Do you think they should/will reboot the Star Wars prequels?

[C.E. Evans]

I'm in the camp that we'll see the original trilogy remade before the prequels. I'm actually skeptical that they'll even bother to redo the prequels--they may just renumber A New Hope as Episode I and go forward from there in a rebooted Star Wars universe...

 

[Jayson1]

I don't see them rebooting the original trilogy because they are still using it. Even "Rogue One" and the upcoming Han Solo movie are connected to those films. You could easily remake the prequels and it wouldn't radically change anything unless you did some radical changes like saying the Clone Wars didn't happen or you made OB-One a female. Things that would not fit with the other movie's. If you change the original trilogy you impact everything, including the prequels ironically.

Jason

 

[Ithekro]

Considering both of their currently canon cartoon series are based heavily on Prequel Trilogy materials, I don't see them doing that at all.

 

[Jayson1]

Considering both of their currently canon cartoon series are based heavily on Prequel Trilogy materials, I don't see them doing that at all.

As good as the cartoon's are the movie's in "Star Wars" will always be more important to the franchise. First thing to go when remakes and reboots happen are books based in the universe. Cartoon's and video games are usually not thar far behind. A live action show might be little harder to erase but even they can be tossed aside.

Jason

 

[Ithekro]

And they've made great efforts into weaving all the films together, so they likely won't remake any or them. But if they do, it will be A New Hope, as pacing and otherwise, it is the most dated and oddly, the one that fits the least of the remaining films and series.

 

[C.E. Evans]

I think it definitely depends on the timing, the state of the franchise, and whoever is in charge of it at the time. And while I also believe there won't be a reboot any time remotely soon, I do think they will be eventually, especially since there's an ever growing need to reinvent or reimagine things "for a new audience" if one or two movies underperform at the box office.

 

[Prax]

I don't see them rebooting the original trilogy because they are still using it. Even "Rogue One" and the upcoming Han Solo movie are connected to those films. You could easily remake the prequels and it wouldn't radically change anything unless you did some radical changes like saying the Clone Wars didn't happen or you made OB-One a female. Things that would not fit with the other movie's. If you change the original trilogy you impact everything, including the prequels ironically.

Jason

Are you talking about like in the immediate future?

Lucasfilm sort of just did a reboot with Star Wars. They swept aside all from the previous continuity, including TV shows, and kept only that which Lucas directly made, so Episodes 1-6 and The Clone Wars 3d animated series. There was quite a backlash from this already. Can you imagine if the tried to "decanonize" any of the movies??

It would be like the Pope removing a book from the Bible. This analogy is a bit hyperbolic, but SW fans take their continuity very seriously.

You mentioned earlier the "10 planned films." When Lucas sold his company to Disney, he made available to them over a dozen story treatments or outlines for spin off movies. The movies LF/D is working on now may or may not include those. Here's what we know or have heard rumors of:

• The Sequel Trilogy(episode 7-9 confirmed)
• Another "main" trilogy(episode 10-12 rumor)
• Rogue One(confirmed)
• Han Solo...solo movie(confirmed)
• Han Solo Trilogy(rumor)
• Boba Fett movie(confirmed)
• Obi-Wan Movie(slightly better than rumor. Ewan McGregor has been approached by Lucasfilm/Disney and has publicly stated he would love to do an obi-wan movie set between episode 3 & 4.)

So that's a definite 6 films, a likely 7 or more, and a possible 12 total.

EDIT: Many people have mentioned here how much they like the Novelizations of the Prequels. I think they're really good. If you have a hard time getting into the films, I would recommend reading them instead. If you don't have a lot of time, try the audiobook instead. They're each about ten hours and probably on youtube for free right now.

 

[Nightowl1701]

The rash of fanedits we've seen of these particular films shows that all The Phantom Menace, Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith really needs is just one more run through the editor's desk, by someone (ANYONE) who isn't George Lucas. Someone faithful to the intent of the scripts, but with a better eye/ear to what works and what doesn't. And who isn't OCD about getting the movie as short and fast-paced as humanly possible.

Most of what feeds the dislike of the prequels, it seems to me, is frustration. Because Lucas was so close to getting it right. Anyone who's read the screenplays or novelizations, or seen the deleted scenes that have been released, senses there are better movies hiding somewhere in all that CGI. All the right ingredients are there - they're just not blending together as they should.

I could see, say, extended 'Assembly Cuts' of the prequels that finished and put back in every deleted scene (except where Lucas chose to change the story, which would be in its own separate section of the Blu-Ray). Fox did that with Alien3 and Alien Resurrection in their Quadrilogy set, publicly noting that it was not done with the director's input, and both turned out better for it (the former more than the latter).

 

[Set Harth]

Instead of Anakin being a literal child, he could simply be a lot less dark and jaded in spirit.

But you need to have some reason why this guy turns into Darth Vader while others don't.

they may just renumber A New Hope as Episode I and go forward from there in a rebooted Star Wars universe...

But then they'd have to make three more episodes in between ROTJ and TFA...

...that was your master plan all along, wasn't it?

 

[fireproof78]

The rash of fanedits we've seen of these particular films shows that all The Phantom Menace, Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith really needs is just one more run through the editor's desk, by someone (ANYONE) who isn't George Lucas. Someone faithful to the intent of the scripts, but with a better eye/ear to what works and what doesn't. And who isn't OCD about getting the movie as short and fast-paced as humanly possible.

Most of what feeds the dislike of the prequels, it seems to me, is frustration. Because Lucas was so close to getting it right. Anyone who's read the screenplays or novelizations, or seen the deleted scenes that have been released, senses there are better movies hiding somewhere in all that CGI. All the right ingredients are there - they're just not blending together as they should.

I could see, say, extended 'Assembly Cuts' of the prequels that finished and put back in every deleted scene (except where Lucas chose to change the story, which would be in its own separate section of the Blu-Ray). Fox did that with Alien3 and Alien Resurrection in their Quadrilogy set, publicly noting that it was not done with the director's input, and both turned out better for it (the former more than the latter).

It is a frustration. There is a lot of potential in the PT that doesn't quite land for me, and, despite the good things there, it doesn't outweigh the disappointment and frustration I feel.

 

[Jayson1]

With the time table I was thinking that the reboot would sort of be the final project connected to the offical timeline so to me this would be way in the future. After that I think the next logical step would either do something even more into the future past the Abrams movies but this would depend on just how popular these movies are over the long haul. If they are popular then you stay in the universe. If not then you remake the original movies.

Jason

 

[Ithekro]

Considering the size of the fanbase, it would be more logical to go into the distant past rather than for into the far future from the sequel trilogy. The Old Republic era.

Sure you could also expand on what happens after Rey does whatever she does and (I keep somehow typing "she dies", weird) the fate of the Republic and Jedi post-First Order/Skywalkers. But I would guess there would be enough support to do a large scale Jedi-Sith conflict type trilogy set thousands of years before A New Hope. Just start to set up the ground work in The Last Jedi and Star Wars: Rebels and other places to give hints and direction to what once was and make people curious as to what happened? Why were the Jedi so different from what we see from Luke or the PT Jedi Order? Why did the Sith even have these huge super weapons in the first place? Those sorts of things.

 

[Jayson1]

Considering the size of the fanbase, it would be more logical to go into the distant past rather than for into the far future from the sequel trilogy. The Old Republic era.

Sure you could also expand on what happens after Rey does whatever she does and (I keep somehow typing "she dies", weird) the fate of the Republic and Jedi post-First Order/Skywalkers. But I would guess there would be enough support to do a large scale Jedi-Sith conflict type trilogy set thousands of years before A New Hope. Just start to set up the ground work in The Last Jedi and Star Wars: Rebels and other places to give hints and direction to what once was and make people curious as to what happened? Why were the Jedi so different from what we see from Luke or the PT Jedi Order? Why did the Sith even have these huge super weapons in the first place? Those sorts of things.

This also sounds like a viable idea but the one disadvantage to it is that you can't use any characters from the Abrams movies in the same way they have used already established characters from the original trilogy.

Jason

 

[DigificWriter]

The rash of fanedits we've seen of these particular films shows that all The Phantom Menace, Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith really needs is just one more run through the editor's desk

Wrong. What they show is a lack of respect for - and understanding of - what the Prequel Trilogy's narrative was intended to be, and an attitude of entitlement that is bigger than Donald Trump's ego (and just as flimsy).

 

[Hound of UIster]

But you need to have some reason why this guy turns into Darth Vader while others don't.

He wants the power to stop death and to control life/death on his own terms and his mentor who is the last Lord of the Sith makes him an offer he can't refuse: if only he would abandon his allegiance to an Order that he has grown increasingly frustrated with and whose rules he doesn't necessarily agree with.

 

[fireproof78]

Wrong. What they show is a lack of respect for - and understanding of - what the Prequel Trilogy's narrative was intended to be, and an attitude of entitlement that is bigger than Donald Trump's ego (and just as flimsy).

Intention does not equal a great story or film or trilogy.

 

[DigificWriter]

Intention does not equal a great story or film or trilogy.

Given that it's a factual reality that the vast majority of both general audiences AND Star Wars fans have a positive opinion of the Prequels, the argument that a vocal minority can get away with imposing their own notions of what does or does not constitute good storytelling and engaging in disrespectful and who-driven actions by trying to 'fix' things that aren't actually broken holds zero legitimacy.

 

[fireproof78]

Given that it's a factual reality that the vast majority of both general audiences AND Star Wars fans have a positive opinion of the Prequels, the argument that a vocal minority can get away with imposing their own notions of what does or does not constitute good storytelling and engaging in disrespectful and who-driven actions by trying to 'fix' things that aren't actually broken holds zero legitimacy.

The fundamentals of storytelling are always legitimate places for comment. The general public also has a generally positive reaction to the Transformers films as well. So, popularity does not automatically equal good storytelling.

It isn't disrespectful to have an opinion on a work, or remark on how it does or does not work for that individual. It's a matter of personal preference, and the opinions that I have happened to be shared by a wide variety of friends of mine, reviewers, commentators and Hollywood professionals.

I have found more commentary against the PT than I have found for it, and actively have to seek out more positive comments or reviews.

ETA: I should also note that I have no issue with people who like or don't like the PT or any film, for that matter. The argument that because someone does not like a film means there is something wrong with them is a rather tenuous foundation for criticism. It's basically telling me, "Because you don't like the PT, and others do, there is something WRONG with you."

 

[DigificWriter]

As a point of clarification, I'm not speaking out against disliking the Prequel Trilogy; I'm primarily speaking out against two things:
1) The notion that the Prequel Trilogy is universally hated (which is demonstrably false)
2) That the vocal minority that dislikes the Prequel Trilogy has the right to pass off their own ideas about what "should've" been done with the Prequel Trilogy as being rooted in some kind of universally accepted truth/fact by "fan-editing" the movies and/or claiming that they, and only they, truly understand what the Prequels "needed" in order to be "successful", especially when the films were in fact ALREADY successful.

 

[Nightowl1701]

1) If they were truly universally hated, the faneditors wouldn't be bothering trying to fix them - there's no point in trying to polish a turd. Clearly Lucas did something right with them; people just want them to be even better. We're now into Act III of this Trilogy of Trilogies, and Act I is still out of sync with Acts II and III.
2) I admit, some faneditors do go too far. If I were to fanedit them myself, I wouldn't be trying to reinvent the wheel. The story is the story, like it or not, midichlorians and all. It just could have been told with a bit more clarity and focus.

Those films were successful because they had the Star Wars name, because there was quite a bit of good amid the bad, and because these stories had been eagerly awaited for decades and the fans were so emotionally invested in them that they wouldn't LET them be a box office failure (much like this fanbase and a certain film from 1979...).