How much time passed from Luke's adoptive parents death to the encounter with the Death Star?

[Skipper]

Well, like the title said: how much time passed from the death of Luke's adoptive parents to when the Millenium Falcon was captured by the Death Star? I'm curious about how much of the Way of the Jedi Obi-Wan taught Luke when the former was still alive and I have the impression that the total duration of the Jedi 101 course was about 15 minutes, including the bathroom breaks...

 

[Smiley]

It's ambiguous as far as I know. The Blast Points podcast did a fascinating episode on the length of time that transpires during the original three movies:
https://blastpointspodcast.com/2020...wars-does-anyone-really-know-what-time-it-is/

 

[Reverend]

Well, like the title said: how much time passed from the death of Luke's adoptive parents to when the Millenium Falcon was captured by Death Start? I'm curious about how much of the Way of the Jedi Obi-Wan taught Luke when the former was still alive and I have the impression that the total duration of the Jedi 101 course was about 15 minutes, including the bathroom breaks...

That depends entirely on two unknown factors: 1) How long it took for Luke & Ben to travel to Mos Eisley, and 2) How long the jump from Tattooine to Alderaan took.

You'd think the first on isn't so tricky because we know Luke set out looking for Artoo at dawn, and it seems to be near-ish suns down when he gets back to the burning homestead . . . but the position of the sun when they filmed a lot of the intervening scenes is all over the place, and it seems to actually be lighter back at the sandcrawler wreck.

Going by the script however, it's a little clearer as to the intent: -

32 INT. PLAZA LAR'S HOMESTEAD - MORNING

Morning slowly creeps into the sparse but sparkling oasis
of the open courtyard. The idyll is broken by the yelling
of Uncle Owen, his voice echoing throughout the homestead.

35 EXT. TATOOINE - ROCK MESA - DUNE SEA - COASTLINE - DAY

From high on a rock mesa, the tiny landspeeder can be seen
gliding across the desert floor. Suddenly in the foreground
two weather-beaten sandpeople shrouded in their grimy desert
cloaks peer over the edge of the rock mesa. One of the
marginally human creatures raises a long ominous laser
rifle and points it at the speeder but the second creature
grabs the gun before it can be fired.

46 EXT. TATOOINE - WASTELAND - DAY

The speeder zooms across the desert wasteland.

47 EXT. TATOOINE - BLUFF OVERLOOKING MOS EISLEY SPACEPORT - DAY

The speeder stops on a bluff overlooking the spaceport
at MOS EISLEY. It is a haphazard array of low gray concrete
structures and semidomes. A harsh gale blows across the
stark canyon floor. Luke adjusts his goggles and walks to
the edge of the craggy bluff where Ben is standing.

48 EXT. MOS EISLEY SPACEPORT - STREET - LATE AFTERNOON

The speeder is stopped on a crowded street by several
combat hardened stormtroopers who look over the two robots.
A trooper questions Luke.

NOTE: I am cherry picking a little here, since most of the intervening Mos Eisley EXT scene are unhelpfully labelled simply "DAY", or not at all. However the final shot of Tatooine appears to be telling.

59 EXT. MOS EISLEY SPACEPORT - STREET - MORNING

The half dozen stormtroopers at a check point hear the general
alarm and look to the sky as the huge starship rises above the
dingy slum dwellings and quickly disappears into the morning sky.

The sun in these last shots is pretty low, so it does seem to track. Of course that either means after making it to the overlook; Luke & Obi-Wan camped out before heading into Mos Eisley in the following morning, or they took up lodging for the night between meeting Han and selling the speeder. Given the urgency of their flight, I think the former is the more likely possibility.

It's probably also worth mentioning that the 'Complete Locations' books has Luke & Ben staying overnight in Bestine between the Sandcrawler and Mos Eisley.

I know this is technically canon, but I tend to err on the side of this kind of thing being "pencilled in" only unless it crops up in an actual story.

Either way, I'd say that means Luke & Ben spent about a day or two together before leaving the planet, though most of that would have been riding in a cramped speeder, so not exactly conducive to training.

As for the trip to Alderaan . . . eh. Hyperspace travel time is almost always deliberately vague. It could have taken them hours or days. Han does mention that they'll be there by 0200, but that's meaningless without a point of reference (plus they get there literally two and a half minutes later anyway.)

It doesn't help that in the time between Ben sensing the destruction of Alderaan, and the Falcon dropping out of hyperspace (again: literally minutes) Imperial scouts were able to get to Dantooine, make a preliminary search, find the old base, and report back while in the midst of mounting a larger search of the surrounding systems. So trying to pin down the length of the Falcon's flight seems a little futile to say the least.

I should note however that this time compression is all totally normal and necessary in a visual storytelling medium. Movies aren't documentaries, they're movies. Best to think of it the way Peter Jackson told his crew to think of LorR; pretending that these are real historical events that they're adapting into a movie, making editorial choices along the way like any adaptation must. The goal after all is to tell a story, not a dry recitation of facts; strictly accurate though they may be.

So don't worry too much about the chronology; perhaps in the original 'Journal of the Whills' texts this is all based on () it states that the journey from Tatooine to Alderaan took five rotations to avoid all the Imperial checkpoints. That Alderaan was actually destroyed on the second day of that trip, and the Imperial scouts took three days to get out to Dantooine; the movie just compressed those events together for clarity since the exact passage of time is unimportant.
All that matters is that Luke got some instruction that at least opened his eyes to the possibilities of what he could do.

See Also: Basically the entire second act of 'The Empire Strikes Back'. That way lies madness!​

 

[Set Harth]

It could have taken them hours or days.

"This will be a day long remembered. It has seen the end of Kenobi. It will soon see the end of the Rebellion."
Hyperspace travel taking days isn't supported by anything on screen.

 

[Oddish]

Well, it was also a day that the Empire pissed off Luke Skywalker.

 

[fireproof78]

To the Emperor it was just Tuesday.

 

[publiusr]

Who knows how long Luke was trained in the X-wing?

 

[Ithekro]

The Radio Drama has Luke do a run through the simulator and basically astound Red Leader, with Biggs beaming with pride in his friend being the best bush pilot in the Outer Rim.

 

[Starkers]

"This will be a day long remembered. It has seen the end of Kenobi. It will soon see the end of the Rebellion."
Hyperspace travel taking days isn't supported by anything on screen.

It isn't disputed by anything on screen either. Tatooine to where Alderaan should be might be a week's journey time even in hyperspace, while where Alderaan should be to where Yavin is presumably is less than a day. Putting it in Earth terms maybe Tatooine is in Australia, Alderaan is in Texas and Yavin Mexico.

 

[Set Harth]

It isn't disputed by anything on screen either. Tatooine to where Alderaan should be might be a week's journey time even in hyperspace

"Well, you can forget your troubles with those Imperial slugs. I told you I'd outrun 'em" is in the same scene as "Anyway, we should be at Alderaan about oh-two-hundred hours" - a line which makes no sense whatsoever unless it's referencing an arrival at Alderaan's location in the same day. So are we to believe that it somehow took an entire week to outrun the "Imperial slugs", and that under the circumstances Han still felt the need to be smug about it?

( Also, though not established in-film, Yavin is Outer Rim. Why would it take a week to get from the Outer Rim to Alderaan but less than a day to get from Alderaan back to the Outer Rim? )

 

[David cgc]

The Radio Drama has Luke do a run through the simulator and basically astound Red Leader, with Biggs beaming with pride in his friend being the best bush pilot in the Outer Rim.

There's also the tie-in lore that Luke's T-16 speeder (not the one he drove around in, the big one barely visible in the garage) was built by the same company as the X-Wing and had pretty much the same controls.

 

[fireproof78]

There's also the tie-in lore that Luke's T-16 speeder (not the one he drove around in, the big one barely visible in the garage) was built by the same company as the X-Wing and had pretty much the same controls.

Yup, same corporation and similar controls. The Incredible Cross-Sections book notes this as well and shows a picture of the cockpit.

 

[Christopher]

Tatooine to where Alderaan should be might be a week's journey time even in hyperspace

Not according to the script. The Falcon is pursued by Imperials on its way out of Tatooine and jumps to hyperspace -- which, according to SW lore, would make it impossible to track or pursue further. We then cut to Alderaan being destroyed, then back to Ben feeling "a great disturbance in the Force." Just after that, Han comes back and reports that he's successfully outrun the Imperials, which would seem to place the scene immediately after the jump to hyperspace. He then says "We should be at Alderaan about 0200 hours," i.e. the following morning.

So unless they were traveling for a week and had an unchronicled encounter with Imperial pursuers on day 6, the travel time from Tatooine to Alderaan must be less than one day.

 

[Set Harth]

his friend being the best bush pilot in the Outer Rim.

that's what she said

 

[Reverend]

It isn't disputed by anything on screen either. Tatooine to where Alderaan should be might be a week's journey time even in hyperspace, while where Alderaan should be to where Yavin is presumably is less than a day. Putting it in Earth terms maybe Tatooine is in Australia, Alderaan is in Texas and Yavin Mexico.

The way hyperspace travel works in Star Wars, the overall distance isn't as significant to travel time as the route taken.

You can probably get from one side of the galaxy to the other in a matter of hours (a statement backed up by tESB) but only if you're on the major hyperlanes. Think of those as the main thoroughfares of the galaxy. Nice clear routes that are extensively charted to within a millimetre, so you can cover tens of thousands of lightyears in no time at all.

However, what if your destination isn't near a major lane? Or even a minor lane? What if your route is interrupted by one or more poorly charted, or volatile region of space that you have to traverse at sublight before jumping again? What if you're say a smuggler and need to be able to avoid all the Imperial checkpoints that are of course at every point along the major commerce routes? Suddenly you're having to take very circuitous paths around backwater systems, along forgotten prospector coordinates, having to frequently drop out and recalculate before jumping again. Well that's going to take a lot longer, isn't it?
Indeed it's probably common for the first and last portions of any long distance trip (on the galactic scale) to take way more time that the bulk of the distance in between, which is mostly smooth sailing once you're on the Hydian Way or the Corellian Run.

Anyway, as far as Yavin goes; the distance and travel time there is almost meaningless since it's not like the Empire can get there ahead of them anyway. They needed the tracking beacon to be sure where the base is either way.

As for hyperspace tracking; the script has this deleted line that sheds some light on Lucas's thoughts on the topic: -

HAN
Watch your mouth kid, or you'll find
yourself floating home. We'll be safe
enough once we've made the jump into
hyperspace. They can't track us
accurately at light speeds. Plus I
know a few maneuvers that should lose
them.​

The key word there is "accurately", which by definition suggests that they can be tracked inaccurately. Which kind of lines up with tESB when Vader orders the fleet to calculate every possible destination on the Falcon's last known trajectory. A very unreliable, brute force approach, but nevertheless makes it possible for the Empire to go after someone if they're motivated enough. Which is where Han's "manoeuvres" come in to guarantee he's shaken any tails. Probably something like looping back around a neighbouring sector, making a recalculation and second jump in some uninhabited system, doubling back and jumping again. The kind of tricks you'd expect a smuggler to employ.

This kind of thing could have been going on for hours or days before Han confidently declared he'd outrun them, just in time to get to the Alderaan system.

In reality, even if we take the movie editing as gospel; the only limiting factor here has nothing to do with the Falcon and everything to do with how long Leia held up under the mind probe, and how long it took Tarkin to loose patience enough to switch tactics and head for Alderaan themselves. That could have been days or weeks (though more likely the former.) Indeed Leia's whole capture, interrogation and scheduled execution is really what determines the timeline for the whole movie.

 

[Christopher]

The key word there is "accurately", which by definition suggests that they can be tracked inaccurately. Which kind of lines up with tESB when Vader orders the fleet to calculate every possible destination on the Falcon's last known trajectory. A very unreliable, brute force approach, but nevertheless makes it possible for the Empire to go after someone if they're motivated enough. Which is where Han's "manoeuvres" come in to guarantee he's shaken any tails. Probably something like looping back around a neighbouring sector, making a recalculation and second jump in some uninhabited system, doubling back and jumping again. The kind of tricks you'd expect a smuggler to employ.

This kind of thing could have been going on for hours or days before Han confidently declared he'd outrun them, just in time to get to the Alderaan system.

Okay, that's plausible. Although days seems a bit much for something like that.

 

[Set Harth]

In reality, even if we take the movie editing as gospel; the only limiting factor here has nothing to do with the Falcon and everything to do with how long Leia held up under the mind probe, and how long it took Tarkin to loose patience enough to switch tactics and head for Alderaan themselves. That could have been days or weeks (though more likely the former.) Indeed Leia's whole capture, interrogation and scheduled execution is really what determines the timeline for the whole movie.

That's irrelevant to the travel time since it all takes place before they leave Tatooine.

Anyway, as far as Yavin goes; the distance and travel time there is almost meaningless since it's not like the Empire can get there ahead of them anyway. They needed the tracking beacon to be sure where the base is either way.

Also irrelevant. The salient point was the same-day transit from Core to Outer Rim.

 

[JoseNoodles]

There's also the tie-in lore that Luke's T-16 speeder (not the one he drove around in, the big one barely visible in the garage) was built by the same company as the X-Wing and had pretty much the same controls.

Yup, same corporation and similar controls. The Incredible Cross-Sections book notes this as well and shows a picture of the cockpit.

Incom Corporation, if I recall.

 

[Reverend]

If people think Luke getting checked out in an X-Wing so fast is implausible, they should go read the first draft where The Jedi General* trains a bunch of stone age level of technology Wookiees to fly captured Imperial starfighters AND mount a successful attack run on the Empire's battlestation . . . all of which happens in the third act. It's bonkers. Though to it's credit, it does at least show them having a training flight.

It should also be noted that in Star Wars; being able to fly a spaceship is like the equivalent of being able to drive an HGV. Not everyone can do it sure, but it's hardly an uncommon skill, and most people can probably learn in a pinch based on transferable skills on lighter vehicles. On top of that, Luke was an experienced bush pilot. The only thing he probably couldn't do (as evidenced by his obvious inexperience with Han on the Falcon) is hyperspace navigation . . . which he didn't need to know for this battle.

* Who is called Luke Skywalker, but when discussing the early drafts, I find it's best to refer to the characters as their archetypes instead of names. Lucas recycled and switched various names around between drafts, and it quickly gets confusing otherwise. In this case The Jedi General's role in the story is closer to Qui-Gon's in TPM than anyone in the OT, and even then just barely, making it doubly confusing.​

 

[Tuskin38]

Which kind of lines up with tESB when Vader orders the fleet to calculate every possible destination on the Falcon's last known trajectory.

Which, according to the side materials, is how the Hyperspace Tracker in the Sequels worked, it was a supercomputer (which somehow existed partly in hyperspace) that did that all in less than a second.