When/Why did you become an OT purist? — Page 4

I suppose I've always been a purist, but I wasn't against the SEs at first.  I had gotten into the trilogy when the '95 boxset came out and was crazy excited in '97 to see the SEs in theatres and to collect them on VHS when those came out.  So I now had both, and I'd alternate between both of them, but I still saw the originals as the "real" movies and the SEs as a fun alternative, where I enjoyed picking out all the changes and new effects.  And when the SEs came out on video, I immediately remembered the "One Last Time..." marketing slogan and put two and two together.  But I was a kid then and didn't really understand the differences between home video and film.  I figured VHS tapes lasted forever, so it was never going to be a big deal.  And the quality was the same as in the theatres, right?

It was around 2000, when I'd become a bit older, a bit more educated, and the SE re-release happened, minus the term "Special Edition," that I got a sick feeling in my stomach realizing what was happening, and I began to resent the SEs for it.  But it wasn't until soon after the '04 DVDs came out that I started looking for a way to get the original on DVD and found my way here.  The rest is history.

Man. I remember the "One Last Time" thing now.

Also, Wook, the Luke scream in ESB is the same as the Emperor scream from ROTJ. And the Vader shuttle scene is just the same scene as his arrival on the Second Death Star in ROTJ.

I also find it interesting how everyone was cool with the SEs until they started to replace the OT. I find that very telling. If only Lucas had done us right, this wouldn't ever have been an issue.

SilverWook said:

Tyrphanax said:

Man. I remember the "One Last Time" thing now.

Also, Wook, the Luke scream in ESB is the same as the Emperor scream from ROTJ. And the Vader shuttle scene is just the same scene as his arrival on the Second Death Star in ROTJ.

 

I also find it interesting how everyone was cool with the SEs until they started to replace the OT. I find that very telling. If only Lucas had done us right, this wouldn't ever have been an issue.

That's what I thought about the scream. I know Vader exiting his shuttle is an alternate take from ROTJ. (You can just glimpse Moff I can't spell whatever his name is waiting to greet him.) I thought the shot of the shuttle on Cloud City was new though?

Oh, sorry. I misunderstood; Yeah, it was.

I became an OT "Purist" after seeing AOTC. I can't really remember when, but it was before I saw ROTS. I didn't have any fan theories about how Anakin became Darth Vader, but after seeing that movie, I realized that the story of AOTC couldn't possibly be it. The CGI probably didn't help, as it was less part of the definitive story of Star Wars, and more the ad hoc imaginings of George Lucas.

After ROTS came out, I felt that Star Wars was finally finished. Dead and buried. Then I saw the Plinket reviews, and considered that as a whole, the prequel trilogy was not worthy of being considered canon, especially as there were many continuity problems regardless of the style of the prequels. Consequently I have embarked on a quest to discover a good prequel story, and in the process I try to discover what precisely made the original trilogy, and indeed any good story, good.

ainchent said:

Nice thread to jump into for my first post :-)

 

I saw SW77 three times in the theater as a 7 year old and remember long lines, audience reactions to various scenes - laughter, cheers. I ran out of the theater energized like I had downed 3 red bulls.  That world fueled my childhood as it did so many people's.

The special editions came along and I was excited. Something was happening with Star Wars after all those years of quiet. I saw ANH SE on opening day and remember people cheered after the inserted CGI Jabba scene, but it looked fake to me and I wasn't happy. The scene with the jawa swinging around and the cgi dewback scene also looked so fake it was terrible.

 

GL's hostility towards the movies of my youth and the final thing that pushed me to sign up for this site is the horrible blu-ray release with the colors all wrong and the sounds changed. That is not what we saw! I want to see and be able to show my children the original unaltered trilogy, properly restored/preserved.

 

Gooble gobble.

Welcome!

When LFL started pushing me in that direction to be honest.

Ironically I first saw the SE theatrically and not the OOT. I rented and bought VHS tapes for years afterwards, and as a kid found myself continually confused as to why the two versions existed and began to compare intensively and realizing that all the new "improvements" and edits weren't necessarily for the better. 

In the age of VHS/LD as DVD began to slowly take hold, you had the two editions and nothing else. A DVD release was still far off in the horizon. Then came the ultimate-new films.

I didn't hate TPM. I still don't hate it. It's a well made film on its own that is just slightly dumb in places in its narrative. The technical aspects are great, especially the sound mix and even some of the cinematography is pretty good. But it isn't a great Star Wars movie, and that has been its central problem.

I suppose my real disenchantment began with the opening of AOTC, which I dutifully saw at midnight, and found myself disenchanted with the whole idea of Star Wars. So I saw the film a good 4 or 5 times theatrically afterwards I believe in some vain effort to rediscover a sense of Star Wars in there somewhere. By the time of the Omnimax curved dome screening making me physically sick in addition to the malaise of disenchantment, I knew it was time to put it aside for a while.

But the big one was September 21st 2004, the day of the OT DVD release. I bought this thing, standing in line, reserved-the works only to come home that night and sit through these with my dog only to become horrified at what had been done to not the OOT but the SE itself. The color was all wrong, the sound was wrong, the new edits and sequences were horridly sticking out, and by the time of the Anakin head replacement I was done. Just done.

ROTS sealed the deal for me, as that is probably the 2nd most deflating experience I have ever had in a theater (the no.1 is Casino Royale) because you not only knew EVERY SINGLE THING THAT WOULD HAPPEN. but that these were done in a way that ANYONE COULD HAVE DONE.

From 2005-2008 I gave up Star Wars entirely. For someone who as a child had been an incessant fan, (My childhood was comprised entirely of Film, Literature, James Bond, Star Wars and Batman) this was really hard to do but I just found I didn't care anymore.

In 2008 I started lurking here and finally took the plunge by renting the GOUT disc.  And that's where both the admiration and frustration came back. Love for the universe returned, memories of childhood, but all thanks to a shoddily tossed off port of a 1993 LD master with horrid motion smearing, and tinny audio. But it was knowing that I wasn't the only one out there, and that the possibilities of the films still existed that got me excited again, and to be honest that excitement hasn't waned despite the further revisions and now with the big changeover.

But if I had to pinpoint the exact moment where I became a purist, it's not the discovery of so many losing all their hard 1977 work to a CG effect, it's not blinking Ewoks, bad EU, blowing more $ on merchandise or any other of such good reasons....it was rediscovering the spirit of the original film itself, one of discovering one's desired adventure along with a sense of purpose. The moment in the end credits where the score fades to the strings just before the final musical climax brought tears of long repressed joy to my eyes. I couldn't help it. Still can't.

When and Why: The mono mix and Puggo Grande.

captainsolo said:

But if I had to pinpoint the exact moment where I became a purist, it's not the discovery of so many losing all their hard 1977 work to a CG effect, it's not blinking Ewoks, bad EU, blowing more $ on merchandise or any other of such good reasons....it was rediscovering the spirit of the original film itself, one of discovering one's desired adventure along with a sense of purpose. The moment in the end credits where the score fades to the strings just before the final musical climax brought tears of long repressed joy to my eyes. I couldn't help it. Still can't.

When and Why: The mono mix and Puggo Grande.

There really is something magical about the original end credits of Star Wars, isn't there? It just flows like pure inspiration, and the other end credits compositions for all the other movies just highlight the fact that the first one was perfect. The others almost seem forced (no pun intended) so that they can end on the same musical motif. It's actually jarring to have the Star Wars end credits at the end of ESB. That movie has a much different end, and should probably have had an entirely different composition to match.

captainsolo said:

From 2005-2008 I gave up Star Wars entirely. For someone who as a child had been an incessant fan, (My childhood was comprised entirely of Film, Literature, James Bond, Star Wars and Batman) this was really hard to do but I just found I didn't care anymore.

It occurred to me that since I went through this stage too, our whole collective experience may fit the Kübler-Ross "stages of grief" model.  So here we go:

Denial: "No way will Lucasfilm pass up a chance to cash in on re-releasing the unaltered trilogy.  They'd never let that goldmine go to waste!"  Uh-huh, sure.

Anger: We may not all say George Lucas did something nasty with our childhood, but everyone has a little generalfrevious buried deep down somewhere.

Bargaining: *cough* Petition *cough*

Depression: The phase described by captainsolo above.

Acceptance: "Don't want to preserve Star Wars, Mr. Lucas?  Fine, I accept that.  Now we'll just have to save the damn thing ourselves!"  A little more defiant in tone than you'd expect from something called "Acceptance", but I think it works.

CatBus said:

captainsolo said:

From 2005-2008 I gave up Star Wars entirely. For someone who as a child had been an incessant fan, (My childhood was comprised entirely of Film, Literature, James Bond, Star Wars and Batman) this was really hard to do but I just found I didn't care anymore.

It occurred to me that since I went through this stage too, our whole collective experience may fit the Kübler-Ross "stages of grief" model.  So here we go:

Denial: "No way will Lucasfilm pass up a chance to cash in on re-releasing the unaltered trilogy.  They'd never let that goldmine go to waste!"  Uh-huh, sure.

Anger: We may not all say George Lucas did something nasty with our childhood, but everyone has a little generalfrevious buried deep down somewhere.

Bargaining: *cough* Petition *cough*

Depression: The phase described by captainsolo above.

Acceptance: "Don't want to preserve Star Wars, Mr. Lucas?  Fine, I accept that.  Now we'll just have to save the damn thing ourselves!"  A little more defiant in tone than you'd expect from something called "Acceptance", but I think it works.

Bang on.

CatBus said:

captainsolo said:

From 2005-2008 I gave up Star Wars entirely. For someone who as a child had been an incessant fan, (My childhood was comprised entirely of Film, Literature, James Bond, Star Wars and Batman) this was really hard to do but I just found I didn't care anymore.

It occurred to me that since I went through this stage too, our whole collective experience may fit the Kübler-Ross "stages of grief" model.  So here we go:

Denial: "No way will Lucasfilm pass up a chance to cash in on re-releasing the unaltered trilogy.  They'd never let that goldmine go to waste!"  Uh-huh, sure.

Anger: We may not all say George Lucas did something nasty with our childhood, but everyone has a little generalfrevious buried deep down somewhere.

Bargaining: *cough* Petition *cough*

Depression: The phase described by captainsolo above.

Acceptance: "Don't want to preserve Star Wars, Mr. Lucas?  Fine, I accept that.  Now we'll just have to save the damn thing ourselves!"  A little more defiant in tone than you'd expect from something called "Acceptance", but I think it works.

Lol but it's so true.

captainsolo said:

When and Why: The mono mix and Puggo Grande.

Thank you for making my day (;

You're most welcome Puggo. The PG with all of its warts, mouse droppings, and being the so-called "children's format" is precisely the way I finally again realized the human effort that went into making the film and the joy of experiencing it. It became real again in a sense, and something that no computer or program can replicate.

2004 as well, after watching the DVDs for the first and the last time. 1997 SEs were a fun alternative as ady said, but since then haven't watched those that much, either. Don't know if I ever will again. If they would have released the SEs as is I probably wouldn't as much of a purist I am now, even though I've always preferred the originals but now to the bitter end.