Translation: Well, we finally know what happened to Han. He's a grad student. His advisor is Jabba. It looks like Boba Fett was a lab tech with Jabba, and convinced Han to go get his degree. Jabba has a lab full of a bunch of other students and Jabba makes them sing, dance, serve him drinks, etc. Pretty typical servitude. Poor Han, I'll bet he didn't know what he was getting himself into. :(

Translation: Leia asks Jabba if he'll let her give a talk and present some ideas she has (she is an ABD after all). She presents her talk (Chewie) and then pulls Han aside and tells him to pitch grad school. She tells him that he was right (with M. Falcon Corp) all along and they should stop throwing good time after bad in grad school. Obviously Leia's been bitten by the startup bug, but Han still isn't sure. It's possible that Jabba is a pretty convincing taskmaster, but it's more likely that Han realizes what he's already sacrificed in time and blood by putting up w/ Jabba, and leaving now would mean it was all for nothing. I hear ya bro... :(

Translation: Luke decides to come give a talk in the department, and Jabba doesn't like it. When Luke is talking Jabba is giving him a really hard time with incessant tough questions. Luke manages to keep his composure and when it's over, he tries to talk Han into leaving school too. Han is still worried about walking away from the time investment he has in Jabba's lab. Ahh, the golden handcuffs, where by golden I mean something that could give you heavy metal poisoning, and by handcuffs I mean metal rings with spikes on the inside that make wearing them painful.

Translation: Jabba throws a lab party and forces all of his students to come. Han invites Leia, Luke, and Lando. Leia is lookin' smokin' in her bikini. They're all standing around making small-talk when Luke and Leia tell Han that Jabba's probably not going to let him finish up for, like, 5 more years. Han asks Jabba what his prognosis is (for getting out) and finds out the 5 year estimate might even be light! Han tells all the other grad students in the lab and they all get worried and just like that, the party is over and Han agrees to drop out.

Translation: After Luke went away for his internship (at C. City Corp in Episode V) he got all disgruntled and didn't come back to Yoda's lab (remember, Vader told Luke that his thesis topic was really a cheap take off on his). Well, Luke decided to come back to Yoda's lab and Yoda told him that he's not much interested in continuing to research. He wants to retire. He tells Luke that he's basically done anyway. Luke thinks that Yoda's just going to rubber-stamp his diploma. Yoda clarifies that he still has to get a committee together and defend. Yoda says that since Vader has made the claim that Luke's thesis isn't original, Luke has to convince Vader to be on his committee! After Luke leaves he gets in touch with Ben and complains that the topic they derived from early conversations w/ him is a ripoff of Vader's work. Ben explains that this is just Luke's fault because he didn't understand what Ben was trying to tell him. Ben tries to reinvent the past so that it seems like he didn't look like a fool. This is really typical. Ben would have made a good advisor. Then Ben tells Luke that Leia had the same problem with advice he gave her (way back when).

Translation: OK, enter Professor Squid-Head; he seems to have a really big lab, and it's possible that he runs something like an NSF center (STC or something?). It's fortunate for our heroes that he seems to have taken Leia on as a grad student, remember, she's been unfunded since her lab at Alderan U. lost its funding. She must have sent a letter to the Squid lab while doing her internship at C. City Corp. Anyway, Han is there with Lando and they're still working on the droid/research projects that they've been dragging around for the whole story. This is really like research. You really do get sick of dragging the same, boring old projects around. They become like albatrosses around your neck.

Anyway, Professor Squid-Head decides he's interested in publishing some of the stuff Leia has been kicking around, and they decide it would be good to bring the lab in on it. So, the Squid-Head lab members all agree to parcel out the work. Leia and Han decide to do some the principle investigation. What they should realize is that these research projects (read: the droids) are still the same droids that Vader thinks are his research ideas. They are all revolving around the same research again! As this is all coming together, Luke asks if he can get a lab-tech position in Professor Squid-Head's lab until he defends.

Translation: Professor Squid-Head isn't stupid. In exchange for taking all of these clowns on: Leia == ABD, Han == Reject from another lab, Luke == ABD, he has insisted that they teach his undergraduate classes. So, the Ewoks are undergrads and their whole mission in life is to be demanding of the grad students, test the grad students' resolve, and try to spar at any moment. This is actually VERY detrimental to the paper's progress, and it looks like they won't have time to finish it. Then they actually talk about the projects with their undergrads. At this point, the undergrads actually seem to get excited and offer themselves up as free labor. That is, they actually might be able to help, instead of just hinder our heroes!

Luke decides that he would rather finish up his degree than languish as a lab tech. So, he goes to talk to Vader (like Ben told him to).

Translation: Vader takes Luke to see his old advisor, and Dr. Emperor (or Dr. E, for short) tells Luke that he should become his student and that he'll give him his degree. Luke is a brat so he says something snide about how Dr. E's lab is gunna be disgraced again. Dr. E snickers and asks if Luke's friends are planning to base their work on the earlier publications from his lab. He tells Luke that some of his earlier work used bogus data to justify the findings and that his outfit is actually dedicating the corporation's massive research staff (the storm troopers) to properly reprocessing the original data.

Translation: Professor Squid-Head seems to like a challenge. His students catch on that Vader's lab is working on the same front as them, and he's obviously willing to make this a foot race. His students spar with Vader's staff researchers as they run into each other while Leia, Luke, Han, Chewie, and the droids are plugging away at some of the obstacles in the research. As they meet at conferences and what-not, the Squid-Head lab students catch on that the earlier work is bogus and get pretty worried that they're going to look stupid if the draw any conclusions from it.

Translation: Vader's outfit is really doing a lot of heavy lifting and making some serious progress. As this happens, Leia et. al. notice the speciousness of Vader's earlier work and use the slew of undergrads to generate a raw data set and process it properly. Without a ton of free labor, would this have been possible? No! And without a ton of free labor there wouldn't be any pyramids in Egypt... Of course all of those laborers at least knew that they were slaves. ;)

In the end, could 500 free undergrads (Ewoks) out perform a bunch of seasoned staff'ers (the storm troopers)? Maybe, there were a ton of Ewoks... and maybe "I'm a Chinese Jet pilot!"

Translation: Luke threatens to disclose that Dr. E. falsified his work and get his publications rescinded. Vader tells him that if he did that, Vader would have to blow the whistle on Luke's stolen thesis. Luke realizes this would mean the last several years in Yoda's lab would be totally wasted and he's really pissed. Then Vader says that he's going to do the same thing to Leia because he knows Ben planted some stolen seeds in her brain too (everybody has been dragging these droids around forever). Then she wouldn't even be ABD. Luke freaks out and realizes that Vader is really just full of it. People can always say, "That was MY idea because..." Luke just has to find his own spin on it... Dammit, Ben's thinking... starting to make sense... grad school... infecting... brain... Luke gets to work with this and Vader has no where to go. Dr. E. likes plagiarism (because he's evil) and congratulates Luke on realizing how to steal ideas. He wants Luke to be his student more than ever now.

Translation: The Squid-Head lab is able to put a really tight spin on the results from Leia et. al. and they submit to the Warring of Stars Journal.

Translation: Luke turns Dr. E down, again. This time Dr. E is pissed. He says he's going to ruin Luke's career by pulling his strings at funding agencies in Washington. Luke will never get funded because everyone will know that he thinks plagiarism is OK! Vader doesn't like this, and like all students has fostered... how should I say this... some resentment towards his advisor? :-/ So Vader says if Dr. E. does that, he'll tell his contacts that Dr. E. is just being vindictive and then no one will be able to trust either of them. This, of course, is a cardinal sin. Thou shalt not cross thy advisor. Vader's career is done. Dr. E. says he's going make sure Vader is through (just like Vader did to Ben).

Translation: Luke tells Vader how much he appreciates this and asks if he'll be on his committee.

Translation: They scoop Dr. E's ass AGAIN! Luke defends (with Yoda, Ben, and Vader on his committee). Luke made it! He finished school! :-D