What does TPM even have to do with the rest of the PT?

"What?!?!?! ESB had a more complictaed plot than TPM???? Ha!!! Thats a good one. Look there is nothing wrong with ESB having a less complicated plot simply becuase of the nature of the story at that point in time of the galaxy."

I never said ESB had a more complicated plot. I said it had a more complex plot. There is a difference you know.

"You say without ESB the prequels would be irrelevent. Bull freakin crap."

So without ESB and the revelation that Darth Vader is Luke Skywalker's father, exactly what or who would these Prequels be about?

"We are talking about a story of a chain of events that are set into motion starting in TPM. ESB is simply a result of the events of TPM, AOTC, and Episode III. Deal with it."

A chain of events that the OT got by without just fine for nearly twenty years. ESB is not the "result" of TPM any more than the original "Star Trek" is the "result" of the current prequel series "Enterprise". It is the OT's popularity that resulted in these Prequels, not the other way around.

 

Good points AC.

 

First of all - this is bloody ridiculous!!!
Ahhhhh, good to get that out of my system.

ferelwookie ---
Your "above post" said nothing of the sort you implied...
And just to add insult to injury (or whatever) - you didn't answer ANY of my points. I pretty clearly stated why it is not wise to state that Lucas has messed it up because AOTC didn't tell you why Qui-Gon didn't disappear. Why should I pretend to be sorry for some damage that you pretend happened? I did not insult you. I argued. Come on - argue back. Don't waste my time.

ShaneP ---
No, you did NOT mention me by name. You did however try to make my point unimportant by stating that so many "gushers" told you this would happen in AOTC, yet it didn't. Come on - argue.

I mean, can any of you guys please argue case and points, and stop changing the subject at will?

 

No, it is against the Will of the Force.

Your point was valid as was mine. In other words, don't cast any stones when your side is just as responsible. It weakens your argument.

 

There you go changing the subject again.

 

LOL! There's a subject?

Adali, chill out and post your damn list if you want to make a point. Don't show up two days later and say I was trying to make your post "sound unimportant".

Post your list.

 

Post it! Post it! Post it! Post it!

 

>>>I never said ESB had a more complicated plot. I said it had a more complex plot. There is a difference you know.<<<

The only differnce between those two words is in your own mind. They mean essentially the same thing. Go look them up in a dictionary.

>>>So without ESB and the revelation that Darth Vader is Luke Skywalker's father, exactly what or who would these Prequels be about?<<<

The only thing that that tells me is that Lucas concieved the prequels (the backstory) before ESB came out. Like he has said a million times before, he has to know where Vader came from and how he got there. He just didn't giggle like Beavis and Butthead and say "you know what Beavis. I think it would be cool if for no reason at all I make Vader Luke's dad. Hehehe". As I said, The entire general backstory had been worked out before the world even had heard of Star Wars.

>>>A chain of events that the OT got by without just fine for nearly twenty years. ESB is not the "result" of TPM any more than the original "Star Trek" is the "result" of the current prequel series "Enterprise". It is the OT's popularity that resulted in these Prequels, not the other way around.<<<

How did the empire come to be? If the empire never came to be then The EMPIRE Strikes Back would never have even occured. The Empire is born in TPm, AOTC, and Episode III. It is becuase of the events of those movies that the events in ANH, ESB, and ROTJ are able to take place. I don't know where you come up with your rebutels. But I would suggest coming up with better arguments than that.

Lets try to get facts straight before we debate.

 

There was a topic in the Classic Trilogy that discussed Vader's origin and that of Anakin Skywalker's as not being the same...
read that and tell me you feel the same way.

 

I don't like the time frame of the prequels. Ten years between the two films really makes 'The Phantom Menace' even more of an outsider in the saga.

 

"The only differnce between those two words is in your own mind. They mean essentially the same thing. Go look them up in a dictionary."

There's a few words you might want to look up in the dictionary. "Polite" is one of them.

As to the difference between a complex plot and a complicated one, one is a carefully crafted plot with a strong subtext while the other is just a garish muddle. I'll leave it up to you which one I think applies to TPM.

"The only thing that that tells me is that Lucas concieved the prequels (the backstory) before ESB came out. Like he has said a million times before, he has to know where Vader came from and how he got there. He just didn't giggle like Beavis and Butthead and say "you know what Beavis. I think it would be cool if for no reason at all I make Vader Luke's dad. Hehehe". As I said, The entire general backstory had been worked out before the world even had heard of Star Wars."

That's funny, because Lucas' own early drafts of both ANH and ESB do not bear that out. It wasn't until Lawrence Kasdan was brought in to work on ESB's script that the idea of Vader being Luke's father surfaces. A previous script that Lucas comissioned by Leigh Brackett contains no reference to it whatsoever. I'm not saying it was Kasdan's idea, I'm simply saying that Lucas didn't think of it until after he had started to work on a new draft. The story was still in a tremendous state of flux in Lucas' mind at this point. As Punisher pointed out, there's a very well-researched thread on this topic in the Classic Trilogy Forum. I'll provide a link shortly.

And once the idea was in place, the backstory that went along with it eventually became the Prequels, hence my contention that without ESB the Prequels would be irrelevant.

It's circular logic to insist that the Prequels give relevance to the OT and not the other way around. The OT, and ESB in particular, do not require the context of the PT for their relevance. However the PT is entirely dependant upon the OT for it to have any meaning whatsoever. Which brings me back to my original point. After ANH was such a resounding success, Lucas realized that he could make not just a series of films but a saga. Where does "Star Wars" start being a saga? With ESB.

"How did the empire come to be? If the empire never came to be then The EMPIRE Strikes Back would never have even occured. The Empire is born in TPm, AOTC, and Episode III. It is becuase of the events of those movies that the events in ANH, ESB, and ROTJ are able to take place. I don't know where you come up with your rebutels. But I would suggest coming up with better arguments than that.


Lets try to get facts straight before we debate."

OK. Facts: ANH was released in 1977. ESB was released in 1980. ROTJ was released in 1983. TPM was released in 1999. AOTC was released in 2002. See a pattern?

The OT stood on it's own for nearly two decades, during which time Lucas wasn't sure if he would ever go back to "Star Wars". The PT is an addendum to the OT. The OT laid the groundwork of the universe that Lucas is now exploring. Without the OT, the PT simply would not exist.

It's a curious phenomenon that so many PT "gushers" are horrified that some of us "bash" the Prequel films, yet they have no qualms about bashing the classic films that made the PT possible in the first place.

EDIT>>> Here is the link to the thread that Punisher mentioned.

 

There was also a Rolling Stone article from '77 where GL mentioned that he wanted to do movies about a young Obi-Wan Kenobi, but with different actors.. I think he also made comments about the 9 films there too, but I'm not sure...

Bashers don't just "bash" we know our stuff...


unless it's REALLY OLD.

 

ShaneP ---

I'm sorry, I don't see where you argued about the midis. I offered a good argument for why there was no need to explain the midichlorians any further, along with an argument for why an explanation of the "Qui-Gon and disappearing" issue is sure to come. Your contribution was that gushers told you before AOTC that this movie would explain it, and now they say EpIII will explain it. I made my stand on this very clear. Once again, I wish you would argue. I only wanted to have a serious debate with you, and not to be cast aside as another gusher who always says the next film will fix it. Peace. Didn't mean to sound harsh. I think we see face to face on a lot of this stuff, but it is hard to maintain a clear mind in debates raging over 10 pages or so. Bear with me.

(And the only reason why there were so many posts before my reply to you is that this thread grew rapidly, NOT that I didn't bother to post. I'm not lazy, but I'm not on the web 24/7, you know).

Another point I'm thinking about ---
We get the PT. I agree 100% that the OT does not need the PT. But I wanted the PT, and now I get it. This PT will make new points and new stories. We can like them or dislike them. Fair enough. But it seems strange to me when someone 1) thinks the OT doesn't need another 3 films, 2) still wants to see those films, and 3) doesn't accept that these films will be new films and not word for word accounts of what old people said about the past in the OT.

I'm not sure if it will mean anything at this point, but here is what I said on page one. At that time, we were still discussing the topic of the thread - "What does TPM even have to do with the rest of the PT?", and as the discussion turned, with the rest of the saga. I said,

"The battle of Naboo leads Palpatine to being elected Chancellor. It leads to Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan meeting Amidala, the future mother of Luke and Leia. It leads to Qui-Gon, Amidala and Obi-Wan meeting Anakin, the future Sith Lord Darth Vader, husband of Amidala and father of Luke and Leia. It leads to Anakin being accepted into training as a Jedi under Obi-Wan Kenobi. It leads to the revelation that the Sith Order is not extinct after all. It effectively sets off a chain of events that includes the rise and fall of Anakin Skywalker, the birth of Palpatine's Empire, the Clone Wars and the extermination of the Jedi Order, and in the end the Galactic Civil War of the Original Trilogy. In other words, it leads to one of the 2 greatest sagas ever told on film."

Probably all debatable, but as much as I agree that I didn't need the PT - I find it hard to see how one can slam it (and I mean TPM, too) as being irrelevant to anything in the Star Wars universe.

Btw, I'm off for 5 days now. See you all next week.

 

I ask this, read the opening prologue to the SW ANH novelization...

There we get a basic history lesson about how Palpatine rose to power. Obviously, this doesn't give the history of Anakin or Obi-Wan, but it covers the IMPORTANT parts that make the OT make sense.
The "history" of Anakin & Obi-Wan is explained throughout the OT, so it does make sense for it not to be given away in the prologue.

 

>>>However the PT is entirely dependant upon the OT for it to have any meaning whatsoever. Which brings me back to my original point. After ANH was such a resounding success, Lucas realized that he could make not just a series of films but a saga. Where does "Star Wars" start being a saga? With ESB.<<<

No, it became a saga with the sucess of ANH. When box office numbers went through the roof in 1977, it became official in Lucas' mind: It became a saga at that point.

>>>That's funny, because Lucas' own early drafts of both ANH and ESB do not bear that out. It wasn't until Lawrence Kasdan was brought in to work on ESB's script that the idea of Vader being Luke's father surfaces. A previous script that Lucas comissioned by Leigh Brackett contains no reference to it whatsoever. I'm not saying it was Kasdan's idea, I'm simply saying that Lucas didn't think of it until after he had started to work on a new draft. The story was still in a tremendous state of flux in Lucas' mind at this point. As Punisher pointed out, there's a very well-researched thread on this topic in the Classic Trilogy Forum. I'll provide a link shortly.<<<

The story was still in a state of flux because as Lucas has said before, he doesn't see the picture clearly. He sees it in like a fog. He knows whats there generally, but indeed many of the DETAILS are never worked out until later.

And Vader was always Luke's father. Vader means "father" in Dutch. The early drafts tell of this. I believe charactors were a little different. Names were differnt. But the jist of what happened was all there. Heck, the early screenplays tell of the jedi purge and how Palpatine came into power. Go read the prologue to the ANH novel which came out before ANH was even released in theaters. It speaks of the massive organs of commerce (i.e The Trade Federation) assisting Palpatine into high office and how the Republic crumbled from with, "though the danger was no visible from the outside" and that Palpatine exterminated the jedi knights by treachery and deception (basically what was happening in AOTC). It also talks about how once he was elected into office he promise to bring peace back to the Republic, hence the line at the end of TPM to Amidala, "together we will bring peace and prosperity to the Republic".

In the Bill Moyers interview, Moyers SPECIFICALLY asked Lucas how much of the story he knew from the very beginning. Lucas said that he really didn't know what anything looked like. But he he had to know where Darth Vader came from and I quote, "how Darth Vader became Darth Vader". He also interestingly enough told Moyers that he always knew that there was a slave owner (Watto), but he didn't know that he flew around on funny little blue wings. Anyone who has seen the infamous Bill Moyers interview with George Lucas which aired on PBS, can back me up on ALL of this.

You are twisting facts to make the prequels look like something Lucas pulled out of his a** in 1998 or something. WRONG!!!

 

Well, everybody seems to have ignored my post.

So I'll ask again:

"As far as how that connects TPM to the rest of the saga, let me ask a question; Why is it so important that we see how Palpatine made the move from Senator to Chancellor? I'm a lot more curious as to how he got elected to the Galactic Senate in the first place. Wouldn't he have had to have been a native of Naboo to get that job? And if so, how does a resident of an almost utopian society become THE dark lord of the Sith? That aspect is unimportant? Smells like there's a Milton-esque Lucifer story here that is totally overlooked."

 

"Your contribution was that gushers told you before AOTC that this movie would explain it, and now they say EpIII will explain it."

It was more than that. I also said I thought you made a good point about Qui-Gon being the one referring to midis and not the other Jedi.

I agree with most of your points. The gusher's excuses reference had nothing to do with you.

Have a good vacation.

 

"And Vader was always Luke's father."


That is flat out not true. Go read the thread in the Classic Trilogy forum that AC linked to.

 

ShaneP --- Peace! Sorry that we messed it up a bit.

RogueSith ---
The only thing I can say is that you are pointing out a paradox. People want to know more, but when they get more it's either the wrong more or deemed irrelevant. All I can say is that you have made a very good point of how Lucas could not possibly make all of us happy. I would also like to know the things you ask, but I do personally find his election to the Chancellor's Chair and his gaining complete military and political power more interesting than how he became Senator in the first place. And I would love to preserve the mystery of his Sith background.

 

Rogue is right. That is not true. Once again, Lucas not only revises his works but his words after the fact.

 

I can't give you guys any links, so these are just my words; but last year I was part of a great discussion on the Vader/Luke's Father issue, and one woman brought in a bunch of fantastic links and analysis. We ended the debate on the following note; Lucas HAD thought of the possibility when he made ANH, probably as far back as 1975. However, he did NOT decide to go that way until they wrote the TESB script. He had other options, but it IS true that he had thought about it. The revelation was also kept hidden from Kasdan (or at least kept out of his drafts) until as late as possible.

I can't really see why it's bad that a writer changes his mind and gets other ideas.

 

That's entirely possible Lucas did think of that. The various drafts of Star Wars show he was all over the place in regards to characters and their relationships.

However, it does seem apparent Lucas decided to write Vader as the main villain of the Star Wars film regardless of the future of the franchise.

The problem I have with this whole Lucas changing his mind is not really his changing his mind about story direction. It mostly has to do with his claim of his influences of the saga and how he originally wrote them as action adventure pieces, then said he wanted to do a "new myth" for today. C'mon! Lucas wanted to do a fun Flash Gordonesque serial-type film that was fun. He did that. He didn't start out planning to do this whole six film arc.

Ahh, what the heck. I'm tired of typing. You know what I'm going to say anyway. Later fellas. Gushers and bashers alike.

 

"I can't really see why it's bad that a writer changes his mind and gets other ideas."


No one said that it was.


My point on Palpatine was just that the events of TPM are not a nescessity to the rest of the saga. IMO, more interesting questions were left unanswered, and the ones that were addressed weren't vital to the overall story. With minimal changes AOTC could be Episode 1. Again -IMO.

 

>>>"As far as how that connects TPM to the rest of the saga, let me ask a question; Why is it so important that we see how Palpatine made the move from Senator to Chancellor? I'm a lot more curious as to how he got elected to the Galactic Senate in the first place. Wouldn't he have had to have been a native of Naboo to get that job? And if so, how does a resident of an almost utopian society become THE dark lord of the Sith? That aspect is unimportant? Smells like there's a Milton-esque Lucifer story here that is totally overlooked."<<<

Because thats the whole point of the story. The story is, How the sith rose the rule the galaxy. Had TPM depicted Palpatine's rise to become a senator instead of his rise to become Chancellor, then there would even be more bashers of the movie that there are now. No one gives a crap how Palpatine became a senator. Had Lucas shown that and totallt skipped how he became Chancellor then everyone would be upset at Lucas for not only skipping THE crucial plot point, but for even showing the set-up of a set-up story. If TPM, as it is, is considered the set-up story of the saga. Then showing how Palp became senator, that would have the the set-up OF the set-up. That= not good.

 

>>>My point on Palpatine was just that the events of TPM are not a nescessity to the rest of the saga. IMO, more interesting questions were left unanswered, and the ones that were addressed weren't vital to the overall story. With minimal changes AOTC could be Episode 1. Again -IMO.<<<

Well AOTC is the story about how Palpatine secretlly has a clone army created which will ultimatly be what gets rid of the jedi in Episode III. And it also tells the story about how the Republic literally splits into two parts and starts the interglacatic civil war. Both of those plot threads take up so much screen time to tell, that there would be no room for telling the story about how Palpatine became Chancellor.

Remember that TPM tells the story about how he rose to power and AOTC tells the story about what he starts to do to the galaxy now that he is in power.

Lucas said in the TPM DVd commentary that in TPM he takes one step, in Ep 2 he takes another step, and in episode III he will take yet another and his final step to get the galaxy to the state that it is in at the start of ANH. Think of it as a step by step process.

Can I ask you one thing? Are you so stuborn that you won't you can't take Lucas' political storyline and at least consider it acceptable if not great? It just seems that you want to be able to say that it sucks. Geeze, he is basically re-telling the story of how Hitler rose to power and such, which (as evil as Hitler was) was a very brilliant and clever way to rise to power and then to institute a reign of terror. Palpatine does it all basically the same way, and you are sitting here trying to tell us that Lucas is sucking at telling this political story? Man oh man. Thats unbelievable. There is no hope.