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AndersonCouncil

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17-Feb-2016
Last activity
29-Aug-2022
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Post
#1501593
Topic
Did you think Lucas regret the way Palpatine died?
Time

Um…I think being thrown down that massive hole/shaft into the bowels of the Death Star which itself was then blown to smithereens is a pretty conclusive “He’s dead” to me.

I personally think that it being Vader who kills the Emperor rather than Luke is brilliant. It not only allows for Vader’s redemption but it also perfectly fits with the Sith “Rule of Two” where the apprentice kills the master. So Vader both embodies the Sith tradition in that moment but the way it happens is undeniably an act of good and sacrifice to save his son. Luke throwing away his lightsaber in defiance of Palpatine was also what Vader needed to see since he himself didn’t have the strength or conviction to do the same back in ROTS.

I think you might find this video interesting: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-2BNdF_NCVQ

The ST bringing back Palpatine was a huge mistake. I love Ian McDiarmid but Palpatine should have stayed dead. Some say that making Snoke Darth Plagueis was a bit too obvious but I disagree. It would have beautifully tied the ST together with the PT and OT and most fans probably wouldn’t even know or remember a single thing about Darth Plagueis from ROTS. For years there was no doubt in my mind that Palpatine died in ROTJ. I personally didn’t need it to be confirmed any more than what was already on screen.

Post
#1501583
Topic
What is Your Preferred Watch Order, and Which Versions (Fan edits/official releases)?
Time

This is something I have spent a lot of time thinking about (much like the vast majority of users here) since I have two young children now who in a few years will be ready to experience “Star Wars” for the first time. To say I can’t wait for that day when the “A long time ago…” text comes on screen and it’s mere moments until that blast of the John Williams music and it all begins is an understatement!

I’m not really a fan of the prequel movies as-is but I can see the massive potential in them and the story that GL was trying to tell, which for my money is brilliant but flawed due to some of the questionable decisions made during the making of those movies.

But they are part of the story and from the mind of the man who created it all so I absolutely intend to show them to my kids. To that end, I have sourced the L8wrtr copies of the Prequel Trilogy and either the Harmy Despecialized editions of the Original Trilogy or the Adywan Revisited Original Trilogy movies. For the latter, I’m patiently waiting for his update to “A New Hope” and desperately hoping he manages to complete “Return of the Jedi” in a shorter amount of time than his “The Empire Strikes Back” edit did (though it is pretty masterful!) My boys are only 3.5 and 1 so I have some time yet.

I keep changing my mind as to whether to go 4-5-6 and then 1-2-3 or the often recommended “flashback” viewing order of 4-5-1-2-3-6. I think I need to try and watch all the movies again with that order in mind and do my best to clear my mind of any prior Star Wars knowledge and just pretend I am watching it as though for the first time. But if I decide that it works I’ll definitely go with the “flashback” viewing order since I think it will lend much more weight to the redemption of Vader in ROTJ and choosing a different path.

So to that end, my choice would be:

Episode 4: “A New Hope” (Revisited HD) by Adywan
Episode 5: “The Empire Strikes Back” (Revisited) by Adywan
Episode 1: “Shadow of the Sith” by L8wrtr
Episode 2: “The Republic Divided” by L8wrtr
Episode 3: “Rise of the Empire” by L8wrtr
Episode 6: “Return of the Jedi” (Revisted) by Adywan

And then finally, on second viewing I will introduce “Rogue One: A Star Wars Story”. I don’t think you can really get as much out of “Rogue One” if you haven’t at least seen “A New Hope” first. I also don’t think it’s the best movie to start with since the Skywalker story is the main one and there are no Skywalkers (Leia cameo notwithstanding) in “Rogue One”.

I would also someday like to have an Obi-Wan Kenobi fanedit sandwiched in between Episode 3 and 4 but by that point my kids will hopefully be very familiar with the world and characters of Star Wars that a 1-2-3-RO-OWK-4-5-6 viewing order would work fine as they’d already know all the big reveals.

Oh and as far as I’m concerned, the story ends with “Return of the Jedi”. The Disney sequels serve no narrative purpose whatsoever so I won’t bother with them. I tried, honestly I did, but my heart broke after “The Last Jedi” and by all accounts everything I have seen and heard of “The Rise of Skywalker” is absolute crap. They don’t come from the mind of George Lucas and therefore aren’t proper canon in my opinion.

Post
#1157225
Topic
The Last Jedi : a Fan Edit <strong>Ideas</strong> thread
Time

I would have completely rewritten the Ben and Luke exchange that led to Ben becoming Kylo Ren. In the movie, the way Luke essentially turns on Ben and considers killing him goes completely against everything we know about Luke. It was a betrayal to the character. How can the one man who believed there was still good in his father, Darth Vader, believe that Ben is lost to the Dark Side just because Luke can sense Snoke having got to him and so he contemplates murdering his nephew?! No, no, no. So instead of what we got I would have written this story element in one of two ways.

Option 1:
During the training of the new generation of Jedi, Luke beings to see how Ben is easily frustrated and at risk of being lured to the Dark Side of the Force. After much effort to talk with Ben about the dangers of the Dark Side of the Force, Luke instead decides that the best course of action, in an attempt to stop this from happening, is to refuse to continue Ben’s training and possibly expel him from the Jedi Academy all together. Luke thinks that by stopping Ben’s training before he gets too powerful he will have stopped Ben’s training before he becomes too powerful. But in a moment of cruel irony it is this very abandonment of his nephews training that ultimately leads Ben down the path of the Dark Side and to Snoke, who offers to complete his training. Maybe Ben has issues with his father Han and sees Luke as an adoptive father of sorts and so the betrayal from his uncle is felt more deeply because of this. In any case, this event is the trigger that sets in motion the rise of Kylo Ren. Snoke possibly sensed this would happen and waited until the moment was right to finally lure Ben to the Dark Side.

In a moment of anger at being told he will be expelled from the academy/his training will be stopped Ben loses it and a lightsabre battle takes place between Luke and Ben. This occurs in a similar vein as to when Luke fought Vader on Cloud City in so much that Luke can easily defeat his nephew (in the same way Vader could easily have defeated Luke) but Luke still hopes that he can bring Ben back to the Light Side of the Force. Because of this belief, he deliberately doesn’t try to strike Ben down and instead adopts a more defensive combat style similar to how Obi-Wan took with Anakin. Luke is the better swordsman (he’s now the fully-fledged Jedi Master we always wanted to see instead of the uncoordinated strikes from ROTJ) and manages to disarm Ben of his lightsabre. In a scene that clearly honours but doesn’t outright copy both Obi-Wan’s prequel “You were the chosen one” line to Anakin and Vader’s “You are beaten, it is useless to resist” line to Luke, the Jedi Master switches off his lightsabre and tries in vain to convince Ben not to give in to the Dark Side of the Force. But in this moment of pause Ben uses his force powers to bring down the temple academy ceiling on them both. This would be similar to how it was in the actual film though more epic than just bringing down a hut roof where Ben had been sleeping.

Ben survives this and the commotion stirs the rest of the Jedi padawans to investigate what has happened. There is a confrontation between himself and the rest of the Jedi padawans with some choosing to side with Ben while some remain loyal to Luke. A fight ensues with ultimately Ben and only those who sided with him surviving. They will in time come to be known as the Knights of Ren. One of the Jedi Academy aides and last remaining survivor of the slaughter, Lor San Tekka, is cornered by one of Ben’s group but before he can be struck down Ben intervenes and saves him because Ben was fond of the old man. In what appears to be a scene of compassion showing that Ben is not entirely lost to the Dark Side, there is a darker undertone as he says that he is only being kept alive so that he can tell others about what happened here. Ben doesn’t see Lor San Tekka as a threat because he is just an old man without any Force abilities. This scene is especially unsettling as it shows that Ben is fully aware of the path he has chosen but also suggests that he could still be brought back to the light side as he didn’t kill everyone in the same way Anakin did at the Jedi Temple on Coruscant.

At this point Ben thinks Luke is dead and orders the temple burned after which Ben and his followers leave. Ben of course will ultimately come to discover that Luke survived their encounter and this will fuel his desire to kill Luke Skywalker and ultimately lead to his motivation to complete this act at the start of The Force Awakens. He is consumed by it and this makes both films stronger for it. This will ultimately also serve to increase his anger even further when he finally thinks he has killed Luke at the end of The Last Jedi only to realize he’s been denied the battle he’s been waiting for.

After Ben and those who sided with him leave the Jedi Academy in ruins, the scene ends with the burning temple and it is revealed that Luke survived. We are given the same scene where Luke’s hand rests on R2 as he watches the Jedi Temple burning. At this moment, Lor San Tekka reunites with Luke with the latter feeling lost at what has happened and announcing that he plans to visit the site of the first Jedi Temple on Ahch-To, a site strong in the light side of the Force, to communicate with the Jedi Masters of old for guidance on what he should do next. Ultimately however, this leads to his self-imposed exile and Luke deciding to abandon the ways of the Force and feeling that it is best the Jedi Order finally ends with him. As Lor San Tekka knows that this is where Luke has gone it perfectly explains how he has the map to Ahch-To in his possession at the start of The Force Awakens. The reason for his contacting the Resistance with this information is because it was not until now with the rise of the First Order and Snoke along with his apprentice Kylo Ren that it was realized that Luke was needed once more. Having Lor San Tekka at the New Jedi Academy also explains why he says to Kylo “I know where you come from, before you called yourself Kylo Ren” in The Force Awakens.

Option 2:

Luke sees how Ben is being lured to the Dark Side of the Force but feels that as his uncle he just can’t get through to him and so he goes in search of Ben’s mother, Leia. Han’s whereabouts are unknown after he and Leia separated and it is implied in this version that this happened before Ben becomes Kylo rather than as a result of it. Perhaps the separation could be because Han did not agree with Leia that their son should become a Jedi since Han could see the dangers of what that could mean if Ben turned to the Dark Side? In any case, Luke goes in search of Leia in an act of desperation. Luke leaves Ben and the other Jedi padawans in the care of the elders like Lor San Tekka from The Force Awakens and leaves on a mission to bring Leia back to the new Jedi Academy in the hopes that she can get through to her son before it’s too late. This would be a nice twist on the original movies where Luke felt there was still good in his father to come back to the light side while in this movie it’s reversed and it’s up to the mother to convince her son not to turn to the dark side. As George Lucas says all to often “It rhymes…it’s like poetry.”

In the time that Luke has been gone Ben has managed to convince some of the other Jedi padawans that Luke cannot be trusted or has abandoned them or something like that – a “You’re either with me or against me” moment similar to Anakin’s line to Obi-Wan in the prequels. A fight breaks out between those siding with Ben and those loyal to Luke which leads to the death of many of the other Jedi padawans. Ben leaves with the remaining Jedi that sided with him. They will ultimately become the Knights of Ren. Luke senses that something is wrong, in much the same way Obi-Wan sensed the destruction of Alderaan or when Leia sensed Han’s death and he races back to the Jedi Temple. By the time Luke returns to the Jedi Academy he finds it ablaze and discovers the bodies of many of the new generation of Jedi killed at the hands of Ben, thus leading to his decision to exile himself and give up on training a new generation of Jedi. As with Option 1, perhaps Lor San Tekka survived somehow and is aware of Luke’s exile and it is for this reason that he alone knows of the location of Luke Skywalker that ultimately leads into the opening scenes of The Force Awakens.

Sadly I have no experience with fan editing and so I can’t make any of this happen.

Post
#1144335
Topic
The Last Jedi : a Fan Edit <strong>Ideas</strong> thread
Time

ziggyonice said:

  • We need to find some way to kill Leia on-screen. I don’t want to sound like an asshole, but we know that since Carrie Fisher passed away, they’ve already said she won’t be CGI’d into Episode IX. There were opportunities in this film to have her character pass away in line with her qualities as a Resistance leader. She could have died in the explosion, or in recovery, or she could have even been the one to go kamikaze in the end and save the Resistance in the process. No idea how to handle this one.

I totally agree. I was thinking/hoping it was going to be Leia as this would have been a perfect end to her character to go out like that saving the Rebellion that she had devoted her life to.

Post
#1144322
Topic
The Last Jedi : a Fan Edit <strong>Ideas</strong> thread
Time

NeverarGreat said:

My biggest issue, other than the fragmented storylines, was that the starship chase and Godspeed Maneuver™ made little tactical sense.

Why couldn’t the First Order simply swarm the capital ship with TIE fighters until it went down? Why are all the ships traveling at a fixed speed? Why hasn’t anyone else used the Godspeed Maneuver™ as a weapon? It seems like a hyperdrive would be one of the most deadly weapons in the galaxy if just any ship could do this.

Oh, and I don’t care if Phasma stays or goes.

Absolutely! I was thinking this as well. If going to hyperspace can be done even with a ship in the way then surely the Rebels could have just used this method to destroy either of the Death Stars no? At least the first one as it had no shield generator to protect it.