Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

How Star Wars Trumped Star Trek For Scientific Accuracy

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the set-phasers-to-awesome dept.

An anonymous reader writes "When George Lucas added the 'ring around the Death Star' effect to his 1997 re-release of Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope, the revision was almost as hated as Greedo shooting first, and to boot was seen as a knock-off of the seminal 'Praxis effect' in Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country (1991). But a debunking astronomer claims that the Federation got it wrong and the fan-boys should thank Lucas for adding some scientific accuracy to his fictional universe."

5 of 495 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Greedo shooting first is far more hated ... by darkwing_bmf · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I agree. This slash story is pretty lame. Also Han shot Greedo preemptively. Han was a rogue, not a white knight.

  2. Re:And So Offered Another Inaccuracy by pitchpipe · · Score: 5, Insightful

    How Star Wars Trumped Star Trek For Scientific Accuracy

    Isn't that the greatest headline ever to create a nerd flame war!?

    --
    Look where all this talking got us, baby.
  3. Re:And So Offered Another Inaccuracy by natehoy · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Star Wars is more like future fantasy

    That certainly explains the opening scroll for every movie, which all start "A Long Time Ago, In a Galaxy Far, Far Away" :)

    --
    "This post contains words, known to the State of California to cause thought. Wash brain thoroughly after reading."
  4. Re:Finally! by Tackhead · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Ep. 4,5 and 6 had a lot of Gaps that we filled in our own imagination that when ep. 1,2,3 came out we would all be disappointed as our imagination was replaced with someone else's.

    No, the problem was that Episodes 1-3 didn't fill in the interesting gaps.

    4: Here's this Luke kid. Light Side wins.
    5: The Empire blows up the base, hacks off Luke's hand, and Han's fully-clothed and petrified. Dark Side wins.
    6: Luke beats Palpatine. Dad's OK. Light Side wins.

    Following the parallel, we should have had:
    1: Here's the Anakin kid. Light Side wins.
    2: Anakin hacks up a bunch of Sandpeople, kids, and finally flips out Natalie Portman, formerly naked, ends up petrified. Dark Side wins.
    3: Here's this Darth Vader dude. He gets more and more evil with every passing month, slaughtering millions, razing planets, building Star Destroyers and Death Stars, and he's so freaking oppressive that the Rebellion starts. Some Bothans rip off the plans for the Death Star and haul ass outa there! Light Side wins.

    Instead we got this incoherent jumble:
    1: Here's the Anakin kid. Light Side wins.
    2: Here's the Anakin dude. Whiny little bugger, ain't he?
    3: Here's the Anakin dude. Still a whiny little bugger, ain't he? DO NOT WANT.

    All the interesting gaps in the Star Wars storyline took place between Episode III and Episode IV. We all know Anakin's going to fall to the Dark Side, and there was no need to spend two movies doing it. The unexplored part of the movie timeline is what life is like immediately after he becomes Vader, but before the events of Episode IV.

  5. Re:Greedo shooting first is far more hated ... by matt_hs · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The other problem with having Greedo shoot first is that they were, what . . . about 2-3' feet from each other? Across the table? Greedo is an experienced bounty hunter. How the hell does he miss from that distance??