Star Wars VIII release date changed....

[Mach5]

http://makingstarwars.net/2016/01/star-wars-episode-viii-to-film-in-croatia/

Fingers crossed.

 

[dahj]

Apparently, the original plan was to relegate them to support roles and have Episode 8 focus on new characters.

That does not sound very plausible to me.

Imagine if A New Hope was followed up by a film that focuses on Lando with Boba Fett as the main villain...

 

[Kor]

Yeah, I think that would be quite a stretch, since we have barely gotten to know the characters.

I hope Episode VIII is grand, operatic, and darker. Perhaps Rey can lose her hand in a duel and learn something shocking about her parentage.... Oh, wait, that's too familiar.

Kor

 

[JD]

The EPVIII script is complete. Both Daisy Ridley and Anthony Daniels tweeted about receiving their scripts.

 

[Jedi_Master]

I noticed the pages aren't bright red this time.

 

[Dream]

I wonder why the three leads needed to have their screen time increased? Shouldn't they have already have had a huge impact in the script already?

 

[Mr Light]

<<Apparently, the original plan was to relegate them to support roles and have Episode 8 focus on new characters.>>

Hey, they did it in the Prequels. TPM starred Liam Neeson and Jake Loyd... AOTC starred Hayden Christen and Ewan McGregor

 

[Alidar Jarok]

TPM starred Liam Neeson and Ewan McGregor.

 

[Mr Light]

Not for the purposes of this joke

Obi-Wan is barely a side kick in TPM, though. It's not his story. It's Anakin's story, and to a secondary degree Qui-Gon's and Padme's.

 

[Alidar Jarok]

I'd argue it was as much Obi Wan's story (in fact, the prequel as a whole was). The whole point was Obi Wan following in Qui Gon's shoes and training the boy, despite his earlier reservations. The boy is just to facilitate the plot.

 

[Mr Light]

Obi-Wan doesn't drive the story, though. He's just Qui-Gon's side kick dutifully following his orders even in death. To use pretentious vocabulary, he doesn't have "agency"

And don't get me wrong, I love Obi-Wan in the Prequels. He and Yoda are the epitome of the ideal Jedi and are my favorite good guy characters.

 

[Chekov's Phaser]

Obi-Wan has agency, it just comes at the end of the movie. The death of his mentor and the taking on of Anakin as his padawan allows Obi-Wan to make his own choices, regardless of the negative consequences those have. Despite the fact that those decisions have more of an impact in the later movies, it's Obi-Wan's choices to make.

And hey, there is nothing pretentious about "agency."

 

[Mr Light]

I've just always found it pretentious when people use that word. Guess it's just me

 

[The Old Mixer]

Not to mention that he killed Maul in the climactic battle. It's an odd story choice that he's not focused on more earlier in the film, but that's Lucas and his prequels for you.

 

[Ithekro]

That was one of the complaints I hear about that movie...who is the protagonist? And why does the movie not have Obi-Wan acting like the protagonist for much of the movie?

 

[Mr Light]

Qui-Gon is the lead of the movie. He's the proactive force all the way through. He grabs the Queen and makes off with her, he grabs Anakin and makes off with him, manipulating both his mother and his owner, he takes Anakin as a Padawan over the objections of the Council...

 

[Set Harth]

Not to mention that he killed Maul in the climactic battle.

Or thought he did, at least...

That was one of the complaints I hear about that movie...who is the protagonist?

Really? I've never heard that!

(By the way, it's "proto-gone-ist" )

 

[Skywalker]

It's hard for the "heroes" to have agency in a plot where pretty much every major event is the result of the machinations of one man, to be honest.

 

[WarpFactorZ]

That does not sound very plausible to me.

I could see this working if Episode VIII was designed to be a "flashback" to fill in the mysteries of Ep VII (Rey's origins, the rise of the Knights of Ren, who is Lor San Tekka, etc...), with the aim of Ep IX being full-tilt Rey/Finn/Poe.

But it's probably a dumb marketing move to jilt your audience by not returning to them the goods you sold last time.

 

[Mr Light]

I'm expecting Ep8 to have substantial flashbacks to the Jedi Academy, taking up about a third of the screen time.