Why Starkiller Base Makes No Sense According To Star Wars Fans
"Star Wars: Episode VII — The Force Awakens" is essentially a remake of "Star Wars: Episode IV — A New Hope," even down to featuring a giant space sphere that can destroy planets. The sequel trilogy film has Starkiller Base instead of the Death Star, and it doesn't merely fire a beam. It draws energy through a nearby star to fire multiple beams at once through space to annihilate the New Republic. It's cool enough, but the exact science is still causing some Star Wars fans to scratch their heads.
It's resulted in quite a few discussions on Reddit, including one started by u/EnduringInsanity, who posits, "At the end of ['The Force Awakens'] we see that it has already consumed the star [it's] orbiting around, and since it's a whole planet I'm guessing it can't travel through hyperspace, and I am assuming they can't bring another star to it, so how would it have charged up again? Is there something obvious that I am missing?" Speculating on the nature of Starkiller Base has led to other thoughts, including this one from u/thedirtypickle50: "What I don't get is why it needs to fire a beam at all. You just consumed an entire star. Congratulations. Job done. You've killed an entire solar system."
Taking away a solar system's star would result in the end of any life in said system. That would also seemingly create a problem for anyone on Starkiller Base, as they would probably freeze to death without a light or power source. Star Wars often ignores real science for the sake of greater drama, but this quandary has caused real problems for fans.
The Force Awakens novelization answers the Starkiller Base question
Starkiller Base is obviously a stand-in for the Death Star. This is made explicit during the scene where a hologram shows how much bigger it is than the Death Star in an unintentionally hilarious Star Wars moment. And the physics of draining a star is only the beginning, as one Redditor also points out how the beam wouldn't have been able to destroy planets lightyears away so quickly: "How can they see the planets being destroyed from a planet in another solar system? It takes light thousands of years to travel that far." The simplest explanation would be not to think about Star Wars science too hard, but better reasoning comes from the "Force Awakens" novelization.
In a separate Reddit thread, u/rick17126 mentions how the book better explains how Starkiller Base works: "In the novelization, the weapon is not powered by drawing plasma from the sun it orbits. It recharges through a system that slowly draws in Dark Energy and is stored [within] the core of the planet before firing [its] payload through subspace, essentially creating a temporary wormhole between Starkiller Base and the target." The star isn't being drained to the point of destruction; it's just having its dark energy drained. To explain why the planets are destroyed so quickly, a wormhole opens up so that the beam effectively disappears and reemerges lightyears away.
Granted, one would only know this by reading the book, so, understandably, things would get confusing from watching the movie alone. Certain aspects of Star Wars, like the science behind lightsabers, can be overlooked. But the science of Starkiller Base is a bit harder for some fans to accept.