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Star Wars TV Show Tainted By Memories of Jar Jar
bowman9991 writes "Can George Lucas' new Star Wars TV series, the first Star Wars spin off with real actors, atone for the flawed follow-ups to his original classics? Producer Rick McCallum calls the new series 'much darker,' a 'much more character-based series' and 'more adult,' while George Lucas himself calls it more like the first Star Wars film. The new TV show takes place in the 'dark times' between the last prequel Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith and Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope, when most of the Jedi and anti-emperor politicians were hunted down and killed. The characters of Boba Fett, C-3PO, and the Emperor Palpatine will return, and casting has now begun. Mark Hamill, the actor who played Luke Skywalker from the original movies, believes George Lucas lost his way, 'making it bigger and bigger and bigger and bigger until you're just exploding with special effects all over the screen like some fireworks display,' but thinks the new show is a 'positive' step forward. Hopefully George Lucas can wipe the memory of Jar Jar Binks, Anakin and Padme's romance, his shameless merchandising, and some lame attempts at humor from everyone's minds once and for all."
We want sequels to Return of the Jedi. Wasn't he originally going to do 3 sets of trilogies: with the 3rd set later on, and the only common characters would be the 2 droids?
Why do so many screenwriters equate "something that adults will enjoy" with "darker"?
Most of Raiders of the Lost Ark was not "dark", but I loved it when it came out, and I still really like it. There was action, adventure, wonder, and surprise. There was no soul searching over life's moral ambiguities, or "deep" plot elements where Indy tortured bad guys with car batteries. Similar with the first Star Wars movie (episode 4).
If this is Lucas' attempt to atone for past mistakes, it seems like he's still off the mark.
Hey Lucas,
Instead of rehashing the train wreck you made of the Skywalker Saga, why don't you tell the story of the splitting of the Jedi and the Sith. In The Phantom Menace, Darth Maul says "At last we will reveal ourselves to the Jedi. At last we will have revenge." Tell THAT story: why they are in hiding; what are they getting revenge for.
When our name is on the back of your car, we're behind you all the way!
Actually Star Wars very definitely has potential to do 'dark and nasty' and do it well. I mean, think about the key themes in there. It's about a rebellion - freedom fighters, or perhaps 'terrorists'? It's about an oppressive regime, spreading out and being racist (ok, species-ist) across the galaxy.
You'd have plenty of framework to make a political commentary on the war on terror. Mix in a little bit of fundamental differences in culture - the Empire plugs one ideology to people who just don't think that way - and maybe mix in a bit of crooked shenanigans, spaceships and just a shade of jedi mythos/persecution. (Not convinced it needs it though - way better to have a couple of 'dark jedi' bad guys, and have the good guys running scared).
Could be pretty good. Fairly sure it'll never happen mind - George Lucas will want creative control, and he'll go all fluffy and cute.
Speaking of Star Wars "side-movies", you can find a copy of the spliced-together reconstruction of the ultra-rare official mockumentary "Return of the Ewok" starring Warwick Davis and the ROTJ cast here: http://www.gappon.com/star-wars-return-of-the-ewok-1982-583635.html
More info about it at Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Return_of_the_Ewok
It's not available commercially anywhere, so I guess sharing the download link is historical/digital preservation and not piracy.
http://www.object404.com
I was a huge fan of Star Wars until the abomination that was episode 1. I watched episode 2 at the theater we affectionately call "The Welfare Flicks", a second run theater. For the third, I just rented the DVD and that was just for closure. Now, I have no more interest in Star Wars. He f*cked up the originals, and I just don't even care anymore if he ever releases a decent DVD of the originals.
As for my kids, their only interest in Star Wars is a video game with little characters made out of Legos. They couldn't care less about the movies. If they run any of the movies on cable, their attention span is about 15 minutes.
George Lucas killed Star Wars.
Not sure if you were generalizing to everyone, but... I watched the original trilogy when I was 18. I loved it. I watched them because I went to see Episode 2 (at my friends' insistence) and I decided to watch the originals to understand the story better. I later watched Episode 3 (which I loved) and then Episode 1 (which I hated). I can say, having watched all six around the same time, that the original trilogy is way better than the prequel trilogy - the only saving grace being Episode 3.
Just a few examples:
The chemistry between Leia and Han is much better than Anakin and Padme.
The humor is worlds apart - not only were the droids a lot funnier than Jar Jar (I realize the droids were in the prequel movies as well, but they weren't as prominent), but Han was funny, the whole Han/Leia/Luke "love" triangle was funny, etc...
I did not like Hayden Christensen's acting, but I also believe that a good director would've fixed that. If it's a bad take, you do it again. He was awkward and it made me cringe a few times.
So it's not that the original trilogy was cooler because I was younger when I saw it. It really was better, imo. I think if any of the kids enjoy the prequels more than the original, it's because it has prettier CG and more action.
Well, for starters, it is set in the best possible time frame...
Are you kidding me? The prequels had so much potential, a great subtext for plots and whatnot. Think about it. The reason Lucas made the films in the first place is because everyone was curious about how Darth Vader became Darth Vader. If that's not a good setup to a story, I don't know what is. The corruption of Anakin Skywalker is an amazing setup for a good story. Instead, it was Lucas that bogged down the prequels with useless CG, pointless Senate meetings and a Jedi Council that really wasn't anything more than a showcase for Yoda. Lucas was the one that felt the need to recycle every character from the first films.
Put a talented writer like Joss Whedon on a project with such clear boundaries and he would have made an amazing film. We could have seen the slow moral corruption of an innocent Jedi. The seduction to the dark side by the emperor. A realistic romance between Anakin and Padme. Several brand new characters that would have depth to them and interesting plot twists could have been made all around. Instead we got a train wreck full of discombobulated stories about characters that no one finds interesting. In short, the story was set up well by episodes 4-6. Lucas just blew every advantage he had in Episode 1. He had three fat pitches down the middle and he swung and missed every one.
Compare that to the setup for this series. You have an already evil Darth Vader hunting down Jedi. Somehow, the emperor is going to show his evilness to the world such that rebels will start rising up. You think senate hearings are boring? How else are you going to show any protest by rebelling planets? Remember that the emperor doesn't dissolve the senate until ep. 4. What about action? The Jedi are mostly already dead. Yoda and Obiwan are supposed to be hiding. What can you anchor the story around? Some Jedi that's running away? A planet that keeps getting oppressed (how exactly? through trade embargos)? It's not obvious and not easy to tell a good story in such a setting. This is like a slider away that you have to hit. A single is possible. A strike is more likely.
I went to see the first set of Star Wars when it was re-issued to movie theaters. When Leila kissed Luke, someone in front of me said "Ewwww! They're siblings!" I said "WHAT?! They are?? Thanks for ruining it!"
At that moment, my friends came to the realization that I had never seen the movies before. At subsequent movies, they announced to the surrounding moviegovers that I had NEVER SEEN IT and to make SURE to not reveal any upcoming secrets (including the "big one").
It was great, actually - my friends, who were born around the time of Star Wars, were super excited to see someone's first reaction to the movies.
Anyway, as a perfectly controlled experiment, I agree that the first set of movies was far superior to the second set. The prequel seemed hacked together in order to resolve things from the first set, and over-reliant on special effects and lame jokes to the exclusion of the storyline.