That’s a long time to hopefully win a wager. 😉
Yes. I can still remember at work or where ever and talking to everyone who liked Star Wars and had been watching the prequels, and they all loved the prequels. But I didn’t. And none of them could understand why I didn’t like the new Star Wars movies. I remember then watching Revenge of the Sith with a bunch of people, and I thought it was a better movie than the first two. But I still didn’t like it. And everyone else who was there loved the movie and didn’t understand why I didn’t like it. Etc, stuff like that. I don’t even remember seeing any prequel hate online when the prequels were still new in the theater. I remember being on message boards at the time as the 2004 DVD’s were out, and people loving the prequels AND loving the changes to the Original Trilogy. i.e. “I loved it that George added a bump noise when that Storm Trooper hits his head.”
Then years went buy when I started seeing a lot of prequel hate online. I also remember watching videos say in 2010 of people talking about how they at the time thought the prequels were amazing, but “now” realize they were fooled and that they really were crap. etc. i.e. they were in Lucas worship mod at the time.
I think one reason people are “tricked” into liking the new movies is because Lucas isn’t involved in them. And so they “have” to be good.
This whole forum exists because people weren’t happy about the special editions and the general retconning of Star Wars. I joined in 2005 and pretty sure it was around a good while before that.
I don’t doubt that. As I too hated the prequels back in 2005 and before that. So I’m sure there were a lot of others like that as well. I’m just reporting on what I personally experienced at that time. There are a lot of youtube channels right now and even back in 2010 where they talk about originally loving the prequels, but now realizing they were garbage.
Back at around 2005, I wasn’t on “Star Wars” message boards. But just regular message boards where people would sometimes talk about Star Wars and how they loved the new ones. And everyone I knew in person at the time, loved the prequels. I still remember getting some “hate” for being the only person who didn’t like the new Star Wars movies back in early 2000’s. Even in around 2005 or so with Revenge of the Sith, I still remember getting some “hate” from other in person at that time for not like those new Star Wars movies. They liked to give me a hard time about it. Wish I could talk to them today to see if they still love those movies.
I remember some people were excited for that Clone Wars cartoon movie back in 2008 wanting us all to go watch that in the theater. I knew it would be bad and didn’t go with them. But I went on my own to watch it.
The way I thought then is the same way I’m thinking now of these new Star Wars movies and a lot of people “loving” them. I could be wrong, but it just feels the same like in 5-10 years that a lot of people who loved them now won’t by then. But I could be totally wrong on that. Especially since Disney will keep pumping out some kind of Star Wars movie every year including a brand new trilogy. With the prequels, people had years and years to just focus on those movies.
I remember seeing TPM in ‘99 and knowing it was a letdown but not wanting to admit it. Something about seeing lightsabers and title crawls on the big screen again muddied my brain and convinced me it was good. Repeat viewings confirmed otherwise.
I saw AOTC and ROTS once each. Both terrible films.
Admittedly I enjoyed the special editions at the time. I was just glad to see those films remastered and in theatres. But I quickly wished up and realised laserdisc rips of the unaltered OT were the way forward.
In short, I think you’re probably right that people won’t feel the same about these films in 5-10 years.
What’s funny is I know I saw TPM back in 1999, but I can’t remember what I thought of that movie at the time. I can only remember The Matrix being this awesome movie of that time period. But thing is, at that point, the last time I had watched the OT was on VHS and TV in the mid 80’s. And I had pretty much forgotten about Star Wars other than in the early 90’s getting an extended universe book of Luke Skywalker. I forget it, but I remember it opened with Luke on a planet and a ship from outerspace crashing.
So when TPM came around, I knew it was a big thing, but didn’t care much. I didn’t watch the OT again until 2004 with the release of the DVD. Which apparently that was also a lot of others first experience with the special editions OT.
So TPM for me was a “whatever” as I wasn’t into Star Wars at the time, and I didn’t start paying attention until the Clone Wars Episode II came out. So I started paying attention to Star Wars again and was like “These new ones are crap”.
I do remember also in 2005. I watched Episode 1, then 2 on DVD. Then watched Revenge of Sith in the theater, then re-watched the 2004 DVD’s of the OT. I also realized at that point that it is NOT a good idea to watch the prequels, then watching the OT. I just felt gross watching the prequels, and then going right into the OT. If you watch all 6 in a session, then watch the OT first, then finish it with the prequels.
I will say this, the prequels got me back into the Star Wars universe. So because of the prequels, I wanted to check out those OT DVD’s in 2004 and remembered how good the OT was. As it had been like 20 years since I had watched them back in the 80’s.
I know some people ask what order to watch all of these movies in. i.e. like with their children in the future. I believe the BEST order to watch them in is the order of their theatrical release. OT, then prequels, then the Disney stuff.