It portrayed his leadership as being pretty controversial, within the Jedi let alone more broadly, and in some ways even in destructive but he didn't either fail as badly or give up or abandon his friends as he did in the ST.
Is The Disney Company a hoarder that destroys our favorite franchises?
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It portrayed his leadership as being pretty controversial, within the Jedi let alone more broadly, and in some ways even in destructive but he didn't either fail as badly or give up or abandon his friends as he did in the ST.
That's interesting. I couldn't figure out why Star Wars was being blamed for killing a franchise when I thought it had revived Star Wars from the dead--regardless of one judges the current movies. But it seems that for a group of fans the franchise was continuing in comics (and still books?) and all of those were de-canonized almost immediately.
Star Wars was very much alive from 1984 to the mid 1990s. It was alive in the hearts and mind of children who thrilled to the adventures of Luke, Han, and Leia. It was alive in the fans who joyfully bought VHS copies of the trilogy, Kenner Action Figures, Marvel and Dark Horse Comics, and other merchandise. It was never more alive.
I appreciate the sentiment, but "living in the hearts of its fans" doesn't really mean it was a going concern as far as most of the world was concerned.
By that standard, DOC SAVAGE and DARK SHADOWS have never been more alive.
The way Yoda and Obi-Wan abandoned their friends to be slaughtered by the Empire and Vader for 19 years?
And, and those people were the ones who just couldn't stand the thought of SW ever being about anyone but the OT Cast. Even when that just wasn't workable anymore.
I can only speak for myself but I was always willing to accept new main characters in a Star Wars movie. I saw all the prequels and I saw the first two Disney Star Wars films.
I think the reaction when folks saw a Black Stormtrooper says it all.
That's an interesting observation, which may go a ways toward explaining how different viewers reacted very differently to Luke's portrayal in the movie.
For those of us who hadn't seen Luke since 1983, I had no trouble buying that he might be older and more disillusioned umpteen years later. We all get battered by life to some degree.
But for folks who had spent the intervening decades reading about Luke as some kind of ongoing superhero, not as an idealistic young guy we haven't seen since RETURN OF THE JEDI, it was probably a bit more jarring.
I was well aware of the EU, but never considered it canon, so the idea of Luke always on a path toward the kind of wisdom, leadership (and yes, power) was based on the character's journey in the films, not comics, novels, etc.
Was that something that happened on the world wide web?
For whatever it's worth I thought the actor who played that character did a fine job.
That's fine if they were going to keep making movies immediately after ROTJ about him rebuilding the Jedi Order and fighting Imperial Remnants and there were no time jumps.
Not so much when they wait 35 years to do anything, and Luke is in need of replacing as the new Jedi Leader because as long as he's around OT fans couldn't accept a new Jedi Hero/Heroine doing anything meaningful.
Frankly, problems with the Sequels can be traced back to how Lucas left them with very little to work with.
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I don't know. He left them with a whole fucking universe. I didn't read the EU, but, clearly there was a lot to work with if you were creative.
I think it's not what Lucas left them, it's being held to fan expectations. Fans want to see their old friends back doing the same thing again. That, to me, is the biggest obstacle. Leia having force powers, being the daughter of a dude who was created by the Force, is somehow how to far for "fans". Seriously, what the fuck?
So, it's that balance between expectations and doing something original.... that's the problem.
He made everything revolve around the original Trio too much, he killed off all the Darksiders with no chance there were other Imperial Force Users, he took out the defining enemy of SW and the hope of a new enemy in SW like Invaders from outside the Galaxy were squashed by how poorly done the idea of Non-Empire bad guys were in the Prequels. The Prequels also soured the audience on political storylines and the idea of the New Republic fighting a power on equal footing.
The MCU doesn't have that problem. But the MCU was smart enough to not make everything revolve around the same characters and wasn't afraid to expand to other leads and stories. Star Wars under Lucas wasn't smart enough to do that.
He made 1 trilogy with Luke and Han and Leia. He made another trilogy with Obi Wan and Anakin. I don't think he "made everything" revolve around the original trio too much. Besides, it was THEIR FUCKING STORY, of COURSE, it should revolve around them.
Also: the scores and scores of comics and books suggest there are a lot more stories that can be told in the Star Wars universe.
I don't know why Lucas should be blamed for OTHER people's creative decisions.
Iron Man was practically in half of all of their movies.... fuck, even AFTER he died, he's still being talked about.
Also: Marvel has made 20 some movies... of COURSE they would have to expand their roster--of course, the avengers movies still revolve around Iron Man, Cap and Thor....
Lucas made 6 (six) movies in the Star Wars movies. Only three had Han, Luke and Leia.
So, pardon my bluntness, I don't know what the fuck you're going on about, with this nonsense about "everything was about the trio."
And because of directives from him, the EU novels couldn't ever move away from them and made them the core of damn near everything. Many places which would've been great places to kill them, they didn't and kept them around when their time had long passed.
That doesn't mean you don't introduce other characters or set up new ones for future installments. Like The Iron Man movies did with War Machine and Widow, the Cap movies did with Bucky and Falcon, etc.
They always bring back the Empire and Darksiders. And they almost always revolve around the original characters.
Because he was the one who boxed them into a corner.
Yes, but there are movies where he plays no importance.
Another reason the 35 year gap was such a big problem. Too long with no growth.
Didn't they do a whole series of books about Rogue Squadron?
Didn't they do stories that took place in the OId Republic?
Didn't they do stories about the kids?
I remember seeing a book of stories about bounty hunters.
They could've taken any of those stories and rewritten them as source material for a new trilogy without Luke and Han...
And I know there was a Lando trilogy of books...
But, again, all of those books show there were more stories in the universe, Lucas didn't fail.
Lucas. Didn't. Care. About. Future. Installments. When he was making ROTJ he was planning on being done. But, he left a universe, that clearly had a lot of stories that could be told.
Jeez, he's not even a part of LucasFilm anymore and people STILL blame him for shit.
Oh, no! Won't someone think of the poor uncreative screenwriters!
Personally, I didn't feel Rian was boxed in. He fucking through the box a way and made something truly interesting.
You might have a point when Star wars reaches 20 or so films.
"Fans" don't want growth. They want Han flying the Falcon and Luke just doing the same hero stuff. The studio changed that and people FAH-reaked. So. Is that on Lucas? On the studio or on the fans?
Rogue One was a great movie that used none of the original cast. After episode 9, the plan is that the Skywalker story has been told and the next trilogy will deal with new characters. TLJ, for all the flaws in the plot, was admirable in that it defied people's expectations and took the story someplace we weren't expecting. The Disney movies have really invigorated the franchise in my opinion.
I understand that people who might have been fans of the EU or people expecting more traditional super-heroics from Luke might have been disappointed--but that is not a reason to declare that Disney has killed the franchise.
I understand that people who might have been fans of the EU or people expecting more traditional super-heroics from Luke might have been disappointed--but that is not a reason to declare that Disney has killed the franchise.
Eh.
Please don’t mistake me, I watched it about a month ago and it was better than I recall. It was probably the closest we got to an actual Star War but I believe it suffers from the majority of the characters being forgettable and from an overabundance of cameos and “hey, remember when?”s. Those in my opinion brings it down quite a bit.
The movie really lost me by the droids cameo. Let’s not even bring up that Vader scene.
On this point I completely agree. Disney hasn't killed anything.
The cameos were good for a brief laugh for me, save for Vader. Rogue One has its moments, but it is dragged down by too many characters that all die horribly. I mean, the film did well enough considering the story but that doesn't make me want to revisit it, at all.
Useless side stories that played no big role in the scheme of things.
Meaningless, because it was all in the past and it all led to Palpatine and Vader killing the Jedi so Luke could restore them.
And the OT leads dominated those stories.
Nope.
That any meaningful continuation of the series was always overshadowed by the OT leads.
And this major failing led to how things are now.
Not their fault they had nothing to work with.
No, Lucas could've done side movies back in the 80s after ANH or ESB about other characters before doing ROTJ. He just didn't care about the Universe's expansion.
It's on Lucas for not preparing fans for the day that SW would no longer be all about Luke and co.
As for Rogue One, the only reason folks like that movie is because they killed off everyone who wasn't an OT character.
Which is what they wanted in the ST, for all new characters to be killed off while the OT characters were left alone to be the only heroes of SW again.
IE, have Finn die from his injuries in TFA, have Rey be mortally wounded by Rey in TFA and then she dies handing Luke back his saber. Then she keels over on the spot. Luke doesn't give this mystery woman a second glace before taking her ship to go join the Resistance and leaves her corpse to be eaten by Porgs.
Oh, and then he finds a way of sacrificing Poe's life to bring Han back.
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