Warning: Do Not Read Unless You Want Star Wars To Be Ruined For You Forever

let's look back on the original star wars, specifically the climactic battle. as you may recall, the empire has moved the death star (a giant space station capable of blowing up planets) near the secret rebel base located on one of yavin's moons.

however, the death star has to orbit the planet to get to the moon for a clear shot. that leaves the rebels with time enough to exploit the weakness they've found in the death star, and blow that shit to smithereens.

maybe that was all a little dense. here's a graphic to explain it:


here, the solid green circle is the moon with the rebel base. the solid grey circle with the eye is the death star. and the orange circle is the planet in between the two. this means the death star has to proceed in its orbit until it gets to the position indicated by the unfilled grey circle - where it has a clear shot.

unfortunately, this is incredibly fucking stupid.

if anybody had thought about this for more than 15 seconds, they would have realized the easy solution - blow up the planet. why? because it only leaves the following possible outcomes:

1. planet is vaporized, eliminating the impediment to a clear shot. moon is vaporized shortly thereafter.

2. planet is blown into a bazillion chunks of flying debris, pelting the moon with asteroids, as well as any spaceships the rebels have sent to destroy the death star.

3. the moon no longer has a gravitational center to its orbit, which just HAS to be bad. i'm thinking massive earthquakes, planet goes careening into space, whatever.

thank you for nothing, george lucas.