Did anyone not like the story of TPM?

"And the reason the film is all about the Jar-Jar is two fold in my opinion. One to obviously keep the kiddies from falling asleep in these more adult segments..."

Yes, certainly... I mean after the unmitigated box-office disaster that the original SW was back in 1977 when all of us nine year-olds were either falling asleep in our seats or walking out in droves never to return (only time in my life I ever actually walked in a drove, by the way... dunno how I managed it on the spur of the moment like that, it just kinda happened. Damned if I could remember how to do it again if my life depended on it, though...), how could they NOT litter TPM with enough Jar Jar to choke a donkey? I mean, it was a marketing NECESSITY, right?

 

LOL, point well taken, Patrick.

 

ANH also didn't have to delve into a political situation now did it Patrick?

This is just how the story goes. He is not trying to "recreate" ANH ESB or ROTJ here. This story calls for more adult themes, so it needs the more childish themes to balance that out.

Your problem is you think like a marketer, not a storyteller.

 

I'm sorry, Go-Mer-Tonic, but I'm just going to have to disagree with you there. Jar-Jar was not about storying telling, he was all about marketing, marketing to the kids. All those kid elements were that way. If he (Jar-Jar) was in there for story telling, he'd have actually done more than he did, given his screen time.

 

What sane marketer would say that the character needs to be the most hated?

 

That's a very good point Go-Mer-Tonic. TPM was a very Regal,Political,Adult themed movie and most people missed that aspect because they were too busy bashing Jar Jar. I'm getting ready to graduate from film school and I think besides learning the technincal side of filmmaking I have learned mostly the art of story-telling. Most people to this day still see JarJar as a marketing ploy and forget his contribution to the story. I think that is very dismissive and shallow. It is a shame that people cannot be more open-minded, and are so quick to judge TPM's story as weak, only because it didn't live up to there own personal expectations.

 

JJ was there for comic relief AND storytelling - he's Amidala's key for resolving the conflict. (duh)

That's like the whole point of the story (at least the 1 episode story).

 

Exactly, Darth S.

I think the problem is that many people including George Lucas himself underestimate the ability of children to relate to stories which aren't aimed specifically at them. To believe that a child cannot enjoy a Star Wars movie without having a stuffed animal shoved in their faces every two minutes is like believing that a child cannot enjoy talking to an adult unless that adult is speaking to them in baby talk.

Kids are gonna be bored with the political story? Come on... like that's gonna kill the movie for them? ANH had plenty of moments when the story turned to more "adult" matters... how about that meeting on the Death Star? Yakyakyakyak. There was a LOT of talking in ANH, and we didn't need some overblown cartoon character tripping over everything in order to keep us interested. This idea that children have fundamentally changed somehow since 1977 and cannot grasp or appreciate anything more mature than Barney is just ludicrous.

Again, the whole Jar Jar thing reminds me of a well-meaning but essentially clueless maiden aunt who insists on talking to her nieces and nephews in ga-ga-goo-goo baby talk until roughly about the time they're ready to collect social security.

 

Go-Mer:
Marketing for a movie: Adding an element to story to increase appeal to a target audience (one definition, anyway). Jar-Jar: element added to increase appeal of TPM to small children.

BobaFrank (nice screenname):
I also went to film school, and spent the last year speciallizing in screenplay and fiction writing. I'm tell'n ya, Jar-jar served as no real plot device. The only thing he did was tell Padme where they could find the Gungans, she did the rest. There are easily a dozen other ways Padme could have teamed up with the Gungans, or it would have been just as easy to write them out of the story entirely and had the Queen's plan work just a little different, but just as well. Jar-Jar was just there for kids, it's that simple.

 

Parick,

I agree, children are a lot smarter than we give them credit. GL is guilty of spoon-feeding I'll admit, but the point he is trying to get across in his movies is the strength of the spirit over high-technology, as well as, human weakness.
ANH-Luke destroys the Death Star using the force and one X-Wing.
ROTJ- Primitive creatures(EWOKS) defeat an empire. Luke's love for his father helps destroy the Emperor.
TPM- A bumbling, innocent, childish bafoon(JarJar) helps lead an army to defeat the trade federation.
GL is an old fashioned, old school filmmaker.
It's too bad we don't have enough directors like that today. A producer once to me, always remember KISS: Keep it simple stupid.

 

The problem was, Jar Jar didn't really LEAD anything. He got an honorary title, went along for the battle, and bumbled his way through it... and the Gungans LOST the battle. Don't forget that. The only thing that bailed their butts out of the fire was Anakin "oopsie"-ing the Control Ship to smithereens.

After all of the asinine slapstick and upstaging that Jar Jar did throughout the movie, he needed to do something INTENTIONALLY heroic at the end in order for his character to come full circle. But he never really did. Yes, he went into battle with the rest of the Gungans, but the entire battle ended up being merely another opportunity for Jar Jar to shriek and fall down a lot. There was an opportunity to transform him from a goon into a genuine hero and it was wasted on more pratfalls and nut-shots.

 

Darth S.

Thanks for the compliment on my name. All of the SW movies are filled with characters who seem to not have any real plot device to them but in the big picture the heroes can't succeed without the other. Look at ROTJ and all of the cross-cutting going on. Han,Leia,R2,C3PO, and the Ewoks bring down the shield, Luke and Anakin defeat the Emperor, Lando and the Rebel Fleet destroy the Death Star. They are all part of a puzzle just like the characters in TPM. That is why I think JarJar is vital to the plot. (Yes, Patrick I do remember the Gungans lost but hopefully after you have read this you'll understand the point I'm trying to make) Each character builds on the other no matter how shallow they may seem.

 

Patrick: "George Lucas himself underestimate the ability of children to relate to stories which aren't aimed specifically at them."

Go-Mer: Sure, but what is so wrong with aiming it at them? Because you are an adult?

 

"Go-Mer: Sure, but what is so wrong with aiming it at them? Because you are an adult?"

Because he didn't need to before. Before he could aim them at everyone and have everyone love them.

Boba Frank, I see what you're saying, but we didn't need Jar-Jar to complish that. We had a nine year old kid who twice saved the day against the odds, and a young woman, ruler of a defenseless world, conquer the evil bad guy. Adding the gungans in was just more of the same, but for children specifically. And I'll agree even further, C-3PO held no real plot device value in ESB, which annoyes me to no end. Just because he did it before doesn't make it any better the second tiem around (use a character for child purposes espcially, that is, which wall threepio was good for in ESB).

 

Why not aim the film specifically at young children? Because those children will get SO much more enjoyment out of SW if it's something for them to grow into rather than grow out of, that's why not. And as Lucas proved almost a quarter century ago, you don't NEED to aim a movie specifically at nine year-olds in order to get them to dig it. And if it's not necessary to limit the appeal of a film by catering specifically to the youngest members of the audience, then why do it? If a kid is old enough for solid food, why continue to feed him pablum?

 

He didn't need to before, because there was no portion of the film that was more for adults.

Now he does.

Kids will hopefully grow up to be tolerant of the Gungan, but if they lose that ability and grow up to be cynical and jaded towards Jar-Jar, I would like to think they would get a lot out of the political machinations going on behind the scenes.

And maybe be cool enough to realise that this is also for kids.

 

Malthus' post on the first page ("I wasn't engaged") is the best post I've read on this thread. It hits the nail right on the head -- TPM is emotionally cold. The story has an interesting political subplot (one of the things I liked most about the film) but it needed more than that. Sorry Go-Mer -- no amount of arguing can change that fact for me. Lucas neglected to give us characters with well-defined personalities that we can get involved with; for the most part, they are little more than talking heads. Up until TPM, vivid characterization was a strength of Star Wars and a major reason why the films were so successful to begin with. (Please don't give me the tired argument that TPM made just as much if not more money than the OT films, and therefore must be just as good -- the anticipation and built-in audience for TPM was such that Lucas could have released video footage of his kids playing in the back yard, slapped "Star Wars Episode I" on it, and it would have rocketed to $300 million before word even spread around.) As it is, Jar Jar is one of the more memorable characters in TPM merely because he is an annoying screw-up. That just shouldn't be.

What's frustrating is that the characters could have been great had Lucas just spent more time developing them. Qui-Gon, in particular, could have been a fascinatingly tragic character. I wanted to know what made him tick -- why he felt so strongly that he had discovered the Chosen One in the form of the boy Anakin. But we never get that. He recites his convictions dutifully without revealing any personal reasons why he has them, and that's it. There's no insight into his character and now that he's dead, there never will be. The same goes for Amidala -- what made her suddenly decide to go back to Naboo and fight after previously preaching nothing but pacifism? All I saw was her short conversation with Jar Jar, and there wasn't enough motivation or emotion in that feeble exchange to warrant such a turning point in her character. I could go on and on but I hope you see what I'm getting at.

So, the biggest problem I have with the story is not so much the plot, but the characters going through the motions of the plot without seeming very involved in it. And therefore, neither am I. Like it or not, Lucas' earlier and much maligned film "Willow" actually does a better job of getting us involved with the characters than TPM does. And that, considering the vast amount of great material that TPM had to draw on by comparison, is what makes TPM all the more disappointing.

 

"He didn't need to before, because there was no portion of the film that was more for adults."

Gomer, what film were YOU watching?? How many scenes in ANH were just people sitting around a table or standing around a table talking? Quite a few. How is the scene in ANH with the Imperial military brass sitting around a table debating the relative merits of the Death Star any less "for adults" than TPM's Senate scene in TPM was? At least there were aliens in the Senate scene for the younger kids to check out, the ANH scene was a bunch of old men sitting around a table.

And as brief and rushed as the Senate scenes in TPM were, I fail to see how they were so crushingly "adult" that the kiddies needed a stuffed animal jammed in their face throughout the rest of the film to make up for it.

TPM didn't need overblown kiddie comic relief any more than ANH did. Sorry Gomer, but once again you're making TPM out to be far deeper a film than it actually was.

 

And VCT, I agree with you. The characters in TPM didn't drive the film, TPM simply being part of the Star Wars franchise did. It featured some of the most shallow, emotion-free characters I've ever seen in a SW flick. No, for the most part the characters didn't engage me either. (And boy, have I ever tried to GET them to for the past couple years...)

 

Don't apologise to me, I don't mind if you were let down. It is unfortunate, and I wish I could change it for you, but this really isn't a problem for me.

I see what you are saying Patrick, but I guess I didn't have any problem with Jar-Jar to begin with. I was hoping I could get you to look around what you can't deal with, but apparently that is not something many of you can't do.

Not that there is anything wrong with that.

It is just too bad, because I know many of you were fans of the classic trilogy, and it is hard to come to grips with finding out that something just isn't for you anymore.

 

Gomer, that has got to be the most self-centered, egotistical, off-the-mark post you have ever written! And that's saying quite a bit! Listen to yourself for a minute:

I was hoping I could get you to look around what you can't deal with, but apparently that is not something many of you can't do.

Who are you to say something like that? You are insinuating that we can't deal with jar jar? That's the biggest load of garbage I've ever heard! He was a crappy character, and many, many people fell this way. If only a few didn't like him, then you have a valid point. But the fact of the matter is that several people, even people who made the movie, and people who love the movie, think jar jar was overdone, and do not like him. It's not that we can't deal with him, I think it's more like you can't deal with someone feeling differently about him than you do.

Next up you say:

It is just too bad, because I know many of you were fans of the classic trilogy, and it is hard to come to grips with finding out that something just isn't for you anymore.

So now you are deciding for us that Star Wars just isn't our thing anymore? My god you are mistaken! I love watching Star Wars. As of this moment, there is only 1 out of 4 movies that I don't like in that saga. And because of this, you think that Star Wars just isn't our thing? Maybe it is too much of a thing for you! Not every piece of work that GL does goes down in history as a great movie. TPM will not, but the OT has. Granted they are older movies, but they were a part of pop culture immediately after they were released. TPM is not, and never will. ANH and the rest are now a sort of folk tale. They hold a great place in the hearts of millions. TPM does not (aside from gushers on this forum), and never will. It simply catered to too small of a segment of society.

I didn't mean to be so blunt, but I once again found your comments insulting and condescending.

 

Patrick -- very funny previous post about how TPM didn't need kiddie comic relief any more than ANH did. Well said.

Go-Mer, I realize you're trying to be accepting of our opinions and I appreciate that. But you seem to be implying that we have somehow "outgrown" Star Wars and just haven't come to grips with it yet. You couldn't be further from the truth. It is not what TPM was, but what it was missing, that bothers me about it. And what it was missing was vivid characters and emotional storytelling. The OT had that in spades; TPM is deficient. And realizing that has nothing to do with how old you are or whether your tastes have "matured" or not. I still enjoy films that are (at least on the surface) even more for kids than TPM, such as the Toy Story films, The Iron Giant, some of Disney's best animated films, etc. -- because they were made with the principle of vivid characters and emotional storytelling in mind, and didn't neglect it.

 

But did George need to have fart jokes in ANH, ESB or ROTJ? Did he have a character that did nothing but goof-up? Yes, 3PO was comic relief in ESB, but he did not overshadow Luke, Leia, Han or Vader. 3PO's unintentional silliness was not trumped-up, and it was mainly situational comedy, not slap-stick. The comedy comes from interacting with the human characters, not through any outright silly antics on 3PO's part.

 

Exactly!

 

Darth23:

One of the problems I see with TPM involves the number of stories it tries to tell at once; in addition to the two you mention, there's also Palpatine's rise to power, Jar Jar's search for acceptance--most of the major characters have their own stories to tell.

When a film deals with this many stories at once, and an ensemble cast to juggle, there are three effective paths to take: Either (1) Have one character at the center, as an anchor for the narrative (as with Braveheart), (2) Have each character's story completely independent from--or only tangentially related to--the others (as with Robert Altman's Short Cuts), or (3) Have all the stories intertwine like a net (as with an effective family drama--Playing by Heart, while not without its flaws, is a good example).

TPM, obviously, doesn't take path number one; the fact that people still argue over who the main character was is enough evidence of that. Nor is each story independent, or intertwined with the others; it's an uncomfortable mesh of methods two and three.

Thus, we get neither the sense of tightly bound camaraderie that comes with method number three, nor the scope of method two; as it is, the film doles out screen time to the individual stories almost at random, and as a result, some subplots (such as Obi-Wan's) get lost in the shuffle.