The Star Wars travesty demonstrates the incredible power of brand

Cafe Society
61

Yup. I really enjoyed them. Absolutely nailed the essence of Star Wars. Fun, great casting choices, looked great, exciting.

Let people enjoy things.

Now THIS is solid criticism.

Of course, this sort of thing is perhaps inevitable. There is no way to have more Star Wars without having more bad guys threatening to take over the galaxy again. The SW canon goes back and forth thousands of years. It’s canon that 4,000 years before the rise of Palpatine, the Sith nearly crushed the Republic but their massive superweapon was destroyed just in the nick of time. One assumes the time between then and “Star Wars” things were not always rosy.

There is room in some Star Wars movie or show, perhaps, to reflect on this - that whatever heroic deeds the protagonist does, there will be another war, and another, and another. Which is like real life, I guess. There never is a war to end all wars.

62

Luke/Han/Leia would have been a rehash, as opposed to a trilogy built around two-guys-and-a-girl (+ Chewy!), a masked henchman-villain who dies in a redemption story in the last ten minutes of the third act, a “Starkiller Base” that can destroy planets, and a puppetmaster emperor big bad who’s been pulling the strings all along? Yeah, I can see how using Luke/Han;Leia together would have prevented all the new ground.

63

OP, I’m confused. You say:

But then you say:

It seems to me that, based on your own observation that the OT is “fine,” meh+ movies live right up to those standards.

Anyway, Rise of Skywalker is going to make a billion dollars and there is no subreddit on the internet* whose population is a significant percentage of anything. It’s a popular movie. Lots and lots and lots of people like it. I’m one of them.

*the title of that post, by the way, is “You showed a complete disregard for this franchise and the fans and you deserve what you are getting right now.” Yes, I’m sure John H. Disney and Malcolm S. Wars (the respective founders of Disney and Star Wars) are in a screaming match right now over whose fault all this is. “No, **you **take the money, you sack of shit! I had to take the last billion dollars!”

64

Of course they were, but that clearly speaks to their true motive.

I, for one, never believed for an instant Lucas’ claim that he had always conceived the Star Wars saga as consisting of three trilogies. I think that’s a rationalization for continuing that he came up with after the unexpected success of the original film.

65

Lucas made up the story about planning 9 movies to make more movies after episode 4 was a big hit? That’s pretty bizarre thinking.

And even if he did it just for cash, what does that matter? Nobody was forced to go to any of the other 10 movies. It wasn’t just Lucas who made a lot of money, the actors , Fox, etc. all made a lot. And all the people hired to make the other movies I’m sure were happy to have those jobs.

66

What’s bizarre about it? Do you have a cite, from before the release of Star Wars (1977) for Lucas saying that there would be three trilogies? I never heard that claim until well after 1977. You do know, don’t you, that the original film was not called “Episode IV” or “A New Hope” until the release of ESB? The opening title sequence of ESB that called it “Episode V” was a big surprise to a lot of people.

And this speaks to the quality or integrity of those films how?

67

Yes, Bond is a brand. And managed to survive the death of his creator, Ian Fleming. I know the old films well, they had a sort of over the top charm and heck, they were the best of their genre at that time and it was obvious that they were pure fantasy, but does a younger audience see them in the same way? What I have seen of the more recent ones just makes me feel that the whole thing got rebranded and the slightly self-mocking charm of the old films is gone. But the period has gone, and zillions of films have come out with spectacular stunts that top those in the Bond films.

As for Star Wars, I have not seen any of the prequels in full, but what I have seen makes me feel that they are totally derivative. It is rare that sequels are good, and there comes a time when it is obvious that the formula has run out. To give an example in another genre; Godfather III references some of the earlier films and does it very badly, while being saddled with a bad script and some bad acting. But hardcore fans will love their sequels anyway.

68

Minor correction to my own post: it was renamed on its theatrical re-release in 1981, a year after the release of ESB. Cite.

69

Why would Lucas need to make up the story about 9 movies? As soon as it was a big hit everybody knew there would be sequels.

When I go to a movie I don’t really worry or even think about why it was made. I either like it or I don’t. If Lucas or Eastwood or Nolan, etc. make movies just for money why do I care?

70

Starlog magazine, somewhere just after the original came out. This comes up enough I should find the issue and reference it. He said nine films more than three trilogies.

71

Maybe Lucas, Fox ,etc should have donated all profits to charity?

72

My point was that I believe that all he originally planned was one film, and that *after *its great and unexpected success, he claimed that he had *always *planned three trilogies. I have seen no evidence predating May 1977 to support that claim. However, JAQ, I would be interested in seeing that cite, to see just what he actually said about his original plans.

These were in response to my post:

…and I shouldn’t have phrased it that way. I meant it not literally, but as shorthand for what they should have done to maintain the same level of quality.

The OP said, in essence, that the Prequel Trilogy (Eps. I-III) and Sequel Trilogies (VII-IX) don’t measure up to the quality of the Original Trilogy (Star Wars, ESB, ROTJ). I go one step further and say that none of the following ten films (including RO and Solo) lives up to the quality of the very first one. Many here seem to disagree with the OP about the Prequel and Sequel Trilogies, and no doubt disagree with me as well, as I suspect even the OP does. No matter, we’re all entitled to our opinions.

Lest anyone think I’m not really a Star Wars fan at all, I was in line at the Senator Theater in Washington, DC, on May 25, 1977 (I was 21 years old), and sat in the front row of that former Cinerama theater, within the arc of its deeply-curved 90-foot wide screen. I was knocked out by Star Wars, and it became one of my favorite films. I found the next two less satisfying for the reasons I’ve mentioned above. And my opinions of the rest have also been made clear. So I maintain I am a Star Wars fan, by which I mean the one film, Star Wars (1977). I am far less impressed by any of the films released under that brand since, and have had no contact with any of the ancillary materials: novels, comic books, games, TV shows, holiday specials, etc. I have no gripe with anyone who likes or loves any of those things, or with the people who made them. But my fandom is limited to the original version (Han shot first) of the original film.

73

Starlog Issue 18, December 1978, pg 20. In an interview with Gary Kurtz, speaking for his and Lucas’ vision:

“From the beginning, way back when George was making American Graffiti, he introduced the original Star Wars layout in the form of a multiple-part story. If we ever got the first film off the ground, the thought occurred to me that it would be nice to do several episodes that fit together into one, giant story. George and I didn’t actually make the decision to go ahead with the second movie until a month after Star Wars was released.”

from the article:
The [sequel], for instance, is never referred to in Lucas-Kurtz circles as Star Wars II.

Kurtz, again: “I would never call it that. Our working title is The Empire Strikes Back…What we wanted to do was to relate every subsequent Star Wars adventure as an episode of a continuing story, like the old movie serials used to do.”

“You see, although this story is a direct sequel to the first movie, we have three more stories that we eventually want to film that actually occur before the point here the first Star Wars begins.”

“I mean, if we had to give each film its true number in the series, this movie would be called Episode Five: The Empire Strikes Back. The first film would be called Episode Four! Can you imagine how complicated it would get?”

But I guess they managed, somehow.

And, there it is, prior to the release of TESB, proof of a planned from the beginning, multi-movie arc, including prequels.

eta, as commasense replied while I was writing, unless they were creatively back filling their own story, which is of course possible. It doesn’t read that way, but then they are both writers of fiction! :slight_smile:

74

yeah, I remember hearing decades ago that Lucas had at least wanted to do multiple films. It’s obvious in the first one he/they hadn’t really fleshed out anything past the first film at that point though; stuff like Obi-Wan calling Vader “Darth,” etc.

75

I read a biography of Lucas, “Skywalking” written before ESB came out. It mentioned the 9 movies, so I wasn’t surprised. It also said that Lucas’ childhood stories involved a hero rescuing his sister, so the revelation that Leia was Luke’s sister wasn’t super surprising to me either.

Given Lucas’ status as a new filmmaker with one flop and one very different hit, I’m not suprised he didn’t running around touting his desire to make 8 more movies, given that a lot of people thought SW was going to be a disaster.
And remember, while ANH had a satisfying ending, Vader had escaped and the Empire was still out there. A sequel was not tacked on, but integral to the story.

76

Thanks for a point in favor of my claim.

As a young ambitious filmmaker, he would have been a fool not to include openings for a sequel. I just don’t think his grand plan for three trilogies arose until after it was clear that Star Wars was going to be huge. Then the sequels were inevitable.

But I’m open to be proven wrong. I just think that Lucas is one of the most over-rated filmmakers ever, who lucked into a really good thing at just the right time and has been heralded as a genius ever since. So I’ve always looked askance at the notion that he had this huge master plan before finishing Star Wars. It just smacks of self-aggrandizement. But if there’s evidence that he really did, I’ll admit I was wrong.

77

you mean other than the evidence posted in post #73 above?

As far as Lucas being called a genius , many people think episodes 1 to 3 are horrible and those are all on Lucas. I think those movies are OK, not bad and not great. But they certainly have problems.

78

I think he just kind of lost the plot. he claimed Ep. I was supposed to be a “kid’s movie” (thus child prodigy Anakin, Jar Jar, and the other cutesy stuff) but then the first half hour is a couple of Jedi sitting around bitching about trade agreements?

79

I’m glad that the OT exists. Those are two really good movies plus one that’s OK. I am not a rabid SW fan, however. I would be fine with anything but the OT not existing. I think the Prequels (midichlorians, only two Sith at a time, etc.–stupid shit) and especially the Sequels (Luke is a failure, etc.) shit on the original story. I wouldn’t like that even if they were great movies that shit on the older movies. But they at best mediocre movies made terrible by the fact that they shit on the older movies.

Yes. Any failure relative to what the Disney Trilogy could have been will not dissuade Disney from making an infinite number of SW movies until the world simply can’t stand any more.

80

This may well be true, but the old characters could have been given a satisfying continuation/conclusion without having them dominate the film.