Info Wanted: Which aliens/droids would you replace with Humans (or vice versa)? — Page 3

Galactica (more so 'Ye Olde Colonial' version) was, like Star Wars, a space fantasy so in my view having robot pilots works because it makes visual sense.

It makes more Science Fiction sense to have a robot brain directly pilot the ship but Star Wars isn't Science Fiction, the dogfights in the PT should be more like WWI in the first half and start turning into WWII as the PT moves closer to the OT.

A robot or alien Red Baron would be a compelling addition to the prequel trilogy in my view.

Bingowings said:

Galactica (more so 'Ye Olde Colonial' version) was, like Star Wars, a space fantasy so in my view having robot pilots works because it makes visual sense.

It makes more Science Fiction sense to have a robot brain directly pilot the ship but Star Wars isn't Science Fiction, the dogfights in the PT should be more like WWI in the first half and start turning into WWII as the PT moves closer to the OT.

A robot or alien Red Baron would be a compelling addition to the prequel trilogy in my view.

Maybe......Griveous? Hurm HURM (that was my potentially impossible, but also very intriguing idea noise.)

If Grievous was an intact flying ace who got more and more mechanically patched up after endless battles... you know for someone who had sixteen years to figure this sort of thing out Lucas really didn't think it through did he?

Maybe Grievous has a flying ace brother (Manfred to the General's Lothar) they could compete for victories, one in land battles and the other in space battles.

You could even call him Darth Vader to confuse the audience.

Bingowings said:

If Grievous was an intact flying ace who got more and more mechanically patched up after endless battles... you know for someone who had sixteen years to figure this sort of thing out Lucas really didn't think it through did he?

Maybe Grievous has a flying ace brother (Manfred to the General's Lothar) they could compete for victories, one in land battles and the other in space battles.

You could even call him Darth Vader to confuse the audience.

In my future edits, instead of the mechanical enhancements being accidental, they'll be intentional. He'll be a creepy alien warrior who makes constant "self-improvements" to his body, in an ongoing quest to become the ultimate warrior. 

And I've heard the "Call a prequel villain Darth Vader to confuse the audience" idea a thousand times, and it gets less appealing every time I hear it. I mean,  I get we don't want to spoil the 'Luke I am your father' reveal. But pasting Vader's name on Maul, or Dooku, or Griveous just diminishes the uniqueness of two characters. 

 

MrInsaneA said:In my future edits, instead of the mechanical enhancements being accidental, they'll be intentional. He'll be a creepy alien warrior who makes constant "self-improvements" to his body, in an ongoing quest to become the ultimate warrior. 

And I've heard the "Call a prequel villain Darth Vader to confuse the audience" idea a thousand times, and it gets less appealing every time I hear it. I mean,  I get we don't want to spoil the 'Luke I am your father' reveal. But pasting Vader's name on Maul, or Dooku, or Griveous just diminishes the uniqueness of two characters. 

 

Isn't the self improvement angle canon for Grievous already?

As for the unique natures of Dooku and Grievous as villains, one is a old former Jedi in a cape with a red lightsaber and the other is a Jedi hunting cyborg.

They are Vader, they should have been Vader in the PT.

The only way to rescue anything out of them at all is to remove as much Vaderness as possible or to use what's there as cover for the important character reveal.

Making Dooku not a villain as such and making the General a cyborg Jedi killing machine that can be with ease be misremembered as the same guy in the mask and the black cape make a lot more sense to me than keeping them where they are.

Make them serve the story not water it down.

The problem with just leaving Anakin dead is that it's so obvious that he is Vader you might as well show him becoming Vader.

You need to plant obstacles in the audiences way so they are as surprised come ESB (when watched in chronological order) as they would be if they watched them in the order they were made.

Giving Obi-Wan a pupil prior to Anakin and giving the audience other Vader candidates are possible obstacles.

Bingowings said:

MrInsaneA said:In my future edits, instead of the mechanical enhancements being accidental, they'll be intentional. He'll be a creepy alien warrior who makes constant "self-improvements" to his body, in an ongoing quest to become the ultimate warrior. 

And I've heard the "Call a prequel villain Darth Vader to confuse the audience" idea a thousand times, and it gets less appealing every time I hear it. I mean,  I get we don't want to spoil the 'Luke I am your father' reveal. But pasting Vader's name on Maul, or Dooku, or Griveous just diminishes the uniqueness of two characters. 

 

Isn't the self improvement angle canon for Grievous already?

As for the unique natures of Dooku and Grievous as villains, one is a old former Jedi in a cape with a red lightsaber and the other is a Jedi hunting cyborg.

They are Vader, they should have been Vader in the PT.

The only way to rescue anything out of them at all is to remove as much Vaderness as possible or to use what's there as cover for the important character reveal.

Making Dooku not a villain as such and making the General a cyborg Jedi killing machine that can be with ease be misremembered as the same guy in the mask and the black cape make a lot more sense to me than keeping them where they are.

Make them serve the story not water it down.

The problem with just leaving Anakin dead is that it's so obvious that he is Vader you might as well show him becoming Vader.

You need to plant obstacles in the audiences way so they are as surprised come ESB (when watched in chronological order) as they would be if they watched them in the order they were made.

Giving Obi-Wan a pupil prior to Anakin and giving the audience other Vader candidates are possible obstacles.

griveous cannon isnt well defined at all. he has 3 different origins or something. so who knows.

and there are much better ways to utilize griveous and dooku then making them trick vaders. making dooku a rogue jedi instead of a sith who has connections to sidious adds a whole new dimension to his character. im sure that simmilar changes can be done with maul/griveous. pasting vaders name on one of them is a waste. giving obi wan a pupil prior to anakin is a perfect solution but realistically could never happen in a fan edit. 

I'd remove the connection to Sidious myself.

I'd have Dooku know all about Sith Sidious and be against him (through people like Gunray who were duped by him) and have him convinced he is someone high up in the Republic.

The Jedi come to think Dooku himself is the Sith Lord.

As for giving Obi-Wan a pupil I already suggested a solution there (I'm sure there are other ways of doing it).

Obi-Wan in episode one isn't Qui-Gon's student.

He is a fully trained Jedi Knight paired with Qui-Gon for a private investigation into the Naboo affair.

That way when Obi-Wan is adamant that he be allowed to train Anakin the line about already having a student is transfered to him instead of Qui-Gon.

That kid who played young Boba would be an ideal choice.

He could be trained by someone else (Dooku?) and Obi-Wan could train Anakin.

Bingowings said:

I'd remove the connection to Sidious myself.

I'd have Dooku know all about Sith Sidious and be against him (through people like Gunray who were duped by him) and have him convinced he is someone high up in the Republic.

The Jedi come to think Dooku himself is the Sith Lord.

As for giving Obi-Wan a pupil I already suggested a solution there (I'm sure there are other ways of doing it).

Obi-Wan in episode one isn't Qui-Gon's student.

He is a fully trained Jedi Knight paired with Qui-Gon for a private investigation into the Naboo affair.

That way when Obi-Wan is adamant that he be allowed to train Anakin the line about already having a student is transfered to him instead of Qui-Gon.

That kid who played young Boba would be an ideal choice.

He could be trained by someone else (Dooku?) and Obi-Wan could train Anakin.

See, for this whole "Anakin totally isn't Darth Vader" trick to work, you'd have to remove Episode III entirely though. "He helped the Empire hunt down the Jedi Knights." Hmmm, sounds suspiciously like Anakin. Wait, isn't Anakin dead? Or wait....is he the big black robot dude? Wait, Obi-Wan said he wasn't, he said it was his old pupil. But his old pupil never had any motive, because we never saw him on screen. Huh. Anakin's probably Vader then.

Honestly, it's painfully obvious either way.  

timdiggerm said:

Hm.. Yeah, good point. Unless we can also get Greivous to switch sides or something.

I guess this is why Ady has his plan of adding an entirely new character, a second pupil for Kenobi. Which sounds insane, but it's Ady.

I don't think Adywan EVER said that. If so, then he truly is insane. Like seriously crazy. In a good way, but still.

MrInsaneA said: See, for this whole "Anakin totally isn't Darth Vader" trick to work, you'd have to remove Episode III entirely though. "He helped the Empire hunt down the Jedi Knights." Hmmm, sounds suspiciously like Anakin. Wait, isn't Anakin dead? Or wait....is he the big black robot dude? Wait, Obi-Wan said he wasn't, he said it was his old pupil. But his old pupil never had any motive, because we never saw him on screen. Huh. Anakin's probably Vader then.

Honestly, it's painfully obvious either way.  

The only time we see Anakin kill Jedi is the Temple scene and he doesn't hunt down and destroy them.

He knows where they are and kills them.

Grievous on the other hand makes sport of hunting and killing Jedi (even collecting their sabers for trophies).

If you removed or adjusted the temple scene the only Jedi Anakin fights is Obi-Wan.

Lucas really screwed up the Jedi purge thing in my book.

Suited Vader should have been with those troops chasing down the Jedi on those planets over months and years.

But seeing as the clones seem so proficient at killing Jedi on their own and child massacre is difficult to square with any form of redemption I'm not sure how essential Anakin is to the temple sequence.

It's a bit of cheat but other than writing a whole new prequel trilogy it's for the moment the best I can offer, though I'm always open to new ideas.

Bingowings said:

MrInsaneA said: See, for this whole "Anakin totally isn't Darth Vader" trick to work, you'd have to remove Episode III entirely though. "He helped the Empire hunt down the Jedi Knights." Hmmm, sounds suspiciously like Anakin. Wait, isn't Anakin dead? Or wait....is he the big black robot dude? Wait, Obi-Wan said he wasn't, he said it was his old pupil. But his old pupil never had any motive, because we never saw him on screen. Huh. Anakin's probably Vader then.

Honestly, it's painfully obvious either way.  

The only time we see Anakin kill Jedi is the Temple scene and he doesn't hunt down and destroy them.

He knows where they are and kills them.

Grievous on the other hand makes sport of hunting and killing Jedi (even collecting their sabers for trophies).

If you removed or adjusted the temple scene the only Jedi Anakin fights is Obi-Wan.

Lucas really screwed up the Jedi purge thing in my book.

Suited Vader should have been with those troops chasing down the Jedi on those planets over months and years.

But seeing as the clones seem so proficient at killing Jedi on their own and child massacre is difficult to square with any form of redemption I'm not sure how essential Anakin is to the temple sequence.

It's a bit of cheat but other than writing a whole new prequel trilogy it's for the moment the best I can offer, though I'm always open to new ideas.

Here's an idea: if you're new to Star Warsm watch 4-6 then 1-3. Or retitle ANH "Episode 1" That makes the most sense. 

That's one approach.

But if that was the only approach this section of these boards would hardly be needed.

I'd definitely replace Admiral Ackbar's second in command with a human.

The mask doesn't move, the line sounds too comedic for such a pivotal scene.

"It's a trap!" is pretty much sacred ground but the line before could be delivered by anyone other than a silly voice, played over a man in an inarticulate mask.

Bingowings said:

I'd definitely replace Admiral Ackbar's second in command with a human.

The mask doesn't move, the line sounds too comedic for such a pivotal scene.

"It's a trap!" is pretty much sacred ground but the line before could be delivered by anyone other than a silly voice, played over a man in an inarticulate mask.

I agree wholeheartedly. He sounds like a human, he doesn't even have the Mon Calamari accent thingy. 

MrInsaneA said:

Bingowings said:

You might be able to pretend that but it's pretty obvious without reading any books or online material that they aren't intended to be piloted by droids.

They are droids.

At one point they were meant to be general fighter craft with robot pilots inside, then a designer (I'm not sure which one at the moment) came to the conclusion that the ship might as well be a droid itself.

They walk around, their heads bop up and down in response to stimulus and they 'talk' to each other.

The idea of droid starfighters only bothered me during that one shot in Episode III where all the droids are walking on the invisible hand, and they talk to each other and make these laughing sounds. Always thought that was very cartoonish and Un-Star Wars like.

 

You just described the whole of the PT ;-)

It makes even less sense when you look at those huge capital ships that the Feds use which have full life support (probably burning up loads of fuel and expending loads of energy which could be used elsewhere) even though droids make up most of the crew and cargo (imagine the tension Lucas could have drawn from having Jedi having to navigate around Fed ships where huge areas have no air or gravity).

So if droids can drive vehicles, populate and control capital ships etc why do they have to be fighters?

It's a science fiction idea in a space fantasy film.

What about him?

If Vader can have a special chamber on his ship Dooku could have a special chamber with life support.

The Feds could have a small wing of their ships with air and life support and the bulk of the ship with the life support switched off.

In the PT we saw a handful of Neimodians on the bridge of their ship, a few people in the conference room and that's it.

On the Invisible Hand their is Surfer Dude Fed, Dooku and his 'captive'.

Grievous can exist in space with relative ease so walking around a ship with the life support switched off would be a doddle.

A small wing on their vaste ships is all they really need.