Not from any particular "I am now disgusted with this franchise" feelings, it just sort of happened that way; really, I haven't watched any of them, except a buddy threw on A New Hope once time back in college. But ever since those RedLetterMedia reviews started, I have been totally in the mood to watch the original trilogy again. In particular, there's that one scene toward the end of the Clones review where he's throwing out all the Yoda stuff, and there's one particular line that's awesome, but that I don't even remember ("Luminous beings are we! Not this... crude matter").
So like a week ago, I found out that the most recent DVD release has the theatrical cut on the b-disc--like the straight-up theatrical cut. Star Wars doesn't even have A New Hope in the title crawl. So I picked that up off Amazon, and I'm watching Empire and hot damn.
Some thoughts from the first half hour:
-Harrison Ford and Carey Fisher are sorta forced at points, I'm finding. Leagues better than, y'know, that obvious comparison, but the scene with the twincest was weird. And not in that way that it's weird if you know how the next movie ends.
-The reveal of the Super Star Destroyer is cinematic genius. We see the rebels hanging out on this awful ice ball, doing nothing except for barely adapting to the climate before having to run off, and then there's the cut to a Star Destroyer, the hugest thing ever, being utterly dwarfed by a way bigger Star Destroyer.
-I was a little iffy about the Hoth battle having played it through in video games so. ****ing. Many. Times. But it's actually still pretty bangin'.
-It is weird how expressive non-humans are with only a short growl or bleep.
-Where the hell are they getting Tauntauns from?
-Why isn't there a single junky ship in the prequels? The Falcon is constantly falling apart, so the characters are fighting against not only whatever obstacle there is (pursuit, asteroids, whatever) but also the fact that their conveyance is awesome but needy. Meanwhile there's perfect silver ships that get more or less exactly where they're going, little transports in perfect condition, there's never any "holy **** the boat's going to blow up" tension. Hell, they worked that into Knights of the Old Republic (although the Ebon Hawk's generally in better shape). And on that note:
-How did they get the video games so right and the movies so wrong?
Next up: I ramble on about Dagobah.
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I think the whole 'no junky ships' thing is because the prequels took place before the galactic war, so there wasn't a real reason for anything to be in bad shape. There were some trashy vehicles on Tatooine, though, like at Watto's junkyard and stuff.
What games are you referring to? Rogue Squadron and KoToR were good but the other one's I've played have sucked some serious nuts.
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Mostly those two, plus Shadows of the Empire. And X-Wing/TIE Fighter. And c'mon, give Dark Forces some love (noting that I've only played the first one extensively). (Oh God I'm old)
Also Rebellion and the one that was like Rebellion Meets C&C and They Don't Like One Another Very Much? Empire at War? Was that a thing? But of course those had the basic plot of the movies.
And frankly, Pod Racer was pretty awesome (the DC version, anyway).
...anyway, I was mostly talking about KoToR. The second one was more fulfilling than the entire prequel trilogy, and it's like 4/5 of a game.
Also, I didn't mean "why no junky ships?" as a plot point; that's a totally reasonable argument, and had they portrayed the prequel universe as a squeaky-clean paradise, I'd totally accept that. That would've been cool, actually, because it would've served to make the Empire way more evil. But instead, there was constant in-fighting and the government is about as useful as the UN if Jar Jar Binks could pass non-binding resolutions. The landscapes and the technology were beautiful and pristine, but the plot required an utterly corrupt and disgustingly ineffectual government.
This is another way KoToR outdid the prequels: in both cases, you have the republic teetering on the edge of collapse. In one, you have actual unrest, with planets talking about leaving the republic, civil wars and shortages; you have acknowledged complacency that's punished. In the other, you have shiny spaceships and a government that does some stuff, I guess.
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From: willis5225 | #003
Also, I didn't mean "why no junky ships?" as a plot point...
Ah, gotcha. I dunno, I always felt that the prequels were more vessels to get to the scene where Anakin first puts on the SPOILERS vader mask END SPOILERS than movies within themselves. 'Cause I mean, you can argue that IV, V, and VI could stand alone, but the prequels didn't have anything arch-worthy in them. It was probably also because Lucas was more focused on the big picture than making each scene memorable. Not sure how many people can relate, but it's like when you play an MMO-- at first, you're super into all the little details that make your character an individual, but when you get to the endgame stuff all you want is big numbers so you forgo the little things that used to make you happy because you're just trying to keep up with everyone else's progress to make a name for yourself/uphold a reputation. Though I suppose you can't expect them to heed the specifics when they can't even string the main plot together well.
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Further observations:
-Luke is the only one who refers to Yoda as "a great warrior" so far as I can tell. I've always heard that as the justification for the awful Yoda leaping around fighting Christopher Lee sequences, but the whole point is that Luke's wrong, and it's wonderful. Yoda is awesome. He completely subverts expectations: simultaneously Luke's and the audience's.
-I remember the "I'm not Yoda" charade going on for longer. Like, it was about as long as forever, this seemed more like six minutes. That said, the "short eternity" is still what I remember, and that meta-pacing maintains it as an awesome sequence.
-"I'm not afraid." "You will be... you will be" struck me as really weird as a kid. It continues to strike me as really weird.
"I am not a committee." Awesome. Line. It's a perfect sexual tension banter moment.
-Yoda lifting the X-wing out of the swamp is entirely banal and uninteresting... until we see Luke's reaction, which, having seen the scene a hundred times, sells it completely.
-The "floating away with garbage" scene is just about musically flawless. From the "this is a beautiful spectacle even though we're looking at garbage" to the "oh no Boba Fett" moment.
-"If you choose the quick and easy path, as Vader did." Man, the prequels would've made so much more sense if he had at any point chosen the quick and easy path.
-Yoda doesn't just talk with weird word order. He places the most important word or phrase first. "Luminous beings are we." "Only a trained Jedi with the Force as his ally can face Vader." "Reckless is he." "No. There is another." This is totally lost in the prequels where he just talks funny.
-So in the EU Wookies are awesome at repairing droids. That's stupid. The scene where Chewie is repairing threepio is much more touching if he's basically a smart animal giving it a go at repairing his robot buddy. It also explains how he could possibly put Threepio's head on backwards.
-"They weren't even asking any questions." Man, what a dick.
@Fox:
I'm just gonna leave this here...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FxKtZmQgxrI
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rofl, i linked that a little while ago and got old'd by a couple of our peers. thanks for reading my topics, dick!
you should list your commentary chronologically so i can read them as i watch the movies
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I thought they were chronological? Admittedly, I am rocking a sweet buzz.
Have you seen the Clones review? It was less spectacular, but I enjoyed.
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it's been a while so i wasn't sure. and yeah i saw the clones one but the first was definitely better. i could do without the whole hostage thing though.. maybe it's just not my type of humor.
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Natalie Portman was here
-The angle at which they show Han shows him with a curled upper lip; it's really gross and ugly looking. We've just seen Leia shout out her love, only to see her hopes dashed, and her presented with the man she loves as ugly as hell. She still tries to save him, though! It's a great metaphor for the idea of finding love in adversity.
-Leia says "it's a trap" way more than Ackbar does. Just sayin'.
-There's a really clear shot of LUke's face before he faces Vader; he is scared ****less. It's the difference between a boss fight in, say, Battletoads, and one in, say, Enter the Matrix.
-The Redletter dude makes more of Leia's impotent blaster shot at Slave I. I'll give you, she looks broken-hearted, but there's no actual shot of her shooting. It might be implicit, but... c'mon, now.
-Darth Vader leaping down stairs = terrifying. Why can he leap? He's mostly robot. Robots can't leap. Well, until the prequels.
It's sort of like the Borg cube: terrifying because it goes against the fundamental laws of kinetics.
-So where'd the Bowcaster come from? Chewie's clearly using a normal blaster rifle. Aside from being a ridiculous convention ("It's a laser powered crossbow. That makes perfect sense, doesn't it? We have laser swords")
-Nar Shadaa in Dark Forces was clearly an homage to the duel in Cloud City. Just sharing. That game ruled.
-"I am your father" could've used more buildup. There, I said it. This might come from having known the story from since before I remember things in particular, so it has never shocked me in a time when I have been conscious enough to be shocked.
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-Another KoToR point: one of the neat things is that technology basically doesn't change in the ecks thousand years between KoToR and the original trilogy. They're still using the same laser guns, the same laser swords, the same hyperdrives. The droids look vaguely different, and the freighters look vaguely different, but that seems aesthetical more than anything else. Malak's cruisers look like star destroyers, republic cruisers look like Corellian Corvettes: they figured out how to cure everything and discovered intergalactic travel, so basically have it all squared away. This is to the point that there're a couple of lunatic war-monks perpetually looking into manipulating the universal lebenskraft and to beat the hell out of one another for ideological disputes. Technology has more or less reached its zenith in laser swords and hyperdrives. Makes sense to me.
So why the hell does Anakin get a skeletor hand twenty years before Luke gets a fleshy one from the Rebellion which we know to be perilously without resources.
I admit that last one's pretty nitpicky, and relies a little bit on EU stuff, but seriously, even discounting that we know that technology has been static since KoToR days, the marriage at the end of Clones is insane. We're doubling processor speeds every two years or whatever; for over a century we've been at the pace where technology is increasing exponentially. Are you trying to tell me that twenty years earlier than ANH, during which laser swords are passe and hyperdrives are so commonplace that it's conceivable that you'd have one and not maintain it adequately, that they had more or less perfected prostheses, but it took another twenty years to perfect the technology of putting fake skin over them? In time for your wedding?
I get that it's supposed to symbolize his inhumanity, and that the reveal taking place during the wedding is supposed to stand for Padme having bitten off more than she can chew, but that's ridiculous; you know what else symbolizes his inhumanity? All the massacring. And that happens before the wedding. There's nothing ominous about the skeletor hand, because we know he becomes Darth Vader and Padme knows that he's a sociopathic killer. There is nothing remotely subtle here, and there is no situational irony. They're depicting an evil guy as plainly evil to a bunch of people who know he's evil.
You know what would've been a good shot? If his fake hand looked exactly like a real hand. Because then he's lying to himself, his wife and the audience; he's saying "I am a whole human being," but the audience knows he isn't. There's a tension; there's an irony. There's a tragic ****ing element. There's the same moment as Luke looking at his hand and thinking "****, I'm becoming my father," except he's looking at it and saying "oh, good, there are no consequences for my actions."
HE'S CHOOSING THE QUICK AND EASY PATH
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GAAAAH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
EVERYTHING MAKES MORE SENSE THAN THE PREQUELS!
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I don't have any comments to add other than that this topic is highly enjoyable.
I'm gonna refrain from delving in to an extremely elongated response simply because I don't have time. But I will say this:
Original Trilogy >>>>>>>>>> Prequal Trilogy
The OT is pure cinematic genius. I'd bulldoze a thousand puppies before I'd let my love for Star Wars die.
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I just want to add that I agree that Dark Forces rules. The sequel to its sequel, Jedi Knight II, is almost as good.
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If it's neither true by definition nor falsifiable, then it isn't important.
So I'm popping in Jedi now; but I'll admit I'm a little sober so this might be boring.
-That title crawl I do not love. "New armored space station even more powerful" is a little too camp for me. “We’re doing the same thing, but BIGGERRRRRRRRR it’s over 9000 like his midichlorian count” okay low blow.
-Oh God, it's the same opening shot as in ANH, except the Star Destroyer's not doing anything. It's just kinda there. They're just repeating the same shot from the first movie for its own sake, because it worked the first time. This is where that started. Oh no.
-[On the way to Jabba's palace] Where are the droids even coming from? Why are they walked unattended by themselves. Who did this shot make sense to?
-While slow as hell, the first few minutes of the palace scene are kinda cool; highly disorienting with the unsubtitled alien dialogue from the get-go and the freaky guards. I can dig that.
-Jabba's expression of surprise when Luke introduces himself holographically as a Jedi Knight was kinda neat, especially for an effect achieved by puppetry. Man I prefer puppetry to CGI. As I read earlier on SA: "CGI is like fake breasts. Why did they become industry standard?"
-So wait, was Luke intending to go in and kill everyone in the palace the whole time? And that's why he offered the droids as tribute? He's kind of a dick. Like he was not getting those droids back without killing everyone, and seeing as R2 is the secret leader of the rebellion, I think it's fair to say he was planning to get them back.
-I would love to know who watched the musical sequence and said "you know what this needs? More of it. This much of it simply did not do the trick." And actually I'm not really sure what "the trick" is. What's this sequence supposed to imply? Just the casual brutality of Jabba's court? I think it's a little cartoonish for that, even.
-I cared for a second right when Leia let Han out, but now I do not anymore.
-I didn't notice before right now, but Luke seems to choke the two guards on his way in. I can't tell if this is supposed to be some implication that he's going down a dark path (implicitly because he disobeyed Yoda), or if it's just that the term "force choke" hadn't been invented yet, and was therefore not yet synonymous with dark Jedi. The mind trick makes me think it's the former (since I'm assuming this is the "quick and easy path"). Sort of like trying to shoot Jabba. Or maybe it's just casual violence for its own sake.
-I wanna play Dark Forces, punch me a Krayt Dragon. I wonder if I have the disc around anywhere...
-What's the point of the rancor trainer being sad? Is it a stilted thing about violence not being the answer, because everybody's somebody's friend? Because the character has no identity or pathos, so it's not sad, but that does kind of suck for him, so it's not funny. It's there, and it elicits a response, but not a clear one.
-Is Jabba that pissed about the rancor that he suddenly wants to kill them? His motivation to go from prisoner to female genital food is really unclear to me.
-Threepio's antics are actually kind of enjoyable, especially the contrast between his pansiness and having to translate for Jabba.
-Yoda's death speech has disappointingly little impact with how it's timed and written. He mostly just babbles, but then tries to get out a whole bunch of exposition. He should babble about the force and beg Luke not to go to the dark side OR exposit. One or the other.
-Man, ghost Alec Guinness does *not* care. He is phoning in phoning this performance in. Also, how did the Emperor and Obi-Wan both foresee the same danger to Anakin from his offspring? What does that even mean?
-Han's "funny feeling" is actually a not uncommon trope in Icelandic literature. You don't get homesickness or nostalgia unless you're going to die in the coming battle. That neither he dies (a la Gunnarr of Hlidharend) nor Lando and the Falcon (a la people who have premonitions about things in Star Wars) is odd.
-I wonder how baffled was the officer who lets the shuttle crew through. Like when Vader was all "yes, let them through. I'll deal with them." He must've been all "Uh... there's something to deal with? I mean, they have a code. What is there to deal with? I feel like I should be doing something."
-The speeder bike bit is... I just kinda don't care. It's not to the point of "oh my God I don't care" but I could take it or leave it.
-By contrast the scene with the ewok I totally dig. How nonchalant Leia is about this bear thing with the spear, how friendly they immediately are. The little peeping ewok war call. I dig it.
-The rest of the ewok bit is a bit... well, it's too ridiculous for there to be much tension to the scene. That's mitigated a little bit when Threepio threatens them and they unexpectedly pile the wood faster, but it's more silly than dramatically effective. I can dig that, but there's not a lot of drama to comically relieve by this point.
-I would not have belabored the Luke telling Leia thing, if only because it's repeating exposition but not in a novel way (cf. Threepio telling the ewoks about their previous adventures; Beowulf). So I kinda zoned out because there was nothing to be gleamed for me, and now I don't know what they're talking about which is bizarre because I already know exactly what they're talking about. "Run far away" "I wish I could go with you" "I have felt good in Vader." What? What are you all talking about? Dialogue should make sense or be profound, and if possible both. It should not both be trite and have nothing to do with everything that's preceded it.
-Okay, Vader and Luke on the landing pad scene was pretty awesome. Yet I am left with the feeling that I just *really* want to like something, and I’m picking that.
-Luke: You're wrong.
Emperor: No. You're more wrong .
He's kind of taunty more than sinister. Someone of his capability really ought to be above the foppish "OOOOH. I'm afraid the deflector shield will be quite operational." He's not Herod in Jesus Christ Superstar. That’s pretty much the lowpoint of that plotline, and it immediately gets better, but c'mon, man.
-The criticism of the ewoks fighting the empire is overblown. There are plenty of shots of them utterly failing in their ridiculous tactics (trying to trip the AT-ST by holding onto a rope, all the stones that bounce off Storm Trooper armor, etc.). I find it toally legit.
-Because of the scene in which the emperor refers to Luke as "my young apprentice," for years I confused "apprentice" and "nemesis."
-The ewok's buddy dying has the same problem as the rancor trainer--I'm not sure what I'm supposed to be feeling. There's a high-speed battle happening, and we get that sad moment, and it’s sorta sad and then BAM star cruiser fight. And they blow up a capital ship. And it’s out of focus, so it’s implicitly less sad than the ewok ‘cause… why?
-Chewie's Tarzan yell? I never noticed it as a kid; it’s stupid but fairly unobtrusive.
-All of Vader's dialogue about the power of the dark side is sort of... I don't follow any of it? Yoda in Empire at least had all the eastern mysticism going, it was an ethos that was recognizable. This is just “man, being evil is cool.” I'm not even really sure what the emperor has to offer Vader, because he clearly feels vaguely conflicted, but keeps talking about how great it is to have power. The dark side has power. And uh… power.
-That said, everything after "Obi-wan was wise to hide her from me" was killer. Okay, so it’s mostly one dude wailing on an aging cyborg, but it’s cool.
-I'm not sure why the emperor decides to kill Luke in the most painful way possible. Is it sour grapes? Does sour grapes justify torturing somebody to death in front of their dad? I'm going with "he's a dick" is not a suitably profound answer. It’s just cartoonish.
-Say what you will: that redemption is not really... it's sort of an empty gesture. Like he did next to nothing. He stopped a dude from torturing his son to death. That does not make up for the other stuff.
-After the Death Star blows up: Uh... what about the Star Destroyers? So they took out the space station and the Executor, but like... they still have a space battle on their hands. And while we’re at it, I really doubt a couple of rebel commandos and some ewoks slaughtered "legions" of the emperor's finest troops. People make much of "they haven't really won the war just because they killed the two most powerful people in the empire," but damn, they hadn't won the battle. I mean, okay, suspension of disbelief, but gimme *something*.
-Y'know what? I still like Yub-nub. Not in a "better than the special edition song" which was my original reaction to the special edition song; no, I straight up like Yub-nub.
So, final verdict: the things that made the first movie so compelling (the stark good and evil, the ill-defined mysticism, the idea of scrappiness winning the day over clear advantage) sort of soured, especially when they try to make it into a profound story of redemption. Having a villain whose main motivation is being villainous doesn’t really work if you then want to reform the villain.
It’s a movie that comes after two pretty good movies, and it’s not *bad*, but you can tell that it’s reaching for the brass ring and missing. Because it’s riding a horse made of Styrofoam. And that was okay, but then it caught on fire. And they put it out and now it’s wet.
Well I'm sick of negativity.
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(Oh God I'm old)
Mwahahaha my young padawan. You haven't even scratched the surface yet. Just wait until things you grew up adoring are sold on Ebay as Old SH**.
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I'm currently watching ESB right now.
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