OzoneSherrif said:Chrille said:I think the biggest problem with this movie is the battle of Endor. The ground portion of it, anyway. IMO, it simply looks childish the way the Ewoks are taking out the storm troopers. They hit them with sticks and punches them, yet it is plainly obvious that their blows aren't forceful at all. It looks almost like their poking them. The battle is played for laughts, which it shouldn't be. The battles of Hoth and Yavin were serious without cartoony humour.
Those who defend the battle usually say that the ewoks were loosing, that it was only Chewie stealing the scout walker that changed the course and brought the battle arround. Fair enough, but the movie does not convey this fact. Before that point, the movie shows plenty of ewoks ambushing storm troopers, but only a measly 1 ewok gets killed. Compare that to the novel, where the ewoks are almost slaughtered, but their great strenght in numbers assures that they keep on coming.
I'm not sure if and how Ady would do it, but ROTJ would benefit greatly from cutting the silliest, most unconvincing parts, and somehow add many more ewok causulties. Not that we need to linger on them, like with Corpsey (yes, that's his name apparantly), but just show it in passing. How that would be done is another matter though.
Yes and even the Stormtroopers just stumble around like idiots or when they do find the rebels they tell them to freeze instead of taking them out. the whole battle is a farce. how can all this be fixed short of going out to the redwood forest and filming new scenes?
You could understand the troopers wanting to keep the main heroes alive as hostages (to aid Luke's turn and for the intelligence they have on the Rebellion) but why do they seperate to get help (and get killed) don't they have comlinks on Endor?
As I said above some of the problems with the ground battle are down to the tone set once the main battle kicks off.
The music is telling us they are going to win and they win (no surprise there), the slapstick decipates tension instead of enhancing it, the Ewoks diminutive stature is played with rather than played against (all those heave ho noises they make while trying to slow down the walker legs (with a split screen set up masked by a handy tree that looks like it came from some bad King Kong rip off too).
It's hard to take the Ewok's seriously as an audience when the director (or directors going by most accounts) refuses to.
The intension here was to show that what the Empire literally sees as the little people are underestimated, it's not just the Emperor that is over confident it's the whole Empire that has got so used to winning that it takes it's eye of the ball but the direction falls into the same trap as the fictional Empire.
That's why I suggested the trap that Chewie sets off be baited with a dead Imperial because it sets up that the Ewoks have already had some experience in this sort of thing and the Rebels just help co-ordinate their already deadly skills (those Walker smashing traps could have been planned before the Rebels turned up).
If it is edited with respect for these creatures the viewers will respond to them with repect.
The same goes with Imperials (these are supposed to be the Emperor's best troops, hand picked for a decisive battle) they should kill not just some but quite a few of their targets to be a threat worth beating.
There should be more weapons on the ground here (the Rebels are caught off guard and aren't well equipped but the Imperials know they are coming) the Rebels and the Ewoks should steal more of this equipment (not just one AT-ST and a few rifles).