Author Topic: Who ARE these Imperials? (ROTJ: BLUE Uniforms!)  (Read 5723 times)

Offline Mobile Artillery

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Who ARE these Imperials? (ROTJ: BLUE Uniforms!)
« on: May 23, 2005, 11:14 PM »
I already posted this over at RS (PLEASE don't hurt me! :-[)  If this has already been mentioned, let me offer my apologies in advance.

http://mobileartillery.blogspot.com/2005/04/pilotgunnery-crew.html
 http://mobileartillery.blogspot.com/2005/05/zaarin.html

Since I'm half expecting these links to be broken, I'll describe them.

Some of the Imperials in the scene where the Emperor visits the Second Death Star are wearing uniforms like I've never seen before.  It appears they're standing amongst the Imperial Navy people... right alongside the shuttle and adjacent to some Naval Techs/Crewmen.

What's really weird is their uniform is blue, which struck me as very odd.  They're wearing shiny black "cockroach" style helmets like the Death Star Troopers', except the backs are rounded off more instead of tapering to a point (they're shaped like the ones that Rebel Technicians wore in ANH).  They have black goggles and a black chinstrap.  They have very loose-fitting, baggy jumpsuits that are most definitley blue.  No belt, no fancy gloves.

On another note, after that I realized that in one of the cutscenes in the TIE Fighter game, when Admiral Zaarin is presenting the new TIE Advanced model to Lord Vader, his uniform also appears to be blue!  The picture's kind of messed, but you can see it a lot better in the game.  In comparison, his uniform is cut different; blue double-breasted tunic, blue officer's cap, eupalets, cuffs, and a belt; probably with belt boxes.  He is back is turned for the whole time so you can't see the front of his uniform.

So I got to thinking, being sure to put on my thinking cap of course, maybe the two are related in the same way?  For an example; olive seems to be one of the indicitive "colors" of the Imperial Navy, the Fleet(s) in particular.  The TIE Fighter Pilots's noncombat uniforms are olive as well.  This compells a lot of us to believe that the Starfighter Forces are part of the Navy (or at least have a "dotted line" relationship).  Well, if we can follow that train of logic, if these weird blue Imperials are wearing blue and appear to be in the Navy, and Zaarin is wearing blue and is obviously in the Navy, then there must be a relationship between the two.

Let's think some more (put those caps on).  The guys in the blue jumpsuits really seem to have the uniforms tailored to function over form.  I mean, look at what they're wearing!  The fact that they're wearing simple jumpsuits, hardly anything to look at, coupled with the fact that they aren't even spared the commodity of shiny black belts, means that they are obviously engaged in some form of hard labor.  They have no gloves, which means that they probably do some fine-tuning type work where gloves would only inhibit your fingers' dexterity.  Also, they have helmets.  Not only does this mean that they may be in danger of stuff falling on their heads, basically dangerous work conditions, but also that the helmet looks like it hugs their heads pretty snug means that they might be confined to thight working spaces.

Now.  In this cutscene when Zaarin is exhibiting the technical advantages of the new TIE model, he's wearing this zany blue tunic.  In every other appearance he makes he has the regular grey tunic on.

What gives?  Well, I've analyzed everything as best as I could, and the conclusion that I draw from all this is that this whole blue thing is associated with like maybe elite, prototype starfighter work.  The nitty gritty worker uniforms would be perfect for assembling and tuning up new TIES, and that would explain why Zaarin was wearing that particular blue uniform for his demonstration.

It's all I can think of, and the more I ponder it the more I like it.  I can't think of anything else that would be even feasible.  And by the way, I haven't come across any reference to this type of uniform anywhere on the internet, not even the SWTC.  If anyone has thoughts or more information please share.
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Offline Mister Skeezler

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Re: Who ARE these Imperials? (ROTJ: BLUE Uniforms!)
« Reply #1 on: May 24, 2005, 10:51 AM »
I'm thinking mechanics. The uniforms (in the one pic I was able to open) look like they are black, but the set lighting (and non color-corrected image) makes them look blue. I'm not going by any EU here, so that's my guess.
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Offline Jesse James

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Re: Who ARE these Imperials? (ROTJ: BLUE Uniforms!)
« Reply #2 on: May 24, 2005, 02:54 PM »
Personally, I don't think either uniform is blue.  It's not on my machine anyway, when I mess with the color.  I've lightened it, sampled it, changed it around and it comes up pretty much just black to me, so I'm still going to stick with that.

Zaarin's cutscene I'm leaning towards that just being the lighting.  Vader's blue in the sequence as well, and there's blue light dimliy illuminating the scene (I don't have that scene handy since my pilot's wiped from my computer so I can't access it, but the screencap is blue lit to me and I'd assume Zaarin's in a basic uniform then in my view).

With that in mind, I'm thinking, personally, that the guys in the ROTJ scene are just gunnery crewman.  I have noticed guys in the background that have the Gunner's helmet without the bottom portion to it.  They look like that guy to me...  The shots are a little tough to tell, but the Gunner's helmet (without the bottom) is almost identical to the RFT's helmet.  I think that could be either the Gunner's helmet without all its extra pieces, or a DST helmet with its neck extension, but for now I'm personally sticking with the ROTJ guy being just another form of gunnery crewman...  To me though the uniform looks black entirely, I don't see blue, so it's like the Han Hoth debate all over.  ;D
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Offline Omega Squad Commander

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Re: Who ARE these Imperials? (ROTJ: BLUE Uniforms!)
« Reply #3 on: May 24, 2005, 04:24 PM »
Hey! What is doing General Vader with that blue outfit?  ;D That's so Infinity. :P
« Last Edit: June 9, 2005, 04:07 PM by Omega Squad Commander »

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Offline Mobile Artillery

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Re: Who ARE these Imperials? (ROTJ: BLUE Uniforms!)
« Reply #4 on: May 26, 2005, 05:11 PM »
My bad, they are on the SWTC (haha, fancy them overlooking something :P)



They don't provide much text of value or theorize what these men might be.  They describe the uniform as blue-black overalls with a single-breasted top.  While I agree with them being blue, bordering dark violet, they can stand alone on their statement that they wear long black gloves.  And also, in my first post, I believe I said they wore jumpsuits but that might not be.  Since most of the jumpsuits worn by the IMperials are made of a semi-reflective synthetic type material and have huge pockets on the sleeve and pant leg.  Since these features are not easily apparent on this blue uniform, I retract that statement and agree that they're actually single-breasted cloth tunics like some black ones worn by other Imps in the same scene.  Sorry about that.

Also, in my picture of Zaarin, I am sure he is wearing a blue uniform.  The colors turned out kind of irregular because I had to manually take a picutre of the screen with my digital camera - the game didn't let me take in-game screen captures.  And photographing a computer, you know how things end up funny looking.  I wish you had a pilot handy so you could take a look yourself Jesse.

At any rate, it's exciting to know about these mysterious uniforms.  It really goes to show how rich in detail the Star Wars movies are.  Also, the notion that them and Zarrin could be intertwined in some way excites me because it might be a completely new division of the Imperial Navy untapped by EU or anything really.  Who knows what might happen?  And if someone has any more leads, let me know.
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Offline mutantpoo

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Re: Who ARE these Imperials? (ROTJ: BLUE Uniforms!)
« Reply #5 on: March 28, 2006, 12:30 AM »
I'd guess Imperial Naval Trooper security rookies.   ;D ;D ;D

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Offline Clone Commander

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Re: Who ARE these Imperials? (ROTJ: BLUE Uniforms!)
« Reply #6 on: March 28, 2006, 02:06 AM »
Rent an Imperial, these guys will show up in malls all across the galaxy!
I can see it now:

Imp Rookie: Hey you kid stop, you cant ride hover-boards in here!   >:(

Kid: Get bent!  ;D

Imp Rookie:  :'(  -sniff- I'll be general some day...some day...

Next day the empire is destroyed and the Imp Rookie jumps off of the imperial palace.
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Offline mutantpoo

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Re: Who ARE these Imperials? (ROTJ: BLUE Uniforms!)
« Reply #7 on: March 29, 2006, 12:58 AM »
Rent an Imperial, these guys will show up in malls all across the galaxy!
I can see it now:

Imp Rookie: Hey you kid stop, you cant ride hover-boards in here!   >:(

Kid: Get bent!  ;D

Imp Rookie:  :'(  -sniff- I'll be general some day...some day...

Next day the empire is destroyed and the Imp Rookie jumps off of the imperial palace.


Heh  Heh
Or trying to impress the teenage space girls

Imp Rookie: Yeah that's right . This whole mall , it's my beat.
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Offline Clone Commander

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Re: Who ARE these Imperials? (ROTJ: BLUE Uniforms!)
« Reply #8 on: March 29, 2006, 01:44 PM »
LoL!  ;D

Anyways, they are probably officers in training.
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Offline mutantpoo

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Re: Who ARE these Imperials? (ROTJ: BLUE Uniforms!)
« Reply #9 on: March 30, 2006, 01:05 AM »
Ohh ooh, they're the janitors. Somebody has to keep the Death Star clean.
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Offline Jesse James

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Re: Who ARE these Imperials? (ROTJ: BLUE Uniforms!)
« Reply #10 on: March 30, 2006, 02:13 AM »
For my money they're part of the gunnery crews...  The uniforms still appear black to me, and the helmets appear to be just the top-halves of the Gunner's helmet with no mouth piece.  I'm gonna think they're GUnnery crewmen of some sort or another for the time being.
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Offline Clone Commander

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Re: Who ARE these Imperials? (ROTJ: BLUE Uniforms!)
« Reply #11 on: March 30, 2006, 01:32 PM »
Its possible.  :)
I think somebody should send a letter to Lucas asking this, he probably wouldnt even know.
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Offline Desfiy

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Re: Who ARE these Imperials? (ROTJ: BLUE Uniforms!)
« Reply #12 on: August 14, 2006, 10:54 PM »
There Geordie construction workers, they come from newcastle in england, lol.

But seriously, I think they are construction workers seeing they had to make the death star II, so it's a reasonible assumption they had to have construction workers to build the damn thing.