PT Lucas's PT Notes

I had a few questions regarding the story writing process of the PT.

1.) Does anyone know what the very first drafts of Episode I and II were like? Like RotJ and ANH, I'm assuming they were very different from what we got. Most drafts of Episode I and II I can find are very similar to the final products.

2.) Apparently it was Obi-Wan who discovered Anakin in the earlier drafts. But this was flopped to what we got with Qui-Gon. Does anyone know why this was changed? I'm thinking maybe to establish the Master/Padawan relationship which is important, really, in all 6 movies.

3.) Was the Sifo-Dyas plot line ever intended to be fully discussed in Episode III?

4.) Along those notes, I understand that Jango's a mercenary, but was there a way to do Episode II without linking Jango to both the Separatists and the Republic?

4.) Is there a way to do Episode III with Leia being able to remember Padme and not just her adopted mother without the use of flashing forward? Or having her die on Alderaan which for me doesn't work because killing a major character like Padme and us not really being able to see her in that process is dumb. (hey maybe we could've been led to believe she was on Alderaan, and in Episode VII Luke can search for her like the discarded Episode VII of him searching for his sister pre RotJ!)

Thanks for the responses!!!!

 

It was more because with Obi-Wan alone (specially during the first act), there was a lack of character dynamism and interaction. But the introduction of Qui-Gon as the main character allowed for the development of the Msater/Padawan relationship, certainly.

Yes.

Meaning...? Jango, being a bounty hunter, works for the highest bidder.

 

Check out the Return of the Jedi novel. Obi-Wan tells Luke about how he and his father fought on a volcanic world. Also Palpatine brings up Yoda, possible shout out to their duel?

 

http://web.archive.org/web/20140623184533/http://secrethistoryofstarwars.com/thebeginning.html

Seems most likely.

Partially possibly when Dooku was killed by Anakin halfway through ROTS when he went on the hunt for Dooku.

This is supposition based on ideas for the different structure of the movie.

Hence why the Darth Tyranus name isn't used in ROTS

IIRC another version had Obi-Wan find out that Palpatine was the Sith Lord when he eavesdropped on Grievous conversing with him.

This is what happened when the original shooting script version of ROTS had Anakin stay at Palpatine's office. Mace then gets the world from Obi-Wan presumably after he destroys Grievous which sends Mace and the Jedi to arrest Palpatine with Anakin there and Sidious uses Anakin's lightsaber not his own in battle with Mace, loses it and Anakin picks it up to stop Mace killing Palpatine.

Leia is remembering Padme. She knows she was adopted and knows the difference between the two.

 

1) Some early breakdowns of the revised rough draft for TPM can be found on the CD ROM Insider's Guide to Episode One. There are some story differences. Qui-Gon is introduced halfway through on Coruscant. Anakin is older, etc.

2) Yes Obi-Wan was alone on Tatooine because in the earlier drafts Qui-Gon appeared on Coruscant.

3) Not sure about this one.

4) Sure

5) I suppose there is a way to do that.

 

yes the Sifo Dyas thing was going to be resolved in EP III. Watch the AOTC commentary around about the asteroid chase scene.

 

I forgot about Lucas suggesting in the commentary that the Sifo Dyas thing would be explored in Episode 3.

 

I thought near the end of AOTC, they inferred that it was Dooku using the name Sifo Dyas to order the clone army.

 

They did suggest it but many fans wanted explicit, not implicit.

The end of AOTC with Dooku/Tyranus and Sidious answers most questions about who started the war and why.

The earlier drafts of AOTC had the jedi who ordered the clones named SiDO-Dyas. Mace and Yoda also state the jedi did not order the clones. That was too on the nose I guess and Lucas altered the name slightly and made Sifo an actual jedi, raising so many questions.

 

Thanks for the link!
I had forgotten Padme was going to fly up for the space battle with Anakin in a 2-man ship. The connection they have is a lot stronger in that draft. Anakin even kisses her! He seems to be more useful in battle too.
Maybe the reason Padme doesn't fly into battle in the final product is because Panaka's side of the battle seems only glossed over in this draft?
I'm not convinced that Jar Jar was going to be less of a goof ball. I'm sure many of his jokes were developed during the computer animation stages. We also see how he is able to unite the Naboo and Gungans more, something that doesn't feel as strong in TPM.
I agree that Qui-Gon was needed in the first half and I feel the right decision was made there. It just seems weird Obi-Wan did not want to train him and didn't discover him at first.
Really the only thing I don't like about this draft, though, is a talkative Darth Maul. I like the silent hunter we got.

I'm still wondering if the PT rough rough drafts were totally unique from what we saw though, like how different even TESB's were. It seems to me that Lucas had more of this thought out then people give him credit for.

That link has a lot of interesting articles that I'd love to discuss but don't want to bog down this thread.
In one of the articles it talks about how, as y'all have mentioned, in a draft how Sido-Dyas was just an alias and there was no real Sifo-Dyas, and that it was changed because Lucas thought it wasn't quite the mystery to the audience, which I agree with. Perhaps we're all really overthinking it though and Sifo-Dyas really isn't supposed to be a real guy?
The article also mentions briefly how a draft included Dooku surviving through halfway through Episode III and Anakin killing him and not Mace to cement his turn to Vader. The article suggests that this draft would have explored the background of Sifo-Dyas and Tyranus. I'm curious though as to how this draft would've worked out. Perhaps Palpatine is captured and taken to a Separatist world. Does anyone have more information?

 

No we can only hope that Rinzler one day is able to do making of's of TPM, AOTC and ROTS like the OT and go through all the draft changes.

 

I agree. The existing Art of books are terrific but Making Ofs in the fashion of the OT set would be terrific. Rinzler has said there are no current plans though.

Let's hope it happens.

I mentioned an Insider's Guide CD Rom like TPMs for AOTC and ROTS to Pablo some years ago but was told the CD Rom market was too soft at the time to justify it.

 

I remember checking out the RotS art book from the library a long time ago. I really enjoyed seeing the discarded planet ideas for the old opening montage of Clone Wars battles.

I had an art of AotC calendar but there really wasn't much in it regards to old drafts.

Does anyone have any cool concept art pictures of discarded ideas?

 

Back when hyperspace was active on StarWars.com, Pablo Hidalgo would hold Q&A's once in a while where Hyperspace members could ask him questions about Star Wars. A lot of the questions pertained to ROTS as that was the movie Hyperspace was covering. One of the questions he was asked was whether ROTS would answer the mystery of the Clones to which Hidalgo said that the current script he saw of ROTS explained it. Another person asked him if we had already seen the person that ordered the clones (on screen) to which he replied yes we have.

There isn't much I don't like about ROTS, however if I had to pick one thing, it would be that the Clone mystery wasn't explicitly solved for the audience.

To me the movies heavily imply it was Dooku, but because it wasn't solved for us on screen it seems we now have a confusing set of circumstances where the story has been changed by TCW. Not based on Lucas's thoughts, but,mbased on Filoni's interpretation of AOTC.
As others have said, I would love to see a Rinzler making of for the PT's, but, I think Lucas learned his lesson about releasing the rough drafts for the OT. He took a lot of flak from a lot of people that took some of his quotes as meaning he had the entire story figured out to the smallest detail, however when they saw the different drafts they used it against him that he was lying and just was figuring it out as he went along. That is however just my opinion.

 

Personally I think it was solved on screen, just that it was implicit. Sometimes the films just imply things but fans want every plot point spelled out in bold terms and often turn to overly complex EU explainations rather than except what the films do imply.

 

I believe the idea was to show, in RotS, the Jedi discovering everything regarding who Tyranus was and how he took Sifo-Dyas identity to order the army. But he decided to establish that they know who Tyranus was from the get go. Honestly, in AotC, the audience already has all the necessary information. The Jedi are the ones who don't.

 

Oh yes, I agree. I've said for years that the end of AOTC, when Palpious refers to Dooku as Tyranus, that the connections can all be made back to who hired Jango and why and who had the ability to erase the archives.

I think the one area where some people got tied up were the jedi's, especially Kenobi, who mentioned Sifo-Dyas himself and his death roughly around the time of Episode One.

But yes, all of the questions raised are satisfactorily answered at the end of AOTC.

Lucas was likely just going to show the jedi finding all of that stuff out. That end scene on Coruscant with Dooku and Palpious really answered so much for the audience.

 

Yes!
I think this is the same area that ties the Jedi up too, and, now that I'm thinking about it, actually achieves George Lucas's goal. The Jedi are led to believe it was Sifo-Dyas. It's also backed up the movie's tones. AotC is very mysterious in tone, something RotS drops and what can make people frustrated Sifo-Dyas isn't mentioned in RotS. (if you're seeing them I-VI, maybe not as Palpatine starts acting mysteriously)

What can we concluded, based on the movies?
Sifo-Dyas was confirmed a Jedi, but his role in the creation of the clone army , if any, is irrelevant. His Jedi background is what is important and what convinces the Jedi they should use the army (in addition to the Chancellor's Emergency Powers Act, which wasn't stressed enough). This is why he doesn't get a single mention in RotS.

Why don't the Jedi think it was Dooku who erased Kamino from the Archives? The Jedi are told by Lama Su it was Sifo-Dyas who ordered the clone army and had the connection to Kamino. The Kaminoans don't bring up Dooku.
Could Dooku have been using the Sifo-Dyas alias when he ordered the clone army? Yes. This is what most likely happened based off the movie's lines The audience knows he was an ex-Jedi, therefore having access to the Archives, and recruited Jango Fett. The audience isn't told why the Jedi don't think this, but there's no reason to suspect this elaborate Sith scheme.

I'm still not sure why Kamino was erased. It's a good thing the Lost 20 sequence was deleted too, as that'd cry it was Dooku even before Sifo-Dyas was introduced. So I also think the right choice was made to have Sifo-Dyas be a Jedi and not Sido-Dyas, not a Jedi, who the Jedi believe is a pro-military Senator. (but I like how that plays up the corrupt politics leading to the Empire bit though)

In a nutshell, there was no reason to bring this up again for RotS, because otherwise they'd predict Order 66. I'm curious as to how it would've been done though. Maybe Palpatine talks a bit about it after Anakin betrays Mace Windu?

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This backs up Sifo-Dyas didn't really play a role. It was all Dooku and Sidious.

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I'm forgetting, how does TCW complicate this even more? I'd like to keep this strictly to the movies, but doesn't TCW have them finding out Dooku is Tyranus before RotS?

 

So that the army's production could continue to go unnoticed.

In RotS, the Jedi already know Dooku is Tyranus, a Sith Lord. In the script the character was indentified as such on purpose (The Making of Revenge of the Sith also confirms this, IIRC). In TCW, the Jedi discover that Tyranus killed Sifo-Dyas and used his identity. Later they discover that Dooku is Tyranus and then connect all the dots. It basically confirms what the audience should have assumed from the clues left in AotC.

 

Which is complete BS.
How is TCW canon (Darth Maul surviving, the Jedi knowing the history behind the clone army, the heroes going to a planet that should be special (Mustafar, Utapau, Yoda and the Wookiees again), Obi-Wan fighting Grevious 1,000 times, the show being incomplete) when many, many great works aren't???
Legends never contradicted the movies (save some Clone Wars background) (Emperor returning wasn't the same guy. It was a clone)

I've tried rationalizing that the Jedi still use the clone army because of the Emergency Powers Act and don't want to be seen as traitors to the Republic, but this was crossing a line.
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Anyone have any thoughts regarding the other questions inPost 1?

 

I can assure you wmu'14 that Lucas made the right call in making Sifo-Dyas more mysterious as it really fired up debates here in the 3SA and other boards back in 2002-early2005 about who or what Sifo-Dyas might be doing. Did he really die? Did he fake his death? Would he reveal himself in ROTS? Who was this guy?

Those were all questions parsed, debated, speculated upon, and analyzed over and over. If Lucas meant to stir the pot and make things a bit more mysterious, he certainly succeeded.

Fun times.

 

Oh Lengends contradicted the films many, many time and even within itself.

 

TCW tries to sort out some of the specifics that sorround the ordering of the clone army. I did a whole write-up on it a few months back on these forums.

In AOTC, the story of who ordered the Clone army is handled very simply and implicitly. We find out that Dooku is Tyranus, Tyranus is tied directly to the clone army thru Jango. So we can then imply that it is Dooku that erases Kamino from the Jedi Archives. The breadcrumbs that are left for the audience (not the characters) continuously points to Dooku as the one having been the one that pretended to be Sifo-Dyas and ordered the clone army. Simple, right?

Well enter TCW which changes the timeline of when the clones were ordered, has Dooku working for Sidious while Maul is still alive, has the Jedi finding out that Dooku is Tyranus and that Dooku has been involved in the clones. With all that, it is again still implied that Dooku did the actual ordering. There is no clear dialogue where it is explicitly pointed out. Even though the TCW episode continues to pile the evidence against Dooku, it still wants to play the game of implying and mystery like AOTC did.

No big deal right? Even though there is not that gotcha moment of someone directly saying Dooku did the ordering, there is enough evidence that puts it at Dooku....right? Well wrong! Because there is no direct dialogue putting Dooku as the one pretending to order the clones, something that on-screen and off-screen evidence has all pointed too, it has allowed an old EU storyline to persist where it is Sifo-Dyas that actually orders the clone army and Sidious and Dooku steal it from him. This plot line (a ****** plot line in my honest opinion) gets official credit as being the official storyline because of a recently released reference book by LFL that has Sifo-Dyas as the one who ordered the clones. I can't remeber the name of the book, I'm sure Iron_lord can help me out here.

This absurd plot line, that IMO contradicts AOTC can only exist because ROTS didn't explicitly tie up the story behind the clones, and Filoni with TCW muddied the waters further without giving us a real payoff and answer.

 

The Jedi knew from the start that something fishy was going on but decided to go along with the clone affair in order to prevent a hostile takeover by the Separatists. Realizing near the end of the war that Dooku was behind the clone army doesn't really change their situation. The war is still on and they still need to defeat the Sith and do their best to minimize casualties along the way.
Perhaps they become more watchful around the clones, but again, the war is on. They need their soldiers to win.

 

No, it isn't.

I don't know what "many great works" you're talking about, but TCW is canon because George was involved in it.

Oh, yes it did. Many, many times.

Why would the Jedi stop "using" the army? Haven't the clones been trustworthy? Haven't they saved the Jedi many times? Haven't they followed their orders?