Density

Are there still any plans to release 2.7 with the ANH crawl? I know, I know, it’s a nitpick. But it was there in the first version I watched, so having the option would make it complete to me. Alternatively, does anyone know how I could simply splice the crawl from 2.6 onto 2.7 without re-encoding the whole thing? (Which would defeat the purpose of using 2.7 because it’s from the lossless files.) It doesn’t have to be perfect. I tried cutting out the crawl in 2.7 down to the frame based on the m2ts file in the 2.6 Blu-ray and then replacing it with said file via MKVmerge, but I had weird playback issues.

TPM’s only advantage over the other two is Darth Maul really. Honestly whether it’s better or worse than Clones depends on whether I’m in a mood in which I find Jar Jar or sand romance more tolerable, but I think ROTS is a huge step above both. Phantom Menace’s greatest crime in my view was just that it’s sooooo boring. Pacing was just awful. Even Jar Jar could have been tolerable if it was fun to watch. But the movie stops dead in its tracks for a loooooong detour on Tattooine before it picks back up. Clones had the same problem to a lesser extent; at least the Obi-Wan subplot was kind of fun and at least there was some sort of emotional impact with the sand people and Anakin’s mom. Phantom Menace didn’t have any of that. It was just pod racing and Watto and kiddie Anakin running around for like 45 minutes that felt 10 times longer. So it’s probably my least favorite for that reason, though sometimes I do prefer it to Clones.

HansiG said:

I don’t understand why you people skip these movies.

If you don’t want to watch bad movies, just don’t watch the prequels at all.

Either watch everything or screw PT entirely. The entire PT is not important to the story of OT.

Keep it all or skip it all.

Because I do think ROTS adds something to ROTJ. It wasn’t executed nearly as well as it could or should have been, but it does add some depth to Vader’s character that makes the climax of ROTJ that much more powerful. Knowing how and why he turned to the dark side makes you more invested in his arc and makes the moment he turns back to the light pack more emotional punch as a result. And unlike the first two, it doesn’t outright ruin his character and pretty much everything else about Star Wars.

imperialscum said:

TV’s Frink said:

imperialscum said:

I don’t see how would having a female lead be more inclusive than having a male lead.

This is so dumb it’s not even worth explaining to you.

…

My young daughters love Star Wars and Rey has a lot to do with it.

It is not dumb. You just don’t get it, despite being very simple.

If you have a female lead then young females will be able to associate/relate more. If you have a male lead then young males will be able to associate/relate more. Either way you “include” one more than the other.

Even with Rey, we still have Finn and Poe. We still have more male characters at the center then female characters. And Rey being a girl didn’t stop the young boy sitting next to me in the theater from loving every second of the movie, but on the other hand I can get why girls might not have cared much for the original Star Wars considering Leia was basically the only female in the entire movie and she didn’t get all that much screen time. Let’s face it, the original Star Wars was very clearly designed exclusively for boys, but the new Star Wars can have strong appeal to both sexes. That’s what makes it more inclusive.

I agree that Leia was a very strong female character, especially for the time. Even in the third movie where they went a bit exploitative with the slave outfit thing, she ultimately literally used her chains to strangle her captor to death which was pretty badass.

But Rey is just on another level, and I only see it as a good thing. People who bitch about it have probably never had a real conversation with a woman except maybe their mothers in their lives, let alone actually seen or touched a boobie.

Darth Vader1 said:

I know it’s just a movie, but is it believable to think that Anakin could survive those burns even with the suit?

You’re seriously asking this question in a movie universe with faster than light space travel, prosthetic limbs that are indistinguishable from real limbs, laser blasters and swords, and literal magic?

clutchins said:

applesandrice said:

LeeThorogood said:

This sounds amazing, I can’t wait for the fixed release! Hopefully things can be worked out with the myspleen admins so it can be accessed from there as well as usenet.

What’s the issue with MySpleen?

negativ- I mean rogue1 is being a bitch and flagging all further uploads of the SSE.

And he’s allowed to get away with this… Why? I mean seriously what a whiny little bitch. “Waaaah they banned me because I was a tool, now nobody gets to see it.” That’s even douchier than George Lucas not letting us see the originals in the first place.

My canon consists of “I don’t care, I just like good stories.”

Well really there’s no other time period to set it in. You can’t set it pre-Phantom Menace unless you want the movie to be about kiddie Obi-Wan training, which I don’t think anyone wants to see. You can’t set it in between 1 and 2 because then you’d have to deal with Anakin’s training, effectively creating Prequel 1.5. Don’t think anyone wants to see that either. You can’t set it between 2 and 3 because The Clone Wars already covers that. And you can’t set it any time after 4 for obvious reasons. So between 3 and 4 is pretty much the only time period you could create a decent Obi-Wan story in. Also the only time Ewan is appropriately aged for now.

If they do decide to go the route of making Rey related to Obi-Wan, such a movie could definitely tie into that and likely humanize Obi-Wan and flesh out his character a great deal, seeing as he was portrayed as a stern monk in the prequels without much of a personality.

So there’s a lot of talk about how the so-called “Machete Order” cuts out Episode I. But I have to wonder why you would stop there. Why not cut out Episode II too? Not just because it’s an awful, awful film. But also because nothing happens in it that is important, least of all when viewed in Machete Order!

Consider that when you watch the movies in Machete Order, you’re reframing the overall arc of Star Wars into the story of Luke Skywalker moreso than Anakin Skywalker. So what is the point of including one or two movies in which Luke Skywalker is not even conceived throughout the entire runtime of the movies? They add nothing. Literally nothing of substance is added to the originals by Episode 2. No revelations are gathered from watching it following the big one at the end of Episode 5. Episode 3 has 100% of the important stuff involving Anakin’s fall to the Dark Side and answers literally every question you may have about how Luke was born and why Anakin became Darth Vader. At the end of Episode 2, he’s still a Jedi and Lucas did a terrible job of setting up any indication that he would fall, so it’s totally pointless to watch it. His shift seems sudden and rushed no matter whether you watch Episode 2 or not.

Seriously. Obi-Wan’s already told you about the Clone Wars in Episode 4, so just watch Episode 3 when they throw you right into the Clone Wars. Do you really need to see all the intergalactic politics of how the Clone Wars started? No. That’s not an important question when watching the movies in Machete Order. You’re focusing on the Skywalkers. And do you even need to see how Luke’s parents “fell in love?” No, in fact you’re much better off leaving it to the imagination, which skipping Episode 2 allows you to do. Knowing that Anakin has a pregnant wife is all you need to know. The romance plot in Episode 2 certainly adds no emotional depth to the situation, so it’s pointless.

So basically, all including Episode 2 does is drag out the flashback time before you get back to the main story and give you a worse, less sympathetic impression of Anakin/Vader, his friendship with Obi-Wan, his relationship with his wife, etc. You can still leave most of this to the imagination if you cut out Episode 2, meaning you get to preserve most of what Obi-Wan says in Episode 4. You don’t even have to think that Owen Lars was just Anakin’s stepbrother he only met once. They could have been raised together for all you know now!

Trust me, watching it this way improves both Episode 3 and 6 substantially and makes the whole experience much more enjoyable.

I think perhaps a tiny fanedit consisting of a rewritten crawl for Episode III adding just the right amount of exposition and backstory that isn’t in the movie so you aren’t lost at the beginning if you’re watching the first time would make it totally perfect.

I just don’t get how you’re going to nitpick something as trivial as being able to evade a star destroyer when there are plenty of examples of far more dubious strokes of luck, less likely coincidences, and outright plot holes in both the original and prequel trilogies that can only be explained away as “the will of the force.” Cherry picking much?

I don’t think George’s prequels had nearly enough Jar Jar Binks. The first episode should focus entirely on him this time. No Jedi or anything getting in the way.

And the second episode should be a straight romance film with Anakin and Padme. No action of any kind, no other characters. Just scene after scene of awkward, stilted dialogue about sand.

Third episode should literally just be Palpatine cackling for 2 hours and shouting “UNNNNNLIMITEDDDD POWAAAAAAAHHHHH!!!1!!”

First watched it sometime in the 90s on the 92 VHS tapes. Changed my young impressionable life. Only movies of any kind I had ever seen before it were Disney movies. So it’s kind of ironic that Star Wars is itself technically a Disney movie now…

Well here’s what I do like:

• The score (especially “Duel of the Fates”)
• Ewan McGregor as Obi-Wan. The casting moreso than the characterization, though I do like the part in Clones where he goes on his little private investigation to uncover the clone army - that’s the only part of the movie I like, and why I really want to see a solo Obi-Wan movie.
• Some interesting environments and worldbuilding
• The “rhyming” idea that Anakin turned to the dark side for the same reason he ultimately turned back to the light side - to save his child
• Darth Maul was kind of cool I guess
• Ian McDiarmid’s performance as Palpatine was awesome, and the whole plotline of Palpatine as mastermind was the best part of the trilogy

I don’t see the ending of TFA as weak (far from it - I loved it because it left me really excited for the next movie while at the same time not being too frustrating a cliffhanger), I can’t think of many plotholes (certainly far fewer than were in the prequels), and frankly I have no idea what you are talking about. Lucas’s “plots” (if you can call them that) were terrible. If we disagree on that then we’re just not going to agree on anything. And dialogue is a huge part of writing, and Lucas may be the worst dialogue writer of all time. The characters in TFA actually felt real, their interactions and motivations felt real, the humor felt lively rather than childish and cringey. It was just all a massive, massive improvement. Fortunately, my opinion is the majority opinion which is why future SW films are going to be more like TFA (which is a lot more like the OT, so I don’t understand how you don’t like it then) than the prequels.

Also, Lucas only directed one of those “first 3 forays into directing” you claim…

And if this was a Trekkie site I’d be crucified, but fuck it: I would watch Into Darkness any day of the week before Wrath of Khan and certainly before any of the prequels. I really just don’t care about originality as much as I do being entertained in sci-fi action movies like these. Something new but shitty isn’t nearly as good as something old but good. (Not that the prequels were exactly innovative - Lucas himself goes on about how they “rhymed” with the originals. TFA actually felt fresher to me despite the parallels with the original, probably because it was a new story with new characters and I didn’t know and still don’t know where it was all going, but we all knew how the prequels would end.)

My only disappointment with the TFA Blu-ray was the lack of a commentary track. I would have loved to hear Abrams and the cast talk about the movie, but instead we got nothing. Just seems like a waste to me. Every other SW DVD and Blu-ray has at least one commentary track. Even the 93 Definitive Collection laserdisc had them, lackluster though they may have been. What gives?

Maul surviving is so dumb even George Lucas couldn’t have thought of it. The dude was literally chopped clean in half. That alone is enough to kill anyone instantly. Never mind the fall down a bottomless pit. I don’t care how strong with the force you are, what kind of alien you are, it’s just dumb. Boba Fett surviving, I can see. We don’t really see what it’s like inside the Sarlaac so it might be possible for him to find a way to cut himself free and jet pack out of there before he gets digested. But we clearly see Maul’s body break apart and watch him fall down an endless shaft. You might as well say Palpatine survived too. I mean why not? Hell, Darth Vader already survived burning once for that matter; who’s to say he didn’t survive being cremated? Maybe the ghost was just an illusion. I mean we never saw him fade away like Obi-Wan and Yoda did. And you can definitely expect to see Han return in the next movie.

If you’re going to include the prequels, then the Blu-ray version does fit in with the continuity a little better thanks to things like the Ian McDiarmid Emperor hologram and the Temeura Morrison Boba Fett voice in ESB. Notice I do not mention Hayden Ghost as an example, as I don’t think that makes any sense no matter what unless you’re going to make Obi-Wan Ewan McGregor too, and even then it wouldn’t make sense since Luke wouldn’t recognize him… And the new galactic celebration montage also no longer makes sense with TFA since we clearly see that all traces of the Empire did not magically fall immediately and the struggle did not instantly end with the death of the Emperor.

So here’s what I would use for any of your sequences featuring the prequels:

• Theatrical cuts of 4 and 6
• Blu-ray cuts of 5 (the only one where changes actually add to continuity) and 1/2/3 (CGI Yoda in 1 fits better with the other prequels than the puppet in the theatrical cut of 1)
• Blu-ray/Theatrical cut of 7 (it is the same)

For release order though, you might want to use the theatrical cuts for all of them if you’re interested in seeing them as they were originally released.

And of course if you want to see the “George approved” saga, you’ll have to go with the Blu-ray versions of 1-6 and just leave out 7. In this continuity you get to pretend everyone lived happily ever after following the end of 6 so the celebration montage makes sense again.

Otherwise, if you’re going to “skip the bad ones” or go with some other custom order, then you’re free to choose whichever cuts you see fit. It all comes down to personal preference really. I personally slightly prefer the Blu-ray version of ESB with the exception of one change (the replacement of the “Bring my shuttle” line) for example, but if you’re a purist (and you probably have purist leanings if you’re on this site) nothing will ever be an acceptable substitute for the OUT.

yotsuya said:

TV’s Frink said:

yotsuya said:

On a scale from 1 to 10, with 1 being fantastic…and 10 being awful

You’ve got that backwards.

Not to mention putting the PT above TFA for the writing (what?).

Face it, TFA is badly written like all of Abrams projects. Good scenes and good acting can’t save it.

Face it, your opinion is wrong.

See how effective that is?

Seems you have an irrational hatred of Abrams since you gave Into Darkness a “10” (which in your universe apparently means “worst”). It wasn’t a masterpiece but god knows it wasn’t that bad. So something tells me you might be a little biased if you’re going to be so ridiculously hyperbolic about how terrible Abrams’s writing supposedly is. I mean really, Lucas a better writer? The prequels specifically being better written? That’s hysterical.

TV’s Frink said:

Just read the whole thread. I’m not a bit surprised to see the usual wet-blankets complaining about the usual things.

OH NO A GIRL. THAT’S TWO!!! TWO TOO MANY!!!
OH NO MARY SUE MARY SUE MARY SUE ONLY MEN ARE ALLOWED TO DO THAT GRUNT GRUNT RRRAHR!!!
OH NO TOO MUCH LIKE STAR WARS!
OH NO NOT ENOUGH LIKE STAR WARS!

Well that sums it all up perfectly.

At least he looked cool though. And in the prequels, less dialogue tends to be for the better. He still beats Count Dooku and General Grievous, who had characters, just really bad ones. That’s worse than a guy with no character but a cool lightsaber and badass style.

TV’s Frink said:

Density said:

The colors aren’t a big deal to me, especially not the 97 version which had great and highly accurate colors apparently. But even the Blu-ray, to be honest I didn’t even know people took issues with the colors until I joined this site.

I take it you’ve never looked at the lightsabers then.

Well frankly I have hardly watched the official Blu-ray or DVD at all, and it’s been years, so no not really. I just didn’t see anything that jumped out at me as awful from what I remember, but then again I was too impressed by the improved detail and resolution compared to VHS to focus on that much. I didn’t even know that the colors were unfaithful to what was originally shown in theaters.

The colors aren’t a big deal to me, especially not the 97 version which had great and highly accurate colors apparently. But even the Blu-ray, to be honest I didn’t even know people took issues with the colors until I joined this site.

IsanRido said:

When I read the title, I thought the thread was going to be about Palp’s plans in the prequels, which requiered everyone else in the galaxy to be idiots.

Well in fairness a lot of it rested on manipulating Jar Jar Binks so…

There’s a certain “vibe” you can’t help but give off even through your internet comments if you’re a certain type of person. I’ve only seen it a couple other places before, but it’s unmistakable when you see it. It’s what I call the “Pretentious Asshole Vibe.” And based on everything I’ve seen from Negative1, he absolutely reeks of it.