Thanks for reminding me I do know Brian Daley wrote that. He also wrote the Robotech novels with James Luceno. Under the pen name of Jack McKinney
Happy Birthday to George Walton Lucas Jr. Happy 81st Birthday.
I do hope George someday relents and releases the originals. or at least allows Disney to do so.
The Mobile Suit Gundam Trilogy of films from the early 80s were “remastered” in 2000 or so. This involved having most of the original actors come in and redub their lines, and adding new, out of place sounds that belong in a PS2 game. Sadly all of the BD releases of these films only include the redubs. The only way Americans are able to experience the original sound design is if you have copies of the VHS with the infamously bad dub.
Another Gundam project with butchered audio is the OVA series Stardust Memory. In 2006, it, like the Trilogy before it, was remastered to 5.1 audio by redubbing all of the dialogue and sound effects. American releases only include the 5.1 mix, while the dub has sound effect alterations of its own, so that should be avoided as well.
I thought they released the original mixes in Japan is that not the case. US is barely a footnote and afterthought for the Japanese industry. Extra money at best but not even a consideration. How many decades have Gundam fans and Macross fans been screwed here. Not to mention to Space Battleship Yamato fans.
Thanks for recommending the series Jason and sticking with it.
I haven’t liked anything else they’ve done recently. Except for Ronin from Visions.
I even think light and magic while initially awesome petered off.
There isn’t much on the Disney service worthy of one’s time and effort to fully digest it.
Andor is well written and has good sets and production values, it does not look completely faked in the volume and cgi. Nor is it insultingly cartoonish.
It was interesting watching John Boyega on happy sad confused talking about the Disney sequel trilogy, and his hopes for Daisy’s movie and his candor about it not potentially getting made.
As in National Public Radio, John Madden directed Star Wars and The Empire Strikes Back. As well as Highbridge audio production of Return of the Jedi.
I have them all on CD in two sets.
I quite enjoy Perry King as Han Solo and Brock Peters as Darth Vader. Mark Hamill is very good in the first two. Tony Daniels is excellent. They even got Billy Dee for Empire. And John Lithgow played Yoda.
Billy Dee nor Mark reprised for JEDI.
But Billy Dee came back for Dark Empire for Time Warner audiobooks, but Mark did not. John Cygan played Luke Skywalker in that.
There are also further radio plays in The Dark Forces trilogy, Crimson Empire, and audiobooks of Dark Empire II and Empire’s End and Tales of the Jedi, and Dark Lords of the Sith.
Brian Daley only did the Star Wars trilogy before he passed away.
Tom Voegli did the NPR trilogy plus Crimson Empire and The Kyle Katarn ones.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but i do not believe there is radio adaptations by fans or books on tape for the Han Solo trilogy by Daley. Only abridged books on tape for the Ann C Crispin books.
I think the quality of printing varies some of the Marvel Epic collection appear to be identical in quality to the Dark Horse Omnibus volumes. In other cases, the Dark Horse printings are superior.
I swear in some instances Disney Marvel just dumps the digital file and prints it. I thought Legacy looked bad.
Maybe I got a bad printing, I have no idea.
my opinion and my experience is marvel epic collection print quality is wildly inconsistent vs dark horse Star Wars, your mileage may vary, and there are more than one printing for some of the books. Some have better paper stock than others.
The different variants for the comics do we really need 3 different versions of Empire Strikes Back. the Dark horse colors in the Omnibus six volume, the original colors in facsimile in original Marvel years. Plus the all new stand alone remastered version. Plus there are 3 different versions of Jedi and 2 of the Roy Thomas comic.
Because the omnibus is the 1997 special edition comic and they didn’t even include the original comic.
Wait I mean 4 versions because you also have the black and white edition scanned from the original art which is very much out of print for the Roy Thomas Star Wars comic, and the Al Williamson The Empire Strikes Back.
And not even getting into variant covers for the hardbacks and the fact they have like 5 different covers per issue of some of their comics.
I’m still half convinced the Rey movie and that Kinberg trilogy is not happening.
StarFighter looks like Rogue Squadron to me with a male lead and male director. Its even in the same timeline 5 years after Rise of Skywalker.
My Star Trek II and III gold-colored Japanese rental discs come today, and damn aren’t they beautiful even without an OBI.
I haven’t had the time to watch them yet but they are pristine.
Now i just have to wait for Willow Rental with OBI, and Star Wars Technidisc trilogy, and my James Bond 20 film special edition DVD boxed set from UK in PAL to arrive.
Edit:
my technidisc trilogy arrived in better than described condition, i’m pleased as punch. i only wanted star wars so getting empire and jedi is a bonus in my opinion.
i helped them get rid of something from an attic cleanout, i got my films, they got paid a non-criminal fair price, we both win.
As much as George spurred on the digital revolution with ILM and Pixar and the Lucasfilm computer graphics group, i don’t think they are nearly as groundbreaking as the originals. They are more contemporary to the films that were coming out in the age of cgi movies. Where films like the Matrix, and Lord of the Rings, and the Spider-Man movies and Superman Returns existed.
And the MCU is, and Disney Star Wars is like their successor.
They didn’t change the face of cinema. Have they inspired an entire generations imagination. Will they be remembered in 50 years as significant. I can’t answer that because i’m too old for the films to have been made for me. The OT was made for me. By the time prequel fans hit 50 i’ll be long gone or old and gray.
Yeah, it stutters and freezes. Whoever uploaded did not correct unless that is how the tape is.
With all his unfinished works being published. With the exception of the Alliterative Beowulf in verse. I’m surprised the estate hasn’t changed their mind about allowing other writers to write in his universe and make new novels in Middle Earth.
You have Conan novels not by Robert E Howard, 007 not by Fleming, Oz not by L Frank Baum, Tarzan not by Burroughs. Holmes books not by Conan Doyle. Literally dozens of imitations and knock offs of Burroughs Martian series.
Terry Brooks Sword of Shannara is the most obvious clone of LOTR. And with the sequel Elfstones thankfully he took that series in its own direction.
I see that Christopher Tolkien was all about protecting his father’s work primarily the legendarium itself and the Silmarillion, and he wished the films by Peter Jackson had never been made. Amazon never would have gotten the rights to Rings of Power within his lifetime period. and even that is just extrapolated from the appendices they aren’t allowed to adapt the Silmarillion. The licensed derivative works are in video games, animation and in film. No books.
To me the prequel he promised in his original outline and in the OT is what I wanted.
Not the prequel as made.
But I’m not going to argue with kids who grew up on these as being valid as their Star Wars.
But Phantom Menace sans the pod race and duel of the fates, and maybe the design of the underwater city I like so much and Mos Espa, is shockingly bad. Though I do like Maul and Qui-Gon.
But the trade dispute and those trade federation guys whose mouths move funny, is just worse than even the Flash Gordon serials in quality. With none of the old charm of the serials. The beginning of the film lags, and Jar Jar is hopelessly a bad character, who bungles his way into situations accidentally to become a hero.
And the politics dialogue in Episode II is even more listless and boring and even Ian has difficulty delivering it.
I almost hate all the palace and senate scenes and Jedi Temple scenes. Though I think the testing of Anakin in episode I is fine. and I quite enjoy the opera scene in Revenge of the Sith.
I wish Lucas had not made unnecessary retcons and made the prequel to fit the original trilogy.
Christopher Lee brings some gravitas to Dooku, and a presence you never got with Maul, because he barely ever spoke. And Obi-Wan cut him in half pretty quickly. and Grievous was like a cartoon mustache twirling villain. I still remember that animated like sequence of Obi-Wan on some lizard and that was awful in the theater. Chasing Grievous and the noise the lizard made,lol.
You never do see Anakin and Obi-Wan develop a friendship or relationship, its left off screen in between episode I and II. And in between II and III. Leaving this up to EU and Clone Wars which came very much later from Filoni was a mistake. There should have been a falling out between them, but first you needed to see these guys as brother warriors who had each other’s back. And slowly Anakin is seduced to evil.
I will give Lucas credit he is a much better visual storyteller than a writer. The prequel is easy to understand and follow visually and if you follow the notes of John Williams score that gives the ideas a beating heart it’s a reasonable experience. But if one wants to build upon or deepen or recontextualize Star Wars in the manner The Empire Strikes Back did, they will come away disappointed. Or if they wanted the same swashbuckling derring-do of SW 1977 they would be disappointed as well.
And not to double post i do love the soundtrack for phantom menace and probably would enjoy it with in an isolated score track.
Leia remembering her mother. Obi-Wan’s teacher being Yoda. No mention of Qui-Gon. Anakin was supposed to be a good friend and star pilot. Who was slowly seduced to evil. There was no learn the dark side to save Padme.
Those bother me.
And i know you covered them.
The Storyboards of the original trilogy book by JW Rinzler. It is quite good, and a very nice companion piece to the trilogy of making of books he wrote. Recommended for all fans of the OT.
there are shows that there were made on film the film material destroyed in favor of the tape because film storage is expensive, and they never intended to have HD anything back in the days of SD video.
Sometimes a reel of film gets lost for some reason or an entire episode goes missing.
Some of the studios even junked original audio tape master’s and original audio for shows.
Have to rely on fans that taped or recording the audio.
And you also have the case of film-based aka cel shows edited on tape. And redoing them for HD is expensive, it’s basically the process Star Trek TNG had to do as that final cut negative was broadcast masters.
What they do is go back to raw camera negative as if they are doing the show from scratch, this makes no sense for low budget anime OVA or tv shows.
It depends on the show and movie and whether the physical blu-ray or DVD sales or 4K sales warrant such a thing, if not streaming them.
Even Studio Ghibli except for Miyazaki’s latest film has not made the transition to 4K.
Then you have upscales like the upcoming Girl Who leapt through time and the recently released Wolf Children and Summer Wars. Mamoru Hosoda.
I also think Perfect Blue and Paprika were DNR, i’m not sure if those were 4k scans or 2k upscales.
I hope the rest of Artmic works show up or get new HD scans. Its a shame only Bubblegum Crisis has been done. Gall Force i have the laserdisc set and i waited forever for a HD version, i don’t even know if the film still exists or just another tape show.
Like i wish Evangelion episode 16 would show up in its original form on film.
A lot of stuff just goes to disc without any menus compressed to hell and they don’t even dub most shows. Japanese releases except for the fact they almost never have dubs or subtitles are always superior on compression and quality.
The problem is far too many upscale old composite or component videotape and even if they made the effort to scan a negative at 4k or higher they hit it with DNR. And Q-Tec always filters releases scrubbed grain they even got a newish AI process that was used on Macross do you remember love. I even said what was the point of a 5k scan just to do what they did sharpen the image and degrain it.
I’m quite tired of them doing these film grain noise busting, it’s usually bad when they manage grain.
It was also done on Space Battleship Yamato to bring it into 4K for the 1977 film and for Farewell to Yamato from 78. You know there is a problem when the 4K has better color definition, but the blu-ray has more detail and filmgrain.
It has even happened with Akira.
Never mind they used a digital source for Ghost in the Shell a filmout tape and hit it with DNR. Why didn’t they just scan the interpositive used to make release prints. Sure, its further down than the filmout tape but its looks more organic.
Its revisionism.
Even when they do it right like with the Tenchi Muyo OVA or some older HD scans that scan never gets updated and its becomes the only master for decades in some cases like with Bubblegum Crisis which will probably never get a new 4K scan.
You even have Funi be the only ones to bother to do scans of Dragon Ball from film 16mm in fact in the level sets and then stop. Toei is a huge issue they just remaster old tapes. I’ve been asking for years where the HD scans for Transformers season 1 and 2 for instance, why can’t Toei and Sony BMI resolve their differences or whatever Hasbro has to do to get new masters made. Rhino had workprint 35mm negatives and somehow or another they’ve been lost since.
There is DNR on Sunrise shows like Outlaw Star and Dirty Fair but for the most part it’s not ruinous. Nor is it on Cowboy Bebop, though I would prefer none at all was applied.
Have you read the history of middle earth by Christopher Tolkien editing JRRT, or John D Rateliff history of the Hobbit.
the 1950s Hobbit to bring it in line with lord of the rings was never finished. It was shockingly terrible and without the charm of the children’s novel. I’m quite glad that and the new shadow was never completed.
I do wish the revised Silmarillion, and the Fall of Gondolin had been completed. The longer version of Beren and Luthien. or the lost road had been completed.
The earliest Silmarillion the book of Lost Tales and Unfinished Tales of Numenor and Middle Earth I did read quite a few times.
Thanks for the share of the PAL UK SW and Empire Strikes Back 1997. from Lee Thorogood. It’s too bad Jedi never turned up.
Cool? no. you got bullied for liking Star Wars, comic books and Star Trek.
If you did anything other than play Football for the school, you were of an unwanted status. That made everyone that was not a jock into an eclectic group of misfits.
Star Wars spoke to me personally, but at that time video games and music were more universal.
Star Wars was like not even a real thing in the middle 1990s unless you read comics, and played the Nintendo games or read the Zahn books.
Then the Special Edition came out and made it more broad to people who did not care for Star Wars for a moment. Because of the anniversary and it was a major event.
Then the prequel happened, and it was for another generation. Explicitly not made for Gen X.
Anything nerdy was not cool that includes reading Marvel comics, reading Tolkien.
My god I mean 60% of my graduating class didn’t even graduate. Like a lost generation and Kurt Cobain was the voice that spoke to us. I’m surprised with all the drug use and widespread desire to escape worse events hadn’t happened.
People got on with life, but this town is the dead center of nowhere. If nowheresville exists, this is pretty much it.
You mean there is someone below frame under Artoo? Weird.
Is that Kenny Baker? The resolution of the image does not make it clear what is being looked at.
I’ve always respected these guys but the stuff on Phil Tippett and Richard Edlund, and especially Joe Johnston makes me respect them even more. I’ve always thought he was a supreme draftsman and artist and had a good eye, and he is one of my favorite directors.
I’ve idolized him since reading those OT sketchbooks as a kid and taking the art books out of the library for the OT. One of my earliest memories is marveling over his speeder bike sketches on ROTJ and The Snow Speeder on Empire Strikes Back.
Not just him but really being taken aback by Ralph McQuarrie paintings, they transported you to another place and time. Especially the ones for SW evoke a Kurosawa meets Flash Gordon esthetic. Which I love. And no wasted space in the paintings.
Also, it’s delightful to watch them geek out over Forry and famous monsters as I loved that magazine, to think they also reverence Ray Harryhausen, which I suspected but not so many of them.
I feel like season 2 was quite rushed. But i guess we were lucky to get anything with Kerner going bye bye.
But almost nothing on Revenge of the Sith when so much was focused on I and II. And nothing on the sequel trilogy.
I watched the episodes that covered Star Wars 1977 and was surprised to see theatrical footage and not from a laserdisc source and not special edition 1997 or anything after. The dirt and scratches and the lack of any sort of digital cleanup was very obvious.
This proves Lucas is lying about the film being a laserdisc. Because it’s terrible that’s how it was. if the original cut only exists on laserdisc where did Kasdan get the film from for this documentary?
The part about Lucas allowing ILM members and even the equipment to be on used on Battlestar Galactica was something i never knew. I knew John Dykstra had been fired, but I never knew he stayed on as long as he did and just wasn’t asked to join the select members who moved from Van Nuys to the new location to do Empire.
Grant Mccune was only talked about briefly i wish he was alive to tell his story.
Also the part with the company that had employed a lot of them to do tv commercials before ILM was interesting, i know Lucas talked about them doing Pillsbury commercials i never knew the name of the company.