George Lucas: "I'm Done With Star Wars"

HughPickens.com writes: Entertainment Weekly reports that George Lucas has compared his retirement from Star Wars to a break-up – a mutual one, maybe, but one that nonetheless comes with hard feelings and although Lucas came up with story treatments for a new trilogy, those materials, to put it bluntly, were discarded. "They decided they didn't want to use those stories, they decided they were gonna go do their own thing," says Lucas. "They weren't that keen to have me involved anyway. But at the same time, I said if I get in there I'm just going to cause trouble. Because they're not going to do what I want them to do. And I don't have the control to do that anymore. All I would do is muck everything up. So I said, 'Okay, I will go my way, and I'll let them go their way.'" Lucas says he was going to tell a story about the grandchildren of figures from the original trilogy. "The issue was, ultimately, they looked at the stories and they said, 'We want to make something for the fans,'" says Lucas. "So, I said, all I want to do is tell a story of what happened – it started here and went there. It's all about generations, and issues of fathers and sons and grandfathers. It's a family soap opera."

Although the team behind The Force Awakens acknowledges they're taking the story in a different direction from what Lucas intended, they maintain affection for his original creations and the man himself. "Before I showed up, it was already something that Disney had decided they wanted to go a different way with," says J. J. Abrams. "But the spirit of what he wrote, both in those pages and prior, is everything that this movie is built upon." Some fans question why there was no "Based on" credit for Lucas in the poster for The Force Awakens. "I don't know why it isn't on the poster, but it's a valid point. I'm sure that that will be a credit in the film," says Abrams. "We are standing on the shoulders of Episodes I through VI."

Comments

Surprised?

[Anonymous Coward]

Just more Cheez-wiz American cinema. Lucas ruined the first three movies when made the last three.

Re:Surprised?

[kwardroid]

If we only could get a HD release of the original theatrical releases of the first ones (S.W., the Empre Strikes back and just to complete it Returnâ¦)

Re:Surprised?

[ArchieBunker]

There used to be laserdisc rips of the original trilogy on bittorrent. That is about as close as you'll get.

Re:Surprised?

[roc97007]

"and just to complete it" -- I know the feeling. Lucas was starting to go off the rails with RotJ. Then with TPM he went off the bridge, tumbled down the mountain, careened into the chasm and plunged into the magma.

Re:Surprised?

[MightyMartian]

He also ruined the first three movies when he shamelessly screwed with them.

Han shot Greedo first. End of story.

Re:Surprised?

[cfalcon]

Look for "despecialized edition". It is the droids you are looking for.

Re:Surprised?

[roc97007]

There used to be laserdisc rips of the original trilogy on bittorrent. That is about as close as you'll get.

I'm told that there are "the despecialized editions", which were attempts by fans with mad skills to recreate the original films from the "special editions". Improved quality and effects where appropriate, without all the squirmy additions.

Re:Surprised?

[hairyfeet]

No he didn't, the problem was after Empire he began to lose people who would tell him no which is the kiss of death to a guy like Lucas.

If you watch the behind the scenes on SW and ESB there were people there that would actually tell Lucas no, tell him what they REALLY thought, be totally honest with the guy...Watch the video on the making of TPM, there are literally dozens of times where you can see Lucas talking and the eyes and expressions of those he is talking to are fucking CRINGING because they know this is a dumb idea...do they say a word? Nope they bite their tongues and say "sure thing George, great" because they are afraid of losing a check.

So if you want to know what killed the prequels it was Lucas not having anybody around him with the guts to say "this just isn't working George" and to let him know whats what.

Re:Surprised?

[roc97007]

> No he didn't, the problem was after Empire he began to lose people who would tell him no which is the kiss of death to a guy like Lucas.

I agree, he always had JarJar potential without talented people to hold him in check. That doesn't necessarily invalidate what I said.

Re:Surprised?

[pushing-robot]

"and just to complete it" -- I know the feeling. Lucas was starting to go off the rails with RotJ. Then with TPM he went off the bridge, tumbled down the mountain, careened into the chasm and plunged into the magma.

To be fair, he didn't have the high ground.

Re:Surprised?

[roc97007]

Just more Cheez-wiz American cinema. Lucas ruined the first three movies when made the last three.

It helps to assume that the last three never existed. Kinda like "wow The Matrix was good. Too bad they never made any sequels".

Re:Surprised?

[wonkey_monkey]

The official original versions as put on the re-release of the SE DVDs as bonus features (known as the GOUT, for George's Original Unaltered Trilogy) came from the Laserdisc masters. They're poor quality by today's standards, but better than any Laserdisc rip.

Re:Surprised?

[BitterOak]

There used to be laserdisc rips of the original trilogy on bittorrent. That is about as close as you'll get.

Not true! There are much better ones available! As an Anonymous poster noted below (and deserves to be modded up!) you should look for Harmy's "Despecialized" versions. Much of the source was actually taken from film and it looks really good at 720p. Look for version 2.5 of episode 4 and version 2.0 of episode. His current version of Jedi isn't quite as good yet, but hopefully a better version will be out soon.

Some info here.

Re:Surprised?

[Razed By TV]

Well, if Disney does well enough with 7-9, maybe they will go back and remake eps 1-3. I'd like to see the look on Lucas's face...

Re:Surprised?

[khelms]

How about an HD release of the original theatrical version of THX 1138. He screwed that one up too.

Re:Surprised?

[Anonymous Coward]

Just more Cheez-wiz American cinema. Lucas ruined the first three movies when made the last three.

Oh for pete's sake, Lucas didn't ruin anything. Star Wars until the sellout to Disney was his. His fucking vision.
I loved Star Wars when I was 6 years old. Then I let go. My kids loved Phantom Menace when they were 8. They've let go since then. People who endlessly complain about Lucas this, Lucas that are adults that simply can't let go. One of the defining characteristics of being an adult is to be able to let go of things. Klinging endlessly to Star Wars is unhealthy. Let a new generation enjoy Disney's vision of Star Wars.

Re:Surprised?

[PRMan]

And it's not just a preference. Han Solo can't be redeemed if he's not a cold-blooded killer to begin with. He has nothing to be redeemed from...

Re:Surprised?

[Nogami_Saeko]

You are absolutely, 100% correct. It was painfully obvious watching the behind the scenes footage that Lucas had been surrounded by a platoon of "Yes Men", rather than people who would give him honest feedback.

And here's the thing, I think that Lucas did have some really great ideas, but he also had some terrible ones. And without the filter to remove the terrible ones, you got a mashed-up mess.

Re:Surprised?

[Noah Haders]

> Star Wars until the sellout to Disney was his.

Not sure what you're going for, but I generally don't like the notion that he "sold out", as in cheated his true fans and his own artistic vision by partnering with a huge corporate conglomerate. He had a good run with SW, single-handedly made it into what it is today (for better or worse), and is now passing the property over to another set of filmmakers that have proven themselves to be quite capable and will likely to the series justice. He made a bundle in the process, which he deserved for all of his efforts. he sold to disney, not sold out.

Re:Surprised?

[Anonymous Coward]

This is exactly it. Shooting second really works against his character's arc.

Plus it was an admirable attribute to the Wild West to be a faster draw. It made him special because he was faster - better instincts, reaction time, situational judgment, etc. He shoots first because he's a badass survivor – not just lucky. The world he was in seemed more dangerous when he shot first, as if he needed that microsecond edge and killer instict.

Re:Surprised?

[cfalcon]

Han didn't shoot Greedo first. Han shot Greedo, and Greedo didn't shoot at all.

Re:Surprised?

[JaredOfEuropa]

Indeed. One word: "Ewok".

Re:Surprised?

[Anonymous Coward]

As if we needed proof this guy is in the Star Trek and not the Star Wars camp.

Re:Surprised?

[Grishnakh]

Don't you mean ex-wife? I thought it was his (then-) wife that edited his script for Episode 4 and helped keep that movie from being a disaster. However, after the original trilogy, they got divorced, so of course when he got around to doing the Prequels she wasn't around to tell him how stupid his ideas and dialog were.

Re:Surprised?

[Darinbob]

Every artist needs an editor. Just like every genius needs someone whispering "stop being a dumbass".

Re:Surprised?

[pecosdave]

I have these disks. Despite having bought the wide-screen trilogy the bonus disks were full frame.

Re:Surprised?

[roc97007]

Well, if Disney does well enough with 7-9, maybe they will go back and remake eps 1-3. I'd like to see the look on Lucas's face...

I haven't used this phrase in a long time, but That Would Be So Cool. Just make the prequels non-canon, completely forget they ever existed, and just do new prequels.

Re:Surprised?

[Citizen of Earth]

You'd think that now that Lucas's "artistic vision" is out of the picture that Disney would be okay with going back to the Money Well and releasing the original versions of the films on Blu-Ray just like dedicated fans have always wanted.

Re:Surprised?

[Citizen of Earth]

tumbled down the mountain, careened into the chasm and plunged into the magma.

And the later Special Edition featured a CGI shot of the magma belching after swallowing Lucas, with eight new weird-looking creature in the background and Jar Jar stepping in some poop...

Re:Surprised?

[Shadow of Eternity]

I'm assuming you accidentally a word and Ep5/Empire is V2.0, what's the version number for Ep6/RoJ?

Re:Surprised?

[zwarte piet]

... which exploded with a ring of fire.... misa big auch!

Re:Surprised?

[Anonymous Coward]

Your mom looks like a bargain at 720p.

Re:Surprised?

[Nkwe]

There used to be laserdisc rips of the original trilogy on bittorrent. That is about as close as you'll get.

Or you could just watch the laserdiscs.

Re:Surprised?

[Anonymous Coward]

Not only that, but Lucas's wife, whom he divorced somewhere around RoTJ is credited with having written and corrected a lot of the dialog and story that Lucas originally wrote. There were rumors she could make a better set of prequels than he could. Of course, he never gave her the credit, but there are articles written about her. I'd like to see her direct some.

Re:Surprised?

[Scarletdown]

Anyone else remember when Star Wars made the rounds at the theaters for its third time (1979)? In the copy we got at our theater here, no one shot in that scene.

The Han and Greedo scene went straight from "Yes, I'll bet you have." to the next scene, which was an outside shot of the Death Star.

For years we had thought it might have been a bad spot on the copy the theater had which needed cut out. Then the Han Shot controversy came up, and that entire mystery was suddenly put into a different light.

Re:Surprised?

[wonkey_monkey]

I don't know which disks you're watching, but the GOUT is definitely widescreen. It's not anamorphic, though (neither were the laserdiscs).

Re:Surprised?

[cfalcon]

This is the first time I have ever heard of this, nice pull! I'm too junior to remember 1979, but I do know that Lucas spared little time in adding "Episode IV" to the title crawl once it was an obvious hit. Them cutting away from that scene in any theatrical cut is pretty unheard of!

In any event, check out the despecialized edition. It fixes everything!

Re:Surprised?

[DirkDaring]

Darn right, I wish people would stop saying Han shot first.

Re:Surprised?

[geminidomino]

I'm sure they would, in a cold second, but apparently distribution rights still belong to Fox.

Re:Surprised?

[dywolf]

Actually yes I am surprised.

And now I'd like to respond directly to Mr Lucas:

although Lucas came up with story treatments for a new trilogy, those materials, to put it bluntly, were discarded.

Thank God.

"They decided they didn't want to use those stories, they decided they were gonna go do their own thing," says Lucas. "They weren't that keen to have me involved anyway.

Smart move on their part.

But at the same time, I said if I get in there I'm just going to cause trouble.

Undoubtedly.

All I would do is muck everything up.

Identifying the problem is the first step to correcting it.

"The issue was, ultimately, they looked at the stories and they said, 'We want to make something for the fans,'" says Lucas.

A lesson you would do well to learn Mr Lucas. Making your fans happy is how you became a success in the first place... ...and displeasing them is how you crashed and burned.

And as long as we're breaking up, can you please give us back our original Original Trilogy?
Just drop it off at our door, no need to stick around. That would be awkward.
And you can keep the prequels, we don't want them.

Re:Surprised?

[Lunix Nutcase]

Every McCartney needs a Lennon and vica versa.

Re:Surprised?

[neilo_1701D]

"The issue was, ultimately, they looked at the stories and they said, 'We want to make something for the fans,'" says Lucas.

A lesson you would do well to learn Mr Lucas. Making your fans happy is how you became a success in the first place... ...and displeasing them is how you crashed and burned.

I agreed with you right up until this point. The story writer's first loyalty is to the story, not the fans. You can never satisfy fan expectations, because for every fan who likes one story point, you'll find another fan who passionately hates that very same story point.

As an example, look at all the Harry Potter fan fiction out there. Suppose JK Rawlings decided to write The Half-Blood Prince and The Deathly Hallows according to fan wishes. Do you think that would have honestly been a better story? Or in Babylon 5, suppose Straczynski went for the "fan friendly" end to the Shadow War with an all-out CGI battle? Would the long term story goals have been served by this?

George Lucas can't write decent dialog, that much is true. His "CGI for the sake of CGI" sequences in I-III really detracted from the story. Directing seems also problematic. But he created an interesting universe with an interesting story. To read that JJ Abrams is making a fan-aimed Star Wars saddens me, as that means the story of Star Wars (eg. does the actions of our parents dictate our own fate?) is likely to be ignored. Sure, we've seen the beautiful vistas of crashed Star Destroyers, the Nazi-esq First Order rallies etc. But at what cost?

Be faithful to the story, not the fans. Fans of the story will follow you anyway. But pander to the fans... well, enjoy Draco Malfoy teaching Hermione Granger a few muggle things

Re:Surprised?

[avandesande]

Yes there is nothing memorable at all about the story-line it is completely disposable other then the fall of Anikan...

Re:Surprised?

[Gamer_2k4]

Just more Cheez-wiz American cinema. Lucas ruined the first three movies when made the last three.

Oh for pete's sake, Lucas didn't ruin anything. Star Wars until the sellout to Disney was his. His fucking vision.

Well, no. His vision was a green-skinned Han Solo with gills and other crazy characters/ideas that brighter minds, fortunately, talked him out of. A New Hope is what happens when you based your movie on established storytelling techniques (hero's journey) and have a capable and outspoken editing staff. The Phantom Menace is what happens when you leave Lucas to "his vision."

Re:Surprised?

[Coren22]

Is the source material compatible with high definition? If it wasn't recorded at those resolutions or widescreen, it might be difficult to make them into HD without reshooting the movies. Are the original films even available?

Re:Surprised?

[Coren22]

But what would we do without a whiny Anakin?

Re:Surprised?

[pecosdave]

Perhaps I got a first release or something? I know that the actual movie DVD's had a sample level of Lego Star Wars for the original XBox on them.

Re:Surprised?

[tnk1]

Anakin's fall was also completely forgettable. You never really got any feeling from what happened that anything that happened was enough for him to be willing to sell out the Jedi, it just seemed like he was a whiner who didn't get what he wanted. And suddenly he's a murderous bad ass. When he marched into the Jedi temple, it was like they added a new character who just happened to look like Anakin Skywalker because you couldn't see how the two of them were at all related.

Admittedly, all the pieces were there. His mother being killed, the forbidden love interest who was also threatened, being denied the title of Master, Palpatine's manipulation of Anakin's ego.

The problem was that those things just sat there like limp dishrags. It was like they had to check some boxes off on the plot so Anakin could get around to turning into a monster. The dialogue and acting for Anakin's part was absolutely critical, and on both accounts Lucas dropped the ball hard. Hayden Christensen was more wooden than a stack of 2x4s, but it isn't clear to me if that is just him or it was Lucas' direction (or both).

If someone who could actually write dialogue and narrative could re-do the prequels, you could almost keep most of the major plot points and make them 100x better just by changing the dialogue and narrative. And if they got an actor who could give off the sense of that slowly building rage, you'd have a winner.

Re:Surprised?

[camazotz]

http://www.blastr.com/2015-9-2...

Re:Surprised?

[roc97007]

I was ok with the windows in cloud city and removing that painfully eighties song at the end of Jedi. The rest were very needed un-changes.

Re:Surprised?

[roc97007]

But what would we do without a whiny Anakin?

Perhaps, enjoy our movie-going experiences? Not have our childhood memories destroyed?

Re:Surprised?

[roc97007]

> Hayden Christensen was more wooden than a stack of 2x4s, but it isn't clear to me if that is just him or it was Lucas' direction (or both).

Hayden is wooden in other acting roles, and Lucas managed to tease wooden performances from good actors, so I'm thinking, it was both.

Re:Surprised?

[Tough Love]

Lucas ruined the first three movies when made the last three.

The first three are actually pretty bad in retrospect, a cut above old episodes of Lost in Space, but not by very much. Bailed out by a ripsnorting John Williams score, but even the music deteriorated as the series wore on.

Re:Surprised?

[TWX]

I have both the (relatively) untouched originals on Laserdisc and the Special Edition versions on Laserdisc.

The biggest problem is that LD is a 4:3 tech where a 2.35:1 image is letterboxed on to it. With a horizontal resolution of 480 lines at 4:3, matted that leaves about 272 lines for program content. When one was accustomed to a tube television this was not seen as a bad thing, but now that we're accustomed to 480 lines even on a widescreen image for DVD as the low-end of what's acceptable this obviously won't do.

If fans have de-special-editioned the SE versions that might be the best approach. Alternately if someone still had theatrical prints it would be even better, but those are probably so caught up in legal limbo between the production company, the studio, the distributor, and any special rights to things like the soundtrack that we'll probably never see a cleaned up original version.

Re:Surprised?

[Rakarra]

Oh sure you can do HD from 35mm film. JJ Abrams is shooting Episode VII on the same film type that Lucas shot the original Star Wars on. It's hard to track down numbers, since analog film doesn't really have "pixels," but I've seen sources that say that a frame of 35mm film can have an effective resolution around 5400 x 4000. So, better than HD, even better than 4k.

Of course, that would rely on the original film stock being available and being in excellent quality to get that good of a digital image from it. The type of film scanner used will greatly affect the quality of the resulting image as well.

Re:Surprised?

[Rakarra]

we plugged the LD player into my monitor's S-video input while the PC played the DVD

And the reason why DVD looks better than Laserdisc is right there -- S-video is an inherently bad video transport. It's better by a mile than composite video, but no where near as good as a decent component connection. I think it's limited to NTSC/480 interlaced. Basically, your laserdisc connected video S-video was better than a VHS player connected by the same, but Laserdisc is still recorded in composite format. It had a horizontal resolution of 425 lines vs 240 for NTSC.

Because the Laserdisc is a composite signal, a DVD is capable of much better color separation and contrast. In Laserdisc's defense, due to its analog nature, although the video quality can be substantially lower, at least it won't suffer from compression artifacts like DVDs can. Early DVDs could be such poor encoding quality that the Laserdisc version could look substantially better! But by the end of Laserdisc's run, DVD encodings had easily surpassed what Laserdisc had to offer. DVDs also allow for progressive scan, though earlier DVDs may be encoded with an inferior, low-res, interlaced video.

Re:Surprised?

[Rakarra]

Yeah my girlfriend sometimes helps me with game playability testing. Therefore, I'd love to see her run her own development house.

An editor does a hell of a lot more for a film than a gameplay tester does for a game. An editor is the one who shapes the film, controls its movement, and decides which of the 20% of the shot footage goes into the final film. They understandably work closely with the director, but the editor and the producer are the two who have the best chance of reigning in a director's impulses.

Re:Surprised?

[Rakarra]

"Han shot Greedo first."

Really, who gives a shit. The Death Star blew up entire planets. Countless Jedi were slaughtered by the Dark Side. Focus on a larger plot point, will ya?

Because we're talking about a movie, where character points tend to have more personal impact than big spectacle.

Re:Surprised?

[CrypticKev]

Grab Harmy's "Despecialized" versions, and if you must, watch in Machete Order - ie IV, V, II, III, VI. ie insert ep2-3 as a 'flashback' after Empire before moving on to Jedi. Forget the mess that is TPM, thus removing the cutesy Anakin and almost all of Jar Jar. http://www.nomachetejuggling.c...

Re:Surprised?

[lucien86]

Jar Jar existed from the time of the first movies, he was definitely in the first comics. The scary thing is that I remember him being funny. Something really weird happened between 1980 and TPM, and Jar Jar wasn't even the worst of it either..
I'M PERSONALLY TERRIFIED OF THE COMING MOVIE - I think it could make the worst of the Prequels look like great films.. Disneyfication - the reduction of something to grotesquely child like elements to make it more appealing to small (sub 10 yr old) children.. And worse - the removing of anything intelligent in script or story or characters..

Re:Surprised?

[lucien86]

That would explain a heck of a lot.

Re:Surprised?

[lucien86]

Don't forget the character you never see - the blue screen.. Probably also partly responsible for Jar Jar + plus a total miscasting. Jar Jar reminds me of 'Ford Prefect' from HHGTTG another total miscast from a movie that totally massacred its source..

Re:Surprised?

[stoatwblr]

The original 3 were homages to 1930s space and horse operas, played as straight as possible in order to be true to form.

There's no big message in them, not intentionally anyway. Enjoy them at face value because that's all that was intended.

Re:Surprised?

[RespekMyAthorati]

Jar Jar existed from the time of the first movies, he was definitely in the first comics.

Can you provide a reference, please?

Re:Surprised?

[lucien86]

Not an exact one. It was in the Star Wars comic which ran for quite a few years. I think I can pin it down as being before about 1984, but it was a long time ago...

Don't worry

[Anonymous Coward]

so am I.

What a coincidence!

[93 Escort Wagon]

I'm done with Star Wars too!

Re:What a coincidence!

[Anonymous Coward]

He's a terrible director...thank god he's not working on the new star wars.

Re:What a coincidence!

[reboot246]

It's just a shame Lucas wasn't done with Star Wars decades ago.

Re:What a coincidence!

[Dracos]

He's also a terrible writer and worldbuilder. The only reason Star Wars endures is because of the merchandising.

Re:What a coincidence!

[cfalcon]

Star Wars endures because it's awesome. Star Wars merchandising endures because it's profitable.

Re:What a coincidence!

[BarbaraHudson]

He's also a terrible writer and worldbuilder. The only reason Star Wars endures is because of the merchandising.

Too bad it didn't work for SpaceBalls 2: The Search For More Money :-(

Re:What a coincidence!

[MacTO]

I wholeheartedly agree.

My first exposure to Star Wars came when I was 20 years old, when a coworker was shocked that I never saw it and lent me his tapes. When I told him what I thought of it, he conceded that it wasn't a very deep story and that you probably had to watch it as a kid to like it.

But my favourite assessment was by Robert Sawyer who noted, among other things, that the good guys weren't very good. (Better than the empire, to be sure. But that's not a very high level to aspire to.)

Re:What a coincidence!

[MightyMartian]

Lucas is at writing stories, but he's a shitty screenwriter.

Re:What a coincidence!

[Fire_Wraith]

Ironically, merchandise was the one thing that Lucas told Mel Brooks was off-limits, because the toys would be too similar.

Re:What a coincidence!

[Nemyst]

So that's why we never had the Spaceballs flamethrower? :(

Re:What a coincidence!

[DutchUncle]

Star Wars endures because of the nostalgia of the generation that saw the original versions when they were released (like me), which has aged into becoming the generation running various toy and merchandising companies. I truly feel sorry for people whose introduction to Star Wars was the hacked videos and the messy "prequels", because they did not experience the crowds leaping to their feet and CHEERING when the Millennium Falcon returns to the Death Star. (Is it still a spoiler if it's 40 years old? I say not.) (OTOH I find the recent discussion that Jar-Jar was supposed to be the secret Sith master, much as Yoda played the fool on first introduction, . . . . disturbing.)

Re:What a coincidence!

[HornWumpus]

'American Graffiti' was good. But sense then, it's all sucked.

Lucas not having control to do what he wanted

[pauljlucas]

If Lucas is complaining about not having control, then why did he sell Star Wars to Disney? (No, I'm not related to George, to my knowledge.)

Re:Lucas not having control to do what he wanted

[NotQuiteReal]

Because you can't have your $4 Billion dollar cake, and eat it too?

Re:Lucas not having control to do what he wanted

[Garybaldy]

He did not really sell it so much as he sold it to the company his wife ran.

Re:Lucas not having control to do what he wanted

[Anonymous Coward]

His car had 160K miles on it, and they just declined his Amex card at the restaurant?

Re:Lucas not having control to do what he wanted

[squiggleslash]

He's not complaining, he's observing and making decisions based upon those observations. All he's said above is that he observed he'd muck things up if he continued to try to be involved given he no longer has creative control, so he stepped back.

Which is entirely reasonable.

Re:Lucas not having control to do what he wanted

[Billly Gates]

Because you can't have your $4 Billion dollar cake, and eat it too?

Dude do you have any idea how rich Lucas is?

I had a friend from college who was a VP when a quote from Walt Disney came up in business management class "After a certain point. You come to work to do your passions. I have all the money in the world as it is .." Basically he told me the folks he knows work to piss on their other business owners to show who is top dog. They have all soo much money that a few million here or there won't make a difference.

Yes for you or I would jump and trip over anyone offering me freaking $4 billion dollars!! But, I have bills to pay. Jobs I go to that are not all that great but needed so I do not have to move in with my parents. I have a car with 130,000 miles on it and student loans and a retirement to worry about. So yeah, Mr. Lucas does not have these problems.

If he wanted he could go live like Mr. McAffee on a tropical beach with hookers, parties, and drugs, with his own jet to go and do whatever he wants when he wants before this deal with Disney. Money is not something on his mind unless his goal was to have another pissing ego contest on someone else so he can grin on how rich and successful he is.

Just a perspective us peasants never really consider. Perhaps we too can make something of ourselves with a startup someday? But anyway he already has cashed out as wealthy back in the late 1970s. ... of course the flipside is poverty. I type this and am middle class. Imagine working 3 jobs and wondering how you are going to eat or keep the lights on? That too is not a concern for Lucas. Perhaps he should not have sold it? I wonder what his intentions were or did a divorce made him do this?

Re:Lucas not having control to do what he wanted

[rholtzjr]

Because he wanted to lower the cost of the film, so Disney says we can do that but Harrison Ford and Carrie Fisher have to train their H1B replacements. Not sure how well that went over though.
I am also done with the Star Wars franchise as well since they were bought by Disney.

Re:Lucas not having control to do what he wanted

[Billly Gates]

You could say that about a lot of people. Still most of them will go for "more money whatever the cost". That's their main point. Of course, it is no point at all. But there isn't really much more they could do at their level anyway.

Someone mentioned a rumor about a divorce settlement?

After 100k more money doesn't really help. At 250,000,000 you can buy mansions everywhere in the world, your own jet, a private chef to cook every meal, every luxury car imaginable, etc.

The bank account signs are for ego I guess. But really would you do a job you hate if you had that kind of cash? HELL NO! You work because you want too or do not work anymore like the actress who played Princess Leah. After Blues Brothers and Star Wars she decided work wasn't for her and she didn't have to do it anymore. She was set.

Oddly rich people are also depressed and lonely. After all their possible needs on Maslows Triangle are met they feel they have no purpose.

Re:Lucas not having control to do what he wanted

[Hognoxious]

"After a certain point. You come to work to do your passions. I have all the money in the world as it is .." Basically he told me the folks he knows work to piss on their other business owners to show who is top dog.

Sport analogy: if we made a touchdown 5 points and a field goal 2, most of the time whoever won before would still win now. It would affect everyone equally, right?

But that simply can't be so. Because everyone says that if we put their taxes up, they won't try so hard to make jobs for us!

Re:Lucas not having control to do what he wanted

[Anonymous Coward]

You're discussing economic "utility". To you there is no difference between $10M and $1B but in truth there is a huge difference in economic utility. What $1B can do $10M can not and that includes some really expensive passion projects.

I don't know about Lucas specifically but just because someone is "rich enough" for you doesn't mean they're "rich enough" for their goals.

All that said I think the real problem for Lucas was that once you're successful you no longer fully own the property that made you successful. You share co-ownership of it with various middlemen, investors, and worse yet the consumers (aka fans). I think Lucas largely feels trapped by that success and the knowledge that he can't do anything knew or weird with Star Wars because too many people are too emotionally invested or eating at the Star Wars trough to continue the co-ownership with him if he does. The good news for everyone else is he'll likely just mess it up in his desire to control it and make it new so him being done with it is a good thing for all those co-owners, including the die-hard fans.

Re:Lucas not having control to do what he wanted

[AK Marc]

I am also done with the Star Wars franchise as well since they were bought by Disney.

And done with Marvel Studios as well, since they were bought by Disney?

Re:Lucas not having control to do what he wanted

[zippthorne]

What's this father-son bullshit he's talking about? In 1-3, does even a single male character have a son? Do any of the kids have fathers?

Re:Lucas not having control to do what he wanted

[rholtzjr]

I guess so. Wow, I may have to choose a new genre to get involved with.
Anything Disney has to be forsaken just as they did to the IT department.

Re:Lucas not having control to do what he wanted

[phantomfive]

If he wanted he could go live like Mr. McAffee on a tropical beach with hookers, parties, and drugs, with his own jet to go and do whatever he wants when he wants before this deal with Disney.

I'm actually surprised more people don't do that, tbh

Re:Lucas not having control to do what he wanted

[Jason Levine]

And if the whole point of Star Wars is family, then why does Amidala die in Episode 3 for no other reason than "boo hoo, Anakin's crossed to the Dark Side"? She's a strong character up to that point but just decides not to live anymore. If Star Wars was about family, then she would have wanted to care for her new babies - or at least live long enough to make sure they were headed to decent homes. Instead, she just decides to die because that's what Lucas' script said for her to do.

Re:Lucas not having control to do what he wanted

[Anonymous Coward]

I suppose I'll post this as AC.

I realize that people think $250,000,000 is a lot. It is. It's a metric butt-ton of money. However, those of us who have managed to acquire that much wealth aren't all that wealthy comparatively speaking. We can not, realistically, buy a mansion everywhere and buy a jet. Jets are expensive. Maintaining a home is very expensive (but not as expensive as a jet). At that level, well, you're getting a huge tax bill - plan on about 1/3 of it (or more) in Federal or State taxes. This is usually paid in the quarter that the income was earned.

Then, say, you sold your business for 98,000,000 in cash and 120,000,000 in stock in the new parent company? You can't actually sell, trade, or touch those stocks (you could, in theory, take loans out against them) for six months or you'll end up in Federal prison. (It might be 60 days, actually.) You're probably not taxed on the full amount - if you're smart and have an accountant. With the above numbers, you're looking at somewhere $155,000,000 which is still a bunch of money but when you start buying things like a jet AND paying to keep that jet functional then you're looking at some serious expenditures.

Now, assuming you do the "right thing" and you reward all the people who helped you to get where you are and make a bunch of anonymous donations you're looking at somewhere around half of that money being kept aside. So, call it $80,000,000. You're now going to want some privacy and a house out in the middle of nowhere. Something like 10,000 acres in the NW part of Maine, with a nice house, and the amenities is going to cost you something along the lines of $20,000,000 assuming you are also setting aside for taxes for the next ten years.

Then you want a place in Florida, nothing special, and a place in Nevada - again nothing special. Plan on another $10,000,000. You want to set your kids, grandkids, etc up for life and pay off your ex-wife? Plan on another $20,000,000 - it could be more but you want the kids to have a trust that doesn't pay for everything so that they're still productive members of society and not just resting on their laurels. Throw in another $20,000,000 for friends and family.

You want to maintain your land and property after you leave? That's another $10,000,000 or so. Throw in seeding a trust that enables a few kids to go to a nice private school? That's another $10,000,000...

These are rather rough numbers but you get the idea? Point being, at the $250,000,000 level you still have to budget and don't get to go spend a metric ton of money on things like a jet. Well, you can if you want but it's really not prudent and is not a responsible thing to do. No, you charter a small plane when you want to fly. You do have a driver but you only hire one in a rented car when you're out on the town. You don't actually own a limo or anything but you might have a bunch of old cars and hire a mechanic on the weekends - you might even get your hands dirty and do some of the work yourself.

If you're smart, and lucky, and aren't lazy - you can actually put your money into a few risky investments and then make your assets equal what they were when you first were paid for your business. That takes some work and some dedication. They don't seem to teach this sort of thing in college or anything. I understand that they do have special coaches for this but I've also heard that they're a scam - mostly. People who win the lottery usually end up broke for a reason.

Really, though, you don't spend like that. What you do is you invest it - almost all of it, and then build up the other funds slowly on earnings from your investments. This keeps the money from being taxed as you're still keeping it in the investment pool and not spending it. Well, if it's taxed then it's at a lower rate. It depends on where you move it and *how* you move it. So, it's not quite as bad as I'm depicting above and you can certainly avoid a lot of that. That doesn't mean that you go spending on things like a jet, however. Sure, you can

Re:Lucas not having control to do what he wanted

[KGIII]

You know, the world is a bit more gray than that black and white statement you've made. For example, I know plenty of people who are "job creators." Personally, I own a portion of (non-controlling shares or "silent partner" ownerships) a number of businesses and, quite literally, create jobs. I guess, in most cases, I help people maintain the jobs they have but I've helped create more than my fair share of jobs in my day and still do. At one point, I even had a business that employed over 200 people.

Now, to the point, no! I'll speak for me and me alone. I can't and won't speak for others but I know a number who feel similarly. I don't mind taxes. In fact, I could stand to pay more in taxes - sometimes I don't even write off donations which means I'm paying more in taxes than I am obligated to pay. What I do mind is that my taxes are spent poorly! I still employ three staff members directly as well as an accountant, a lawyer, and a personal finance manager. I pay a higher sum total but a lower percentage overall than they do. And it's not because I pay them poorly - it's because that's where the tax rates are.

See, almost all of my income is derived from "capital gains." Now, they tax me at the rate they do (about 15% overall, I guess) not because they like me - but because they want to encourage me to keep my money invested. I quite agree - it's nice to keep it invested. I honestly had no idea that it was this lucrative. There's something to be said about municipal bonds! At any rate, I don't actually even get taxed until I *spend* the money (pretty much). So long as the money remains in the market then, as near as I can tell, err...

Hmm... I'm not actually sure what rules apply? I don't think I get taxed until it's spent. I'm pretty sure that if I move some funds earned into the market then that too isn't taxed - so long as it's in a fairly reasonable period of time. If I move it into the credit union account then I'm taxed on it but I don't really pay any taxes other than that (on income).

It's a little embarrassing, now that I think about it, but I have to admit that I don't know all the specifics but, in my defense, that's kind of my point. I don't worry about taxes - at all. Well, I worry that they're paid on time and to the exact amount (or greater) owed. I'm not even very good at keeping receipts or anything. Sure, I pay a pretty big number but it's not that big, comparatively speaking.

My taxes could go up, a reasonable amount, and it would not even begin to be noticed by me. It would not stop me from investing until it reached the point where it was less costly to simply live elsewhere or to not invest at all, that's quite a ways away from where it's at. I've said before, and I repeat, go ahead and raise my taxes and lower the tax burden of the low and middle class brackets. The upper-middle class kind of gets screwed, from what I've read. They can deal with it.

However, if you want me to pay more in taxes then I ask that you spend it wisely. I have a social contract to uphold but so don't you. I'm willing, able, and doing so. I am willing and able to do more but, again, I ask simply that you spend it wisely. Do you really need a giant military? Do you really need as much waste as you do have? Do we really need to be giving tax breaks to the wealthy? Do we really need to incarcerate so many people? If you want more of my money then how about you use it to feed the hungry and treat the ill? Is that too much to ask?

Re:Lucas not having control to do what he wanted

[kilfarsnar]

I think I know how you made all that money: You get paid by the word!

Re:Lucas not having control to do what he wanted

[kilfarsnar]

Because everyone says that if we put their taxes up, they won't try so hard to make jobs for us! It turns out that regardless of how much someone has you don't have a right to take their money - even if 51% vote to do so.

Sure we do. We do it all the time.

Re:Lucas not having control to do what he wanted

[camazotz]

That is all quite cogent and true, but please remember, most people would love to have those money management problems. Not the typical problems salaries under $100K tend to have, like running short on rent, being unable to afford basic utilities, constant medical or school debt that will haunt you for decades, and the never-ending risk that one major health issue or bad accident will put you in poverty and reduce your quality of life from a square meal to ramen, or worse, hand-outs. I feel your pain, and wish I had it; the stress of money management with a $250 million fortune is something I would gladly take in place of worrying daily about the perpetual risk of losing it all due to one bad week.

Re:Lucas not having control to do what he wanted

[WhatHump]

Holy shit! How much blow did you snort before you wrote that post. I kept hearing Leo DeCaprio's voice when I read it, as if it were the voice-over from Wolf of Wall Street.

Re:Lucas not having control to do what he wanted

[lucien86]

Lucas probably wanted to have another shit on the fans.

Re:Lucas not having control to do what he wanted

[lucien86]

Economically I crashed and burned. I would be technically classed as underclass - I am technically on a medical government benefit, about two or three tiers from the very bottom of the pile. That doesn't stop me understanding science or business, or wanting to fund and get my projects off the ground, it just makes it a little harder..
For the main project I am working on $10 to 20 million is the full start-up costs for the development part of the thing and to reach proof of concept. To go from there to full production is probably at least $1 billion.
Some other projects I would like to work on could eat a $ billion or $ ten billion or more very easily. .

Re:Lucas not having control to do what he wanted

[Shortguy881]

Im not sure you know what a dollar is.

Then you want a place in Florida, nothing special, and a place in Nevada - again nothing special. Plan on another $10,000,000

A five million dollar home in Florida or Colorado is going to be special. Nothing too special would be in the $250,000-$500,000 range and it would still be a pretty nice place.

So now?

[burtosis]

We may have a re-re-release where Han shoots first? I'm not sure where they will take it but I dare them to make a character worse than jar jar.

Re:So now?

[cfalcon]

Had doesn't shoot first.

Han shoots.

Greed doesn't shoot at all.

Because he's dead.

Because that's what happens when Han Fucking Solo shoots you.

Re:So now?

[Trogre]

You're looking for Star Wars: Revisited.

Chewie also gets a medal.

Re:So now?

[martinfb]

That's Mr. JarJar to you, buddy! Bang! Bang!

Re:So now?

[martinfb]

(My blaster is down, so I used my glock!)

Jar Jar Binks

[rbrandis]

He lost all credibility with Jar Jar Binks

Re:Jar Jar Binks

[Anonymous Coward]

If only this were true...

https://www.reddit.com/comments/3qvj6w
https://www.reddit.com/r/DarthJarJar/comments/3rntpj/theory_support_megathread/

That would have been the best twist ever. Alas we just have a meandering annoying character.

Re:Jar Jar Binks

[Z00L00K]

No, that's not the problem. The problem was the re-edits of the old movies where things like the sarlacc was changed for no useful reason, the original Darth Vader actor was edited out and Hayden Christensen was edited in instead of finding a Darth Vader actor that did resemble the original Darth Vader actor in the death scene in Return of the Jedi. (Anakin in first episode was not a problem) But the transition from a kid with rounded features to the thin Hayden and then to the more rounded features of the face that Darth Vader had in the death scene annoys me more.

Smaller changes that aren't obvious to the watcher - they don't make things worse or better, at least when it comes to background items or pure graphical enhancements of stuff that weren't good in the original movies due to the fact that special effects weren't good at that time.

You may be annoyed with Jar Jar Binks, but in the first movie C3PO was an annoyance. But his character actually got better over time. Initially the way Yoda talked was also an annoyance. So forget about Jar Jar and figure out that there are worse problems.

What's possible to be more annoyed about is the story incoherences between the original movies (Episode 4 to 6) and the newer movies (Episode 1 to 3) where some things went on in a way didn't make sense to someone that had seen the original movies. Luke was a teenager and considered to be "too old", Anakin was a lot younger and still considered to be "too old".

Re:Jar Jar Binks

[phantomfive]

Because C3PO was so amazing?

Re:Jar Jar Binks

[oakgrove]

You know, the more I read discussion of the changes to the first three movies, the more I'm glad I just watched them at the time and left it at that.

Re:Jar Jar Binks

[M8e]

He was fabulous!

Re:Jar Jar Binks

[SvnLyrBrto]

I actually quite likes a fair bit of the re-done & enhanced effects in the Special Editions. Where they went wrong, IMO, is where they changed plot or characterization (Greedo shooting first.), added scenes that just didn't make sense (Palpatine's not dead a whole day, and his statues are already being torn down on Coruscant? How did the news get there so fast? What happened to the empire's military and police forces? Did they all just decide to take the day off?), and where they were obviously half-baked (Jabba the Hutt inserted into Ep.4).

Inserting Hayden Christensen into the ghost scene at the end wasn't offensive so much for the replacement of the original actor; but because Hayden Christensen is just so bloody awful I didn't want to be reminded of his casting. And I think that's a big part of why the prequels were bad too. Sure Jar-Jar was annoying. But he was really a non-essential bit of (bad) comic relief... easily ignored. Midichlorians were dumb fake science, but no more than timing the Kessel run in units of distance. No, the main thing that made the prequels so terrible was casting two of the most obnoxious, annoying, incompetently-acting, prats to play the most important character of the trilogy. Hell, Christensen was so terrible that even sharing the screen with Natalie Portman couldn't make him anything better than craptastic. And the less said of that other one, the better.

Also, if Lucas ever tries to write a romance subplot again, someone should break his fingers.

Re:Jar Jar Binks

[Nidi62]

He lost all credibility with Jar Jar Binks

You know, in the CNN article I read about this, Lucas said the character he most identified with and would want to be was Jar Jar. Seriously.(look at the final few lines of the article)

Re:Jar Jar Binks

[captjc]

There is still a belief that Kylo Ren may be Jar-Jar. Just look at the mask. Only time will tell.

"No one cared who me-sa was until me-sa put on da bombad mask"

Re:Jar Jar Binks

[yoshi_mon]

I agree. Jar Jar was bad but not the real problem. The whole midichlorians, the way Qui-Gon Jinn acts, and of course all the nonsense with messing with the previous episodes is what the issue is.

Re:Jar Jar Binks

[RobinH]

Natalie Portman is an award winning actor and quite good in other movies. Hayden Christensen might be terrible, but you can't come to that conclusion solely on his performance in episodes 2 and 3 because clearly even a really good actor couldn't act well in that situation. The blame has to fall on Lucas. He thought he was inventing a new form of film-making where he could fix everything in post production so he didn't push for good performances. He was wrong.

Re:Jar Jar Binks

[Gr8Apes]

Hayden Christensen might be terrible,

Compared to Vin Diesel in Fast and Furious, board, meet plank....

Re:Jar Jar Binks

[Trogre]

Natalie Portman is an award winning actor and quite good in other movies. Hayden Christensen might be terrible, but you can't come to that conclusion solely on his performance in episodes 2 and 3 because clearly even a really good actor couldn't act well in that situation. The blame has to fall on Lucas. He thought he was inventing a new form of film-making where he could fix everything in post production so he didn't push for good performances. He was wrong.

Nailed it. You should get a +5, Insightful for that.

Re:Jar Jar Binks

[NormalVisual]

Natalie Portman is an award winning actor and quite good in other movies.

The parent poster wasn't saying she was bad, and was pointing out that even she couldn't save Hayden's performance. The other obnoxious, annoying, incompetently-acting individual he was talking about was Jake Lloyd. Part of my disappointment was due to Christensen's performance, but a lot of it was due to the awful script and having to deal with Lucas's idea that Darth Vader was a whiny little bitch most of the time.

As for my part, I felt it was quite disrespectful to Sebastian Shaw's memory and career that he was replaced in the ending scene for no good reason. It doesn't make sense either - Obi-Wan's ghost was still old, as was Yoda's, so why is Anakin magically returned to his 20-something self when no one else is? And if you're going to replace Shaw with Christensen, why not also replace Alec Guinness with Ewan McGregor?

Re:Jar Jar Binks

[MightyMartian]

Don't blame Portman for Lucas's awful dialog.

By the same token, Christensen just sucks. At least Portman and McGregor did their best with a really awful script, but Christensen was awful; wooden most of the time, delivering his lines like a Speak-and-Spell, and then finding the magic way to be wooden AND over-emotive in other scenes. It's little wonder he's done so little work since the Prequels. He's just unbearable.

Re:Jar Jar Binks

[thejynxed]

I think I can answer that - when a Jedi (or Sith) becomes a Force Ghost, they take the form they were when actually at the peak of their raw power in, and connection to, the Force.

For Annakin, this means before he became Vader, because he lost a significant amount of his power once he had to be maintained within the life support suit.

Re:Jar Jar Binks

[Jack Griffin]

I'm still waiting for a remake of Corvette Summer with Christensen as lead...

Re:Jar Jar Binks

[captjc]

I agree, the problem wasn't so much Hayden as it was Lucas' poor writing and lack of direction. The fact that the sets were just giant blue screens didn't help. In the prequels, Ewan McGreggor, Liam Neeson, Natalie Portman, and Samuel L Muthafucking Jackson are all giving lackluster performances. If Sam Jackson comes off as wooden, what chance does a novice like Hayden Christensen stand?

I really don't care for the guy, and I couldn't stand the character of Anakin but I think he just gets too much of the blame for the prequels.

Re:Jar Jar Binks

[dbIII]

But the transition from a kid with rounded features to the thin Hayden and then to the more rounded features of the face that Darth Vader had in the death scene annoys me more.

Fair enough, just like in B5 where the Centari Ambassador's aide went from a fat guy to a thin guy. Oh wait, that was the same actor and reality made the change! Still, continuity issues like that are annoying without a story reason.

Re:Jar Jar Binks

[dbIII]

In my case it's making me happy that I never saw the third one and didn't bother rewatching the first two. They had Brian Blessed on the payroll and instead jar-jar is filling the air with noise.

Re:Jar Jar Binks

[Z00L00K]

Vir Cotto - well, he transited quite a bit, but that character developed quite nicely. When you look at Anakin - you can't remold the shape of a face that much unless you have a severe accident.

Re:Jar Jar Binks

[dbIII]

you can't remold the shape of a face that much unless you have a severe accident.

Hence the missing bridge for continuity :)
Oddly enough that was the excuse in the recent movie "Predestination" for a character having a face that his own mother wouldn't recognise.

Since Vader ends up being mashed up and on life support anyway that sort of excuse could have worked with the multiple changes if some effort had been put into plot and writing. I never made it past movie two of the prequels due to a long list of annoyances of which ripping off Snarf from Elmore without credit to do the very annoying Jar-Jar was just a minor one. So many big names just turning up to do roll call because they couldn't be given a chance to upstage a cartoon stereotype that could have escaped from "song of the south". The problem isn't really Jar-Jar, the problem is nothing was supposed to be better than it.

Re:Jar Jar Binks

[SvnLyrBrto]

My point wasn't that Natalie Portman is a bad actress. I think she's quite good as well. My point is that Christensen is just so bad, that he dragged her down into the depths of sucktitude with him.

And as for Christensen starting with bad material in the first place, I'll point out that Alec Guinness, Harrison Ford, Peter Cushing, Kenny Baker, James Earl Jones, Ewan McGregor, Peter Mayhew, Liam Neeson, Frank Oz, and even Billy Dee Williams, all suffered under the yoke of George Lucas' film-making "talents". And they all turned in much better performances across the board than Hayden Christensen. It takes a pretty damn bad actor that a voiceover, a walking fur suit, a metal can, and a muppet are all more believable and likable in their roles.

Re:Jar Jar Binks

[painandgreed]

... but Christensen was awful; wooden most of the time, delivering his lines like a Speak-and-Spell, and then finding the magic way to be wooden AND over-emotive in other scenes. It's little wonder he's done so little work since the Prequels. He's just unbearable.

Yes, but he does an excellent job of sounding just like an awkward teenager that just found out he has knocked up his girlfriend.

Good news

[Hognoxious]

Good news, but several parsecs too late.

Re:Good news

[wwalker]

A parsec is a measure of distance, not time. Yes, I'm a metric nazi. :)

Re:Good news

[khelms]

It would appear you didn't get the Star Wars pun.

Re:Good news

[styrotech]

Heh, that reminded me of some other 70s 'sci fi' usage of units:

http://galacticafanfic.com/ima...

Why?

[khasim]

Lucas says he was going to tell a story about the grandchildren of figures from the original trilogy.

WHY?!?

It's a GALAXY. Isn't there anyone with a story to tell that is NOT related to a handful of characters from the original movie?

The Adventures of Han Solo the third!

Re:Why?

[NotQuiteReal]

Turns out "the force" is really the embodiment of solipsism.

Re:Why?

[sanf780]

One thing I read is that there are spin-off movies planned. According to Wikipedia, you get "Rogue One" between episodes 7 and 8. It is up in the air if these money grabs, I mean spin-off movies, are going to be better or worse than the Holiday Special.

Re:Why?

[Beck_Neard]

This always seemed kind of weird to me too. This is a story that supposedly takes place on a Grand Galactic Scale, with millions of planets, trillions of sentient beings, wars thousands of light years across, and then something like five main characters determine the fate of everyone and everything.

And R2D2 always seems to find himself everywhere there is action.

Re:Why?

[wonkey_monkey]

The Force did it.

Whenever you notice something like that, the Force did it.

Re:Why?

[bloodhawk]

It's a made up story. Isn't there any other universe that one could tell a story in? The only advantage of doing more stories in the Star Wars universe is if there is a connection to the earlier characters.

bullshit, Star Wars has a huge array of species, lore, factions, organisations etc that make it a piece of cake to completely disregard ANY link to the orginal characters, hanging onto the original characters is just a way to play it safe and appeal to their popularity.

Re:Why?

[Beck_Neard]

Love your sig

Re:Why?

[BarbaraHudson]

This always seemed kind of weird to me too. This is a story that supposedly takes place on a Grand Galactic Scale, with millions of planets, trillions of sentient beings, wars thousands of light years across, and then something like five main characters determine the fate of everyone and everything.

And R2D2 always seems to find himself everywhere there is action.

Just look at our own history - Hitler - one guy out of billions who determined the fate of the world.

Re:Why?

[ChrisMaple]

Doesn't that violate the Geneva Convention?

Re:Why?

[Beck_Neard]

We're talking about GALACTIC scale here. You'd need a million Hitlers to have an impact that would even register on a scale like that

Re:Why?

[magarity]

But it took several million Allied soldiers to get rid of him. This is why there are an awful lot of WW2 movies all with different characters.

Re:Why?

[dbIII]

Because it worked so well in Dune.
Yes it's sarcasm.

Re:Why?

[0xdeaddead]

same reason why it's always a death star. iv was about the death star, v was being pissed off about the broken death star, vi was about a new death star. And look at the poster, vii? A new death star.

In a GALAXY there is only like 5 people, and an obsession with moon sized space ships that get blown up at the drop of a hat.

Re:Why?

[0xdeaddead]

bullshit, there are only 5 people, and always a death star.

Re:Why?

[0xdeaddead]

This is a story that needs telling!

Dreams of a green empire, the Ruby Rhod story.

Re:Why?

[BarbaraHudson]

We're talking about GALACTIC scale here. You'd need a million Hitlers to have an impact that would even register on a scale like that

I guess you never read the Foundation trilogy.

Re:Why?

[Beck_Neard]

Let's put it this way. In the scale of the Galaxy, someone like Hitler would have just been one local warlord out of millions, barely significant to anyone not living on that particular planet, and soon forgotten. In the Foundation, Hari Seldon and the Mule are able to influence the course of history through what is essentially magic (psychohistory is not a real thing, and the Mule was telepathic). With sufficient magic you can of course have an impact on any scale you want. Star Wars has the Force. You need magic to make a story like that believable.

Re:Why?

[Perky_Goth]

I thought Dune was a story of a single man and his multiple clones.

"For the fans"? Really?

[Opportunist]

Last I checked Disney started putting light sabers into the hands and paws of their cartoon characters, bastardizing the whole crap. I sure as fuck don't want Lilo and Stitch running about spouting Jedi wisdom.

But I'm probably not the right kind of fan they're looking for. For example I'm not the kind that buys any and all merchandising rubbish they will near certainly crank out.

Re:"For the fans"? Really?

[Opportunist]

Yes, Lord Mouse.

Re:"For the fans"? Really?

[burtosis]

Star Wars the flame thrower!

Re:"For the fans"? Really?

[MightyMartian]

Meesa so happy Mickey Mouse will be here with me, and Ani! Meesa hopes the Muppets come too!

Re:"For the fans"? Really?

[Wycliffe]

Last I checked Disney started putting light sabers into the hands and paws of their cartoon characters, bastardizing the whole crap. I sure as fuck don't want Lilo and Stitch running about spouting Jedi wisdom.

But I'm probably not the right kind of fan they're looking for. For example I'm not the kind that buys any and all merchandising rubbish they will near certainly crank out.

Exactly, you might go watch the movie and/or buy the dvd and then you are done. A family with kids will watch the movie, buy the dvd, buy a half dozen Disney Infinity characters, halloween costumes, toy lightsabers, themed lego sets, themed candy, etc... not to mention travel to Disney World, etc... The fans that Disney care about are the ones that they can get several hundred plus dollars from over the course of several years.

Re:"For the fans"? Really?

[Opportunist]

I have a bad feeling about this.

Re:"For the fans"? Really?

[DogDude]

Last I checked Disney started putting light sabers into the hands and paws of their cartoon characters,

They did it BEFORE Jar Jar? How'd they do that?

Re:"For the fans"? Really?

[serviscope_minor]

Meesa hopes the Muppets come too!

You mean like all of Jabba's musicians and that small furry critter he has?

Re:"For the fans"? Really?

[mu51c10rd]

Hey now...the Cantina theme song is one of the best sound tracks from Star Wars.

Re:The real reason

[Anrego]

Watching old interviews of Lucas is kinda depressing. The guy does have a talent. Maybe he's like Tarantino and needs people holding the leash and a limited budget for it to really work, but I do think a lot of the original trilogy was him. It's sad to see a guy go from being revered to being almost universally mocked.

"A special effect without a story is a pretty boring thing."

He once said that! How does a guy go from that to a mind numbing scene that's basically 2 characters smashing light-sabers together on a CGI backdrop for like 20 minutes.

Best when Lucas' role is limited ...

[perpenso]

Star Wars works best when Lucas' role is limited. For example he wrote the story for the Empire Strikes Back but others wrote the screen play and directed the film. For the original Star Wars movie (ep 4) the studio had more control while he wrote and directed. The Phantom Menace being an example of an unrestrained Lucas, well that and the awful reworking of the original trilogy. If those reworks represent the vision that was always in his head then than goodness technology and budget had restrained him. Maybe we are at the point where Lucas has told enough of the "story" for this universe via film, animation, literature and games and we can just say thank you and move on.

Re:Best when Lucas' role is limited ...

[Billly Gates]

If what he said was true and this is an action movie with no drama or character development I will sorely be pissed. Episode 3 was ok but could have been written better.

I do not want CGI and freaking special effects and stuff blowing up! If Lucas says there is no drama or character development and a story then what you thought was bad about Phantom Menace will be much better than what is about to come up.

Re:Best when Lucas' role is limited ...

[perpenso]

I don't think he said it lacks drama and character development, I think he said it lacks the drama and character development he proposed. And his work is not know for a lack of high speed chases and things blowing up either.

Re:Best when Lucas' role is limited ...

[oh_my_080980980]

Wait...there was character development in Phantom Menace? What movie did you watch....

Maybe selectively merge original and reworks

[perpenso]

If we only could get a HD release of the original theatrical releases of the first ones (S.W., the Empre Strikes back and just to complete it Return)

My opinion changes. At times I would love the originals. At other times I would like a careful merging of the originals and Lucas' reworks. The CGI for the space scenes may a nice modernization. No plot changes though, Han shoots first, no infantile CGI additions like turning the corner during a chase and finding 50 additional unexpected stormtroopers rather than a few more unexpected, etc.

Such selective merging works with the general theme that Lucas can come up with some good ideas but he needs adult supervision to prevent him from taking something too far.

Re:The real reason

[MightyMartian]

The last few Tarantino films have been pretty big budget, so I think whatever Tarantino wants, Tarantino gets. Despite the apparent excesses of Tarantino's films, you can tell they're very tightly plotted, edited to near perfection, and most importantly, Tarantino has a gift for a dialogue that Lucas never had.

Lucas was a great filmmaker, and there was a time when the technology was at just the right level of development that he couldn't go hog wild. The real problem with the prequels, to my mind, were that he didn't in fact have nearly enough story for 360+ minutes of film. I swear you can edit all three prequels into a reasonably watchable 150-180 minute film. You could get rid of most of the Phantom Menace, and Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith could be married together by turfing most of the romance (which was just awful anyways).

And yeah, edit down the final battle between Obiwan and Anakin to about two minutes. We've known it was coming since 1977, so no need to overplay it.

Re:That's what Daniel Craig said

[MightyMartian]

The difference being George sold the store, and Disney doesn't want him around, whereas you can be sure a lot of dollars will be waved in front of Craig's face to do at least one more Bond film.

Re:Parse error: "on bittorrent"

[MightyMartian]

Yes, I downloaded it a while ago.

And a collective sigh of relief...

[blahbooboo]

And from us star wars fans let me say THANK YOU George.

He's not the only one who's done

[darthsilun]

I swore after Episodes I, II, and III that I'd never pay to see another one. And I'm sticking to my guns.

Re:He's not the only one who's done

[richman555]

I feel your pain. I have watched Ep. 1-3 and have tried to like them... its just impossible. That said, I am a big JJ Abrams fan and if anyone can do it, he can. Also Lawrence Kasdan assisted to create this story (co wrote Empire Strikes Back) so that gives it legitimacy.

Re:He's not the only one who's done

[Bing Tsher E]

I watched the movie in 1977 and haven't bothered with any of the sequels.

Re:He's not the only one who's done

[oh_my_080980980]

Sequels were good: Empire and Jedi. Prequels sucked balls.

Best part of the summary

[grimmjeeper]

Lucas came up with story treatments for a new trilogy, those materials, to put it bluntly, were discarded

This is absolutely the best thing that could have happened to Star Wars. While he did have good ideas back in the 70's, he's long since used up whatever talent he ever had. He single handedly turned his franchise into "mule fritters" with Episodes 1-3. There is no way for the franchise to go but up now that Lucas is no longer involved.

Good riddance. Don't let the door hit you on the way out.

Re:Best part of the summary

[quantaman]

Lucas came up with story treatments for a new trilogy, those materials, to put it bluntly, were discarded

This is absolutely the best thing that could have happened to Star Wars. While he did have good ideas back in the 70's, he's long since used up whatever talent he ever had. He single handedly turned his franchise into "mule fritters" with Episodes 1-3. There is no way for the franchise to go but up now that Lucas is no longer involved.

Good riddance. Don't let the door hit you on the way out.

I'm not sure it's so much that he lost the talent as he lost the perspective or relationship with the state of film that made the first trilogy so good.

Both the first and original trilogy involved a boy getting recruited into an order of what was essentially mystical monks.

Both had really goofy aliens in the main cast (Chewy and JarJar), both had influential family connections (Anikan's wife and mother and Luke's sister and father), and both really pushed the technological bounds of what was possible.

I think one of the main problems is that acting styles have changed. In the first trilogy Lucas got more emotion when ranges were subdued and got emotional connection, in the second trilogy he did the same when actors tend to overact and he got whiny melodrama.

The other big problem is in the 70's he was very limited to a few props, cheap costumes, and lines drawn on the film. So by necessity he ended up with a very stark aesthetic that gave the feel of a western and felt very physically present.

In the 2000's he could give people superpowers and create entire cities, instead of a fantastic turn on real life he ended up with a completely different world no one could relate to.

Put today's George Lucas back in the 70's with the same concept of a fantasy space opera and he might make the original Star Wars again, but take the George Lucas from the 70's and take him to 2000 and Star Wars IV-VI might look a lot more like I-III.

Re:Best part of the summary

[grimmjeeper]

The difference is that Star Wars started out as an action movie. Trek did not. Turning Trek into an action movie was a "questionable" move at best. Keeping Wars an action movie is staying with it's roots. Still, I'm hedging my expectations so as to not be completely disappointed.

Now he gets it

[wonkey_monkey]

All I would do is muck everything up.

Interesting avoidance of past tense, there.

Re:The story didn't advance

[grimmjeeper]

Read the Han Solo Adventures trilogy. All the holes with Han were filled 35 years ago.

Re:Midichlorians

[wonkey_monkey]

So anyone who actually subjectively enjoys it is...?

Re:The real reason

[roc97007]

Disney didn't want Lucas's stories because Lucas can't write well.

He came up with some good ideas (regardless of how much he borrowed from Kurosawa) but (a) he couldn't write dialog to save his life, and (b) success led to excess.

I was never a big Star Wars fan

[AndyKron]

I was never a big Star Wars fan. It was OK like Buck Rogers in the 25th Century was OK. I think 2001 a Space Odyssey is still the best.

Re:I was never a big Star Wars fan

[iggymanz]

that's ok, the second group of three movies was more like Duck Dodgers in the 24th Century

Re:I was never a big Star Wars fan

[BarbaraHudson]

I was never a big Star Wars fan. It was OK like Buck Rogers in the 25th Century was OK. I think 2001 a Space Odyssey is still the best.

2001: A Space Odyssey would have been far better if someone were to cut everything until the scene in the lunar pit where they discover the monolith, and everything after disconnecting the HAL 9000. Sometimes, less is more.

Re:I was never a big Star Wars fan

[GuB-42]

2001 is different, it is science fiction and it depicts a semi-plausible future.
Star Wars is a space opera. It is closer to high fantasy, in space. It happens "a long time ago in a galaxy far far away", scientific accuracy isn't even considered, and there is even magic (ok, "the force").

Re:I was never a big Star Wars fan

[0xdeaddead]

amen to that! I mean I 'get' the overreaching part, but damn, real deceptions of space are BORING AS HELL, and listening to some guy breahe while displays flash and a machine that goes 'ping' pings away is... lame.

that and add in some explosions, and a high tension sound track not lullabies.

Re:I was never a big Star Wars fan

[gsslay]

I'm with you on this. Star Wars was always just cowboys in space, making it up as they went along. The fact that its creator felt compelled to keep going back to previous films to try and make it into something deeper and cohesive, and increasingly just made it more of a mess, demonstrated this.

The films are (mostly) fun, but nothing to get over excited about. I'm sure the new one will be fun too, but I'm not expecting it to turn the general train wreck of a plot around.

Re:I was never a big Star Wars fan

[BarbaraHudson]

I was never a big Star Wars fan. It was OK like Buck Rogers in the 25th Century was OK. I think 2001 a Space Odyssey is still the best.

2001: A Space Odyssey would have been far better if someone were to cut everything until the scene in the lunar pit where they discover the monolith, and everything after disconnecting the HAL 9000. Sometimes, less is more.

Yes, but then it wouldn't be an Oddesey, would it.

If they made sequels that eschewed the boring pretentious artsy-fartsy stuff, sure it could be an odyssey A journey across the solar system and eventually into deep space

Re:I was never a big Star Wars fan

[BarbaraHudson]

That's because 2001 is a theme-driven film, not a plot- or character-driven one.

Evidently you're supposed to be thinking about the Meaning of the story during those long boring stretches. Not having studied classics, I didn't have much to go on in that respect. It was only years later that I gained any appreciation of what Kubrick was trying to do.

At its core it's a religious film about man's evolution. Take out the beginning and ending, and the film has nothing to say.

Star Wars, OTOH, is a fairy tale Western built on archetypes. It's not complex but it is emotionally affecting.

Take out the beginning and the end, and you could have had a film that had plot, character, and theme, HAL9000, for example - a computer that went insane because he had to lie. Can HAL go insane if he's not alive? Or the morality of disconnecting him completely - was it "killing"? Both of these questions touch on the greater question of "what does it mean to be alive?" That is one question that is of far greater meaning compared to a "religious film about man's evolution."

Re:I was never a big Star Wars fan

[BarbaraHudson]

That doesn't explain why the HAL9000 on board the spacecraft deviated from the HAL9000 on the ground. The HAL9000 on board was given two contradictory orders - be be one of the crew, and lie to to his crewmates. His reaction was quite human - he went nuts. Since he was incapable of telling the crew ahead of time, If the crew was no longer around, he'd have no reason to lie to them. Crazy logic, but in retrospect, the only solution that fit all the parameters of his orders.

Re:That's what Daniel Craig said

[roc97007]

George Lucas: "I'm Done With Star Wars"

That's what Daniel Craig said about Bond after 007 Spectre.

The difference is, with Lucas we hope it's true.

Re:The real reason

[Dunbal]

And Disney can only write the same story, over and over again.

Family Soap Opera

[richman555]

He lost me at "its a family soap opera"... just what every Star Wars fan wants to see.

Re:George Lucas is for crows.

[MightyMartian]

You are all Fry Guys. Fry Guys say "Hey Ronald! Hey Ronald! HEY RONAL!" You are all Fry Guys.

Re:The story didn't advance

[MightyMartian]

Hey, the Star Wars Christmas Special did have Wookie porn!

Re:The story didn't advance

[Isaac-Lew]

Those stories are no longer considered canon. See this link:

http://www.starwars.com/news/t...

This illustrated in this sketch

[maxbash]

https://youtu.be/B-I9d9MuSuY

Are you also a Whoosh Nazi?

[Brannon]

Whooooooooosh

A couple points

[debrain]

First, the best treatment of the prequels, and one of the most brilliant things I have ever seen period, is the Star Wars prequel reviews by Red Letter Media. They're here:

https://www.youtube.com/user/R...

I found something meaningful in those reviews, they just captured a sentiment for me â" and I totally recommend checking them out.

Second, maybe the title should be "Disney: George, you're done with Star Wars."? :)

Re:That's what Daniel Craig said

[skam240]

While Daniel Craig hasnt been as bad for James Bond as Lucas was for Star Wars I tell you as a good bit of a Bond fan since childhood that I cant wait to see him go as he's been one of the worst at playing Bond. Bond is supposed to be suave and charismatic while Craig's Bond has all the charisma of a rock. The new Bond movies are just Mission Impossible movies (or any other big Holiwood action brand) which is fine if you like that sort of thing (and i do sometimes) but they certainly dont watch like any of the movies before Craig.

George Lucas did not create Star Wars

[Dega704]

Contentious thing to say, but it's technically true. The only thing he deserves credit for are the initial story ideas. In the end, the original trilogy was the result of a lot of creative input from a lot of people; to his great displeasure. Some of its most iconic moments happened in spite of him rather then because of him. (Actual quote to him from Harrison Ford during filming: "You can type this shit but you can't say it.") He has made it excruciatingly clear that he hates the original trilogy and has always hated it because he didn't have total control over it; and thinks that the only thing that made everyone love it was HIS creative input. All of the praise and fame he earned as a result of it's success, which he literally bet against with Spielberg, led him to think "Wow, if everyone loved movies that only slightly showcased my vision, imagine how much they will love them when I DO have control over every aspect!" At this point he was rich, powerful, and surrounded by yes men who dared not question him. We all know what the results looked like. The only thing he as proven beyond a shadow of a doubt is that if Star Wars had turned out how he wanted, it would have been terrible. There would have been no sequels, no merchandising empire, no worldwide generation-defining cultural impact. Just another sub-par sci-fi flick from the 70s. The "creator" of Star Wars was also its biggest liability.

Re:George Lucas did not create Star Wars

[Wahakalaka]

Technically, the original story idea was "A Once and Future King." But yeah, I agree with you.

Re:George Lucas did not create Star Wars

[RyuuzakiTetsuya]

From a certain point of view.

The greatest liability of Star Wars from Lucas' point of view is the hypercritical fanbase.

The problem here is that the fans feel like they are entitled to having things their way and having it be what they want. If someone were to tell Lucas "no", would it automatically have been better or worse?

It's easy to come to the lazy come to "Lucas did it wrong and Lucas is a crappy hack." Maybe. But the sense of entitlement i get from the fans just stinks. It's as if they can't let go of their anger and their feelings are driving them to be destructive. :) They don't seem to understand that projecting their opinion as fact is just incorrect. It's factual that a lot of star wars fans hate 1-3 and the special editions of 4-6, but it's not factual that these are bad. That's an opinion.

Right now there's a generation of kids with fond memories of the original trilogy. Are they wrong factually? How do you prove that?

In the end it all comes down to taste and vision, and even though George Lucas might have questionable taste, he had a vision. It was ambitious. It might be rubbish, but there's a ton of cinema out there that has neither taste nor vision. Stuff that is so bland it makes plain tofu seem exciting.

Re:George Lucas did not create Star Wars

[Osgeld]

given the history of lucas before and after, he should be happy and proud of his 3 act 1 hit wonder and thank god for every blessing and opportunity it has given him

Re:George Lucas did not create Star Wars

[oh_my_080980980]

Good god get your head out of your ass. The prequels sucked because they were bad.

The crap George pulled was re-imaging, again and again and again the original movies to fit in-line with the prequels. NO ONE EVER DID THAT. People slammed him for that. Most notable South Park - where the creators mentioned they never wanted to do crappy cut-outs and now that they have super expensive CGI then can make the show they way they wanted. Lucas fucked up. He couldn't leave it alone.

Without the fans, Lucas is just another art school hack.

I can say the prequels don't exist and believe it.

[Snufu]

My memories of Star Wars are of standing in line as a seven-year-old during the original release in 1977.

I never got around to seeing the prequels and from what I hear that was good fortune. Now I can live in ignorant bliss that they never existed. I won't see the latest attempt to cash in on the original films either. Why taint a perfect childhood memory?

umm

[Ol Olsoc]

George Lucas - "I'm done with Star Wars!"

The World - "Great!"

Re:umm

[SomeoneFromBelgium]

Ummm. Is that a promise? Really? Honestly? Yes??? Great!!

Want proof that it is a good thing? He had some material for a prequel that would be (an I quote the master himself): "a family soap opera".
No wonder they put it in the trash can ASAP. Good riddance!!

Re:umm

[Ol Olsoc]

Want proof that it is a good thing? He had some material for a prequel that would be (an I quote the master himself): "a family soap opera".

There are some people, who once they have enjoyed a measure of success, start to believe that any idea that pops out of their head will be a success. Enter Jar Jar Binks

Not surprised at this.

[MtViewGuy]

I'm not surprised that Disney wanted to do something different with the Star Wars universe. After all, Disney saw the precedent of the many issues of the prequel trilogy and that's why in the new trilogy, Disney wants to get back the "feel" of the original trilogy. Indeed, I expect "The Force Awakens" to be essentially a self-contained movie, but with just enough plot points "open" to do the subsequent two sequels.

Oh, Good

[Greyfox]

Maybe I can have a shred of hope for the future of the franchise. Whenever Lucas dies, he should get a tombstone with an exquisitely carved scene from the Wookie Life Day Special.

Re:Oh, Good

[oh_my_080980980]

LMOL - yeah saw that....

For those bitching about the "Special Editions"

[cfalcon]

For those who are just bitching about the special editions, yes we get it. But the internet has you covered. Harmy has a "Despecialized Edition", that you'll obviously have to torrent. If you're concerned about legality, just be sure you own the most recent Blu-Rays- much is based on those, and if you have an edit of a product you own (the Blu-Ray), that's totally legal.

Anyway, here's a youtube where the despecialized edition is gone over at length:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

If you give any fucks about the original cut of the movie, this is what you want, full stop. And yes, Empire and Jedi have been done too.

Re:For those bitching about the "Special Editions"

[oh_my_080980980]

Really Potsy? That's not legal so you can fuck off. You do not have license to modify the movie. The simple fact is the original theatrical releases could be released on bluray but Lucas has prevented that because it "interferes with his vision." Hopefully Disney will release them because Disney likes money.

Re:For those bitching about the "Special Editions"

[pavon]

If you're concerned about legality, just be sure you own the most recent Blu-Rays- much is based on those, and if you have an edit of a product you own (the Blu-Ray), that's totally legal.

No it's not, unfortunately. The edited version is still a derivative work, and it is illegal without the permission of the copyright holder, even if you own the original. It is not considered fair use. People have tried that argument in court in the past, and lost.

Re:For those bitching about the "Special Editions"

[Areyoukiddingme]

Really Potsy? That's not legal so you can fuck off. You do not have license to modify the movie.

I don't need a license to modify the fucking movie. I need a license to modify and distribute the modification. It is legal for me to possess a movie and a modified copy of the same movie that I have not distributed. The person who performed the edit and distributed it did something currently illegal, but I am not doing anything illegal by having both.

Oddly enough, all we have to do is create a fully scriptable movie editor, and even the person creating the modified version would be doing something legal, as long as what he distributes is a script that will generate the modified version from the purchased media. He would, in fact, hold a copyright of his own to that script, completely independent of the movie copyright.

Do I have the legal right to tear pages out of a book I own? Yes I do. I have the identical right to rip scenes out of a movie I own.

Do I have the legal right to rip pages recommended by a friend out of a book I own? Yes I do. I have the identical right to rip scenes recommended by a friend out of a movie I own.

Re:For those bitching about the "Special Editions"

[Areyoukiddingme]

The edited version is still a derivative work, and it is illegal without the permission of the copyright holder, even if you own the original.

It is illegal to distribute. It is not illegal to create a derivative work in your own home. That's definitely fair use.

Something Positive

[richman555]

George, it is time to step away from Star Wars. You did a great job with the first 3 movies, the last 3 not so much. There is nothing wrong with a movie which the fans will enjoy. Since everyone seems to be negative about Episode 7... I think JJ Abrams will do a great job! What if... just what if he read the George Lucas stories and thought they were bad, really bad. This was probably the right thing to do and honestly... why did George think they would use his stories after selling the franchise off to Disney? Also, from what I know, Lawrence Kasdan was involved in this new story and as far as I am concerned the best movie was Empire Strikes Back. JJ Abrams is very much into storytelling, so for those thinking this will be a lifeless action movie are likely mistaken. Personally, I can't wait to see this film. I think its shaping up to be great!

Re:Something Positive

[Antique Geekmeister]

The Timothy Zahn books from the Star Wars universe have actually been quite good. They're gone further with the old characters, introduced fascinating new characters, and told much broader stories. I don't believe they're considered "Star Wars canon", but parts of them have certainly shown up in the games. The Thrawn trilogy, itself, included _wonderful_ exploration of other racess' personalities and how individuals are much more difficult to predict than large groups of their native races. It also explored why "clones" might be a limited or difficult resource to handle in a universe with "The Force".

Re:Mucked up.

[lord_mike]

Whatever they did with Star Trek, they certainly didn't do it to please Star Trek fans...

Re:The real reason

[Kiwikwi]

The last few Tarantino films have been pretty big budget, so I think whatever Tarantino wants, Tarantino gets.

I think GP's point was that the last few Tarantino films have also been pretty bad... like the last few Star Wars films. YMMV, obviously.

Too bad he wasn't done 20 years ago

[mrun4982]

If he was, we'd all have a prequel trilogy worth watching and we'd be enjoying the theatrical release of the original trilogy on BluRay.

Re:Too bad he wasn't done 20 years ago

[oh_my_080980980]

*sigh* sad but true. We can hope that Disney's money grubbing hands want to milk this franchise for what it's worth and will release the theatrical versions of the originals on bluray - they'd be passing up a goldmine if they didn't.

You and me both

[GoodNewsJimDotCom]

Between the three movies I pretend don't exist and Electronic Arts doing the video game side, I've seen nothing I liked since xwing vs tie fighter. I don't even plan on seeing the next movie unless I hear really good reviews from friends.

Re:That's what Daniel Craig said

[ChrisMaple]

Never Say Never Again.

Re:The real reason

[magarity]

I swear you can edit all three prequels into a reasonably watchable 150-180 minute film

Have you not seen the scenes that didn't make it? You could replace several nearly endless chase scenes with character development sequences and have a set of movies the same length but with characters who are interesting and well rounded.

He's done with the franchise?

[argStyopa]

"It's like millions of voices cried out, and were suddenly joyous"

Re:That's what Daniel Craig said

[roc97007]

While Daniel Craig hasnt been as bad for James Bond as Lucas was for Star Wars I tell you as a good bit of a Bond fan since childhood that I cant wait to see him go as he's been one of the worst at playing Bond. Bond is supposed to be suave and charismatic while Craig's Bond has all the charisma of a rock. The new Bond movies are just Mission Impossible movies (or any other big Holiwood action brand) which is fine if you like that sort of thing (and i do sometimes) but they certainly dont watch like any of the movies before Craig.

I understand what you're saying (Sean Connery is still everyone's favorite Bond) I'm not sure I agree. I guess I got so tired of the camp (Connery starting with Diamonds Are Forever, *all* of the Roger Moore Bonds, a short break from the silliness with Dalton and then baaaaack to campycampycamp with Brosnan) that the serious tone of Casino Royale (and other than the game changing to Texas Hold-whatever, not a complete travesty re: the book) that I was able to overlook Craig's ... ears. That's it really, isn't it?

It helps to remember that in the novels Bond is a stone killer. He occasionally does the right thing just because, but in general he can be pretty callous, at least up to the death of his wife. (Most people don't know the novels all follow a story arc, and specifically OHMSS-YOLT-TMWTGG is one complete story.) Craig fit that mindset pretty well, in my opinion.

I think the Craig movies did a good job of capturing the spirit of the novels without rehashing the story elements that had already been done (Casino being the obvious exception). I especially loved the call-backs to both the earlier films and the novels, even stories that had never been filmed. Did you catch the reference to The Hildebrand Rarity in Specter?

Re:Family Soap Opera

[0xdeaddead]

he is shilling for the new star wars, basically telling everyone that he has nothign to do with it, that they actively ignored him, and that they are doing things completely different.

Re:The story didn't advance

[grimmjeeper]

Well of course. There's tons of money to be made milking the franchise. But until they do a "Han, the early years" series, go read the books and have a temporary patch over the holes. Who knows. It may just stay there for a while.

Re:Star Trek is dead

[grimmjeeper]

Trek will never die. If this one fails, they'll reboot it again. And again. And again. And every time they do, the fans will line up to pay money to see it. I mean, it's not like they give a damn if they rewrite the entire story line. They've got unlimited possibilities to work with until they find something that keeps the fans in the seats.

Sing along with Jar Jar binks

[BeCre8iv]

Coming to a cinema near you.

Re:That's what Daniel Craig said

[goose-incarnated]

Bond is supposed to be suave and charismatic while Craig's Bond has all the charisma of a rock.

You never read any of the books, I presume? Ian Fleming's Bond was a real ass-kicker, not a suave and charismatic lounge lizard. Ironically, Craig's bond was the most faithful representation of Ian Fleming's Bond.

A true blessing

[SEE]

So, they decided to ignore the bullshit you imposed on the series halfway through? Thank goodness, that means we're getting back to the real Star Wars.

It's well-documented that you were just making it up as you went along in the original trilogy.

It wasn't until you made the prequels that you had this whole "generational soap opera" "vision" driving the thing, and the result was decidedly inferior. They're tossing away that "saga" nonsense you imposed post-hoc in favor of something that pleases the fans? That's perfect. That's the only way we're ever going to get anything actually true to the actual original vision of Star Wars.

It's the fans, stupid.

[Simulant]

The fans and the attempted catering to them ruin everything in the end.

Re:Parse error: "on bittorrent"

[Pseudonymous Powers]

Yes. Send me a self-addressed stamped envelope, and I'll mail you a copy. Or, for a slightly smaller fee, I'll telegraph you the script. Here's a sample:

dit dit dit dit dit-dah dah-dit dit-dit-dit dit-dit-dit-dit dah-dah-dah dah dit-dit-dah-dit dit-dit dit-dah-dit dit-dit-dit dah

("Filter error: Please use fewer 'junk' characters.")

All I would do is muck everything up.

[neo-mkrey]

Yes, like you did with the re-imagined special editions and the the prequels.

Disney was wise to keep you the hell away from the sequels.

Re:Lucas wasn't even going to make them

[oh_my_080980980]

He gave us: Phantom Menace, Clone Wars, and Revenge of the Sith - all craptacularly bad. Lucas has proven he can't write a script much less direct a movie. Producer is pretty good but he need to stay away and let other people do their work. That's why Empire was soo good.

Re:For the fans

[oh_my_080980980]

They have a new group of characters. This movie sets up the new cast. The old cast is there to start it off. Not sure if they come back for round two.

Re:Coren22 = "Run, Forrest: RUN!!!" #6/6

[Coren22]

It has been a long time since I have had someone so infatuated with me as this. Thanks for all the attention, but no, I won't be your boyfriend.

Re:A New Hope

[oh_my_080980980]

Actually Roddenberry wasn't the cause of the problems. There were a lot of meddling hands in the process and a lot of starts and stops to the project. The second one fared better because the decided to do a movie and settled on a proper plot.

Re:Coren22 = "Run, Forrest: RUN!!!" #6/6

[Coren22]

http://slashdot.org/comments.p...

APK caught not understanding basic logic, and constructions of grammar.

What a Coincidence!!!

[Lord Flipper]

Me too...

FTFY

[allquixotic]

"We are standing on the shoulders of Episodes IV through VI."

They missed a "V".

Re:The real reason

[rpstrong]

The last few Tarantino films have been pretty big budget, so I think whatever Tarantino wants, Tarantino gets. Despite the apparent excesses of Tarantino's films, you can tell they're very tightly plotted, edited to near perfection, and most importantly, Tarantino has a gift for a dialogue that Lucas never had.

I'm a big fan of Q's earlier films, but I'm not so impressed with his last few.

I really wish I'd seen Grindhouse in its original form. Instead, I saw Death Proof, which was padded out into a feature film - and I thought it showed. The tight plotting, pacing, and editing just weren't there. Instead, there was entirely too much of his trademark dialogue.

Inglourious Basterds had its moments, but was largely forgettable. And while Django Unchained was gorgeously shot, its story paled in comparison to one of its influences, Mandingo.

IMHO.

I'm hoping that Hateful Eight will be back on track. Meanwhile, I think that it's time to watch Jackie Brown again.

Re:That's what Daniel Craig said

[skam240]

Regardless of how Bond was in the books, Bond movies are just Hollywood cookie cutter action flicks without the sauve, charismatic bond we used to know from cinema in prior decades. And don't get me wrong, I sometimes like action flicks that fit the standard Hollywood mold and if I take myself out of the mindset that I'm watching a Bond movie I can even enjoy Casino Royale. All I'm getting at is that the Craig Bond doesnt bring anything to the table to make the movie any different then Mission Impossible or any other major action franchise. For that, I have no use for him as Bond.

Plus, Roger Moore wasnt all bad. Man with the Golden Gun was a great Bond movie.

Re:That's what Daniel Craig said

[roc97007]

Sorry, I'm not into camp. Shrug. Some people are.

Re:To answer your questions Coren22... apk

[Coren22]

Now who is libeling who? I did not post that. I was driving to a parent teacher conference at that time.

"No complaints from me, I like APK's spam. Reminds me to use a host file. Also, his stuff is free." - by aaaaaaargh! (1150173) on Tuesday November 17, 2015 @09:31AM (#50947415)

So, he claims your spam reminds him to use his hosts file (like he has a choice in the matter, it is part of the OS), but he doesn't even know you charge for your software?

Re: Coren22 = "Run, Forrest: RUN!!!" #6/6

[Coren22]

My goal is for Slashdot/Dice to figure out how APK is evading the AC limits and cut his ass off. The more shitposting he does, the more it highlights the issue. Though for some reason, he thinks this is me being a crybaby, though I don't know where he gets that idea.

I find it funny that he can post as much as 6 times as much as a registered user, but there hasn't been a ban hammer on him yet.

Re:That's what Daniel Craig said

[skam240]

I dont think we're using the same deffinition for camp