My money’s on Lucas cashing in his chips by drowning in an eight-foot Lucite cylinder of aerated Bactine ® in a misguided attempt to regenerate his lost youth.
Oh wait, that’s how I go out.
As for the movies, it’s hard to say how they’ll hold up.
For so many of us who viewed the original trilogy when we were in the neighborhood of ten years old, viewing them again as adults is a very different thing. That’s not to say that I agree 100% with this:
They are, really. An adult eye takes in so much more than a child’s – especially if the eye belongs to a film geek. Sure, Luke is far from the towering hero we wanted to emulate – because Lucas had Luke emulate us, and what made him such a sympathetic character for kids makes him pathetic to adults.
What makes the Star Wars movies so great is that they’re just a set of time-worn mythic archetypes with the barest coat of paint on 'em. They have huge appeal for kids, but I don’t think that makes viewing them when you’re a kid a prerequisite for valueing them as adults. Take The Wizard of Oz. (Heh, George did.) Even if you’re an adult the first time you saw it, you recognize that it’s something special – even with the technical flaws that a kid would never notice. Same deal with the Star Wars movies.
The difference between the originals and the prequels, for me, is that I go into the prequels viewing them the same way I now view the originals – digging the numerous references to silent era classics and two-reeler serials, all that.
Technically, the prequels are just as good, and possibly (heresy!) better than the originals, when it comes to the spectacle. Music, special effects, that kick-ass sound design that makes Star Wars for me – it’s all there in spades. Lightsabres? Great concept, only now fully realized. Compare the fight choreography with Obi-Wan, Qui-Gon, and Darth Maul to anything from the first three movies and tell me it’s inferior to anything that went before.
Anyway, I think that posterity will find the prequels on par with the originals, despite their numerous flaws. Whatever “par” is half a century from now – I’m guessing Star Wars will hold a special place in the hearts of future film geeks, but that the general population will mostly know them second-and-third hand – sort of how nearly everyone today has a passing familiarity with the delicious cliches of the various Philip Marlowe films, even though the people who have actually sat down and screened them all are an extreme minority. Those movies are part of our common cultural lexicon – so’s Star Wars.
In the end, it doesn’t matter if a class of films are completely consistent in their quality – it’s the subtle quality that makes them classic that sets them apart.