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The Book Of Boba Fett (live action series) - a general discussion thread - * SPOILERS * — Page 18

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Man, Bryce Dallas has for sure come a long way since her first Mando episode. She already upped her game for her S2 episode and now is giving us a contender for the best episode of BOBF.

Sirius said:

It even seems like a high budget episode, while all of the first four episodes of BOBF seemed to have a really low budget, with pour effects and bad action scenes.

I think that has mostly to do with the directing and stylistic choices. Bryce directed Chapter 5 and it shows. The second episode had also solid direction and cinematography. On the other side, Rodriguez’s episodes looked the most simplistic and “cheap” both in choreography and camerawork, they also have the most notorious goofs.
Also this is the first time we left Tatooine in this show. Tatooine has typically been brought to life with enhanced practical effects and sets, while the showrunners likely secured part of their CG/Volume budget to convincingly depict this place.

Seeing Mandalore and the Great Purge onscreen shocked me. Also I can’t believe we saw the destruction of Tipoca City and now Sundari in the span of less than a year. Truly the Empire was no good for fan-favorite cities with weird yet iconic designs. The scene with the KX droids and probes finishing off the survivors of the nuking was shiver-inducing and looked as it if were pulled straight from Terminator (in the good sense).

I had a grin from ear-to-ear the entire time they repaired and flew the N-1 starfighter, one of my favorite ship designs ever. And I fell in love with the BD unit brought into live action.

I’m really looking forward to seeing Mando and Grogu’s reunion, but I also hope Mando’s own arc doesn’t detract too much from Boba’s story, considering there are only two chapters left.

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I’ve been wondering why BOBF (minus the latest episode) has felt somewhat cheaper than The Mandalorian and I wonder if it simply has to do with how bright and open Tatooine is as a setting. It’s so much harder to hide the rough edges of CG effects when everything is in broad daylight, and they might have had to resort to more green screen as the volume doesn’t work for most types of open spaces. Contrast this with The Mandalorian which was usually much darker and moodier, with the exception of its two Tatooine episodes and the Rodriguez episode on Tython, two of which had a fair amount of “it looks off” comments. The only exception here is The Marshal, but they definitely spent more time and money on that than other episodes.

I also think it’s possible that Rodriguez isn’t used to directing on a TV budget and/or schedule, though at the same time isn’t he known for being a quick and cheap director? I don’t really know his work all that well, but based on his episode of The Mandalorian I get the impression that he’s more of a “fix it in post” guy, and while this might work for movies like Sin City or Alita it can cause a lot of trouble on TV series, especially since the volume require extensive pre-production work, the reverse of most movies these days.

Of course in addition to my first point it could simply be that BOBF isn’t as big a prority to Lucasfilm and that the budget is simply smaller. And to be clear, with a few exceptions, I don’t think the series look bad at all, but it does feel a little “off” when compared to The Mandalorian.

Star Wars is Surrealism, not Science Fiction (essay)
Original Trilogy Documentaries/Making-Ofs (YouTube, Vimeo, etc. finds)
Beyond the OT Documentaries/Making-Ofs (YouTube, Vimeo, etc. finds)
Amazon link to my novel; Dawn of the Karabu.

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I hope they’ve given budget priority to the Obi-wan and Ahsoka series. Those sound like they’d need it.

“Remember, the Force will be with you. Always.”

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ZkinandBonez said:

I also think it’s possible that Rodriguez isn’t used to directing on a TV budget and/or schedule, though at the same time isn’t he known for being a quick and cheap director? I don’t really know his work all that well, but based on his episode of The Mandalorian I get the impression that he’s more of a “fix it in post” guy, and while this might work for movies like Sin City or Alita it can cause a lot of trouble on TV series, especially since the volume require extensive pre-production work, the reverse of most movies these days.

Rodriguez is sort of a Swiss army knife, besides producing and directing his films he also uses to perform camerawork, editing, and oversees the score, sound design and visual effects. So yeah he puts most of his effort in post production. He clearly hasn’t performed all of those tasks for BOBF, but I wonder what grade of imput does he have into them.

Either way, BOBF seems to be, at least for season one, a smaller-scale adventure, so it’s not that surprising most of Lucasfilm’s attention and effects budget is set on limited events like Obi-Wan or Ahsoka.

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Yes I do get the sense that BOBF is meant as filler while we wait for the Kenobi series, Andor and of course season 3 of The Mandalorian and all of the Thrawn stuff that will happen in future.

I’ve noticed that the BOBF ratings on sites like IMDb have dropped a fair bit since the first few episodes, but when all of these other shows come along I think BOBF will get less criticism as its intended purpose between these series becomes more apparent.

As far as I’m concerned it’s been a solid series so far and if this is the “worst” live action SW series we’ll get in the coming year/s then I’d say we are very lucky.

Star Wars is Surrealism, not Science Fiction (essay)
Original Trilogy Documentaries/Making-Ofs (YouTube, Vimeo, etc. finds)
Beyond the OT Documentaries/Making-Ofs (YouTube, Vimeo, etc. finds)
Amazon link to my novel; Dawn of the Karabu.

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I think the final verdict will depend on the quality of the last two chapters. If they’re anything like chapters 2 or 5 this series will be looked back with much more favorable eyes.

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The next two chapters will have the Mandalorian and one with Grogu.

As well as other bounty hunter cameos, I think the next two chapters will be very fun to watch.

I believe the next chapter ends in a cliffhanger, leaving us waiting another 7 days.

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I agree. It wasn’t a wasted episode. To me, It was the most interesting by far. Not surprising though because it’s an episode of The Mandalorian. That’s the show I’m interested in, not the BOBF, which has been lackluster. A great deal of which is the weird choice to light everything like a 1980s soap opera. WAY too much light. It all looks like a TV show with a limited budget, all filmed on sets. It looks and feels nothing like the teaser we got last year or any Boba episodes of The Mandalorian.

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Interesting how much they’re throwing in the prequel references. This latest episode featured Din flying a Naboo starfighter, which he built with the help of pit droids, through the Beggar’s Canyon podracer route. All Phantom Menace iconography.

“Remember, the Force will be with you. Always.”

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jedi_bendu said:

Interesting how much they’re throwing in the prequel references. This latest episode featured Din flying a Naboo starfighter, which he built with the help of pit droids, through the Beggar’s Canyon podracer route. All Phantom Menace iconography.

Well, the people who grew up with the prequels are now old enough to give Disney money, so it makes sense they’d start pandering to them. 😉

My preferred Skywalker Saga experience:
I II III IV V VI VII VIII IX

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I thought Bryce Dallas Howard did a stellar job directing Episode 5. I’d go as far to say that the establishing shots of the Ring World space station are the most epic images we’ve had thus far in either BOBF or Mandalorian. And I use that word meaning in the tradition of epic cinema. You can have city wide destruction in superhero flicks and action movies but I found the Ring World shots more in tune with the language of epic cinema (David Lean, Ridley Scott, Kurosawa, and yes George Lucas), the stately pace that allowed the grandeur and scale to be realised.

Gorgeous stuff, more of that please (and less Spy Kids!).

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Decent but a tad boring 5th episode. This series has strong issues with pace and humor.

So long 🙌

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jedi_bendu said:

Interesting how much they’re throwing in the prequel references. This latest episode featured Din flying a Naboo starfighter, which he built with the help of pit droids, through the Beggar’s Canyon podracer route. All Phantom Menace iconography.

It’s all got to be normalised along with the special edition stuff, to stay on brand. Same goes for the Fallen Order easter egg stuff.

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jedi_bendu said:

Interesting how much they’re throwing in the prequel references. This latest episode featured Din flying a Naboo starfighter, which he built with the help of pit droids, through the Beggar’s Canyon podracer route. All Phantom Menace iconography.

and he said “Wizard!”

ROTJ Storyboard Reconstruction Project

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jedi_bendu said:

Interesting how much they’re throwing in the prequel references

That has been the case for all SW productions released after 2005. Not even to mention SE references. Binding the 2 trilogies together has been one of the moto of all SW Productions even before Lucas sold to Disney.

So long 🙌

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CarboniteSolo said:

Chapters 5 and 7 will be memorable for everyone.

So far I have not really seen many memorable stuff in the 2 series. It’s been an overall good series but nothing historical to my view. Seeing Mando clumsy with a dark saber or having CGI Luke showing up out of nowhere is not really my definition of great storytelling. Granted that after the ST it’s still good enough to be very much welcome. I hqve fun watching these episodes, I just don’t feel they really top the best SW has offered before.

That’s being said, I’m looking forward to some cool action in Chapter 7.

So long 🙌

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MalaStrana#2 said:

jedi_bendu said:

Interesting how much they’re throwing in the prequel references

That has been the case for all SW prtoductions released after 2005. Not even to mention SE references. Binding the 2 trilogies together has been one of the moto of all SW Productions even before Lucas sold to Disney.

Only when references are more necessary. At the start of Disney’s era of Star Wars they seemed hell bent on ignoring the prequels - The Force Awakens actively steered away from them and you can tell, meanwhile they announce two spinoff movies and a series set in the OT era. Dave Filoni perhaps chose to include a lot of Clone Wars characters, setting etc in Rebels because he knew there were many TCW fans that would love it, and Gareth Edwards included Bail Organa at the Yavin 4 base, but that’s mostly because it makes sense. Now the prequel references come totally voluntarily. Having Din fly an N-1 fighter and retracing the podracer route seems much more directly like a love letter to The Phantom Menace.

“Remember, the Force will be with you. Always.”

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Yeah I see your point. PT references have become more and more common after TFA. It might indeed be related to Dave Filloni getting more involved in LFL. It also can be related to the ST backlash and subsequent PT “aftermath” (re)appreciation (outside this site, I have noticed that most people actually like the PT and dislike the ST).

Bottom line is: PT references are actually a good counterbalance to pure OT continuity (and rehash in a way). It works fine. I’m less enthusiastic by new ideas that don’t really blend. On this particular show, I still can’t buy that Temuera is the same guy (physically and in term of personality) we discovered in TESB/ROTJ 😦

So long 🙌

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jedi_bendu said:

MalaStrana#2 said:

jedi_bendu said:

Interesting how much they’re throwing in the prequel references

That has been the case for all SW prtoductions released after 2005. Not even to mention SE references. Binding the 2 trilogies together has been one of the moto of all SW Productions even before Lucas sold to Disney.

Only when references are more necessary. At the start of Disney’s era of Star Wars they seemed hell bent on ignoring the prequels - The Force Awakens actively steered away from them and you can tell, meanwhile they announce two spinoff movies and a series set in the OT era. Dave Filoni perhaps chose to include a lot of Clone Wars characters, setting etc in Rebels because he knew there were many TCW fans that would love it, and Gareth Edwards included Bail Organa at the Yavin 4 base, but that’s mostly because it makes sense. Now the prequel references come totally voluntarily. Having Din fly an N-1 fighter and retracing the podracer route seems much more directly like a love letter to The Phantom Menace.

Ok first of all, he’s in a ship that starts in Mos Eisley and he travels through that city and Mos Espa, of course you’re going to see all those references, especially from The Phantom Menace’s Boonta Eve track and Beggar’s Canyon. He’s on a test flight, that’s going to happen.

The 2nd reason that he does this, is so they can save a little production money and reuse those shots already created for Episode I. They saved a few thousand by doing this.

The 3rd reason is the nostalgia factor, oh look, it’s Anakin’s pod racing track from the movie, so cool.

I don’t mind that they did this, we did get to see new aliens and new places in this chapter. It’s all very plausible in my opinion.

Just have to put this out there, I loved The Rocketeer reference, which the director of that movie was Joe Johnston, who helped create Boba Fett, amongst other things in Star Wars. He also directed Captain America The First Avenger.

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CarboniteSolo said:

The 2nd reason that he does this, is so they can save a little production money and reuse those shots already created for Episode I. They saved a few thousand by doing this.

Has this been confirmed? Is it even possible to reuse/transfer CG files from the late 90’s on to modern systems? Though I suppose Beggars Canyon was a miniature, so maybe they just had to find the original film negatives for those shots. Though IIRC the rocky desert landscape was mostly CG.

Star Wars is Surrealism, not Science Fiction (essay)
Original Trilogy Documentaries/Making-Ofs (YouTube, Vimeo, etc. finds)
Beyond the OT Documentaries/Making-Ofs (YouTube, Vimeo, etc. finds)
Amazon link to my novel; Dawn of the Karabu.

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ZkinandBonez said:

CarboniteSolo said:

The 2nd reason that he does this, is so they can save a little production money and reuse those shots already created for Episode I. They saved a few thousand by doing this.

Has this been confirmed? Is it even possible to reuse/transfer CG files from the late 90’s on to modern systems? Though I suppose Beggars Canyon was a miniature, so maybe they just had to find the original film negatives for those shots. Though IIRC the rocky desert landscape was mostly CG.

The Phantom Menace was shot on 35mm, the other two Episodes were shot digitally. All they did was remove the pod racers, they did create a few new shots for it, but mostly used the 24 year old footage.

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CarboniteSolo said:

All they did was remove the pod racers, they did create a few new shots for it, but mostly used the 24 year old footage.

I’m sorry, don’t mean to nitpick / further derail the thread, but how do you actually know this?

They saved a few thousand by doing this.

And this?


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CarboniteSolo said:

ZkinandBonez said:

CarboniteSolo said:

The 2nd reason that he does this, is so they can save a little production money and reuse those shots already created for Episode I. They saved a few thousand by doing this.

Has this been confirmed? Is it even possible to reuse/transfer CG files from the late 90’s on to modern systems? Though I suppose Beggars Canyon was a miniature, so maybe they just had to find the original film negatives for those shots. Though IIRC the rocky desert landscape was mostly CG.

The Phantom Menace was shot on 35mm, the other two Episodes were shot digitally. All they did was remove the pod racers, they did create a few new shots for it, but mostly used the 24 year old footage.

Yeah, I know TPM has film negatives lying around, I was just wondering how much of it would be reusable since much of the podrace scene was fully CG, except for the canyon and the cave (and the arena of course). So I guess the BOBF shot that is exactly the same as TPM (minus the broken gate) was reused while the rest of the scene with the rocky “pillars” was completely redone. Though I’d image its a fair bit easier and timesaving to recreate something than to do it from scratch.

Star Wars is Surrealism, not Science Fiction (essay)
Original Trilogy Documentaries/Making-Ofs (YouTube, Vimeo, etc. finds)
Beyond the OT Documentaries/Making-Ofs (YouTube, Vimeo, etc. finds)
Amazon link to my novel; Dawn of the Karabu.

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By reusing CGI shots, they didn’t have to pay people hours and hours to create new effects, new landscapes, digital frontiers, etc.

Movies that rely on CG effects cost the most to make, that’s common knowledge.