My unpopular opinion on the ST: TLJ will be redeemed by the passage of time and stand out as the only worthwhile entry of the ST.
Kind of agree. I have a soft spot for TFA and I can forgive it for not doing a whole lot, because of the context of the time it was made in. Its purpose was to bring back trust in Lucasfilm after the Disney buyout and the prequels, and it honestly did its job.
That said, taking the movies for what they are: TLJ is the only Star Wars movie outside the OT that’s in the “Sequels that actually justify their own existence” club. That’s not surprising, though, it’s a very exclusive club.
Its his story and its in no way collaborative. The stories are his and very personal.
Star Wars is my go to example I use when I want to talk about how movies are a collaborative art form, because of how much the Original Trilogy is not just George Lucas’s work.
The other people who worked on the OT didn’t just help Lucas realize his vision, they created part of the vision themselves. It’s not just that Star Wars would have failed without them, Star Wars just wouldn’t have been Star Wars without Ralph McQuarrie, or Marcia Lucas, or Gary Kurtz, I could keep going.
Hell, if you look at what happened behind the scenes of the Empire Strikes Back, it’s clearly not just George Lucas’s movie. While Lucas was working on Raiders of the Lost Ark, Irvin Kershner shot the movie in such a way that Kershner’s vision would be the most prevailing in the final cut. Often there was only one or two (usable) takes, and when there were more, there was not that much variation in them. Lucas was essentially unable to make his own movie out of ESB.
This is also why Richard Marquand was hired for RotJ. Marquand was a weaker, much less experienced director, but he wouldn’t have the balls to do what Kershner did. He also micromanaged a lot more with RotJ, as opposed to Empire, where he rarely even showed up on set.
The only way you can look at Empire and say it wasn’t a collaborative project, is if you’re being cheeky and making some comment on how adversarial Kershner and Lucas’s relationship got toward the end.
This is ultimately why I like new Star Wars much better than the prequels. The prequels are what happens when you take everyone but Lucas out of Star Wars. John Williams is the only person (besides Lucas) I can think of off the top of my head who was there for both the OT and PT, but even his input was severely neutered, especially in 2 and 3, although that’s a long story all on its own.
For better or worse, Star Wars is being made by the fans now. The fans may have wildly different ideas of what Star Wars is, they might even have downright dumb ideas of what Star Wars is, but they have a more holistic view of what Star Wars is.