Star Wars: Rogue One-Plot Holes and other problems you notice with it??

[SuperiorIronman]

Yes, because it was intentionally designed to go boom, making it go boom becomes less of an accomplishment.

For me seeing the shitty explanation for things we already knew happened just makes those things weaker and less interesting . Maybe if the movie had been good it would have added something, but it wasn't, so it didn't. I don't care about seeing a bunch of badly drawn characters going on some boring missions and dying in the end; these aren't real people, they're bad boring fictional characters. I don't care about the sacrifices of uninteresting make believe characters in some uninteresting make believe story; a movie has to make you care about that stuff, this one didn't. Having their faces associated with Star Wars is a bad thing, because this is a bad movie, and this bad movie is wanting me to think about it now while I'm watching a good one. It's like Return of the Jedi wanting me to think about the crappy prequels at the end of the movie, I don't want to think about the bad ones while I'm watching the good ones.

And seeing that it goes right into Star Wars makes the whole thing monumentally stupid. I'm not even sure how that ending is meant to jive with anything said at the beginning of Star Wars. Oh really, you're on a diplomatic mission? Because we just followed your tiny ship for the big ship that was at the battle, and we know you got the transmission from where the battle was happening. Did anyone ever imagine something so stupid before this movie, I mean, besides whoever it was that came of with that really dumb ending?

Again, it's not like the Rebel's would hit the exhaust port no matter what. The Death Star was well maintained and the Imperials after discovering the weakness nonetheless felt confident in the exhaust port being unreachable (turbo lasers, Tie fighters, what would've been a fleet of Star Destroyers, as well as enough soldiers aboard that you couldn't simply take the station itself). Granted that there was a chance for the station to be blown up but it still required the Force for it to work. Most of the squadron was wiped out during that (not counting the Millennium Falcon, 3 out of 30 ships got shot down) and Darth Vader was about to shoot down Luke Skywalker should Han Solo not intervened when he did. Not to mention that the attack on the Death Star was right up to the last second, as the Death Star was about to fire on Yavin-4. Should Luke have instead used the targeting computer, or perhaps have been shot down by Vader, or even was a little late Yavin-4 would be star dust. They also used starfighters, as frigates would've been picked off by the Death Star's own defenses so the Rebels sending starfighters was the only chance without trying to infiltrate the complex itself.

Bear in mind that the Death Star still worked.
Keep in mind that the entire station still functioned and had a weakness that was no more than 6 feet wide.
The only other person to get that far to fire on it without the aid of the Force not only missed, but got shot down shortly after.
Without Galen's message or him being alive for that matter, and the heroes on Scarif unable to send the plans to the Alliance, they never would've known how to destroy the station and the attack would've been in vain should it have shown up.
It wasn't a kick me sign as nobody could actually fire on the hole in the first place.

It wasn't designed to go boom. The Death Star still worked and had one flaw that nobody but a guy with the aid of space magic could hit. Galen's weakness is assuming that anybody could hit that in the first place as not even trained soldiers could do it.

Another thing is that the crew of Tantive-4 had no idea the Devastator would be following them since they jumped to Hyperspace the minute they could. Darth Vader wasn't even aboard his Star Destroyer yet. Not only did they not realize any Imperials would follow them specifically as everyone jumped, but they also had no idea it would be Darth Vader and Vader personally making an entrance. He still needed time for he and his Stormtroopers to board his Star Destroyer, and any surviving Rebel present would think they could escape before Vader could resume post. It's sheer luck Darth Vader could return to his ship so quickly.
The diplomatic mission excuse might fool the average Imperial, but it's not like they knew it was Darth Vader's Star Destroyer. It's not like they knew Darth Vader would personally be boarding the ship, and any rebel aboard is from Leia's unit presumably from Alderaan and she is a diplomat. So any other Imperial might think they may have made a mistake since it's not like the Tantive-4 is the only one of its kind. Any Rebel interrogated also wouldn't give it away but there is also the chance they might fool them and get to live, stealing Imperial records would guarantee death. They also never found the plans on the ship which didn't fool Vader, but again, it's not like they expected him to single them out nor did anyone expect he would personally follow. Sure Vader saw the ship but could he really have known where they would be going?

[WebLurker]

And seeing that it goes right into Star Wars makes the whole thing monumentally stupid. I'm not even sure how that ending is meant to jive with anything said at the beginning of Star Wars. Oh really, you're on a diplomatic mission? Because we just followed your tiny ship for the big ship that was at the battle, and we know you got the transmission from where the battle was happening. Did anyone ever imagine something so stupid before this movie, I mean, besides whoever it was that came of with that really dumb ending?

That's not a contradiction; Leia's story was always crap and both she and Vader knew it as far back as '77; the movie opens up with her crew shooting at a Imperial ship and attacking the Stormtroopers that came onboard. Leia's story was always a pathetic lie, R1 just showed us the full context of how groundless it was.

[Za Waldo]

No, the Death Star was designed to go boom. Rogue One is a giant retcon about how an Imperial scientist sercretly designed the whole thing to go boom boom this whole time. No longer is this a tiny chink in the armor thought of as too unimportant to matter, now it's something secretly put there to help the good guys.

Was the Death Star well maintained? Did they feel confident this weakness was a nonissue? Rogue One take place only moments before Star Wars. I don't even remember, but did the guy that was told of the weakness even tell anyone over him? Did he tell Grand Moff Tarkin, the person he hated for taking over and taking credit for his project? Did the Empire even know? If they don't, there goes that hubris angle the original movie had. Rogue One, you just keep making Star Wars less interesting.

I've no idea how anyone could even defend that stupid ending taking use right into Star Wars. The whole thing is dumb, and it doesn't make any sense. Let me ask you a question. When you watched Star Wars, did you ever get the impression that Vader was following them directly from a giant battle where they just got the Death Star plans, and you could see Princess Leia's ship exiting a ship that was at the battle? I'm not even sure why the conversation in Star Wars even happened now given the new context Rogue One places the opening of Star Wars in. Shit, why didn't the opening crawl of Star Wars give us that information? I mean, if she was racing away from the Rebel's first win, you'd think the movie would have made a point of telling us.

[Za Waldo]

That's not a contradiction; Leia's story was always crap and both she and Vader knew it as far back as '77; the movie opens up with her crew shooting at a Imperial ship and attacking the Stormtroopers that came onboard. Leia's story was always a pathetic lie, R1 just showed us the full context of how groundless it was.

No, it is a contradiction. Before she could have actually been doing the thing she said she was doing while also using it as an opportunity to smuggle information from one place to another. Now that can't be a thing, because we (and everyone else) see her fleeing the giant battle where the plans were just taken.

Yeah, the original movie opens with characters on the run from other characters, and people shooting back and forth at people shooting at them. This doesn't tell us they were on the run from the opening crawl battle, or what the situation beforehand looked like. Before you could have guess one thing, now Rogue One puts everything into a new very stupid context where nothing about the Star Wars opening makes sense.

[Carabas]

Rogue One take place only moments before Star Wars. I don't even remember, but did the guy that was told of the weakness even tell anyone over him? Did he tell Grand Moff Tarkin, the person he hated for taking over and taking credit for his project? Did the Empire even know? If they don't, there goes that hubris angle the original movie had. Rogue One, you just keep making Star Wars less interesting.

Nope. Krennic took the secret with him when he died.
Tarkin probably suspected something, which is probably why he nuked the entire at storage facility.

When you watched Star Wars, did you ever get the impression that Vader was following them directly from a giant battle where they just got the Death Star plans, and you could see Princess Leia's ship exiting a ship that was at the battle?

I certainly did get the impression that he'd beenchasing those plans, and that he knew she had them.

I'm not even sure why the conversation in Star Wars even happened now given the new context Rogue One places the opening of Star Wars in.

He didn't see her and there are a lot of Correlian Corvettes in the galaxy. He knew, hecould not actually prove it, and she was still a Senator while ther was still an actual Senate, and he wasn't Darth Vader, Impervious Lord Of All yet. That came after Episode IV.

No, it is a contradiction. Before she could have actually been doing the thing she said she was doing while also using it as an opportunity to smuggle information from one place to another. Now that can't be a thing, because we (and everyone else) see her fleeing the giant battle where the plans were just taken.

No, she couldn't have, because he ship was loaded with armed Rebel soldiers, in uniform no less. And she's Bail Organa's daughter. Palpatine and Vader know all about Bail Organa, they have been enemies since the Clone Wars.

Really, if you just take the opening of Star Wars, and nothing else at all, Vader would have been fully justifoed in executing her on the spot. Because he "diplomatic" ship was full of terrorists who shot a bunch of Stormtroopers.

[SuperiorIronman]

No, the Death Star was designed to go boom. Rogue One is a giant retcon about how an Imperial scientist sercretly designed the whole thing to go boom boom this whole time. No longer is this a tiny chink in the armor thought of as too unimportant to matter, now it's something secretly put there to help the good guys.

Was the Death Star well maintained? Did they feel confident this weakness was a nonissue? Rogue One take place only moments before Star Wars. I don't even remember, but did the guy that was told of the weakness even tell anyone over him? Did he tell Grand Moff Tarkin, the person he hated for taking over and taking credit for his project? Did the Empire even know? If they don't, there goes that hubris angle the original movie had. Rogue One, you just keep making Star Wars less interesting.

I've no idea how anyone could even defend that stupid ending taking use right into Star Wars. The whole thing is dumb, and it doesn't make any sense. Let me ask you a question. When you watched Star Wars, did you ever get the impression that Vader was following them directly from a giant battle where they just got the Death Star plans, and you could see Princess Leia's ship exiting a ship that was at the battle? I'm not even sure why the conversation in Star Wars even happened now given the new context Rogue One places the opening of Star Wars in. Shit, why didn't the opening crawl of Star Wars give us that information? I mean, if she was racing away from the Rebel's first win, you'd think the movie would have made a point of telling us.

Sure the Death Star had a built in weakness now but no one could actually hit the weakness itself. The Death Star may have a built-in flaw, but the entire station still functioned as expected, it still destroyed planets as designed. Security worked, the station was a nightmare to infiltrate, turbolasers meant you couldn't just take a fleet to it, and the Tie fighters would shoot down remaining starfighters. The Rebels couldn't destroy it without the aid of the Force.

The Death Star meeting room scene doesn't mention the exhaust port, though Tagge does admit that a flaw can be found within the Death Star plans though even he admits it's unlikely they (the Rebels) can destroy the station. The consensus of the room was that the Imperials had been confident in it's effectiveness and that Darth Vader would recover the plans before any attack could be formed. Even if an attack was mounted against the Death Star no one seemed all that worried until someone got right up onto the exhaust port and even then the Rebel couldn't hit the target. Even then when they did blow up their first planet, Tarkin and company appeared confident enough to give a full demonstration and had no worries in the weapon performing at peak effectiveness, and of course Alderaan is destroyed then it did everything it needed to do.

How was this even the Rebel's first win? The crawl states that this had been going on for awhile which was part of the reason Tagge was so worried about them. The Rebel's while not making substantial progress had been active and fighting the Empire long prior to this. They may not have been as organized prior to Rogue One's events but the Rebel Alliance wasn't really a thing until the end of Star Wars anyways. There had been 20 years of Rebellion since Revenge of the Sith.

[Za Waldo]

Sure the Death Star had a built in weakness now but no one could actually hit the weakness itself. The Death Star may have a built-in flaw, but the entire station still functioned as expected, it still destroyed planets as designed. Security worked, the station was a nightmare to infiltrate, turbolasers meant you couldn't just take a fleet to it, and the Tie fighters would shoot down remaining starfighters. The Rebels couldn't destroy it without the aid of the Force.

Yeah, this movie changes thing from a tiny flaw people couldn't hit into something designed to be hit that they nevertheless still couldn't hit. Before it looed like they accomplished the impossible, but the new information recontextualizes what happened before. Now it looks like a bunch of people failing to hit the ball off the tee.

Was the station a nightmare to infiltrate? It didn't seem like it was.

The Death Star meeting room scene doesn't mention the exhaust port, though Tagge does admit that a flaw can be found within the Death Star plans though even he admits it's unlikely they (the Rebels) can destroy the station. The consensus of the room was that the Imperials had been confident in it's effectiveness and that Darth Vader would recover the plans before any attack could be formed. Even if an attack was mounted against the Death Star no one seemed all that worried until someone got right up onto the exhaust port and even then the Rebel couldn't hit the target. Even then when they did blow up their first planet, Tarkin and company appeared confident enough to give a full demonstration and had no worries in the weapon performing at peak effectiveness, and of course Alderaan is destroyed then it did everything it needed to do.

The meeting room scene doesn't tell you a flaw can be found, or that they're even aware of one. It only tells you a weakness could maybe be discovered in the station given they have technical readout of it, although that it's unlikely that could happen. Then again that makes sense, given the whole stupid idea about a flaw intentionally being built into the Death Star wasn't even an idea in '77. Given how Star Wars plays, and the new information Rogue One gives us, it would seem they had no idea there was a special place that could be hit that would bring the whole thing down.

How was this even the Rebel's first win? The crawl states that this had been going on for awhile which was part of the reason Tagge was so worried about them. The Rebel's while not making substantial progress had been active and fighting the Empire long prior to this. They may not have been as organized prior to Rogue One's events but the Rebel Alliance wasn't really a thing until the end of Star Wars anyways. There had been 20 years of Rebellion since Revenge of the Sith.

The crawl in Star Wars tells you this was their first win. The movie opens with:

It is a period of civil war. Rebel spaceships, striking from a hidden base, have won their first victory against the evil Galactic Empire.

[SuperiorIronman]

Yeah, this movie changes thing from a tiny flaw people couldn't hit into something designed to be hit that they nevertheless still couldn't hit. Before it looed like they accomplished the impossible, but the new information recontextualizes what happened before. Now it looks like a bunch of people failing to hit the ball off the tee.

Was the station a nightmare to infiltrate? It didn't seem like it was.



The meeting room scene doesn't tell you a flaw can be found, or that they're even aware of one. It only tells you a weakness could maybe be discovered in the station given they have technical readout of it, although that it's unlikely that could happen. Then again that makes sense, given the whole stupid idea about a flaw intentionally being built into the Death Star wasn't even an idea in '77. Given how Star Wars plays, and the new information Rogue One gives us, it would seem they had no idea there was a special place that could be hit that would bring the whole thing down.



The crawl in Star Wars tells you this was their first win. The movie opens with:

It is a period of civil war. Rebel spaceships, striking from a hidden base, have won their first victory against the evil Galactic Empire.

My mistake on the crawl but everything since has shown rebels making wins against the Empire though small by comparison.
The guys in the meeting room knew there was a chance the rebels could destroy the station, it's why Tagge makes such a big deal about them considering they had a full readout of the plans, Tagge was worried a weakness could be found and one was. It doesn't matter if the chink in the armor was intentional or not so much as the station still worked. Galen couldn't just put up a "kick me" sign on the thing since someone would figure it out and so the station still had to work with a flaw that was insignificant enough nobody would notice. The port was still well protected and you couldn't just infiltrate the station. By the end of Star Wars the Imperials have analyzed the attack pattern and put it together they are aiming for the exhaust port, a guy literally tells Tarkin about it. From Rogue one Darth Vader himself knows Galen Erso was up to something and that the Scarif battle was to steal the plans if Galen is already dead. If they don't know specifically in Rogue one, and they don't know specifically during the middle of Star Wars, they are well aware towards the Death Star battle of the weakness. They now know 100% that there is a weakness and it almost didn't matter (like a second differences as it was right about to fire).

The Death Star was never infallible even without Rogue One. Rogue One never makes mention of what exactly it is Galen did so much as he put something there. Weakness or not that still would be there without Rogue One and still had to be there. Someone put that in intentionally or not, with or without Galen Erso we just don't know. It doesn't invalidate how difficult the battle was as like I said prior, few came back and only won because of Luke Skywalker whom had no bearing on Rogue One.

It honestly sounds like you simply didn't enjoy the movie or didn't like the explanation for how the rebels got the plans, which is fine. However the only thing it changes about ANH is the Death Star plans being a known issue and not as recent.

[Za Waldo]

My mistake on the crawl but everything since has shown rebels making wins against the Empire though small by comparison.

Everything since what, Star Wars? Well yeah. They won in the end. Although the second movie starts with them losing.

The guys in the meeting room knew there was a chance the rebels could destroy the station, it's why Tagge makes such a big deal about them considering they had a full readout of the plans, Tagge was worried a weakness could be found and one was. It doesn't matter if the chink in the armor was intentional or not so much as the station still worked. Galen couldn't just put up a "kick me" sign on the thing since someone would figure it out and so the station still had to work with a flaw that was insignificant enough nobody would notice. The port was still well protected and you couldn't just infiltrate the station. By the end of Star Wars the Imperials have analyzed the attack pattern and put it together they are aiming for the exhaust port, a guy literally tells Tarkin about it. From Rogue one Darth Vader himself knows Galen Erso was up to something and that the Scarif battle was to steal the plans if Galen is already dead. If they don't know specifically in Rogue one, and they don't know specifically during the middle of Star Wars, they are well aware towards the Death Star battle of the weakness. They now know 100% that there is a weakness and it almost didn't matter (like a second differences as it was right about to fire).

The Death Star was never infallible even without Rogue One. Rogue One never makes mention of what exactly it is Galen did so much as he put something there. Weakness or not that still would be there without Rogue One and still had to be there. Someone put that in intentionally or not, with or without Galen Erso we just don't know. It doesn't invalidate how difficult the battle was as like I said prior, few came back and only won because of Luke Skywalker whom had no bearing on Rogue One.

It honestly sounds like you simply didn't enjoy the movie or didn't like the explanation for how the rebels got the plans, which is fine. However the only thing it changes about ANH is the Death Star plans being a known issue and not as recent.

I didn't say the Death Star was infallible, I've been saying this movie gives you the viewer new information about the Death Star, and that this new information changes the ending of the original movie. Not only does it change it, it changes it for the worse, making the original ending weaker.

There's only one person in the meeting room that sees the Rebels as a threat. But nothing said in that scene, even the thing the one guy says about them having the technical readout, would indicate that anyone on that base knows anything at all about a built in weakness that can make the whole station go kaboom. So it isn't like they were still confident nobody could reach that weakness because none of them even know it's a thing.

Yes, a movie coming along and saying someone intentionally designed a weak point to be hit to blow the whole Death Star up does invalidate how hard it seemed in the original movie. If you can hit something that wasn't ever intended to be hit, you've done a good job when you hit it. If you can't hit something that was built to be hit, you're just kind of shitty at hitting stuff. I feel weird having to explain this concept, but doing a thing you weren't ever meant to do is a greater accomplishment than succeeding at something that was designed for you to win.

[thwhtGuardian]

Everything since what, Star Wars? Well yeah. They won in the end. Although the second movie starts with them losing.



I didn't say the Death Star was infallible, I've been saying this movie gives you the viewer new information about the Death Star, and that this new information changes the ending of the original movie. Not only does it change it, it changes it for the worse, making the original ending weaker.

There's only one person in the meeting room that sees the Rebels as a threat. But nothing said in that scene, even the thing the one guy says about them having the technical readout, would indicate that anyone on that base knows anything at all about a built in weakness that can make the whole station go kaboom. So it isn't like they were still confident nobody could reach that weakness because none of them even know it's a thing.

Yes, a movie coming along and saying someone intentionally designed a weak point to be hit to blow the whole Death Star up does invalidate how hard it seemed in the original movie. If you can hit something that wasn't ever intended to be hit, you've done a good job when you hit it. If you can't hit something that was built to be hit, you're just kind of shitty at hitting stuff. I feel weird having to explain this concept, but doing a thing you weren't ever meant to do is a greater accomplishment than succeeding at something that was designed for you to win.

It doesn't invalidate the ending to A New Hope at all, there was a flaw designed in the reactor with no information ever mentioned in the film as to how one might exploit that flaw so in a New Hope all the Rebel High Command knows is that there is a hope that they might be able to destroy the Death Star; but they don't know how until they get the plans.

Now, if someone at the end of Rogue One exclaimed," It's so simple, a kid who knew how to bullesye whomprats could do it!" you might have a point...but that never happened.

[Za Waldo]

It doesn't invalidate the ending to A New Hope at all, there was a flaw designed in the reactor with no information ever mentioned in the film as to how one might exploit that flaw so in a New Hope all the Rebel High Command knows is that there is a hope that they might be able to destroy the Death Star; but they don't know how until they get the plans.

Now, if someone at the end of Rogue One exclaimed," It's so simple, a kid who knew how to bullesye whomprats could do it!" you might have a point...but that never happened.

It does, it makes the ending to Star Wars less than it was. When you change something from a simple flaw into something you've designed to be hit, that changes things. It puts the whole ending of the movie in an entirely new different shitty colored light. It recontextualizes a lot about the original movie, and none of it is for the better. A movie so bad it actually starts fucking up the first one in the series. It's like nobody stopped to think about how what they were doing would effect Star Wars; which I guess isn't a surprise, because they also seemingly didn't think anything through about Rogue One.

No one needs to say something so stupid. They already have someone saying something stupid about how they've intentionally built the Death Star to blow up real good when you hit this thing. It can also very much be assumed that the way Hannibal intended for someone to do this is the way they did do it. They've got a readout of the whole station, this was seemingly the only way to get to a thing designed to be hit. You could argue they didn't attack a thing someone intentionally built for people to get to so they could destroy the Death Star the right way...but that would still change the ending of Star War, and it would still make the Rebels look really bad at what they're doing anyways. In fact it would make the Rebels look pretty stupid, make them look worse than I'm saying they look in light of the new information Rogue One gives us.

[Carabas]

... this was seemingly the only way to get to a thing designed to be hit.

Alternatively, if they had studied the plans earlier, Chewbacca could have planted an explosive charge when they were there. Much, much easier. And it didn't seem too hard to get on board either.

[WebLurker]

It does, it makes the ending to Star Wars less than it was. When you change something from a simple flaw into something you've designed to be hit, that changes things. It puts the whole ending of the movie in an entirely new different shitty colored light. It recontextualizes a lot about the original movie, and none of it is for the better. A movie so bad it actually starts fucking up the first one in the series. It's like nobody stopped to think about how what they were doing would effect Star Wars; which I guess isn't a surprise, because they also seemingly didn't think anything through about Rogue One.

No one needs to say something so stupid. They already have someone saying something stupid about how they've intentionally built the Death Star to blow up real good when you hit this thing. It can also very much be assumed that the way Hannibal intended for someone to do this is the way they did do it. They've got a readout of the whole station, this was seemingly the only way to get to a thing designed to be hit. You could argue they didn't attack a thing someone intentionally built for people to get to so they could destroy the Death Star the right way...but that would still change the ending of Star War, and it would still make the Rebels look really bad at what they're doing anyways. In fact it would make the Rebels look pretty stupid, make them look worse than I'm saying they look in light of the new information Rogue One gives us.

New movies in a series always recontextualize the previous ones in some way.

As far as it ruining ANH, hardly; the fact that the designer arranged for the Death Star to have a faulty piece that would blow it up if hit doesn't change the fact that the the Rebels needed to get the plans to Yavin IV to find out how to do that and that it took a one-in-a-million shot to actually make the target in the first place. Besides, at the end of the day, both movies asserted that there was an exploitable flaw in the reactor. The only difference was that until R1, we assumed that it was an oversight.

[Za Waldo]

Alternatively, if they had studied the plans earlier, Chewbacca could have planted an explosive charge when they were there. Much, much easier. And it didn't seem too hard to get on board either.

Like I said in the very bit you quoted. How they got to it was seemingly the only way to do so. It can be assumed what you're suggesting isn't an option, as we've already seen that getting into the Death Star isn't some impossible feat. If vent and the trench are the only way to get to something designed to be gotten to and hit, it can be assumed that was designed for them to get to it that way.

[Za Waldo]

New movies in a series always recontextualize the previous ones in some way.

No they don't. And even if that were true, the problem here is that it does so in a bad way. It does no make what came before better or more interesting, it only takes away.

As far as it ruining ANH, hardly; the fact that the designer arranged for the Death Star to have a faulty piece that would blow it up if hit doesn't change the fact that the the Rebels needed to get the plans to Yavin IV to find out how to do that and that it took a one-in-a-million shot to actually make the target in the first place. Besides, at the end of the day, both movies asserted that there was an exploitable flaw in the reactor. The only difference was that until R1, we assumed that it was an oversight.

I don't even know what you're talking about here. This movie doesn't fuck up the part of Stat Wars where they take plans to a place. I'm not even sure why you're trying to get at there.

No. One movie asserted that the Death Star had a fatal flaw. In Star Wars it's hubris that's the villains downfall. They think nothing of their enemies, and see no way such a small force could bring down such a powerful weapon. So what if vent is a weak point? There's no way anyone could possibly get to it. But now it's different. Now someone just prearranged it, they specifically designed the Death Star to explode when you hit it just right. They specifically built a place where when hit everything goes boom. And if they're helping there, how much else are they helping? You put this thing you want hit at the end of this trench, are the weapons along this specific trenchs less than they normally would be? Who knows? Why assume anything works totally like it should be when the designer of the whole station specifically tells us he built it so someone could come along and blow it up? What's even the point of added such a stupid element into the movie? Oh, an explanation of a thing that didn't need explaining. Well great, the explanation for the vent is it was secretly put there to take the Death Star down this whole time.