The Unofficial Complete REVISITED SAGA Ideas and Random Discussion Thread — Page 19

The problem with the droids isn't that they are there.

It's that Lucas goes out of his way to give them dumb things to do to justify their presence.

Like I said in response to Ady saying he wants to remove C3P0 from all but ROTS.

Complete Threepio could be in the background and say little for all the Padme scenes on Coruscant and on her ships in every film (he doesn't have to be made by Anakin or have a stupid head swap in the Geonosian arena).

Artoo could fix the odd thing here and there but he doesn't need to play Curly to Kenobi and Anakin's, Larry and Moe on The Invisible Hand.

It's good to have a Greek Duet through the entire series of films.

Besides Artoo is a much better PT character than Anakin.

chyron8472 said:

I like "Shadow of the Sith", "The Republic Divided", and "Dawn of the Empire" better than the official titles. I especially dislike the name "Attack of the Clones."

The PT titles were a little too showy........and tried too hard to evoke the B-Movie serials that GL loved so much....."Revenge" MIGHT get a pass as it's an homage to ROTJ's original title......but even that seemed a bit gimmicky to me (not to mention that no Sith actually avenges himself nor HAS anything to avenge.....they're just coming into power.

Bingowings said:

The problem with the droids isn't that they are there.

It's that Lucas goes out of his way to give them dumb things to do to justify their presence.

I agree that they could work in a background role as opposed to the in-your-face humour that Lucas gave us or being removed completely........might have been interesting to have seen 3P0 walking with Qui-Gonn and the Queen on Tatooine, look down, see R2 rolling by, suddenly engage him in conversation, and just kinda dragging him along because R2 would be too polite to interrupt him...have him just get swept up by the series of events.....showing his entry into the series, but not exactly explaining it.

There lies the rub.

In the ideal situation his aging would progress from what we already see happen between TPM and AOTC.

For no reason that makes sense to me at the beginning of ROTS he appears to have rejuvenated since the last film and then comes the most stupid dumbass shoe-horned special effects sequence of the whole PT.

Lucas thinks his audience so stupid that they couldn't figure out that the man running the show in Episode 3 has deteriorated to become the wrinkled thing in Episode 6 so we have that awful Force lightning reflux thing.

This leads to Palpatine looking like a weird Halloween mask version of his ROTJ self for the rest of the film and there is nothing (even Ady) can do to reverse this totally without cutting the footage altogether.

So whats to do?

For me the only option that works is that Palpatine has a Sidious face and when Sidious is out and about it takes over his body.

Think Pazuzu in The Exorcist.

That way his evil face can just snap into place without the need of that awful CGI transformation which makes no sense because nether Anakin, Luke or Mace melt when they get the full blast of Force lightning in their face.

Yoda and Palpatine should never use lightsabers.

Team Ady have the skills to have Yoda push people and objects around.

They also have the skill to have Palpatine dodge Mace and zap him without the saber.

Dooku should never use Force lightning.

One suggested way is to make the Sidious hologram wrinkled and prune-faced in all the episodes.

That way when he transforms we know he has always been the phantom menace.

It would also help make it less obvious it's him in the first two episodes (that cowl is as lousy a disguise as Clark Kent's glasses).

I wish there was simply a way to not have that super ridonkulous looking wrinkley face for the rest of the movie... any extra "wrinkles" seen in the OT can just be attributed to an old man aging 20 years.....

Probably unrealistic, but is there no way to superimpose the "normal" Palpatine face for the second half of RotS and not have it look awkward?  Maybe if he is covered by his cloak a majority of the time it could be pulled off?

also I completely agree no sabers for Palps or Yoda.... should be force battle + Dodging

I agree no Lightning for Dooku as well... and I know this has been discussed before, but I'd change his roll completely.... I'd still like to see him as simply a rogue Jedi and not a Sith... a character who disagrees with the Jedi Order's stances and knows something is not right with the Republic... he thinks his cause is genuinely the right one.... this also makes more sense as to why he reveals Sidious is controlling the senate and wants others to join his cause... you could have him stay with a blue/green saber... (or even a white one that I saw mocked up awhile ago) 

To me this makes its more clear Anakin was targeted as the next Sith apprentice the entire time, and Sideous simply isn't burning through apprentices each movie. 

Perhaps you could even remove Sidious as a puppet master on both sides of the war,  simply have him taking advantage and manipulating the feelings about the war to come to power within the Republic.. he could be the one who ordered the army, even though it wasn't OKed by anyone, all of the sudden the Republic needs an army and hes there with one.  Then when we finally see Palpatine is the Sith, the reveal is Dooku was right the entire time not to trust the Republic...

The only real interesting way to change the Dooku character into something meaningful is to have him mean something in the overall story or better yet in Anakin's specific story arc (otherwise its just changing him for the sake of changing him)......if Anakin killed him, but then it was discovered that Dooku WAS in fact just a "grey area" jedi...neither good nor bad....and that he HAD discovered that something was up and was maybe trying to do something about it from the inside (which meant letting the rest of the Jedi believe he had turned to the dark side)......it makes Anakin's killing of him a bit awkward........AND then you can show Anakin struggling with the fact that he ENJOYED killing him (lending itself more appropriately to the idea that Anakin was SEDUCED by the dark side, and not tricked by Palps).

But, as it has been said many times, short of a reshoot of the entire film....much of this cannot be achieved. 

muddyknees2000 said:

The only real interesting way to change the Dooku character into something meaningful is to have him mean something in the overall story or better yet in Anakin's specific story arc (otherwise its just changing him for the sake of changing him)......if Anakin killed him, but then it was discovered that Dooku WAS in fact just a "grey area" jedi...neither good nor bad....and that he HAD discovered that something was up and was maybe trying to do something about it from the inside (which meant letting the rest of the Jedi believe he had turned to the dark side)......it makes Anakin's killing of him a bit awkward........AND then you can show Anakin struggling with the fact that he ENJOYED killing him (lending itself more appropriately to the idea that Anakin was SEDUCED by the dark side, and not tricked by Palps).

But, as it has been said many times, short of a reshoot of the entire film....much of this cannot be achieved. 

Surely having Anakin kill the only person who could prevent the rise of the Empire is a good move from a story perspective.

It makes Palpatine stronger because he has manipulated his enemies into killing each other and taking the blame for the conflict and it makes Anakin's fall more logical.

Killing someone he doesn't know was trying to do the right thing is one step away from killing people who he knows to be trying to the right thing.

Dooku being a Jedi gives Palpatine an example to lead Anakin to the conclusion that the Jedi and the Sith aren't all that different so the transition from one order to the next is more smooth. 

If it could be suggested that Dooku tried to tempt Anakin away from the jedi, and that Anakin later killed him in the heat of the moment but that it wasn't his first choice, then this could be used to show Anakin is already straying from the jedi path so all Palpatine has to do is give him the final nudge. 

There were MANY wasted opportunities in the PT....Dooku's character being only one example (the fact that Lee's talent wasn't used, and that he was killed off and replaced with a coughing CG robot is just insulting). TPM was one big wasted opportunity.....should have been Obi-Wan's story....wasn't. AOTC should have shown Obi and Anakin becoming "good friends" (as mentioned in ANH)......Dooku was a "middle of the road" character, more or less the Boba Fett of the PT...neither good nor bad....but then we get to ROTS and GL basically just wastes him by declaring him a full on bad guy, moments before killing him off....Anakin isn't shown lusting for power.....but only seeking it in his obsessive desire to keep stalking Padme....essentially only turning to the dark side (what should have been more or less the biggest (and most anticipated) climax in cinema history) because he was tricked into believing something that wasn't true (and then doing nothing about it once he realized the truth)...........blah blah blah

Revisited still has to work with the material available to us.....we (most unfortunately) cannot reshoot the entire film......so as much as we can tweak things and make them somewhat different, the base material for such an edit IS still the PT as it exists now.

Johannus said:

If it could be suggested that Dooku tried to tempt Anakin away from the jedi, and that Anakin later killed him in the heat of the moment but that it wasn't his first choice, then this could be used to show Anakin is already straying from the jedi path so all Palpatine has to do is give him the final nudge. 

Perhaps this deleted scene could be used, and with some clever editing and a voice-alike for Dooku, we could have a suggestion of Anakin joining his cause rather than the Naboo?  Or maybe even using clips from him speaking to the Captured Obi-wan.... Anakin pauses maybe, and Padme ends up answering for him.

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

Truthfully, I wouldn't mind if all the Jedi had blue lightsabers. I think a consistent color would look pretty interesting and would actually lend some significance to Luke's green saber...after all, he's figuring things out as he goes instead of following the prescribed Jedi methods. Plus, he's the first of a new line of Jedi, and it holds symbolic value there.

Instead of reducing colors to simply Red/Blue... how about just splashing in some other colors in general?  Give a few other Jedi Purple and make it less out of place..... maybe a yellow one here and there... they wouldn't need to be as prevalent as the blue/green... but still existent.

Nah! Blue for Jedi, Red for Sith, Green for Luke (it sends a message of renewal to have his blade unique and the colour of spring).

dabest13 said:

Perhaps this deleted scene could be used, and with some clever editing and a voice-alike for Dooku, we could have a suggestion of Anakin joining his cause rather than the Naboo?  Or maybe even using clips from him speaking to the Captured Obi-wan.... Anakin pauses maybe, and Padme ends up answering for him.

 

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

Thats a scene I am hoping to find in better quality.  I was toying with whether the film could be recut to make it seem that Padme and Obi Wan are travelling to Geonosis to save Anakin who was captured by Dooku.  Once at the Seperatist base OW and Padme split up and Padme tries negotiating for Anakin's freedom (a simple name change in that scene).  Dooku orders Padme killed too, then captures Obi Wan who was off sending a sneaky message to the jedi council.  Dooku tries to make an ally of OW (adding in something like "Skywalker was more easily persuaded" followed by OW's "No, I don't believe it" line).  I would even remove Dooku's reveal of Sidious, then later when the jedi council is discussing this they could be talking about the worry of Anakin slipping from the path. 

Anyway after capturing the three of them the Viceroy wants them killed so play the arena scene, but before Mace arrives just have the three ride away on the reek (that was a fun lesson in masking and patience).

I don't think you would need anyone who sounds like Christopher Lee, just search high and low, the guy generally always sounds the same and there must be weeks of sound clips altogether.  I spent a couple of hours trying to find him saying "beast" but it was out there for the finding. 

dabest13 said:

Instead of reducing colors to simply Red/Blue... how about just splashing in some other colors in general?  Give a few other Jedi Purple and make it less out of place..... maybe a yellow one here and there... they wouldn't need to be as prevalent as the blue/green... but still existent.

I strongly agree with this too.

Wouldn't that look a bit :

?

muddyknees2000 said:

The only real interesting way to change the Dooku character into something meaningful is to have him mean something in the overall story or better yet in Anakin's specific story arc.....it makes Anakin's killing of him a bit awkward........AND then you can show Anakin struggling with the fact that he ENJOYED killing him 

 

You've blown my mind with it. Very strong idea. I think that with the material we've got, one very plausible way to have Dooku be influential on Anakin's arc should be centered on how Anakin killed Dooku, the fact that he enjoyed it, and that Palpatine is the only witness of what happened. Like officially Dooku died in the duel, but only Anakin and the chancellor know the "little secret" that he was killed as an un-armed prisoner.

Good reason to remove or reuse some bad lines too. I think of the sequence like this...

Anakin defeats Dooku, and cuts his hands off. Then the Chancellor orders to kill him and Anakin does it without hesitation at all. Cut to a shot of Palpatine showing some interest or curious face about what happened. Finally, Anakin's face of doubt or strangeness, like he's feeling something he's never felt before.

It might not even be needed to have Palpatine order to kill Dooku at all, that way Anakin's violence would take the Chancellor by surprise and therefore the "impressive" face.

After that, no dialogue, just cut to them escaping.

The following scenes in the Emperor's office during the movie should show how this new "sensation" weighs on Anakin, and how he trusts it to his new confident. One of this scenes features them walking away though the office, and having them backwards is a good chance to reimplant lines from another part in which case I suggest one of two dialogues:

A: "I know there are things of the force they're not telling me" (based on what he felt when he killed dooku

P: "It is only natural, he cut off your arm, you wanted revenge"...

Or:

A: "I shouldn't have done that, it's not the jedi way"

P: "It is only natural..."

A: "I know there are things of the Force they're not telling me"

I think the elliptical way of referring to what happened would help a lot to give depth to the characters as well as it would imply that there have been similar dialogues between Anakin and the Emperor about the subject which haven't been shown in the movie... this meaning that Anakin is getting "obsesed" with the matter. 

Another nice instance would be to have the Emperor, later, tell Anakin that he has to kill Padmé, though I don't know how to pull that out with the existing dialogue. All I can think of is "...including your wife is now an enemy of the republic" but that hardly fits in the context of "every single jedi".

I just don't like the line, mainly because of the fact that while Palpatine can lie to the Senate about what happened, he can't ever tell Vader what really happened in that office. Anakin is smart enough to know that the republic is an excuse, he must know it's a coup d'Etat.

A less epic, but more grounded line would feel more natural in the context, or at least it wouldn't show the Emperor lying to Vader as if he was dumb:

Every single Jedi is now our enemy./ enemy of the Sith.

Our enemy, not the Republic, because at this point Vader should clearly know Palpatine doesn't give a f*ck about "the republic". It's a pivotal part of the movie, Vader must show a change of values, from "duty" (the Republic) to "interest" (I, me, mine) and make that clear is the neat difference between a full bad Vader and a "confused" Sith Anakin. 

Bingowings said:

Nah! Blue for Jedi, Red for Sith, Green for Luke (it sends a message of renewal to have his blade unique and the colour of spring).

Yeah, this'd be my vote as well. As is the colors are kind of pointless. If it was like that there'd actually be some reason and meaning behind them. 

Also, the idea of a huge variety of colors (blue, green, purple, orange) has always seemed very fan-fictiony to me. 

Okay, this will probably get lost fairly soon and it's not a major request, but - am I the only one bothered at how colorful the battles of the prequels, especially the opening to ROTS look like?

I mean the ships specifically. The Originals did have some colorfully painted ships (X-Wings and Y-Wings at Yavin, for example) but whether these were miniatures and colors looked more real and muted, or because it was offset with the pure grey/blueish hues of the Imperial fleet, it didn't look bad.

Watching a brief cut of the opening of the battle of Coruscant made me think that ships, especially capital ships, have way, way too much coloration in the prequels. Especially with the far too saturated and bright "low orbit" setting, it makes for an eye-soring festival of colours not unlike that in Rio, but definately not serious as a battle should be.

 Maybe this could be toned down and have fleets be differentiated mostly by the design of the ships (as in the battle of Endor), or leaving only partial color markings? Like leave only the three red stripes on each side of the Venator Star Destroyer "wings" instead of the entire red hull.

Same for Confederate ships. Far too colorful, IMHO. 

Burdokva said:

...am I the only one bothered at how colorful the battles of the prequels, especially the opening to ROTS look like? 

Couldn't agree more. When talking about George Lucas one could say that CG is a gateway effect...it leads to all kinds of other silliness. He seemed to think that just because he COULD do anything on a whim, that he SHOULD. The minute anything was being done in CG it seems like it just became Avatar....pretty colors, just because. There definitely ARE some scenes that called for more color (the opera house for example).....and it IS a time of greater prosperity and luxury, but not every bloody thing needed to be highly saturated in bright colors. The speeder chase in AOTC suffers from this same problem IMHO.....and many of the sets....because they were ALL being extended in CG, only the bare minimum was created in actual physical form....and they took on these ridiculous colors simply because they were being added in digitally at a later time.

This is where I must disagree.

The Clone wars is a very different kind of beast to the Rebellion against the Empire.

The Empire in the OT are a monolithic despotic government.

They don't need markings on their ships (I don't like the blue TIEs for this reason).

The Feds and the Reps are opposing teams who at the height of their powers almost match each other.

Essentially both sides are the Rebellion but with something more like the resources of the Empire.

It makes sense they would draw attention to which side they were on by using colour.

In AOTC both side's ships should look clean and fresh too because they have effectively just come of the production line.

In ROTS both sides should look more worn down and patched up (more like the Rebels).

When the Empire takes over all the colour should drain out of the Star Wars galaxy.

Only the rusty hotrodded rebels with their tatty stripes echo the age of the PT.

More colorful that the OT isn't hard to do.....and it doesn't have to mean the rainbow light show that was the PT either.