Star Wars: Episode VII: The Nerd Rage Awakens

[Enterprise is Great]

Re: New Casting and Story Rumors re: EPISODE VII

Thought this was an interesting read, if no one's seen it yet. About Ford's involvement in the movie and how (despite his well-known lack of interest in the character) he was apparently onboard as early as 2012 when Lucas first discussed the idea with him.

http://insidemovies.ew.com/2014/05/...-ford-and-han-solo-bury-the-lightsaber-essay/

Reading that makes me think that my prediction of Han Solo dying is pretty off base. I thought that maybe Ford only signed up if they killed Han off but that doesn't seem to be the case.

 

[Set Harth]

Re: New Casting and Story Rumors re: EPISODE VII

I've been skeptical of the Han dying thing for one reason: if they kill off Han right away, what are they going to do with Leia for the remaining two films?

 

[davejames]

Re: New Casting and Story Rumors re: EPISODE VII

I don't know, the fact he's got such a big role in this movie makes me think he probably does end up dying at the end.

Hard to imagine him going from a big role in the first movie back to a supporting one in the next two, for instance. And it seems unlikely they'd give him the same big role in all three movies (unless this is going to be a story about the Solo family instead of the Skywalker one, which I also highly doubt).

 

[Set Harth]

Re: New Casting and Story Rumors re: EPISODE VII

I'd say. Italy and Tunisia were obvious. Everything else, not so much.

For example, ROTS also shot in Thailand, Switzerland and China.

 

[Mr Light]

Re: New Casting and Story Rumors re: EPISODE VII

^^

Those were only background plates, right?

 

[cooleddie74]

Re: New Casting and Story Rumors re: EPISODE VII

If Episode III shot principal photography on location inside China that's the first I've heard. Like the above post says, weren't they background images later incorporated into the appropriate scenes?

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

Re: New Casting and Story Rumors re: EPISODE VII

^ IIRC, pretty much everything in Episodes II and III was CGI except for the human actors themselves, who shot their scenes via greenscreen.

Episode I had sets, but only to the tops of the actors' heads. Everything above that was CGI.

 

[cooleddie74]

Re: New Casting and Story Rumors re: EPISODE VII

The inside of Queen Amidala's palace at Theed (seen in both Episodes I and II) was actually filmed on location at Caserta Palace near Naples in Italy. It is true that Lucas and his effects teams enhanced those live shots with CGI to make the completed scenes.

 

[Hound of UIster]

Re: New Casting and Story Rumors re: EPISODE VII

And of course Tatooine. Generally for TPM they seemed to have put more effort into costumes and location shoots that AOTC and ROTS looks lazier.

 

[DimesDan]

Re: New Casting and Story Rumors re: EPISODE VII

^ IIRC, pretty much everything in Episodes II and III was CGI except for the human actors themselves, who shot their scenes via greenscreen.

Episode I had sets, but only to the tops of the actors' heads. Everything above that was CGI.

Parts of the Jedi Temple Library were filmed at Trinity College Dublin.

 

[Set Harth]

Re: New Casting and Story Rumors re: EPISODE VII

Also, some active volcano footage was shot at Mt. Etna for ROTS.

The inside of Queen Amidala's palace at Theed (seen in both Episodes I and II) was actually filmed on location at Caserta Palace near Naples in Italy.

There's also the shooting at Lake Como used in places such as the end of AOTC.

 

[davejames]

Re: New Casting and Story Rumors re: EPISODE VII

There's certainly nothing wrong with enhancing existing locations with CGI (pretty much every movie does it nowadays, after all), but I think one problem with the prequels was that nearly every location and set was either CG or CG-enhanced in some way. Which just made the entire trilogy feel artificial as hell.

I'm sure some of that will be unavoidable in the new trilogy as well, but I wouldn't be surprised if JJ and Kasdan made sure to construct their story so that it would have as few big cities and temples and prequel-type structures as possible. And take place mostly in the Outer Rim again like the OT.

 

[RoJoHen]

Re: New Casting and Story Rumors re: EPISODE VII

I've been skeptical of the Han dying thing for one reason: if they kill off Han right away, what are they going to do with Leia for the remaining two films?

Episode VIII: The Great Mourning
Episode IX: Revenge of the Wife

 

[TV's Frank]

Re: New Casting and Story Rumors re: EPISODE VII

There's certainly nothing wrong with enhancing existing locations with CGI (pretty much every movie does it nowadays, after all), but I think one problem with the prequels was that nearly every location and set was either CG or CG-enhanced in some way. Which just made the entire trilogy feel artificial as hell.

I'm sure some of that will be unavoidable in the new trilogy as well, but I wouldn't be surprised if JJ and Kasdan made sure to construct their story so that it would have as few big cities and temples and prequel-type structures as possible. And take place mostly in the Outer Rim again like the OT.

What many people tend to forget, though, is that a great number of the OT sets were "enhanced" by matte paintings, such as the Star Destroyer bridge and inside the Rebel Base on Hoth. To me, this is no different than the enhanced sets in the prequel movies with digital matte paintings. There were hundreds of actual sets built for the new movies that many fans overlook or are not aware of. Just because some of the sets were partial and then extended with digital matte paintings make them no different than the exact same thing being done in the original trilogy with traditional matte paintings.

 

[Reverend]

Re: New Casting and Story Rumors re: EPISODE VII

To be fair the original trilogy didn't have *that* much location shooting. ANH just did Tunisia with some pick-up in Death Valley. ESB just had two or three scenes in Norway. Jedi had the most with the Tatooine and Endor stuff. Besides that though, everything else (including almost every interior) was shot in the studio, with the possible exception of the odd second unit shot or plate footage.

 

[davejames]

Re: New Casting and Story Rumors re: EPISODE VII

What many people tend to forget, though, is that a great number of the OT sets were "enhanced" by matte paintings, such as the Star Destroyer bridge and inside the Rebel Base on Hoth. To me, this is no different than the enhanced sets in the prequel movies with digital matte paintings. There were hundreds of actual sets built for the new movies that many fans overlook or are not aware of. Just because some of the sets were partial and then extended with digital matte paintings make them no different than the exact same thing being done in the original trilogy with traditional matte paintings.

True, but the matte paintings in the OT were also much more subtle and less show-offy than the CG in the prequels.

 

[RoJoHen]

Re: New Casting and Story Rumors re: EPISODE VII

What many people tend to forget, though, is that a great number of the OT sets were "enhanced" by matte paintings, such as the Star Destroyer bridge and inside the Rebel Base on Hoth. To me, this is no different than the enhanced sets in the prequel movies with digital matte paintings. There were hundreds of actual sets built for the new movies that many fans overlook or are not aware of. Just because some of the sets were partial and then extended with digital matte paintings make them no different than the exact same thing being done in the original trilogy with traditional matte paintings.

True, but the matte paintings in the OT were also much more subtle and less show-offy than the CG in the prequels.

The prequels were just too damn colorful. It made the CG much more distracting.

 

[TheSeeker]

Re: New Casting and Story Rumors re: EPISODE VII

Nothing against Hamill, but I have a feeling if we see anybody in the teaser it'll be Ford. Not only because he's more recognizable but because seeing him in costume again as Han Solo would be guaranteed to get audiences most excited.

You don't think he'll have found a new wardrobe in the intervening 30 years?

I've been reading the Dark Horse comic "The Star Wars", which is an adaptation of Lucas' first draft. One thing from it that I'd love to see is Luke as "General Skywalker". He's pretty badass.

 

[cooleddie74]

Re: New Casting and Story Rumors re: EPISODE VII

Personally, I'd like to see Han in a long-sleeved jacket again. Not a copy of his clothes from the OT, but an homage to those Corellian smuggler's outfits so that Han remains visibly recognizable as the hero we grew up with but doesn't look like a guy who didn't buy one new piece of clothing in over 30 years even though he himself had aged greatly.

It's the Rebel Alliance and the New Republic. Surely, if nothing else, they can toss a new wardrobe Han's way every now and then for all he did to help bring down the tyranny of the Empire.

 

[Hound of UIster]

Re: New Casting and Story Rumors re: EPISODE VII

To be fair the original trilogy didn't have *that* much location shooting. ANH just did Tunisia with some pick-up in Death Valley. ESB just had two or three scenes in Norway. Jedi had the most with the Tatooine and Endor stuff. Besides that though, everything else (including almost every interior) was shot in the studio, with the possible exception of the odd second unit shot or plate footage.

Well I guess then the sets for the OT were more realistic and better built then the CGI backgrounds for the PT.