Saga Unpopular Star Wars opinions!

If Dooku was indeed a Jedi Shadow, his story and character would be more interesting.

 

Luke's arc in Dark Empire was pretty much "infiltrate them and bring them down from within".

Ended up needing a bit of help from Leia after Palpatine got tired of toying with him and simply used the Force to brainwash him.

 

I have often wondered if Anakin in a way was a Jedi Shadow, but he went to the extreme and lost heart somewhere down the road. I have no proof of this and I defer to canon, but it is an intriguing thought. If Anakin intended to lure Palpatine into his confidence like the Jedi Council wanted, but instead did so through Dark Side acts, then Anakin's Fall could be completely re-interpreted.

 

The idea that Anakin was already plotting to bring Palpatine down in ROTS has a certain amount of support:

RoTS novel:

"Let Palpatine call himself Emperor. Let him. He can do the dirty work, all the messy, brutal oppression it'll take to unite the galaxy forever— unite it against him. He'll make himself into the most hated man in history. And when the time is right, we'll throw him down—"
"Anakin, stop—"
"Don't you see? We'll be heroes. The whole galaxy will love us, and we will rule. Together."

ROTS movie:

Padmé: Come away with me. Help me raise our child. Leave everything else behind while we still can!
Anakin: Don't you see? We don't have to run away anymore! I have brought peace to the Republic. I am more powerful than the Chancellor; I... I can overthrow him! And together, you and I can rule the galaxy; make things the way we want them to be!

 

Since Anakin actually did complete the goal by slaying Sidious, one could argue he was the greatest Jedi Shadow ever. It merely took Luke to remind Anakin of his mission.

 

It's extremely rare for them to actually infiltrate Dark Side groups though.

Their usual methodology:

http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Jedi_Shadow

My "unpopular opinion" - the Jabba scene in ANH adds depth to the later references in TESB.

 

My unpopular opinion: The Millennium Falcon is not a great ship. Granted its fast, but it is not aesthetically pleasing to look at. I prefer the Ebon Hawk over the Falcon.

 

That's for sure

My unpopular opinion: There was little to on incentive for Vader to join Sidious after finding out about Padme's death.

Unpopular opinion #2: Luke's plan about rescuing Han and Leia from Jabba was not a very good one (although it turned out OK)

 

I think Vader only felt obligated to stay Sidious' apprentice because one: Sidious saved his life and two: there was nothing left for Vader. Vader had lost his family and destroyed most of the Jedi.

Unpopular Opinion: R2D2 really is only necessary for ANH. After that he becomes a sidekick and his importance becomes inflated.

 

This brings me to another unpopular opinion of mine: I would have preferred the Sage being made without R2-D2 and C-3PO.

 

I think that R2D2 and C-3PO could have had very minor roles. That they could have existed merely to transport the Death Star plans, and to draw Luke to his destiny via Kenobi. After that, they could have been removed in subsequent films through phasing out like Jar Jar Binks.

 

I might go the opposite way; what if the overall saga were ABOUT Artoo and Threepio... ?

 

That would be...strange to say the least. And definitely not to my liking

 

I recall an interview/article from the 80s (I think) where Lucas said that the droids might be the only characters to appear in all of the films (all nine, at that time). I think that with the droids' role being like the peasants in Hidden Fortress in the first film (being clueless audience avatars who get swept up in larger historical events), it might have been (or might still be?) an interesting take. But that's 'just, you know, my opinion, man.'

 

Kid Anakin and whiny emo Anakin are good for the saga.

 

Of course, this wasn't the case at all - the idea that the story would be told from the POV of the droids didn't even make it all the way through the first film. Once they're sold, the POV is basically picked up by Luke. From then on, the droids are simply supporting characters, right through the OT.
Artoo seems to be around for plenty of important events in the PT, but Threepio is practically relegated to cameo appearances most of the time. I'm guessing it'll be much the same for Eps VII-IX, although I can see there being some sort of nod to their having been in all nine films at the end of Episode IX.

 

Unpopular Opinion: Return of Jedi suffers from more than Jabba and Ewoks. It suffers from having too many battles going on at once: The Throne Room Confrontation, Battle of Endor Ground, and Battle of Endor Space. It would have been better to cut most of the Battle of Endor and just focus on the Throne Room.

 

Their role has certainly undergone some strange mutations. Even in the first film, R2-D2 is no longer the clueless bystander of The Hidden Fortress; he seems to know a lot more than Luke much of the time. The prequels made the droids more secret-keepers than the final storytellers: C-3PO can't pass on what he's seen, and R2 apparently doesn't, or won't. Meanwhile, R2 becomes an action hero? Odd. I do like 3PO's storytelling to the Ewoks, though.

 

Me too. He goes from "not much of a storyteller" to the storyteller.

 

We had TCW episodes focusing on droids. They were (IMO) bad.

 

A what?

 

Outside of holding the cardinal unpopular opinion that, on the whole, the Prequel Trilogy is a better set of films than the Original Trilogy (in story and heart the Originals are superior...in all other aspects of film spectacle they are inferior), I would say that my most unpopular Star Wars opinions are...

(1) That Governor Tarkin is a wholly superfluous character.

(2) That Luke and Leia being brother and sister makes the movies worse, not better.

There are more, but I'm not sure how unpopular they are...

 

Care to elaborate why you feel that way?
I don't see any way their being siblings makes the movie worse, but I actually never put any thought to the issue.

 

Sure.

It feels forced (which it was; see: The Secret History of Star Wars, by Michael Kaminski). There's no obvious reason for them to be siblings, and having it so takes a lot of the tension out of what happens to Luke. Screenwriting 101 -- get rid of pointless baggage.

"There is another." It irks my nerves. Did Obi Wan not know that Leia was the sister? He's known about Leia for her whole life. Why does Yoda have to tell him, ominously? Why didn't they keep Leia in seclusion? Maybe Vader only thought he had one child. Vader didn't know he had any children, remember? He thought he killed them.

What does it add to the story? Nothing. It provides a reason for Luke and Leia not to end up together, sure, but how about she just falls for Han as Luke devotes himself to the ways of the force? It takes a lot of the punch out of a New Hope, which is a classic, romantic tale of rescuing the damsel in distress and turns it into a weird, accidentally incestuous, slightly comedic series of hijinx.

Then there's the ROTJ scene where she reveals to Han that Luke is her brother, and he reacts...as one might...but then they kiss anyway and it's not believable.

They had to do a lot of gymnastics to make Leia the "other" and it throws little hiccups into a story that, without it, would have rolled along more smoothly.