What should the Prequels have been? - Page 2

3/4 of Ep III. Padme's Ruminations, General Grievous and the Droids are filler. General Grievous and a good portion of the title track are just typical. The rest is as good as anything in the OT. Anakin's Betrayal, Anakin's Dark Deeds, and The Birth of the Twins actually manage to be better.

Anything with the "Force Fanfare" is cool beans to me.

My answer: All written (at least a first draft) before cameras started rolling on Ep. I.

focus on Obi-Wan, a hero we can root for, a guy stuck in between his jerk friend and his job. Way more relatable than the "chosen one." Never mind the cheap paperback-pop psychology"character study" of Anakin. "What makes an asshole who he is?" Who cares. Ewan's a better actor anyway.

I dunno. That opens the door to 80% more Jar Jar throughout the series.

Horrible idea. We don't need the Jedi vs Sith fights demonstrated in ANH, specially when we know they were done that way due to limitations, not some other higher purpose or style.

You know I liked the Qui-Gon character, maybe there should have been a way not to completely waste him. Perhaps get rid of Windu and make him second in command after Yoda?

Someone suggested that Anakin should have been Qui-Gon's apprentice initially, and that Qui-Gon's death leads to Obi-Wan taking over his training. If it wasn't for Lucas adhering to the "always there are two" mantra, you could have started Episode I with Obi-Wan and Anakin apprenticed to Qui-Gon. Early in the film Obi-Wan leaves to takes the trials and advances to full Jedi-hood, leaving a frustrated Anakin behind -- he feels he's ready too, but Qui-Gon feels he needs more time. Then you have Episode I play out as normal, but with the Qui-Gon/Anakin dynamic. When Qui-Gon is killed, robbing Anakin of his father figure, Obi-Wan takes over the training as he did originally. You'd have an Episode I fairly devoid of Obi-Wan, but you'd better develop Anakin's character and avoid the perils of having an eight-year old playing the savior of the galaxy.

My problem is not so much with his age, although I agree at least a teenage version would have been better. But yeah, I like what you suggest here.

Lucas chose Anakin at such a young age to show the impact him leaving his mother had on him. Perhaps this would have worked better with Anaking having a longer and more established relationship with Qui-Gon as his "father" (not biological).

From that, Qui-Gon should have died as a result of some bad decision by the Jedi or Jedi council. Or maybe he was mistakenly marked a traitor, or something, so that you have that resentment against the Jedi in the 1st movie and not later on.

Seriously, give it up, everybody.

Here's the better question: who here has in their head a rough outline for Chapters 7, 8 and 9?

Wel, his scenes trying to convince the Council the Sith have returned and their casual dismissal of it ("We would have felt it") lead directly to him having to face Maul as the film originally played. Wouldn't take much to have added Anakin to those scenes playing the brash reckless youth trying to convince the Council his master is right. Then when Maul kills Qui-Gon, Anakin believes the Council could have prevented it by taking their warnings seriously.

And of course, like I said earlier, you leave Maul alive and have him take over Dooku's role, so when Palpatine tempts Anaking to kill him, he can play the "But he killed your master!" card, which is much more compelling and character-driven than "He's too dangerous to be left alive!" And it would nicely turn around the scene with Windu later as Anakin tries to stop him from killing Palpatine -- Mace could argue "His apprentice killed your master!" and Anakin could counter with "You and the council did nothing to stop it!"

All said, this creative energy would probably best be used elsewhere.

[Sheepishly raises hand]

Had they been done on the original time frame (every three years), my original idea was to have Leia "fall" -- she lacked the training Luke had, and in Jedi doubts she could ever have such power. Seemed ripe for a turn to the Dark Side.

Now? Who knows? It would seem kind of anti-climactic to have the remnants of the Empire be the main threat, since the OT was all about defeating them. But introducing any other sizeable threat would feel like simply trying to bring back the Empire.

Again, Lucas hamstringed a lot of ideas with there being only two Sith at any one time. The final defeat of the Sith could easily fill up three films.

But you have Ben's "He was a good friend" line in Star Wars. Maybe Episode II is about Anakin overcoming that resentment, only to have it resurface in Episode III thanks to a perceived betrayal -- perhaps the rumored flirtation between Padme and Obi-Wan? It doesn't even have to be real, just a situation Anakin misreads.

I've got one, too, Poxy.

I think something damn cool to see would be a sort of sith ritual of Anakin gaining his red lightsaber. If I had the money, I'd make a short of it.

Leaving aside the Zahn trilogy, which is actually more "canon" to me than the prequels in many respects, I always envisioned seven, eight, and nine involving Luke establishing a new Jedi Order, a wayward pupil going "darkside", and the remnants of the Empire coalescing for one final show down.

Ha, ha, ha, the expanded universe as more canon than the movies, that's a great one!

"Canon to me" is not a synonym for "officially canon". I think I'll continue to feel free to pick and choose what I like, thanks.

Oh I got that, believe me. Doesn't make it less funny of course.

Actually, the Zahn books feel more like Star Wars than the prequels do.

Absolutely.

Of course, the EU quickly devolved into sheer nonsense....I basically ended up rejecting everything except the original Zahn trilogy.

**Bring back the Obi-Wan avatar!

How many times did they resurrect the Emperor in the Ewww?

Almost as many times as they found a discarded Death Star prototype laying around.

They only built 2, we needed more!

Now Emperor Clones, wow there was a bunch of them, in the Ewww he seemed to have turned into Freddy Krueger.

As far as I remember the Emperor came back twice as a clone, both within the Dark Empire storyline which took place over a short space of time. The EU had a pretty wide range of villains, with the best and most developed over time being the respectable Pallaeon, who started off as the Dr. Watson to Thrawn's Holmes but took on a whole new life as the EU went on.

Was I the only one seriously hoping that palpatine would be a clone...? I mean, I remember that it was speculated as far back as TPM (given that Palpatine/Sidious can't make up their/his fucking mind about where he wants Padme to be at any given time), but was anyone else hoping for it...? That, at least, would have given us some interesting twists in the last film -- at least ones that would have been better than Padme dying of a broken fucking heart.

Speaking of Padme's death: I rememebr speculation that Sidious was going to fry her with electricty while Anakin stood by, choosing not to act, which would resonate in ROTJ with Luke. That might have been kind of cool...or kind of lame. It IS Lucas directing, after all.

I wouldn't go that far. Yes, much of the EU is crap, but the Rogue Squadron book series (along with the Wraiths) would make a much better TV show than the Clone Wars crap we're getting instead.

It can even be done live-action, because with the exception of Wedge, none of the characters have appeared in the films.

I don't get the love for the Thrawn trilogy. Everyone talks about how it "feels more like Star Wars than the prequels," but frankly, I found the Thrawn books borth silly as well as plodding.

The biggest waste was the Luke clone, who was grown from his own severed hand and weilding the blue lightsaber. Not only does he fail to talk, but he's "evil" simply for the sake of Mara Jade killing him. He does absolutely NOTHING, just as the book is getting interesting. The potential for his character is tossed out the door on the next page.

And where did the hand and saber come from? Was somebody down there at the base of Cloud City with a net waiting for falling objects? Or did the Ugnaughts find them in an air duct and say, "Hey, a hand! I'll bet we can sell this to a crazed rogue Jedi for his cloning experiments!'

Dumb dumb dumb.

You know, I never put much stock in blaming McCallum. Then, reading the new Making of Star Wars book, you see Lucas' first rough draft of Star Wars is rife with exactly the kind of political mumbo jumbo people hated about Episode I -- talk about power and transportation companies creating monopolies to gain power, slowing down the system of jurisprudence to raise the crime rate to allow a police state to be accepted and grow, "trade barons," you name it. The difference is, back in '75, Lucas was getting input from Matthew Robbins, Hal Barwood, Steven Spielberg, and Franics Ford Coppola. In '97, it was just McCallum.

I guess I'm one of the few who enjoyed the Prequels. However, there's always room for improvement.

One suggestion would be to make Anakin more heroic. This could've made his turn even more dramatic. Maybe a few scenes with Anakin acting like a "big brother" to a youngling and/or helping the poor and homeless of Coruscant. All of this out of the kindness of his heart. In other words, show grown-up Anakin "giving without any thought of reward."

Another suggestion would be to show Darth Vader, in the suit, kicking ass like General Grievous in the Clone Wars animated series. I'm sure alot of people wanted to see a younger, suited-up Vader going to town on Jedi.

Speaking of Grievous. I really would've loved to have seen a live-action version of the Palpatine kidnapping that occurred in the Clone Wars animated series. Additionally, he's such a cool looking character that I think he should have been portrayed as a badass in Episode III instead of a weak, useless coward. He should've been so badass that the only one who could've stopped him would be Vader. How cool would it have been to see Clone Wars badass Grievous going up against a freshly suited Darth Vader.

I seriously don't buy Obi-Wan taking out Grievous as easily as he did.

Grievous was not a coward. He was acting as a distraction so Kenobi would pursue him and leave Anakin in the grip of Palpatine.

The only good the Thrawn books did was bring Star Wars back with fresh stories after several years of nothing, on the surface they are a fun read, but they are so dumb.

So right!
I never understood why the hand thing was used. To me, it would have worked just fine if the baddies broke into a New Republic Medical facility and stole some of Luke's blood samples or some shit. Anything was better than, we found a hand, what shall we do with it? I know, let's make an evil Luke Skywalker and call him Luuke Skwalker, bullshit.

"feels more like Star Wars than the prequels,"-- not even close.

On a side note, Nick's prediction of years ago has proven true - Jake Lloyd is hitting the convention circuit. So is Christensen, for that matter.

At the risk of being a total nerd, that was covered. Windu severely wounded Grievous at the end of Clone Wars. That's why he's so stooped over and sickly in the movie.

Yeah I'm pretty much in agreement that it would have been cool to have met Anakin in his early twenties, a definite Han Solo rogue-ish type, but also someone who's a true anti-hero, constantly drifting between good and bad, a drifter with no aim in life, a loser. Through chance encounters his path crosses with Obi Wan (on a mission) and Padme (professional thief); they unwillingly form a ragtag team against some kind of Sith threat or whatever. There's no fucking prophecy, but Obi Wan manages to help Anakin tame the force inherent in him and use it for things better than winning card games. ("Anakin, the force is in you." "...I thought I was just naturally lucky!") But shit happens throughout the three films and eventually Anakin uses it for evil. No political bullshit, no fanservice cameos or retcons, no Lucas directing, just epic adventure.

Fucks sake.

Let's not underestimate the influence of Gary Kurtz. As far as I'm concerned, the series took its real nosedive with his departure after Empire.

Star Wars went off the rails with Return of the Jedi, when Lucas decided to pursue the redemption of Vader.

Seriously, fuck Vader. When you've got an epic, first class villain, who cares how he got to be villainous, and who cares about his redemption? The guy is a torturer, and he was complicit in the destruction of Alderaan. For that matter, who says he has to be telling the truth when he tells Luke that he's his father? Just let him be the bad guy, the Penultimate Boss for Luke to defeat on his way to full Jedi-hood and his final confrontation with the Emperor.

As for the prequels, they should have been the Adventures of Obi Wan Kenobi in the Clone Wars. He and his buddy Annakin are kicking ass, with Annakin the better pilot and Obi Wan the better swordsman (samurai (as opposed to wuxia) style), and hot on the trail of a young Sith Lord named Vader. Impetuous Skywalker bolloxes things up and finds himself face to face with Vader while Kenobi's involved in a space battle, each is overmatched in his area of secondary expertise, and Kenobi barely makes it out alive. There's your setup for Star Wars.

Having said all that, let us not forget that Star Wars isn't for grownups. My 7-yr-old loves all the movies just the way they are.

I think this is the fact most often overlooked in these debates.

Are we really considering Vader being Luke's father to be a misstep? That's silly. What if the only savior of the galaxy, the "new hope" was the son of the most evil motherfucker in the galaxy? Yeah, Vader could be lying, but I bet in the back of everyone's head in 1980 they knew it was the truth.

Next we're gonna start bitching about that Luke and Leia being fraternal twins was a silly convention made during the pre-production of JEDI (Which, of course, it wasn't.).

Now that you mention it, that was a silly decision. I remember reading that in the novelization just before seeing the movie and thinking, "You have got to be kidding me."

I took that as FreeRobotSex just joking around. That's a joke right, FRS?

That's pretty much how it's been, though. It's always been about these two twins and their father. I'll admit it was handled pretty sloppy in JEDI (Harrison Ford critics really need to re-watch Fisher and Hamill's scene. Her reaction to Vader being Luke's father had as much weight as Luke telling her that he wants to repaint his living room. Then she finds out that they are siblings. And she doesn't put two and two together. The fuck.), but I always thought that the simple idea of siblings trying to bring back their father was a pretty strong one.

I'm glad they didn't take this to the nth level and show Leia being a total badass female Jedi in skimpy outfits using two lightsabers... at the same time!*

*If you haven't noticed, I'm poking fun at EU silliness.

The brother & sister thing came way out of left field. I didn't like it when the movie came out, and I like it less now. It adds nothing to the story or the characters. If anything, it seems like just a cheap way of resolving the romantic triangle. I'm sorry, I refuse to believe that Lucas had that in mind from the beginning. I don't think they set up that kiss in Empire saying "Dude, this is gonna be so awesomely creepy when we finish the trilogy".

Have you watched the EMPIRE OF DREAMS documentary?The twins are a well-documented concept that existed back when Luke Starkiller was around, along with the Kiber crystal.

And you don't really know the galaxy's laws on incest either.

True...but not just because of Kurtz though. I credit Marcia Lucas with being half of the "George, that's a really stupid idea" team. She left around the time of JEDI too, and it shows.

As for anyone hoping for post-JEDI sequels at this point, please consider this:

That's fucking great, Litmus.

When I saw you posted in this thread, I figured it was to back me up a bit. Was I spot on in my ramblings?

I don't think it's very nice of you to post unflattering pictures of Carrie Fisher like that.

Absolutely...as evidenced by this innocent 1979 production photo from THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK, in which Leia helps Luke with some dirt that got in his eye!