Star Wars on ITV....

Some of the audio was a bit different to how it is on the SE vids I have. Extra echo in the DS swing bit for a start. Some of the SFX were altered also. Weird...

And yes the picture wasn't widescreen but it wasn't 4:3 either (the first indication of that was you saw the Tuskan Raider in Luke's binoculars... you can't see him at all on 4:3).

 

Hey Mayhem
Nice to see you back.

 

First off TESB wont be shown next week because of Champions League football
Thats what the "coming soon" thing was all about.

secondly:
Going onto another topic - Jar Jar Binks. I am sorry I don't buy all that rubbish further up in this thread. Anyone who attacks Jar Jar is not racist, to suggest they are is absolute nonsense. To be frank, this sort of ridiculous accusation really gets up my nose!

It annoys me intensely that we cannot have a constructive criticism of someone, without an immediate accusation of some sort of prejudice being thrown back. Now, if I said I hated Jar Jar because he was black, then that would be understandable. However in my criticism of Jar Jar, it makes no difference whether he is black, white, red or indifferent, the character is just crap!

I don't get why so many people today seem to have such a hang up about religion and race - just accept it and deal with it!

Alright maybe you dont criticise based on his looks and his speech, and you don't also criticise the Gungans on the same basis. Fine But to say he is a bad character missed the point entirely. Ok he might not be the "coolest" or the "toughest" character around, but does that matter? he doesn't need that to be who he is. His lesson to us is that of tolerance, not just of others but of ourselves. the desireable and the undesireable. You know why young children like him? Because they aren't as self-conscious as the adults around them. It is a good litmus test as to how far you are in the tolerance scale.
But anyway what exactly has the Gungan done? In TPM he was everywhere, whether he realised it or not. Much like the Force in most respects, he is very much like the metaphor of the Living Force, he isn't concerned about anything apart from the events in his present. And he was the special link to getting the Naboo & the Gungans together, without him that would never have been accomplished because he is the amphibious link from the Naboo land-dwellers to the water living Gungans. And an interesting inclusion was the idea of him being the lowest of the low and linked with excrement. Thats a common theme for this type of character, either the fool or the trickster. But people make way too much of a few seconds of that, which missed the point as well.
He never did anything bad in the film, and to him the way he conducted himself was normal. But everyone that dislikes him makes a big song and dance, and hate him.
Thats alot of intolerant people, shamefully.

And how was he handled badly?
He fit the role he was given and was a success because he showed that he had value in the end.
Even I admit Jar Jar can be annoying but its deliberate (not on his part but the way he is portrayed by Lucas) and its a shame some people can't see behind this tirade.

 

Cool posts Darth Terrious!

 

that explanation is nonsense..thats one thing that annoys when ppl start analysing situations for pages and pages thinking that reinforces their agruments when at the end of the day its useless waffle! i have no time for ppl like u, also casting around acusations like racist aint gonna do much for u...JUST GROW UP!

----------------------------------

it is jus me, but i dont like the fullscreen versions, in some scenes some characters which are standing off at the ends cant not be seen at all...dunno why this is and whos fault but it was a bit annoying...

 

Very annoying - LS...

As for Jar Jar - I haven't thought that deeply about it. Although I will say that the Gungans as a civ were rank IMHO as well. I play SW Battlegrounds on the pc, and I like nothing more than obliterating the Gungan civ...

 

Nothing's ever gonna be 'perfect' until the DVDs are released in a few years' time. Hence the constant annoyance about all the niggly things.

But even the DVDs will probably be butchered to create 'George's ultimate vision of the Star Wars saga'. And they should re-do Jabba. It doesn't even look like Jabba...

 

Jabba annoys, but not as much as "Greedo: The Galaxies Worst Shot!"

Having said that, I loved it. ANH truely is a great film.

UKS

 

yeah that got me too, had hom at point blank range how could he miss?

Plus I thought it was really cool in the original ho wHan got Greedo, one shot he never even saw coming!!!

 

Limbo I'm sorry you feel that way, obviously you're entitled to your opinion.
I'm just trying to get you to see my side of the whole thing.
And if you care to notice I've held back on the racism issue ok. But I do know people who use racist remarks towards Jar Jar (and hey know it too).
Obviously if you hate him or other reasons thats fine.

 

yep. and in the original version you can hear han say 'yes, i bet you have' far more clearly. in the SE you can barely make out the 'yes'...

Finally. People are joining my crusade against the SE. Did you also notice the stupid cgi bits of metal when the sandcrawler was blown up... silly bits of computer generated scrap. It looks and is so pointless...

They should of kept it with Jabba the man. they could've conned us by saying that jabba sent reps to do with face-to-face business and he kept his id secret or summat...

 

Oh brother!
Attack the SE's now?!

I've had enough of that in the "In defense of George Lucas" thread in the AOTC forum.

 

Its not a case of attack the SEs now.
I've attacked the SEs (ANH and RoTJ mainly - ESB is ace) since 1997. If you're going to improve something, then by all logic you should make it better. Not worse.

 

Well I guess Jabba could have been done better.

But the SE's in my opinion are fine.

 

The annoying thing about the SEs is that some parts are so obviously improved - the wampa's lair, the final death star battle in ANH, the dewbacks, the cloud city digital mattes - but some things have really knocked the films back - the atrociously inept Jabba the Hutt scene, Greedo shooting first, Jabba's palace band.

Also, some of the things that need cleaning up still haven't been done - the matt lines around the Rancor, the dodgy lightsaber effects in ANH and the changes of frame as lightsabres are ignited etc etc.

I'm not gonna start griping about the SEs - because I can't really be arsed with all that stuff. But with the benefit of hindsight, you can see that things haven't really been finished. Which kinda prompts the question: why start in the first place?

 

Mmm... the original Jabba's band and music was ace. Now we have that stupid dog thing. I'm so disappointed I haven't even bothered to learn its name...

 

For me, however little annoyances there are in the SE, the fixes of the INCREDIBLY BAD EFFECTS more then makes up for it.

I mean, has any one watched the OE recently?

Do you all want Bad matt lines, Splodgy blob speeders and Obi-Wans Stick Saber?

Artoo and Jawa's in the really bad continity and look of the R2 capture sequence?

Veeerrrrryyyy Sllllllooooowwwww X----Wiinnngggsssssss?

TIE Fighters intentionally missing?

Dodgy Mos Empty?

Though neither is perfect: SE over OE any day.

EDIT: GL did the SE in main to act as a testbed for the Prequels. I Predict the DVD versions will contain more differences..again!

UKS

 

The way I look at the Original versus Special Editions party is thus:

ANH Original was the perfect film.
ANH SE had some good bits added, some very good bits; but some things were messed up (eg. Jabba), which for me, knocked it off the 'perfect' spot.

ESB Original is the best film of the Trilogy.
ESB SE, strangely, is hard to differentiate from the original in terms of how good the final outcome, so I place it at joint best film!

ROTJ Original - I liked the film. But it after sixteen years, I count it as just above TPM.
ROTJ SE - no idea, can't remember anything of it.

Apart from ESB, I never bothered to purchase the Special Edition videos.

As for Jar Jar and racism, all I know is that no-one said ***** when the pretty white girl paved the way for Palpatine to become Chancellor, but the planet and his wife condemned the Gungan for suggesting emergency powers.

 

Okay, been through the posts and noted you listing your owned films, so here are mine, of top of my head:

ANH UK
ANH German (Krieg Der Sterne)

ESB UK (ex-rental white box)
ESB UK (black box)
ESB UK (silver edition)
ESB UK (gold edition...was there a Bronze?)
ESB UK (special edition)
ESB SECAM (France)
ESB PAL (Italy)
ESB PAL (Spain)
ESB PAL (Denmark)
ESB PAL (Holland - comes with Dutch X-Files trailer)
ESB UK (Remastered)

TPM (pirate Malaysian video)
TPM VCD UK
TPM DVD UK

SW Trilogy Boxed Set (Spain)
Video from Italian Star Wars convention, provided by Cloud City.

 

Puts my list to shame
-------
-Comic Book Guy

 

I think DS and Az hit the nail firmly on the head with their comments on the Special Editions. They (the SE's) for the most part add nothing to the original versions of the films and there are still so many things obviously wrong that they haven't corrected, it makes me wonder why they bothered at all

The whole scene with Jabba in ANH is totally unnecessary. It is exactly the same as the scene with Greedo - it adds nothing. Jabba looks dreadful and in a couple of shots, it is obvious that this CGI monstrosity (literally!) was added later.

Why? Probably so ILM could prove they could do CGI characters in preparation for TPM. But why didn't they get it right? Why did Lucas even release the SE of ANH when it wasn't perfect? After all, I thought that was the whole aim of the SE; to improve upon the original.

The lightsabres in the final duel between Obi-wan and Vader alternate between a special effect and a prop. Dave Prowse can clearly be seen through Vader's mask in many shots and there is a terrible scene with Tarkin, where he is still gesticulating even though the dialogue has stopped!

The Mos Eisley scenes don't work - everything added looks like it was and the totally new scenes fail to match up with the original scenes. There is a different texture and quality to the new scenes i.e. everything is a bland monochrome.


The Empire Strikes Back was ruined by the new scene of Vader making his way back to the Executor from Cloud City! Did we really need to see that? It now ruins the pacing of the film, the new Vader dialogue doesn't match and the music is all out of synch. It is a terrible piece of editing.

The other additions to ESB do enhance the film and make a better experience all round. And I think it is no accident that ESB required the least improvement - it was a perfect film the first time.

Having said that, in the space scenes, matte lines are still visible, which has not been corrected.


Return of the Jedi needed very few enhancements yet they decided not to replace the Rancor, which looks dreadful. It looks like a puppet!



Why enhance a film unless you are going to do it properly? And I will state again that the existing trilogy does not match the prequel trilogy. Comparing the two, it is clear to see the differences that 25 years of advancements in filmmaking has made.

When Episode III is released, it will be impossible to watch the whole saga together, because they will look so different. I find it ironic that the films that are supposed to show a later time in the galaxy have technology, which is completely outdated by the earlier films. The "look and feel" of the original trilogy is also dated. Although they maybe set in a galaxy far, far away they are nevetheless influenced by the time in which they were made. The most noticeable example of this is perhaps the hairstyles but I digress.

My feeling is that Lucas will remake Episodes IV-VI to fit in with the prequel trilogy. There are so many glaring inconcistences between the prequel and original trilogy, to name a few:

* Why is there no mention of midichlorians beyond The Phantom Menace?

* Why does Obi-wan say he was trained by Yoda when clearly he was not?

* Why are Aunt Beru and Uncle Owen suddenly aged in Episode IV - in AOTC they are only about 25!


And one of the curious things about watching Episode IV last night was how many times C-3P0 either lies or embelishes the truth! Notice how he says before the capture of the Tantive IV that there will be "no escape for the Princess this time" yet denies to know who she is when R2 plays her message to Luke?

I've probably rambled on enough and if after reading the above you have a different impression, let me just say that I love the SW saga. I just don't believe that Lucas has a clue about its direction or what he is going to do next!

 

"* Why does Obi-wan say he was trained by Yoda when clearly he was not?"

Yoda trains all the young Padawan's before being sent out on what you could call 'work experience (i.e. Obi Wan is given 'work experience' by Qui Gon). So Yoda does train them up to a point.

"* Why are Aunt Beru and Uncle Owen suddenly aged in Episode IV - in AOTC they are only about 25!"

If I remember correctly AOTC is about 25 years before ANH so IMO they look about the right age in ANH- lets not forget constant sunny climates ages your skin.

Regarding the midichlorians- this MIGHT be explained in Episode III.

 

I prefer the SEs. Onliy things I dont like is the execution of the Greedo scene (Han seems to have a spasm, which causes Greedo to miss and the Jabba SFX. Otherwise, I loved them.


And you dont like the Jabba band? Lucas always wanted a big musical number, but couldnt until then. That was more Lucas' vision than before

 

Turr,

"Films aren't released: They escape."

George Lucas.

The points you make are not really valid, I would say. Yes, there are changes that are not for the "better" in our eyes, but they don't "ruin" the film. Did the bad effects first time round "ruin" it?

remember, though ANH did well on rel-release, this wasn't expected! The studios only started clearing other films away AFTER they saw how well it did, (and the only film that didn't move, "The Saint" got crushed.)

Thus, the money spent on the Special Editions was not a lot. George is an expert at what you can squeeze past an audience, without going perfectionist crazee like Kubrik. So, though after a hundred viewings you can see The Green Cross Code Man, (I never have), 99.9% of the audience cannot.

I don't like the Jabba scene, (wrong tone compared to ROTJ) and the Greedo change and the Mr Bean voiced "Perpare my Star Detsroyer for my arrival", but hey, that's not going to effect my enjoying the rest of the fixes!


Now George, bring back the Biggs desert Sequences and extend the that boring 15 minutes at the start to an hour!

UKS

 

Bah its pants UKS.

Cheapness rules. I prefer the puppets to CGI monsters/creations any day. Yeah - even the puppet Yoda! To me, puppets still show a reality that CGI hasn't captured in a lot of films yet.

As for film's cheapness ratings...the skeletons in Jason and the Argonauts. Yes, they were cheap, but thats still one of the best scenes in fanstasy film making.