NeverarGreat

RogueLeader said:

This is somewhat related to discussion regarding the opening crawl we’ve been having on Nevarar’s TFA thread, but I wanted to move this conversation over here since it isn’t necessarily just about his edit. I wanted to have a conversation regarding how the politics in the films reflect real-life politics, and how this perspective can affect one’s approach to editing the Sequel Trilogy.

The political situations in the previous films seem to reflect real-life American politics in very general ways. In the OT, the Empire was America. Nixon was the Emperor. The rebellion was like the Viet Cong or the objectors/protestors in America, like the hippie movement.

In the prequels, George made parallels between Nute Gunray and Newt Gingrich, Bush and Vader and Cheney and Palpatine. Seeing a democracy become a dictatorship. “You’re with us, or you’re with the terrorists”.

In the sequels, what could that parallel be?
The rise of nationalism and the alt-right?
The election of Donald Trump?
So, which angle to by which to handle the New Republic would fit most appropriately with a contemporary American political analogy?

American politics seem totally divided between two sides. The idea that the Republic has been split into two parties, one allied to Old Republic ideology vs another that wants to restore Imperial strength, would seem to reflect the total division of the Democratic and Republican parties today (in a more extreme away obviously). The “death” of the New Republic could parallel the democrats losing the 2016 election and leading to the political upheaval we’ve see on a daily basis the past few years.

Not trying to say this interpretation is fact. George openly made liberal parallels with his films, so I figure it would be appropriate to strengthen similar parallels that are in the sequels as well.
And you can make parallels between the GFFA and the US, but the rise of nationalism globally has been a major talking point in recent years, so the ST fitting with that in a general sense fits too.

So I guess the question boils down to how the opening crawls could be worded (or things in the films themselves) to match this metaphor? Should the First Order be an open “nationalist” movement or be something hiding in the shadows and then striking from the cover of darkness? Should the Republic be trying, but struggling, to deal with this movement, or are they not taking it as seriously as they should be? I’d like to get suggestions that consider the real-life parallels.

What makes the most sense for the ST, in regards to how the OT and PT also reflected the real-life politics of their times?

I’m liking the way Nev is currently leaning with his, but I just wanted to carry that discussion over to here in order to talk about it more generally.

I hope that this discussion doesn’t run afoul of the new-ish political rules of this forum, but I definitely had worldwide rightwing movements in mind when trying to write the crawl. As you say, it was already an aspect of the originals so it made sense to continue that tradition. This paragraph in particular is probably the closest I’ve dared come to making an explicit reference to American politics:

In his absence, leaders from a thousand worlds have forsaken the fragile Republic in favor of the IMPERIAL FIRST ORDER, which has vowed to return strength to the galaxy through the designs of the once mighty Empire.

This was fun: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0mbtI4uRG9I

But reminded me of this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m8VU2GwkBtY&t=724s

Which reminded me of a thought in the theater watching the Portals scene for the first time: It would have been infinitely more rewarding if Thanos’s army had turned tail and run after seeing the entirety of the Avengers Assembled. I even half expected the movie to go that way, but then remembered that everyone would be expecting their favorite characters to punch random henchpeople for a solid five minutes without furthering the story.

But seriously, am I the only one who wanted to see this? Where the army surrenders en-masse and Thanos is handcuffed and sent to Space Prison? Just me?

I mean, he’s a genocidal maniac but he’s not actually the Thanos who killed half the universe. Seems kinda weird for our heroes to take out their anger on someone for thoughtcrime.

Putting this here so I don’t forget it:

https://youtu.be/sGbxmsDFVnE?t=76

Concept: pan down from the crawl onto a starfield which matches this shot of the Falcon going to hyperspace. Proceed directly into Rey landing on Ahch-To.

Searching for more dialogue in the Lego TFA game files, I came across more Poe lines specifically about why they get drawn so far away from the Oscillator. Here’s the new scene as it stands, with the flipped shot of the X-wing flying away instead of being shot down. I could probably adjust Poe’s mouth to better fit the lines, but it might be fine based on how brief the cutaway is:

https://vimeo.com/362476408

Password: fanedt

CHEWBAKAspelledwrong said:

NeverarGreat said:

It’s even worse than using the original poster for each movie

What? That’s what they should do!

That was assuming that the goal was artistic homogeneity. Obviously the original posters would have been superior.

And some lightsaber colors are changed to fit the overall color scheme while others are not. It’s even worse than using the original poster for each movie, since they’ve failed to follow their own standardized branding!

Here’s a bump spurred by the recent discussion of the ‘Obi-wan once thought as you do’ scene for Adywan’s edit.

It always felt like there was more to the story when Vader said ‘You don’t know the power of the Dark Side…I must obey my master.’ What was so powerful that would essentially hold Vader hostage to this evil man? I suppose in the film we are supposed to assume that the Dark Side is so seductive that after you fall you are incapable of ever recovering, but even then why is Vader so adamant about serving Palpatine? It’s not like Palpatine is the source of the Dark Side.

So my theory is that Palpatine has some ability with the Dark Side which Vader cannot replicate, for instance he might have kept Vader alive with the Force after his injuries and may periodically give Vader a new ‘infusion’ to prevent him from further deterioration. In this way Vader is a literal hostage of the Emperor.

DominicCobb said:

FreezingTNT2 said:

There’s a problem I don’t see anyone talk about: ever notice how almost anytime the movie needs to suddenly go somewhere else, a character is stunned unconscious? Poe, Finn (twice), Kylo, Leia, and Rose are all knocked out so the scene can move to another location across the galaxy. It’s almost like the writers don’t know how to end a scene, so they just knocks out a character to take a nap. It’s like watching The Room: the reason every scene ends with “Oh, I’ve gotta go” and cuts to a location shot is because Tommy Wiseau is lazy and has no idea how to switch from scene to scene.

I think if you actually examine the instances where those characters are knocked out you’ll notice your thesis isn’t really accurate in anyway.

I wouldn’t say in any way. Sure, the scene doesn’t always cut to one across the galaxy afterwards, but it’s true that this movie has a ton of people being knocked out to the point where it feels like a screenwriting crutch.

RogueLeader said:

I’m really digging the new crawl! So, would some/all the senators think Leia is insane because they want to prevent a full-on civil war, not start one like Leia wants them to?

Basically.

I’m fine with the blue saber. This should probably be in the other thread, but right now I’m thinking that my TLJ edit will be more modest and focus on the handful of really crucial issues in the film, Luke’s saber not being among them.

SomethingStarWarsRelated said:

This is quite nice, Sir Ridley. However, I don’t think this single line spells it out to the audience. I hope Adywan will consider this for his edit:

https://youtu.be/4QwE5iaDALQ

This is canon.

An update on the crawl:

https://vimeo.com/362209420

Password: fanedit

This uses the custom font (I still need to find a more authentic font for the title) and applies a rather aggressive method for disintegrating the letterforms as they march into the distance. Probably too aggressive.

I’m not 100% happy with the text as per usual (too wordy, etc), but one thing I do like is having IMPERIAL FIRST ORDER take up an entire line, something which hasn’t yet been done in an official crawl.

Now we know where the design for the Naboo Star Skiff came from!

While the latest version sounds pretty good, there’s no escaping that his reading of ‘mother’ is too fast for the scene. I did a search of all instances of the word ‘mother’ in the New Testament and came up with 92, some as the last word of a sentence. Surely there’s a slower reading in there?

Anakin, I don’t understand Bubble Comedy.

It’s got some nice movement, very dramatic, but that part feels quite video-gamey. I mean, how are they controlling the platforms? Are they just hoping they stay close enough for the fight?

Remember when all the fanart for 7 showed the rusted husk of the Falcon?

I wish we got that movie.

The Knights of Ren are revealed to be the surviving members of Kanjiklub, out for revenge against Rey for setting the Rathtars on them.

The Rathtars are also revealed to be on a quest for revenge against Rey for killing one of their number via windshield lightspeed ramming, which has become a War Crime in the months since the battle of Crait.

act on instinct said:

The festival seen in the latest trailer is actually happening on Dantooine, when they arrive to the scene, Poe will turn to both Rey and Finn and enthusiastically proclaim “Don’t let anybody say Dantooine is too remote to make an effective demonstration!” before running to join the crowd.

I appreciate the dedication to this bit.

I was 13 when TPM came out and remember liking it, and was especially interested in where the story could go next. Then AOTC was released, and I remember thinking, even at such an age and without the help of the internet, that GL had lost the plot. By the time of ROTS, the trilogy was an exercise in completionism more than anything else.

Just for fun, I tried correcting three of the trailer images with a global adjustment:

https://imgur.com/a/zlYa2pK

What if it was hyphenated? Kylo-ren.

Or Ben-kylo-ren.

Or Kylo-ren-ben.

Or Obi-benkylo.

Or Sheev-ren.

Holy heartbreak, that’s great.