CO said:
S_Matt said:
It is extremely difficult to imagine that there are some who dislike Empire, one of the finest science fiction films ever made.
As for disputing the plausibility of Vader being Luke's father... SERIOUSLY?
SMatt, you're not thinking like a 'casual moviegoer' you are thinking like a SW fan.
Now my brothers friends think ESB is a good movie, but most casual moviegoers don't like sequels, (Hence why 99% of sequels gross less then the original).
These are casual movie goers who aren't SW diehards like us, so they don't care about the Saga, or the Classic Trilogy, they just went and saw the movies in 77, 80, 83 like most people, and that was their opinion.
Check out the grosses of the SW movies (adjusted for inflation and without counting re-releases), SW'77 outgrosses Empire and Jedi by a large amount.
Don't patronize me - I know a bit about film grosses. But I don't think sequels gross less because people don't like them - its just that you can never recreate the novelty of something like the original Star Wars. And its understandable why Empire would have taken less - its not exactly a cheerful, feel-good movie like the first one. Its substantially more cerebral and existential too, rather introspective in tone and visually subdued. Of course these features are what make it so well regarded these days.
And well, Jedi made the least because it was bit of a drop in quality story wise and the third one out, and repeated two of the principle locations and main plot direction from the first film and of course, by 1983, big budget fantasy and sci fi extravaganzas were commonplace so Jedi was less distinctive in the market than Star Wars had been 6 years earlier.
In any case, in the last decade it has become increasingly common for sequels to outgross originals.
And to my mind, I feel that casual moviegoers who have less investment in the story are less likely to question plot developments than those who do. They wouldn't care enough about the movie to care whether Vader was Luke's father or not.
My challenge to those who don't buy Vader being Luke's father is to actually come up with a good argument against it, and you'll have to do better than "But Obi-Wan said" or "George Lucas never intended".