One of the latest Star Wars controversies, the crossguard lightsaber shown in the teaser trailer for The Force Awakens has sparked a ton of nerd debate. Some fans think that it looks cool and could possibly serve as an excellent defensive tool. Other fans think that a crossguard lightsaber is almost as dumb as Darth Maul’s double-bladed lightsaber and that it has great potential to damage the user. As with so many situations in the world, Stephen Colbert added some much needed wisdom to the discussion.
In a recent episode of The Colbert Report, Colbert talked about his background as a lifelong Star Wars geek and nerdily gave reasons why a crossguard lightsaber makes sense. Check out the video below for a thorough and hilarious explanation.
As much as I admire Colbert and try to model my life after his, I’m not yet sold on his explanation. A certified master bladesmith told The Washington Post why a crossguard lightsaber would be dangerous to the user. While Colbert knows a great many things that cover an astonishing variety of topics, I think I’m going to go with the certified master bladesmith on this one.
Besides, the crossguard lightsaber clip shown in The Force Awakens trailer seemed like it was trying to one-up the first time Darth Maul busted out the double-bladed lightsaber in the first trailer for The Phantom Menace. Eventually, it’s going to lead to stupid things like this:
Damn I hate having to defend Phantom Menace but the bo style lightsaber made sense. The beams were clean and the device itself while wildly dangerous looked functional.
The crossguard lightsaber on the other hand look as if a Sith were to attempt to utilize the intended function then the opponent’s lightsaber would simply shear off the beam conduit. Besides the beam is all jagged so that more than likely supposes that whoever made the lightsaber did a crap job and thus the poor design on the hilt.
lagniappe: how does one become a certified master bladesmith? i don’t know where you learn that except another bladesmith and why would a bladesmith teach another person? The demand has to be tiny and therefore his piece of the pie will shrink.
I believe that being a bladesmith is similar to being a highlander (Christopher Lambert variety). They chop each other’s heads off to keep their numbers thin…but that’s just conjecture.
It’s such an obscure profession for 2015 that I’ll just agree with your conjecture.