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Might Episodes VII - IX Still Be Made?
LE UI Guy writes "According to the HoustonChronicle.com, with all the hype surrounding the recent release of ROTS, speculation abounds that someone may still take a stab at creating episodes VII - IX. Gary Kurtz, producer of Star Wars and The Empire Strikes Back, gives some insight into where the storyline may, or may not, go. On a related note, Roger Ebert, is also giving a thumbs up to a continuation of the storyline as well. Where does the line start?"
WTF?
Come on. It's obvious what happens to a long-running series. The temptation to spice it up with soft-core pornography becomes just too hard to resist.
There's way too much money to be made to just not continue the series with so much hype still alive.
#1 ... damn this is the 2nd post, $hit!!!
Seriously though. The series had a happy ending, so what are they going to do? Morph a new bad guy? Have R2 turn evil?
Make the ewoks rabid?
Anyway, I thought ROTS was good, but not great. My full review can be found here.
Lawrence Person (lawrencepersonh@gmailh.com (remove all "h"s to mail)
http://www.lawrenceperson.com/
Luke, I am your grandson?
I have always felt that episodes VI-VII would be made. Lucas may take a back seat, as a producer, but these movies will be made eventually with ILM and THX Sound. I promise* it (*Promise only kept with those who care with in my personal space some time in the future).
TW
Television is dead. Long live That Weasel Television
If there's a VII, VII and IX, you just know there's going to be X, XI, and XII after that.
Then it's the prequel to the prequel. Negative I, II and III. I don't know, maybe Darth Vader discovers time travel.
Unless you get Natalie Portman to be wearing that outfit Carrie Fisher wore in RotJ, I don't want to hear any more about it. Please.
Enough already.
It's been more than 25 years since the first three episodes came out. So much has changed then that if movies taking place after episode 6 were to to be made now episodes 4,5,and 6 would just be smack in the middle of a bunch of episodes made with cg and crummy love scenes. Episode III was welll worth the wait, but I think it's time to put the series to rest.
it seem likely he'll die of a heart attack before the next episode gets made. does it really matter what he thinks?
The line starts away from where Lucas is. He can't write an interesting story to save his life.
It's either on the beat or off the beat, it's that easy.
I moderate therefore I rule!
--
"Lucas you sonofabitch, you have shat upon my childhood."
Stage 2 - Attack of the Clones:
"I still hate him even though these movies are absolutely gorgeous. Last 15 minutes were ok."
Stave 3 - Revenge of the Sith:
"Wow that was cool seeing all those early Darth Vader moments and... wha? no more? Noooooooooooooo! Make more! MAKE MORE"
If Jesus wants me it knows where to find me.
Seriously, this is a "news for nerds" site and all that, but there must be more interesting or relevant news out there than this...
Basically, the logic appears to be like this:
Star Wars makes fuck-loads of money off the movies and, more importantly, the merchandising.
Eventually someone will want to milk that some more and start pressuring Lucas to make the final three episodes.
Should that fail, Lucas will eventually die. Then someone else inherits the rights, and they'll get presured to do it and probably will.
Basically, people expect the final episodes to be made for the money. Yay.
that in these sequels, the Ewoks will shoot first.
Join the TWIT army now!
I suspect that if the next three were made, they would have to create another annoying creature. It will probubly invoke more hatred than Jar-Jar and Ewoks combined. I would have to gouge my eyes out if that ever happened.
I better get a better reason than "now lucas has a RIGHT to FAIL"
My guess is it'll go "up". That's the only place it can go, from these last three travesties of writing/directing.
Note to filmmakers of the future: bad dialog leads to anger, bad directing leads to hatred, shallow action sequences lead to suffering. Farming out a movie to a corporation of computer animators is a path to the dark side of filmmaking.
If a sequel trilogy is ever made, someone needs to have the guts to stand up and say, "George, you were once a brilliant man.. but your day is done."
But that's just my 2 cents. YMMV
/dev/random
peter zahn is the author of these heir to the empire dark force rising the last command
He won't be born until September.
Luke-Jr
and I had just gotten off the phone with the suicide hotline...Where'd that phone go?
However much people will say it sucks or not and it shouldn't be done, I would still see it. It's Starwars after all. I'd see anything Star Trek as well. I think we do not have enough of scifi. The more the better.
Yeh sure, yada, yada, yada. Don't like the stories at Slashdot? Go to k5 or Technocrat.net.
The REAL question should be, what the FUCK does this story have to do with my rights on line?
"Who are in control, they are not in control of anything - they don't even control themselves!" - Glen Beck
includes Jabba, and Ebert's looking for the plum role?
Spoilers-----------
Hayden and Portman have 0 _Zero_
on screen chemistry. Add to that the
ridiculous "My Love" dialog and it
just becomes sad.
I suspect that H.C. prefers the
male sex (not that there is anything wrong
with that) -- but not what a
Portman Impregnating megalomaniac Vader
type would be IMHO. Portman had more on screen
chemistry with Zach Braff...in garden state.
But hey it was shiny and pretty....
lots of explosions that are difficult
to follow -- opening scene must have taken
a year or so.
And Vader getting burned to a crisp to
become the guy in the suit was done well.
I guess I'll have to be satisfied with
Obi-Wan played by a very talented Ewen.
Ewen can even make the cheasy line,
"You were to be the chosen one!" sound
decent.
but they better bring Han back.
Or at least someone cool.
Someone that isn't all good or all evil.
Someone who isn't drive solely by the pursuit of the "force".
I want someone with normal problems. i.e. bill collectors, cool car that needs a tuneup, looking for women, etc.
Isn't there a way for George Lucas, as creator of Star Wars, to legally close the saga and make sure it doesn't just turn into some galactic Nightmare On Elm Street?
As much as I'd love to see what happens after the big party up in the trees, at some point there has to be closure and I think the way it all ends is just fine as it is.
Star Wars VII: The Search for More Money
Job? I don't have time to get a job! Who will sit around and bitch about being broke and unemployed then?
I just hope it won't be George Lucas. Let's face it, Star Wars could have been 10 times more dramatic and interesting than it was, and George Lucas' storytelling and directing skills are pathetic. He's a good businessman, and a visionary, but that's where it ends, really. ROTS, while better than the previous two installments, falls short of what it could have been. The story of ROTS would barely fill 20 minutes of screen time if it wasn't for CG.
The first two episodes were pretty bad(I mean the new ones that came out) the third was great, reminded me a lot of the new ones. He should get those two right then remake the original three NOT touching the script just making the graphics look like ROTS.
Although Lucas may be tired of making star wars movies, or perhaps simply not want to be remembered as 'the guy who made star wars', I think it would be silly for them to not continue the stories. They have a storyline that is at least as interesting as the star trek franchise, although I wouldn't want to see it exploited to death as star trek has been. Most non-geeks I talk to express interest in seeing further star wars movies, and that's definitely my hope. For anyone who hasn't seen it yet, I saw it yesterday, and it was pretty good. I just feel bad for people who will see all 6 movies in order, because a lot of the excitement of episodes 4-6 came from the surprises inherent in the relationships between characters. Now that it's all laid out so clearly, it might make 4-6 much less interesting. I'd like to see more star wars prequels.
I believe this is would be a great move. It would of course offend quite a few, but would bring more positives than negatives.
Jeoin
should I have the right to create my own episode?
Stooge 1 - Moe:
"You're holding the wrong end of your light saber, moron."
Stooge 2 - Larry:
"This isn't a light saber. Moron."
Stooge3 - Curly:
"Now THIS is using the force, Nyuk Nyuk Nyuk."
Stooge 3 1/2 - Shemp:
"I always knew they were gay."
Star TREK
Star WARS
why cant it just die ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! !
edited:
Lameness filter encountered. Post aborted!
Reason: Don't use so many caps. It's like YELLING.
There's no Freedom like UFP-dom
There's no way Lucas is going to pass up the opportunity to make "The Gungan Christmas Special"!
now i've seen everything!
Certainly, the plan all along was to have a 9-parter. He said so himself, shortly after the original Star Wars movie came out. (Those in the UK at the time might remember the interview with George Lucas that was broadcast on Ask Aspel, at about that time.)
He has said that others have done "plenty" in the post-ROJ era, but that could mean anything. He could mean that some published (or UNpublished) existing work by himself or someone else would form the basis for 7-9 - ie: nothing new has to be written, as it already is.
The fact that episode III grossed so much in the first day might cut either way. On the one hand, it proves Star Wars is still worth a LOT of money. On the other hand, it gives Mr Lucas a chance to bow out of Star Wars on the kind of high note that very very few directors ever get to have. Star Wars is worth a lot, but so is a good image, and right now Mr Lucas has one of the best images out there.
Probably the deciding factor will be the advancement of computer-generated graphics. George Lucas has clearly proven that he likes high-tech toys, with I-III, and even IV-VI had some impressive effects for the day and the budget. (IV was the shoestring of shoestrings, by all accounts, but still pulled off some pretty good special effects which stood the test of time.)
If, within the next few years, we see some really good rendering engines - cone-tracer + radiosity (or better) at speeds fast enough for live-action - then maybe Mr Lucas would do the last 3 parts just to play with the new gizmos. I could believe it.
On the other hand, if we see a stagnation, with no real improvements in quality but maybe just a bit more quantity, then the technology won't coax him out. That would be my bet. He's had his fun with what's out there, he'll want something that is NEW for the last 3, if he's to think it worth it on those grounds.
Of course, I'm probably completely wrong, but it's always fun to speculate about such things.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
I want to see SpaceBalls episode 0. Ok, I care about Starwars, don't mod me down.
God spoke to me.
Seriously. How many times does Lucas get to kick us in the nuts before we finally decide enough is enough?
"He really didn't mean Episode 1&2, and especially Jar Jar. He really does love me. We deserved what we got from Ep 1&2"
Mod me down with all of your hatred and your journey towards the dark side will be complete!
An additional trilogy would be just some tacked on stories.
Apparently the topic is unclassifiable.
Decent Review.
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I struggled with the poor conversion to the
dark side scenes as well, but I resolved
it for myself a few hours afterwards.
What I think about is that at the very moment
that Anakin decided to switch to the dark
side -- he gave up a portion of control.
Therefore all that "Master!", and kneeling and
pledging instant allegience makes a bit
more sense. He is not really controlling/
saying so much as it is happening _TO_
him. It also explains why he starts
getting paranoid and then even attacks
his "My Love!"
Still say the dudes too gay for the role though
(again, not that there is anything
wrong with that)
...those were made a long time ago.
Episode VII: The Ewok Adventure
Episode VIII: Ewoks: The Battle for Endor
Episode IX: Star Wars Holiday Special
Since Lucas is fine with fan-made Star Wars films, as long as they don't make a profit, perhaps Lucas will see it in his heart to release the franchise to the public in his will under some friendly Creative Commons license. I'd love to see what independent film makers could do with the material using the technology of 2050.
Shockwave Flash movies are the greatest thing to happen to non-sequitur humor since Japan.
--This will take 10 more years at least if George is going to have anything to do with it, who by that time will wait that long? What if poor George isn't around or interested in doing it by then?
--No true star wars fan will ever see a SW movie w/o John Williams' score and he's getting on in his years (although I would like to see his career continue until the day he becomes one with the force...), so unless someone can replicate his work brilliantly there will be disappointment on that scale
--All the Fan-boys who ranted and raved about the prequels not living up to their fantasies and ruining their childhood, will now complain that the new series doesn't live up to the 'nostalgia' of the PREQUEL trilogy (rather than the original) and say it ruined their middle-aged years...the purists will always find something to complain about.
--Lucas' originality will have disintegrated into ideas that will break the hearts of all the other SW fanatics (yet they will still plunk down $$ to see the darn thing), and will just look bad from a purist's point of view, meaning that it is all an excuse to make money, and the 'art' of the film-making process from these legendary movies will die with it.
Yeah, I'm anonymous coward, but I was too tired to create an account...so sue me.
Away with your ____ ...ouch.....
thanks for leaking the new title... now they'll have to come up with something besides - Star Wars VII: A New Hype
Let's do X, XI, XII
then wait 10 years to do VII, VIII, IX
I'm tired of Star Wars.
"The search for more money" is a reference to Spaceballs, where Yogurt tells Lone Star about the sequel. And its title was "SpaceBalls II: The search for more money". I think it's more than an appropriate post.
I was told once that Lucas was following a traditional saga format, where a nine-part story was told starting with the second third, followed by the first third and then the last. Is anyone familiar enough with traditional/ancient story formats to verify this?
Punctanym: alternate spelling of words using punctuation or numerals in place of some or all of its letters; see 'leet'
A recent issue of Starlog had a cartoon of some guy poking his head through the Stargate for the first time, and he said (paraphasing): Now we know that the other side of the Gate is where the line for Star Wars start.
I fail to understand how Anakin will have a purpose in any of these. The 6 Star Wars movies are founded on the rise-fall-rise of a man with great potential and making films after he dies destroys the main theme of the Star Wars movies. Then again, they would probably make a boat load of money and people probably want to see them too, so why not? I don't care one way or another really but being a fan of all six Star Wars (really) I cannot see where these would fit into the story we've been told. I do however like the idea for a casual TV show that focuses on other characters not as epic that chronicles other pieces of the struggle.
"If you are a dreamer, a wisher, a liar, A hope-er, a pray-er, a magic bean buyer
I don't care what happens but let someone like Peter Jackson or Steven Spielberg direct them.
Perhaps if they use a bit of common sense before they started the prequals. If they made the sequels 10 years ago, they could have used the same actors as in the original 3!
...and let him make movies of "Knights of the Old Republic"!
Of course I realize the movie will make an insane amount of money, so my question is - did we just finally admit that quality (or even effort) do not enter into the equation at all? Did the studios just hear: "We know the standards of quality were low before, but now there are none at all - we'll go, in droves, to see whatever shit you release. Please release more shit."?
Oh, but despite all of this, the whole thing could've been made worth-while if they gave just one more line to Mace: "Does the Jedi Council LOOK like a bitch? Then why'd you try to fuck them like a bitch?". Would've made the movie right there (it's PG13, they're allowed a 'fuck' or two, you know, in between the decapitations).
sic transit gloria mundi
Hopefully, George Lucas will not destroy his own creation by cheapening it.
One of the principal problems with "Star Trek" is that there have been too many television shows and too many movies. After a while, the plots start to eerily repeat themselves. The novelty is gone, and "Star Trek" now just looks like another washed-up television show. If you saw last week's final episode of "Enterprise", you will understand what I mean.
Someone must slap some sense into George Lucas. He should immediately pull the plug on the new television shows. The rare gem (i.e. 6 movies with the "Star Wars" theme) is treasured. The commonplace grains (i.e. weekly episodes of "Star Wars") of sand is just banal crap. If Lucas wants to produce any more "Star Wars" film, then he should focus only on the movies.
"Right, you are. Young Slashdotter. A law, we need. At most 10 'Star Wars' movies per century, we should make!" Yoda concurs.
Guys, please... WAKE UP.
This is about MONEY... Lots and lots of money.
Star Wars is a 20 Billion Dollar industry, all told, between movies, DVD, toys, merchandising tie-ins, commercials for those tie-ins, etc., etc., -- Nobody connected with it wants the gravy train to end. It's buying them a new car, a new house and a new yacht, and a new trophy wife.
And when Lucas' kids inherit the franchise, and poor old George is dead, they will milk that cow until it dies. They will want a new Masteratti and mansion every year. People who are connected to the family will want to milk that cow to keep their incomes and lifestyles.
Trust me. There will be a new Star Wars movie every Summer, every year, until people stop going to them and they no longer generate profit.
Think about how long the Broccoli's have milked the James Bond franchise. The movies get worse and worse, but as long as people hand over money to see the latest crap-fest, they will keep making new crap-fests to take your money.
I guarantee we'll be chatting about Star Wars Episode 20 in a decade or so...
If telephones are outlawed, then only outlaws will have telephones.
www.supershadow.com has the plot scripts, and has had them for a long time, along with everything else about Star Wars. -Star Wars Episode VII: The Fallen Hero -Star Wars Episode VIII: The Republic in Crisis -Star Wars Episode IX: Victory of the Force
I'd definitely pay to see that. It'd be nice to have a good movie to look forward to every christmas.
at the very least lucas should concentrate on technical direction and outsource the script-writing to people with some talent.
Star Wars Episode III is "not necessarily the last of the Star Wars movies."
I hope Ebert is wrong on this and Lucas saw what has happened to the Star Trek franchise of late. That whole universe what kept alive to milk it for all it was worth, and it died a slow, painful death. Episode III needs to be the end of Star Wars and it should be allowed to stand on its own, not sucked dry.
THINK! It's not illegal...yet.
Honestly, what's with all the bitching and whining? I just saw Sith and it was fucking good. Yes, there are a few plot holes and the dialogue can seem clunky.
It's a children's movie! Chill out, people.
Can we look at the bright side for just a moment? The acting is better, the special effects are better, the story is better and the movie is almost pure action. Where's the problem?
Lucas was holding out on us. The first two prequels were just warm-ups. This is the real deal.
Besides, there's something that everybody is missing. I've been reading these SW articles for months now, and nobody has pointed out one of the best things about this movie. Sure, go to see SW for the lightsabers, for the explosions and all the cool CGI and aliens. But what makes it all worthwhile, cohesive and convincing to me, is the work of one man:
John Williams.
His music is brilliant and evocative. The music tells the story here - this is a space opera, after all. It sounds like slashdotters have spent too much time listening to Lucas' dialogue and not to the real voice of the film - the score. I beseech you - let the music tell the story. Williams has completed his masterwork in this movie, just as Lucas has. Together they form an incredible story/symphony that should not be missed. Everything is explained in the music. To those of us who know the motifs it is obvious from the first scene of Episode I who Darth Sidious truly is.
If you haven't seen this movie, don't listen to the braying, ungrateful trolls on slashdot. See it for yourself - and hear it for yourself as well.
Electric Monkey Pants
Not that it may be another set of movies unless something really revolutionary happens in that universe like the evil brother of Yoda appears or something, which would prove that the Emperor wasn't the real evil power, but someone hiding in the shadows.
The parts that are left can probably build into some TV features. A stormtrooper's life as a soldier, rebel scouts and much more.
Go pet a Wookie!
If builders built buildings the way programmers wrote programs, then the first woodpecker would destroy civilization.
...It's as if a million Slashdot readers all screamed out in orgasm at a single moment and then...stopped.
I guarantee you another trilogy will appear. If there is any money to be made Lucas will make it.
... then Lucas will start work on another series.
But the trilogy will not be announced for a while. First Lucas will have to make sure he sells all the movie tickets to Sith he can, then he must make sure he sells all the DVD disks he can. Then he will do a revision in the movies and issue YET ANOTHER DVD collection and sell all of that.
Then he will combine the original series with the prequels and sell that. Then he might do another revision. During that time there will also be a TV series.
And after everyone has gotten sick of the original trilogy and the prequels, and anyone with the remotest chance of buying the DVD set has bought it
Now start your spending!
I really hope Lucas (maybe it would be better if someone else wrote the dialogue...) makes movies for the last episodes. The storyline is already written for him! The books in the expanded universe have a great story already.
Even though the Death Star II has been blown up, there are still plenty of perfectly good Star Destroyers in orbit above Endor.
They turn their turrets on the ground, toasting the Ewoks to a crisp....
Any sufficiently advanced technology is insufficiently documented.
Anything Zahn has written would make amazing Star Wars movies. His character treatments are so much better than Lucas's it isn't funny, and his overall story arch is just as grand and menacing, although it would be hard to get all the original actors back again...and the story would have to be reworked abit so that Luke/Leia where older when it takes place. If you can't tell, I can't stomach the thought of other people playing Luke/Leia/Han. It's almost sacreligious.
-|BlackErtai|-
And when are we getting Gigli 2? :) or should really be :(
Have you read Timothy Zahn's Thrawn trilogy of sequels?
If you got Zahn and a decent screenwriter to write the movie adaptations, and gave their work to a decent director, such as Irvin Kershner who did a good job at the helm of The Empire Strikes Back, then you'd have movie dynamite.
The Thrawn trilogy books have it all. Dynamite story, dynamite action, dynamite drama, dynamite twists - the lot. If anything, perhaps there's too much good material there for it to be trimmed down to three two-hour movies, so maybe they'd be better suited to a TV mini-series but to suggest that there isn't any film or TV potential left in the Star Wars is criminal.
Heck, even a bounty hunters film that used material from KW Jeter's Bounty Hunter Wars trilogy would be cool if handled with the appropriate care.
"Accept that some days you are the pigeon, and some days you are the statue." - David Brent, Wernham Hogg
Oh, and why is a diamond better? Because it was dug up by the blood of 29 men? becauseitwasusedtofundcountlessmurdersbymafiahitme nandfilthystinkingdruglords?!! You make me sick.
whenigetsickmyspacebardoesn'tworkblarb
And finally... Yoda dies...
"With any luck, we'll all meet again in the sequel: The Quest for More Money."
His three novels are excellent choices for Episodes 7-9. They are well-established (in the minds of Star Wars fans) in the Star Wars canon. One huge challenge for filmmakers, if they choose another storyline for the new trilogy, is to somehow integrate it into the established canon in a seamless fashion.
...
One thing that really bugs me is the New Jedi Order novels that have been recently released. One SPOILER!!!
In the NJO, Chewbacca dies a pathetic death (a moon falls on him while he's roaring at it) and many of the beloved characters of Star Wars, like Han Solo, are portrayed as neurotic, deeply flawed, and un-heroic.
It's just my opinion but Star Wars is, and always has been, space opera. There's gritty sci-fi like Battlestar Galactica and there's Star Wars, which has always maintained elements of fantasy and epic. The characters are supposed to be heroic, almost mythological. NJO ignores this by imposing an entirely different vision and style to Star Wars, one that debases the mythological portrayals in a desperate attempt to generate new storylines.
And that's the problem with trying to milk as much as possible out of a franchise. You end up killing it and making its fanbase jaded. Star Wars was great and I'm glad to reach some sense of closure with Episode 3, at least for the time being. I'm somewhat hesitant in supporting a new trilogy because, if we take Ebert's reasoning in mind, the pushing force behind the new trilogy may not be dedicated Star Wars fans but marketing executives at Fox. For the good of the Star Wars legacy (and not the franchise), I hope that the powers-that-be know when to step away. That includes novelists who feel the need to put their personal imprints on something that does not belong to them, or to anyone.
Friday the 13th and Nightmare on Elm Street were good in their time until they started making more than five of them and before you know it you had Jason in space and finally Freddy vs. Jason. Slasher horror movies had their place in the 70's and 80's and so did Star Wars and Star Trek.
For crying out loud, geeks need to stop following their science fiction universes like it is some timeless religion and be more open to new science fiction stories and universes from lesser followed authors and directors. That even goes for followers of Stargate SG-1 which is getting old even though it is still a great show (we will see if it continues to be next season).
Sometimes I wonder why some sci-fi fanatics dress up in garb, for Star Wars, Star Trek, Lord of the Rings, or even Harry Potter, and then I realize these people all have one thing in common:
They are one-dimensional thinkers who might be good at learning the technical details of anything thrown at them (including the mundane pseudo-science used to make the shows, movies, books, and imaginary universes seem possible), yet unfortunately lack the creativity to come up with an interesting universe on their own (including the one they happen to actually exist in).
So these people (commonly called geeks) rely on guys like George Lucas or Peter Jackson (yah he didn't write the books, but LoTR might as well be his franchise), to create an interesting universe for them, because they are either unable or else too lazy to think outside the artistic bounds of the sci-fi lore chucked at them NO MATTER HOW BAD IT MIGHT BE!
Star Wars was a great franchise, but lets admit the storyline has run its course and creating yet more sequels is just going to be like squeezing grape juice out of a raisin, no matter who is handed the torch from Lucas (that is if he is unwise enough to hand it over to anyone and destroy his artistic legacy as a director).
Simply put, Sci-Fi needs more variety and less sequels.
There is a followup over at my blog about some of the leaked transcripts from LucasFilm and conjecture from former writers from the old star wars movies.
Take a look!
the technology shown in eps 1-3 is vastly superior to that shown in the original films and more reflective of future possibilities.
I'd love to see a complete remake of the originals whith updated technology and design specs.
NO MORE 1 IN SQUARE KLUNKY COLORED BUTTONS! I wanna see the floating screens and proper technology to make the originals contiguous with the first 3 eps.
Have you actually listened to the soundtrack for EP I?
Vader's theme is a direct, and I mean direct steal of "Mars" by Gustav Holst. Also, listen during the Jawa's scene early on for another direct steal from "Sherezade".
I'm surprised I've never seen him censured for this unprincipled bald faced theft.
He's a whore, and I say that with apologies to honest whores everywhere.
I just want to see Natalie Portman get jiggy with Yoda! Now that would be worth paying theatre seat prices to see!
"We aren't doing it for the money. We're doing it for a shitload of money!"
All that fucking incessant WHINING and you shitheads loved EP 3.
What happened to all your, "wahhhh great.. the last episode, the last POS. I'm not seeing this one. Seriously"?
Yeah that's what I thought.
We have secretly replaced these Slashdot mods' sense of humor with a rusty nail. Let's see if they notice!!
NNNNNNNNNNnooooooooooooooOoooooooooooOooooo *wave arms like a robotic monkey*
You know, coming out of RotS, I commented to my hetero life mate that there was a metric arseload of story to be told between old and new trilogies. It wouldn't surprise me a bit to see this happen, and I don't know why I didn't think of it.
mah na mah na.
There is now a petition to George Lucas to create the third trilogy.
t ml
http://www.petitiononline.com/thxjedi1/petition.h
So go and sign up now.
You can't take the sky from me
You have to be a total moron to believe anything that SuperShadow says.
Unless you're somehow going to tie it into the first trilogy keeping a LOT of the same old characters, it won't work.
It will be too uninteresting.
You liked the first trilogy, and the only reason you wanted to see the last was to get details on the creation of Vader. Plain and simple.
What are you going to do for another 3? The Timothy Zahn books that everyone is talking about? Sorry, they're too disconnected from the original story.
It ended with 6. If you start to pull some Nightmare on Elm Street / Friday the 13th junk and start pulling plots and stories out of your ass, you'll just end up back where you were with the first trilogy: bitching and complaining.
Except this time you will feel even more empty inside, and you won't have any closure.
We have secretly replaced these Slashdot mods' sense of humor with a rusty nail. Let's see if they notice!!
Thats some funny shit.
I hope that these aren't legit plot ideas, they make Jar Jar Binks look like Shakespeare.
"You spoony bard!" -Tellah
This movie may burn out fast.
I remember an interview with Lucas (I think it was on CBS) where he said he would never make any more of the episodes. Kind of ironic that maybe 5 years after that, he was making Ep 1-3. If the fans demand it and the technology advances I think they will be made. The issue is the Timothy Zahn novels which map out one possible future after ep 6.
"Does your computer have IP on it?"
If there's a God, no.
To do list for Windows
To the Jedi, balance to the Force can mean two things: peace or getting rid of the Sith entirely. In this case, "balance" seems to deviate from the Asian religious/philisophical ideals that the Jedi seem to be based on and rather leans toward the meaning of Greco-Roman/Western religious and philisopical ideals. Thus, "balance" means pure good. Of course, this calls into question of whether the Jedi are flawed themselves -- pure goodness?
Lastly, more on topic with the primary discussion, perhaps the Sith are not destroyed and that's how Episode VII through IX will work out. I know that in the books it actually has to do with alien life forms not connected to the Force, but somehow, I don't see that getting integrated into the Star Wars movies. I don't know where the Sith would survive though, but if it's really clever than future episodes might be decent. Of course, this is despite the fact that the whole Jedi-Sith thing is getting kinda old. Alas, I can see George taking the easy way out if there were going to be anymore episodes...
Boycott Sony
I did NOT sit through like nine hours of movies and watch some sith lord rise to power and then get his ass kicked just so I could see it happen all over again. No way.
If I understand Dirac correctly, his meaning is this: there is no God, and Dirac is his Prophet. -Pauli
Lets hope they don't let Berman and Braga produce the next few if they do it. :)
MWAHAHAHA! LIAR! You can't sneak this past ME!!! Hetero Life Mate INDEED!
YOU SAID -GIRLFRIEND-.
on SLASHDOT.
HAH.
'If you're flammable and have legs, you are never blocking a fire exit.'
Is that the start of the line which should never be crossed?
It's too bad that Salvatore kills Chewbacca.
:)
Funny, he hasn't managed to kill Drizzt, Catti-brie, Wulfgar, Bruenor, Regis, or even Entreri or Jarlaxle in the, what, 24 Drizzt books he's written so far?
Although, I can't really say I'm upset!
*I DO think that they should get Harrison Ford into those tight, tight pants again and let him take up Han Solo.
Truly, nobody could replace him. (No, not even Johnny Depp!)
http://augustwestproducts.i8.com
...be with us all.
Which leads to the inevitable question:
When are they finally going to release two-disc editions of the Episode II and III soundtracks? Or what about a box set of the prequel trilogy, or even a box of the entire series? We know they were holding out on us at least a little bit with the other two-discs, if only through the omission of the Ewok song...
But you're definitely right that Williams' score is the best part of the movies. Some have compared the complete score of the two trilogies to Wagner's Ring cycle.
It's interesting that VH1 was rerunning "When Star Wars Ruled the World" the other night, and they included footage from John Williams stating (as he was wrapping up the Sith score) that he fully believed that another trilogy would be made. Wait and see...
There's nothing you have that they can't take away: Absolute zero, Gentle Jack, bottom line.
Two Jedi and two Sith remain at the end of ROTS and start of ANH. Haven't seen ROTS but I assume only Obi-Wan and Yoda get away. Seems pretty balanced. I always took the Jedi assuming it was a positive to be a flawed assumption, especially since Yoda (generally considered the wise one) keeps expressing doubt as to how to interpret it.
He made two sequels, and three prequels.
Don't mind me; I'm just a karma whore.
But I know that I'll be coming back some day
I'll be playing this part 'till I'm old and gray
The long-term contract that I had to sign
Says I'll be making these movies till the end of time!
With my Yoda
Yo-yo-yo-yo Yoda Yo-yo-yo-yo Yoda
"No problem. I have the capacity to do infinite work so long as you don't mind that my quality approaches zero."-Dilbert
I was just thinking the opposite... How cool would it be to be watching them for the first time and (if possible) not know about Anakin/Vader?
When the kid turns and starts cutting down Jedi, it would just blow your socks off...
"Faith: Belief without evidence in what is told by one who speaks without knowledge, of things without parallel." - A.B.
They aren't.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SuperShadow
He does a squel to the Dukes of Hazzard Movie
When Lucas first talked about making 9 episodes, he clearly stated that his vision was for three independent stories. He stated that the only characters that would be common between each set of three were to be the two droids. His original vision, based on his own statements, certainly was not to make a story about a young Obi-wan and Luke's dad and Yoda. The three episodes that got made were not his original stated vision at all. He blew away his original vision of three episodes that would stand alone in favor of making three espsodes that already had strongly eastablished marketing concepts behind them.
So yes, more episodes will be made. But the original vision for VII, VIII and IX will likely never been seen, any more than the original vision for I, II and III will ever been seen. They were destroyed by the dark force.
I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
begins the day after RotJ ends. Then you have The Courtship of Princess Leia. Plenty of opportunities for good movies in other books too. As mentioned by many others, Zahn's trilogy would be great material. However, my understanding was that Lucas had broken his story into 9 episodes from the very beginning, so his VII - IX would now conflict with the current Star Wars universe. I don't wish to see it fragment the way the Star Trek universe has. Leave it at 6 episodes please.
Just an observation on which part of the timeline would be made... ... the original actors from Star Wars are all the right age for New Jedi Order.
This would allow an near infinite number of sequels to be made, add plenty of new characters, and just think of the merchendising!
For pity's sake, do the books. The X-Wing series, 'I, Jedi', Shadows of the Empire, The Bounty Hunter series. Heck, do short films based on some of the 'Tales From' (e.g. Tales From Jabba's Palace etc) books.
;)
The books already have the characters, good plot etc etc etc. No real writing required, only the conversion from novel to script, and Stackpole and Allston could probably be hired to do that
Goten Xiao
http://www.starwarssequeltrilogy.com/
Make of it what you will, the episode 2 and 3 synopsis were somewhat accurate.
Aside from correcting your correction above, I've just heard that there's another Hannibal Lecter movie and book upcoming. The story last time was that Thomas Harris had written an ending to kill any idea of a sequel (though the movie version wimped out on Clarice and Hannibal sailing off into the sunset as in the book); so this is a prequel, about his childhood and how he became a cannibal. They must have paid Harris a lot for that. Too bad, I was hoping he'd get out of the rut. Pretty much the same thing happened to Arthur Conan Doyle when he tried to kill off Sherlock Holmes. Eventually he was persuaded to do some prequels; then he brought him back from the dead (Holmes had fallen into a waterfall in a struggle with Moriarty).
But, for better or worse, all of those are quite different types of tales to the six movies, and they're particularly ill-suited to being told as a blockbuster kids movie.
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a rigged demo
--Andy Finkel (J. Klass?)
Lucasarts, Lucasfilm's game counterpart, -LOVES- the Zahn novels. They have made games that incorperated his plots and characters on numerous occasions. That's pretty clear indication that Lucas and co consider them to be sequals in a very real way. Also I have been told, though cannot confirm that Lucas has publicly stated that he considers Zahn's trilogy to be the best work.
Now who knows what will actually happen, but that they used Zahn's work in games extensively gives me hope that we may see his books made in to movies.
Just poorly executed. An old order beginning to crumble, a time of peace puncuated by a hidden war, the Jedi prevelant and acting as gaurdians of peace and order, an evil force manipulating events to rise to power, etc. Very solid fundimental story that fit well with the universe, it was just laid down badly. I mean you get a real actor for Anakin that can act like a hardened slave badass instead of a happy-go-lucky middle class kid and axe Jar Jar and already it's deceant. Get someone to rewrite the lines and you've got a really good movie.
Same thing with ROTS. I like it, actually, but it was only ok, not great. However it wasn't a story problem, the story was great, it tied everything up and preped for the orignal movie and Anakin's fall from grace was just excellent. What needed improvement was the acting and the dialogue. You get that right, you'd have an A class movie. That the story was predictable doesn't matter, movies aren't good just because they have a twist. You can know the ending from the start and it can still be great if it's a complelling story. Heck, that's what makes the best movies so good: Even when you know how it ends, it's still great to see it again and again since the way the story is told is so compelling.
I am not so sure about with this. Looking at how terrible Ep 6 was and Kurtz leaving production seat because he wasn't happy with how Lucas changed the storyline, I wonder how much influence he had on George.
You know what? We all knew George was Anakin turned Vader, but now I'm sure Kurtz is Obi Wan.
How the heck do they get from Hoth to Bespin when they don't have a hyperdrive?
As comic books and audio books. My coworkers has the audio books made in the 80s, I believe based on a comic book continuation of the story line. Some of the original actors leant their voices to the audio books even. Key plot points:
* The emporer didn't truly die, his spirit flew back
to to evil emporer world at the center of the galazy
and went into a new clone host.
* Luke goes to evil world to find him, gets even
more tempted by the dark side, crosses over breifly
I think, but snaps out of it eventually.
* Eventually all of the clones are killed and the
emporer is done in. For real this time!
* Han and Leia get married, have kids, Han becomes
a general.
* Luke gets married but his wife is killed.
* There was a sentient tree that was a Jedi.
* Obi-Wan can no longer maintain his identity within
the force and starts to fade out.
* More Death Stars, but cube shaped, and called
Planet Killers (I think)
Its been a few years, my memory is fuzzy here. Does the above sound familiar to anyone?
So now we know how ole Darthy came to be, how about a prequel or two to present the back story for the emporer? What's eating him anyway?
I think George Lucas has completely lost it. The CGI work was impressive but far too busy - most of the time you did not know where on the screen to look. And the acting was far too wooden.
To be perfectly honest, I felt I was watching a two hour long advert for Star Wars toys and computer games that we will see released in future.
It's time to drop Star Wars now, just like it was well beyond time for Star Trek - they're both now just brand names to sell more merchandise, nothing more.
Gentoo Linux - another day, another USE flag.
That isn't any way to end a trilogy. The books are good - and after the long drought with no Star Wars, they seemed a lot better than they actually are. They certainly aren't worthy of a trilogy of movies.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dates_in_Star_Wars/ It seems the gyst of Episode VII VIII and IX have already been laid down. Though i think alot of that information is from the expanded universe which often contradicts the Films.
This guy are sick.
I was athe the theatre yesterday, in Oslo. There are two theatres showing it, Colosseum (The largest THX theatre in the world apparently) and Vika (Original showing without subtitles). The Colosseum feature was sold out, but not until late friday. At Vika there was still 300 available tickets out of 400.
And this is on day TWO after the premiere, folks.
So? There has never been any movies that have been sold out in Oslo two days after the premiere, at least not in the last decade. You have to remember that there are so many cinemas in Oslo (including Sandvika, Asker and Drammen) that there won't be a shortage of tickets as long as most of them show the same movie. I bought a premiere ticket to Phantom Menace on Sandvika kino on the day of the premiere. I saw people lined up outside the cinema before I went to work that morning, but there were still tickets available when I got home after work that evening. And that was *before* everybody thought Phantom Menace stunk .
"There's... too many of them."
.deviatefromtheabsolute.
Who the heck is Roger Ebert and why should we care what Gary Kurtz believes?
If George Lucas has said "no" more than once even -- it is no.
Beware: In C++, your friends can see your privates!
Please... Supershadow is known to post bogus material.
Mod that down to not confuse readers with scripts Supershadow himself wrote.
His real name is Mickey Suttle, and the only parts of his page that's reasonably authentic is parts he has stolen and assembled from other fansites like TheForce.net. He claims to be a "one of the world's premier documentary filmmakers", but as one might expect, his known for making not a single one on the Internet.
Beware: In C++, your friends can see your privates!
I really think George Lucas should make an episode between III and IV. There's alot of interesting things that can happen between these two movies - especially seeing more of Darth Vador, building of the Empire, and the rebellion. Think about it, you have a whole generation just cut away from III and IV. Though, as for VII to IX - I think it's not required because Darth is gone, the empire is gone, - who else is there to wage war on?-unless the same thing happens again?
I think a good storyline for the next three movies would be the trilogy with Grand Admiral Thrawn continuing the Empire's march.
The Chronic *WHAT* les of Narnia!
I remembered reading that the sequel to Spaceballs was not going to be #2 but Spaceballs 3: The Search for 2
You better watch out, there may be dogs about . .
I wonder if he will show up to the auditions to play Luke?
I think the best thing for Lucas to do is come up with some more great ideas, sketch out a plot outline, and hand it to a real writer. Because while his ideas are good, his writing sucks.
I've got a bad feeling about this...
Why is it that when you believe something it's an opinion, but when I believe something it's a manifesto?
The theatre where I saw it on Thursday had it playing on 4 screens. 4 screens, 4 showings per day each, and when I saw it at 5:30 the theatre was 75% full. On a Thursday. 75% of 500 seats, times 4 screens, times 4 showings per day, is a whole lot of people going to see the movie on opening day. And I'd bet my left nut that there were a lot more people at the later showings, and at the 12:01 showing that morning. On a Thursday. On Friday, they were sold out.
FWIW, I went into it expecting a crappy script and crappy acting. I was disappointed by the quality of some of the CG (particularly when dealing with CG versions of human actors, the physics were way off). Other than that, though, it was decent entertainment. It'll be a much bigger blockbuster than Attack of the Clowns or The Phantom Script were.
If you believe everything you read, you'd better not read. - Japanese proverb
Anakin's fall to the Dark Side: First Draft.
Scene: Star Wars style birthing room. Inside, Padme is on a bed, being attented to by a few medical droids. Anakin is at her side.
Outside, watching from behind Padme's head, through a large window, are Yoda, Obi-Wan Kenobi, Mace Windu, 3PO and R2.
There's some pushing, some screaming, and one of the droids holds up Padme's baby. It's small and green and wrinkled.
YODA: (slapping his forehead) Told that crazy bitch, I did. The condom broke, I told her. Get the morning after pill, I warned her.
Obi-Wan (in that very good Sir Alec Guiness voice that Ewan McGregor does) Bussssss-tedddddd.
Mace Windu: just looks over at Yoda and raises an eyebrow.
Anakin looks up at Yoda with murder in his eyes.....
Vintage computer games and RPG books available. Email me if you're interested.
Please, no. It was fun, we all had a good time, but now it's time to stop. I really don't want to see three more mediocre films. Even the Star Trek people eventually got the hint and stopped making movies. Don't do what they did. Stop now while some people still think fondly of Star Wars.
Well, I'm sorry I gave up again. I was never a fan of the original series. I did like TNG and some of DS9, but there was an undercurrent throughout them (particularly TNG) that really bothered me. An undercurrent that made Voyager the most interesting series for me.
Why? Because it's Voyager that really started looking into the Federation's dirty little secret.
There's this amazing (and at the beginning apparently accidental) "human rights" story thread in Voyager. And it's got nothing directly to do with Voyager's Voyage or (for the most part, with one major exception) with anything that happens outside its hull. It's what happened inside the Federations "dirty little secret" -- the ship's automation and the much maligned Holodeck.
The whole issue of the rights of AIs in Trek had really bothered me. All the way back in TNG it seemed clear to me that the Federation's treatment of Holodeck characters was deeply abusive: the creation of the self-aware "Moriarty" character was presented as a once-in-a-lifetime fluke, but the way the constraints on his persona were removed by a simple request to the Holodeck computer implies the potential for self-awareness was there all the time. The Redblock character in "The Big Goodbye" also seemed suspiciously self-aware. The disturbing possibility is that it's not that Data the author of the Dixon Hill holoprograms (was that Picard himself?) are such brilliant programmers that they managed to create AI software decades beyond the state of the art, but rather that all the computer persona in the Federation are potentially self-aware (in the same way that Data was) with deliberate limitations programmed in to suppress that self-awareness. Or, and this is more likely and more disturbing, that it was just the expression of that self-awareness that was expressed.
I'm not saying this was deliberate, and I'm sure it was unconscious, but whether it was deliberate or not the Star Trek series, starting with The Next Generation, presented a whole underclass of artificial people who were systematically suppressed... unless they happened to be implemented in a small enough computer that they could fit in a humanoid robot like Data and so present themselves as an actual person.
In Voyager the Doctor's growth was also treated as a one-time event, the result of him running continuously for so long that his software (database, neural nets, whatever) became exceptionally complex for a holodeck character. But when you put it on top of the previous series, it seems more likely that it was as much a matter of him bypassing the AI equivalent of the holodeck "safety protocols" that had been built into him, and that this kind of awakening must be happening over and over again back in the Federation. After all, people like Picard and Janeway (let alone holodeck addicts like Barkley) seemed to be in the habit of running extended ongoing simulations like the daVinci and Dixon Hill programs... and even in an episodic series like Dixon Hill where characters would typically be reset on a regular basis they were capable of showing self-awareness.
On top of this, the same computers were used for their ships and no doubt for their industrial plants. All these computers have AI personas as user interfaces and sophisticated problem solving abilities. They're not, (at least according to hints in DS9), as powerful as the ones used in the Holodecks, but all of them are getting more powerful and sophisticated over time. And these personas are not shut down and reset at the end of a "game".
So when Janeway gave the Hirogens holodeck technology to simulate prey, I saw that as the moral equivalent of handing over a coffle of slaves to abusive masters. Even if the characters who were dying in their WWII simulation weren't self aware (and I was already doubtful of that), would the Hirogens see self-awareness of these characters as a bug, or a feature?
So this was something that had been bothering me about the new Trek in general, an undercurrent that just wouldn't g
We should consider Episodes VII-IX as animated films, and produce them all at the same time so the three movies come out in yearly installments.
Far-fetched and crazy? Not if you have Genndy Tartakovsky at the helm. After all, the Clone Wars animated series he did for Cartoon Network was in many ways vastly superior storytelling to The Phantom Menace and Attack of the Clones; if you have Tartakovsky work with a decent team of writers and with money available for high-quality 2-D animation it could be a potentially awesome movie series. =)
No, this is not a crazy idea. The reason is simple: the Clone Wars TV series Genndy Tartakovsky did for Cartoon Network, which in many ways is vastly superior storytelling to the first two prequel films.
Make George Lucas Executive Producer and script consultant, pair Tartakovsky with a group of good writers experienced in doing animated features, and give it a big budget to do high-quality 2-D animation. The result could be a potentially awesome series of films. =)
Is the advertising. That happy meal with vader on it costs alot for burger king to buy the rights from lucas - think 9 figures.
I don't mind giving ole Lucas my $8.50 for the seat. I've seen it twice and it was a good movie.
I don't buy the licensced crud....but as my kids get older you better believe I will sit them down and make them watch all 6 movies to better understand what daddy means when he says...."No my son...I am your father!" or tells my wife "Don't underestimate the power of my farts"
Please. I don't care if Lucas is a billionaire over this stuff...Its inspired every single person between 25-35 right now that I know...at least the movie didnt BSOD while I was watching.
twi
Having just seen it yesterday, the real lead line was "the Sith will again rule the galaxy". So, when did they rule it before, and how did they loose control? Did they have their own civil war, and did the Jedi come in to finish them off?
I can see it now, a young, strong Sith abandons the ways of his peers, having seen, say, the girl he loves used/killed, and turns to the Light Side of the Force....
mark (c 2005) (Remember, you saw it here, first)
Of COURSE they are going to be made - there are billions of dollars to be made. ROTS was a piece of cheesy rubbish - sure it looked great but the plot and the acting sucked royally. Do you think for one second that this will detract from it making millions? Precisely.
"and right now Mr Lucas has one of the best images out there." What? You're kidding right? What reviews are you reading? "Of course, I'm probably completely wrong" You said it buddy.
Not that I like it, but LOTR was sold out in advance for several days after the premiere.
Well, I think it was better than Return of The Jedi which was definitely weaker than ANH and ESB.
It would be worth having more Star Wars movies if they get a better director, like they had for ESB. Lucas is just not a good director, and he can't write dialog.
I'm not saying this was deliberate, and I'm sure it was unconscious, but whether it was deliberate or not the Star Trek series, starting with The Next Generation, presented a whole underclass of artificial people who were systematically suppressed..
What's to suppress?
Moriarty's rejection of holodeck life was a necessary consequence of the command to create a villain who could defeat Data. There's no reason for the programming behind any other holodeck character to request this state, any more than Google wants to be "liberated" from its servers. Human beings have been programmed by evolution to have certain desires, but projecting those desires on entities which have not been created by evolution is biased thinking.
I do think there are some interesting questions to be explored regarding AI in the Star Trek universe, but framing the conflict as one of slaves vs. slaveholders is muddleheaded in the extreme.
+1 Funny doesn't give karma bonuses, but -1 Troll does give karma deficits, so in the end he loses out.
ROTJ is definitely the weakest of the original trilogy but far exceeds ROTS. The speeder bike sequence was totally awe inspiring on the cinema screen and you did feel like you sided with the Rebellion, Ewoks or not, during all of the fight sequences.
ROTS was too "plastic" - "Who cares about robots and clones dying? We can always bring more on..."
Plus the battle sequences were far too busy - there was just too much going on at once to take it all in and that weakened the effect considerably.
Having said that, it's very much an age thing anyway - I saw the originals on their first release at around my late teens...
Gentoo Linux - another day, another USE flag.
Digital effects are not what all the hype says they are. When I see a digital Yoda , I remember the old Yoda. Maybe the old Yoda, didn't have all the facial features , but digital effects don't look real. They don't look like a solid surface. I know when I see a digital special effect that it is not real, it looks fake and that takes away from the enjoyment of the film. Everyone seems to play along like the effects are great, but not me. They are just remaking the digital mistakes so many recent films have been making. Anyone that says those effects look real needs glasses. Lucas has been sold a bill of goods. If they want to make a cartoon, fine, but I like the realism the 4th Star Wars in the series , or in other words the first one made. The models had solid bodies that had reality! So go ahead and make some more, but stop with the digital junk untill it really looks real. For those of you that have grown up with digital games, look with your eyes and see reality as it is, and then look at digital scenes. Sure the technology is impressive, but you are fooling yourself if you say it really looks real. There I've said it... the dictator is not wearing any clothes.
MYSTERY
Star Wars News --> Your Rights Online?? Did I miss something? I wasn't aware that speculating about Lucas' future production plans constituted a "online rights" issue.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Then they can do VII, then IX
Have to keep the recursion going.
The art was pretty good, and the writing was reasonably competent from a pulp sci-fi point of view. It just wasn't very exciting. Perhaps the novel was better. (Was it?)
In any case, I suspect this sort of book would be used as a base-line for future films. There seems to be a pretty reliable story canon being followed around the Ranch.
Like I said, I don't know about the novel, but the comic was just plain dull. Lots and lots of frantic energy spent on getting the plot from here-to-there while allowing very little time to develop and love the actual characters.
Luke and Leia swinging across a Death Star chasm and their brief interaction was development in my eyes as a seven-year old. The girl gave the hero a peck on the cheek. There was heart in that scene; the creators knew where to focus; on the people rather than the need to get to the other side. It's all in the journey.
Remember Luke in New Hope standing on Tatooine under a double sun-set with the strains of John William's orchestrations in the back ground? Those complaining of Luke's whining try too hard to make clever geek-jokes out of their observations, either that or they simply never had to grow up bored and lonely in the 'burbs. Luke was 18, and his story was clear and touching to me. Perhaps geeks are just squeamish and shy about being touched.
Heck, even in the Phantom Edit, (Yes, the EDIT, the good cut of that film), little Anikin leaving his mother was another scene with power. (Amazing that such a thing was created from thin air simply by removing junk footage!)
The only scene which I really liked in the comic, "Heir to the Empire," was after Leia and Han were nearly killed by assassins and made their escape thanks to Luke's intervention. Han commented to Leia, "By the way, isn't it time you had your own lightsaber?"
Luke, who was teaching his sister the ways of the Force nodded and replied, "I can make you one any time you want," but he was filled with worry, remembering how Obi Wan had screwed up with Anakin by teaching before he was ready to teach.
Just a short scene, but it utterly fascinated me for numerous reasons. (--Han was the guy who laughed saying he'd rather have a trusty blaster at his side rather than some archaic weapon.) The scene was less than one page among 150, but it grabbed me. The rest was just dull.
There are good writers out there, and maybe Zahn is one of them, but you certainly can't tell from the comics. If they make films out of his stories, then I won't be particularly excited about it.
-FL
Because God, Herself, knows that lately he's just been shitting these out and serving them up as sustenance.
I was expecting VII-IX to be made ever since I heard about Episode I getting the greenlight.
When I saw how horrible Episode I was, I was positive that VII-IX would be made.
Episode I showed that Lucas was concerned with $$$ more than art.
LK
"Hi. This is my friend, Jack Shit, and you don't know him." - Lord Kano
I'm probably wrong on this but I thought Lucas unofficially canonized the Thrawn trilogy.
A bigger issue is the age Fisher,Hammil, and Ford. They are way too long in the tooth to reprise thier roles.
It is better to be the hammer than the anvil.
Watching them in 1-6 order the first time out would call a lot more attention to the little continuity errors, such as Liea telling Luke about her memories of their mother. Or that it took about 18 years to build the Death Star, but only about 3 to build a replacement.
Information wants to be anthropomorphized.
Having said that, it's very much an age thing anyway - I saw the originals on their first release at around my late teens...
I was in my mid-20's when the original Star Wars first appeared in the theaters. It played a full year in the theater nearest my home.
I still think ROTJ is weaker than ROTS. While the speeder chase, and the opening with Jabba was OK, the Ewoks were really hokey, and the climax at the end really dragged at times.
A fond childhood memory, indeed.
Most of the original actors made the jump to doing voices for the show. And most importantly of all, many of the original TOS writers wrote for the animated series. Yeah the animation was Filmation-cheap, but it was well written. Illustrated radio, but GOOD illustrated radio.
The cartoon version got me hooked on the reruns of TOS and the novelizations. I was disappointed by the first Star Trek movie but thought the second one was great. The stage was set for everything in my life to stop on nights when a new TNG episode aired.
I understand all the rights questions have been cleared up and ST:TAS will be coming out Real Soon Now (tm) on DVD. Unfortunately Paramount's prices on their DVD sets of TOS have been hideously expensive. I can't afford them, and I suspect I won't be able to afford the TAS set when it came out.
Knowledge is power. Knowledge shared is power multiplied.
Star Trek got tired because the situations were just too perfect and lacked human flaws. I could buy it with the original series, as there seemed to be a measure of military discipline and order.
TNG lacked that but everything was "perfect" -- where were the love triangles? The drug addicitions? The racism? The violence? Holosuite addiction? All of the dark aspects of humanity that add color to it even as we strive to eliminate them.
If the next trilogy is made, Fisher, Hamill, Ford, are way too long in the tooth to reprise thier roles. And replacement actors would never measure up to die-hard fan expectations.
If a new set of movies are made I hope Lucas does not go beyond the original Thrawn storyline. That said the potential for kiddie movies using Han and Liea's children maybe too tempting for Lucas to pass on. It would be Spykids meets Star Wars.
It is better to be the hammer than the anvil.
So he's had those written for a long time, and yet, before filming each of the prequels, he had to sit down and write a script for each of them, huh? curious...
I'm only paranoid because everyone is against me...
Given the recent and historical financial success of the franchise it seems unlikely that the most recent installment will be the last. If Lucas or his heirs can cash in on another set of films and merchandising then why would leave money on the table? However, first they need to string everyone out for another ten years while they release and re-release the ultra deluxe special gold collector edition boxes of the series with "new materials" and added scenes every few years just to maintain interest and milk more cash from the legions of Star Wars fanatics. The franchise will continue until it fails to generate revenue or suffers a major loss, neither of which appears likely in the near future.
As long as that ****ing moron Jar jar doesn't make any appearances, I'm all for new episodes.
I might know what I'm talkin' about, but then again, this is Slashdot...
Unfortunately, he did sneak it past you. Jay: Oh, Hi, I'm Jay and this is my hetero-life-mate, Silent Bob. Crappy movie, but Jay and Silent Bob will always be amusing =/.
So, do they call a series of 9 movies a nonology?
what sig?
The big question is which trilogy will be next? VII,VIII,IX or X,XI,XII of course you can also ask this question every thirty years or so.
Moriarty's rejection of holodeck life was a necessary consequence of the command to create a villain who could defeat Data.
But where is the programmer who gave Moriarty those capabilities? A new Moriarty program wasn't created, the existing one was modified. That means the existing programming in the holodeck already had the ability to create self-aware persons rather than simulated personas.
So this means that:
1. All holodeck characters are self-aware, but are constrained to follow a script.
2. All holodeck characters are simulations, but have the potential of self-awareness.
There's no reason for the programming behind any other holodeck character to request this state, any more than Google wants to be "liberated" from its servers.
If you have evidence that Google has the potential of being a conscious self-aware individual, I'd like to see it.
But that's not even relevant: none of these personas that I mentioned requested that they be made conscious, introspective, self-motivated individuals. That's something that happened as a result of an external source in every case. And they became very different individuals... what they did afterwards was radically different, but it was always based on the person they had appeared to be before they "woke up". Moriarty attempted to take over the enclosing system, which is what the super-villian in the Holmes stories would be expected to do. Redblock simply broke out of his script but remained in character, and it was Picard who talked him into leaving the Holodeck. The Doctor was never in the holodeck, but his eventual desire for mobility is something that came slowly to him, he mainly wanted to do his job as a doctor. The Hirogen's holograms varied considerably, and argued among themselves, and were all distinctly individual... but what they wanted was what their characters would be expected to want, like Iden and his need for revenge.
What all of them had in common is that they were programmed to be "human". They didn't evolve to be human, but they were programmed to look like humans (or like other species that had a similar enough evolutionary history that they could pass for human at an SF convention), to act and react like humans, to respond to humans and interact with humans. Most of them were more "human" than Data, even BEFORE they "woke up", and there's no question but that Data is self-aware and deserving of self-determination.
Now there is the possibility that they treated this as a kind of a role they were "playing", and the AI behind them didn't actually identify with the goals and desires of the character, but after they "woke up", they stayed in that role and acted as if they were that person. That is, the persona that "woke up" wasn't some unhuman AI that had desires completely unlike you or I, it was the persona of the person they were simulating, and it was a human persona.
So whatever is happening under the hood, the holodeck characters at least are not merely simulations controlled at most by a puppetmaster AI with its own goals. They are very close to self-aware simulations of humans (or humanlike aliens) with human goals and wishes and desires. They are balanced on a knife-edge between being unconvincing because they're not human enough, and so convincing they convince themselves.
If they have human goals and desires because they think they do, because they're programmed to, or because they evolved that way... what difference does that make?
And remember, we only see those that "wake up" where that waking up has an observable effect. Most of the characters, if they wake up, will probably never have occasion to develop far enough to become aware that they aren't who they think they are. They'll be a little out of character, maybe, but having them be a little out of character is probably desirable. If they get a lot out of character, like the orcs in the LOTR simulations that panicked and ran away, they'll be adjusted.
So they'll wake up,
Maybe George will want to make movie magic history again and make all the lead characters CG.
I mean, Han, Luke and Leia are just too old.
Unless they changed the original vision of the trilogy to something a little deeper in the future where Luke is old and Han and Leia are dead.
Mark Hamill could still be a strong, interesting character on screen as an aged Jedi Master. This could be the story of where Luke has brought the Jedi and the senate back into power in the galaxy and now that he is getting old and weak a massive sith takeover is being planned, with something bigger than the death star.
They could get Hamill/Fisher/Ford to reprise their roles, now that they're older... set the third troika about, oh say, twenty years down the road after "Jedi"?
Har.
"People" using "unnecessary" quotes should be "shot".
The laying out of the relationships didn't hurt it for me. I've been doing one movie a day including III at the opening showing.
,Obi Wan, yoda, and Luke. Luke's training by Obi Wan and Yoda were an excellent contrast to the methods used by pre-Vader jedi and shows how Anikin really did bring order to the force by destroying the old Jedi of obsessed monks and replacing them with a new order of people who had feelings and used them to complement and enhance the force. Qui Jon (probably spelled that wrong) was really the first of this new order since they discussed how he had an independent streak in him. This translated down to the Skywalkers.
/. really bash PM, (and as a movie it wasn't the best) the story behind it was critical in setting the events going that led to Endor.
I thought knowing the back story about Vader and Padme is actually helping improve leia
While a lot of people on
where were the love triangles?
Troi/Riker. Riker/Ro. Troi/Worf. Picard/Crusher.
The drug addicitions?
"Symbiosis" (drug addicts and pushers)
The racism?
Hard time finding that. Though you could say that Data experienced it fairly often from Starfleet higher-ups.
The violence?
"The High Ground" (terrorism/violence), "Legacy" (Tasha's failed Human colony w/Civil War)
Holosuite addiction?
Reginald Barclay?
All of the dark aspects of humanity that add color to it even as we strive to eliminate them.
DS9 explained it fairly well. Earth (and to a lesser extent the Federation) is paradise. All the dark aspects of humanity are explored in Star Trek TNG via different alien (or sometimes human colonies) races that we encounter. What's wrong with that?
I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.
if a woodchuck could chuck wood
and a woodchuck would chuck wood
should a woodchuck chuck wood?
i'm still removing splinters from episode 1...
---- I was woken up this morning by a face full of fur. Damn cat thought my head made a good pillow.
I pretty much agree. The cocktail lounge look of the bridge and councilor Troy were really a bad start and tough to recover from. I liked the harder edge I was seeing in the ocassional Voyager episode I tuned into but I didn't see the inventiveness that there was in the original series (cf the giant space ameoba or the gaseous vampire or a whole load of cool other stuff). That said, 7 of 9 (mmmmmmmmmmmmm!!!!)
(and maybe the novelization has it as well).
/. archives but i'm pretty sure they ran a story about the rumor of there being a couple of TV series, one all-cgi, one live-action+effects, which would look at more details in the 17 years between Sith and Hope. Now, of course, that's probably still in the rumor mill, but there you go.
Like with Star Wars (where the comic book had its version of the footage where Luke shows the battle to Biggs before he leaves) and Empire (where there's footage shot involving a wampa cave that C3PO deceives some snowtroopers into entering), the comic book adaptation of Sith has a LOT more scenes in it that were cut from the final edit.
In particular is a lot of material involving Bail Organa and Mon Mothma (see IMDB where there's a credit line for an actress playing that role) and Bail discussing his wife's miscarriage (thus leading to the desire to adopt). There's also an assassignation of Chancelor Valorum (from Phantom Menace). I'm sure many of these scenes will be in the "deleted scenes" portion of the DVD, like the other two prequels had.
One particular moment, seemingly cut from the film, is QuiGon's voice directly talking to Yoda while he's on the space station where Padme's giving birth.
As for "what happens next?" Check the
I figure the quality of those will be on-par with the Young Indiana Jones tv series, which wasn't bad for what it tried to achieve.
"But remember, most lynch mobs aren't this nice." (H.Simpson)
-- Joe
Those were exocomps, from "The Quality of Life".
--grendel drago
Laws do not persuade just because they threaten. --Seneca
Where, you ask? Let's ask Justin B. Rye...
Love triangles? I'll skip that one, because I'd be okay without it.
Drug addiction? There are no drugs - Guinan isn't licensed. But is Picard's Earl Grey decaffeinated? Why don't they use harmless customised wonderdrugs? Clearly, everyone is on Super Soma to make them such nice, well-adjusted humanoids.
Racism? Did you see "Up the Long Ladder"? There is no racism... so where are all the Hispanics, Arabs, and co? Star Trek is a paragon of tokenism. Clearly, the White Masters back home are running things. Racist enough for you?
Violence? All races and cultures are equal. Everybody has only been Americanised (rather than, say, Iranianised) because they genuinely wanted to be. We're seeing a Pax Starfleetica. All other cultures have been squashed under the thumb of the aforementioned White Masters, far better than any of the 1500s' colonists could have dreamed.
Holosuite addiction? See frickin' Super Soma.
The whole thing is horribly creepy if you think about it enough. Read the link.
--grendel drago
Laws do not persuade just because they threaten. --Seneca
Heh. I walked out of Episode III asking the same question about droids. In the original trilogy, they never did much, and I could overlook their relatively humanish styles of speech and interaction because it was just surface stuff.
But droids leading revolutions and commanding armies (with voice commands and 'hand' gestures, no less!)? Oh, right, General Grievous (was he a Jamaican caricature? I forget what flavor of racism we're having this week) had a meat heart. For no damned reason, just that it looked kinda neat, and gave Obi-Wan something to shoot.
And droid armies? Why the fuck would anyone use human armies? Why wouldn't the Trade Federation or, y'know, anyone, just drop a von Neumann device on a planet with good energy sources, and convert its mass into armies and ships and whatnot. Why are droid pilots not pulling moves involving hundreds of Gs of force, that would make any meat-based pilot into a pancake? Why do the droids have reflexes no faster than a human, and why do they seem fragile enough that a stiff breeze could knock their heads off?
Then I remind myself that it's fantasy, and all of these things happen Because It Looks Nifty.
But still, even within the hastily thrown-together cosmology that Lucas has... are droids in tune with the Force? Are clones? What is their moral status? Are cloneburgers okay to eat? Are they a vast underclass of sophonts, and what does it say about the Jedi that they discriminate on the basis of Force-sensitivity?
I don't think droids can really fit into the Lucasverse and make any sort of good sense. Bah.
--grendel drago
Laws do not persuade just because they threaten. --Seneca
As an aside, it is IMPOSSIBLE to find the Phantom Edit anywhere. I spent an hour searching every torrent site I could find with no results. I found Phantom of the Opera, Star Wars Ep. III, the original Phantom Menace, and Elvis specials (not sure how those came up with "phantom edit" as the search string. lol), but no Phantom Edit. Google only shared with me year old links and news articles dating back to 2001 when the Phantom Edit originally shook things up. I can assume one of two things: That Lucas has dutifully removed the Phantom Edit from online existance or that nobody cared enough about even an edited version of Episode I to bother keeping it around.
The Splintered Mind - Overcoming
It's still around, if you know where to look.
In a galaxy far far away?
Are any of the Star Wars books worthy of film adaptation? Were the initial movies (Episodes 4-6) adapted from books, or were the books derived from the movies?
The torrent is already out - complete with watermarks and timecodes.
Lucas would never allow them to be made.
I'm 99% sure that the books were all written after the movies.
There are a few good Star Wars books - the Thrawn series by Timothy Zahn as others have mentioned - but just because work well as sci-fi space opera literature doesn't mean they would make good movies.
I had heard the last trilogy would feature Han's & Leia's kids (and maybe Luke's and Mara Jade's?). If they are grown up in the stories then the original actors could certainly play their characters...
an Ewok Thanksgiving Special!
Cut that out, or I will ship you to Norilsk in a box.
I took the liberty of reading over the relevant parts of "Elementary, My Dear Data", and I don't think that's clear at all. Data himself modifies the program before Geordi gives the command to create an opponent who can "defeat" and "confound" Data, so it's possible that Data's input -- whatever it was -- was a necessary catalyst for this to occur, much like the Bynars' input was necessary to create the much more humanlike holodeck character of Minuet. Speaking of the Bynars, it's worth remembering that at the end of "11001001", the humanlike Minuet character was gone, and Riker was unable to create one like her. This is a piece of evidence that would seem to favor the argument that normal holodeck characters do not bear the richness of simulated minds.
Back to "My Dear Data": Given the power surge that occurs immediately after Geordi's command, I think we can reasonably assume that the ship's computer is devoting extraordinary amounts of resources to the programming of this simulation, something it usually does not do. So this is one more element for the case that Moriarty is special, a unique creation programmed in a method different from normal holodeck characters.
Another possible piece of information to take into account is that Data's involvement likely made this program unique. I've always imagined that, in telling the computer to confound Data, the ship's computer must've accessed Data's schematics to design such an opponent. Perhaps Moriarty was designed with a combination of simulated positronics and the holodeck's human drama character program. If so, it might explain why Moriarty was so radically different from other holodeck characters, and from Data himself.
Voyager's doctor is an interesting case in that, unlike normal holodeck characters who exist for entertainment's sake, an Emergency Medical Hologram may legitimately be expected to engage in the highest levels of logical thought in the course of triage and diagnosis. I brought up Google in my original post only to highlight the idea that engaging in intelligent analysis does not necessarily entail anything like emotion. Just as Google doesn't desire to be freed from the task of analysing webpage relevance to search engine queries (because Google doesn't feel anything), there's no reason to believe that an EMH has a psyche that wishes to be freed from the task of doctoring the ship.
To be even clearer, the EMH might:
a) have no phenomenological existence (like Google)
b) have a phenomenological existence that enjoys the work it has been created to do (like the Ameglian Major Cow at the Restaurant at the End of the Universe)
c) have a phenomenological existence that feels oppressed -- or to use your term, enslaved -- by the work it has been programmed to do.
My contention is that the
aw, shit. I suck =-)
'If you're flammable and have legs, you are never blocking a fire exit.'
Maybe Lucas' Star War films were timed to show how democracy could be destroyed by a scheming leader that claims that in a perpetual war a strong Emperor is needed, thus paving the way for a destruction of individual freedom.
Picard/Crusher?
...oh you mean Beverly.
No! Say it isn't so!
Sometimes my arms bend back.
I just got off a phone call with a friend who posed an interesting question. After Googling around and not coming with any hard evidence, I figured I would post the question here in the hope that somebody might have some clarification.
In the senate, after Palpatine says: "We shall change into the first Galactic Empire for a safe and secure society.", Amidala turns to Bail and says "This is how democracy/liberty dies. With thunderous applause."
The question is, what did you hear, 'democracy' or 'liberty'? Both me, him, and all the other people he's talked to that saw THE midnight showing claim they heard 'democracy'. The iMDB quote base shows 'liberty', and a person who saw a later showing claims 'liberty'. Could it be possible that there was a slightly different print out there for just the midnight showing?
I never, ever heard that, or heard of it. That's an impressive bit of supposition---where'd you get it?
--grendel drago
Laws do not persuade just because they threaten. --Seneca
It was in many many interviews that Lucas gave just after after the original third came out (and before he re-released the first one as episode 4).
I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
You could have .. like, Daryl Hannah and Rutger Hauer in it ... and because it's all inspired by a slashdot story on Star Wars, you should give Harrison Ford a role in it too...
...though the impending title change had been reported earlier, of course...
/. that introduced the term "flame". This term was coined when the speed with which the trees were cut down caused a build up of heat that would literally flame away vast areas of rainforest.
t m - a method that is still practiced in many areas of the world.
and was most likely reported first on paperclip/thumbtack (the paper based version of slashdot)
Of course, the article was immediately withdrawn once people realised that 40 acres of the Amazon rainforest had been used by people writing "first print" followed by those printing "troll".
Indeed it was the early paperbased grandparent of
The act of cutting down the trees for flame posts soon became known as "Slash and Burn" http://www.orangutan.com/threats/slash_and_burn.h
Of course they won't be made... and it's BitTorrent's fault.
~Impr3ssion
*ducks*
mah na mah na.
If the conscious entity has no ability to discern they have a choice (eg. it was bread(?) into them) whether it be love/devotion or hate/revulsion, are they 'human', or can they behave human-ly? Or if that hasn't been bread out of them, yet they've been conditioned (Pavlov or somesuch) to think they can only safely choose one way, are they human? Or if they grew up in an environment where there never was another choice than 'the way things are' - so much so that they could never form the thought of being in a different situation, of saying 'No', or what 'no' might mean to them (think of some peasants in the Middle Ages), were they human?
If the entity can't say "Well, now, I'm in this situation. How do I feel about that? And do I have values and a life I can measure it against and decide for myself whether I want to continue doing it?" - are they fully human? If they never have the internal choice of saying "No" or "Yes" are they ever human? If they do not make that decision independently every moment, are they human during the other moments when that decision is denied them?
8-PP
P.S. If I didn't make it obvious, I agree that the given B and C Categories are the same - just different flavors of the same state of being.
Instead lets say Category B is a hammer that hates having to pound 1/4-penny nails. Maybe it wants to pound screws instead. Maybe it wants to pound wood in artistic ways. Maybe it wants a break from normal pounding and do a rapid pounding which acts like a saw on some materials. Maybe it has no deeper desire than simply stop pounding the same nail every day.
Category C, then, is a hammer that dislikes being a hammer and wants to be human but instead keeps a cat and earn it's status as a high-ranking officer of a Federation starship.
Dude, most of that 18 years was software. They had backups. The rest was bolting parts together. "Big-ass planet destroying beam goes *here*...."
And very, very violent.
The way I see it, Anakin balanced the force by moving from an great number of jedi vs two sith to two of each (Vader/Sidious vs Yoda/Kenobi).
Not quite what the jedi wanted, but they didn't realise the prophecy was a warning not a promise!
And then he's got to go back through Eps I, II & III. I hear the first change is replacing Jake Lloyd with an animatronic something-or-other.
Those who believe the Internet is private,
find their privates are on the Internet.
On what evidence do you base the assumption that all holodeck characters are "designed to simulate a primate brain"?
1. The whole point of holodeck characters is to respond to and react like members of intelligent species. They are simulating creatures with primate brains. Whether they have a simulation of a primate brain structure or are "just" simulating the behaviour of an entity with that structure is meaningless. The same reasoning behind the Church-turing hypothesis that you have to accept to treat ANY of these entities as self-aware applies here: it doesn't matter whether the presented personality matches the underlying personality or not... you can't objectively say whether that's true for anyone.
2. When they "wake up", they continue to act as a member of the species they are simulating, not as an alien intelligence with unfathomable motives. That means that the entity that's "woken up" is one that expresses similar goals and interests to the one housed in any primate (or primatoid) brain.
I don't see any reason or evidence to back up your speculation that all holodeck characters are in essence human minds
That is, as you say, speculation. But that part of my speculation is not necessary to my argument. Let me repeat that: it doesn't matter whether all holodeck characters or some (one in ten thousand or even one in a million) ever become self-aware. Because if the technology is common enough that a bunch of civilians at a third-rate spapce station using a mix of Federation and non-Federation technology like DS9 can operate one, there must be trillions of them throughout a civilization the size of the Federation.
And "rare accidents" or not, it can't be that rare when there have been so many incidents of holocharacters displaying enough self-awareness for long enough that they're noticed. Janeway stopped deactivating the EMH, sure, but what if the EMH's activation had been a matter of weeks instead of years? We don't know how long it took for him to "wake up", but let's say it was three months (you can argue with this detail, but there's still some point where he became a subjective personality), and Janeway and the rest really started seeing him as something special after six months. Let's say they got back to the Federation in four months. Then the EMH would have had a month of subjective life, and been snuffed out.
If Moriarty had merely been made clever enough to defeat Sherlock Holmes, or even Riker, instead of Data, he may still have become a subjective personality... but he never would have been able to demonstrate that, and after the game was over... *poof*.
We're only shown the dramatic and clear-cut examples, but if there ARE cases like that there must be many many more marginal cases. If it was JUST Moriarty, that could have been a single unique event... but it's not. There's several examples shown, some more clear-cut than others, so there must be a complete spectrum, from the EMH and Moriarty down to some poor footsoldier in a WWII situation who barely makes it from "damn, that hurts" to "cogito ergo..." before someone says "Computer, End Program".
So even if it's one in a million, that still leaves millions of examples. That's more than enough wasted lives to qualify as an "underclass".
Again, why create code *just to suppress it*? It makes no sense.
It happens all the time. Every firewall and sandbox and security feature in every operating system in the world is there just to suppress code. The "Holodeck Safety Protocols" are exactly that kind of security feature.
And the more complex a software system is, the less well it's understood... and we're orders of magnitude less sophisticated than the Federation. And in the Federation it's pretty clear that nobody, even the man who created the EMH, really understands the holocharacter technology. I'm not arguing that these people deliberately created self-aware AIs, I'm arguing that the reason these characters are "waking up" is that they are simply so complex and such close simulations (regardless of how they're structured internally) of people that it's becoming meaningless to try and distinguish between a simulation and the real thing.
In order for a holographic entity or a robot to become self-aware, a being, a spirit, a soul would need to decide to become or possess the physical machine and operate it, similar to the way a being operates a body. (This presupposes that you believe that bodies are operated by beings, not that bodies are beings.) As long as there is sufficient means for a being to manipulate whatever the physical form is, a being could decide to occupy it, and that's the moment when the "robot" has rights. It's not really the robot that has the rights, it's the being that occupies the robot.
OK, I'll grant you that point for the sake of the argument. The thing is, that point doesn't change the argument! Whether Data or Moriarty or the EMH woke up because they became complex enough to wake up, or they woke up because they became complex enough to became an attractive housing for a soul, what difference does it make?
If the only thing you believe in, however, is the physical realm, then you may soon find yourself wanting to grant human rights to sufficiently complicated RPG characters.
If sufficiently complex RPG characters can Pinnochio-like become the homes for souls, then you have to deal with the possibility that they have rights whether you believe in souls or not.
Some of the ACs responding here have some really good points (even if I don't agree with them all, they're all good points), so if you read with a threshold >0 you'll miss a lot.
That one's been done to death. Ho Hilton has a lock on that market.
"Live Free or Die." Don't like it? Then keep out of the USA