Are the SW space battles as good as it gets?

ANH and ROTJ are the greatest space battles IMO ever to be seen on the big screen. AOTC, TPM, ESB, The Star Trek movies, The Last Starfighter, Ememy Mine are the only other notables I can think of now.

My question is, is SW the best we'll ever see? I'm passionate about SW and the space battles. It's my favorite part of the movies to watch, but I hope one day that the bar will be raised even higher. Regardless of if it's Ep.3 or another movie.

 

If they ever come out with the oft-rumored Starcraft movie, I think even RotJ will have a hard time defending it's position as mother of all space battles.

 

Pretty much.

But there was this one time....

Other battles that have been at least as good as the ANH and ROTJ battles are these:

-There was one episode (Weenie knows its hard to believe, but trust him.) of Deep Space Nine that had more Star Trek ships than there are SW ships in ROTJ (no joke) on screen, and the fighting was just as good or better. The Star Trek ships were moving more like Star Wars ships. It was really weird. And they never did anything like that again. It was a freak episode. The Weenie started to actually watch the show after that thinking this trend would continue, but it didnt. It was just that one episode...


-There was a show a few years back (One of Weenster's favorite TV shows of all time) called Space: Above and Beyond. The space battles in that show were consistently as good as ROTJ. The downside was the ships just looked really cheesy and computerized. But then again so did the ones in AOTC. Definitly check this show out if you get the chance.

-Also, Babylon 5 had some AWESOME massive space battles. The ships in that show moved nothing like the ones in Star Wars do. They had a whole different personality as to the physics of how the ships moved and stuff. But again, just really computerized looking.

For that reason, sorry to tell you, ANH and ROTJ will probably always be the best because movies these days wouldnt go back to models. Their ships are always CG, nowadays, which is far inferior to models unfortunately.

 

As technologies increase and evolve I am sure that the battles seen in Star Wars will be left in the dust.

Having said that, the battles in the OT are in my opinion the best of its kind. The battles in the PT aren't that bad either.

 

Are the SW space battles as good as it gets?

In the original Trilogy, yes, definitely. Nobody's done ANYTHING better than ANH and ROTJ's battles in space. However, I think the space battle in TPM was a HUGE disappointment when one considers what MIGHT have been. The ground battle in TPM and AOTC, however, were better than I could ever have imagined. Maybe its just too damned easy to do space battles now: back when SW started in '77, the only way to actually make a good battle was to make it a space-battle: space effects were the only effects it was truly possible to make dimensional and radically exciting back then, but now, they can also do that with ground battles, so that is why the focus on those now, I feel. Space Battles are probably just too easy to do, and thus very difficult to make interesting. To be perfectly honest, shows like B5 and DS9, as cool as some of the space battrles were, just seem a bit antiquated now. Besides, Star Trek movie battles used to have a unique feel all their own, like Star Trek II, III and VI, where ships lumbered around and pounded each other into submission: Star Wars style speed and explosions just don't suit Trek. B5's space effects looked EXCEPTIONALLY fake, but they at least had a style all their own, and probably the most realistic space battles ever done on a conceptual level.

-JDR.

 

Wing Commander had some sweet space battle's. Their warships actually fire real non-energy missile's and their fighter's have gaitlin guns. And military tactic's are more relevent in it then alot of them.

<[-]> Saber

 

It's a pitty that the movie was awful

 

As an addition to my previous post, I'll add that I think Starship Troopers probably has the best space battle since Return of The Jedi. It had bloody (bloody being the operative word!) excellent ground battle sequences too.

Also, we cannot forget the opening of Star Trek: First Contact. That battle was awesome. Pitty it was over so fast, but at least they stuck closely to Trek tradition and only had the small ships zooming around: the big ones lumbered around very impressively like in the Trek battles of old. (Albiet the newest Enterprise is far more powerful than the old ones, so it did maneuver a bit faster), but what I liked was the sense of weight in the battle, something Starship Troopers conveyed very well, too.

-JDR.

 

I have to put in my $0.02.
Lost in Space - the movie itself was mediocre. I loved the cameos that so many of the original TV show people made. But, on topic, I loved the short fight they had at the beginning.

 

Yeah, the start main battle was cool in Lost in Space, despite what otehres think, I always wanted a sequel.

I want a bubble fighter and those cool contact lenses that Matt LeBlanc had, and that cool rifle, and helmet. man I really liked that film.

 

sp had some pretty killer space battles.

 

i hope EP3 makes up for the crappy/lack of space battles in ep1 and ep2

 

I am expecting a huge space battle in E3, but I think technology will be better and they will actually be filming the battles in space with little robots designed to die in these battles. In other words, I'm sure it will get better.

 

I've always hoped that GL held back on the space battle in TPM so that he could save up for a massive space battle in Ep2 or Ep3. Ep2 didn't have a massive space battle, so I'm crossing my fingers that Ep3 will. If not, then I will truly admit that the TPM space battle could and should have been MUCH better.

 

I hope that people aren't counting on a large space battle in Ep3. While there is every chance that there will be one, I think people should have open minds over this matter. It could be that Lucas will attempt to emphasise the differences between the two eras by having mainly ground battles in the Prequels and mainly space battles in the Originals.

I personally love the ground battles in the Prequels. They're fantastic. I think space battles are a bit old hat these days, IMO.

-JDR.