Seems Lucas didn't only screw up the prequels...

Cafe Society
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Just replying to a few points:

  1. As far as I remember, there’s nothing in the movie or books to suggest that about her title. In the movie, she says “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I am a member of the Imperial Senate on a diplomatic mission to Alderaan.” In the galactic sense, she’s a Senator, so by implication she’s a princess of Alderaan (or at least a princess of somewhere). It’s not nonsensical, either; she’s fulfilling a political role while also happening to be a member of a royal family.
  2. The choice of venue can greatly improve the quality of a movie by selecting something that has meaning and relevance. People who’ve seen the original trilogy have an attachment to Alderaan, even if it’s as simple as “Hey, I’ve heard that name before.” By coming up with a brand new planet, Lucas missed out on that attachment. It’s not a movie-killer in itself, but it’s a piece of evidence pointing to the lack of finesse and understanding of dramatic story structure people have come to dislike about Lucas.

That is the accepted canon, and I do think Miller’s idea falls down here. I rather like that the Republic was forced to use an unethical creation which Palpatine used to take over.

Nothing Is Original. I’m amazed I can’t quickly locate a relevant TVTropes page, but I’m sure it’s there somewhere. You can still have great, inventive works that use the plot framework from an earlier classic. The Lion King is an excellent Disney movie, but the plot is derived pretty clearly from Hamlet.

The original trilogy had romance, too, and even the beginnings of a love triangle between Leia, Luke, and Han, at least until Return of the Jedi. It’s not out of place, and in fact it’s a great way to inject pain and meaning into the battle between Obi-Wan and Anakin. Obi-Wan would never want to kill Anakin, even if Anakin went full Sith…but Anakin believing his mentor and friend was having an affair with his wife would be a fantastic motivation for him to want to kill Obi-Wan. It makes Anakin’s fall that much more tragic because, well, it’s believable. It’s easy to imagine yourself in Anakin’s shoes, feeling hurt, betrayed, and angry, wanting to lash out at the person you thought was your friend but had done you wrong (or so you believe). Lucas attempted this in Revenge of the Sith, but without the actual implication of a love triangle it was much weaker and looked more like an emo hissyfit.

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Lucas face-palm inducing decision #264759606-4A

Who exactly is he re-releasing the original trilogy for? The kiddies that love the CG mash-up prequels so much? 'Cause it’s patently not for those that grew up with the franchise.

Wonder if he’ll whore it in 3D next… :rolleyes:

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The first sign something was wrong came in 1978: The Star Wars Holiday Special.

Will that include the ORIGINAL versions as well, ripped from laserdisc again, like he did last time?

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But of course.

Now, where have I heard that before?

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[quote=“CanvasShoes, post:98, topic:550134”]

Don’ bag on me, mang, I’m on YOUR side. :smiley: (although I suspect it was an Unintentional Quote)

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Are there no depths this Sarlacc spit won’t stoop to get his rocks of at the expense off the SW franchise?! :confused:

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Apparently, the perpetrator was a greasy Mexican.

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lol - another wetback-hating Yank! At least Mel is feeling a little more justified now…

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No, they’ll be the DVD (post-Special Edition) versions only.

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I’m not saying that leaving out Alderaan, by itself, is what makes Phantom Menace a bad movie. But it is a very large missed opportunity. Alderaan, in the original trilogy, is a blank slate. We never see so much as a single shot of the planet’s surface. Why not develop that? Why not make it a central location for the new movies, particularly when you’re almost wholly unconstrained by established canon from the first movies? It’s not so much an example of doing something wrong, as of missing a chance to do something right. And there’s a lot of that in the trilogy.

I don’t care why the planet is valuable. The problem here isn’t, “Why is the planet valuable?” the problem is, “Why isn’t the Senate doing something when one of their planets is attacked without provocation?” That’s the main plot motivator for most of the first film: Amidala has to get to the capitol to convince the Senate to send aid. But it’s never explained why the Senate needs convincing in the first place. I’m not asking for Aristotle, I’m asking for a couple lines of dialogue that make the plot coherent.

Right, but so what? You’re asking what I’d change, right? One of the things I’d change is that the Stormtroopers aren’t clones. It’s not like there aren’t other ways of raising an army.

No, “young Anakin” is absolutely one of the worst things about Phantom Menace. The kid himself is an unengaging actor, having the invading army effectively destroyed because an eight year old kid started pressing random buttons on a starfighter destroys the credibility of that army as a legitimate threat, and having the Jedi rescue a small child from slavery, but leaving his mother behind, is the first of many morally indefensible actions taken by the purported heroes of this film.

Having an older Anakin occupying a Han Solo sort of role would also help alter the dynamic of the core cast, and give the audience a “viewpoint” character who is more relatable. Our main characters in the first movie is a member of a heriditary aristocracy, and a pair of ascetics who deliberately cut themselves off from regular human society. Most audience members aren’t going to be easily able to identify with these characters, which is not an insurmountable problem, if you’re a particularly deft screenwriter. And no one has ever accused Lucas of being a good screenwriter.

So? Shakespeare never wrote an original plot in his life. Everything he did, Othello included, was taken from some other, older source. And that worked out pretty good for him. For that matter, it worked out pretty well for Lucas the first time around; when he wrote Star Wars he was very much wearing his influences on his sleeve.

There’s a reason they call this genre “space opera.” The melodrama is kind of baked into the concept, particularly when you’re attempting to tell the story of how the galaxy’s greatest hero became its greatest villain. You’ve got to come up with some sort of a motivation, and romantic betrayal is a pretty strong one. Plus, having him tricked into believing his wife is cheating on him makes the villain a lot more villainous.

The next few bits here are things I mostly agree with, so I’m snipping that to jump to:

In Star Wars, sure. In the prequels, which are purportedly supposed to describe how the Empire rose to power, I’d have liked to have seen more of them actually rising to power. “Hey, look! I’ve got burns on my face!” “We declare you Emperor!” didn’t quite cut it for me.

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Though it wasn’t the only thing, I maintain that the biggest thing the prequels needed was a character like Han Solo. Obi-Wan began to show signs of it in Revenge of the Sith, and in fact I really enjoyed the character in that one. But it was too little too late.

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One thing I had to say for the prequels, they managed to take Obi Wan from the snarky little smartass that he was in TPM, and by the end of RotS, he seemed more developed, more worn and universe-weary, you could really see the Obi-Wan from the end of RotS becoming Old Ben Kenobi.

Whether you could see Anakin becoming Darth Mother-freaking Vader, well…:smiley:

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Can he get away with that? Yeah right, no originals…
There are still 35mm prints of the original release around, I’ve seen them sold at film collector’s forums. Someone else ought to just scan a decent print to blu ray profesionally so people can enjoy the original versions. The originals that made possible all the shit he did afterwards.

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Well, ignoring the whole copyright thing…and I suspect Lucas sure can afford good lawyers.

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My problem with the prequels was simpler than just the incoherency of the plot, it was the utterly horrific acting, directing and writing that did it for me. I mean, come on, only the writing and direction of Lucas can turn some of the better actors working today into indistinguishable, wooden dolts who are unable to figure out their motivation from scene to scene.

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My pet theory is that Lucas filmed the rehearsals; the actors thought they were doing a run through, and holy shit! they kept that in? 'Course they shold have figured that out by AotC… McGregor/McDiarmid were the only ones who weren’t annoying to watch. The dialogue was just as stilted; the only thing that saves the last two prequels is the hot damn effects. The fighter scene at the beginning of RotS was sufficiently hot damn! to make me buy the DVD, ditto for the Obi Wan/Daddy Fett rain fight in Clones.

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Totally. If you watch Revenge of the Sith and skip all the talky chapters, the action scenes are sufficiently entertaining all by themselves.

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[quote=“Annie, post:116, topic:550134”]

Yeah, but it was over in, what, two minutes? And yet the scenes showcasing George’s supreme dialogue writing skillz just went on and on.

I maintain to this day that AotC is the absolute least watchable of a decidedly lacklustre lot.

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I agree this lessens the threat level, but I guess the fanwank is that Anakin is so saturated with “the Force” that no matter what he does, it will all come out all right in the end. Anakin is already unique, so it’s not like anyone else can duplicate the feat.

I think this (as well as their acceptance and use of the clone army) might illustrate that the Jedi (and the Jedi Council) are losing their way. Knowing how to stay on the light-side may not be easy, especially when emotions cloud your judgement.

Anakin restores “balance to the Force” by throwing down the Jedi Council. Not by killing the Emporer in Episode 6.

I had that very same thought when I saw it. :slight_smile: I wonder if there was stuff that ended up getting snipped out of the script, or out of the final cut, that would make the transition more understandable.

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I agree, it’s relatively easy to come up with an in-universe explanation that makes logical sense. But the problem isn’t plot-related, its structure related. Even if you stipulate that Anakin is the only person who could have done that because he’s so gosh-darned special, you’re still left with the fact that, if he can do that when he’s an untrained eight year old, once he gets some training and experience, he’s going to be effectively invincible, and invincible characters are boring characters.

But there’s nothing in the movie to indicate that what the Jedi are doing is morally questionable. Characters that are unambiguously presented as moral centers (such as Amidala) don’t bat an eye at the use of a slave army. Even Anakin, who used to be a slave never voices any concerns over the morality of using an army of clones to fight a war. But in Phantom Menace, when they land on Tatooine, they explicitly mention that slavery is illegal in the Republic, and are shocked to see it practices openly outside the Republic’s borders. I think the problem here is that Lucas himself never considered the moral or ethical ramifications of a clone army. It was a neat idea, and he ran with it, but it undercuts the central theme of his movies, which is that the Jedi were a benevolent and wise order, brought low by the machinations of the underhanded Sith. Taking the movies as written, there’s no particular reason for the audience to root for one side over the other. So what if the Sith win? How are they worse than the Jedi? How is Anakin becoming a Sith Lord morally different from him being a Jedi Master? As a Jedi, he’s already a mass murdering slave driver. Turning to the Dark Side isn’t so much a fall for him, as a side step.

I agree that this is the most reasonable interpretation of the “prophecy” about Anakin, although FWIW, Lucas has specifically disavowed it, and stated that bringing balance to the force meant wiping the Sith out of existence. I’ve never been a fan of authorial intent as a mode of critical analysis, so I’m more than happy to throw that statement out, but in terms of analyzing Lucas’s ability to convey a specific message, I think it’s another good example of how badly he dropped the ball with these movies.