Saga The Reboot Question

I think EVERYTHING might be remade eventually. I mean, if movies are being made a hundred years from now, and we're rebooting movies like crazy nowadays? Seems impossible for them not to. There won't be people here a hundred years from now who lived through the releases of all these films so it won't be the same for them.

 

Someone mentioned a reboot introducing a new generation to Star Wars.

I get the impression that Star Wars is crossing generations easily as it stands now without being remade.

A series like this isn't still so successful based on the original fans from the 70's and 80's. Its picked up new fans along the way with the PT and TCW cartoons. It will continue to pick them up too, especially now we have a ST and new cartoon coming. Because those fans become parents and their kids get introduced to it and its a continuing cycle. The good will and the word of mouth that is attached to this series is immense.

I don't see the point of remaking a trilogy of movies. Yes I can see them in the future making films within the SW universe that feature familiar characters but not remaking say the OT. What would they do if they did........ change the story, remake it shot for shot? Whats the point?

Look at the films series that have been rebooted in recent times, James Bond, Batman, Spiderman.......... all individual characters with standalone stories to tell. Also the lead actor changes as they age / get bored so they have to reinvent them to keep the series going and keep audiences intereste

SW to my mind is a different beast entirely. In fact I wonder if it falls in to that untouchable classic film bracket where the film is that iconic that a cinema reboot is out of bounds within the industry like Casablanca, Gone with the Wind, North by Northwest?

 

AndyLGR is right -- Star Wars is a different beast. In a James Bond, spider-Man, etc., it's accepted that no one presentation is a definitive take. The franchise deletes old entries as the talent leaves or the story becomes too constricting. Batman just finished a triumphant run of movies, but it doesn't matter -- the role's already been recast, and the Nolan story is dead. It doesn't count anymore. In Star Wars, the movies that were made are, for lack of a better word, what really happened. Spider-Man's origin story is going to be told again and again, but the Death Star is only ever going to get destroyed one way.

 

Of course they could remake the original SW years down the line, but do they stop there or do they remake ESB then? Do they retell the same story or do they tweak it?

Disney now have a huge legacy and franchise to protect and add to. I think that reboots or remakes could derail the film canon and also detract away from new projects in the franchise.

Having said that SW is a different beast look at what they had to do with Star Trek........ they had to create an alternative timeline away from the original movies so that they could potentially co-exist together. I don't know how that sat with Trek fans. But that option isn't there for a SW reboot as tiem travel etc isn't part of the film lore.

 

I have to agree with this assessment of the Saga. I suspect that Disney understands this as well. At least for now.

 

I just want the OT rebooted. But if that requires a PT reboot too, fine.

 

I think you got that backwards, Cyreides.

 

No, I got it exactly as I meant to. The OT has aged horrendously in so many ways after so many years and I can't bear to watch it anymore.

 

lolwut?

Uh…okay dude. I don't agree. At all. Sure the puppet effects sometimes show their age. But the space battles? Nope. I thought those were modern special effects when I first saw the OT in about 2004. And my little brother, who is still under 13, loves the films and considers ROTJ one of his favorites.

Just my opinion, though.

 

I don't know how any one could possibly confuse the special effects in the OT for anything recent. They look pretty awful all around. And it's also not just the visuals that aged badly either.

 

Because the ships still look great. Also, have you ever compared shots of the planets from the OT and the PT from space? They don't look that dissimilar. Now, the OT does tend to be more stationary and have less dynamic movement, but I sure as heck didn't think they were made in the 70s and 80s as a young teenager.

 

Cyreides: I'm totally the opposite. I find most of the 'modern' effects horrendous they look fake and have no substance. I'd love having the OOT restored to it's original state. I truly dislike CGI. Some of it is simply wiring, perception, and generation differences. And the newer effects don't fit with the OT it makes everything disjointed.

As I have said in another thread I absolutely believe the films will be rebooted. Just a question of time and money.

 

I still think a lot of the effects from the OT hold up now. The space battle stuff especially. Maybe its an age thing, but thats my view. In fact overall through the OT the effects certainly don't take me out of the film and make it any less believable.

They are far from awful. It certainly doesnt need rebooting because there is better technology available now.

 

The only OT effects that bother me are the overuse of fog machines in some scenes (just a minor complaint, really) and those annoying white flashes.

The Vader/Old Ben duel also hasn't aged all that well but that was more due to prop problems IIRC than effects issues.

Everything else seems great to me, visually. The only other issue is the sound quality does seem a bit muffled (especially in ANH).

Other than those very minor instances, I find the effects in the OT seem to have aged pretty well. I can't find anything so problematic that would necessitate a reboot.

 

A lot of you people really need to watch some modern blockbuster sci-fi movies and look at the visuals and then take at look at the OTs. It's god awful and it's not a subjective thing at all, it's just factually far worse looking then what's coming out now or even 10 years ago. So much blind nostalgia on this website it's painful to read.

 

Believe it or not I saw the PT first. Like I said earlier, a few things did stand out to me (excessive fog, white flashes, the ANH saber duel, muffled sound) but overall, it seemed to have aged well.

It can't be an issue of blind nostalgia in my case. I only got into the series in 2007 and Episodes I and III were the first ones I saw. I saw Episode V afterwards and the fog machines and sound quality were noticeable to me after watching I and III, but that was about it.

(Yeah I saw them totally out of order, but I was somewhat familiar with the story and I saw them on HBO for the first time, so I didn't really have a choice. lol)

I will say this though, the OT as it is now could use some serious color-correction. But that's an entirely different topic.

 

A. Let's not let this get too... aggressive. Criticize the movies, sure, but let's remain respectful of other posters.

B. Personally I like many of the OT effects more than, say, The Avengers. The latter is on a far more spectacular visual scale, and is filled with moving camera shots following detailed CG (or even not CG) elements. But the former often makes me feel, in a different way. It could be because I'm more attached to Star Wars. It could be my history with it. I think, perhaps, in addition to those things, it is the simplicity of some of the effects. Paintings, models, even the designs themselves were, I think simple-yet-effective. Some contemporary films have gotten so filled with 'stuff' that it can actually detract, in my eyes. (That's not necessarily a criticism of The Avengers, so much as just a general comment.) Compare, on the ROTS DVD, the before-and-after shots of the Mustafar model; the before is - or has the potential to be - moodier, I think, while the after is definitely more spectacular. The former feeling is just more what appeals to me.

With that said, there really are quite a few dodgy effects in the OT, especially in ANH. But even those have some value, I think, because the film was such a breakthrough/masterpiece of its time. Something to be remembered, even if not necessarily the latest and greatest in slickness.

In terms of pure effects (not 'feel' - I think ESB is my favorite for that), TPM might be my favorite. A great mix of practical effects and CG where necessary, good production design, and it doesn't go as hard as AOTC and ROTS.

 

Mod edit: Drop the personal remarks

The OT simply looks old as dirt now. There is no denying this.

And it isn't just the visual effects of the OT that are out of wack now, there is so much more wrong with it.

 

The OT just has that certain something that I can still feel today.
The emotion of it maybe? Battle of Yavin, Luke vs Vader in ESB, Palpatine using Force-lightning, Han charging after the stormtroopers on the Death Star etc.

 

I disagree, I think the only thing that ages the OT so much is Luke's haircut in RotJ.

Yeah, I re-watched it with my kids a few days ago, and the scene where Vader and Obi-Wan are fighting and Obi-Wan's lightsaber gradually fades out (which, when I first watched it around the age of five, I thought meant that his saber was running out of power!) is actually a few seconds shorter, possibly because of how crappy it looks that they never really finished the effect off, even in the Special Edition version.

I personally feel that, instead of a reboot, they should make a Perfect Edition, and go back through and fix a load of mistakes, like the saber issue I mentioned, as well as Greedo vs. Solo, maybe even the Force Kick, and some of the shockingly bad sound effects in the PT (when the large container toppled in AotC and clanged on the floor like someone dropped a tin can, or the lack of SFX in RotS when Anakin crash-lands what's left of Grievous' ship. Maybe also the "Carrie! Leia!" in ANH.

 

I don't get how you guys keep thinking the visuals are a subjective thing that you can just disagree with when it comes to how the OT has aged. It's flat out not. The movies were made in the 70s ffs, so in order for them to be visually comparable to really anything coming out right now, design aesthetics/visual effects would literally have had to not progress at all in the past 30+ years, and that's utterly ridiculous. Either that or you all think the movies were so good looking upon release that visually things have been playing catch up for the past 30+ years and still haven't quite caught up yet, which is even more freaking ridiculous. Ugh...

 

And CGI is automatically better because its newer? Ha ha lol.

 

Seriously, that's your response...? Ignore everything and jump right to 'lolCGI'...? Ugh. I'm out, enjoy the thread.

 

Well that is how special effects have evolved since the OT is it not?

 

This may be your opinion, be we have the right to ours as well. You need to quit stating your opinion as an absolute while clearly much of the film and Star Wars communities clearly disagree with you.

The primary reason that we tend to see the originals as superior is because they are, barring visuals and "action," far superior to the prequels in every way. In the veins of acting, writing, and directing, the prequels fall flat to the originals. The "action" may be more fun to look at in the prequels, but outside of Revenge of the Sith there's hardly any emotion in them. What makes the ending to Return of the Jedi so great is all the emotional build-up in Luke and Vader. Nothing happens in the entire prequel trilogy that comes near the emotion of the Vader vs. Luke duel, the "I love you," "I know" exchange between Han and Leia, or the family lineage reveal at the end of The Empire Strikes Back. All of these moments are due to great acting and great directing, something that the prequels simply lack at times. I would say that The Phantom Menace and Revenge of the Sith are good movies, but Attack of the Clones at times suffers from the prequels problems to the point where the film collapses on itself. Clearly that is just an opinion seeing how quite a few members of this board and others prefer it to every other film.

The visuals in the prequels look very good to made in a computer. But they're just that: made in a computer. When it's really in front of the camera, there's an organic and real sense to it. There are probably kids out there that thought Star Wars was real back in the 80s. I would hardly say there are kids now that think that. Because kids are smarter? No, because the prequels look fake. You can clearly tell that they're standing in front of a green screen for nearly the entire film.

Basically, it boils down to what was sometimes lazy filmmaking. And this showed in the very robotic performances displayed by many of the actors on set (some of which had done great things before or would do great things after, such as Samuel L. Jackson and Natalie Portman. Can you blame them for being bad in the film? No, I don't think so.)

The prequels are good movies that are fun to watch. But the first Star Wars trilogy is an emotional experience that cannot be matched in this era. Or, at least, not by using a green-screen for a 140 minutes.