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With Disney's purchase of the Star Wars
franchise, there have been a lot of online
articles on making the next set of movies, and
beyond. With these articles, and sometimes even
within them, there is the endless comments
condemning George Lucas. This wasn’t surprising
because Lucas was guilty in the past of going
back and changing his movies. If you are a Star
Wars fan and haven’t heard about the infamous
‘Greedo shot first’ controversy, than you are
clearly not as big of a fan as you think. (You
can find plenty of info on this all over the
Internet if you are interested in the details.)
Ever since then, more and more people seemed to
jump on the ‘Let’s criticize Lucas’ bandwagon
for changes made to the original 3 films. When
the prequels started, the bandwagon became even
bigger. Many older Star Wars fans didn’t like
the new movies and were not shy about expressing
it. I can’t even tell you how many times I read
or heard someone actually claim that George
Lucas had ruined their childhoods.
I can honestly say that Lucas DID NOT ruin my
childhood. Sure, some of the changes he made to
the earlier movies left me disappointed.
(Changing the Ewok song at the end of Episode VI
is one of them.) However, most of the changes
he did were to improve the special effects to
add a greater depth and reality to the movies
that he originally wanted to incorporate, but
didn’t have the time, money and technology to do
so.
Now, just stop and think about that for a
moment. Before George Lucas came around, how
many other Hollywood producers went back to
films they’d made to try and make them better?
I personally have not heard of any. On top of
that, what most people don’t know is that once
Star Wars became so popular that it spawned a
huge string of books, Lucas felt a huge
obligation to its fans. He made sure that any
author who wrote a Star Wars novel adhered to
what already happened in the movies, kept any
storyline from contradicting what was to come in
the prequels, and also kept consistency from one
novel to the next.
For me, the last one was a huge deal. I have
read dozens of Star Trek novels, many of which
contradicted other novels. There was no
continuity at all, which many times made the
book fail for me. I never had that problem with
Star Wars.
The complaints I heard about all the prequels
really baffles me. Sure, the story concepts are
completely different. Episodes IV – VI dealt
with our heroes fighting an uphill battle with
an evil empire. Episodes I – III were about the
fight to save a democracy. Two very different
story lines. There was absolutely no way movies
about the fall of the Republic could have the
same simple, innocence of a black and white
fight between good and evil. I believe therein
lies the true animosity of the older Star Wars
fans. When all is said and done, they wanted
the simple black and white and felt betrayed
when they didn’t get it. The younger audiences,
who didn’t grow up with the originals, didn’t
have the same tunnel-vision expectations. The
sad thing is, the older, complainer fans were
obviously not paying attention during the heyday
of the original trilogy. Lucas openly talked
about his intended story arc of the entire
series enough that anyone could have foreseen
that the prequels would have to be different.
Hell, I even remember an artist’s rendition of
the duel between Obi Wan and Anakin Skywalker on
Mustafar in a book of art about Star Wars that
came out sometime around Ep. V or VI. I also
remember a quote by Lucas that defined the
entire six movies as the rise, fall and
redemption of Anakin Skywalker.
Lastly, many of these same complaining fans
seem to be ecstatic by the news that the new
director of the upcoming Star Wars films will be
backing away from digital effects as much as
possible. I’ve read many complaints that the
digital characters and special effects looked
fake. Really? Obvious puppets look more
realistic? Plastic X-wing and Tie Fighters
flying through space in a formation falsely
tight in movement to one another, surrounded by
obvious matte lines is more realistic than the
fluid, but independent motion of the Jedi
Starfighers and the Vulture Droids? Depthless
explosions of plastic miniatures looks more
realistic that the ground battle on Geonosis?
Flat sets and obvious matte paintings look more
realistic than the Senate Chamber? A light
saber duel on a static set of not much more then
metal stairs is better than on a collapsing
building falling into a river of lava? I’m
sorry, but I have to disagree with these
people. Sure, if you look hard enough you’ll
find an element of two that may not look quite
real. They are far outnumbered by the elements
that bring majestic depth to the worlds and
aliens of the prequel movies.
Personally, I love all of the Star Wars
movies. I’ve watched all many, many times. The
one thing I’ve noticed, though, is when I get a
hankering to revisit a galaxy far, far away, I
have been pulling out the prequels far more then
the originals. I don’t expect to change anyone
else’s’ mind who doesn’t like the prequels.
Everyone has their own tastes, and is entitled
to them. My biggest concern is that Disney is
listening too much to the whiners, and are not
looking at the heart, depth and continuity
provided by Lucas. They need to respect ALL
Star Wars movies, as well as the novels that
followed. Not only does George Lucas deserve
this respect, but so do ALL Star Wars fans.
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