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Star Wars Ring Theory — Page 3

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SilverWook said:

Danfun128 said:

Am I the only one who thought this was about people dying in 7 days after seeing (something) star wars (related) before reading the actual post?

 That only happens if you don't return the VHS back to the video store, or worse still, forget to rewind. ;)

 Thank the maker of DVDs that this won't happen anymore.

Ceci n’est pas une signature.

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DuracellEnergizer said:

Yeah. Rewinding was such a pain in the ass.

Really? Did you have to manually spin the tape? :D

My VCR was like:

*rewinding* vrrrrrrVRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR... BOOM, ka-tru, ke-ketchu.

*eject* SKRA-PUM-RRRRrrr... KA-BOOM.

You know what? I think my VCR is the one cursed, not the Ring.

The Original Trilogy’s Timeline Reconstruction: http://originaltrilogy.com/forum/topic.cfm/Implied-starting-date-of-the-Empire-from-OT-dialogue/post/786201/#TopicPost786201

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DuracellEnergizer said:

Yeah. Rewinding was such a pain in the ass.

 FWP

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Oh, c'mon -- people living in Second and Third World countries haved owned VCRs, too.

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Well the ring theory does explain the film structures, it doesn't explain though the poor film making. In Ep I the main character, Anakin, isn't even introduced until 30 minutes into the film. Padme's identity as the Queen is kept a secret from the audience - so she isn't even introduced until 30 minutes in either. Qui-Gon, a trained Jedi Knight, rushes in to fight Maul without waiting for Obi-Wan. Portman was quite flat at times, for instance in Padme's plea to the Gungans - there's no emotion or sincerity in her voice. In her speech in fact her voice changes tone for no apparent reason whatsoever - something that would have been easily fixed back at the studio during re-dubbing.

[ Scanning stuff since 2015 ]

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How about the fact that at the start of TPM it is established that Jedi have super speed, when they escape from the Destroyer droids, but Obi-Wan seems to have lost this ability when his master's life is on the line. This is a clear example of sloppy writing. Ring theory is not going to fix these continuity errors or any of the many other problems with the prequel trilogy. I just don't understand these type of arguments, where something bad is portrayed as a special type of good. 

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Yep, it's not meticulous rhyming that makes for good poetry.

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^Let's test that presupposition, shall we?

***

I wrote this poem

While visiting a gnome

Who lived in a dome

A girl wrapped in tape duct

He then went and f*cked

Down came Gott

Who said this poem sucked

***

You're right!

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DrDre said:

How about the fact that at the start of TPM it is established that Jedi have super speed, when they escape from the Destroyer droids, but Obi-Wan seems to have lost this ability when his master's life is on the line. This is a clear example of sloppy writing.

Supposedly the force-speed is force/energy intensive and requires substantial recovery time. Although how anyone's supposed to work that out for themselves just from the movie is beyond me.

[ Scanning stuff since 2015 ]

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DrDre said:

How about the fact that at the start of TPM it is established that Jedi have super speed, when they escape from the Destroyer droids, but Obi-Wan seems to have lost this ability when his master's life is on the line. 

Maybe he was just being careful, as this video demonstrates: 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t3dI-ghYimg

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The recovery time explanation seems more like a way to plug the holes in the plot, to treat the symptoms rather than the disease. 

Although the video explains a lot. :-P

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Duracell's Poem >>>>>>>>>>>>> TPM Screenplay

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DuracellEnergizer said:

^Let's test that presupposition, shall we?

***

I wrote this poem

While visiting a gnome

Who lived in a dome

A girl wrapped in tape duct

He then went and f*cked

Down came Gott

Who said this poem sucked

***

You're right!

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hS6xDZxQ1jo

Nobody sang The Bunny Song in years…

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DuracellEnergizer said:

imperialscum said:

Films are an art and therefore film maker should be first and foremost an artist. A true artist follows his/her vision with disregard to popularity and people's tastes. A film maker who makes stuff in a way so that people will like it is not an artist but a salesman or an attention whore.

So, seeing as Lucas cut down on Jar Jar's screentime with each prequel as a result of negative public opinion on the character, does that make him an artist or a salesman?

 I actually spoke to Ahmed Best about this, he actually said scenes of Jar Jar were shot for Episode 3. His explanation as to why the scenes were cut was because George thought the scenes took away from the central focus of the movie which was about Anakin.

 

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Danfun128 said:

DuracellEnergizer said:

^Let's test that presupposition, shall we?

***

I wrote this poem

While visiting a gnome

Who lived in a dome

A girl wrapped in tape duct

He then went and f*cked

Down came Gott

Who said this poem sucked

***

You're right!

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hS6xDZxQ1jo

LOL. That very scene was fresh in my mind when I typed this. 

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I think Lucas was influenced by the Godfather films. The original two films have a pretty rigid ring structure that sees the story come full circle. Both films have a clear midpoint - and the first would have had an intermission after Michael carries out the dinner shooting. The themes are patterned and run in parallel: Vito and Michael both begin their entry into the Mafia with the shooting of two people that they perceive as a threat to their families, and also as an act of revenge.

They both have a false-empire and a false-benevolence (and note there are clear differences to both of these under each don). Both are ultimately responsible for the deaths of their own family members - Vito by allowing Sonny to be Don which in turn sees him fall victim to a trap set up through Connie's husband Carlo. Carlo could have been stopped any time by the Don, but Vito didn't intervene in the mistreatment levelled against his daughter, which in turn compelled Sonny to intervene. Later on in the second film, Fredo is involved in setting up Michael for entrapment. Ultimately Michael has his assassin kill him.

The traps in the films also come full circle. At the start of the second film, Senator Pat Geary attempts to extort Michel over a gaming license. Later on the film Michael's assassin kills a prostitute he is sleeping with while in a hotel/brothel run by the family. Geary falls for the deception, and is later shown showing support for the family for the remainder of the film.

Similarly, Hyman Roth devises an elaborate trap for Michael. He orders the Rosato brothers (who work for him) to carry out a fake assassination attempt against Pentangeli (who works for Michael). The Rosato's tell him they are acting on behalf of Michael - and their bluff works in turning Pentangeli against Michael. Just as Geary fell for Michael's deception, Pentangeli falls for Roth's deception. Both assassination were a lie - one a false assassination, the other a misattributed one.

Vengeance, Deception, and Betrayal all come full circle also. The whole story arch of the Godfather Pt 2 revolves around Roth attempting to take revenge against Michael for killing Greene. The story of the first film sees Michael carry out revenge against Sollozzo for the attempt on Vito's life, and against Barzini for the death of Sonny.

Deceit and Betrayal are prominent themes - following Sonny's assassination Vito calls a meeting of the families, claiming he wants to end the bitter war between them. In reality he wants to learn who is really responsible for Sonny's death, and he wants to arrange for Michel to come home. He learns that it is Barzini, not the Tattaglia family,that ordered the hit. He then stands up and assures the other dons by 'swearing on the souls of his grandchildren' that he will not break the peace, all the while knowing that he is lying. That he really intends to bide his time to take revenge against Barzini. The foreshadowing of this is when Michael is made Don his first act is to remove Hagen as consigliere because he needs a wartime consigliere. Vito then explicitly tells Hagen this was at his request.

Vito knows that the Barzinis will attempt to preempt a move against them by taking out a hit on Michael, thus preventing the family from taking their revenge. Vito foretells that a traitor will come to Michael with plans for a meeting with Barzini. Prepared for this, when Tessio comes to Michael he uses his own trap against him.

In Part II the story comes full circle. Although Michael fends off Roth's elaborate plan for his demise, he himself destroys the family that he is supposedly protecting from Roth. In the same way that Vito had defended the family against Barzini and other threats, but had ultimately caused the harm to his family though his own actions.

It breaks down to the next level also, Vito kills Don Fanucci to free Italian-Americans from his oppression, but then becomes the source of the oppression himself. This is then exemplified when Michael becomes don, for instance when he wants to take back what the family had given to Greene.

I have a feeling that Lucas envied this storytelling and tried to replicate it with the Star Wars films. Ultimately though he failed where Coppola succeeded.

[ Scanning stuff since 2015 ]

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 (Edited)

WRONG MEDIUM! :P

Edit: Er... sorry, I think I had one too many from the bartender in the ship's lounge. Please disregard.

“That Darth Vader, man. Sure does love eating Jedi.”

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I’ve recently been watching Fargo (the film and the tv series) and I shan’t spoil any of that here beyond saying that it’s exactly how the PT, OT and ST should have played out.
Each story (film, season 1, season 2) is almost totally self contained, doesn’t spoil either of the others, compliments each other in theme and some shared events and characters and are really compelling to watch. While there are visual references to each other they are far more sophisticated than in the Star Wars films.
We didn’t need to see Anakin turn to the dark side (we know all that from the OT), that’s why I’m glad the Han/Leia thing in TFA happened off screen between movies, it’s all implied by where they are when we see them.
The PT should have been centred around totally new characters the story of which intersected Kenobi and Vader tangentially.
That way we are invested in the potential of their survival and character development possibilities.
This churning of story elements harms the sometimes amazing work done in all the films, even the PT.

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TheBoost said:

I read up until they got to the Joseph Campbell refrences. Most overused gimmick in criticism. I tapped out at that.

What started as analysis became a tool and now an excuse.

Not to mention he is not a respected name with people who seriously study old myths from different cultures, with those types he is seen as a racist white guy trying to force everything into the same western Europian mold and not taking note of any cultural differences.

So I pretty much tune out of anything that uses Campbell as a source as if he is the end all be all of this type of research.

My ratings for the Star Wars movies. EP1 4.5/10. Ep2 4.0/10. EP3 2.0/10. EP4 9.5/10. EP5 10/10 EP6 8.5/10 EP7 8.3/10.