Disney+It’s a known fact that Stormtroopers can’t shoot to save their lives – literally – but after years of ignoring it, the elephant in the room has finally been acknowledged in recent episodes of The Mandalorian.
Stormtroopers’ lack of aim has been a running joke ever since the original Skywalker saga, after fans noticed them continuously missing what was thought to be an easy shot.
In the early days, it seemed the protagonists always evaded fire from their blasters, but really it was likely they were needed to be kept alive to keep the story line going. But as the saga went on, there were even more scenes of the Stormtroopers missing their targets from stupidly close proximity and arguably – with their training – this shouldn’t be happening.
Disney+Fans began to pick up on this, making it common knowledge that, well, Stormtroopers can’t shoot for shit, which became a hallmark of their appearances in the franchise.
Following this, someone decided to pay homage to this in the final episode of The Mandalorian, where two Stormtroopers pass time by shooting at a tin can – which they miss every time.
One Twitter user shared the funny clip, which you can see here:
Stormtrooper bad aim is canon now.#TheMandalorian pic.twitter.com/dSj6TL4eaQ
— Yak Yak 💀🎄 (@I_Am_Yakiti) December 27, 2019
Following a post on Quora, one person expressed their own, potentially valid, opinions on why Stormtroopers are such a shit shot.
The Quora user gives the following reasons:
A) Their helmets have low visibility.
A throwaway line from Captain Rex in Star Wars Rebels says that he prefers his Clone Wars era armor than that of Imperial Stormtroopers, as the helmet’s visor is misaligned, making it hard to see.
B) They miss on purpose.
When needs call for it, they will use suppression tactics to coax a target to a predetermined place, such as a bugged Millennium Falcon in Ep 4. When they were taking on the rebels in the Tantive IV they didn’t miss, since they had orders to arrest the princess and kill anyone else.
C) The Force protects the Jedi from their weapons.
The pilot movie for Rebels shows Kanan Jarrus walking out from behind cover into oncoming fire, and dodging all the shots without missing a beat. And that is without his lightsaber. He predicted where the shots would be and was able to dodge with ease.
D) Stormtroopers are inferior to Clones.
Remember that the Clone Army were created from the template of esteemed Mandalorian Warrior turned Bounty Hunter Jango Fett. The Fett clones were trained for over a decade in combat skills and military training, had the musculature of one of the finest soldiers in the galaxy, and were trained to be excellent marksman.
Imperial Stormtroopers consisted of mostly humans who had been recruited as a police force rather than an army. Their training didn’t concern military tactics because it was an era of peace. The warzones were instead commanded by the special forces such as Supercommandos (Imperial Mandalorians), Death Troopers (elite guards and spec-ops soldiers) and the 501st legion (Vader’s personal battalion made up of Clone Veterans and birth-born humans). The 501st was the only legion to retain clone commandos, and thanks to their superior training served as the strongest unit of troops for large scale battles such as the Battle of Hoth.
Disney+Maybe they do do it on purpose, maybe they don’t, you can decide for yourself; but one thing I’m sure we can all agree on is the way they address it in The Mandalorian was pretty funny.
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Niamh Shackleton is a pint sized person and journalist at UNILAD. After studying Multimedia Journalism at the University of Salford, she did a year at Caters News Agency as a features writer in Birmingham before deciding that Manchester is (arguably) one of the best places in the world, and therefore moved back up north. She’s also UNILAD’s unofficial crazy animal lady.