The Positive State of Star Wars

George Lucas claimed that first-generation fans looked at the Original Trilogy of Star Wars (or episodes IV, V, and VI) with the rose-colored glasses of nostalgia which caused a disproportionate level of disappointment with the prequels, especially Episodes I and II. The other argument, usually brought about by children, was that older fans rejected new characters and environments because they were new. Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens disproves that spin because it actually delivers brisk pacing and clear narrative, as well as new characters who display integrity and make choices that earn our stake in them. Detractors now say that follows the footsteps of the original 1977 film, as J.J. Abrams stated in publicity, "Going backward to move forward." A few on-line geeks have pouted that the new film is following the "save the cat" blockbuster format of screenwriting and that it must be the work of a "committee." If that is the case, then Star Wars is ideally suited for that approach, because the circumstance we all claim that we want - the one auteur who can write and direct anything and answers to nobody - became out-of-touch in his later years running a business and living in the Xanadu of Skywalker Ranch. Not to disparage Lucas, who is by all accounts a kind and charitable person who kicked off a grand vision and in the 1970's got 2 Oscar nominations for directing. Events happen in The Phantom Premise and Attack of the Clones, but they aren't especially good screenplays. Lucas now refers to the tone of The Force Awakens as "retro." In other words, it feels like the product he brought out between 1977 and 1983 and the brand he built as opposed to the counterfeit Star Wars movies presented between 1999 and 2005. Nostalgia may have sold those but it did not save them from being mediocre. Arguably the "retro" tone began when he started delegating work to other writers and directors, with a 2003/4 Clone Wars animated series for the Cartoon Network and then in 2008 with a CGI-animated series Star Wars: The Clone Wars and after the Disney acquisition of Lucasfilm the best of the batch Star Wars: Rebels. Even Lucas would admit that the Clone Wars shows were closer in tone to the breezy and compassionate Original Trilogy despite being set between the events of prequel Episodes I and II. Rebels keeps the retro done, set before the events of the original Star Wars (or Episode IV) and with less baggage from the prequels. Billy Dee Williams was a guest voice for Lando and Frank Oz was the disembodied voice of Yoda in season One with James Earl Jones returning to voice Darth Vader in Season 2. So what is being extracted and followed are the qualities that people who love Star Wars and understand it - as opposed to being jaded by it and believing one's own hype - are the simple but engaging characters and principles we can commonly get behind. The Force Awakens committee in question is J.J. Abrams whose "Mystery Box" TED talk is applied to the use of reveal here and Lawrence Kasdan who gives the movie authority as a connection to the Original Trilogy. Michael Arndt is credited as well, but it is unknown how much of his work they kept. The Art of The Force Awakens book shows illustrations and character descriptions who were abandoned. Simon Pegg was an on-set consultant for J.J. Abrams, who himself was a superfan. Kathleen Kennedy's first comment to J.J. was, "We are talking about a female Jedi." Kasdan's first comment to J.J. was, "It has to be delightful." These are all people making a movie that they were all eager to see as audience members, and that is the make-or-break deciding factor in my definition of personal expression versus drudgery. The spirit of Star Wars formally, officially, awakens with the wide release of Episode VII.

Faster and More Intense

The directions "faster" and "more intense" don't necessarily go together. In fact they can work against each other. But the direction itself has been attributed to George Lucas as his most common - if not only - direction to actors on Star Wars, "Faster and more intense." The Original Star Wars trilogy (1977 - 1983) is generally fast and intense. I expect that this over the years got through to Lucas as Carrie Fisher, Harrison Ford and Mark Hamill have related anecdotes from filming. Unfortunately the result may have been that the prequels released between 1999 and 2005 are neither fast nor intense, from scene to scene. Scenes generally just happen and there is little or no momentum, but most of all decisions are not made under fire and with the machine-gun delivery that had school kids like myself reciting, "It'll take a few moments to get coordinates from the nava-computer." On paper or as text, that looks pretty flat, but correctly acted with conviction it is gold. I don't know if delivery alone could have saved the prequels. The Phantom Menace and Attack of the Clones are especially constipated and less open to the emotional participation of the audience, as if the story will resume after these messages. They are a world populated by robots, monks and politicians for the most part. This makes anyone who is not speaking in a prescribed or a regulated tone stand out in sharp relief as begging for laughs or reaction. Anakin's mother was a fine actress, but even she could only do so much with what was written, and Lucas himself has stated that more emotional takes were done but he didn't want them to upset the balance of the movie in which he had flattened pretty much all emotion. Both versions of the animated Clone Wars are such a change in tone that they recall the original trilogy. I remember Yoda taking a moment with some clone troopers and asking to see their faces and making it clear that though they are clones they are all distinct persons within the Force and then speaking to each one by name. Such depth is lacking in the prequels. These new series are clearly made by old-school Star Wars fans and not as a grind by Lucas who might think that his terrible first drafts of outlines must be vacuum sealed (in other words they suck). Even though he stays involved, mostly to make sure the grasshopper-like battle droids have comical exit lines as they die, like "Whyyyyyy?" or "But I just got promoted." Very forgivable considering that the Clone Wars are generally faster and more intense than the prequels despite being from the same era (and errors). It is May the Fourth, Star Wars day, so I had to get in my two cents on this unfortunate watering down of something that was quite great most of my life. May the Fourth Be with you. . . .

all supply, no real demand

Here is a rant I went on against a Star Wars fan who had posted on imdb "Star Wars returns to theaters in February!"

I had argued that The Phantom Menace is what is being released in February and that it
doesn't deserve the name Star Wars and that it was like
saying The Star Wars Holiday Special and the Ewoks cartoon are Swar Wars.

"The Six features are cannon.
Each film is as much Star Wars as the other."
- sanoma6

This is like saying Godfather Part III is
automatically on a par with its predecessors.
Or Jaws The Revenge is inherently as valid as
Jaws or Jaws 2.

Or that Dumber and Dumberer: When Harry met Lloyd
is anywhere near as good as Dumb and Dumber.

I'm sure Oliver Stone considers Wall Street 2:
Money Never Sleeps "canon" in his work.

Side note: Even though nobody would argue that TV's
Young Indiana Jones prequels are as engaging as the features, they were all released on VHS in numbered
sequence, including the features, counted as one long
epic and all Cannon by Lucas. And as much as I am a defender of Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, I don't
dare say it is "as much Indy" as Raiders of the Lost Ark.

The Star Wars prequels are counterfeit Star Wars, even
if they come from the same printing press as real Star Wars.

They are inferior, and they have sunk a strong brand which
declined in value sharply after May 19, 1999.

Oddly, because the Clone Wars animated show require so much
content they are farmed out to a team of other writers and
directors. Despite being in an era that involves characters
I don't prefer, they are close to the tone of the OT.
The stories are all competant and often compelling, and
certainly fun.

But the Clone Wars feature - at a time when animated
features do good business - is regarded as the least
successful SW feature and Phantom Menace the "most
successful" which is nonsense.

The brand was damaged. I saw Clone Wars in a theater
and I didn't actually mind the baby Hutt because it
was the "boon" that is followed in good adventure
storytelling. It, arguably, is cannon, financed
and ordered by Lucas. But the distinction of "cannon"
means nothing.

People were burned from Phantom Menace through Sith.
Only the most hardcore fans will read all the novels
and comics, the rights to which are basically whored
out by now. Timothy Zahn's forst trilogy of post-Jedi
novels brought fans back from the late-eighties nadir
of Star Wars when the Marvel Comics had ended their
SW run and Kenner opted not to renew its licencing with
Lucasfilm. (On that last point it is terrific that Lucas
got the last laugh when Kenner was bought out by Hasboro
and Lucas was given half ownership of Hasboro in the late
nineties as the price of a new licence agreement when the
hype had returned with re-releases and optimism about the
prospect of Episode One.) How sad that Hasboro has gone
through Post-Menace period of being ready to give away
action figures, when KFC and Taco Bell cringed at the
prequel decorations in their restaurancts, and Exhibitors
resented the contract Lucas had insisted upon which kept
their screens occupied by The Phantom Menace weeks after
word of mouth caused audiences to dwindle.

The hard bargain Lucas once drove couldn't happen by the
time the Clone Wars feature was being made. He ended up
cutting a deal with Warner, but he got a lot of rejections
and for a while there were no takers even for the quite
good Tv series.

What is especially bothersome about these upcoming 3D
releases is that they will only be accepted by exhibitors
because of the 3D gimmich, which won't be Avatar quality.
it will just be another way to condition us for the regular
ticket fees to be jacked up again, even for non-3D movies.

Fans have to learn to be more critical. Nobody is really
asking for the prequels to hit theaters again. When Lucas
first showed examples of the 3D conversion at Comic-Con it
was scenes from the 1977 Star Wars made 3D.

So all this talk of a year to complete that process
is nonsense - HE HAS HAD FOUR YEARS SINCE THEN,
and has ALREADY GOT A NEW HOPE CONVERTED.
That COULD be the first one released. But he KNOWS
if he shows the OT first, nobody will go to the
prequels. And he floats a bully stance that "the
older films will be released in 3D if these ones
do well." Which is like saying "eat three turds,
with nothing to cleanse the pallet, and then I
will give you the best cheezeburger available."

The re-release of the prequels needs to be boycotted.

imdb debates -further trashing of Star Wars prequels

Okay, here are a few things I've said in response to a young Star Wars prequel fan who refuses to look at them with a critical eye. I know it's beating a dead cat, but the upcoming aboninations of 3D-converted re-release make it part of the soft boycott I'm sort of doing.

OCCASSIONALLY wooden acting? Compare the work of any cast member to their non SW prequel work. Even Jake Lloyd is more bearable in Jingle All the Way. And I'm sure it's no accident that there isn't any mention of Haley Joel Osment screen testing for Anakin on the DVD documentary.

Minor plot holes with OT - Padme's death in III despite Leia's memory of interacting somewhat with her, as described in VI ? That's minor?

- Here, have something to drink without even sniffing it for poison despite the disturbance you feel in the Force.

- Why would anyone want balance to the Force when there are supposedly two Sith in the Universe and a community of Jedi? That's the right kind of ratio.

- The wisdom of the Jedi is apparently to be humorless, reckless and fearless despite paying lip service to the opposite. A character must REACT with fear to new surroundings so the audience can feel suspense, even if they summon the strength to overcome it.

- In OT, decisions were usually made under fire and in a crunch, on the fly. In the prequels, there is usually no urgency and things are decided or discussed in periods of rest. (Except of course scenes like "rational" Obi Wan jumping through a window instead of pulling the floating robot to himself with the Force, despite saying he "hates when" Anakin jumps from a flying vehicle).

- One point in the Sith review that makes GREAT sense is that it would be common practice for the Jedi to "watch the watcher" or keep an eye on Palpatine or anyone else in power. Knowing that absolurte power corrupts absolutely. They need only look into the heart of anyone they encounter, including Palpatine, and if they are blocked then they know that person is communing with the Dark Side in order to do so.

- I don't care about the rationalizations. "I didn't really come here to free slaves, " is an INFURIATING line coming from "Schindler" but it is also not befitting any Jedi or any protagonist in a heroic adventure. Freeing slaves and disregarding an outlying system's WRONGHEADED tolerance of it would have been a rousing and engaging central premise. And LEAVING Shmi Skywalker to live as a slave and not even check in on her for, what, 10 years?

Fear of Anakin's mother suffering is a REASONABLE fear, and NO relation whatsoever to Fear that we overcome, like prejudice -- which I what I thought Yoda was talking about when I saw the trailer, and what other fans nodded appreciatively over.

The business of "attachment" being forbidden is paradoxial, since a Jedi may be attached to irrelevant rules at the expense of what is worth a hero giving his life to defend.

- Anakin talks about a device he has invented for scanning where slaves have their incendiary devices planted in their skin. THAT should lead to a quite worthy sequence! Is Qui-Gon removing Anakin's explosive when he takes the blood sample? I don't recall WHAT he was doing. Then why not Shmi's explosive next? Why not make a point of covertly ridding all of Anakin's friends of their bombs? Maybe Shmi is off at work when this happens and she has to be among the last, and maybe she crosses a perimeter and Watto sees this and activates his remote.

THAT would have been an ideal circumstance for her to die, right in front of Anakin, and maybe in reflex he mentally swats Watto against a wall like a fly. Might not be apt for a children's film, but certainly okay if Lucas cared to establish a tone that naturally ended with the PG-13 finale of Anakin's legs being chopped off before he burns beside a lava lake.

- The chief accomplishment of Attack of the Clones is they manage to have a battle between armies of robots and Jedi and make it boring. They have also made peace boring, which is quite offensive in a set of stories about war and mostly released during war time.

That's not even the tip of the iceberg. Years from now melchiahdimension-1 you'll watch these prequels and wonder WTF you were thinking.

On close examination of the most basic points, it all falls apart.
George Lucas is all about negotiations and deals and those transactions are a big part of the "story" in the prequels. It doesn't make them more civilized. It makes them false and out of touch with the human spirit.

The fact that Lucas will re-release The Phantom Menace in 3D February 2012 and not stick to the OT just willfull greed and shortsightedness. The prequels are a disgrace.