Hello, Rebel scum!
You Rebel scum!
I’m Mike, and I’m taking that phrase back from the Imperial propaganda machine.
The Empire feeds on the fear of its constituents,
and they love showing off their power with massive superweapons
and fleets of giant, phallic Star Destroyers.
But the most terrifying symbol of Palpatine’s regime is his limitless army of white-clad murder machines.
From their humble origins as Kiwi clones to the human conscripts that make up the First Order,
Stormtroopers have terrorized the ‘Star Wars’ galaxy for decades.
And if you’re really serious about smashing fascism and restoring the Republic,
You’re gonna need to know
How to Kill Stormtroopers
When it comes to the first line of defense against the jackbooted thugs of the universe,
hokey religions and ancient weapons are no match for a good blaster at your side.
Standard-issue Stormtrooper armor consists of 18 plastoid plates,
and a hermetically sealed helmet with a state-of-the-art optics system.
I can't see a thing in this helmet!
I’m sure it’s more effective than the khakis and earth-tone vests worn by the Rebels,
But in practice the uniform seems to offer less protection than little league catcher’s gear.
Blaster bolts burn right through the armor, regardless of the source.
It doesn’t matter if you’ve got a tiny pistol,
or high-caliber starfighter cannons,
more often than not, it’s one shot, one kill.
A hardened melee fighter like FN-2199 can kick the crap out of a traitor like Finn,
but he doesn’t last too long when he’s staring down the barrel of a bowcaster.
And just look at Baze Malbus put down an entire squad of Death Troopers.
These guys have advanced tech and genetic modifications to make them the most elite soldiers in the Empire,
but one by one, they fall to a single shot from an (admittedly huge) gun.
The armor’s material can disperse the energy of glancing shot,
but a direct hit will bore a hole clear through your average grunt.
And lucky for us, most freedom-loving citizens of the Galaxy have way better aim than Palpatine’s finest.
But the Empire seizes victory through strength in numbers,
not functional armor and basic marksmanship.
If they throw enough bodies at you, eventually your gun’s gonna jam or run out of juice.
But if your blaster fails, fear you should not.
Because Stormtroopers have zero protection from
Blunt Force Trauma
Their armor might be worthless against supercharged plasma,
but you’d think it would at least help against a bump on the noggin.
In ‘Rogue One,’ Chirrut obliterates half a dozen troops with nothing more than a wooden stick.
It’s not even pointy!
Granted, Chirrut has some advantages.
The Force is with him, for one,
and I’m sure he’s expertly aware of the weak points between the plates.
He’s also Donnie Freakin’ Yen.
But how do you explain a bunch of Ewoks crackinag heads like eggs?
During the rise of the Empire, the 501st Legion conquered an entire planet of Wookies,
but just a few years later,
a whole platoon of Stormtroopers gets their ass handed to them by a primitive tribe of teddy bears.
Look, I wouldn’t mess with Ewoks either.
They eat humans, after all, so you’d better think twice if you wanna insult their god.
[EWOK LANGUAGE] Boom!
But these little guys are pretty far behind on the tech tree,
especially compared to an Imperial army with the power to destroy entire planets.
How do their stone arrowheads pierce through thick plastic?
How does a little club swung by a three-foot tall beanie baby knock out a fully grown man in armor?
What good is a helmet if a foam rock can fracture your skull?
This is what happens when you contract your armor out to the lowest bidder.
The gear doesn’t protect them from high falls either.
Maybe I was wrong in the first section.
Maybe troopers can survive a direct blaster shot,
but only if there’s a bottomless pit nearby.
I’m sure Tarkin was in a rush to finish the Death Star,
but would it have killed him to install a few railings?
I think OSHA would have some serious concerns,
but the Emperor doesn’t give a shit about his troops.
[EVIL LAUGH]
He’d rather blow the budget on giant death lasers and cool capes for his personal guard.
But even if he cared, all the credits in the world won’t buy armor to protect you from
Lightsabers
We actually don’t see a lot of saber vs. Stormtrooper action in the movies.
Finn running this guy through is one of the few times in the whole saga a trooper falls to a plasma blade.
Obi-Wan only fights Vader and some cantina thugs,
and Luke’s still reliant on his blaster in ‘Empire.’
In ‘Jedi,’ Luke slices up a bunch of Jabba’s goons,
but he gets captured peacefully before he can cut loose on any troopers.
Well, he does chop off the tip of a speeder bike which sends it into a tailspin,
but I’d say the big-ass tree is a more direct cause of death.
In the prequels, the Clones are on the Jedi’s side, at least for most of it.
And once they execute Order 66, everyone is too shocked to fight back.
except for this one little kid, apparently.
Of course, with enough prep time, a determined Jedi can cut through a squad of troopers like they’re butter.
Just look at what happens when some Clones try to arrest Pong Krell.
I will not be undermined by creatures bred in some laboratory!
Honestly? If you wanna see troopers sliced and diced,
You should just do it yourself.
Starting with ‘Jedi Knight II’s’ legendary dismemberment mod,
most ‘Star Wars’ video games show off the gory power of a lightsaber in a way the movies never could.
‘The Force Unleashed,’ in particular, relishes in all the ways you can cut through the Imperial Army.
By the end you’ve shredded thousands of Stormtroopers in hilariously brutal ways,
and you could probably build a third Death Star out of just their severed limbs alone.
But, if you’re too squeamish to get up close and personal,
You can rest easier when the blood on your hands is just
Collateral Damage
At a certain point, you’ve got to stop thinking small.
The Empire’s bigger = better strategy comes with one major downside:
All those mile-long space fortresses need a lot of crew.
We're all fine here, now. Thank you. How are you?
After all, someone’s got to stare at all those blinking lights,
and those levers aren’t going to pull themselves.
The Imperial Navy constitutes the bulk of the staff,
but most ships contain a sizeable Stormtrooper garrison.
You average Star Destroyer has about 9,700 onboard,
and that’s tiny compared to massive dreadnaughts like Darth Vader’s Executor, or Snoak’s flagship, the Supremacy.
When these bad boys go down, so do all the poor souls onboard.
Why bother blasting a bunch of individual Stormtroopers,
when one crazy asshole in an A-Wing can wipe out thousands?
In ‘Rogue One,’ the Rebels take out two Star Destroyers simultaneously,
using just an ion cannon and the laws of physics.
Prepare for impact!
Nearly 20,000 Stormtrooper lives vanish in an instant,
so it’s no wonder why the Empire wants to upgrade to an “impenetrable” Death Star.
Of course, a bigger ship just means more Imperial casualties.
The first Death Star had 1.2 million people on board,
and the second was even bigger.
Of course, that number’s inflated by a lot of civilians and hard-working independent contractors
All those innocent contractors brought in to do the job were killed.
Casualties of a war they had nothing to do with.
but there were plenty of Stormtroopers stationed on both.
And they all died a horrible, fiery death when the Rebels blew them to hell.
It’s harsh, but the Empire had already snuffed out billions of lives on Alderaan,
and was milliseconds away from destroying the Galaxy’s last hope.
Luke had no choice but to fire his proton torpedos and kill a million people.
It was the will of the Force, after all,
and you can’t let your buddy down after he does you such a huge solid.
Great shot, kid, that was one in a million!
Just like you can’t let the Alliance down.
We’re counting on you soldier.
It might not take a lot to kill a Stormtrooper,
but the beautiful thing about cannon fodder,
is that you have plenty of chances to practice.