You Have Failed Me (For The Last Time)

This was the last and most successful version of this.

File this one under "Scenes I'll Never Write In Screenplays" (whose acronym, SINWIS, is practically as cumbersome as the phrase it stands for). Whatever traction this scene once had, the slaughtering of an underling by a disappointed superior officer, is officially lost on me, along with tossing items overboard to lessen the load of a ship, a student appearing inattentive in class but actually knowing the answer and, most saliently, the passing vehicle disappearing act.

I play with the trope somewhat in Hull Damage (Bald Tizor, for the curious) and, to some extent, in Galactic Menace, with Nemo substituting the Big Bad in both cases, but I staunchly refused to allow Boss Ott to succumb to such a tactic.*

The example that finally tipped me over the edge here was The Hobbit actually, with Azog the Defiler quite unnecessary dispatching some orc minion for failing to locate the party of dwarves. As cute as the inclusion of Weathertop was, the scene itself ran so sour in my mouth from misuse. I imagine that once, in 1980, Vader choking out Captain Needa and Admiral Ozzel was the height of unflappable badassery. These days, if you don't murder a few witless boobs before brunch, you hardly deserve your fascist prick membership card.

No more villains choking out, defenestrating or especially, especially stabbing their minions in the bellies with swords while whispering one-liners in their ears for me.

*In fact, with Boss Ott, I made a conscious effort to separate him from the cartoonish and laughably idiotic depiction of Jabba, his Star Wars counterpart, whom the EU depict as the canniest gangster of them all, but ROTJ depicts as a brainless, vengeance-minded buffoon, surrounded by sycophants equally as clueless. I was determined to make Boss Ott a competent character and I hope he's all the more frightening and intimidating as a result.