Star Wars Eps I-VI Blu-Ray Release - Review Thread

[TremblingBluStar]

Why fix something like that, or fix the matte lines and such around the old effects when you can add in "Nooos!" and make doors bigger?

Good question.

The one effect that always bothered me, and I'm not sure why, was during the hanger scene in Jedi when Han and Lando are talking in front of the Falcon and it is clearly a matte painting. I guess it bothers me because in every other Falcon scene up to that point it was always a real prop. I read here long ago that the real prop was damaged and couldn't be used, so why not use CGI to make that backdrop look more realistic?

 

[Corran Horn]

Got it...funny thing is...there are still defects...the discolored matte from the death star control scene, et al. Why didn't they fix those before adding rats and izards to the Mos Eisley scenes?

They didn't change the Death Star plans at the Yavin briefing - the superlaser is still along the centerline.

 

[Cmndr J Crichton]

I for one am enjoying Attack of the Clones right now in 5.1 surround, and High Def picture!! The Phantom Menace looked amazing. The CG Yoda actually portrayed what he was actually feeling, and thinking about the situation with Anakin, so It gave those scenes more feeling. So far, Clones looks just as incredible. The picture is flawlwess. Some scenes look like my TV is a window at times.

It seemed people were gonna hate on this set no matter what, which is a shame, cause so far, the prequels look beautiful. Even if it came with the originals in full 1080p resolution 'fans' would find something to bash. Like the audio channels, not being in 5.1, or so forth.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

People who buy this crap should be ashamed of themselves.

<Perry Cox>
Ladies and gentlemen, allow me to present...Man Not Caring.
</Perry Cox>

You're just enabling him.

Two things about that: 1) So what; 2) He's George fucking Lucas. He therefore needs no enabling.

Me, I'm glad I bought the Blu-Rays, because they look fantastic. And I love the Special Editions. So there.

 

[Cmndr J Crichton]

Now that Ive said my peace, I hope this thread is just as entertaining as the last one. You realize the complete saga is on sale for 80 bucks this week, dont you? :P Picture Palpy's voice on that last sentance.

 

[LOKAI of CHERON]

Picture looks good, and supposedly from reviews TPM looks the poorest of them all in this set.

It's the weakest transfer in the set, but the biggest improvement from the DVD's.

 

[Cmndr J Crichton]

What the heck are people saying? TPM looks fantastic!! I think it's biased.

 

[LOKAI of CHERON]

What the heck are people saying? TPM looks fantastic!! I think it's biased.

I'm not saying it looks terrible, just it's comparitively the poorest transfer in the set. It does look a little washed out, and has a tadge too much DNR for my taste - the image is sometimes just a little soft.

However, as I've said, it is a vast, hands down, improvement on the DVD.

 

[OdoWanKenobi]

The rough cut of the Cantina scene is pretty interesting. The whole thing is a lot more sparse than we're used to, and Wuher and Dr. Evezan are both speaking with different accents. Greedo is speaking English and has different dialogue. Kinda like some weird alternate universe Star Wars.

It was also great to finally see the Toshi Station scenes. They've been one of those great curiosities to me for a long time as a die hard Star Wars fan.

 

[spooky spice]

The one effect that always bothered me, and I'm not sure why, was during the hanger scene in Jedi when Han and Lando are talking in front of the Falcon and it is clearly a matte painting. I guess it bothers me because in every other Falcon scene up to that point it was always a real prop. I read here long ago that the real prop was damaged and couldn't be used, so why not use CGI to make that backdrop look more realistic?

I seem to remember there was a fire and loads of Star Wars stuff was destroyed.

Unless it's an urban legend - George Lucas had to pay for the movies himself with no studio backing, the Studio [who agreed to distribute the movies] took the profits from the movies (and presumably video and DVD, and now blu ray). George only got profits from the merchandising rights, which in retrospect turned out to be the sweeter end of the deal. He did the best he could with his budget at the time, and now that he's making money from the merchandise he's able to make the tweaks to the movies he couldn't film at the time.

I really cannot see that big of a difference between the blu ray and DVD versions of the PT, but the OT looks a helluva lot better

 

[DarthPipes]

The rough cut of the Cantina scene is pretty interesting. The whole thing is a lot more sparse than we're used to, and Wuher and Dr. Evezan are both speaking with different accents. Greedo is speaking English and has different dialogue. Kinda like some weird alternate universe Star Wars.

It was also great to finally see the Toshi Station scenes. They've been one of those great curiosities to me for a long time as a die hard Star Wars fan.

Oh yeah, those cantina accents are thick. "He don't like you!" with a heavy cockney accent.

Many of the voices were dubbed, like Aunt Beru. Wedge had a different voice every movie and they finally didn't dub the actors voice in ROTJ and it's British. Or maybe Scottish...the actor is Ewan McGreggor's uncle.

 

[cbspock]

Why hasn't he fixed the Falcon in Docking Bay 94??? How hard can it be to do a set extension and put the dish and the other mandible on the falcon???


-Chris

 

[David cgc]

Why hasn't he fixed the Falcon in Docking Bay 94??? How hard can it be to do a set extension and put the dish and the other mandible on the falcon???

That is pretty weird, especially since it was fixed literally by a guy in his garage.

 

[MacLeod]

The one effect that always bothered me, and I'm not sure why, was during the hanger scene in Jedi when Han and Lando are talking in front of the Falcon and it is clearly a matte painting. I guess it bothers me because in every other Falcon scene up to that point it was always a real prop. I read here long ago that the real prop was damaged and couldn't be used, so why not use CGI to make that backdrop look more realistic?

I seem to remember there was a fire and loads of Star Wars stuff was destroyed.

Unless it's an urban legend - George Lucas had to pay for the movies himself with no studio backing, the Studio [who agreed to distribute the movies] took the profits from the movies (and presumably video and DVD, and now blu ray). George only got profits from the merchandising rights, which in retrospect turned out to be the sweeter end of the deal. He did the best he could with his budget at the time, and now that he's making money from the merchandise he's able to make the tweaks to the movies he couldn't film at the time.

I really cannot see that big of a difference between the blu ray and DVD versions of the PT, but the OT looks a helluva lot better

I might be mistaken. But I seem to recall reading/hearing that due to costs Lucas agreed to a reduced director fee for whats is now "A New Hope" in exchange for merchandising rights. The profits from which allowed him to pay for the rest of films without backing from another studio. Fox is simple the distruibuter and gets a cut of the profits for being a distributier. Of course it is possible that they get the US profits whilst Lucas gets the rest of the world.

 

[Dream]

I might be mistaken. But I seem to recall reading/hearing that due to costs Lucas agreed to a reduced director fee for whats is now "A New Hope" in exchange for merchandising rights. The profits from which allowed him to pay for the rest of films without backing from another studio. Fox is simple the distruibuter and gets a cut of the profits for being a distributier. Of course it is possible that they get the US profits whilst Lucas gets the rest of the world.

If you watch the Empire of Dreams doc on the dvds, ANH is owned by FOX since they paid for the movie. The rest of the movies were paid by Lucas, but he still had to take out loans from a bank to make the movies. ESB famously went overbudget and the bank almost pulled the loan, so Lucas had to go to FOX to ask them for more money to get the movie completed.

Lucas completely owns the merchandising and sequel rights though. FOX signed away everything which is something a studio will never ever do again.

 

[cbspock]

Why hasn't he fixed the Falcon in Docking Bay 94??? How hard can it be to do a set extension and put the dish and the other mandible on the falcon???

That is pretty weird, especially since it was fixed literally by a guy in his garage.

Yeah, I have seen those pics before.


-Chris

 

[General_Phoenix]

The Toshi Station footage is cool to see, really glad it wasn't ever included in the movie - the film already feels like it drags sometimes, it seems like forever before they get off Tatooine.

The Wampa scenes in ESB are interesting, but I don't know how they ever would have worked in the movie. I am a bit confused, was that one Wampa that is clawing through the corridor supposed to take place at the same time as Han and Leia's argument? Just don't know where they were going with that one. 3PO removing the warning sign and tricking the snowtroopers was cool, would've loved to have sound with that one. The way Vader walks up and they just stand there is hilarious, you can imagine that one snowtrooper probably screaming for his life.

And it seems that they were trying to inject some kind of love triangle between Han, Luke, and Leia in ESB.

 

[I am not Spock]

The rough cut of the Cantina scene is pretty interesting. The whole thing is a lot more sparse than we're used to, and Wuher and Dr. Evezan are both speaking with different accents. Greedo is speaking English and has different dialogue. Kinda like some weird alternate universe Star Wars.

It was also great to finally see the Toshi Station scenes. They've been one of those great curiosities to me for a long time as a die hard Star Wars fan.

Oh yeah, those cantina accents are thick. "He don't like you!" with a heavy cockney accent.

Many of the voices were dubbed, like Aunt Beru. Wedge had a different voice every movie and they finally didn't dub the actors voice in ROTJ and it's British. Or maybe Scottish...the actor is Ewan McGreggor's uncle.

Yeah, until I watched the rough cut, I had no idea Greedo, the bartender, and the 'I hold the death sentence on twelve systems' guy were English! Why did they dub the Cockney into American English? I liked the barkeep's 'they're not welcome 'ere' in heavy Cockney.

 

[RAMA]

Got it...funny thing is...there are still defects...the discolored matte from the death star control scene, et al. Why didn't they fix those before adding rats and izards to the Mos Eisley scenes?

Because George Lucas is insane and he knows he can add in whatever bullshit he wants and not really "fix" anything and people will buy it. No offense, but you sort-of prove his theory.

I mean why fix mattes, actual mistakes like the dish on the MF and stuff like that when there's CGI bullshit to be added? Doors to make bigger for inexplicable reasons scenes that define a character to re-define and senseless CGI alien Jazzy-Blues acts to insert?

Matte lines and inconsistently colored light-sabers? Phooey!

I bought it because its on bluray and the last copy of the special editions I bought was in 1997 on vhs. Quite a different technological level between then and now. Don't assume anything. I could care less if he made doors bigger or whatever at this point. The video quality between this and the vhs is astounding(yes I compared them).

RAMA

 

[DarthPipes]

The Toshi Station footage is cool to see, really glad it wasn't ever included in the movie - the film already feels like it drags sometimes, it seems like forever before they get off Tatooine.

The Wampa scenes in ESB are interesting, but I don't know how they ever would have worked in the movie. I am a bit confused, was that one Wampa that is clawing through the corridor supposed to take place at the same time as Han and Leia's argument? Just don't know where they were going with that one. 3PO removing the warning sign and tricking the snowtroopers was cool, would've loved to have sound with that one. The way Vader walks up and they just stand there is hilarious, you can imagine that one snowtrooper probably screaming for his life.

And it seems that they were trying to inject some kind of love triangle between Han, Luke, and Leia in ESB.

Yeah, the Wampa subplot was supposed to be in ESB but the Wampa suit looked so fake it ended up getting cut out. Leia's line in ESB where she says "it could be one of those creatures" was a direct reference to it. Basically, the rebels would find out that there were a lot of Wampas in their base and it was causing havoc. I believe the rebels end up killing a wampa with a blaster bazooka.

Threepio tearing down the sign was pretty badass for him but without the subplot, it wouldn't have made much sense.

Yeah, they were definitely going love triangle in the early cuts of ESB although I think Han/Leia was firmly established as the relationship by the end. Even in the early cuts.