The Prequel Radical Redux Ideas Thread — Page 212

Yeah but this is a movie. Unless a films is specifically about a character with senile dementia, his reminiscing of Anakin will be accurate, simply for the sake of the audience :-p

Old Ben is clearly not senile, after ESB he does come across as more than a little manipulative (consistent with someone who would use mind tricks against the weak minded).

If ANH was the simple tale of good versus evil ESB introduced more complexity to even the good guys so Ben (for even the best of reasons) is capable of distorting the truth (even when he is telling it to a young guy he is fond of) for what he sees as a higher goal.

I wouldn't have minded a good set of films which showed the Republic as being very much less than perfect and the Jedi not clearly in the right.

The problem with the films as they stand is not the lack the more civilised age that Ben talked to Luke about but more that the characters and events of the story don't make any sense at all.

We saw the OT story unfold as Luke did, first he was naive, yearning for adventure, full of unrealised optimism and energy. Then he he had to face his own demons, the world became more complicated and messy and in trying to steer a path through it he almost lost everything. Finally he is his own man and fulfilled his obligation to the idealised absent father figure of his childhood by reconciling the conflict between the man he became and the man he could have been.

The PT should have been similar but with the final act inverted and some of that is in the footage available it just needs a lot of restructuring to bring it out.

There does need to be new sound and vision to complete the task though, that's why trying to fix the PT offers the highest challenge and the greatest scope for creativity.

In fan editing terms it's possibly always going to be a work in progress.

Imagine the things we could do if we had the original greenscreen footage from the Ranch, and a few good amateur actors.

*SIGH*

I look on ROTJ and the PT (in their extended forms with all the deleted scenes put in) in the same light as the lost cut of Star Wars.

There have the potential to be good films (maybe not great films but films you could show along side ANH and ESB and feel they belonged together).

They all have lots of good material in there but so much of it is unfinished business.

brash,  nice to see another "keep the surprise til ESB" member here. There are many of us. I know there are many PT problems, but this is the most difficult task perhaps in all of the prequel ideas.

Mainly it comes down to the payoff. Is there enough of a payoff for the audience at the end of the PT if you hide Anakin's fate?

Is it that we think Anakin died a tragic death? Could work.

It is all in how it would be presented.

edit: bingo, in your radical edit are you saying young Boba would become young Vader in TPM?

Speculating and moving the puzzle pieces is sometimes the funnest part of these edits.

I've long wanted to make Jango a mandalore somehow or include the mandalore's as part of TPM but haven't figured out a way with the available footage. There doesn't seem to be enough footage available.

I think that at this point, and by the treatment the PT has had, it's rather useless trying to hide Anakins identity as Vader. Radical RADICAL edit has to come through to make it believable.

Don't know what Ady (considering what he said of an hypothetical ROTS:R edit) has in mind, but suppose we just don't see Anakin's surgery... ok, we have obi wan's tale in ANH, "a young Jedi who was a pupil of mine until he turned to evil"... DONE, no more secret.

So IMO, we just have to resign this WTF moment ESB has, and try to make something more cathartic out of it; which, is indeed possible, and doesn't require as heavy edit as the idea of giving Obiwan a new apprentice, or rotoscoping Boba.

I tend to agree with you although I do hold out hope that my fanboy wishes will one day come true regarding the prequels. I mean adywan has done wonders with the OT edits. This would be the next big step for someone of his talent to take on.

Im just not sure if hiding Anakin's turn could be done without people going "wtf just happened?" And the existing prequels gave us enough of those moments. ;)

I insist, even if it's a matinée-like movie, the PT defined the saga as a drama-plotted story. Perhaps you could change a WTF moment in ESB by another (this one a little less strong than "I am your father").

I personally find it interesting, and don't chill about the saga being re-structured as a drama, I find it more human. A story of fall and redemption through love, very faustic. On the other hand I'm very very critical of the way it was made. Which such promising general story, the best GL could pull out was...you know, the PT.

So I had this idea in mind, which I think that could tie a little bit some things. Of course, it wouldn't preserve the WTF moment of ESB. But still, I find it (and hope you too) very interesting. (infact, I'm gonna post it in Bob Garcia's thread too).Of corse I don't pretend that just by putting in excercise this only idea all the problems of the PT would be solved, but let's see.

"He was a pupil of mine until he turned to evil"

"Annie was a good friend"

Well, immaginin' an all-PT-episodes fanedit saga, make it as if Obi Wan was not that impollute Jedi we see in the theatrical release, but someone more in line with the great guy, but yet tricky person we see in the OT. Something ala Qui Gonn. Someone who we know has great intentions however's a little rogue; a Master who could tolerate Anakin being married. Till here's the general EPI-EPII editing.

Let's sink into ROTS. By this point ObiWan should know about Anakin and Padme, so sharing the secret is an implicit way of showing how bonded they are as best friends. On the other hand they are like the best generals from the Order, perhaps except Yoda. So Skywalker-Kenobi are kinda the star boys who have a very particular pov of the Jedi rules.

By the time we reach order sixty six,we just get rid of Yoda, I mean, we see he chop's the clone commander head's off and that's it (so that we make room for this brand new WTF moment in ESB... what? Yoda? still alive?) And have Obi leave Utapau in hurry. Bob managed to get rid of Bail's hologram. having just the radio signal gives us the chance to replace the message and leave it into another place:

 C:"this is bail organa's ship" (bail's a senator, he doesn't have time to be communicating with lost Jedi through the galaxy, so have obiwan speak with his captain instead)..."it seems that there's been a Jedi rebellion. The jedi are being hunted"
        OBI WAN: ANAKIN!! (worried). so he goes straight to Coruscant and Padme's, worried by his friend being in danger. By the time he reaches Mustafar and sees what Anakin does to his pregnant wife, we have enough critical mass so as to have them fight.

Pretty doable, I think. The main disadvantage I find on doing it this way is that we just don't have the Obiwan-Yoda chat about Qui gonn.

Sorry for the long long reply.

shanerjedi said:

bingo, in your radical edit are you saying young Boba would become young Vader in TPM?

 I was thinking more of using the footage to create a pseudo-Vader (a previous student of Ben's that the audience can suspect is the person who has become Vader instead of Anakin).

He has the dark looks, the petulant stare, take away the dialogue and you have a brooding maligned brat who could eventually become the Dark Lord.

He could even have his Master replaced from Obi-Wan to Sido-Dyas or whatever he you want to rename him which could explain why his face is plastered all over the clones (leading people to suspect he bumped off his new master and ordered a clone army in his own image...sounds like a Sith apprentice to me, only he isn't, he's just another innocent who has been framed).

Another variation would be to give Grievous dark human eyes so when Obi-Wan faces him off he sees not only the eyes of his past mistakes looking at him but a reflexion of his current ones too.

That might lead people to believe Vader started out as the rejected child, became the cyborg Jedi Hunter and finally was re-suited as the Imperial strong arm (only it's a false trail).

Oh ok. Yeah a part of me wants to try an edit where Maul/Grievous/Obi-Wan's previous failed apprentice are all the same person.

Of course another failed apprentice makes Kenobi look like a further dunce but to me it works better than the "different points of view" thing in RotJ.

Wait a minute. Where in the saga does Kenobi first mention that he trained Anakin as a jedi?

shanerjedi said:

Wait a minute. Where in the saga does Kenobi first mention that he trained Anakin as a jedi?

ROTJ is the only place where Ben mentions training Anakin but seeing as ESB establishes that Vader is Anakin (or at least Luke's father) and in ANH Ben describes Vader as a former pupil of his that plot point has been there from the beginning (after the 1980 retcon).

Bingowings said:

shanerjedi said:

Wait a minute. Where in the saga does Kenobi first mention that he trained Anakin as a jedi?

ROTJ is the only place where Ben mentions training Anakin but seeing as ESB establishes that Vader is Anakin (or at least Luke's father) and in ANH Ben describes Vader as a former pupil of his that plot point has been there from the beginning (after the 1980 retcon).

well you could do a radical move and just make Anakin and Kenobi peers instead of teacher-student and then just have Kenobi with one failed apprentice, the real Vader who died in Eppy 3.

Another question: why does Anakin take the name Darth Vader? or were you planning on not naming pseudo-Vader that?

shanerjedi said:

Another question: why does Anakin take the name Darth Vader? or were you planning on not naming pseudo-Vader that?

I suppose you could edit the PT so the only Darth's are Vader (the real one and the name adopted by Anakin as another layer of disguise) but personally it makes sense to me to have the Sith naming ceremony but as a hooded obscure hologram so when Yoda talks about the boy he trained being gone and now Vader it could be pinned on the other guy too.

I was thinking about those stone heads on naboo the other day. I remember us talking about if they could be relevant to the story being told in TPM.

All of us here mentioned cloning, ancient slavers, ancestors of both naboo and gungan.

I really like the cloning angle.

Hey, what if they were Kaminoans? Maybe the Naboo/Gungans have this ancient cloning tech they "inherited" from this ancient alien race. Then in eppy 2 we meet this ancient race.

Necessary? No. But just throwing something out there. I'm just trying to find a way to tie the events of TPM into the subsequent two films more. And into the clone wars.

The Kaminioans are evil! >:(

And i would consider TPM its own movie. I think its purpose was just to introduce the characters and give you and idea of who they are.

I thought the same thing with ANH.

I continue to worry about the elevator scene. There is so little for establishing prior relationship. Maybe begin with AS "You fell into that nightmare...." They chuckle, then go again to a quick exterior shot of elavator rising (if nec to cover a rough transition) then AS "I haven't seen her in <2> years...." I think that one has to work.

  I appreciate the gallows humor in the face of danger. Quips make it feel more like SW.

    Maybe start hangar scene in TPM with simply OW "The negotiations were short." and have QG brush it off with his part after. Try different things to see what works best? If we don't see the crew in the consular ship cockpit when it's destroyed then they might have debarked?

    ROTS is, by necessity, a tragedy. Maybe make the prior episodes as lighthearted as possible by cutting frowns and highlighting quips wherever it seems to work.

   That's all I've got for the PT. It will be fun to see whatever the fan-editors decide to do with the trilogy. :)  

I found nothing wrong with TPM and ROTS. AOTC sucked due to the fact of the corny love scenes between Anakin and Padme. I begged for a Obi-Wan scene every time that happend.

All in all, the prequels weren't that bad. They will never amount up to the OT movies of course. Realize you would be criticizing the OT if the PT came first.

Many complain about why Obi-Wan left Anakin to burn to death, instead of trying to do a mercy kill or save him.

I was reading the ROTS novel, and one of the reasons why Obi-Wan left is that he saw Palpatine's shuttle approaching.

Would it be possible to insert a shot of the shuttle approaching?  Perhaps insert it just before the jump to the side of the hill when Anakin says "This is the end for you my master."  Maybe even have shots of clone troopers approaching too.

gobalicious said:

Would it be possible to insert a shot of the shuttle approaching?  Perhaps insert it just before the jump to the side of the hill when Anakin says "This is the end for you my master."  Maybe even have shots of clone troopers approaching too.

The clone troopers coming actually sounds to be quite a good idea. After all, it would make it reminiscent of the other Obi-Wan/Darth Vader duel in ANH when the storm troopers come running towards them. Although this time in ROTS, Obi-Wan won't let himself by killed.

At least Obi-Wan wouldn't seem like he doesn't give a damn

"I was reading the ROTS novel, and one of the reasons why Obi-Wan left is that he saw Palpatine's shuttle approaching."

^^ Hmm interesting. Haven't read the novel myself. From your description though that sounds kinda like a wussy move for Obi Wan to just hit the road at the sight of Palps shuttle. If anything, you'd think he'd stay because seeing the shuttle would let him know that Yoda failed to defeat Palps, and so he might want to try finishing him off himself.

Also in the novel, Obi-Wan is at the edge of a shallow cliff when he slices Anakin, who then falls down to the bank after losing grip with his mechanical hand.  Not sure why George didn't do this.  Makes a whole lot more sense.

btw, the novel is pretty good; I'd recommend it to any fan editors out there.  Anakin's fall is so much more believable, with a lot of new insights and dialogue added.  Some of the bad lines remain, but it's forgivable this time.

i read the first half of the book and that was it.

In TPM i wish we could see the part where Anakin saves the tuskin and becomes friends with them. I think it makes the story a lot more emotional since later he ends up having a hatred towards them and kills them.

WhatsMyName said:

Realize you would be criticizing the OT if the PT came first.

Utter crap. The PT breaks fundamental rules in moviemaking and logic. The OT doesn't. This isn't just opinion. The prequels are objectively bad to anyone who has a clue.