As a filmmaker, and after reading this book cover to cover many times, I've come to the assumption that this book is truly unfilmable. I have read a few scripts based upon it found on the 'web, one particular written by Gibson himself, but there is just absolutely no way to capture the depth of environment this novel creates.
I don't care how big your budget is, it "ain't gonna happen."(tm)
Everyone remembers the exact moment when they realized that their Phanom Menace sandwich was filled with shit.
I think that would make a good Slashdot poll. When did you realize that George Lucas had defecated on your childhood memories?
- Opening sequence: "The taxation of trade routes to outlying systems is in dispute." - First appearance of Jar Jar - First mention of midi-chlorians - The creepy virgin birth thingy - First appearance of the annoying brat who played young Anikin - First appearance of the wooden teen-aged brat who played older Anikin - ???
- Greedo shot first. - Han Solo steps on Jabba's tail without getting killed.* - BS explosion rings from the Death Stars. - Ewoks Cartoon. - Droids Cartoon. - Star Wars Christmas Special. - Ewoks instead of Wookies on Endor in RotJ.
My personal pick is when Greedo shot first.
(* Yes I know that it was because when they originally filmed the deleted scene Jabba was a man instead of a slug-like alien and Harrison Ford moved around him in ways that didn't work later, but this did sort of help break suspension of disbelief.)
- Han Solo steps on Jabba's tail without getting killed.
Yes. That's the point when I got the first sensations that something, somewhere was horribly, horribly wrong.
(I don't actually dislike the new Star Wars stuff. I just now see them as entertaining movies, rather than the magical land of wonder and arse-whoopery that it used to be. The prequels are like finding out that Santa doesn't really exist. You knew all along, but there it is in black and white.)
Worse is the fact that Jabba's reaction (in the theatrical remaster anyway) was actually kind of cute and funny. This is supposed to the badass mafia lord who Han is pissing himself over in the later scenes of Star Wars and early scenes of Empire... and now he's a freakin' muppet. It just doesn't work. Also, I continue to be baffled why, when adding the Jabba scene back in, Lucas didn't either delete the Greedo scene or at least changed the dialog of one scene or the other. I mean, it's subtitles of made
Han Solo steps on Jabba's tail without getting killed.
I think that's actually worse than Greedo shooting first. Sure, the Greedo scene undermines Han as cold-blooded-badass-and-not-necessarily-a-good-guy , but on the plus side it does emphasise his leet smuggler's reflexes: Greedo fires, Han gets his head out of the way of the bolt so fast even a Jedi could hardly follow it, and next thing you know Greedo's toast. Han's a dangerous guy to cross. Very Clint Eastwood.
The scene with Jabba, though... he's trying to talk his way out of a deep, deep hole. Han owes Jabba money. Jabba's already sent murderous bounty hunters after him. Han needs to talk Jabba around. We're talking edgy diplomacy here.
And then he steps on Jabba's tail. This we might not have noticed, it could have been fudged away, but Lucas has Jabba clearly react to it. Han's already in considerable trouble, and he's just flagrantly disrespected the biggest syndicate boss on the outer rim in front of his henchmen. Han is dead. Very, very dead. Eventually dead, after an extremely nasty interlude involving hot sharp things. His head's going up on a spike in front of Jabba's palace, and the rest of him's getting fed to the banthas.
That scene made Star Wars just... silly. Absurd. From there on, it's downhill all the way to Jar Jar Binks.
Meh, as far as I'm concerned the true Star Wars died when Lucas changed Starkiller's name to "Skywalker". It was all downhill for the franchise after that first bitter betrayal. Who's with me?
Actually in my case, and in that of my friends, it was one of:
- When it was announced that George Lucas was doing a new Star Wars(tm) series - When it was announced that the first of these would be called Phantom Menace
For me, it was the Ewoks. How badass could the empire be if the friggin' Ewoks can do such damage to the place where they're building a new death star. It's like letting native americans on horseback with bows and arrows take over the site where a nuclear-powered aircraft carrier is being built.
The Ewoks were an obvious shout-out to the Zulu tribe which slaughtered the much-more-technically-advanced British army using nothing but spears, wicker shields, and a the kind of bravery that can only come from phychotic drug-induced haze.
That had to do it for me. I was under the assumption anyone could be a Jedi if they just tried hard enough and not because of some noble upbringing or good genetics.
Secondly, it added nothing to the movie. It isn't as if we didn't already have some knowledge of what the force was coming from the first three movies. I mean they could just have wandered by and said "I feel a strong presence in the force with this child" or something like that. Not this "let me whip out my tricorder and talk about something that wasn't mentioned in the first three films.
Those are one of the things I hope George takes out in the first movie. Heck... Why doesn't George just do them all over again.
"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!", pretty much sums up my Star Wars I,II,III experience.
I was under the assumption anyone could be a Jedi if they just tried hard enough and not because of some noble upbringing or good genetics.
Is this where everyone who doesn't like midi-chlorians is coming from? I had no real problem with midi-chlorians, and I always thought force-usage did run in families (with the occasional random person getting just the right genes where previous family history was unknown).
Canon-wise, the only proof in the movies was Luke's statement of "the force is strong in my f
Of course, light sabers are really wimpy, dogs and giraffes can be sprayed with flamethrowers for 30 seconds and not die, or even just run away screaming in agony etc. etc. etc. ad nauseum.
There's different levels of cannon in Star Wars. Games are on the lowest rung. They pretty much have to, because they'll often show outcomes that are significantly different from more official sources (such as possibly building 30 death stars in Rebellion). Galaxies in particular is, umm, not exactly cannon. The light-side ending to KotOR is official, IIRC.
The books are just below the movies as offcial sources. They're all supposed to create a single story line that refers to earlier books. The movies sti
Are people still worked up about this midi-chlorian shit? That's the part of the prequels that bothered me the least. I do at least understand why you're all pissed. Who would have ever thought that a mystic bad-ass Jedi Knight would have essentially whipped out a tricorder and punched a few buttons to get the answer? It just seems wrong, right?
You see, that's the whole point -- it was wrong. The Jedi Order from the prequels was getting a little too big for its britches, a little too political, a little too technical. They were starting to abandon the mystical connection to the Force in favor of things that they could see and measure. As a result of this, they started to miss the whole point of this Force business, and the only way to rescue things and "bring balance" was to fucking kill them all, and start over from scratch.
So many other folks don't seem to get how the Jedi Order in the prequels was intentionally a bit crap. The "return" in ROTJ means Luke is restarting the Jedi, but it also means that the purity has returned, the Jedi are back to their ideal.
Note how neither Yoda nor Obi-Wan try to teach Jedi culture to Luke. No "council", no rules, no "padawan" or other ranks. If they hadn't the time while alive, they could still do it while blue and glowy - but no. I'd call that deliberate.
I Disagree. When Lucas said that he had planned all along to make nine... um... six movies, I believe him. The Star Wars Universe is, after all, incredibly detailed, much more so than the movies can ever get across. (At least, that's what the fanboys who have the time to read all the books tell me).
Lucas's problem, IMHO, is that all he had was the talent to write was the backstory, but the commercial success of the original Star Wars trilogy convinced him that he had the talent to actually write and direct
> I Disagree. When Lucas said that he had planned all along to > make nine... um... six movies, I believe him. The
Except that he had no idea Luke and Leia were brothers (the "kiss" in the first one, and hints at romance in the second one, even as he had already decided Vader was the father in that very film -- something he may have had in the back of his mind given "darth vader" was jabberwocky for "dark father".
Sibling has a point when they mention that the backstory (council, etc) basically hadn't been written yet, which is why Yoda and Obi-Wan never mention it. But if we put that aside, they may also never mention it because it's simply irrelevant. In Ep 4, there is no council. Hell, there are no Jedi, aside from Obi-Wan and Yoda. So why give him a big speech about the council, ranks, etc. It would all be pointless.
Are people still worked up about this midi-chlorian shit? That's the part of the prequels that bothered me the least. I do at least understand why you're all pissed.
The problem is that the prequals were full of crap like this that could have been done in 1/4th the time and with heightened mood in the hands of a college-level competent filmmaker. We didn't really need to see Anakin tossing and turning in his bed for 30 seconds before Amidala comments that he's been having nightmares. We could have had a si
Lucas can't write for shit. The best of the franchise, imo, is Empire Strikes Back, the script of which was non-Lucas anyway - Leigh Brackett and Lawrence Kasdan get the credits here and I'm pretty sure that I read somewhere that Brackett did most of the graft. Kasdan - a not inconsiderable talent in his own right - lasts until 6 when Lucas gets his first screenplay credit for the franchise. That's when the ewoks get introduced. umm. I, II & III - all scripted by Lucas (someone called Hales gets credits
I like the other theory I've run into, explaining most bad sequels to brilliant films. When the first movie comes out, the producer has to fight tooth and nail to get any budget at all. The tight-fisted financiers can bully him into relying on tight scripting and good dialogue for his movies. After that movie becomes a blockbuster success, the director can request just about anything for the "blockbuster sequel" and are therefore free to ruin the movie by adding everything their heart desires.
The problem is that the prequals were full of crap like this that could have been done in 1/4th the time and with heightened mood in the hands of a college-level competent filmmaker.
I won't dispute that at all. They could have been so much better had someone else been involved. George Lucas came up with this universe in the first place, so he's not a total idiot, but I think he's proven with these last three films that his creative output needs a lot of filtering through other creative people in order to n
George Lucas came up with this universe in the first place, so he's not a total idiot, but I think he's proven with these last three films that his creative output needs a lot of filtering through other creative people in order to not be total crap.
That's it in a nutshell. The Star Wars universe is amazing. While it is a fantasy Lucas makes it feel gritty and real, as opposed to the sanitized purity of Roddenberry's Trek. The sites (distressed metal, garbage in the streets), sounds (whining motors, garbled
Agreed. I was willing to roll with the whole Jar-Jar thing for a while, but when they went on their little journy through the "planet core" (Which was aparently entirely water at a depth of about 50 feet), they get attacked by a big fish-dragon thing, only to be rescued when it's gobbled up by a bigger fish. Then shortly afterwards, they get attacked by another fish, and again rescued when it gets eaten by a bigger fish. That second get-attacked-by-a-sea-monster-who-gets-attacked-by -a-bigger-sea-monster s
The story of "The Chosen One". Here's the plot: Person (often young person, as it is used most often in juvenile fiction) thinks he is completely useless, no one even knows he exists, he is in a dusty corner of the world. Person finds out actually he is actually one of the most important people ever (is a prince, a jedi, messiah, etc.) (optionally) Person saves the world.
It's been done successfully a zillion times. It's Star Wars 4, it's Spider Man, it's Harry Potter, it's "the Princess Diaries", it's "The Wild
Obligatory Link [weeklystandard.com]. From the linked article:
The Force, it turns out, is an inherited, genetic trait. If you don't have the blood, you don't get the Force. Which makes the Jedi not a democratic militia, but a royalist Swiss guard. And an arrogant royalist Swiss guard, at that. With one or two notable exceptions, the Jedi we meet in Star Wars are full of themselves. They ignore the counsel of others (often with terrible consequences), and seem honestly to believe that they are at the center of the universe. Wh
Episode I would have been far better if Lucas had stuck to his original sources. Imagine a slight variation on Seven Samurai with Yoda as Kambei, Obi Wan as Katsushiro, and Anakin as Kikuchiyo (who younger and obviously lives instead of getting killed). Plenty of interesting material there, and a classic storyline, plus it's sets up nicely for an Episode II with Obi Wan older and deciding to take a slightly chastened Anakin as his apprentice (presumably unbenownst or to the displeasure of Yoda). There's eve
You know what would have worked, if Lucas wanted to do prequels, is, say, a movie dedicated towards the ancient history; say a movie about the first confrontations between the Jedi and the Sith. A second could deal with the rise of the Republic, and then one single movie to deal with Anakin becoming Darth Vader.
The way I figure it, Episode I was a total waste of time. It was dull, badly written, poorly acted and just generally no damned good. What Liam Neeson was doing in this movie I'll never understand, and the introduction of idiocies like midichlorians and Anakin-as-Jesus-virgin-birth crap was nonsensical, and would require the most bizarre explanation for Anakin's brother Owen in the next film.
Episode II just didn't seem to know where to go. Did it want to be Obiwan's detective story? Did it want to be the love affair between Anakin and Padme? About Anakin's descent into the dark side? The Sith's bizarre machinations (including a Sith apprentice who tells Anakin that "oh yeah, the Sith control the Senate")? Or is it a political thriller? It wanted to go so many places in two hours that it ultimately went very little distance at all. One way to have patched things up would have been for Anakin to become Darth Vader at the end of that film, which would have made the next film much more interesting.
Episode III. As close as we'll ever get in Lucas's post-1980s world to a good Star Wars film. Still clunky, but at least the Emperor comes off interesting (by now he's clearly the only character in the prequels that is really all that interesting). Still, way too much deux ex machina. Anakin still seems to sort of abruptly become Darth Vader rather than a slow descent into evil (which is why I think the more natural transition would have been at the end of Episode II). The whole "my apprentice is in trouble" which gets the Emperor on a ship to fly to Vader's aid was the worst example. The ending was idiotic, the Darth Vader suit sequence seeming anticlimactic, and the whole bit about Padme dying not only ridiculously maudlin but making the Epside VI statement by Leia that she could still remember her mother rather odd, considering Luke didn't.
I think Lucas's whole reason for making Star Wars films changed between 1976-1983 and the 1990s. The earlier films, even as they got a bit deeper and more philosophical on the nature of evil in the Star Wars' universe, still maintained a fun, swashbuckling feeling. The plot holes in Episode VII could be ignored because, goddamnit, those Ewoks were cute, the Millenium Falcon was way cool flying into the Death STar, and the Emperor was so fucking evil in a basic, elemental fashion, rather than as some political plotter more in the line of Idi Amin than a Dark Lord holding extraordinary powers.
I think Lucas decided to take his space opera and turn it into some sort of political parable. The problem is that Lucas isn't a very good writer, so loads of nonsense like midichlorians get loaded into the brew just so he can progress his almost-plot with as little effort as possible. He's so busy with his wannabe-political-philosophy nonsense that he forgets that a movie has to be interesting, whether it aspires to greater things or not.
Lucas is a good idea man, or was, but ultimately, his instincts are all wrong. He overestimated his abilities as writer, and misjudged want the fans wanted. The fans didn't want The Galactic Manchurian Candidate, but rather Star Wars, as they saw it between 1977 and 1983.
I disagree with the article that the prequels were a bad idea, though they clearly would have the limitation that we all know Anakin turns into Darth Vader. There's no "Wow, Luke is Vader's son" or "Hey, Darth Vader ain't so bad after all" moments. Those that read the original novel adaptations even knew basically how Anakin received the injuries. I really think that the entire Anakin-Darth Vader could have been done in a single movie, and without all the virgin-birth nonsense. Two other movies could have given us a better background of the Jedi-Sith struggles and the Republic.
You know what would have worked, if Lucas wanted to do prequels, is, say, a movie dedicated towards the ancient history; say a movie about the first confrontations between the Jedi and the Sith. A second could deal with the rise of the Republic, and then one single movie to deal with Anakin becoming Darth Vader.
I think that would be way too much history to cover with only 3 movies. One of the things I liked about the OT was that it didn't try to tell the whole story of the rebellion, it focused on the adventures of a few key characters. The civil war served as a backdrop, with the story threads winding in and out of it. So you end up with a grand universe that allows for many interesting stories to be told in the EU in parallel with the OT events.
I agree with your description of the first 2 prequels. The problem I had with those movies, is that there was no sense of history (the OT had allusions to the republic, clone wars, etc), the universe seemed revolve around the main characters. That is what made them so shallow, Lucas tried to handhold the story of the creation of the empire entirely through a handful of characters. The thrid prequel had more of that sense of "a grand universe" that was in the OT.
I think Lucas decided to take his space opera and turn it into some sort of political parable. The problem is that Lucas isn't a very good writer, so loads of nonsense like midichlorians get loaded into the brew just so he can progress his almost-plot with as little effort as possible. He's so busy with his wannabe-political-philosophy nonsense that he forgets that a movie has to be interesting, whether it aspires to greater things or not.
If he was a good writer the prequels could have been very interesting. He does bring up several good points on the failure of democracy during crisis, liberty vs security, law vs morality, but ends up skimming over them. The prequels could have been filled with political intrigue, backstabbing, the grey of good vs evil. After watching the TV series "Rome" on HBO, I thought a similar story would have been great for the prequels. The underlying elements were similar (political disputes, assassination, self-interest, etc) just Star Wars didn't make it interesting.
One of the things I liked about the OT was that it didn't try to tell the whole story of the rebellion, it focused on the adventures of a few key characters. The civil war served as a backdrop, with the story threads winding in and out of it. So you end up with a grand universe that allows for many interesting stories to be told in the EU in parallel with the OT events.
I agree with your description of the first 2 prequels. The problem I had with those movies, is that there was no sense of history (the OT ha
... If Count Dooku had not been consciously Sith-influenced, but rather an honest "loyal opposition."
This would have required only minimal changes to the sequencing of things, and could have shown off off the fall of the Old Republic as an honest-to-goodness tragedy. Having the Sith successfully playing off two honestly well-intentioned sides against each other could have worked out excellently well.
What was also unfortunate is that little more than lip-service was paid to the various "failures of democracy." It seemed to me that when Dooku explained, in Kenobi's earshot, why he was collecting up forces to oppose what was going on in the parliament, he had some pretty legitimate reasons for concern.
Unfortunately, all we saw, after the various "things failing," was that people seized at power of one sort or another to respond to them. What perhaps wasn't clear enough was that seizure of power was, in every case, a mistake.
You are exactly right, I kept thinking if Doku was "right" and then the Jedi were forced to choose sides in a revolution, well, that could have made for a really interesting plot twist.
So you end up with a grand universe that allows for many interesting stories to be told in the EU in parallel with the OT events.
So you end up with a grand universe that allows for many interesting stories to be told in the European Union (parliament) in parallel with the Off Topic events.
Just my common association with those acronyms! Then again, using those alternate acronyms may also sum up Eps I-III reasonably well. (thinks of Simpsons take on the prequels).
Here's a plot outline I did for the Prequels [kyhm.com] a few months ago, it would have kept the story that Lucas told in them but would have given a lot more depth to the characters. Plus Jar-Jar doesn't suck in my version.
The way I figure it, Episode I was a total waste of time. It was dull, badly written, poorly acted and just generally no damned good. What Liam Neeson was doing in this movie I'll never understand, and the introduction of idiocies like midichlorians and Anakin-as-Jesus-virgin-birth crap was nonsensical, and would require the most bizarre explanation for Anakin's brother Owen in the next film.
Agreed. Episode I raped my childhood. I've already gone off about midichlorians. The idea of Anakin being a created being caused by Sith force-manipulation of one of Shmi Skywalker's ova is interesting, but was introduced clumsily in Episode I. This revelation might have been something for a later episode. Or maybe an aside in a single prequel movie.
I always come back to it, again and again: Episodes I, II and III would have made a bitchen single movie.
Another thing that rankled about Episode I was the blatant pandering to the juvenile audience. Jar Jar Binks was only the tip of the iceberg. Young Anakin as a boy genius was just intolerable and gag-producing. Episode I didn't have to be kidvid. "The Phantom Edit" proved that.
Episode II just didn't seem to know where to go. Did it want to be Obiwan's detective story? Did it want to be the love affair between Anakin and Padme? About Anakin's descent into the dark side? The Sith's bizarre machinations (including a Sith apprentice who tells Anakin that "oh yeah, the Sith control the Senate")? Or is it a political thriller? It wanted to go so many places in two hours that it ultimately went very little distance at all. One way to have patched things up would have been for Anakin to become Darth Vader at the end of that film, which would have made the next film much more interesting.
Again, if the prequels had just been one movie, a lot of this weirdness could have been just asides and flashbacks. Also the main weakness of the film was the actor chosen to play Anakin as an adult. Sorry, but Hayden Christiansen falls completely flat as a pancake. He reminds me of the deer-caught-in-the-headlights performance of John Travolta as "The Boy In The Plastic Bubble." He might have been good elsewhere, but he was a bad Anakin.
Everyone screamed when Leonardo DiCaprio was considered as Anakin. However, he had chops as an actor before "Titanic," (Go rent "What's Eating Gilbert Grape" and "The Basketball Diaries" sometime) and he definitely showed he had chops and could portray a character like Anakin in the movie "The Aviator." DiCaprio's Howard Hughes was a swashbuckling, rogueish guy who started coming apart at the seams. Anakin Skywalker always struck me as a swashbuckling roguish guy who came apart at the seams. DiCaprio is going to wind up like fellow ex-teen idol Johnny Depp...a really awesome character actor who can do anything he wants to. I don't know if his oevre will be as quirky as Johnny Depp, whose work I love.
Episode III. As close as we'll ever get in Lucas's post-1980s world to a good Star Wars film. Still clunky, but at least the Emperor comes off interesting (by now he's clearly the only character in the prequels that is really all that interesting). Still, way too much deux ex machina. Anakin still seems to sort of abruptly become Darth Vader rather than a slow descent into evil (which is why I think the more natural transition would have been at the end of Episode II). The whole "my apprentice is in trouble" which gets the Emperor on a ship to fly to Vader's aid was the worst example. The ending was idiotic, the Darth Vader suit sequence seeming anticlimactic, and the whole bit about Padme dying not only ridiculously maudlin but making the Epside VI statement by Leia that she could still remember her mother rather odd, considering Luke didn't.
Episode III would provide the backbone to a potential "Mega Phantom Edit." Every important element that moved the plot forward in Episodes I and II could be told in flashback around the framework of Episode III.
I don't even think that DiCaprio was that bad in Titanic. Just because it's not to people's taste (and it is overwrought melodrama) doesn't mean that he did a bad job in it.
It's been suggested that Palpatine was responsible for Anakin's "virgin birth". This does make sense, from a certain point of view. Darth Plagius (sp?) had the ability to create life. Plagius taught his apprentice all he knew. Palpatine strongly implies in Ep3 that he was Plaguis' apprentice. And given his grand ambitions it's not inconceivable that he might have engineered Anakin's fate right from the start. Though why he would choose a nobody from the arse end of the universe isn't exactly clear.
Palpatine strongly implies in Ep3 that he was Plaguis' apprentice.
If you're willing to believe Extended Universe sources, "Dark Lord: The Rise of Lord Vader" has Palpatine musing voer the lessons he learned while he was Darth Plaguis's apprentice. I'd Amazon link it, but I don't know how to get a clean link so as to avoid people accusing me of trying to milk referrals.
the whole bit about Padme dying not only ridiculously maudlin but making the Epside VI statement by Leia that she could still remember her mother rather odd, considering Luke didn't.
Actually this is not quite as outlandish as it may appear. Leia was raised by people who knew her mother, and would have been able to relate an experience of Padme to her. You or I may not consider this to be a true memory, however I strongly suspect that you have installed memories from your early childhood that if you really t
I have it chaked up to that her adopted mother died and Leia had not been informed that he was adopted.
After all here adopted parents where rulers of the planet, since she was called princess you could assume that her adopted father was king, so why would you tell her of the adoption and allow that to come out. Considering who her father was, why tell her about Padme was and allow that to somehow spread?
If you remember, they had 3-d moving holographic projectors in Star Wars. Padme would probably been filmed a lot as a high-ranking person so Leia may have seen those.
A giant firball called "Wookie" is pretty much as stupid as "Jar Jar", it's just that we were kids so it became a part of our mind that this was okay.
I would disagree with you. While Chewbacca had his comic moments, for the most part he was not only big and furry, but also could visibly kick ass. Jar-Jar... fell a lot. And, bizarrely enough, kept succeeding through his mastery of Sna Fu. Which, of course, leads one to the conclusion that Jar-Jar may be high in the force and therefore the real Jedi master
First appearance of the wooden teen-aged brat who played older Anikin
Don't be so hard on him. Hayden Christensen is actually a good actor. As are Natalie Portman, Samuel Jackson, Ewan MacGregor, Liam Neeson and Jimmy Smits. But their performances in the Star Wars prequels all uniformly sucked. Only one person can ultimately be blamed for that.
I take exception to this. I see a lot of people claiming he's a good actor. I've seen a lot of reviews saying the same thing. One of his "best" performances was supposedly in Life as a House.
Watch it sometime. Christensen is wooden, boring, unsympathetic, and perpetually whiny. In short, he plays his Anakin character TO THE TEE, sans Star Wars dress-up.
By the end of that movie I honestly wanted his character to die. Just like in Star Wars:)
I take exception to this. I see a lot of people claiming he's a good actor. I've seen a lot of reviews saying the same thing. One of his "best" performances was supposedly in Life as a House.
Watch it sometime. Christensen is wooden, boring, unsympathetic, and perpetually whiny. In short, he plays his Anakin character TO THE TEE, sans Star Wars dress-up.
I did see it, actually, and I quite liked his performance.
But it's a matter of taste; I understand what you're saying. My real point is that Lucas
When did you realize that George Lucas had defecated on your childhood memories?
Jar Jar, or the Midiclorians. But still... I could have lived with these annoyances if the rest of the movies had been anywhere near the standard of the 1st three. They weren't. And I wasn't sure why. Like the article's author, I thought the CGI was way, way over the top at times, especially during the space battles and chase scenes. But still not enough to ruin a good movie. Then I read this: "The universe gets smaller
What's more, I realized that my Episode I-III turd sandwich also looked like a giant douche, when Cartoon Network ran the Clone Wars animated miniseries. Now that was Star Wars.
"- Opening sequence: "The taxation of trade routes to outlying systems is in dispute." - First appearance of Jar Jar - First mention of midi-chlorians - The creepy virgin birth thingy - First appearance of the annoying brat who played young Anikin - First appearance of the wooden teen-aged brat who played older Anikin - ???"... - Profit!!! ?
all of those, plus these: two lightsabers melt through a massive blast door, and continue to be useful on the other side. Is this the same universe where balky old spaceships have to be continually tweaked into running, blasters overheat and quit shooting, and droids get all sand-jammed?
Every character from the good films appears as a child in the bad films.
Huge amounts of technology are introduced which are supposed to have vanished without a trace twenty years later? My son sees these inconsistencies at 7,
If Hyperspace is also a warped space generated by the ship's engines, then it'd be possible that he could do the Kessel Run in less than 12 parsecs -- his ship warped the space into that small of a distance, a record.
Ummm, but the speed of light in Hyperspace would have to be faster since it'd still take like 15 years to travel 12 parsecs even at the speed of light.
The scene where teenage Anakin starts whining about how 'nowone understands him' and that it isn't fair... and then goes of killing a whole tribe... and just as he finds his mom , the **** has the nerve to die.
For me it was right after the opening scroll of Phantom Menace. As soon as I saw the first spaceship fly across the screen, I thought "What is this, a joke? This looks like a cartoon!" Even the sound effects were all "wrong" from the sound of the ships in the original trilogy.
That's what did it for me. I mean, seriously. If Vader had been lying, that would have been one thing. Or even if Vader was a clone of Luke's father, things would have been ok.
But that made liars out of both Yoda and Obi-Wan. "Yeah, we knew he was your dad, but we decided to bullshit you."
But that made liars out of both Yoda and Obi-Wan. "Yeah, we knew he was your dad, but we decided to bullshit you."
Well, you have to remember that the Jedi are essentially heavily-armed religious fanatics in service as military. Yoda and Ben knew that if Luke knew the truth, he may not fight fully against Vader from the beginning and would therefore die. So, judging the needs of the Jedi over the needs of the few (Luke), they withheld the information, but left him with enough cryptic equivocation that he w
Personally, I thought that AOTC was a worst film. Annoying kid actors I can deal with. Kids are rarely great actors and I'm tolerant of it. The bit with Brian Blessed's Gungan near the end annoyed the crap out of me, though.
Hayden's whiney teenager, the overbaked and lifeless CG, R2 flying and the dreadful scenes between Anakin and Amidala. That sucked.
The way the camera pans into the stadium as the announcers start talking all nascar-ish. I had managed to hold out hope until then, but that killed it dead.
The main problem overall with the prequels, is that there is not a single character you can like - no Han Solo. Anakin is going to be evil and he's about as deep as a puddle; the Jedi are all conceited; Padmé is ok I suppose but she gets reduced to being a childmaker and victim; Shmi is... yuck; and so on.
Oopsie. (Score:5, Insightful)
As a filmmaker, and after reading this book cover to cover many times, I've come to the assumption that this book is truly unfilmable. I have read a few scripts based upon it found on the 'web, one particular written by Gibson himself, but there is just absolutely no way to capture the depth of environment this novel creates.
I don't care how big your budget is, it "ain't gonna happen."(tm)
Best quote from the article (Score:5, Funny)
I think that would make a good Slashdot poll. When did you realize that George Lucas had defecated on your childhood memories?
- Opening sequence: "The taxation of trade routes to outlying systems is in dispute."
- First appearance of Jar Jar
- First mention of midi-chlorians
- The creepy virgin birth thingy
- First appearance of the annoying brat who played young Anikin
- First appearance of the wooden teen-aged brat who played older Anikin
- ???
Missing Option (Score:5, Insightful)
- Han Solo steps on Jabba's tail without getting killed.*
- BS explosion rings from the Death Stars.
- Ewoks Cartoon.
- Droids Cartoon.
- Star Wars Christmas Special.
- Ewoks instead of Wookies on Endor in RotJ.
My personal pick is when Greedo shot first.
(* Yes I know that it was because when they originally filmed the deleted scene Jabba was a man instead of a slug-like alien and Harrison Ford moved around him in ways that didn't work later, but this did sort of help break suspension of disbelief.)
Re:Missing Option (Score:1)
Re:Missing Option (Score:2, Insightful)
- Han Solo steps on Jabba's tail without getting killed.
The Han Solo who shoots first is the only one who can get away with #2...
Re:Missing Option (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:Missing Option (Score:2)
Re:Missing Option (Score:3, Insightful)
Yes. That's the point when I got the first sensations that something, somewhere was horribly, horribly wrong.
(I don't actually dislike the new Star Wars stuff. I just now see them as entertaining movies, rather than the magical land of wonder and arse-whoopery that it used to be. The prequels are like finding out that Santa doesn't really exist. You knew all along, but there it is in black and white.)
Re:Missing Option (Score:2)
Also, I continue to be baffled why, when adding the Jabba scene back in, Lucas didn't either delete the Greedo scene or at least changed the dialog of one scene or the other. I mean, it's subtitles of made
Re:Missing Option (Score:5, Insightful)
I think that's actually worse than Greedo shooting first. Sure, the Greedo scene undermines Han as cold-blooded-badass-and-not-necessarily-a-good-guy , but on the plus side it does emphasise his leet smuggler's reflexes: Greedo fires, Han gets his head out of the way of the bolt so fast even a Jedi could hardly follow it, and next thing you know Greedo's toast. Han's a dangerous guy to cross. Very Clint Eastwood.
The scene with Jabba, though... he's trying to talk his way out of a deep, deep hole. Han owes Jabba money. Jabba's already sent murderous bounty hunters after him. Han needs to talk Jabba around. We're talking edgy diplomacy here.
And then he steps on Jabba's tail. This we might not have noticed, it could have been fudged away, but Lucas has Jabba clearly react to it. Han's already in considerable trouble, and he's just flagrantly disrespected the biggest syndicate boss on the outer rim in front of his henchmen. Han is dead. Very, very dead. Eventually dead, after an extremely nasty interlude involving hot sharp things. His head's going up on a spike in front of Jabba's palace, and the rest of him's getting fed to the banthas.
That scene made Star Wars just... silly. Absurd. From there on, it's downhill all the way to Jar Jar Binks.
Re:Missing Option (Score:1)
Guys?
G-guys?
Re:Best quote from the article (Score:1)
- When it was announced that George Lucas was doing a new Star Wars(tm) series
- When it was announced that the first of these would be called Phantom Menace
Re:Best quote from the article (Score:2)
Re:Best quote from the article (Score:2)
There was a scene with a baby Ewok, and half the bloody audience in the cinema went "Aaaah". That was what killed it for me.
And then following it up with the "Luke and Leia are brother and sister" bullshit, Man, that was just crap.
Re:Best quote from the article (Score:2)
Re:Best quote from the article (Score:5, Insightful)
That had to do it for me. I was under the assumption anyone could be a Jedi if they just tried hard enough and not because of some noble upbringing or good genetics.
Secondly, it added nothing to the movie. It isn't as if we didn't already have some knowledge of what the force was coming from the first three movies. I mean they could just have wandered by and said "I feel a strong presence in the force with this child" or something like that. Not this "let me whip out my tricorder and talk about something that wasn't mentioned in the first three films.
Those are one of the things I hope George takes out in the first movie. Heck... Why doesn't George just do them all over again.
"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!", pretty much sums up my Star Wars I,II,III experience.
Re:Best quote from the article (Score:2, Insightful)
I was under the assumption anyone could be a Jedi if they just tried hard enough and not because of some noble upbringing or good genetics.
Is this where everyone who doesn't like midi-chlorians is coming from? I had no real problem with midi-chlorians, and I always thought force-usage did run in families (with the occasional random person getting just the right genes where previous family history was unknown).
Canon-wise, the only proof in the movies was Luke's statement of "the force is strong in my f
Re:Best quote from the article (Score:2)
Re:Best quote from the article (Score:1)
I guess anybody can be a Jedi after all!
Of course, light sabers are really wimpy, dogs and giraffes can be sprayed with flamethrowers for 30 seconds and not die, or even just run away screaming in agony etc. etc. etc. ad nauseum.
Re:Best quote from the article (Score:1)
There's different levels of cannon in Star Wars. Games are on the lowest rung. They pretty much have to, because they'll often show outcomes that are significantly different from more official sources (such as possibly building 30 death stars in Rebellion). Galaxies in particular is, umm, not exactly cannon. The light-side ending to KotOR is official, IIRC.
The books are just below the movies as offcial sources. They're all supposed to create a single story line that refers to earlier books. The movies sti
Re:Best quote from the article (Score:5, Interesting)
You see, that's the whole point -- it was wrong. The Jedi Order from the prequels was getting a little too big for its britches, a little too political, a little too technical. They were starting to abandon the mystical connection to the Force in favor of things that they could see and measure. As a result of this, they started to miss the whole point of this Force business, and the only way to rescue things and "bring balance" was to fucking kill them all, and start over from scratch.
At least, that's how I would have wrote it.
MOD UP (Score:5, Interesting)
Note how neither Yoda nor Obi-Wan try to teach Jedi culture to Luke. No "council", no rules, no "padawan" or other ranks. If they hadn't the time while alive, they could still do it while blue and glowy - but no. I'd call that deliberate.
Re:MOD DOWN (Score:2)
Lucas's problem, IMHO, is that all he had was the talent to write was the backstory, but the commercial success of the original Star Wars trilogy convinced him that he had the talent to actually write and direct
Re:MOD DOWN (Score:1)
> make nine... um... six movies, I believe him. The
Except that he had no idea Luke and Leia were brothers (the "kiss" in the first one, and hints at romance in the second one, even as he had already decided Vader was the father in that very film -- something he may have had in the back of his mind given "darth vader" was jabberwocky for "dark father".
Re:MOD UP (Score:2)
Re:Best quote from the article (Score:1)
With a tip o' the hat to Ballmer. Thank you, imadork.
Re:Best quote from the article (Score:3, Interesting)
The problem is that the prequals were full of crap like this that could have been done in 1/4th the time and with heightened mood in the hands of a college-level competent filmmaker. We didn't really need to see Anakin tossing and turning in his bed for 30 seconds before Amidala comments that he's been having nightmares. We could have had a si
Re:Best quote from the article (Score:2)
The best of the franchise, imo, is Empire Strikes Back, the script of which was non-Lucas anyway - Leigh Brackett and Lawrence Kasdan get the credits here and I'm pretty sure that I read somewhere that Brackett did most of the graft. Kasdan - a not inconsiderable talent in his own right - lasts until 6 when Lucas gets his first screenplay credit for the franchise. That's when the ewoks get introduced. umm. I, II & III - all scripted by Lucas (someone called Hales gets credits
Re:Best quote from the article (Score:3, Funny)
This meant that he lost the only person who could tell him "No George, that's a stupid idea" and get listened to.
Being told no (Score:2)
Re:Best quote from the article (Score:2)
I won't dispute that at all. They could have been so much better had someone else been involved. George Lucas came up with this universe in the first place, so he's not a total idiot, but I think he's proven with these last three films that his creative output needs a lot of filtering through other creative people in order to n
Re:Best quote from the article (Score:2)
That's it in a nutshell. The Star Wars universe is amazing. While it is a fantasy Lucas makes it feel gritty and real, as opposed to the sanitized purity of Roddenberry's Trek. The sites (distressed metal, garbage in the streets), sounds (whining motors, garbled
Re:Best quote from the article (Score:2)
That second get-attacked-by-a-sea-monster-who-gets-attacked-by -a-bigger-sea-monster s
wrong, go back again and study... (Score:2)
Here's the plot:
Person (often young person, as it is used most often in juvenile fiction) thinks he is completely useless, no one even knows he exists, he is in a dusty corner of the world.
Person finds out actually he is actually one of the most important people ever (is a prince, a jedi, messiah, etc.)
(optionally) Person saves the world.
It's been done successfully a zillion times. It's Star Wars 4, it's Spider Man, it's Harry Potter, it's "the Princess Diaries", it's "The Wild
Re:wrong, go back again and study... (Score:1)
Re:Best quote from the article (Score:3, Interesting)
The Force, it turns out, is an inherited, genetic trait. If you don't have the blood, you don't get the Force. Which makes the Jedi not a democratic militia, but a royalist Swiss guard. And an arrogant royalist Swiss guard, at that. With one or two notable exceptions, the Jedi we meet in Star Wars are full of themselves. They ignore the counsel of others (often with terrible consequences), and seem honestly to believe that they are at the center of the universe. Wh
Re:Best quote from the article (Score:2)
Re:Best quote from the article (Score:2)
President of Nicaragua Anastasio Somoza Garcia was described by FDR as "our son of a bitch."
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Re:Best quote from the article (Score:5, Insightful)
The way I figure it, Episode I was a total waste of time. It was dull, badly written, poorly acted and just generally no damned good. What Liam Neeson was doing in this movie I'll never understand, and the introduction of idiocies like midichlorians and Anakin-as-Jesus-virgin-birth crap was nonsensical, and would require the most bizarre explanation for Anakin's brother Owen in the next film.
Episode II just didn't seem to know where to go. Did it want to be Obiwan's detective story? Did it want to be the love affair between Anakin and Padme? About Anakin's descent into the dark side? The Sith's bizarre machinations (including a Sith apprentice who tells Anakin that "oh yeah, the Sith control the Senate")? Or is it a political thriller? It wanted to go so many places in two hours that it ultimately went very little distance at all. One way to have patched things up would have been for Anakin to become Darth Vader at the end of that film, which would have made the next film much more interesting.
Episode III. As close as we'll ever get in Lucas's post-1980s world to a good Star Wars film. Still clunky, but at least the Emperor comes off interesting (by now he's clearly the only character in the prequels that is really all that interesting). Still, way too much deux ex machina. Anakin still seems to sort of abruptly become Darth Vader rather than a slow descent into evil (which is why I think the more natural transition would have been at the end of Episode II). The whole "my apprentice is in trouble" which gets the Emperor on a ship to fly to Vader's aid was the worst example. The ending was idiotic, the Darth Vader suit sequence seeming anticlimactic, and the whole bit about Padme dying not only ridiculously maudlin but making the Epside VI statement by Leia that she could still remember her mother rather odd, considering Luke didn't.
I think Lucas's whole reason for making Star Wars films changed between 1976-1983 and the 1990s. The earlier films, even as they got a bit deeper and more philosophical on the nature of evil in the Star Wars' universe, still maintained a fun, swashbuckling feeling. The plot holes in Episode VII could be ignored because, goddamnit, those Ewoks were cute, the Millenium Falcon was way cool flying into the Death STar, and the Emperor was so fucking evil in a basic, elemental fashion, rather than as some political plotter more in the line of Idi Amin than a Dark Lord holding extraordinary powers.
I think Lucas decided to take his space opera and turn it into some sort of political parable. The problem is that Lucas isn't a very good writer, so loads of nonsense like midichlorians get loaded into the brew just so he can progress his almost-plot with as little effort as possible. He's so busy with his wannabe-political-philosophy nonsense that he forgets that a movie has to be interesting, whether it aspires to greater things or not.
Lucas is a good idea man, or was, but ultimately, his instincts are all wrong. He overestimated his abilities as writer, and misjudged want the fans wanted. The fans didn't want The Galactic Manchurian Candidate, but rather Star Wars, as they saw it between 1977 and 1983.
I disagree with the article that the prequels were a bad idea, though they clearly would have the limitation that we all know Anakin turns into Darth Vader. There's no "Wow, Luke is Vader's son" or "Hey, Darth Vader ain't so bad after all" moments. Those that read the original novel adaptations even knew basically how Anakin received the injuries. I really think that the entire Anakin-Darth Vader could have been done in a single movie, and without all the virgin-birth nonsense. Two other movies could have given us a better background of the Jedi-Sith struggles and the Republic.
Re:Best quote from the article (Score:1)
that is only because he looked like the pope http://www.scurvydawg.com/article.php?story=Sith_
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Re:Best quote from the article (Score:4, Interesting)
I think that would be way too much history to cover with only 3 movies. One of the things I liked about the OT was that it didn't try to tell the whole story of the rebellion, it focused on the adventures of a few key characters. The civil war served as a backdrop, with the story threads winding in and out of it. So you end up with a grand universe that allows for many interesting stories to be told in the EU in parallel with the OT events.
I agree with your description of the first 2 prequels. The problem I had with those movies, is that there was no sense of history (the OT had allusions to the republic, clone wars, etc), the universe seemed revolve around the main characters. That is what made them so shallow, Lucas tried to handhold the story of the creation of the empire entirely through a handful of characters. The thrid prequel had more of that sense of "a grand universe" that was in the OT.
I think Lucas decided to take his space opera and turn it into some sort of political parable. The problem is that Lucas isn't a very good writer, so loads of nonsense like midichlorians get loaded into the brew just so he can progress his almost-plot with as little effort as possible. He's so busy with his wannabe-political-philosophy nonsense that he forgets that a movie has to be interesting, whether it aspires to greater things or not.
If he was a good writer the prequels could have been very interesting. He does bring up several good points on the failure of democracy during crisis, liberty vs security, law vs morality, but ends up skimming over them. The prequels could have been filled with political intrigue, backstabbing, the grey of good vs evil. After watching the TV series "Rome" on HBO, I thought a similar story would have been great for the prequels. The underlying elements were similar (political disputes, assassination, self-interest, etc) just Star Wars didn't make it interesting.
Re:Best quote from the article (Score:1)
Episode II could have been easily better... (Score:4, Interesting)
This would have required only minimal changes to the sequencing of things, and could have shown off off the fall of the Old Republic as an honest-to-goodness tragedy. Having the Sith successfully playing off two honestly well-intentioned sides against each other could have worked out excellently well.
What was also unfortunate is that little more than lip-service was paid to the various "failures of democracy." It seemed to me that when Dooku explained, in Kenobi's earshot, why he was collecting up forces to oppose what was going on in the parliament, he had some pretty legitimate reasons for concern.
Unfortunately, all we saw, after the various "things failing," was that people seized at power of one sort or another to respond to them. What perhaps wasn't clear enough was that seizure of power was, in every case, a mistake.
Re:Episode II could have been easily better... (Score:2)
Re:Best quote from the article (Score:1)
So you end up with a grand universe that allows for many interesting stories to be told in the European Union (parliament) in parallel with the Off Topic events.
Just my common association with those acronyms! Then again, using those alternate acronyms may also sum up Eps I-III reasonably well. (thinks of Simpsons take on the prequels).
Re:Best quote from the article (Score:2, Interesting)
Needed: The Mega Phantom Edit. (Score:5, Interesting)
Agreed. Episode I raped my childhood. I've already gone off about midichlorians. The idea of Anakin being a created being caused by Sith force-manipulation of one of Shmi Skywalker's ova is interesting, but was introduced clumsily in Episode I. This revelation might have been something for a later episode. Or maybe an aside in a single prequel movie.
I always come back to it, again and again: Episodes I, II and III would have made a bitchen single movie.
Another thing that rankled about Episode I was the blatant pandering to the juvenile audience. Jar Jar Binks was only the tip of the iceberg. Young Anakin as a boy genius was just intolerable and gag-producing. Episode I didn't have to be kidvid. "The Phantom Edit" proved that.
Episode II just didn't seem to know where to go. Did it want to be Obiwan's detective story? Did it want to be the love affair between Anakin and Padme? About Anakin's descent into the dark side? The Sith's bizarre machinations (including a Sith apprentice who tells Anakin that "oh yeah, the Sith control the Senate")? Or is it a political thriller? It wanted to go so many places in two hours that it ultimately went very little distance at all. One way to have patched things up would have been for Anakin to become Darth Vader at the end of that film, which would have made the next film much more interesting.
Again, if the prequels had just been one movie, a lot of this weirdness could have been just asides and flashbacks. Also the main weakness of the film was the actor chosen to play Anakin as an adult. Sorry, but Hayden Christiansen falls completely flat as a pancake. He reminds me of the deer-caught-in-the-headlights performance of John Travolta as "The Boy In The Plastic Bubble." He might have been good elsewhere, but he was a bad Anakin.
Everyone screamed when Leonardo DiCaprio was considered as Anakin. However, he had chops as an actor before "Titanic," (Go rent "What's Eating Gilbert Grape" and "The Basketball Diaries" sometime) and he definitely showed he had chops and could portray a character like Anakin in the movie "The Aviator." DiCaprio's Howard Hughes was a swashbuckling, rogueish guy who started coming apart at the seams. Anakin Skywalker always struck me as a swashbuckling roguish guy who came apart at the seams. DiCaprio is going to wind up like fellow ex-teen idol Johnny Depp...a really awesome character actor who can do anything he wants to. I don't know if his oevre will be as quirky as Johnny Depp, whose work I love.
Episode III. As close as we'll ever get in Lucas's post-1980s world to a good Star Wars film. Still clunky, but at least the Emperor comes off interesting (by now he's clearly the only character in the prequels that is really all that interesting). Still, way too much deux ex machina. Anakin still seems to sort of abruptly become Darth Vader rather than a slow descent into evil (which is why I think the more natural transition would have been at the end of Episode II). The whole "my apprentice is in trouble" which gets the Emperor on a ship to fly to Vader's aid was the worst example. The ending was idiotic, the Darth Vader suit sequence seeming anticlimactic, and the whole bit about Padme dying not only ridiculously maudlin but making the Epside VI statement by Leia that she could still remember her mother rather odd, considering Luke didn't.
Episode III would provide the backbone to a potential "Mega Phantom Edit." Every important element that moved the plot forward in Episodes I and II could be told in flashback around the framework of Episode III.
The whole relationship between Padme and A
Re:Needed: The Mega Phantom Edit. (Score:1)
Re:Best quote from the article (Score:3, Insightful)
Do not
Palpatine as Plaugis's Apprentice (Score:2)
If you're willing to believe Extended Universe sources, "Dark Lord: The Rise of Lord Vader" has Palpatine musing voer the lessons he learned while he was Darth Plaguis's apprentice. I'd Amazon link it, but I don't know how to get a clean link so as to avoid people accusing me of trying to milk referrals.
Re:Best quote from the article (Score:3, Interesting)
Actually this is not quite as outlandish as it may appear. Leia was raised by people who knew her mother, and would have been able to relate an experience of Padme to her. You or I may not consider this to be a true memory, however I strongly suspect that you have installed memories from your early childhood that if you really t
Re:Best quote from the article (Score:2)
After all here adopted parents where rulers of the planet, since she was called princess you could assume that her adopted father was king, so why would you tell her of the adoption and allow that to come out. Considering who her father was, why tell her about Padme was and allow that to somehow spread?
3d imaging? (Score:2)
Re:Best quote from the article (Score:1)
Uh, yeah it is.
The picture was funny because a picture of a pipe is not a pipe. Your sig misses the point because it is, in fact, a sig.
Re:Best quote from the article (Score:2)
"You have done that yourself!"
A ball of treelimbs? (Score:2)
I would disagree with you. While Chewbacca had his comic moments, for the most part he was not only big and furry, but also could visibly kick ass. Jar-Jar... fell a lot. And, bizarrely enough, kept succeeding through his mastery of Sna Fu. Which, of course, leads one to the conclusion that Jar-Jar may be high in the force and therefore the real Jedi master
Re:Best quote from the article (Score:5, Insightful)
First appearance of the wooden teen-aged brat who played older Anikin
Don't be so hard on him. Hayden Christensen is actually a good actor. As are Natalie Portman, Samuel Jackson, Ewan MacGregor, Liam Neeson and Jimmy Smits. But their performances in the Star Wars prequels all uniformly sucked. Only one person can ultimately be blamed for that.
Re:Best quote from the article (Score:2)
I take exception to this. I see a lot of people claiming he's a good actor. I've seen a lot of reviews saying the same thing. One of his "best" performances was supposedly in Life as a House.
Watch it sometime. Christensen is wooden, boring, unsympathetic, and perpetually whiny. In short, he plays his Anakin character TO THE TEE, sans Star Wars dress-up.
By the end of that movie I honestly wanted his character to die. Just like in Star Wars
Re:Best quote from the article (Score:2)
I take exception to this. I see a lot of people claiming he's a good actor. I've seen a lot of reviews saying the same thing. One of his "best" performances was supposedly in Life as a House.
Watch it sometime. Christensen is wooden, boring, unsympathetic, and perpetually whiny. In short, he plays his Anakin character TO THE TEE, sans Star Wars dress-up.
I did see it, actually, and I quite liked his performance.
But it's a matter of taste; I understand what you're saying. My real point is that Lucas
Re:Best quote from the article (Score:1)
Re:Best quote from the article (Score:1)
Re:Best quote from the article (Score:3, Insightful)
Jar Jar, or the Midiclorians. But still... I could have lived with these annoyances if the rest of the movies had been anywhere near the standard of the 1st three. They weren't. And I wasn't sure why. Like the article's author, I thought the CGI was way, way over the top at times, especially during the space battles and chase scenes. But still not enough to ruin a good movie. Then I read this: "The universe gets smaller
Re:Best quote from the article (Score:2)
Re:Best quote from the article (Score:1)
- First appearance of Jar Jar
- First mention of midi-chlorians
- The creepy virgin birth thingy
- First appearance of the annoying brat who played young Anikin
- First appearance of the wooden teen-aged brat who played older Anikin
- ???"
- Profit!!! ?
Re:Best quote from the article (Score:1)
Re:Best quote from the article (Score:1)
Re:Best quote from the article (Score:2)
two lightsabers melt through a massive blast door, and continue to be useful on the other side. Is this the same universe where balky old spaceships have to be continually tweaked into running, blasters overheat and quit shooting, and droids get all sand-jammed?
Every character from the good films appears as a child in the bad films.
Huge amounts of technology are introduced which are supposed to have vanished without a trace twenty years later? My son sees these inconsistencies at 7,
Re:Best quote from the article (Score:2)
Re:Best quote from the article (Score:1)
Ummm, but the speed of light in Hyperspace would have to be faster since it'd still take like 15 years to travel 12 parsecs even at the speed of light.
Umm, nevermind.
Re:Best quote from the article (Score:2)
Indeed. It would be like claiming that you ran from Chicago to New York City in "under 12 miles"
...which Chuck Norris did once, by the way.
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Re:Best quote from the article (Score:2)
Another missing option (Score:2)
"I am your father, Luke!"
That's what did it for me. I mean, seriously. If Vader had been lying, that would have been one thing. Or even if Vader was a clone of Luke's father, things would have been ok.
But that made liars out of both Yoda and Obi-Wan. "Yeah, we knew he was your dad, but we decided to bullshit you."
After that, things went downhill: Ewoks.
Vader's Paternity Test (Score:2)
Well, you have to remember that the Jedi are essentially heavily-armed religious fanatics in service as military. Yoda and Ben knew that if Luke knew the truth, he may not fight fully against Vader from the beginning and would therefore die. So, judging the needs of the Jedi over the needs of the few (Luke), they withheld the information, but left him with enough cryptic equivocation that he w
Re:Best quote from the article (Score:1)
Hayden's whiney teenager, the overbaked and lifeless CG, R2 flying and the dreadful scenes between Anakin and Amidala. That sucked.
The pod-race. (Score:1)
The main problem overall with the prequels, is that there is not a single character you can like - no Han Solo. Anakin is going to be evil and he's about as deep as a puddle; the Jedi are all conceited; Padmé is ok I suppose but she gets reduced to being a childmaker and victim; Shmi is... yuck; and so on.