Star Wars Reboot

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Those people are all wrong too. The prequels were always crap, and no amount of "the sequels were worse" is gonna change the fact that the prequels were still crap.

Jar Jar was annoying. Anakin was a Mary Sue (at least in episode 1) and started out too young (Obi Wan made it sound like a he was already an adult in the originals), and had close to zero chemistry with Amidala. The Midichlorians SUCKED in every way--even their damn name sounded silly. The Sith Rule of 2 was just stupid. Jedi needing to be basically taken in as babies was just idiotic--are you just gonna reject a 10 y/o Force Sensitive kid and leave him out alone on his own to be tempted by the Dark Side just cuz YOU failed to find him as a toddler?!? What kind of a moronic idea is that?

There was so much inconsistent idiocy in the prequels, it would fill several volumes just hashing them all out! They didn't even get Bail Organa's name right in Episode 1 for crying out loud! A guy calls him Bail ANTILLES in one of the scenes--WEDGE Antilles was a freaking X-Wing pilot from Corellia, not an Alderaanian senator, and he wasn't even born yet! Can't these people get characters' names right?!? :angry:
This is why I get rid of everything but the OT and the EU that does NOT conflict with them (Which by the way is MUCH smaller than you'd think).
The thing that struck me as the weirdest thing about the Phantom Menace was this whole thing of trying place Anakin as this kid hero figure. It was just tonally WTF?

It's like they completely ignored the fact that he grows up to be Darth Vader. (At the level of plot it was touched on sure, but the film just completely seemed unable to deal with the fact that we were watching a film about a kid who the audience knows is doomed.)

It's not that the kid needs to be clearly evil from birth, they could have gone with innocence that's later corrupted or something, but clearly Lucas had no idea how to do what he was trying to do with the prequels. You need some kind of genuine tonal presentiment that the whole thing is actually some kind of tragedy.

It was just bizarre, and made it clear right from the start that there was really no point to the prequels even existing.

Was there noone to read the script and say"George, this thing you're trying to do here. It's beyond you. Stick to fun Saturday matinee space opera adventure. This story, whether it includes podracing or not, this ain't it.
There really wasn't and he's said as much in later interviews.
Given the opportunity to reboot, I don't.

I create a streaming focused Cinematic Universe focused entirely on stories featuring new characters who do not appear in any of the Movies: Original Trilogy, Prequel Trilogy or Sequel Trilogy. Star Wars is a massive Galaxy. There is no reason it has to focus entirely on this one family.

IMHO, the only unironically good thing to come out of Disney Star Wars has been The Mandalorian. It's an entirely self-contained story that can stand on its own and be appreciated even by someone who has never seen the Original Trilogy. Disney should lean into that.
Removing the Prequels and Disney Trilogy isn't not mutually exclusive to that goal. Even better, that actually HELPS with spin off properties. Less confining changes to the lore.
 
Yoda says there’s only two Sith at one time, “no more, no less” during the funeral for Qui-Gon Jinn in The Phantom Menace. It’s always going to be canon. Also, Darth Bane is canon because his avatar or spirit or illusion appeared in season six of The Clone Wars when Yoda traveled to Moriband.

You know I'd forgotten about that.
Dunno if it makes the book canon or not though - same way we have the Thrawn trilogy, and while he has a lot of characteristics from the books not sure they are canon either. They may have just lifted some of the ideas....who knows to be honest.

YMMV I guess...
 
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OMG! The whole immaculate birth Anakin thing was so cringy as well. Trying to shoehorn religious underpinnings that didn't fit and were never implied in the originals. Now Anakin was suddenly the Messiah...but evil (to be) and with a laser sword, and also a moody kid.

Dune did it a hundred times better. Paul 'Muad'dib' Atreides was a real messianic hero, build to be a messianic hero from the get go. Not clumsily shoehorned after the fact.
The chosen one is not solely a judeo-christian idea. You have Arthur tale which 'may' have originated before Roman Christendom hit the British shores. And Zeus was nailin' everything but Palin for the Greek heroes.

I agree that Dune (probably Lucas's origin of the idea) better but remember, he isn't the hero of humanity. He brought the times of chaos and destroyed the system in line. His kids/grand children would be the ones to 'rescue' the universe. Paul simply knew he had to bring the universe suffering before it could reach a better path.
 
As long as they keep picking the best bits of the EU and ignore the dross we'll all be happy :smile:
The problem is that the best bits is always up for interpretation. I've always done it in my games (and will continue to do it because I'd rather play on Legendary than Canon).

The thing that struck me as the weirdest thing about the Phantom Menace was this whole thing of trying place Anakin as this kid hero figure. It was just tonally WTF?
Personally I would of rather the prequel be the story of young padawan Obi-Wan grow up in the Clone Wars while Anakin would have been the super powerful chosen one that seems more distant to the viewer because you know that this shit will go south real quick. Being the one to discover with Obi-Wan that, "hey, your padawan is giving the full force to a noble, you better check that." and Obi-Wan having to decide 'do I report my good friend to do I let this go". One of my biggest issues (and there are many) w/the prequels is Anakin's turn on a dime to the dark side. The Clone Wars series helps w/this but not enough.
 
The problem is that the best bits is always up for interpretation. I've always done it in my games (and will continue to do it because I'd rather play on Legendary than Canon).

Of course, but as I have said a few times, 200 gigaton turbolasers make zero sense.
So in order to clarify perhaps it might be easier to split it into nonsensical and up for interpretation?
 
I hire David Lynch and give him full creative control... can't wait to see what he does with the Ewoks.

The entire Endor sequence is just a CGI recreation of Jack Nance strutting around naked except for a pair of these:

f4C4D6s.jpg


All the other characters react to him as if he were actually an entire tribe of fuzzy aliens.
 
Of course, but as I have said a few times, 200 gigaton turbolasers make zero sense.
So in order to clarify perhaps it might be easier to split it into nonsensical and up for interpretation?
Not that I disagree w/you but nearly everything can be nonsensical in Star Wars. They got PEW PEW sounds in space. I remember those online arguements and the energy needed to completely destroy and astriod in space during ESB w/people trying to validate them. And this was back in the 98-99 timeframe.
I don't think 200 gigaton turbolasers would be a huge reach considering but I might be wrong.

"You can be and you are wrong." - Barry; High Fidelity
 
I don't think 200 gigaton turbolasers would be a huge reach considering but I might be wrong.
It depends on the franchise to be honest.

But in the scope of Star Wars it would as it would negate the need of a Death Star. Five shots would create the same amount of energy if the West Coast of USA sank beneath the waves, 1 teraton of energy. Now think about the amount of times you see them fire at things.

The Falcon takes one hit and survives.

Or them bombard planets with little effect.

It makes no sense at all.
 
One of my biggest issues (and there are many) w/the prequels is Anakin's turn on a dime to the dark side.
Though it's not exactly well written, they stacked up the foreshadowing of his turn- it wasn't by any means on a dime.
 
The more I think about it, the more the decision to make the first of the prequels about 'Baby Vader' was just a colossally bad decision.

You should never make a trilogy purely for the sake of symmetry.
 
Not that I disagree w/you but nearly everything can be nonsensical in Star Wars. They got PEW PEW sounds in space. I remember those online arguements and the energy needed to completely destroy and astriod in space during ESB w/people trying to validate them. And this was back in the 98-99 timeframe.
I don't think 200 gigaton turbolasers would be a huge reach considering but I might be wrong.

"You can be and you are wrong." - Barry; High Fidelity

Explosions, ships whooshing in space, WWII dogfighing action in space, etc. Drove sf writers nuts back in the 70s.
 
The more I think about it, the more the decision to make the first of the prequels about 'Baby Vader' was just a colossally bad decision.

You should never make a trilogy purely for the sake of symmetry.
According to Lucas (though I'm skeptical that it was anything but an afterthought) it wasn't about symmetry. It was about the Rise and Fall of Vader- Luke was never the primary protagonist of the arc. I think if that was true, they would have focused on Vader more in the original trilogy.
 
According to Lucas (though I'm skeptical that it was anything but an afterthought) it wasn't about symmetry. It was about the Rise and Fall of Vader- Luke was never the primary protagonist of the arc. I think if that was true, they would have focused on Vader more in the original trilogy.
Yeah that's obvious bullshit.

It even contradicts his other bullshit about the original trilogy following the "Hero's Journey". That could only really be remotely true if Luke is the primary protagonist - the "Hero".
 
Yeah that's obvious bullshit.

It even contradicts his other bullshit about the original trilogy following the "Hero's Journey". That could only really be remotely true if Luke is the primary protagonist - the "Hero".
The question now is; does it really matter? Lucas can say whatever he wants, dude's got 4 billion.

I liked 7 because it fealt like it was trying to go back towards the old style of movies. Yeah it wasn't great, a rehash of 4, but all the movies are stolen from other great ideas, why couldn't it steal from itself? And though people love Han Solo, nothing sound more like a greek tragedy than a father dying while trying to save his son. Prequels were problematic but they were some of the prettiest Sci-Fi girls in the room. You don't watch a Kendra Roll movie to learn about the lack of government compliance with the Havana Peace Agreement, you watch it because she looks fantastic.
But 8, that movie...
The Last Jedi was The Last Straw. It ruined 7 for me. It ruined Star Wars for me. 9 was never going to make it, cluster f*** of a movie or not (like the doctor in '89 Batman says to Joker, "Look what I have to work with here.")
I was a Star Wars freak. I've still got lightsabers, minis, and micro-machine starships on my shelf; d6, d20, saga books below. It was the escapism that helped get me through some of the toughest times of my life. And it was killed. The excitement for it died. My yearning to get my kid into it for fun we could share faded.
Mandolorian was great but the scars still run deep and are fresh. My avatar is what I got w/the sequel.
Legends has it's issues but it didn't fully screw over one of the few heroes from my childhood. I'm too old, too cynical, and too aware to believe in heroes now.
When your inner kid is ripped in half, how can you reboot that?
 
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According to Lucas (though I'm skeptical that it was anything but an afterthought) it wasn't about symmetry. It was about the Rise and Fall of Vader- Luke was never the primary protagonist of the arc. I think if that was true, they would have focused on Vader more in the original trilogy.
You know, I really hope to hell he realizes things like this are bullshit when he says them. Otherwise, I might fear for a man whose own memories of his greatest public achievements are so... malleable.
 
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Somehow, you acquired the rights to Star Wars. However, one of the stipulations of the deal is that you must reboot the franchise. The original movies, the Legends EU, all the Disney Wars stuff, it's all in the past. It's your Star Wars universe now.

What is your reboot like? What's changed? What stays the same? What is similar? What is totally different that makes the reboot yours and yours alone?

At this point, I would take the best of all of it and discard the rest. That's pretty subjective, of course.

The original movies would stay the same. The three prequels could be collapsed into one or (at most) two movies, with far less focus on the silly stuff and the unconvincing romance angle and more about the fall of the Jedi and Anakin Skywalker. Absolutely NO fucking Midichlorians or Jar-Jar. I would discard everything related to the Rey and Kylo Ren movies and the Han Solo one. There was nothing in them that (to me) were good additions to the Star Wars universe. I'm neutral on Rogue One. I liked The Mandalorian.

The EU was a mixed bag. There was some really good stuff in there, some really bad stuff, and a lot that was in-between. There are a lot of things I would have kept from it, but it would take a long time to go through all that, so I won't get into it. Disney really should have drawn from the more beloved and popular parts of that for their movies. They would be in a much better position today if they had done that.

Ultimately, the parts I like the most about Star Wars is the space western action-adventure stuff, the cool and diverse aliens, and the general idea of the Force and force-using traditions. I don't really care that much about the Empire, Rebellion, and "Chosen One" stuff. If I were writing and filming new material for it, I would dive deeper into the various alien races and the older history of that universe. I would particularly like to delve into the variety of force traditions and force users that have existed over time, particularly the ones that have nothing to do with the Jedi or Sith (or that branched off and changed a lot). I have never been fond of the dualistic "Jedi are calm and good, Sith are hateful and evil" approach to the Force and force traditions. The EU touched on some of that, but there is a lot more to explore there.
 
You know, I really hope to hell he realizes things like this are bullshit when he says them. Otherwise, I might fear for a man whose own memories of his greatest public achievements are so... malleable.

George Lucas has long subscribed to the idea that his past ideas and motivations are a work of ongoing fiction that he should be able to shape as he pleases.
 
The question now is; does it really matter? Lucas can say whatever he wants, dude's got 4 billion.

I liked 7 because it fealt like it was trying to go back towards the old style of movies. Yeah it wasn't great, a rehash of 4, but all the movies are stolen from other great ideas, why couldn't it steal from itself? And though people love Han Solo, nothing sound more like a greek tragedy than a father dying while trying to save his son. Prequels were problematic but they were some of the prettiest Sci-Fi girls in the room. You don't watch a Kendra Roll movie to learn about the lack of government compliance with the Havana Peace Agreement, you watch it because she looks fantastic.
But 8, that movie...
The Last Jedi was The Last Straw. It ruined 7 for me. It ruined Star Wars for me. 9 was never going to make it, cluster f*** of a movie or not (like the doctor in '89 Batman says to Joker, "Look what I have to work with here.")
I was a Star Wars freak. I've still got lightsabers, minis, and micro-machine starships on my shelf; d6, d20, saga books below. It was the escapism that helped get me through some of the toughest times of my life. And it was killed. The excitement for it died. My yearning to get my kid into it for fun we could share faded.
Mandolorian was great but the scars still run deep and are fresh. My avatar is what I got w/the sequel.
Legends has it's issues but it didn't fully screw over one of the few heroes from my childhood. I'm too old, too cynical, and too aware to believe in heroes now.
When your inner kid is ripped in half, how can you reboot that?
That’s interesting. The Last Jedi is my third favorite movie out of all of them and The Rise of Skywalker is the worst movie out of all of them.

Luke was, for a brief time, Palpatine’s apprentice in Legends, so I’m not sure how he was treated any better.

95FA12A4-F726-4A20-A024-08355E8F809F.jpeg
 
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Luke was, for a brief time, Palpatine’s apprentice in Legends, so I’m not sure how he was treated any better.
But the Skywalker's had a chance to be redeemed. Leia embraced her training in the force to bring Luke back. If anything it enforced the ability of the Light to overcome the dark no matter how bad it gets. For me it's not so much Luke's victory as it is Vader's redemption. The son helping the father come over even the lowest of times and finally do the right thing for your child and your family;s future is the message that resonates w/me today.
Writing Luke as a washed up has bin who just decided "f*** it i'm done" was a kick in the pants. I know they wanted to get his character out of the universe so the new hero can shine (as noted by the pic w/a red x over Luke) but at least have a little reverence for what came before.
DXIjf2BX0AAwMu0.jpg

I won't knock anyone who likes The Last Jedi. You like what you like. I will still happily watch Killer Clowns from Outer Space so I can't argue preferences.
 
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