PT Has the PT eclipsed the OT, in your Star Wars conception/associations?

A funny thing happened on the way to the forum: I came to the realization that my Star Wars associations are predominately comprised of the characters and iconography from the PT. Exotic queens, double-edged lightsabers, Coruscant nights and choral music overshadow the OT fixtures, to the extent that Luke, Leia, Han and Lando now linger in the periphery. Highly peculiar, since I'm 28 and was consequently weaned on the OT...but there you go.

Does anyone else have this predilection?



Note: This is NOT a thread for gauging the quality of one trilogy over another.

 

They compliment each other nicely. The OT is a more personal story while the PT is a more epic one. The characters in the OT are more likable, but in the PT they're more interesting because of their flaws.

I noticed though that when I think about Obi-Wan the face that pop ups in my head belongs to Ewan

 

This is a really odd question-- when you say Star Wars, what pops into your head? Well, for the most part I tend to think of things that are interchangeable between the two trilogies-- I think of Jedi Knights, lightsabers, the Force. I think of mission briefings with holograms or computer displays. I think of huge, ornate set-design that's somehow spare and streamlined at the same time, somewhere between art-deco and Albert Speer. I think of epic duels, imaginative set-pieces of all sizes and scales and cinematography that's both colorful and documentary. I think of special-effects creating whole worlds out of models, miniatures and computers. I think of Yoda.

 

It's still OT for me. Luke is my favourite Jedi and Han my favourite character. When I look for EU material I look for Luke and/or Han stuff. I like the PT but the OT is the dominant one for me.

 

Pretty much the PT, yeah. The epic scale - some may think it's a muddled mess, but I find it much deeper overall. The themes are less simplistic - and while I love the OT, I think I love the CT more.

 

Eclipsed? Pretty much, but thinking of it all as one story is the next step.

 

I don't see them as seperate trilogies anymore. I now see it as one, deep saga. Originally, the story was simply about defeating the evil empire. Now, it is about a man whose flaws cause him to lose his soul. However, in the end, he still fulfills his destiny.

 

I'm leaning towards your angle, DD91. When I think about the Star Wars Saga, I picture Anakin and his life, both as a Jedi and as a Sith.
I can still separate the trilogies from eachother, though, especially since I watched the PT in one day. It's a great tragedy and stands on its own legs just fine. The OT is, of course, also a great adventure. When I think about it as one separate trilogy, I still view it pretty much the same way I viewed it before the PT came along, but nowadays, the events of the PT breathe more life into the backstory.





The Saga - it's one, but it's also two
/LM

 

I don't think that the PT has eclipsed the OT.

They are very much equals, both trilogies complimenting eachother.

 

As someone who grew up in the prequel era, the prequels eclipsed the OT for sometime during my childhood. It took a while to take in the OT as equals, because I saw them as "those older films that aren't as exciting as the new ones"(Many of my childhood friends at the time would agree). A little while after ROTS's release did I finally see the two trilogies as 1 saga, spectacularly weaved together in story and imagination. What I love most about Star Wars, is that it spans so many different stories, characters, aliens, environments, and time periods to compliment one big overall story: the tragedy of Anakin Skywalker. Both trilogies fit together perfectly to tell that epic tale.

 

I think, to some extent, I hone in on the "American Graffiti"-ness of Star Wars, which, to me, stands out with the yellow vehicles Anakin drives in the PT, and Luke's jacket at the end of ANH. Plus the bars/diners, the open plains of Tatooine, the doomed, naive love of Anakin and Padme, and a billion and one other things -- but that cheeky yellow; that yellow makes itself known. So, I guess, in a way, I see the first four as the elemental installments, with V and VI burning less brightly -- a strong, loving afterglow. Another aspect I tend to focus on is the Art Deco-ness of Coruscant, plus all the higher-ups there -- the Jedi, the politicians, the bureaucrats -- and all the epicness that they bring. The colours of AOTC. Qui-Gon. Jar Jar. Darth Maul. Laser gates. Ewan as Obi-Wan. The droids. The Clone Wars. The dresses of Padme. Anakin's black tunic. The lightsabers. Han Solo. The Millennium Falcon. The Death Star. Luke. Yoda. The Emperor. Characters slowly pacing round. Lava erupting on Mustafar. The gardens of Naboo. Hoth. Jabba's palace. See? Some of the latter two sneak in. Sliding doors with door controls. Latches. Switches. Anakin's moods. Anakin's tears. The confession scene. "Don't try it!" Jar Jar's sad faces. Padme's funeral. Cameras panning across in suggestive wide shots. Cheesy acting. "You don't want to sell me death sticks..." Watto. Cloud City. Dagobah. Yoda lifting the X-Wing. "I saw... a city in the clouds!" Luke thrashing Vader. "You have paid the price for your lack of vision!" Scene wipes. Sand crawlers. Oh, was I meant to be mentioning non-visual stuff, as well? Screw it. That'll do.

 

Absolutely. The Prequels, despite whatever problems I/you/we may have with them, opened up the Star Wars Universe in a way the OT never could. We had desert, ice and forest environments that looked suspiciously like Earth, and some built sets like the Death Star and Bespin and Dagobah. Plus, a good chunk of ANH and TESB took place aboard the Falcon. So, as big as the GFFA is, we didn't get to see much of it. TESB was the best, but it hardly had any aliens in it, at all.

Like others have said, when I hear Star Wars, I now think of Darth Tyranus, Darth Maul, Geonosis, Jango Fett, the Trade Federation, Coruscant, Naboo, clones, battle droids, General Grievous, Mace Windu, Padme, Qui-Gon, Ewan's Obi-Wan, plus the whole myriad of new aliens, droids and spaceships that the Prequels brought about.

Even if you hated the Prequels, you can't unsee them. People hated the Ewoks, but didn't try to stick their heads in the sand and pretend that Return of the Jedi didn't happen.

 

I wouldn't say that the prequels eclipsed my perceptions of Star Wars. I would say that they changed my perception quite a bit. Say what you will about the prequels, it has a lot of good images and presents many interesting concepts.

 

That's true. I could see why the general audience would not appreciate the PT, but it's actually the fans who seem to express the most hatred, as if the movies have absolutely nothing new to offer.

 

I dont see them as trilogies anymore (so I guess i can't answer the question), and it would be cool if TFN closed the Prequel & Classic Trilogy forum, so the only forum to post is The Saga Forum

 

^^I like that idea.

--MissPadme

 

Ive been thinking that for years.

 

I'm disgusted <i>and</i> offended by the turn this thread's taken.

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Oh, sorry. Wrong thread.

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Kidding aside, I do find the idea of closing the CT/OT and PT forums pretty extreme, but there you go.

I hate people trying to IMPOSE their own subjective pathologies/beliefs on *me* or *anyone else*, which is exactly what I think this is.

No surprise, sorry to say, the proposal and its quick votes of approval come from people -- my fellow fans, no less -- who love the PT. I wonder what CT people, and, for that matter, other prequel fans, like myself, might think about that? Well, I know what *I* think about it.

Hopefully, this website has no such plans to institute such a policy, or I, for one, might leave permanently. As much as the attitude of certain fans has annoyed me, and may continue to annoy me, there is also such a thing as tolerance of diversity, and ambiguity. The CT, PT and Saga forums make a beautiful trilogy of their own -- ever stopped to think about? -- and, more to the point, have proven themselves to be immensely-popular, superbly-structured places to stop and chat, laugh, joke, argue and discuss.

Perhaps closing the CT and PT forums, leaving just the Saga forum, would better reflect the "finished" nature of the Star Wars movies, but it would also deprive people of a certain order and sensibility that the current partitioning allows for. Plus, the saga forum is meant to be for saga-spanning material, while the CT and PT forums engender a certain kind of specificity that has helped guide and shape their various threads and arguments. There is still a tempting argument here, though. After all, even if there have existed, there no longer exist any active individual movie forums, right? You can't just hop into "The Empire Strikes Back" forum or the "Attack Of The Clones" forum and start chatting. So, I'm quite willing to believe that the CT and PT forums may also end up having their day in the sun, and then, goodbye, but I'm not sure that that time is yet.

I don't know. I guess it's something that could be put to a vote in the future. I'd be happy to go along with a majority vote. I believe in democracy. Kinda. But in the meantime, I'm going to look upon this for what I think it is: certain stingy, harassed prequel fans (I can relate, guys) wanting to quell dissent and have things their own way. I may not like all the behaviour of fans, at times, or that of myself (I am naturally included in the former group, anyway, of course), but people do need breathing room. And while there's such a thing as too many forums, there's also such a thing as too few.

In the (slightly-expanded) words of TFN's good ol' Lars_Muul, Star Wars is one, two, three and six. It is also books, video-games, fan-films, and a boat-load of other things. TFN is what it is because it's set up in a way that respects and adds to that eclecticism. So, less is more, sometimes, but not always.

My 0.02 cents.

 

...What? lol.

Anyway, yeah, I tend to think about the PT a whole lot more (maybe because I didn't see the OT until after it was completed, but got to see the prequels happen in real time); the storyline is more open-ended than the OT is, which tends to lend the PT more to flights of imagination ("What if this happened instead?" and so on).

They tried to do AUs of the OT in comic form a while back; it didn't work terribly well IMO, but you can AU the prequels just to death and that's pretty enjoyable if you ask me.

 

Anticipation and speculation adds to the experience, doesn't it? I remember watching all seasons of Babylon-5 in a month a few years ago and enjoying it immensely. However, I didn't become a big fan like my friends who saw it during its original showing on TV.

 

The universe just exploded.

Or... it was me, being all hyperbolic again.

^^ See?

 

Yeah, I wasn't really on tfn for the pre-TPM phase, but the pre-AOTC spoiler phase was just nuts.

Also: People really liked the fireplace scene dialogue when it was leaked. No, I am not making this up.

 

Have the prequels started a whole new generation of diehard fans?

Yes.

But to say that the prequels have "eclipsed" the originals... what the heck does that even mean? I think discussions like the validity of the prequels v.s. the OT show that the prequels are still very divisive amongst fans.

 

What the OP means is more personal. Has the PT eclipsed the OT for you, not for the public at large. Like, if someone says Star Wars, do you immediately think of Darth Vader, or Darth Maul? Stormtroopers or Battle Droids? Dogfights or Duels of the Fates? And that's a fair question, I think.