>>212764664
Your standard TIE fighter was meant to be designed so that any backwater hick and eight-pounder waterhead asshole could pilot it. TIE pilots didn't get attached to their TIE's the same way X-Wing or Y-Wing pilots would get attached to their ships. A TIE was a TIE was a TIE.
The ones you saw in the original trilogy were an evolution of the ETA-2 Jedi starfighter, itself being an evolution from the Delta-7 Aethersprite-class light interceptor. The TIE fighters seen in the films were ships with the mentality of maintaining an Empire, rather than building it at the time. "Cheap" is actually the correct operative word there. The TIE Fighters we see in the film are the Japanese Zero's of space: sleek, fast, deadly, nimble, but any stray shot at it and the whole thing just bursts into flames. No shields, no life supports, no hyperdrive, no pressurized cabin, little vision out of the top of the vehicle, no visibility out the starboard or port having been obstructed by the wings, so you can only see out the front canopy window and what the sensor systems pick up. They look cheap because they are cheap. Vader's TIE fighter solved all those problems, but it was expensive to produce and the Imperial higher ups didn't want funding to their fancy Star Destroyers to be slashed along with the Death Star draining precious resources at the time too.
