AT-ATs

davey — Sat, 21 Dec 2019 20:19:04 +0000

All Terrain Walkers are armoured fighting vehicles from the Star Wars universe that traverse the landscape on mechanical legs. They are used by the Old Republic, the Galactic Empire, and the First Order for ground assault, reconnaissance or transport. Throughout the saga walkers have played a pivotal role in the fate of characters and the outcome of battles. Industrial Light and Magic (ILM) is responsible for their animation and design, often using models, stop-motion animation, and relevant matte paintings to depict their presence in the films.

The All Terrain Armored Transport, or AT-AT walker, is a quadruped mechanized infantry combat vehicle used by the Imperial ground forces. Standing over 20 metres (66 ft) tall with blast-impervious armour plating, these massive constructs are used as much for psychological effect as they are for tactical advantage.[1]

The AT-AT (pronounced either 'at at', or using only the letters 'A.T. A.T.')[2] was first introduced in The Empire Strikes Back and also appears in Return of the Jedi. The AT-AT also appears in a destroyed form in Star Wars: The Force Awakens. Modified forms appear in The Last Jedi.

Joe Johnston's original design for the Empire's war machines was a giant, multi-wheeled vehicle; this design later became the "Juggernaut" in West End Games' roleplaying material, and the design was reworked into the clone turbo tank for Star Wars: Episode III – Revenge of the Sith.[3] Johnston said Lucas wanted the walkers to look like anthropomorphic walking tanks to make them frightening.[4]

For The Empire Strikes Back, however, the final design was a four-legged walker. Inspiration for the AT-AT came from Paraceratherium, an extinct genus of rhinoceros and the largest land mammal in history.[5] George Lucas later dismissed claims that the AT-AT design was inspired by container cranes at the Port of Oakland (across San Francisco Bay from ILM's San Rafael offices), calling it a "myth"; animator Phil Tippett told the San Francisco Chronicle the same thing.[6]

ILM created models ranging from six to fifty centimetres (2–20 inches) in height.[7] ILM filmed the AT-ATs using stop-motion animation against matte paintings created by Michael Pangrazio because attempts at compositing miniature footage against live-action background footage yielded mediocre results.[7] Additionally, ILM studied elephants to determine the best way to animate the four-legged AT-ATs.[7] Although the stop-motion animation style gave the AT-ATs a jerky, "staccato-like" effect on film, ILM found this movement acceptable because of the AT-ATs' mechanical nature.[8]

The sound of the AT-AT walking was created by Sound Designer Ben Burtt, by using the sound of an industrial sheet metal stamper.

Dialog in National Public Radio's adaptation of The Empire Strikes Back says that AT-ATs "look like animals"; the character goes on to describe the vehicles as carrying "extremely heavy armor and armaments". The AT-AT, designed to favor "fear over function", can carry up to five speeder bikes and 40 Imperial stormtroopers.[1] The head/cockpit armament consists of two side-mounted medium blaster cannons and two chin-mounted heavy laser cannons. It is manned by two AT-AT Drivers, which are combat drivers specialized in operating the Imperial Army's AT-AT walkers, wore distinct battle armour, similar in design to that of a modified basic Stormtrooper. The drivers operated the walker's movement and firing controls, and are overseen by a commander who sits behind them in the cockpit.[9]

Manufactured by Kuat Drive Yards, Expanded Universe sources describe the AT-AT as being either 15 metres (49 ft) or 22.5 metres (74 ft) tall.[1][9][10] The AT-AT's rate of stride is not fast, but this fact is mitigated by the immense height of its legs. They can outrun opponents that underestimate AT-AT walking speed, while their neck can pivot quickly enough to bring their heavy weaponry to bear against even fast-moving craft like snowspeeders. Their blasters and laser cannons do not have a high rate of fire, but the shots are powerful enough to destroy most small targets in one to two shots. Their armor is resistant to most standard blaster weapons; however, the "neck" column of the walker holds no such invulnerability and, if shot, can cause the entire walker to be destroyed.

The AT-AT is the primary assault vehicle during the Battle of Hoth, first depicted in The Empire Strikes Back. In the film, the squadron of AT-ATs, lead by General Maximilian Veers, are responsible for destroying the shield generator protecting the Rebel headquarters, taking out soldiers, artillery batteries, and snowspeeders in the process. Luke Skywalker, realizing that the walkers are all but impervious to artillery and snowspeeder blaster fire, orders his squadron's snowspeeders to entangle their legs with tow cables, a trick he remembered using on Tatooine to rein in hard-to-control farm animals. Wedge Antilles and his gunner Wes Janson successfully bring down an AT-AT using the tow cable: shortly after, another snowspeeder scores a direct hit on the fallen AT-AT's neck, causing a huge explosion. Skywalker, after being shot down and narrowly escaping his stricken snowspeeder before it is crushed beneath the AT-AT's leg, used his hoist cable to latch upon that AT-AT's underside, with a slash of his Lightsaber cutting away a panel so he can toss a thermal detonator inside, causing a series of internal explosions culminating with the cockpit and the walker toppling over. In the novelization of The Empire Strikes Back, General Veers' AT-AT is destroyed when its cockpit is rammed by a snowspeeder piloted by Derek "Hobbie" Klivian, however this never made it into the final cut of the film.

An AT-AT makes a brief appearance in Return of the Jedi; one walks up alongside a landing platform on Endor to deliver Luke to Darth Vader. The first appearance of an AT-AT in the Star Wars Rebels TV series occurs in the second-season episode Relics of the Old Republic, when Agent Kallus unsuccessfully confronts the rebels while on Seelos, with a trio of the four-legged walkers challenging Captain Rex's retired clone cohorts and their own much-modified AT-TE six-legged walker, where the rebels are hiding out. A ruined AT-AT appears in Star Wars: The Force Awakens as the makeshift home of the scavenger Rey on the planet Jakku.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lwoQH9moSvg&t=6s&ab_channel=MrYouSM

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AT-ATs