In Defense Of George Lucas

This is the man who, in the "Within a Minute" doc, made a joke about "more pixels to the personalities." He thought that was funny. The prosecution rests :lol
 
I love George, but he is at his best when he's part of a collaboration. The biggest failing with the prequels is the fact that he tried to control everything and didn't collaborate with anyone he trusts.

proof in point when the clone wars came along. I was expecting to hate it. but from that very first episode with Yoda and the clone troopers, it fixed EVERYTHING wrong with the prequels and made the universe fun again. that's how you forge ahead in the SW universe. not by rehashing old plot points ;o).
 
Watching a Trek doc on Netflix (I forget which one) I was really taken aback by how similar Gene R and GL are/were. GR started to believe his own hype, that he was a prophet, something above and beyond mere mortal, and like all powerful people who buy into their own hype, he went off the damn rails. A decade and a half of fawning over GL in the 80s/90s really must have warped the guy in some way. I mean, he didn't turn into Jim Jones or anything, but he clearly lost sight of something that makes a normal human a normal human. You see it all the time with rich, powerful people developing a warped view of reality. Oh well, we'll always have Paris.

Chaos on the Bridge.

I was surprised by that documentary. it spent the whole time painting the picture of bashing gene roddenberry, then spent the last ten minutes complimenting him. notice how they waited to release that after majel died.

but, I wouldn't be surprised if it was all true. and the same thing happened to george lucas along the way. he sat around for decades reading all the hype about him, and when he finally went back into it, his vision and mission changed
 
Chaos on the Bridge.

I was surprised by that documentary. it spent the whole time painting the picture of bashing gene roddenberry, then spent the last ten minutes complimenting him. notice how they waited to release that after majel died.

but, I wouldn't be surprised if it was all true. and the same thing happened to george lucas along the way. he sat around for decades reading all the hype about him, and when he finally went back into it, his vision and mission changed

That's the one, thanks. Good doc for Trek fans. GR and GL basically turned into Kurtz from Apocalypse Now :lol (A film I'm HEARTILY grateful Lucas didn't end up directing, btw!)
 
I realized I'd never seen Empire of Dreams and found the whole thing on youtube! [video]https://t.co/kvUuAD71Mi[/video]!

Now I need to go watch the OT again. :)
 
Listen, this whole situation is no different than Roddenberry and ST. We're not going to **** on Roddenberry on the original series, but is there anyone who can really say that the first season of TNG was really top quality stuff? I mean for god's sake, he gave us Wesley ****ing Crusher, the Jar Jar of ST. But when Roddenberry stepped aside, we saw how good it could be with someone with new fresh vision and we got the rest of the series..

Forget about Wesley. Since we're on the subject of race, take a look at how Season 1 of TNG dealt with racial humanoid aliens.

Code of Honor
The Enterprise visits a world populated solely by black people who's leaders are manipulative, murderous, resort to kidnappings, willing to let whole worlds die and openly allow disputes to be settled by fights to the death.

Justice
The Enterprise visits a world populated solely by fit, blonde white half-naked people who are so pure and innocent. As SFDebris described it, "When you create a supposed paradise that Hitler would nod at with approval, maybe you should stop and rethink things."
 
Jeyl: Don't forget, that was the time, when Marice Hurley was writing the stuff and from the BTS what I read, he was at times not the sanest guy in town with some ideas.
drcraig13:

it's rough on some cuts, but overall more bearable than anything else - and recommended is "Fall of the Jedi" Fan edits by Q2. A lot of fan edit tries to cut the "unnecessary" fat out, leaving the juicy meat.

A fan on IMDB had also made a very good take on how the PT should have looked like, without sacrificing the whole Anakin arc:
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120915/board/thread/251212461
First, let me say he is a master of concepts:

A perfect example is the Podrace:

In and of itself it was a completely brilliant, inventive action set piece. And I give George full marks for his imagination here. But awesome concepts aren't good enough. And that's where George goes horribly wrong throughout the new trilogy: The Podrace is rendered completely irrelevant to the core narrative because of 'how poorly integrated it was into the story' We don't learn any new information after it's over that could further the plot and/or develop our characters in any way. That's a cardinal sin in movie making. It's like a movie about sea pirates where our heroes take an irrelevant detour to mars for 20 minutes simply because it's still in keeping with the themes of 'adventure' and the special effects will blow our minds. -_-

What's even more frustrating is that it would have been SO fricken easy to write the podrace into the story in a much more satisfying, relevant/connective way. Without thinking for 10 damn minutes I came up with a simple solution:

Instead of Qui-Gon learning, suspecting or detecting Anakin's force abilities well before the race, have him simply think Anakin is a mere child who works for Watto. Meanwhile, Qui-Gon needs parts for his ship; check. Greedy Watto won't take anything less than 10 million republic credits in exchange for the parts. Qui-Gon in incredulous and says he could never afford that. Watto makes a half serious joke about working for him for 30 years to save up. Enter Anakin: He mentions the race he'll be participating in and suggests if he takes first, he'll give all his winnings to Qui-Gon (Forgo the whole building his own Pod nonsense) This A: establishes a good hearted Anakin where we, the audience, begin to care about him as a character and overlook his silly acting, and B: It begins to give the Podrace more weight and purpose already. Watto doubts Anakin, a mere child, could ever take first place and thus agrees to Anakin's offer. Qui-Gon is unsure of it all but suddenly goes double or nothing saying he will place a bet on the boy only if Watto is willing to free Anakin from slave labor in addition to his winnings. Watto accepts the bet on condition that if Anakin loses, Watto gets to keep him AND the winnings. Qui-Gon agrees. (This makes Qui-Gon even more likable because he's putting his own needs in grave danger) (Note: Qui-Gon's motivations for betting are actually triple or nothing! If he wins the bet, Anakin is FREE, he gets the parts he needs and he knows taking first place means there might be 'more to this silly little boy than meets the eye'.

Enter Podrace:

It is here we LEARN NEW INFORMATION along with Qui-Gon. For the very first time in the movie, we see Anakins gifts rather than simply being told of them 20 minutes earlier (per the actual movie which renders the race redundant and irrelevant from a story telling perspective) As Qui-Qui watches the race unfold from his view screen he is most astounded with Anakin's skills at such a young age and profoundly encouraged/relieved as he begins to think his fool hearty bet will pay off. Furthermore, once Anakin takes first, Qui-Gon, for the first time, suspects Anakin is truly something more than a mere child and insists with Watto that, in addition to the winnings and setting Anakin free from slave labor, he would like to take Anakin with him to Corescant for further evaluation. Watto says 'NO WAY' with the logic that although the bet included Anakin's freedom, it never put a limitation on how long Anakin could remain free. In this way, we suddenly see Watto as a clever, conniving, manipulative little '*****' rather than just a poorly written dim wit who goes back on his word for no other reason than that he just does. (poor writing in the actual movie -_- )

Qui-Gon now realizes he suddenly wants to get off the planet and with Anakin as soon as possible, not just for evaluation but for the child's safety and his own lest Watto change his mind any further. In a smart move, Qui-Gon plays it cool and 'tells Watto to simply give him the parts he needs for the ship and he'll be on his way' Anakin looks devastated. Meanwhile, Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan repair the ship with Watto's parts and plan to go back to rescue Anakin 'stealth-op' style. Watto catches the operation at some point and sicks his bandits on the trio, there's a terrifying foot chase back to the Nubian, as all is at stake. Enter Darth Maul: He shows up, kills Watto and his bandits and the trio escape in an exciting scene with lasers, lightsabers and alien limbs flying left and right.

You'll notice this 'structure' is very similar in tempo to the way the actual movie plays out but is drastically improved with some very slight modification to the writing, improving character motivations and integrating the Podrace to the story in a wholly necessary and coherent way.


my 2 cents:

After reading some of the first drafts of Star Wars (which was so badly written, I thought a 12 year old has done it), I see, that GL has the idea to create a world, taken from many sources to merge it into something new, but utterly fails at communcating it via written words. He needs outside restrictions and people, who understands, what he wanted to convey, but also has not the side-blinded views that he has. He may be the creator, but without those who were named, his ex and the screenwriter Kasdan and especially Ralph McQuarrie, he would have never been able to visualize his idea.

Gene Roddenberry suffers from a similar aspect. He created Trek from the concept "Wagontrains to the stars" and TBH, he isn't good writing, too. His pace was so damn slow, everyone was calling "The Motion Picture" infamously "The Motionless Picture". That was also very appparent, when he still had the reigns on TNG til his death in 1991. If not for outside input, we wouldn't have the Trek we know and love.

Both are suffering from grandeurism, the hype and artifical myth created around both had made both think, "I'm invincible and unfallible". Both were unable to listen to reasonable outside input when left unchecked and unchallenged.

So, I see Roddenberry as the same fallible man he really was.
 
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Minor point, but are you sure you aren't thinking of Glen Larson -- creator of Battlestar Galactica -- who wanted to do the "wagon train to the stars" thing? I thought Roddenberry had a different view.

Anyway, really interesting take on the pod race there. I think that's a big part of why I am more forgiving of some of the things that were, in my view, missing from TFA (e.g. a little exposition on the state of the galaxy, how the Senate works, who the Resistance is and why they aren't the Republic Army, etc.). Most of that stuff would've helped to contextualize the action, but it would've slowed the film down, and wouldn't have done anything to reveal more about the characters.
 
Minor point, but are you sure you aren't thinking of Glen Larson -- creator of Battlestar Galactica -- who wanted to do the "wagon train to the stars" thing? I thought Roddenberry had a different view.

Anyway, really interesting take on the pod race there. I think that's a big part of why I am more forgiving of some of the things that were, in my view, missing from TFA (e.g. a little exposition on the state of the galaxy, how the Senate works, who the Resistance is and why they aren't the Republic Army, etc.). Most of that stuff would've helped to contextualize the action, but it would've slowed the film down, and wouldn't have done anything to reveal more about the characters.

I would argue that knowing how the galaxy works and understanding what is really at stake would help enrich the characters that exist in it. If we don't know what's going on in the galaxy, why should we care about what they do in it?
 
I would argue that knowing how the galaxy works and understanding what is really at stake would help enrich the characters that exist in it. If we don't know what's going on in the galaxy, why should we care about what they do in it?

I think it's a question of "how much is enough?" We know, clearly, from the opening scene that the First Order is BAD. They slaughter civilians. Then they blow up five planets.

And, to be fair, we really don't know anything about the state of the Galaxy in ANH, either. We get some brief discussion about the senate being dissolved, local governors having direct control, and so on, but we don't really get into any clear understanding of the political state of the galaxy. We know, however, that the Empire is evil because the opening crawl says so. After that, the film is more about showing you they're evil than explaining the political aspects of how they're evil or why there's a rebellion, etc.
 
I think it's a question of "how much is enough?" We know, clearly, from the opening scene that the First Order is BAD. They slaughter civilians. Then they blow up five planets.

And, to be fair, we really don't know anything about the state of the Galaxy in ANH, either. We get some brief discussion about the senate being dissolved, local governors having direct control, and so on, but we don't really get into any clear understanding of the political state of the galaxy. We know, however, that the Empire is evil because the opening crawl says so. After that, the film is more about showing you they're evil than explaining the political aspects of how they're evil or why there's a rebellion, etc.

I don't know if it was intended to be like this to sale more books or what. But the Aftermath books do help to answer some of these questions. I know it seems weird having to do some pre reading before seeing a movie but it does help answer some questions of what is going on from a government stand point. I guess they assumed people would read these and know more about what was going on so they could have a faster pace movie.
 
I don't know if it was intended to be like this to sale more books or what. But the Aftermath books do help to answer some of these questions. I know it seems weird having to do some pre reading before seeing a movie but it does help answer some questions of what is going on from a government stand point. I guess they assumed people would read these and know more about what was going on so they could have a faster pace movie.

I don't think it's designed purposely to sell books. I think it's more that, for purposes of the film, a lot of this information isn't really necessary. It's nice to have, it's informative and interesting, but it just isn't necessary.

The closest analog I can think of is the World of Ice and Fire book that accompanies' George R.R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire books (and also the show). All that backstory is really, really interesting...but it doesn't really inform, say, Arya's motivation for studying with the Faceless Men. You don't need to know about how Aegon V became king, how his itinerant youth squiring for Duncan the Tall influenced his attitudes with regards to the commons, and how he wanted to really transform the realm to be more protective of the commons even if that meant stripping the rights from other noble houses, which in turn led him to pursue having dragons (seen by him as the ultimate trump card to beat his rebellious noble subjects or deter rebellion), which in turn led to his death and that of his heir, and resulted in Aerys II -- the Mad King -- taking the throne, and so on.

It's been a while since I watched the first season or read the first book, but my recollection is that a LOT of extra information is provided not in the narrative itself, but rather in the notes and appendices at the end of the book. Information is referenced and sometimes provided here and there throughout the books, but it's only done in the appropriate context and usually feels a lot more organic than just "BOY I'M SURE GLAD THAT THE MAD KING IS DEAD BECAUSE HE WAS CRAZY AND TOTALLY KILLED YOUR DAD. REMEMBER THAT?!"

The movie itself was already pretty long at almost 2.5 hrs. Adding in that additional exposition would've stretched it to closer to 3 hours, I'd bet. Even a 5-minute scene here or there adds up.
 
Minor point, but are you sure you aren't thinking of Glen Larson -- creator of Battlestar Galactica -- who wanted to do the "wagon train to the stars" thing? I thought Roddenberry had a different view.

Anyway, really interesting take on the pod race there. I think that's a big part of why I am more forgiving of some of the things that were, in my view, missing from TFA (e.g. a little exposition on the state of the galaxy, how the Senate works, who the Resistance is and why they aren't the Republic Army, etc.). Most of that stuff would've helped to contextualize the action, but it would've slowed the film down, and wouldn't have done anything to reveal more about the characters.

Wagon Train to the stars was part of GR's TOS pitch to the studios.
 
Huh. I guess both of them did that, then. Interesting.

Sort of...

But, as I'm sure you know, BSG was far more laced with (or influenced by) the Mormonism parallels - envisioned as a sci-fi representation of their pilgrimage to Zion, paradise, or whatever (sorry - don't know my Mormon history all too well)...
 
Sort of...

But, as I'm sure you know, BSG was far more laced with (or influenced by) the Mormonism parallels - envisioned as a sci-fi representation of their pilgrimage to Zion, paradise, or whatever (sorry - don't know my Mormon history all too well)...

Yeah, I knew that. I'm just specifically remembering Larson himself describing it as "A wagon train in space" on the E! True Hollywood Story or somesuch.
 
The older i get(currently 27), the less the prequels upset me. Do I like them, no, not by a long shot, but I'm not really mad about them anymore. I feel bad about all the Lucas bashing I have done. I look at it like this, Star Wars was his, he owned it, and did whatever he thought was best, the fanbase happened to disagree. I feel that the prequel trilogy suffered from a lack of collaboration, it wasnt any one person that man the OT great, it was a group of people working hard to bring these movies to the screen. Perhaps George Lucas thought he had learned all he could from a group effort and could apply that knowlege himself. Whatever the case may be, Episodes I, II, & III may not be what we as fans wanted, but they are what the creator of this vast universe wanted, we have to just accept that and move on.
 
The older i get(currently 27), the less the prequels upset me. Do I like them, no, not by a long shot, but I'm not really mad about them anymore. I feel bad about all the Lucas bashing I have done. I look at it like this, Star Wars was his, he owned it, and did whatever he thought was best, the fanbase happened to disagree. I feel that the prequel trilogy suffered from a lack of collaboration, it wasnt any one person that man the OT great, it was a group of people working hard to bring these movies to the screen. Perhaps George Lucas thought he had learned all he could from a group effort and could apply that knowlege himself. Whatever the case may be, Episodes I, II, & III may not be what we as fans wanted, but they are what the creator of this vast universe wanted, we have to just accept that and move on.

Yeah, I'm 38 and I look back on the degree of frustration and anger I felt when the prequels had been released and such. I guess I've just...relaxed as I've gotten older. It frustrated me to no end that Star Wars was becoming something I couldn't enjoy, but I also couldn't see past the fact that there wasn't much new content being released, rather than choosing to appreciate the old content and focus on that. I wouldn't say that my identity was closely tied to my fandom, but Star Wars had been a big part of my life up to that point, so when it went in another direction, I was really disappointed. Eventually, though, I just...moved on. The anger faded, the frustration faded, and the stuff I so loathed was less objectionable.

I still don't like the PT and view it as a wasted opportunity. I doubt I'm going to bother purposely showing it to my kid the way I will the originals and some of the other material. At least, I doubt I'll show her all of it. Maybe ROTS after she watches the Clone Wars cartoon. I dunno.

I think the Disney sale helped a bunch, as did finding some fan edits that allow me to generally enjoy the films more than I used to. That was probably my last real beef with Lucas: his refusal to release the OOT and insistence on the (poorly done -- from a technical standpoint) SEs. Now I care a lot less. It still bugs me, but I'm less concerned. (I also suspect that, at some point in the 2020s, the films will end up released, but that's for a different discussion.)


Anyway, the Star Wars universe is now on an expansionist trajectory. Plenty of it will...not be for me, I'm sure. As long as some of it is, though, I'm happy. And even if nothing is, I'll always have the originals.
 
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