Suppose you had written PHANTOM MENACE?
Posted on 14 January 2012
I am no Lawrance Kasdan. Let’s get that straight from the beginning.
But I am a fan of STAR WARS, so the fact that I am an obscure midlist science fiction author should not disqualify me from answering the question all fans are allowed, nay, required to answer: if it were given you, fanboy, to have written Episode I of Star Wars, what would you have done differently?
First, no Jar-Jar. I thought he was too much like Stepin’ Fetchit. The humor in the first movie was not centered in one comedy relief character: all the characters, robots and farmboys and princesses and lovable rogues alike had some good one-liners.
Second, no Midichlorians. If we must have a scene where Qui-Gon discovers the boy Anakin is bursting with secret talents, I would have Qui-Gon clutch his head and announce that he had a vision showing that this boy is all-important, whereas Yodi had a vision that the boy should be killed, and, to prevent a child murder based on nothing but pre-crime oracular evidence, Obiwan spirits the child away to the Planet of Silence, realizing that to fail to train him would be tantamount to allowing him to be spiritually corrupted by forces he cannot control.
Unwillingly at first, but then pleased at the child’s growing mastery of the Force and willingness (apparently) to do good, Obiwan unwisely takes him to the Haunted Dyson Sphere surrounding the Black Sun. It is then that Anakin has a vision, and see his destiny, and, instead of fearing it, embraces it. But such is his mastery of strange powers, that he can hide his own true evil from even the mental perception of his mentors….
But this all assumes I would go with the idea of making the story about Anakin.
Bosh on that. Do you watch FLASH GORDON prequels hoping to see a youthful Ming the Merciful, adorably cutie-pie boy prince, slowly (or suddenly) corrupting himself into a leering Space Fu Manchu? That is soap opera stuff. This should be space opera.
Nope, nope. I would have made Obiwan the main character, and made Anakin a bad egg from the get-go, having the story start with him already the trusted but treasonous apprentice of Obiwan.
There are any number of old serials where the plot concerns some group of scientists or businessmen who are being killed off one by one by some dramatic villain, never knowing nor suspecting that the villain is actually one of their number, who sits in on the meetings, makes suggestions, and knows exactly what the hero’s plans are to catch him. He always sets up a trap, or sends his henchmen to avoid the trap, and there is always a Donnybrook where every piece of furniture ends up broken. In this case, all Vader has to do to assume his other identity is take off his mask. The fact that Skywalker the Jedi is secretly the Dark Lord should be a surprise and shock for Obiwan.
To ramp up the drama, I would establish, like the Black Prince Kourai in the immortal SEVENTH VOYAGE OF SINBAD, that each and every time Vader uses the dark side of the force, it damages his body and soul, so that he has to keep replacing his failing organs with more and more machinery.
Vader and Palpatine, and the ENTIRE Sith order, which includes thousands of individuals from thousand of races about the galaxy, conspire for the overthrow of the Senate and the erection of an Empire, and use their mind-powers to force Senators to vote for foolish laws, to start feuds among the Patrician families, to encourage the ambitions of dangerous admirals, and spread discontent among the plebeians.
They kidnap and replace high ranking space princesses with clones, as well as admirals and judges and senators, duplicates so exact that only the Jedi can sense anything wrong with them. The clones of the Clone Wars were never soldiers fighting on the side of the Republic, who would never use such abhorrent technology: they were invaders as loathsome as the Skrull, an invasion of body snatchers.
The first act of the Senate-clones, upon achieving power, is to turn public opinion and the force of the law against the Jedi, the only people who can sense that they are clones.
When it is discover that the core of the galaxy is exploding, the panicked commoners demand that one supreme leader be placed in charge of the ineffectual and feuding Senate. The lonely voices of the Jedi, now falsely accused and hiding in scattered corners of the galaxy, calling for adherence to the constitution and the ancient traditions are shouted down.
The trusted and loved Jedi Anakin Skywalker warns the hidden Jedi council that some new enemy is hunting down the Jedi one by one — a creature called Darth Vader, who seems to have strange powers, almost like a Jedi himself (but that is impossible!) — and so he asks Yoda, the master of Obiwan, to give him the coordinates and addresses of all the safehouses where the Jedi are safely tucked away from the anger of the public …
Unbeknownst to Anakin, Palpatine has not only made clones of his enemies, but also of any lieutenants that may prove too powerful. Luke is not the son of Anakin in a normal sense, but is his clone. As the vision in the tree will later prove, Luke *is* Anakin.
Which means I would have the middle aged Mark Hammel play the role.
So: my opening word crawl goes something like this:
THE GALAXY IS DOOMED!
BILLIONS OF STARS OF THE GALACTIC CORE HAVE EXPLODED INTO SUPERNOVAS, OBLITERATING WORLD AFTER WORLD IN FIERY DEATH!
IN THE SECRET MONASTERIES OF THEIR ORDER, JEDI MASTERS HAVE SENSED AN DARK INTELLIGENCE BEHIND THE CATASTROPHES!
PALPATINE, THE NEWLY-ELECTED ‘SUPREME CHANCELLOR OF PUBLIC SAFETY,’ GRANTED ABSOLUTE POWER DURING THE CRISES BY A FOOLISH AND FRIGHTENED SENATE, HAS COMMANDED THE JEDI NOT TO INVESTIGATE THIS STRANGE VISION!
DEFYING THE COMMAND, TWO JEDI, QUI-GON AND HIS APPRENTICE OBIWAN, FLY IN RADAR-INVISIBLE STEALTH BATTLECRUISER <em>PHANTOM MENACE </em>TOWARD THE ONE PLANET WHICH MAY HOLD THE ANSWER, THE DREAD AND DREADED <em>SHATTENREICH</em>, LONG DEAD THRONEWORLD OF THE EVIL SITH….
THEIR DESPERATE FLIGHT IS BEING OBSERVED BY HOSTILE EYES…
Okay. It is not great. But compare it with this:
TURMOIL HAS ENGULFED THE GALACTIC REPUBLIC. THE TAXATION OF TRADE ROUTES TO OUTLAYING STAR SYSTEMS IS IN DISPUTE.
HOPING TO RESOLVE THE MATTER WITH A BLOCKADE OF DEADLY BATTLESHIPS, THE GREEDY TRADE FEDERATION HAS STOPPED ALL SHIPPING TO THE SMALL PLANET OF NABOO.
WHILE THE CONGRESS OF THE REPUBLIC ENDLESSLY DEBATES THIS ALARMING CHAIN OF EVENTS, THE SUPREME CHANCELLOR HAS SECRETLY DISPATCHED TWO JEDI KNIGHTS, THE GUARDIANS OF PEACE AND JUSTICE IN THE GALAXY, TO SETTLE THE CONFLICT….
Oy. Wake me up when a real STAR WARS movie gets made, okay?
How about working with the movies? They were pretty good for half of the arc. I like the idea of poor old Count Dooku getting it right, trying to save the Jedi and the Republic, but cut down by the council, who have become too hide bound to listen to “traitors” who have left the Order. I liked the story they came so close to telling, of Anakin as a Force using John Brown, who breaks with the Jedi, who have become jaded, “Pro-Choice” when it comes to the plague of Slavery……
The strategy of the Dark Side, in Star Wars, is completely incomprehensible to me. Dooku, the leader of the Separatists, tells the Jedi that the Senate is under the control of a Sith Lord, yet Dooku is supposed to be the apprentice of Sidious. Then, we learn that the Dark Side has been secretly raising a clone army, without the knowledge of the Senate: a clone army that will be used against the Separatists, the same Separatists run by Darth Tyranus, who is also Dooku. Huh?
In a later episode, the Separatists kidnap Palpatine, who staggers about looking useless, until the Jedi rescue him. But Palpatine is supposed to have all sorts of awesome dark powers AND he is secretly running the Separatist operation, anyway.
Then the Jedi fight Dooku, with Palpatine watching, and Dooku fails to mention that Palpatine is the head-Sith-in-charge. Even when Palpatine tells Anakin to kill Dooku. Really? Either, Dooku is a traitorous Darksider, who would gladly betray Palpatine, or, he does want to expose the evil controlling the Senate.
Let’s not even start on Anakin, who signs on to the Dark Side, to save Padme, and gets burned. Then the Rebel Alliance fights the evil Empire. Are they allied with the Separatists? I thought the Separatist were bad guys. The robot troops used by the Trade Federation/Separatist team disappear.
I certainly don’t mind a story with villains, but the villainous plot must be something vaguely comprehensible. Perhaps there is a Jedi Master here, who can explain just what is the Dark Side’s plan. Help me, Obi-Wan, you’re my only hope.
You bring up some good points, but a few are easily batted away.
First, Palpatine obviously set up the whole kidnapping. Convoluted plotting on Lucas’ part. But the bad part about this is it makes Anakin even more mind blowingly stupid since he fails to piece this together a little later when Palpatine reveals his identity. “Hold it, you faked your own kidnapping so I would kill your apprentice? Hold it, you are behind both sides of the conflict? Ah, well let’s kill some younglings!”
I think the point was that Palpetine orchestrated the whole kidnapping to lure Anakin to a position to kill Dooku, stepping him closer to the dark side. Dooku was obviously under different impressions to the whole set-up and was probably just supposed to be shocked that he was the dupe. The bad part about this as plot is we have to infer this instead of it being somewhat clear. And I could be entirely wrong. It is entirely possible, to me, that Lucas could read this and go, “ah, yes! that is what I intended!” and then walk away wondering what the hell the scene was supposed to be when he filmed it.
Of the Separatists. Palpatine gave the order, on film, for all separatist units to shut down, and he gave the order to Vader to slaughter all the separatist leaders. The rest would have just involved junk yard dealers, and the galactic recycling program.
This is not to say I would have plotted Phantom (nor the rest of the prequels) anything like Lucas did. I start from the same premise as Mr. Wright does, the story is not about Anakin. I think that was the main fault of the prequels that ran through all the convolutions and plot holes.
Or, at the least, give us some reason to sympathize with the beast. It should, if he was going to follow the line from Return of the Jedi, have been an apologia for Darth Vader. For a man that participated in the deaths of billions of people, we would need something quite extraordinary – very, very extraordinary, which would have required making Palpatine twice the villain of the originals. Mind control, or perhaps machine-mind influence once he was in the suit. But what would not work is some pouting chosen child who misses his mommy and then freaks out over a death dream about his lover.
But then I would just put the machine-mind thing in there at the end – something horrific that gives gravity and justification the end of the original trilogy. But it would be in a grander scheme story.
Mr. Wright, do you have, in the dark recesses of your desk, or on a floppy, a more detailed treatment of your version? You have one, don’t you? Perhaps from 11 or 12 years ago?
“Mr. Wright, do you have, in the dark recesses of your desk, or on a floppy, a more detailed treatment of your version? You have one, don’t you? Perhaps from 11 or 12 years ago?”
No, this was just what I tossed off the top of my head while I was typing the blog entry. Why would I take the time to do a detailed treatment of a movie that was already filmed and terrible?
FOR A BETTER AUTOPSY of everything wrong with the Prequels, see here. You can learn more about the basics of film making and story telling from here than you can from film school or a writing workshop:
http://redlettermedia.com/plinkett/star-wars/
Yes, someone spent 260 minutes of film to discuss 270 minutes of film. There reviews are as long as the original trilogy.
Ugly Humor warning: the review is brilliant in my opinion, but I am annoyed to nauseated by jokes about killing wives and prostitutes in the basement. I wish Plunkitt would produce a non-nauseating version of his reviews for public consumption.
I agree, the nauseating humour is unfortunate. It does serve one purpose, though: to underscore the idea that this Plinkett character, senile psychopath though he is, has a better understanding of normal human psychology than Lucas. That is a very dark joke, but one that made me, for one, cackle repeatedly with glee.
I thought he was also gently reminding us fanboys that our obsession with STAR WARS, which is, after all, just a movie no more dignified than FLASH GORDON serials starring Buster Crabbe, is outside the psychological norm.
Also true. I have met creatures almost as strange and repulsive as Plinkett at cons.
Well I just meant more detailed, like a couple of pages, not a full blown treatment or anything. Although what you came up with off the top of your head was better than what Lucas came up with. That would be a compliment if the bar wasn’t resting its entire weight on the floor.
I recommend the Plinkett reviews all the time. Not only are they devastating critiques, but, like you said, they are worthy lessons in film, and writing themselves.
I have to agree with Mr. Simon on the humor. And add the jokes, as I see it, are not meant to be funny of themselves, but in the context of the review of the film although sometimes overplayed. Plinkett plays not only someone of ill education (the mispronunciation of common terms), senility, but also entirely deranged. The dumb, senile and crazy man understands film and story structure better than not only George Lucas but all his yes men, and most of his audience. Although I can understand it being too much for some people, I found it rather enjoyable.
Well, it’s tricky. First, the Sith are already in charge. Having the skill, power and resources to secretly build two armies is not something even an average dictator can do. So why have a war at all? The answer seems to lie in how Sith powers work. The Jedi seem to be able to quietly “guide” people when they (the people) are calm. The Sith seem to be able to control people who have lost control of themselves, who “feel their Anger”. Nothing like at messy Civil War to make people angry and keep them angry. So if Palpatine can set up a Belfast situation, he will achieve the dream of dictators everywhere and control not just an outward show of loyalty, but Body, Mind and Soul.
You raise a good point: Why, if you can bsecretly build two armies, would you then have them fight each other, when you could have them unite and take over the galaxy? Although, being in charge, and then generating a crisis to have the senate or parliament or reichstag vote you more poewr has its real life equivalents.
It’s worse then that, because you have already united the galaxy, have the only armies around, and no one knows. Shades of the Psychohistorians! What more power do you need?
“The strategy of the Dark Side, in Star Wars, is completely incomprehensible to me…”
My I be blunt? Really, really blunt?
The reason why the strategy of the Dark Side is incomprehensible is because George Lucas is a flaming politically correct HAN SHOT SECOND style Lefty leftist.
Leftist can write stories about the decline and fall of galactic empires is the backdrop, but they cannot write stories where that corruption is part of the plot, because they do not know, and they have no mental tools to allow their brains to grasp, the source and cause and motive and consequences of corruption. That requires moral clarity, the one thing from which Leftist flee as vampires flee crucifixes.
Likewise, a Leftist cannot write a story about the corruption and downfall of a hero to a villain because they have no mental tools to allow them to grasp the nature of heroism or of villainy or what the psychological causes of temptation and sin might be. Those words are all null-spots in their thinking. There is no sin in the Leftist universe, aside from racism and sexism and homophobia. Everything else, including cannibalism, is permitted.
When a Leftist tries to write such a story, he has the Empire decline and fall because Big Business interests and Bankers and Trade Federations lead separatist rebels, causing dissent, but they are pawns of a conspiracy of Some White Guy, whose motivation is evil for the sake of evil, and the poor silly and foolish proles (Leftism is always elitist at its root, contemptuous of democracy) cannot keep their parliaments in running order.
When a Leftist tries to write such a story, there are heroes on both sides, and only a Sith speaks in absolutes.
George Lucas did not know and cannot tell you what causes empires to fall, or young men to turn corrupt, and so he could not put that into his movie.
Could this be a reason why the “utopia justifies the means” -type of villain is so rarely found in movies? As a history student and geeky film lover I’ve often wondered about this – the Robespierre personality is common in real life, novels, manga and anime, but very rare in Western films. The type of villain who is not born evil, who is not greedy or sadistically evil for evil’s sake, but absolutely certain that he is doing the right thing and that he knows best what’s good for other people and the society.
Would this be a bit too close to home for film directors? Artists are often drawn to totalitarian ideas and have been always fanboying dictators and failed utopian attempts.
Star Wars EU has a whole selection of this sort of characters, but not the unfortunate prequels.
I would have made the prequels more about Obi Wan Kenobi and would have had Anakin either as first good guy who starts doing evil things and falls because of his totalitarian impulse or a evil schemer to begin with. I like both types, but not the confused whiny film-Anakin.
I’m not expecting Star Wars to be wonderfully deep and philosophical about these issues – just to offer some enjoyable characters (like the first films did) and escapism.
Unfortunately personal experience tells me that the contemporary leftist, especially in America, does answer to your description – and you still don’t mention the hysteria, the wild-eyed hatred, the incapacity of seeing oneself that leads one to consider oneself the ultimate in toleration even as one breathes hatred and denial from every pore. I can’t help feeling, however, that this is a modern development, and that the left of times past had plenty of morality – too much, if anything. Jack Kirby was quite left-wing, as I showed in this essay – http://fpb.livejournal.com/315626.html , http://fpb.livejournal.com/315752.html (I had to split it in two because of LJ space restrictions), but his pictures of evil, from gangsters to gods, are universally admired.
“I can’t help feeling, however, that this is a modern development, and that the left of times past had plenty of morality…”
I agree. It is a modern pathology, the by product of shifting their philosophical basis from an affection for things modern, for progress and science, to an affection for things nihilistic, non-judgmental, relative. Franklin D Roosevelt and Truman (and Jack Kirby) and those of of the Left in his generation displayed none of these characteristics. All these men were stalwart patriots, and the men who made the film above were no doubt Democrats of their day and age.
The Left of times past were on what is now the Right, that is, in favor of the equality of all men.
In Lincoln’s day, it was the Republicans who were the abolitionists and the Democrats who were the secessionists — and as Mark Twain (not a man I would otherwise trust for insight, being blinded with cynicism) correctly remarked, the secessionists of that day were infatuated with yet another simple and simply false idea, much earlier than communism, the romance of the knightly gentleman as seen in Scott’s IVANHOE.
– you are the historian, not I, so I welcome any correction if I am wrong here.
In Lincoln’s day, it was the Republicans who were the abolitionists and the Democrats who were the secessionists — and as Mark Twain (not a man I would otherwise trust for insight, being blinded with cynicism) correctly remarked, the secessionists of that day were infatuated with yet another simple and simply false idea, much earlier than communism, the romance of the knightly gentleman as seen in Scott’s IVANHOE.
Having made some study of that period, and of Twain’s particular claims, I have only one distinguo to offer. That is that Scott never actually put forth the romance of the knightly gentleman as an ideal; he merely presented it as a myth-system or belief that the ‘knightly gentlemen’ did in fact believe to be true of themselves. Scott was the first novelist ever to make an honest effort to portray historical personages as men of their own time, with the beliefs, ideas, habits, and mores of their time, rather than as modern men in fancy dress. Twain, like a great many Americans of his time (and ours), had no historical sense and imagined instead that Scott could only be talking about eternal verities, in which case he was talking obvious rot.
After reading A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court, I wonder if Twain really is the right person to judge the effects of chivalry. It’s something about the way he chose for his narrator a thick-headed lunk who could have been dropped in the middle of a Camelot that was all its most starry-eyed admirers thought and would have still regarded it with contempt.
When we read it in ninth grade, we all thought it a satire on the Yankee.
Then Woodrow Wilson was even earlier than FDR and Truman, and is the reason for segregation. The feds jumped on Jim Crow whenever it reared its ugly head, until Wilson come into office and set about segregating the federal government instead of swatting segregation down.
Things seldom fall into neat epochs
[...] Mr. Wright has a great discussion underway called Suppose You Had Written Phantom Menace? Well, suppose I have, many times. That is a discussion I could partake in with a ferocity merely [...]
Predictably, I like your version better. But then, A, you’re one of my favorite writers, and B, most everything can improve upon the Phantom Menace.
One of my biggest complaints, aside from Jar Jar and all the obvious nitpicks, is in the handling of the Clone Wars. Reading Zahn’s Thrawn trilogy, you got the impression of the Clone Wars as something horrible– and clones themselves being something unnatural. I seem to remember Luke being sickened by their presence.
Cut to the “official” version of the Clone Wars– and I’m still not sure who the wars are being fought against. (Which might be, granted, because I’ve avoided that time period of Star Wars in total disgust, refusing to accept it into internal Josh-canon.)
I am more than happy to use the Knights of the Old Republic games as my prequels: You get tons of Jedi who are actually amazing, fighting tons of Sith, who are actually intimidating. Plus, the Starforge, which I found far more intimidating than the Death Star.
But then, BioWare’s proving to have a better grasp on Space Opera than most film and TV makers, anyways.
I am more than happy to use the Knights of the Old Republic games as my prequels: You get tons of Jedi who are actually amazing, fighting tons of Sith, who are actually intimidating. Plus, the Starforge, which I found far more intimidating than the Death Star.
Same here. I wish Lucas had ceded the storytelling to others ages ago, Expanded Universe notwithstanding. He could’ve had his cake and eaten it too, if he had just loosened his grip on the reins.
I wouldn’t even attempt to salvage the original storyline. That was a hash. Instead, I would’ve told of the origins of the Jedi and Sith. The first in the new trilogy would’ve covered in the first Force users on the galaxy and the discovery of the Light and Dark side. You could play around with Force use, making it more primal and less refined.
The second would’ve been the creation of the Jedi Order and the schism that lead to the Sith, with a despairing Jedi Master determining that strength was needed to impose order to hold back chaos in the galaxy and thereby preserve life (note the corruption of Jedi philosophy, such as it is). He breaks with the Order and goes off to train his own apprentices, his good intentions paving the way for disaster.
The third would cover the first encounter between the Old Republic and the original Empire. The Sith Lords emerge from beyond the edges of known space to conquer the Republic. The Jedi, for the the first time, must face trained Force users like themselves.
I like it. All you’d need to add is a vampire sun that cruises the galaxy at faster than the speed of light, swallowing planets filled with screaming populations, a robot revolt, and the mythical discovery of the first light saber being held up by an arm clad in shimmering samite from the roaring great red spot of a storm-wracked gas giant, and we’d really have a script.
What? No magical ninja gunfighter beautiful space princesses with evil eye makeup? How can you have a real space opera story without magical ninja gunfighter beautiful space princes with evil eye makeup?
You could have aethereal alien swordfighting space princesses with acres of visible cleavage. This would be my own aesthetic preference, which, needless to say, is high and holy and entirely uncontaminated by any low biological interest in visible cleavage.
Sounds pretty awesome, but I must disagree on one point. To help reinforce Luke’s statement that there is “still good in him”, and Obi-Wan’s “he was seduced by the dark side”, it is necessary to show Anakin’s goodness and then his seduction by the dark side. The big problem I have with the prequels is that Anakin’s characterization makes his fall seem inevitable (I know it’s a prequel, but if these were the first movies, you could still see it coming a mile away) rather than tragic. The first movie would need Anakin and Obiwan as main characters to establish Obiwan as a legendary Jedi and Anakin as the best starfighter in the galaxy. In the second movie Anakin would begin to start down the slippery slope of good intentions, and by the third movie would be completely turned to the dark side. His descent should be like what would happen if Gandalf took the One Ring, or if Harry Dresden decided to embrace his decisions in CHANGES and abandon his morals, or like Lelouch’s transformation in Code Geass.
Hmmm…rewriting Phantom Menace…
Okay, two possibilities. Both are more rewrites of the whole prequel arc, one far more radical than the other.
Option 1, the minor rewrite:
Keep the general structure intact, but make Anakin a terrifyingly powerful Force user, whom no-one wants to correct until it’s too late – the prophecy of balance, natural inertia, disbelief that he’s actually falling to the Dark Side (some Jedi might not even believe that’s possible; they’d become so complacent as to casually use their powers to alter other’s minds at a whim (‘You want to stop selling drugs and change your life’)). His unrequited love for Padme drives him further and further to the Dark Side, which Sidious manipulates. By the time it’s become too obvious to ignore any longer, it’s far too late – Anakin is incredibly powerful, driven by hate, fear and denied love. Palpatine is the father figure that Obiwan failed at being. Strength is all that matters, the Empire must be created, and the traitorous Jedi must be hunted down, they’ve abused their position and powers for far too long!
Option 2, the major rewrite:
All is the same through the first movie; nearly everyone is incompetent, complacent or both. Palpatine, forseeing Maul’s failure, is there to recover his body and save what useful parts he can. Eyes, brain and most of the spinal cord are installed in a powerful, agile droid body, who goes on to become the leader of the Separatists droid armies, and Jedi hunter – Grievous. Grievous/Maul realizes that he’s been manipulated, used, and now is locked in a horrific existence. The droids, however, are not what he expected. Fear, hate (as shown by the battle droids), belief in a greater power (‘Thank the Maker!’ says C3P0), willfulness – all the same things that a good Sith would believe in. Himself enslaved by Palpatine, he sees the droids as enslaved by the organics, and is not far wrong. The Separatist, and Palpatine’s, plans collapse as Grievous/Maul leads the droid armies in a crusade/jihad of conquest and slaughter. The clones, unsure of their loyalties in the face of convincing arguments that they and the droids are in the same straits, fragment. Some remain loyal, some join the side of the mechanicals, some remove themselves from the fight. There’s simply not enough military force to resist the mechanicals, especially as ‘liberation memes’ infect droids across the galaxy. The future is dark for the surviving organics…
Huh…those sound a lot worse in writing than they do in my head.
John, your version seems to embrace a set of “comic book” philosophical premises that I would think that your Catholic upbringing would have caused you to reject. Your re-write turns Star Wars into even more of a comic book universe than it already is. Frankly, I agree about the mitochlorians: if you’re going to have mysticism then have it all the way; don’t poison your story’s theme with contradicting elements, especially ones which threaten the suspension of disbelief. If the empire’s technology has “The Force” so figured out, why haven’t they developed a pill, or some genetically engineered short-cut to “spiritual” mastery? I think the mitochlorians was an attempt to have the story keep giving an air-kiss to spiritual mysticism without becoming caught up in its embrace. It’s an artifact of George Lucas’s own mixed premises. Also, I agree at least a little on the idea of Jar-jar. His characterization was a bit too much over-the-top. Nevertheless, as a “useful idiot,” upon which so much of politics depends, the character was necessary to the story of the Empire’s political corruption.
I disagree about Obi-wan and Anakin. The story, as written, doesn’t turn science fiction into soap opera; it actually runs the risk of turning a “mere” science fiction story into literature. Your allusion to Ming the Merciless is revealing. Ming IS a comic book villain. Hitler, Mussolini, Stalin, even Ghengis Khan were more three dimensional human villains. I found some of Anakin’s actions in Star Wars to be insufficiently developed, with respect to motivations, but the idea that Anakin turns to “sin” in rebellion against people who are trapping him in ethical problems arising from their own efforts to do him “good” is actually good literature.
I’m actually intrigued by the idea that the Jedi could have roused Anakin’s cynicism by sending him out and having him spy on Palpatine for them. Palpatine could have disccovered this activity, and convinced Anakin that he was merely misunderstood and persecuted by the Jedi unjustly, because Palpatine was more devious than Anakin’s naivete and youth let him perceive, especially after Anakin discovers, perhaps through Palpatine’s overt or covert “help” even, that the Jedi are spying on Anakin, so as to discover if Anakin is breaking his Jedi commitments and bonding with and having sex with Padme. The consequences of his conflicting relationships with both Padme and the Jedi then, would push Anakin, through his own weaknesses and flaws, deeper and deeper into Palpatine’s orbit, until he became trapped by chains of consequences that he could not face. That’s not “soap opera;” that’s Shakespearian tragedy. (My highschool english teacher always suspected that Shakespeare was a good Catholic boy.) Only comic books postulate that people are born evil. People are tempted into evil, by vices, weaknesses, flaws, misunderstandings. They succumb to the seven deadly sins, often times while pursuing the best of intentions, by their own reckonings.
“Only comic books postulate that people are born evil.”
Only comic books and every book of fiction ever written from a Jewish, Christian, Muslim, or Darwinian perspective.
And don’t comic books often give sympathetic backgrounds of the villains to show why they turned evil? I know the movies do, but I haven’t read actual comic books in decades so my memory of them is a bit dim.
I do have to say that John’s version rather ruins the redemption of Darth Vader in episode 6.
If I may gently disagree, there is no such thing as a deep and tragic meditation on the nature of corruption and redemption in a Space Opera. The decision to make the first three movies about the decline and fall of the Galactic Republic and the corruption and fall of Darth Vader require that the films be a full-blown Shakespearean or Greek TRAGEDY, with all that implies: elevated language, insightful monologues in graveyards, ironic and painful conjunctions and coincidences, Ophelia going mad, Macbeth being tempted by Witches, Pentheus being torn to bits by his mother and sisters during a drunken frenzy, Orpheus turning on moment to soon and beholding the ghost of Eurydice (one slender foot already touching the soil of the living world) being whisked suddenly and without salvation back into the shadows.
I say it cannot be done. A tragedy can take place in a science fiction background, but NOT in a fairytale “Long ago in a Galaxy far far away” background, where the ticket buying audience is there for spectacles and laughs and exploding planets, lovable rogues and innocent farmboys rescuing spunky space princesses from dark haunted fortresses of Nazi-helmeted skull-faced samurai-warlocks and bone-pale stormtrooper.
Space Opera and tragedy don’t mix.
As usual, very well argued and I cannot disagree on that point: space opera and epic tragedy do not mix. I also agree with your other comment, that Lucas suffers from metaphysically conflicted premises. As I observed, I think the mitochlorians were an attempt by Lucas to divert back into the “materialistic morally relative” world of science fiction after straying, perhaps a bit unintentionally into a Tolkieneque fantasy theme of where spirituality and moral verities possibly got a little too “hot” for his own comfort. On the other hand, despite Lucas’s suspected “left-y-ness,” he does have an almost libertarian, almost Rothbardian, sense of the natural consequences of concentrated political power. His story of imperial decline in the Old Republic would have been favorably received by an old school conservative like Garet Garrett.
I think the Leftiness was the one and major problem.
In STAR WARS (I won’t call it A NEW HOPE) the rebels were the good guys against the evil empire. The evil empire, on order to be evil, was made the illegitimate heir to the power of a once great republic, a la Rome.
Leftism is a shallow and simplistic philosophy (actually, a set of catchphrases and word fetishes that substitution for philosophy and excuse the user from needing to philosophize), that preaches that rebellion is right, either usually or absolutely.
So in PHANTOM MENACE, the men fighting the republic could not be rebels, because rebels are good guys. So they had to be White Separatists, or, rather, just “Separatists” because that is the only form of rebellion considered ungood in Leftist catchphrases. But the Separatists had to be the only people the PC catchphrases say are bad people – trade federations, bankers, rich folk. It was not a American style civil war of the clone-owners versus the clone-abolitionists, and it was not even a Roman style civil war like that of Caesar versus Mark Anthony, Cleopatra, Pompey. There was never anything like the kind of thing that starts real civil wars.
Embarrassingly enough there was not even the simplistic war motive as you might find in FLASH GORDON or PRINCE CASPIAN – the Evil Ming and/or Evil Miraz usurping unlawful authority and reign from the good Prince Barin and/or Prince Caspian.
Why not make Palpatin Caesar or Napoleon, a successful and charismatic war hero, who flattered the people into abolishing the unpopular Senate and grants him an imperial crown? Because this is the point of the Leftist political philosophy (or rather, catchphrase-neurosis) and they cannot bring themselves either to understand that this is how fallen man behaves, or that there is something wrong with it.
Corrupt people do not understand what causes corruption. People whose whole moral code consists of nothing but rebellion against morality cannot write morality plays, not even simple ones.
I am sorry to seem like a party pooper to all the Star Wars fans here, but I never really got INTO
My clumsy fingers caused me to upload the previous note before I was finished! Drat!
I’m sorry to seem like a party pooper to all the Star Wars fans here, but I never really got INTO the Star Wars mythos. After reading so much of the works of Poul Anderson, Isaac Asimov, Ray Bradbury, Sir Arthur C. Clarke, Robert Heinlein, Andre Norton, etc., before STAR WARS came out, I found the movie itself rather thin and shallow. The Polesotechnic League and the Terran Empire of Poul Anderson’s Technic stories, to name just one, had a far more convincingly “historical” or “lived in” feeling to me.
Sincerely, Sean M. Brooks
Not to seem like a party pooper on a party pooper, but even rather devout fanboys like me recognize that STAR WARS is Buck Rogers and Flash Gordon serial brought to life with modern special effects and big budget look, set to the epic music of John Williams.
Thin and shallow was not a bug, it was a feature. When Darth Lucas tried to make the prequels thick and deep, he got junk instead.
The reason why the world went crazy over the allegedly deep mythical “heroes journey” meaning in STAR WARS was not because those meanings were there, it was because the mythical meanings had systematically been drained from every mainstream literature since the 1920′s, and could not be found anywhere outside Science Fiction.
Star Wars was not deep. It was cartoony. The reason why the world went mad for Star Wars is not because the picture was drawn by Leonardo DaVinci. The reason why is because a man who has not seen his beloved for fifty years would go mad over any picture that captured her beauty, even if it were only a comic book in four color inks rather than an oil painting.
Dear Mr. Wright:
Thanks for your comments. I read them twice because I think you made some good points I should have thought of myself.
Yes, I agree we should simply relax and enjoy the best of the “Star Wars” films as light entertainment–not as a source of philosophical reflections similar to those of Marcus Aurelius’ MEDITATIONS (hmmmmm, what would a similar book by evil Emperor Palpatine be like?).
And I think you made a very good point saying so many went crazy over the Star Wars mythos because many people were STARVED for deep solid myths which popular culture and literature had not been giving them ouside the field of science fiction for many decades. I would include GOOD fantasy as well because of the genuine moral and mythical “deepness” in JRR Tolkien’s THE LORD OF THE RINGS.
It’s a sad reflection on our times that so many have to find deep mythical meanings in what should be no more than a decent fluffy movie like STAR WARS.
Sincerely, Sean M. Brooks
Indeed, you see the same hunger satisfied again in “Raiders of the Lost Ark.” It is not for nothing that Mad Magazine entitled their parody Indianna Jones story: “Raiders of the Lost Art.”
Hi, Montecristo:
Good analogy. I would include as well INDIANA JONES AND THE LAST CRUSADE. That, as well as RAIDERS were, in my opinion, were the best Indiana Jones movies. These films actually were a cut above the cotton candy and popcorn level.
Sincerely, Sean M. Brooks
You brought up examples of novels to compare to a movie. I don’t think a movie can ever reach the depth that a written word can so it is sort of an apples to oranges kind of thing. Even if you were to take any of these books and transfer them to movies, the first thing you would have to do is start to cut, and the first thing you would have to cut is some of the depth. Unless of course you were going to take a painstakingly detailed mini-series treatment of it. But even then there are some things that simply do not translate to film. They are two different mediums.
This is not to say SW would have made a deep(er) novel if Lucas had been a writer rather than a filmmaker. He was making an obvious throwback to Flash Gordon and other works.
That said, it has to be remembered the cultural context in which Star Wars appeared, the depressing mid-seventies. A decade of funk (not the music), stagnation, and films that consisted of horror and disaster and fatalistic holocaust, and general depression. Just in terms of sense of life, it was like the flash of a supernova suddenly going off in the black deepness of space. It was a slap in the face to the cultural malaise of the time.
Technically, it was never deep, wasn’t meant to be originally. I think it is an important movie, but not philosophically or in any way intellectually, but in the vein of an heroic motif – a decidedly anti-tragic sense of life.
Dear Mr. Wizard:
Thanks for your comments. You made a fair point, stressing that films simply are not the same as written books. A novelist has more SPACE to go into the depths of ideas, character, philosophies, religions, etc., than is possible for a film maker. I have to grant that. And that in turn is why I accept that Peter Jackson had to cut or shorten the LOTR saga to make it a workable film. The fact that I don’t think he did a very good job is another issue.
And I agree that since STAR WARS was largely inspired by the Flash Gordon movies rather than by any novels, it’s not wholly fair of me to compare it unfavorably to the works of great men like Poul Anderson, Robert Heinlein, etc.
All the same, since I WAS so deeply affected by the writers I listed here and in other notes, I think I was at least unconsciously affected in how I viewed STAR WARS by what I had previously read. And the movie was judged unfavorably by that comparison to what I had previously read. I would also argue that since STAR WARS was at least technically an SF movie, it was not totally unreasonable of me to compare it to written SF.
And, yes, STAR WARS was a bright spot in the otherwise glum and dismal Seventies.
Sincerely, Sean M. Brooks
Mr. Brooks,
I forgot originally to add this part or caveat. Our experiences of the film are quite opposite, or in reverse. You had read all those fine authors before seeing SW. I was 6 when the original SW came, and was years from discovering Anderson, Heinlein etc. In fact, given the age I was, it was SW and no other that got me into science fiction in the first place. Although as an adult I realize that SW is not really science fiction.
I don’t think it really changes anything, but having been a 6 year-old in 1977 leaves a lasting impression.
Being an adult in 1999 just left me a little jaded….
Dear Mr. Wizard:
Yes, I can see how a boy of six could have been impressed by STAR WARS in 1977 in ways I could not share due to both age difference and from reading SF authors like Poul Anderson.
As for STAR WARS leaving you feeling jaded in 1999, I fear that was because it was, to use my words, “thin and shallow” (or “cartoony,” to use Wright’s term). If it was otherwise a decent film, the best attitude would be to treat it as lignt entertainment.
Sincerely, Sean M. Brooks
Indeed. I was left cold by The Phantom Menace, but enchanted by The Iron Giant. I have not forgotten what it was like to be a child.
Get rid of the guy who played Whiny Teen/Adult Anakin.
Get rid of Jar Jar (that really goes without saying).
Get rid of Young Anakin.
Get rid of Padme/Amidala.
Get rid of Lucas.
These are just some vital preliminary steps.
I thought Padme/Amidala was cute as a button. Maybe if she was cast as a villainess rather than a heroine, she could have been the paramour of Vader and the mother of his child.
“I thought Padme/Amidala was cute as a button.”
Indeed. I was a teenager when the first one came out..and to say I had a crush on Natalie Portman would be an understatement.
What if, instead, she was a spy planted by Palpatine/Sidious to seduce Anakin? She ends up falling in love with the passionate, idealistic Jedi, becoming conflicted about her role. She defects to the Jedi, supplying information, but by that time Anakin is too far gone and falls to the Dark side. Padme comes to him and finally reveals her history, hoping to dissuade him from siding with Sidious, but now so corrupted, he sees her actions only as manipulation and betrayal, and then kills her. If, in this time, she had her children in secret (hoping to avoid Sidious), he would not know about them, thus fitting everything into the old continuity.
They could’ve made her the prototypical Emperor’s Hand.
I like it. THAT is drama. Hey– wait! Aren’t you are real writer? And a member of the Space Princess movement in Literature?
I’m trying to be a real writer, at least. Most of my work has been on the non-fiction side, but I’ve written some short stories. I’m working on getting a blog up, so I can cross-post the guest articles I’ve done/doing for your wife’s website and start promoting the fantasy novel I’m working on, The Dawn Forge, which I hope to turn into a series. It’s Tolkienesque in spirit, but worlds apart in setting. No space princesses planned for that one yet, but I think I could tuck a traditional princess in their somewhere, or even a princess of the faerie, since they show up.
Best of luck, friend! Just remember that genius is mostly persistence. You have to collect a hundred rejection slips before you make your first sale, and Ray Bradbury was up to over a thousand.
Please take midichlorians, those ugly Naboo fighters, and whatever that flappy alien was that owned Anakin. Also any and all appearances by Threepio and Artoo. Their presence stretched my suspension of disbelief just a tad too much.
Alas! I should not have written my entry without pausing the revile the flappy alien that owned Anakin, or to say how annoyed I was that the droids owned by Captain Antilles showed up there. Absurd.
In other words, yes, you hit the space-nail right on the head.
Oh yeah, midochlorians have to go. Maybe Portman can stay, but only if someone else does her dramatic moments for her. And that flappy alien thing- maybe he should go too. I didn’t think he was so bad at first, but I read that Jewish people thought he was an anti-semitic stereotype. Let me think…What was his line again?
“Mind tricks don’t work on me Jedi, only money!”
…Yeah, get rid of him.
“Maybe Portman can stay, but only if someone else does her dramatic moments for her.”
I liked her in “Thor”, and am disappointed she won’t be in “The Avengers” next summer.
I liked her in Thor too.
Speaking of which… http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1DTgNkkX2eU
Hi Mr. Wright!
I own “RebootStarWars.com.” If you ever have any devious plans you’d like to do with it…. Let me know!
Most sincerely,
Paolo
There’s a lot to be said that would improve star wars. If you’re going to cast Anakin as the villain from the start you might as well go all the way. Anakin would be a clever, egoistical brat that spend his time reading and admiring the deeds of the Sith, their pragmatic disregard for morality for the sake of raw power, their progressive ideas of what good and bad and their utopic plans of an empire unleashing “pax intergalactica” under the rule of the sith.
He would grow contemptuous of his humble and hard-working father and as teenager he would kill him. Patricide will be in anakin’s eyes how he becomes a man and begins his path to sith-hood and finally god–hood (I know there are no gods in star wars but screw that; Anakin wants nothing less than to be God in the flesh.) He will proceed to coerce his mother to destroy records that he had an earthly father and, before he stabs her in the womb, would force her to make sworn statements that “she never knew any man” and was a virgin when Anakin was born.
After Anakin commits matricide and severs all blood ties he would become an apprentice of obi-wan who would soon discover what Anakin really is and becomes the only person who struggles and tries to warn everyone that Anakin will be the downfall of the Jedi and the senate. He will be ridiculed, shunned and finally persecuted by all including his fellow jedis.
Even yoda will doubt obi-wan, “Anakin evil?” Yoda would see the dedication of young idealist Anakin for peace, his wise counsels to improve the jedi and the senate. Yoda will see how Anakin assiduously works to transform the jedi from barbaric knights into *weaponless*, pacifist men of reason who tried solve conflicts through rational discourse and love.
How could such a peace loving man be evil? Yoda will think.
Anakin would be popular with masses teaching non-violence, free-love and would convince the government to outlaw weapons. And instead of fear or disgust towards the Sith he would emphasize “understanding” them instead since Anakin’s moral dialectic would not allow for anyone to be evil. Moral goodness, Anakin will say, is to be found in the blend of opposites. This will be the same Sith doctrine of the thesis, antithesis- and synthesis of good and bad under a new progressive façade.
Of course you forgot to mention that every time Anakin loses a limb he enjoys it, after all, he’s leaving humanity behind. And every time he does an immoral deed he’s transcending our parochial ideas of good and evil.
Instead of having the storm troopers as clones or aliens, they would be followers of Anakin that believe in his ideas leaving humanity and morality behind. And only by performing callous deeds would they prove themselves to be part of Vader’s army. In this sense, every storm trooper will be a little Dart Vader onto himself.
There’s a lot more that can be said that can improve star wars, but alas, my dreams of Obi-wan saying at the climax of episode three that a “only a Sith would be a relativist” will never take place.
OK, stop it everyone! I hate to have to be the adult in the room, but if you are going to rewrite the prequels, you have to take the original movies as source. For example, in Star Wars, Obi Wan speaks with great tenderness of Luke’s father, whom we later learn is Darth Vader. If you are going to make Darth Vader a bad guy from the beginning then you have to somehow account for that scene in a memorable way. And I don’t think you can because, the redemption scene at the end needs something to back it up. It was plausible in the original movie specifically because of two things: Obi Wan’s testimonial, and the fact that Vader tried to get Luke to join him. You can’t invalidate the testimonial and make Vader a character who never showed affection –otherwise the redemption doesn’t work. No one cares about it.
Why do you want to make the prequels about Darth Vader anyway? Why does he have to be the Jesus character of ancient prophecy born of a virgin? Seriously, I’d rather see a movie about a middle-aged Obi Wan trying to save the Republic with a young sidekick (the two blasterkateers with light sabers instead of rapiers?). The side kick goes bad, but not in the ridiculous good-guy-to-mass-murderer-of-children-in-an-hour kind of way. Instead, there is a legitimate rift of loyalties that splits them up like the American Civil War did to many friends.
Have the emperor turn into a monster gradually along with Vader, as they find it necessary to be more and more ruthless to maintain control. Have Vader trying to restrain the emperor at first. Foreshadow the climax of the series by having Vader capture a friend and bring him to the emperor like he did Luke to be persuaded to join up. But in the earlier case, Vader stands by while the emperor kills his friend. It’s a test of loyalty for Vader. It’s the source of Vader’s political power. Ooh. Make it his father, not just a friend. Now that’s some real space opera there –the audience CANNOT like Vader’s father if you do this, or the redemption is ruined, but it should still be a shocking thing to do. Vader’s father should be a distant figure who is primarily interested in his son Vader as a political asset. Also, Obi Wan CANNOT HAVE A PERSONAL STAKE IN THIS. He can’t have a visceral reason to hate Vader or the testimonial is ruined.
And Obi Wand shouldn’t be sent to kill Vader. That’s a horrible plot element. Vader comes to assassinate someone that Obi Wan is defending and they have a last drink together before the duel. Or they meet on the field of battle. I mean, do I have to explain the point of dramatic cliches in space opera to George Lucas?
Absolutely right sir.
Doc, I think you’re on the right track here. I like your analogy to the American Civil War (or the War of Northern Aggression, if you prefer.) Consider the following rewrite-
For all of the nostalgia about the old Republic in episodes 4 to 6, let us stipulate that the Republic is a poorly-functioning, loose affiliation of disparate planets. Some systems permit slavery. The Senate is an ineffectual debating society: the UN, the EU, the US under the Articles of Confederation. There is no standing army to enforce its judgements – each planet raises its own militia.
Now, the Jedi Order is, essentially, a constabulary. They are well-trained, with high morale and careful training in the Force. This confers rapid reflexes, great intuition, a measure of mind control and psychokinesis, but they are NOT supermen and NOT incorruptible, though they thoroughly indoctrinate their members in ethics. This explains the reliance on on light sabres, rather than the more effective blasters: the light sabre is their truncheon of lignum vitae.
Similarly, the Sith are an ancient criminal organization, with its tentacles everywhere, a pervasive Mafia, pruned back by the Jedi’s policing. Of course, they too have Force powers.
“Phantom Menace” is now a cop show. You can have the classic old-cop vs fresh rookie interplay between old Qui-gon and young Obi-wan. Let’s have them clash at first, with Obi-wan trying to do everything “by the book” and Qui-gon, more jaded and willing to do whatever works. Now, they have actual personalities, two-dimensional personalities to be sure, but this is a big improvement. They are dispatched to planet Naboo, NOT to be diplomats, but to investigate an assassination: the mysterious assassination of the Trade Federation negotiator. This is an Archduke Ferdinand moment. It is plausible now that the Trade Federation would use their droid forces, which usually just protect their trade routes from space pirates, to enforce a blockade of Naboo.
Eliminate all the nonsense where the traders take orders from a mysterious cloaked hologram. The two Jedi can investigate with many twists, turns and action sequences. The main characters (not Jar-Jar) can be introduced. Perhaps Queen Amidala starts out as a prime suspect. They learn, to their dismay, that the Sith corruption reaches further than the Jedi realized: even into the Senate. As for young Anakin, who should have a very much reduced role, Qui-Gon can simply sense that he has an aptitude for the Force, while Obi-Wan is reluctant. No Midichlorians. Eventually, the Sith assassin is uncovered and defeated, but only after killing Qui-Gon. Obi-Wan, who has grown to respect Qui-Gon through their adventures, now feels obligated to train Anakin.
Note how the Civil War analogy works in the coming episodes. Palpatine now will have some sort of rational motivation to create a clone army: he wants to centralize power and be Emperor: the gangster element is prominent in Hitler or Stalin. Anakin has a motive to side with the Emperor: he and his mother were slaves and the Empire will abolish slavery and bring order. Dooku has a motivation to break from the Jedi Order: he prefers the independence of the old ways and suspects that the Empire will become a Sith-controlled tyranny. In fact, the entire Jedi Order could split, as they become increasingly suspicious of the military supplanting their role. Thus, Obi-Wan, as an old man, could still remember Anakin with affection and loyalty, as a Union loyalist could still admire a Southerner who chose the other side.
Anakin, now Vader, remains essentially a policeman, but now, head of the secret police, where his Jedi skill are useful. He is important to the Emperor for security and surveillance but he is not a ruler-in waiting. He is Dzerzhinsky or Beria or J. Edgar Hoover, feared and hated. Hence, he is the one to interrogate Leia but he obeys Grand Moff Tarkin in Episode 4. By this time, the Empire is a military-run police state.
Brilliant!
Nice overall, but I think you are still taking too much from the prequels. Two things I didn’t like were the elevation of Vader to a mystical force and the introduction of the Sith. In the first movie, Vader was just a high-ranking SS officer like you saw in WWII movies. In the later movies it turns out that he’s a confidant of the emperor himself, and that they share these powers associated with the dark side of the force, but he’s not the greatest Jedi ever born and isn’t the subject of prophecies.
It wasn’t clear in the first three movies that Jedi never used the dark side or were always good guys. Of the four former Jedi we met (I’m including the emperor), two were good and two were evil. The Jedi just seemed to be an old martial order that had become obsolete. I think the inspiration for Jedi knights was Japanese samurai movies set at the beginning of Japan’s industrial revolution when, over a few years, the sword-wielding samurai went from the undisputed rulers of Japan to useless figure heads occasionally used as officers. There was some romantic nostalgia for them, but they were widely held in contempt as the old-fashioned guys who couldn’t adapt to the new world.
Obi Wan and Yoda would not be typical Jedi. They were part of a small sub-cult of Jedi who believed that using emotions such as anger to “energize” he force could lead to moral degeneration. To most Jedi of their day, the dark side was just considered a battle technique. It gave you more power in some ways but led to weaknesses in some ways. Obi Wan and Vader could argue over the light-side/dark-side controversy like a religious argument.
Here is how I would have done it from the technical side:
Movie 1: an old sword-and-muskets swashbuckler. Armor and shields render projectile weapons useless so fighters carry an old-fashioned blaster that takes several seconds to recharge between firing. The recharge time means that melee weapons are essential. Troops carry blast pikes that can penetrate armor and Jedi carry light sabers and serve as officers and cavalry, riding those flying motorcycles from Empire Strikes Back.
Movie 2: mostly more of the same, but a new crew-served blaster is invented that can be fired several times before recharging. This becomes a pivotal weapon in the last battle in the movie, where thousands of samurai are killed during a heroic desperate charge against general Palpatine who later becomes emperor.
Movie 3: a transitional movie where multi-shot hand blasters are becoming more and more common, and only the most talented Jedi, those who use the Force best, can continue to fight using light saber. The old cavalry all either retire or are killed. Some remain officers but they generally don’t get along with the new Force-less officers who don’t know or respect the old ways.
Then, of course, by movie 4 the old Jedi are pretty much gone and of those that remain no one calls himself a Jedi any more.
Two things I didn’t like were the elevation of Vader to a mystical force and the introduction of the Sith.
Actually the Sith occur in the earliest iterations of the Star Wars story, namely, Lucas’s original outlines and treatments for Star Wars. Darth Vader is explicitly called a Sith Lord in the novelization of the first movie by Alan Dean Foster.
My problem with the Sith in TPM & co. was the colossally stupid “Rule of Two.” Two Sith? A galaxy of quadrillions of sentients is going to be afraid of two magical swordfighters? Meh.
Maybe it works if the two Sith are super-strong Force users. Like, ya know, they way Jedi were portrayed in the post-Return of the Jedi books. Luke crushing an AT-AT with the Force, a handful of Jedi knocking a fleet of star destroyers out of the Yavin system (even if it did kill the guy who was the focus.). That’s intimidating. Magical swordsmen, manipulating from the shadows? Yawn.
This is what I wanted to see:
Or this, even: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l6IAoPAjzpw
But aren’t the least visible aspects of Force use the most potentially dangerous? If a Sith Lord, with preternatural ease, could identify traitors, uncover plots, hide his plans, anticipate the moves of his enemies, and strike from the shadows with impunity, he would certainly develop a fearsome reputation, as the body count steadily rose. He may even become more feared than if he made displays of raw power, for such unseen subtlety can be more threatening. Think of Keyser Söze in the Usual Suspects. Unseen, we have this palpable sense of him as a criminal mastermind, of his seemingly endless reach and vast power base, all without one flashy display.
Of course, all that would require a good writer and a talented filmmaker to bring off. What a pity we got stuck with Lucas instead.
If it’s not in the original movies, it doesn’t count. It was the movies that were great, not Lucas’s plans or ideas surrounding the movies.
That’s as may be. But it is still factually incorrect to say that the Sith were not introduced until the prequels were made.
So is this the part where we argue whether the Sith was an old worn-down Lucas memory of the Sidhe?
Because if the Sith Lords were evil fey and those trained by them, it would all totally make sense.
Deiseach, search your feelings. You know in your heart it is true.
Fair enough. I’m just proposing a Rule of Rewriting –that the properly rewritten prequels should conform to the three original movies and not to other source material. Allow me to state my reasons as succinctly and politely as possible: What are you, some kind of freaking fanboy that lives in his mother’s basement and plays with Star Wars action figures? Grow up! All that extraneous crap was generated out of Lucas’s lower intestines in order to turn waste into money!
But I suppose reasonable people can disagree.
I agree that they should not contradict anything established in three original films, but to only be based solely on them is a silly limitation, for several reasons:
1. Implicit in almost any invented world is a history and background largely outside the narrative. Indeed, the more a world feels “lived in,” the greater the suspension of disbelief for the audience. Part of that details is conceiving of details that don’t get a mention in the final story, but are still there, nonetheless.
2. The prequels cover a new set of events and new locations, meaning details are introduced which aren’t in the original films.
3. The prequels could take place at any time before the original films.
4. By the time they started producing the prequels, the Star Wars universe had already grown well beyond the original three films, which were a part of the landscape the fan base occupied.
5. Such a rule is equally silly when applied to other series. What would’ve happened to The Lord of the Rings, if Tolkien were only limited to what happened in The Hobbit?
Forgive some of my redundant wording. Long day.
Allow me to state my reasons as succinctly and politely as possible: What are you, some kind of freaking fanboy that lives in his mother’s basement and plays with Star Wars action figures? Grow up! All that extraneous crap was generated out of Lucas’s lower intestines in order to turn waste into money!
Your arguments are elevated and of course correct. Although I have never had a Star Wars action figure. When I were a lad, there were a hundred and fifty of us living in a hole in the road. If we wanted action figures we had to collect interestingly-shaped pieces of our own poo.
Which may explain why I have an abnormally high tolerance for the contents of Lucas’s lower intestines.
Nevertheless, Vader was clearly portrayed in the original Star Wars as a kind of evil Jedi, a ‘fallen Jedi’ or ‘anti-Jedi’, and it is in no way a stretch to suppose that there may have been others like him, or that they considered it Way Cool to name their order after the sound of a lisping snake.
P.S. ‘Sith’, as the great scholar Harry S. Plinkett has pointed out, is not in fact a term wholly of Lucas’s invention. It is in fact a transparently obvious anagram of the Mandarin Chinese t’shi, which means ‘disappointed in the cooking of the duck meat’. I think that should lay the etymological argument entirely to rest.
I have this fantastic book that I found in this crowded little hole in the wall bookshop some years back. It is called the Complete Encyclopedia of Elves, Goblins and other Little Creatures. It has roughly 150 – 200 entries covering little creature folklore and history (as folklore of course) from a variety of cultures.
Anyway on page 46 there is an entry for The Siths or alternatively Sleagh Maith. They apparently come from the work of a Reverend Robert Kirk, a Scottish presbyterian and known as a fairies minister and clairvoyant. I couldn’t find a reference to the creatures Sith themselves in Kirk’s own work, The Secret Commonwealth of Elves, fauns, and Fairies (although I confess to a large amount of skimming), but to Sleagh Maith and that they lived in hill caverns called Sithbruaich.
“Legend” has it that the curious Reverend got too close to the secrets of the Sith and killed him. Alternative stories say that he died naturally upon the Doon Hill, also known as Fairy Knowe and Dun Sithean (where the fairies lived), and they skirted his spirit away to fairyland.
Any reference checking online has to be done without entering the direct term “with” because of the 15 gazillion SW references. Although I did find several Scottish lore sites that referred to George Lucas’ use of Sith from the Scottish use.
Mr. Wizard:
That is terribly interesting; but I must reject it as a source for Lucas’s usage of the word Sith, because it would have required him to know something; and far be it from me to accuse him of such a lapse.
*sour but almost puckish grin*
I don’t think the term Sith appeared in any of the first three movies. It may have been in the first book adaptation (which also made the Emperor out to be a military man who was basically turned into a figurehead by bureaucrats) or maybe early on with the toys. It must have been a term that came out early because I remember as an elementary school kid trying to find out what a Sith was by researching it in the school library.
I hope JCW will forgive me a moment of self promotion but…
*cough cough* I DID do a rewrite of episode 1.
Though, of course, I would feel more than honored to have shared a co-writing credit with John.
(c’mon hollywood, we’re waiting)
Every fanboy and fangirl has either done a rewrite of PHANTOM MENACE, or wishes he had. Your self promotion is welcome. Feel free. We all love STAR WARS or else we would not complain about it.
Oh good, I thought only Trekkers and wives who were permitted to complain about what they love.
Aside from nostalgia, I think that many people (myself included) reacted poorly because we had understood the background details presented in the Original Three (O3) movies very differently than Lucas did. Especially so once Lucas got around to filming the prequels.
For example, in the O3 the Jedi are referred contemptuously to as ’wizards’ and ’sorcerers’ and the Jedi order itself seems to have been thought of as a religious/monastic order with questionable power. Yet in the prequels Jedi are famous, many or all Jedi appear to have high level military commissions/authority, and Jedi “supernatural” power is very obvious. This is particularly jarring as this is taking place only ~20 years before the O3.
Darth Vader in O3 seemed to be very dangerous and certainly important, but more akin to a member of the secret police (which is how I originally conceptualized the ’Lords of the Sith’) standing outside normal military channels but still having to take orders from military governors and presumably other Sith. I also had the strong sense that Vader and Kenobi were contemporaries–only perhaps a few years apart in age. It had seemed that Kenobi had ill-advisedly taken on his space pilot friend Anakin as an apprentice and then they had a falling out. I actually thought that there were supposed to be parallels between the friendship of Luke and Han but with reversed personalities and ages. Kenobi being a young, naive, earnest Jedi while Anakin was a cocky and cynical but slightly younger ne’er-do-well space jockey. Kenobi and Anakin being close friends as-if they were brothers and then had a falling out over a princess that they were both attracted to (the Leia character).
I also think by Lucas making Anakin originally from Tatooine was a mistake–just as it had been a mistake to make Jabba appear to be based out of Tatooine. It made the universe of Star Wars feel smaller and filled with too many coincidences. Han is hiding out from Jabba on the same small population planet that Jabba lives on? Kenobi decides not only to hide Luke on Vader’s home planet, but he decides to hide from Vader there himself?
In a parallel universe, the moon of Endor had Amazon-esque primitives instead of those twerpy Ewoks. Instead of C-3PO being made a god, they anoint Leia as their Supreme Queen (maybe even making her wear Slave-girl Outfit 2.0 – the Queen Edition) and as they’re about to sacrifice Luke and Han for being males, Luke uses his Jedi force to levitate Leia, and then the native Amazons obey her command to free the guys. Besides, Amazons are much better to look at, and I would’ve been more sympathetic to them being shot down by the Empire (ie – that pathetic scene of the *mourning* Ewok – gaaarrggh). That’s my fantasy, and I’m sticking to it!