Star Wars: Prequel Era as Originally Envisioned

Yuck.

Of what we've been "shown" on film or in novelization of the core SW story (the rise of the Empire, the struggle against it and the aftermath, basically) it seems to me they picked the right sections the first time. It might have been possible at the time to have covered a bit more just before and after the trilogy to make it 4 movies, but as it is one isn't missing much if anything one couldn't imagine from what is covered. Just from Star Wars, you already know the Empire rose to defeat an Old Republic, that Vader turned to the dark side, that Han and Leia are getting together, that Leia is going to have a tough time finishing things and trying to lead things towards recovery and so on.

 

Where the prequels went wrong is thinking the audience from the original trilogy cared one wit about the childhood of moviedom's greatest villain, Darth Vader.

 

Lucas has said, one of his goals with the entire series was to make the audience realize that the story was really about the rise, fall, and redemption of Darth Vader; Luke Skywalker was not necessarily the primary character. (His words, not mine.)

 

Amen! Call me a spoiler if you will, but that has long been my sentiment, almost exactly. It's like this:

STAR WARS: A bona fide classic for the ages in its original '77 incarnation. I myself was 7 years old when I first saw it on the big screen that summer, and was positively mesmerized by it, as were so many others. In fact, the only point czeskleba makes that I disagree with is that the first film perhaps lacks "darkness" compared to the sequels; on the contrary, I thought there was considerable seediness and dread throughout that movie (definitely did not ever accept its being called "A New Hope" in '81), from the dingy tractor thing the Jawas drove to the dusty nearly empty streets of the original Mos Eisley space port including the dangerous forbidden atmosphere of the bar with its gruesome fight scenes, all of which added to its aura of believability. In other words, it very much seemed like any of the main characters could be killed or horribly maimed at any time (remember the burned corpses of Uncle Owen and Aunt Beru?), and I actually first thought that R2-D2 might have been lost at the end, which was not so optimistic as Darth Vader clearly managed to escape. This, to me, always worked as a stand-alone film, with the possibility of a sequel, which clearly depended on then not-so-certain box office success. That it was indeed a blockbuster, I think, surprised a lot of people, for better and for worse.

Empire Strikes Back: I have to say that this movie plays like exactly what it is...an over-hyped sequel. There are a number of reasons: for one, the three year wait from '77 to '80 was a long one, and no movie could reasonably generate the same excitement as that first rush following the opening credits of the first film when the ship seemed to come from behind the theatre and zoom right over your head (essentially repeating this sequence was redundant); second, that whole schtick about Darth Vader being Luke's dear old dad always seemed contrived to me as did Luke's lame reaction (count me in as one of many who felt vindicated by Conan the Barbarian a few years later when that "I am your father" sequence was, I think, not-so-coincidentally repeated with James Earl Jones' getting his head chopped off instead of being whined at); third, whether it was planned or not (c'mon, we all knew Lucas was making it up as he went along), the whole movie felt like a buildup to a climax that never happened...what, we have to wait another three years? While I agree with Vidiot that Irwin Kirshner deserves more credit for working real-life events into the film, such as Mark Hamill's auto accident (not from Corvette Summer, apparently -- that just mauled his career! ), and there certainly were some entertaining sequences like the Hoth planet, the asteroid worm monster, and yes, even Yoda to an extent, overall Empire simply never was as good a ride as that first film, and unfortunately left me, and a lot of other people, wanting. Did you feel the urge to go back in line and re-watch it? I'll go a step further and say that I have always regarded Raiders of the Lost Ark as the true follow-up to Star Wars in that it at least seemed to recapture some of the magic, and hey, there was basically Han Solo again, not cryogenically frozen to boot (plus, he had a whip!).

Return of the Jedi: Ugh! I agree with another poster that this was where the proverbial bottom fell out. I'd echo many previously expressed sentiments: bad scripts, bad acting, too muppetty, over-emphasis on f/x, etc. Ironically, even Lucas himself at the time tacitly acknowledged that the latter was precisely the problem at issue:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ykmZp5cgbkU
Never again would Lucas be so forthright, or perhaps make such a Freudian slip (how often do people say they didn't do something knowing full well that it is merely an attempt to deflect blame?); in nearly every subsequent interview I've seen, his "genius" is taken as an oppressive given. Although I haven't read "The Secret History of Star Wars" my understanding is that the original concept for the third film was to return to Chewbacca's home planet, which I think would have been much more interesting, and less obviously "kid-friendly"; I reiterate that the first Star Wars film worked largely because it had a more "adult" feel to it, back when "PG" actually meant something.

The Prequels (de-emphasis added): Not much to say about these unmemorable footnotes to history, except that the problems obviously apparent in Jedi were merely exacerbated. I would add, though that in the interim, Lucas did the unthinkable by re-editing the original films, which in my mind, not only ruined those classics, but more or less destroyed the franchise. Yeah, I felt culturally and generationally obligated to watch Episodes I, II, and III (weren't there actually 9 films planned at one point?), but after the bad taste of the "special editions" so much goodwill was lost, that those "prequels" had to be far better than they were to bring me back on board...IMHO, they weren't good at all. Maybe it's just my dislike of CGI at work here, but I am doubtful whether those might have been much better at this stage, even if done "as originally envisioned."

 

I agree with your post completely. There's plenty of darkness in the first movie. The scene with Uncle Own and Aunt Beru is plenty dark if you ask me. Plus don't forget they blew Alderaan to bits with the Death Star. These were people you really didn't want to mess with. I love the first movie and I will never watch any of the other movies ever again. For me, Luke's father was killed by the evil Darth Vader.

 

The toys were nice:

 

Umm...thanks, I think. You and I must have a similarly twisted sense of humor!

Another thought on the Star Wars prequels: what really bothered me about these films, besides the over-reliance on CGI catastrophes, was the sense that "The FORCE" itself was now somehow cheapened by its being only apparently available to Luke's family. This appalling trend actually began in Empire Strikes Back, and is offensive to a "muggle blood" such as myself.

What I mean is, that first Star Wars film was far more universal in reach, and has aged better as a result, even if nowadays it appears to have been a fluke. Thanks also to Spitfire for reading, and of course agreeing with, my rather lengthy post.

 

Yeah, in the audience I was with on Phantom Menace, there were audible groans when the dialog started mentioning "midichlorians in the blood" and stuff like that.

Some of the CGI I thought was quite clever and well-done, but it was a little oft-putting to find that, 20 years before Luke Skywalker's time, the spaceships and interior decor was far more "futuristic." That's one of those filmmaking problems they can never solve: the movie still winds up being influenced by when it was made, not the era in which it's supposed to portray. Lots of problems like this with the various Star Trek shows.

 

Its impossible to unlearn and go back to 1999 before I saw the premiere of The Phantom Menace, but I had a lot of hope and a completely different impression of how these prequels may turn out to be after I first saw trailer for The Phantom Menace.
Of course, as soon as the first battle droid opened his mouth in the opening sequence and out came a poor Mel Blanc impersonation, it all went downhill from there, didn't it?

 

Of the prequels, I think the Phantom Menace could have been improved the most with judicious edits. Eliminating Jar-Jar and some of the stuff surrounding Anakin would have made it vastly better.

 

My main gripe with the CGI (apart from it looking dated...already) is what is pointed out prominently in the Red Letter Media reviews: that the actors cannot convey any sense of atmospheric presence when 99% of the acting is done in front a giant green/blue screen - or worse, surrounded by and interacting with CGI actors. The result is an obvious artificiality that just kills any suspension of disbelief necessary to enjoy these films.

Combined with a corny and poor script, even the outstanding actors (Samuel L. Jackson, Natalie Portman, Liam Neeson) are reduced to phoning in abysmal performances.

 

Very few movies have been able to successfully mix live action and CGI characters. The only ones that come to mind are the Lord of the Rings trilogy, and that's because Andy Serkis was so involved in the Gollum character, is a talented actor in his own right, and was interacting with the other actors in each scene.

The only real solution seems to be to make ALL of the characters CGI and leave it in the hands of talented animators to convey the interactions, such as in pretty much every Pixar movie.

 

I bought the Complete Saga blu-ray box set today from Walmart about 2 hours ago. I sat it on the table and looked at it for a bit and then the scene where Anikan talks about sand getting everywhere played in my mind so I snatched it up and drove it back to the store and got my money back.

 

It is a nice set if you can find it used, as I did, but far from what it should be. I did watch the prequels and enjoyed them for what they were, and the original
Trilogy looks great. Now if only there way to watch the original versions in high def...

 

It's hard to argue with that. I had the same problem with Robert Rodriguez' Sin City, which was also a (mostly) green-screen movie. I think the actors act and react a lot better when they're surrounded by real sets in a real place.

Too many times with movies like this, you see some huge, sweeping vista with towering, futuristic skyscrapers and hundreds of space ships and you say, "wow! That looks so cool!" But you almost never say, "gee, that looks totally real, like it's actually happening!"

 

Borrowed directly from Nazi Germany. It is exactly how Hitler seized power.

 

I think hatred of the prequel films is over the top. I think what they mostly suffer from is not meeting unrealistic expectations of those who grew up and were already familiar with the original trilogy. How can any film compete with the imagination of fans? The reality is, we can sit and list a lot of things we'd like to change but nothing would have put them on the same level or higher than the Original Trilogy in the minds of fans.

Also in some ways, we either didn't think about or want to think about what the Senate or what the Capitol of the Republic would look like or Yoda being an active, fighting Jedi Knight. Many had a problem with Yoda fighting but he wasn't always old and slow.

 

I agree with you 100%. Nothing would live up to the expectations of those who saw Star Wars as kids. Personally, I loved all 3 prequels. Yes, even Phantom Menace.

 

I think the bashing of the prequels is way over the line and the praise for the original trilogy is also over stated.

I also don't think the general public feels the way the people who constantly cry about this stuff online feel.

It's definitely the case of a very vocal minority. People keep bitching, but they moved half a million expensive Blu-ray sets the first week in North America.

I've moved on with life, yeah the prequels could have been better, yeah some of the changes are annoying, but you know what I put in the Blu-rays forgot all that and enjoyed the set.

 

Surprised to learn that Harrison Ford is open to playing Han Solo again. I hope he does.

http://www.cnn.com/2012/11/06/showbiz/movies/star-wars-sequel-harrison-ford/index.html

I've never seen any of the prequels, not interested. I would defintely see a sequel to the three original films with any of the original cast.

 

Have you seen to original cast lately? Ford is the only one who belongs in front of a camera anymore.

 

Yeah, I was shocked to see Carrie Fisher awhile back, I hadn't seen her in a long time. I have no idea what Mark Hamill looks like these days.

 

I would like to see that. Apparently Dark Horse did a 4 part comic series on this. But I haven't seen it.

 

Why are there Stormtroopers (that appear to be people) in the original trilogy but only CGI robots in the later 3 movies? Are the Stormtroopers in the original 3 supposed to be robots too? I don't get it. And don't get me started on how all the space ships in the new movies looking nothing like the ships in the original 3. What a mess.

 

I don't believe the stormtroopers were ever robots - they were originally clones of Jango Fett, Boba's father.