just go by playing cards and call it an Ace. How about just calling them by their length and width measurements? Nah, far too easy.

Wire gauge

So the smaller the number, the bigger the wire? 

     That’s really confusing. So say I’ve got a 12 ga. Wire and that’s not big enough. So I’ll switch to something bigger. How about 2 ga.? No that would be way too big. What's the biggest size you have? Size 0. Huh?
 
 

 

Tennis scoring

   The first point you win in a game is worth 15 points. So is the 2^nd. But the 3^rd is only worth 10. I’m not even gonna get into deuce. For example, if I win the first 2 points of a game, the score would be 30-0. Now if you win the next point, you get 15 points. However, if I were to win that point, it would only be worth 10. That’s racist.

But here’s where they really get me. Every time someone wins a game, there score is increased by 1. Then when they win enough games, their number of sets is increased by 1. When they win enough sets, they win the match. So the creators of tennis scoring understand how to keep it simple and add 1 for every game won, or every set won, but chose not to do so for every point won.

On to the most confusing measurement system

Light bulbs

They have different sizes, but they are labeled with letters.

I can’t even argue why it is a bad system because I have no idea how it works. I just match the letter of what I need, or I bring the burnt out bulb with me. Good luck getting the right one, cause I can’t help you.