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Opinion: The Biggest Missed Opportunity in Star Wars History...

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I have always thought that the original Star Wars Trilogy storyline, cast of characters, and so on never got enough screen time.  Yes, there are dozens of great Marvel comics and Archie Goodwin daily strips, and even many novels featuring the characters.  However, the comics are...comics, without any audio/music, scant dialogue. etc, and most of the books featuring Luke and Co., tell their story several years after Return of the Jedi.  Thus, most Star Wars books featuring the original characters do not feature the characters as they were in the OT, but rather later when they are much more mature and in many ways "different" people (A wise, nearly all powerful Luke in many books, Leia as a Politician and a Mother, and Han as a father and upstanding citizen who has completely severed his former "chaotic neutral" Smuggler ways).  None of this is wrong, and I love The Thrawn Trilogy, the Hand of Thrawn Duology, The New Rebellion, Luke Skywalker and the Shadows of Mindor and so on, but it all feels like...a new series, sequels.  

What I always wanted to see was more screen time of the young Luke, Leia, Han, and the rest.  More films would have probably turned the series into junk (well, it happened anyway), and also would have taken too long (3 years for each) and would have ended up in same forward direction of the novels.  

But then I found TV.  The beauty of a good, quality Television show is that you get to see A LOT of your favorite characters, and more so than in a film series.  The Original Star Trek was on for three years and yet there are about 80, 52-minute episodes to watch the characters, in that "era" of their fictional lives.  As Fry so proudly put it in "When Mars Attacks" in the first (and best, IMO) production season of Futurama, fans of TV shows love how little, if anything, is changed about the characters they love. When you sit down to watch a new episode of your favorite show, chances are that you'll sit down to watch the same characters you love, as you love them.  As for Star Wars, we didn't get much of the young "Big Three" at all, beyond the original film and ESB (and a few novels, which we know of, and which generally keep them separate, Luke and Leia off in Splinter of the Mind's Eye and Han and Chewie off together in the Brian Daley Han Solo Adventures books).  

In conclusion, I have recently been dreaming of "What if..." there had been a live-action Star Wars show.  It could have even been made after Return of the Jedi, and could have gone "back in time" to the era in between Star Wars and The Empire Strikes Back.  It could have just been a a show lasting a few years, with a lot of attention spent on well-written scripts (perhaps adapted from the daily comics) and could have filled in what is, IMO, the most interesting "gap" in the Star Wars timeline.  Imagine being able to watch Star Wars in all its glory on the big screen, then to spend several days watching the TV series, then watching Empire, and then (if you like it) Jedi, and then reading the "sequel" books!  It would add so much more...

 

-Someone, someday, needs to bring back the LIGHT SIDE to Star Wars.  Has anyone else noticed striking similarites between the character of Anakin/Vader and George Lucas, or is it just me? 

-It's called STAR WARS. NOT "Episode IV: A New Hope". Kids, get this straight.  

-Please read the Archie Goodwin daily SW comics: Too good to be forgotten! 

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interesting idea but star wars is supposed to be bigger than life.  and it does need the big screen (although with dlp projectors, even home theatres can have pretty big screens)

having just the movies gave it a sense of occasion.  if there was a tv show with the same characters, it may have started off pretty cool but then it would become too much of a good thing.  The tone and approach would have to be totally different. 

besides,  if an in-between tv show was anything like shadows of the empire, then i would pass (that whole enterprise should have been my first tip-off that SW was now purely franchise and story and quality was now 100% irrelevant).

i dunno, any x-file fans around here?  how was it when that movie came out?  was the series still cool afterwards? did fans want more big-screen x-files or just the shows? did it screw anything up?

click here if lack of OOT got you down

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There's a new Star Wars comic coming out in January, called Star Wars. It follows the characters immediately following the events of the first movie.

http://www.comicbookresources.com/?page=article&id=39579

My plan is to pretend that nothing else exists other than 'A New Hope,'" said Wood. "At least in the minds of the characters. The fact the reader knows so much, especially things the characters don't just yet -- such as Luke and Leia being related, Vader as their father, et cetera -- makes for some fun writing. I love 'Empire,' and maybe in the future I'll catch up to that film story-wise, but for right now I'm enjoying this beautiful moment in time, starting literally days after the Battle of Yavin when everything is set up and the future is wide open.

It looks like it could be interesting, but I'm gonna wait to see how word of mouth is.

You know of the rebellion against the Empire?

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Erikstormtrooper said:

There's a new Star Wars comic coming out in January, called Star Wars.

lol

“Grow up. These are my Disney's movies, not yours.”

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Wow! A product JUST called Star Wars.  4 years later will it be re-titled "Episodes 4.5" ?!? 

Anyway, I think the TV show COULD have avoided detracting from the appeal of the films, as long as the writing and acting were of quality.  I see the series as being the Flash Gordon serial George Lucas initially dreamed of. It would focus on Luke, Leia, Han, Chewie, C-3PO, and R2-D2, all as the central cast, and with "cameos" or lesser roles for Dodonna, Wedge. etc.  Heck, Vader could have had a side story or maybe even slight encounters with some of the characters (but never Luke, or maybe once or twice briefly, idk).  All in all, it would be a FUN show, like the original Star Trek, with a little bit of camp, but a lot of attention paid to the writing, the actors, and in having entertaining, interesting, fun stories that all fill in the gap between the first two movies (and with continuity between SW and ESB sought after as much as possible).  Pretty much like the Archie Goodwin daily comic strips, except with some more humor.  Wouldn't you just love to see The Return of Ben Kenobi adapted for such a show? Alec Guinness making a feasible full fledged cameo!

Also...if this show HAD occurred, they might have done more with the Prequel Era, and have maybe even effected a superior back-story to the crap they call continuity today.  I can see episodes finding a few other old Jedi who avoided the scourge which Vader inflicted upon the Knights (yet who perish before the show ends, or have given up Knighthood. etc).  Why not have hints to there possibly being a great Jedi Master out there in hiding somewhere...I definitely see the last season pretty much directly leading up to Empire and the film essentially serving as the series finale.  Why not have a brief mini-series in between Empire and Jedi.  That era should be handled a bit more, maturely.  I enjoyed Shadows of the Empire but it didn't work in the context of the story well.  We didn't see LUKE BECOME THE GREAT JEDI KNIGHT THAT HE IS IN THE MOVIE THAT DIRECTLY SUCCEEDS IT.  

 

 

-Someone, someday, needs to bring back the LIGHT SIDE to Star Wars.  Has anyone else noticed striking similarites between the character of Anakin/Vader and George Lucas, or is it just me? 

-It's called STAR WARS. NOT "Episode IV: A New Hope". Kids, get this straight.  

-Please read the Archie Goodwin daily SW comics: Too good to be forgotten! 

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I don't know if a live action series could have worked. Would Hamill, Fisher, and Ford have continued playing Luke, Leia, and Han? If not, then they would have had to be replaced with other actors, and who can say how that would have gone? And what if the series ran too long, and the actors visibly aged during production? That's not a problem if you're working with an open-ended timeline, but an OT-centric series would have had to limit itself to a period of four years. And then there is the budget - a limited budget can make a series look and feel very cheap, even if the writing/acting is strong.

I think an OT-centric series would have worked best as an animated series, preferably back in the 90s, when traditional animation for TV was at its peak and, IMHO, at its best, before digital animation came into prominence and pretty much phased everything else out. That way recasting and age wouldn't serve as major issues, and you could get away with depicting large-scale battles and fantastic worlds without the need for a very large budget.

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[quote=Erikstormtrooper]
There's a new Star Wars comic coming out in January, called Star Wars. It follows the characters immediately following the events of the first movie.

<a href="http://www.comicbookresources.com/?page=article&id=39579</a>

]http://www.comicbookresources.com/?page=article&id=39579">http://www.comicbookresources.com/?page=article&id=39579</a>
[/url]

My plan is to pretend that nothing else exists other than 'A New Hope,'" said Wood. "At least in the minds of the characters. The fact the reader knows so much, especially things the characters don't just yet -- such as Luke and Leia being related, Vader as their father, et cetera -- makes for some fun writing. I love 'Empire,' and maybe in the future I'll catch up to that film story-wise, but for right now I'm enjoying this beautiful moment in time, starting literally days after the Battle of Yavin when everything is set up and the future is wide open.


It looks like it could be interesting, but I'm gonna wait to see how word of mouth is.


Some people are already discussing it. A number of fans on TFN are afraid this series will disregard previous canon and go off on its own course.

Why they care about such a frivolous issue, especially at this point in time, is beyond me. They certainly didn't care when the prequels came out.

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I'm just glad this thread is labeled "Opinion" so I wouldn't mistake it as something else.

 

;-)

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Sometimes such a label is a refreshing and necessary feature on interweb forooms.

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Everything on the internet is opinion.  Just ask wikipedia. :p

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DuracellEnergizer said:

Some people are already discussing it. A number of fans on TFN are afraid this series will disregard previous canon and go off on its own course.

 

I know I'm concerned. They better not dare step on Archie's toes!

Forum Moderator
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I just hope they avoid Prequelisms as much as possible. I'm still afraid I'll end up seeing Luke meeting Jar Jar and calling himself a "Padawan"...

-Someone, someday, needs to bring back the LIGHT SIDE to Star Wars.  Has anyone else noticed striking similarites between the character of Anakin/Vader and George Lucas, or is it just me? 

-It's called STAR WARS. NOT "Episode IV: A New Hope". Kids, get this straight.  

-Please read the Archie Goodwin daily SW comics: Too good to be forgotten! 

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Davnes007 said:

TV's Frink said:

Everything on the internet is opinion.  Just ask wikipedia. :p

You're wrong, IMHO.

[citation needed]

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TV's Frink said:


Yeah, just try and prove you are honest.

Okay everyone! We need a time traveling lie detector in here stat!

...As an aside I'd just like to point out the irony of a device that is said to detect lies through stress indicators. That then forces you to stay absolutely still with various wires around your person for approx. an hour. And that only a Sith deals with absolutes http://img802.imageshack.us/img802/9097/yhmin.gif.


http://img687.imageshack.us/img687/7405/cooly.gif

http://twister111.tumblr.com
Previous Signature preservation link

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TV's Frink said:

Yeah, just try and prove you are honest.

Okay.

Frankly (or should I say 'frinkly'?), the spelling and grammar of most people on the interwebz is quite bad. I'm tired of having to read things 10 times to figure out what the fudge someone said...and then sometimes coming to the conclusion that I don't care about what they wrote.

Is that honest enough?

:D

Star Wars Episode XXX: Erica Strikes Back

         Davnes007 LogoCanadian Flag

          If you want Nice, go to France

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Frankly, I think a live TV show taking place during the OT (as opposed to between the two trilogies) could be very interesting.  I think it'd be cool to actually develop some minor heroes, characters who do their part for the Rebellion.  I know it's classic storytelling to have the same cast of characters save the universe on multiple occasions, but I think it'd be nice to develop a few new characters as well, and have them contribute to the Galaxy's salvation.

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Star Wars Purist said:


I just hope they avoid Prequelisms as much as possible. I'm still afraid I'll end up seeing Luke meeting Jar Jar and calling himself a "Padawan"...


The first one is unlikely. The second one, though ... :shudder:

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darth_ender said:

Frankly, I think a live TV show taking place during the OT (as opposed to between the two trilogies) could be very interesting.  I think it'd be cool to actually develop some minor heroes, characters who do their part for the Rebellion.  I know it's classic storytelling to have the same cast of characters save the universe on multiple occasions, but I think it'd be nice to develop a few new characters as well, and have them contribute to the Galaxy's salvation.

I kind of agree.  I wonder how it would look, however.  One of the (many) problems with the SE is the way the new CGI doesn't integrate well with the original effects and footage.

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If it was as good as the Star Trek original series and it kept Mark Hamill, Harrison Ford, and Carrie Fisher, it would have been worth it.

I wish that I could just wish my feelings away...but I can't.  Wishful wishing can only lead to wishes wished for in futile wishfulness, which is not what I wish to wish for.