My defense of George Lucas...

Only_2, a modern day Voltaire with equal charsima to match his wit, stated, as eloquently as humanly possible:

Someone please dig up AL's long winded flowery nothing of a post in the "George ain't as hip anymore" thread that got locked for degrading to a US-bashing argument and then we can decide who is really boring, the Jedi, or AL.

Is that Succinct enough for you Sir ALbert?

I state my argument; it is boring. I agree, but then again, which one of us mere mortals is blessed with such divine inspiration as you so blissfully are.

 

Al, Well excuse me if I made a couple typos, I was typing my thread very quickly and did not bother checking for spelling errors. And dyslexia is not what you seemt to be thinking it is, friend to freind is not dylexia, if I put in dneirf , that would be dyslexia.

Besides, that has absolutely nothing to do with AOTC.
sorry.

 

<<<If we are the suckers, how come we got the movie we wanted?>>>

Lucas could've given you anything and it would've been the movie you wanted, Gomer (Pyle?). That's what 4 years here have taught me about many of you. Every choice made in this trilogy is 'the best choice,' if you're to be believed. Everything that doesn't sit right, such as Jar Jar, Lloyd's wretched acting, AOTC's hideous romance and dialogue, etc, has a reason for being there...right? There's a fancy excuse for everything people complain about in the PT...right? It's almost as if Lucas got in your face as a drill sergeant and screamed "This is what you're getting! Your mission is to LOVE IT, worm!" It's obvious you responded "Yes sir! At all costs, sir!" Poor suckers. You should've deserted instead.

 

AL,

Actually, even though I liked Episode II more, I'd say Episode I felt like a more "rounded" film- it didn't feel so cut up and horribly edited as Episode II did.

 

I was talking about myself yoda900, I am dyslexic. It was supposed to be a joke, sorry if it came across wrongly.

 

padme may be intended that way, to be stoic and reserved, but the acting of portman, and the writing and directing of lucas dont manage to make that work. instead she is boring, her dialogue is clunky and grammatically inept, and her characterization is totally unconvincing IMO.

there is a difference.

its like saying an actor is doing a great job of playing "blind" just because his/her eyes are closed.

 

Lucas could've given you anything and it wouldn't have been the movie you wanted, Endboss (from level 4?). That's what 4 years here have taught me about many of you. Every choice made in this trilogy is 'the worst choice,' if you're to be believed. Everything that doesn't sit right, such as Jar Jar, Lloyd's wretched acting, AOTC's hideous romance and dialogue, etc, has no reason for being there...right? There's no excuse for anything people complain about in the PT...right? It's almost as if Lucas got in your face as a drill sergeant and screamed "This is what you're getting! Your mission is to HATE IT, worm!" It's obvious you responded "Yes sir! At all costs, sir!"

 

Bashers, who argue succintly and with a point, are Star Wars fans too. They did not want to dislike the new films but there are many who did.

I personally like TPM very much though not AOTC. I had no intention of not liking it when I went in, as my previous posts very easily prove.

 

I state my argument; it is boring. I agree, but then again, which one of us mere mortals is blessed with such divine inspiration as you so blissfully are.

At least someone here recognizes my place among the stars.

but I do love reading your flowery BS. At least you make it unique, and not the same old AOTC basher formula:

George is over the hill, he ran out of ideas after American Graffiti, CGI sucks, Jar Jar sucks, the acting is wooden compared to the OT, nothing is as good as MY OT, I can't sleep withoput my OT sheets on the bed, where's my 12' Bespin Luke figure??? Mommy!!!! There's a Sarlacc under my bed!!!!

 

Sometimes I hide under beds. It is a hobby.

 

HA! I knew it was you, you slinky minx!

 

As we all try and forget the image that the phrase "AL's flowery BS" suggests...

 

it's a metaphor, silly.

 

Plagiarism, Gomer? Shame on you, Pyle.

 

it's a metaphor, silly

Yet again, your omnipotent wisdom has eluded my feeble brain.

 

I don't care what people say, I still consider GL to be one of the best directors of all time. Yeah hes made a few mistakes and I was a little disappointed by Episode I. But, to me AOTC felt like GL had brought back the same qualitys that had made the original triolgy so good.

 

it's a metaphor, silly

Yet again, your omnipotent wisdom has eluded my feeble brain.

you taunt me with your pot-shots but it is your "my S$%@ smells all flowery" attitude that I mock. Funny, not only are you pretentious, but you also project it onto others who mock you and you don't even notice because you are so far above everyone else. But I'm just teasing you. You did make some distinct points in your post, even if most of the people here had to use a thesaurus to decode it's wisdom. I've just always found that when I meet someone with an overactive vocabulary, it tends to be due to arrogance, not intelligence. "Look what I can do!" You on the other hand, do seem to have a very deeply buried subtle cynicism that shows you do have a sense of humor, which I have found is uncharacteristic of Basherdom. As long as the conversation remains interesting....

 

Watch the flaming...

 

Re: "The characters in the PT are all flat and wooden because they're SUPPOSED to be flat and wooden".

Herein lies the problem. Lack of balance between different character types. We're looking at a trilogy of films in which the main characters are mainly Jedi and politicians... this means that even MORE attention must be paid to creating interesting characters.

"But Jedi are supposed to be dull and stoic. Politicians are supposed to be dull and stoic."

Says who?

Personally, I think there's a case to be made that Jedi DIDN'T all have to be stoic and serious in the PT. What did we know of the Jedi before TPM? We knew what we learned from the words of two exiled Jedi Masters who were racing against time to try to train the son of a powerful, emotionally unstable fallen Jedi so that he could face down and defeat his father and the Emperor. They were operating under duress, in the face of very little hope of success, and with their only hope being a young man topping the Empire's "most wanted" list.

Obviously they were going to be dour and serious and focus Luke's attention on the gravity of the matter at hand, no matter whether or not that was the norm for Jedi in the Old Republic.

Lucas could just as well have made the Republic Jedi less serious and more of a "Three Musketeers" sort of bunch. They weren't under the gun to anywhere NEAR the same extent Yoda, Ben, and Luke were in the OT, especially not in TPM.

This isn't to say that they should have been written as frivolous, laugh-a-minute buffoons. But they also didn't have to be written as drab, stoic bores either. They could have been lightened up a good bit and still had the eventual seriousness of Ben and Yoda seem like a perfectly logical progression in light of what eventually befalls the Jedi order.

The politicians? Come on... not all politicians are zombies. He may be a horse's ass and a criminal, and it's a bit of an extreme example, but look at the basic personality of a guy like Jim Traficant. The guy would get up to speak and just treat it like he was on stage, half the time playing for laughs. A lot of politicians, though they put on a serious, professional front when they're up there speaking, are totally different once they're "off duty".

No way did Padme absolutely have to be written as being wooden and dull. Sure, she'd speak a certain way when "on duty", but the rest of the time she could easily have been ANYTHING. Again, not saying she should have been some zany, madcap goofball, but there were plenty of options for her character besides "stoic and reserved".

Again, it's all about character balance. A cast full of stoics is just not that bloody interesting, and the addition of one overblown slapstick sidekick character doesn't really change the fundamental problem of having all of the main characters written to have broomsticks up their bums. As I've said many times before, Lucas is not reporting on historical events... he's writing a work of fiction. And since he IS writing a work of fiction, it stands to reason that he has to do what every other fiction writer has to do... balance the main characters out to create an interesting dynamic between them. Making them all stoic and serious is just a dull choice for him to make. And it's completely unnecessary for him to do it like that.

Again, I think he really needed to take a lot more inspiration for the PT (and TPM specifically) from what he's said is his favorite Kurasawa film, Seven Samurai. The samurai in that film were serious warriors, but they weren't all just dour, serious monks like the PT jedi have been. They had individual characters, and some of them were pretty damned outgoing, while some were indeed rather stoic.

It's all about balance for the sake of compelling the audience to bond with the characters. If you make a cast of relatively dull, serious characters for a Star Wars movie, it's not going to really reach that much of the audience. At that point it basically becomes a movie aimed at a certain section of the fan-base, and at those who just want

 

Lucas did do it in the way he imagined.

Could he have pandered to your tastes? Sure, but in my opinion, that would have only served to cheapen the film.

Not everyone sees a need to spice it up you know.

 

I am SOOOO tired of being told how stupid I am for liking whatever GL puts up there. Or how blind us Fanboys are for liking all SW. Well Duh! Of course we are going to like what ever is up there. We like SW! Whatever he puts up there as long as it is SW we will like it. I love the EU. Why? Because it is SW. I like the books in between the movies, the comic books before AHO takes place, the figues, the memoribilla(sp?), the little lightsaber pens in the cereal box, the old BK glasses WHY? Because it is SW!! I would not have liked the PT if I did not like the OT first. People that have a strong liking for something tend to like everything about it. I am one of them. I look past any flaws and just enjoy it. I would like to go on a thread where someone does not start insulting those who like want GL is doing. How about have a healthy debate for a change. Stop all the mud slinging at each other. I am not saying you should not come in here and not say how you feel about someothing, but do not get on someone because they dis agree with you. I read threads that get like this and it p***** me off. Oh no they disagree with you let's start calling him names. Please people grow up!! We are here for one common thing and let's not have all the time mudd slinging!!! just my two cents. Later!!!

 

I like what Lucas has given me so far... and that's all I really ask. Is there bad acting? Yes. Bad dialogue? It's there. But those come UNDER story, action, and character development in my book- and those three things, at least in my eyes, were executed beautifully.

 

Again, Lucas could have chosen to write the characters any way he wanted to and he ended up choosing to write the vast majority of the main characters to be wooden and relatively emotionless.

All I'm saying is that some attention to balance between character types might have improved the PT some. For those who love anything with Star Wars stamped on it, or for those who happened to find the wooden characters compelling, of course this isn't an issue. For a lot of people, however, it is. Purposely populating a movie primarily with dull, stoic characters almost to the exclusion of all else is not generally considered to be top-notch storytelling, however...

 

"Purposely populating a movie primarily with dull, stoic characters almost to the exclusion of all else is not generally considered to be top-notch storytelling, however... "

So, how do you feel about Jar-Jar? He is the exact opposite of a dull, stoic character. Did he, at least, improve the story telling in the scenes that he occupied?

 

I thought Anakin, Padme, Kenobi, and virtually all the characters who play a big role were not wooden or stiff at all. Some people will not see them as being stiff characters, and others will see them as being as stiff as a board.

People see the same thing in different ways- which is why these bash/gush wars will NEVER end. It is also why these bash/gush wars are pointless.