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Almost Worth Knowing: The Double Light Saber Provides No Tactical Advantage

Having just watched Star Wars: The Clone Wars, I would like to say that the movie is TERRIBLE: the worst movie I've seen this summer by far and I've seen plenty. Furthermore, the movie again reminds me that the double light saber, first made famous by Darth Maul in Episode One: The Phantom Menace, is entirely impractical. In fact, it's just plain stupid.

Here's why: the double light saber is modeled after the long staff or bo staff, a weapon well-known for being Donatello's trademark.

The effectiveness of the bo staff is is due to the extended range it gives the user, when he grasps the weapon at one end and swings the other end at his target. Due to the increased torque provided by a lengthened motion arm, this also increases the power of the attack. The following video, while a little slow, is still a good visual representation of how the staff would be used in the shaolin style. Pay attention to where the two individuals grip the weapon while using it.

In The Clone Wars, a character named Ventress uses a weapon that can be separated into two light sabers or connected into one double one. The light saber is characterized by the fact that the weapon is extremely lethal: you can't touch the blade. If this is the case, the entire point of the extended staff light saber is useless. The range of the weapon is not any greater than that of a normal light saber, since you are forced to hold the weapon in the middle. Therefore, it becomes nothing more than a normal light saber, with an extension out of the bottom that cannot be used at the same time as the top half of the weapon. This fact alone makes the weapon impractical. However, the weapon becomes entirely stupid if you further consider the fact that a sword (which the light saber is fashioned after) is extremely effective due to its medium length which allows for mobility of usage. The addition of an entirely lethal extension to the bottom of the light saber does nothing except restrict movement. Watch this next video and pay attention to where the bottom half of the light saber would be if a lethal light saber extension out of the bottom existed.

I'm confident that the wielder of such a weapon would have to go to extreme precautions to use the weapon safely, hampering his own movements, or else he would simply cleave himself in half.