10 thoughts on “I have a two word response to this Star Wars-related headline.”

  1. I’m just like…”Huh?”

    After all this time? Personally, if Greedo shot first, he would have had to be in the midst of an epileptic seizure to have missed at that distance.

    1. “Han Solo was going to marry Leia, and you look back and say, ‘Should he be a cold-blooded killer?’” Lucas asks.
       
      Rank historical revisionism. Han Solo wasn’t going to marry Leia, Luke was.
       
      In an interview shortly after Star Wars (AKA Star Wars: A New Hope) premiered, Lucas described his plan for a movie series, if only he had the money: a prequel describing the fall of the Republic with a climax of Luke’s father battling Darth Vader on the edge of a volcano, and a sequel in which Luke defeats Vader. The framing device would have been the two droids telling the story to Luke and Leia’s grandchildren.

  3. I can’t decide how much of George’s avowed opinions on Star Wars reflects that he’s always been rather out of step with his audience, as opposed to what appears to be a continuing search for the one, true, perfect middle finger to give his erstwhile fans and current critics.
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    I mean, every time I think he says things (like claiming that Jar Jar is his favorite character, say) just to aggravate the people who didn’t like his parvum opus (thank you for that term, Wikipedia), I remember that there’s some credible evidence that he thought A New Hope was a metaphor for the Vietnam War, with the heroes representing the Viet Cong.
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    Maybe the best thing to take from all of it is that George has a number of unresolved hangups.

    1. It’s been quite a few years, people change, especially if you’re surrounded by people who all believe the same thing. Just like some rock bands do their best work before they get famous, and especially before they’re so famous and rich they won’t listen to other opinions, I think Lucas did his best work a long time ago.

      An interesting thought- what if the original Star Wars wasn’t quite as good and genre-defining in another timeline? What if Lucas got to make more Star Wars movies, but didn’t have as much control, and didn’t have piles and piles of money thrown at him?

      1. I’m happy to entertain the idea that Lucas’s opinion of the property changed over time. He has a tendency to claim that it was all and always part of his grand, original plan, but I’ve thought this was a bit of a stretch for some time. (I tend to think that he’s claimed a bit of credit for the story, particularly in Empire, to which he probably has no right, even though it’s clear that Jedi and the prequels are pretty much all George.) The bitterness in current interviews seems to have developed during or after the prequels, for sure.
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        As far as what Star Wars might have been without Lucas having as much control or money … for good and ill, that’s where’s it’s going with Disney. I guess we’ll have a better idea about what that means in a few weeks.

        1. Verily. Lucas said about a thousand times in the days before the original trilogy became a thing that Star Wars was a retelling of the Seven Samurai in space. In that context, a lot of the changes that went into Empire make much more sense as, “Well where do we take this?” extensions than logical plotlines.
          ——
          This is even clearer when Kasdan’s role in Empire was outed. And Lucas’ subsequent muttering that the movie the fans typically like best is the one he hates most. Yes, Lucas gets credit for a great twist in making Vader Luke’s father. But if you look at the 1st movie, Vader is a bit-part flunky who takes orders from Tarkin.
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          Lucas’ insistence in blowing up his one big idea into “The” point of Star Wars is essentially where everything goes off the rails. The story works where it’s the Rebellion vs the Empire. When it becomes the Anakin biography….meh.

          1. Lucas’ insistence in blowing up his one big idea into “The” point of Star Wars is essentially where everything goes off the rails.
             
            Yup. And if you read Leigh Brackett’s original script for The Empire Strikes Back, it’s clear that Lucas had no grand scheme to make the series about Anakin Skywalker/Darth Vader.
             
            I do, however, support the conspiracy theory that Lucas originally intended to eventually expose Jar Jar Binks as the Big Bad who was pulling all the bad guys’ strings, including Vader’s and the Emperor’s … and then chickened out.

          2. I find, Herp, that I also support the idea of JarJar as the ultimate big-bad in the series, just as Yoda was the ultimate big-good.
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            The parallels are just *too pat*.. the problem is .. the George Lucas who showed up for the prequels was the one involved with Howard the Duck .. not Willow. Too much weird, too much scenery, not enough character, not enough story ..
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            It is probably possible, with a few added scenes in the first two prequels, to reduce Count Dookie (sorry, Dooku) to a bit part, and edit/CGI JarJar back in as the ultimate big-bad .. but I just don’t see Disney doing so.
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            Mew

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