Lucas: "I sold Star Wars to White Slavers"

[BigJake]

Just admit it's a thing the movie did that isn't hurting it, rather than acting like it was the only possible course of action they could've taken.

While we're facing facts here: the fact of the matter is that Star Wars was already in a massive trough of creative suck -- yes yes "the prequels were commercially successful," we know, but it's long since stopped being outre to admit they sucked -- and the big question everyone was waiting for TFA to answer was whether it would ever climb out, even just to recover the basic level of quality of the previous films let alone growing beyond them.

TFA is the reset button*. It answered that question by quite literally returning the franchise to form. It's not just a thing the movie did that isn't hurting it, it's basically central to its appeal and very likely the reason it's earned the commercial and critical success it has. There are other possible courses of action they could've taken, obviously, but honestly it's hard to see that as much worth bitching about.

[* I mean, there's a simple way to understand the phenomenon. Drink in this here:

I know there are people who profess to dig the whole Detective Obi-Wan business in AOTC, and bless their hearts. If Yanni's got fans, anything's got fans**. But it's my belief that if you can identify even half the things wrong in that gif, you will achieve Enlightenment as to why TFA has gotten the reception it has.]

[** To any Yanni fans in the thread: I kid! I kid. ]

 

[Gepard]

I don't really buy the idea that this "reset button" was at all necessary. The film was going to make bank no matter what they did. All they had to do, then, to reestablish trust was to make a good movie, and there's any number of ways they could have gone about that. I'm unimpressed that they chose the safest, most by-the-numbers and downright boring way to do it.

 

[BigJake]

I don't really buy the idea that this "reset button" was at all necessary.

Nothing was "necessary." It just happened to work really well and receive boatloads of praise and money. Whether or not the money was a foregone conclusion (I would say its making a profit probably was, but its obliterating domestic box records wasn't), the praise wasn't a foregone conclusion. That it happens to be deserved means that few people are much exercised about what should have been done differently.

[EDIT: Which is not to say that I don't see any number of options for different stories they could've told. I can see lots of such options, from the great to the terrible. But given all the ways it is plainly possible to misfire with SW, I really can't be sad or angry about having gotten an amazingly pitch-perfect "derivative" adventure movie out of Abrams.]

 

[Gepard]

Nothing was "necessary." It just happened to work really well and receive boatloads of praise and money. Whether or not the money was a foregone conclusion (I would say its making a profit probably was, but its obliterating domestic box records wasn't), the praise wasn't a foregone conclusion. That it happens to be deserved means that few people are much exercised about what should have been done differently.

So you're rolling out the a.) massive box-office take and b.) critical consensus in order to refute specific criticisms? Man alive, I feel like I'm reading a post written by someone else -- Dennis, say -- that would have been aimed at you back during the height of the Abramstrek arguments. Which you would have met with the objection that mass agreement on entertainment doesn't erase that there are objective standards by which blah blah blah.

Which is not me saying you're wrong now or anything. Just...man. Talk about irony.

 

[Ithekro]

It was a given that the movie would make money. What was not given was if it was going to be any good. That it is good have made it a whole lot of money as people want to see it again and again. The Phantom Menace got that reaction because it has been so long since any Star Wars had come out, and the lightsaber fight was awesome. But the repeat viewing didn't help it seem better. It made it seem a bit worse. Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith did not get so many repeat viewings.

The Force Awakens seems to be getting better with repeat viewings from reports. It is still early though. It will be a week before I see it for the second time, and depending on who's involved I might see it a third time before it leaves theaters.

 

[BigJake]

So you're rolling out the a.) massive box-office take and b.) critical consensus in order to refute specific criticisms?

To be clear, I'm not trying to "refute" your criticism, Gep. I'm explaining to you why it's going to be of limited interest to most of the film's audience. If I was skating dangerously close to sounding like I'm equating box office and critical consensus with quality, that's my bad and I repent; I promise I'm not going to go quoting RottenTomatoes scores at you to prove that your opinion is "wrong."

(Frankly, I don't even disagree with the broad strokes of your opinion except for finding your particular spin on it rather overdrawn and hyperbolic for my tastes, and also kind of not really caring because I don't come to SW looking for deep, sophisticated and "original" storytelling. If it were otherwise, I'd be far more in agreement with you.)

Far as Abramstrek arguments of yore go: I did in fact acknowledge pretty much when I first came here that I had different expectations of SW than I did of Trek (on account of thinking they're franchises with fundamentally different core identities) and that I fully expected to have no problem with Abrams' SW efforts for many of the same reasons that I didn't care for his Trek films. So telling me that my opinion of his SW films sounds like others' opinions might have done about his Trek films is not exactly news to me... I predicted this a long time ago.

 

[sidious618]

While I liked the movie, I do agree with Gep on a macro level in regards to the approach. For me, the movie managed to skirt past danger territory because the similarities to A New Hope tied in with Kylo Ren wanting to follow in Darth Vader's footsteps.

I don't view the film as a reboot, though, more of a history repeating itself approach.

However, they can't pull this off again.

 

[BigJake]

However, they can't pull this off again.

Likely not, no.

 

[Greylock Crescent]

they can't pull this off again.

I'm a big fan of TFA (and, heck, the PT, too), and even appreciate, understand and like the intentional rehash of the OT in this film (i.e. this was the production's way of saying, "Yes, we get Star Wars and we're going to play it safe to show that we're not going to screw this up").

But I completely agree that now that the franchise has been re-energized, the next film cannot simply rehash old material. It has to step out on its own and establish its on Star Wars-ian identity.

In other words, given how the PT has received such hyperbolic criticism, there had to have been a mandate to play things safe and reassure audiences that the new trilogy would recapture the spirit of the OT - and what better way to do that than such an explicit homage to the OT? But that's not a three-film formula. Like the characters, the films have to evolve and grow from their starting point.

 

[sidious618]

I think they know that and I think we'll see more inventiveness coming up, especially with the anthology films. A lot of the comments Kathleen Kennedy has made, and she really deserves a lot of the credit, makes me a happy camper and I think I'd still be happy even if I didn't care for TFA. The immediate future looks bright for Star Wars.

 

[JirinPanthosa]

I think at least for the next twenty years, George Lucas will be to Star Wars as Stephen King is to Kubrick's Shining.

 

[Set Harth]

I think at least for the next twenty years, George Lucas will be to Star Wars as Jack Torrance is to Kubrick's Shining.

FTFY

as for what Snoke is doing, the background materials suggest the Empire was looking for the "source of the Dark Side" which was supposedly at the edge of or beyond the edge of the Galaxy.

Which is just such bullshit. ( Not to mention cribbed from the infamous SuperShadow. ) Hopefully that will remain in the "background materials" where it belongs.

The source of the dark side is the same as the source of the light side. Alec Guinness explained it in 1977.

 

[Greylock Crescent]

Nah ... a really stupid and insensitive statement born from seller's remorse aside, Lucas really ought to be in very good graces with fans. His biggest criticism during the PT was that he was unwilling to let go and let others find the best way to realize his vision. And now? He's done exactly that. True, he made an incredible profit from it, but he's finally done what a vast majority of people were clamoring for him to do.

And considering just how big a part of his life Star Wars had been, I think what he has done in letting go of his work is both praiseworthy and something that gets him a mulligan on a clearly wrong statement for which he has already apologized.

 

[The Nth Doctor]

I think at least for the next twenty years, George Lucas will be to Star Wars as Jack Torrance is to Kubrick's Shining.

FTFY

No, he means Stephen King because King is notorious for his utter hatred for Kubrick's version of The Shining despite its universal praise.

 

[ancient]

I think at least for the next twenty years, George Lucas will be to Star Wars as Jack Torrance is to Kubrick's Shining.

FTFY

No, he means Stephen King because King is notorious for his utter hatred for Kubrick's version of The Shining despite its universal praise.

King's favored adaptation sucked, ironically. Lesson learned: leave movie making to the movie makers.

 

[Galileo7]

^ True.

 

[M.A.C.O.]

The moment when you realize you sold your children to the white slavers. Hahahaha

 

[Turd Ferguson]

While I liked the movie, I do agree with Gep on a macro level in regards to the approach. For me, the movie managed to skirt past danger territory because the similarities to A New Hope tied in with Kylo Ren wanting to follow in Darth Vader's footsteps.

I don't view the film as a reboot, though, more of a history repeating itself approach.

However, they can't pull this off again.

Again, it's like poetry, it rhymes

 

[Kor]

Supreme Leader Snoke, doesn't seem to care all that much about Starkiller Base. He seems more concerned about matters of the Force. Letting Hux use the base seems to be more a way to get Ren to do something as Snoke seems to be playing Ren off Hux each time. There must be something else going on here, as this huge planet killing planetary base seems to not really matter all the much to Snoke even if the First Order spent a long time building it.

But then Palpatine built a second Death Star as a trap entirely to crush the hope in Luke Skywalker and turn him to the Dark Side while also ending the Rebellion at the same time. That he could use it to replace his first Death Star's purpose of ruling via fear seems to not be important to the Emperor. Only turning the last Jedi to the Dark Side matters.

Also, when Starkiller Base was falling apart, it had already served its purpose of destroying the Republic fleet and core worlds. I would say that one base (which might not even work anymore now that its power source is gone) is a good trade-off.

Kor

 

[Tulin]

The moment when you realize you sold your children to the white slavers. Hahahaha

How can you tell?

He looks as dour and humourless as usual!