A number of Star Wars fans just realized why one often memed-about element of the Death Star's design actually makes a lot of sense. It turns out it has a lot to do with its origins and a bit less to do with workplace safety.
The cool thing about a franchise as big as Star Wars is that new fans are noticing certain details for the first time every day. This ranges from things like the classic shot of a stormtrooper hitting his head on a door to more behind-the-scenes goodies like a particular «hidden character» in Revenge of the Sith. Today's freshly unearthed tidbit involves the planet-destroying space station known as the Death Star. It turns out one supposed safety oversight on the massive structure may have a different explanation other than simple Imperial negligence.
The «oversight» in question is the Death Star's lack of handrails, leading to some precarious situations for heroes and baddies alike. Fans will recall the tense scene where Obi-Wan stealthed his way through to deactivate the station's tractor beam, balancing himself carefully over a perilous drop. Well, users on the Star Wars Cantina subreddit have realized one rather compelling and oddly simple possible explanation for this. The Death Star was originally designed by the bug-like Geonosians, and they could fly.
It makes a lot of sense in a deceptively uncomplicated way. As part of Palpatine's conspiracy in Attack of the Clones, he took advantage of the people of Geonosis to have them draft the design for his ultimate weapon. However, due to that outsourcing, he and his people may not have thought to go over certain details. The need for handrails is basically nonexistent for a species that flies as part of their regular method of traversal, and they likely wouldn't have even thought to include that design element since their architects and engineers just create what they know.
The thing is, it's only one possible theory. Other fans pointed out that the Death Star likely went through a number of
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