Why should an audience have to

No, I won't "lay off the poor guy", because, guess what? He's not a "poor guy", he's a badly written, pointless CG character who distracted Lucas from telling a compelling story (at least that's how I see it). He's the "star" of Episode I.

 

Not really though Darth Torgo. I mean you don't have to like him at all, but why make things up out of thin air like that?

---

Hawk: "Do me a favour and look inside yourself."

Go-Mer: Wow, look at all the tissue and bone...

Hawk: "Imagine a Lucas who tried very hard to make a comical character, fully rendered in CGI."

Go-Mer: But that could never happen... HEY! wait a minute, it DID happen!

Hawk: "Picture him believing the character would not be hated and that he would be the main comedy relief for TPM."

Go-Mer: Okay, I am picturing.

Hawk: "Then picture the audience cringing at Jar Jar and Lucas thinking he have made an error."

Go-Mer: Poor George, he was trying so hard...

Hawk: "You said it yourself, George is only human. Let him be human."

Go-Mer: What do you mean? Was I stopping him from being human up until now?

Hawk: "Take a deep breath and realise that in your world, where everything in TPM was planned and even the REACTION was planned, this world does not make sense."

Go-Mer: Why not?

Hawk: "It is placing Lucas as a God-Like figure."

Go-Mer: So whenever someone plans something out and then realizes that plan and things go the way they planned, and then someone like me points out that sucess, they are being held up as a "God"?

Hawk: "Maybe if you occasionally allowed yourself to let go and believe there are mistakes in the films (with acting, characters and effects not glued horns!) you may see things in a more rational, objective way."

Go-Mer: I do allow myself to beleive there are mistakes in the film. You are the one who thinks Maul's horns were somehow "perfect" and not worthy of my criticism.

Hawk: "As it stands, almost every new member comes along and is shocked at your worship of SW."

Go-Mer: I don't worship the film I just aknowledge where George suceeded.

Hawk: "It's just unreal the lengths you will go sometimes and a little creepy."

Go-Mer: Sorry, being happy is not easily understood by people who are sad. Trust me though, I won't eat you or anything.

 

Oh, why thank you for clearing that up for me, Gomer. Thank you for determining what my opinion should and should not be. Thanks for telling me that my opinion is "not really" the case.

 

Jar-Jar wasn't actually the "star" of Episode I. You can't just act like that is a matter of opinion Darth Torgo.

 

<<Grabs popcorn>>

I never knew that because I don't care for how jar jar was portrayed, I am a sad person. Oh wait, insinuations like that make me go I guess I'm not sad after all! ?

 

He left an impression on everyone who saw the movie, good or bad.

 

(steals some of Stone Jedi's popcorn) Hmm, I didn't know that either.

 

Hey! You're buying the next tub.

 

<takes some of SJ's popcorn too>

Hey, Gomer, did you lick your fingers first?

Oh well, I stand by my earlier statements in here. I find him annoying and out of sync with what Star Wars is. My opinion, though. I found him exceedingly annoying and I should not have to tolerate him as some social lesson rapped across my knuckles. Just a news flash... Jar Jar didn't ruin the movie for 99% of the fans in here, DarthTorgo included. Some of us are adamant about some of the small details because, like sand in our shoes at the end of a big walk, it was the sum of all the little bad story elements that gave us a sour taste for the movie at its end. We then explain each small pebble to explain ourselves.

In other news, I've noticed a large influx of new basher members to these boards. Perhaps ol Malthus was right after all...

 

Maybe I should tolerate and become best friends with people I can't stand because, if I'm being robbed, they might try to run away and abandon me, but end up tripping and running into the robber. This distracts the robber, and causes him to accidently fire the gun into his face.

LOL! Excellent suggestion!

You know, I think this whole thread is a lesson in tolerance.

 

Yeah, that's pretty much the lesson George tried to teach us with Jar-Jar.

 

Is this the same as whne he taught us that incest was good?

 

I am not sure where you picked that up, but it wasn't from Lucas.

 

Gomer....Emprie strikes back baby. Sis toungs her brother. Of course THEY didn't know it at the time....but I have a hunch neither did Lucas! Oh, and staring at your sister hologram and declairing she's beautiful is a little creepy. Of course staring at your sister while she's lying on a bed while wearing a Stormtrooper outfit...might make you...oh well.


But to stay on topic. Jar Jar was more than just comic relief, he was a fool archtype and a lesson in that all members of a society can be useful. Including the annoying orange clumsy ones. Remember, he was thrown out of his community not for being cowardly...but clumsy.

Star Wars isn't just an "fun" movie...there is a lot of thought put into their construction. While not everything succeeds with flying colors...the Lucs' failures are far suprerior to some other people successes.

Think about it...people hate a fully cgi character, and they hate his CHARACTER.

 

STUPID SERVER...repeated message...move along, this isn't the Lukash post you are looking for!

 

So having a character find his sister attractive because he doesn't know they are related is not creepy.

Sure after everything comes out, it is creepy in retrospect, but by no means does that send a message that incest is "okay". In fact as soon as he finds out and tells Leia, the whole idea of them getting together is completely tossed aside.

 

I agree, Gomer.

 

Go-mer

You know I love you as a fellow gusher...but sometimes you take things a little too seriously, my friend

 

<<But to stay on topic. Jar Jar was more than just comic relief, he was a fool archtype and a lesson in that all members of a society can be useful. Including the annoying orange clumsy ones. Remember, he was thrown out of his community not for being cowardly...but clumsy>>

I agree that Jar-Jar was supposed to be that, and if done well, it would be great, but I don't feel that it was done well. I don't get any impression that Jar-Jar could be useful in a society, since all the good things he did was completely by accident (and don't you dare bring up AOTC, because I already know what you are thinking) And, he might not have been thrown out for being cowardly or stupid, but he certainly embodies those "qualities".


You know, maybe Jar-Jar is intended to be a satire on anti-intellectualism in American society. Then, I would agree that Lucas did an exceptionaly job. But apparently, as everyone tells me, Jar-Jar is supposed to be some kind of positive, uplifting message. Well, I gotta say that I don't feel Lucas did a very good job with that.

 

DarthTorgo.

I'm not sure what Jar Jar does in the second movie so I am not going to bring ATOC up.

And I think Lucas, did dissapoint people with Jar Jar...he seems to be the main bone of contention for most people. For some its the way he talked(which was very hard for me to understand, for others it was because he was a complete idiot.

Personally, I still find Ewok 300 millions times more abrasive and annoying Jar-Jar..but of course, like everything else on this board....opinion.

 

For new meaning on the role Jar Jar (and accidents) played in TPM, check out the last thread I posted in Joseph Campbell Parallels thread (it's in the TPM forum) concerning the meaning of blunder-fool characters found in myths. I quoted a passage from The Hero With a Thousand Faces, which most know was one of Lucas's biggest influnces for SW.
I gave the whole movie new meaning for me, and I think it will for others too.
I would paste it here, but I'm not sure if that would be spamming, and i don't know how to insert links. Skip down to the end, if you don't want to read the rest of the posts, but I really think you should check this out.

 

I realize that about the mythic stuff Jar-Jar was SUPPOSED to be, but those characters usually end up proving us wrong that they are worthless. Jar-Jar does not do this, because all the stuff that he does in the movie is completley by accident and not of his own free will, or intelligence, or bravery, or cunning, or love. Just stupidity. That's it.

 

Fool! You understand nothing!!!

Just kidding. That was just fun to say. But seriously DarthTango, you missed the whole point. The accdients and ignorant stupidity with no meaning IS the point. It's an alien way to think, but that's what Lucas is getting at.

In case you haven't read it, here is Jar Jar's purposecopied from the Jar Jar: accidents and fool archetype explained, thread). Read and be amazed!!!


"'This is an example of the ways in which the adventure can begin (*note, the adventure does in fact begin in TPM). A blunder-apparently the merest chance- reveals an unsuspected world, and the individual is drawn into a relationship with forces that are not rightly understood. As Freud has shown, blunders are not the merest chance (AKA Freudian Slip). They are the result of suppressed desires and conflicts. They are ripples on the surface of life, produced by unsuspecting springs (a vergence in the force you say?). And these may be very deep-as deep as the soul itself. The blunder may anount to the opening of a destiny.....Typical of the circumastnces of the call...are the underestimated appearance of the carrier of the power of destiny....The frog (amphibian like Jar jar), the little dragon, is the nursery counterpart (note the kid theme throughout the prequels, including child Annie, the Jedi children, and the Jango/clonetrooper children, all in a nursery type role) of the underworld serpent whose head supports the earth and who represents the life-progenitive, demiurgic powers of the abyss....The disgusting and rejected frog or dragon...is the representative of that uncconscious deep wherein are hoarded the rejected, unrecognized, unknown, or undeveloped factors, laws, and elements of existance....The herald or the announcer of the adventure, therefore, is often dark, loathly, or terrifying, judged evil by the world; yet if one could follw, the way would be opened through the walls of the day into the dark where the jewels glow.'"

That's all Jar Jar, and I think it's not acoincidence that so many can't stand. His pointless action were not from conscious choices, worthy intentions, or free will, and that is the WHOLE POINT!!
They represent repressed unconscious desires.

 

That's very interesting, but what I said was developed more as a reponse to the whole cliched "loveable, well-meaning" Jar-Jar. You said yourself that he was a younger form of a dragon, which is typically associated as being evil in western culture. Also, whose desires does Jar-Jar represent? Anakin's? We already know what his desires are. Also, Jar-Jar never really interacts with
Anakin in any real way, which would have helped to emphasize that point.

 

Whoops. I accidently posted this in the Jar Jar: accidents thread. Ironicly, it's a Jar Jar type accident, but I guess it fits there too. Well, here it is again, in it's intended thread, in repsonse to DarthTorgo's last post.

Well, first of all, I don't want to set myself as the defender of Jar Jar. He bothered me too, but now I think he was supposed to bother people.
I don't think he was meant to be lovable, or not lovable either. He's neutral really. Ambiguous to go with the ambiguous themes of TPM.
A lot of the characters seemed to have a lack of emotion. If it was just one, then it could be an error, but that all of them do, hints at an overall tone Lucas was shooting for.
The dragon is not always necessarily evil. He is a serpent type creature, with multiple meaning. The first being the protector of the status quo. Always guarding gold or girls, but never using them. It's also a symbol of life.
However, the frog is the little dragon, the child counterpart of the dragon. It's a go between creature. Both land and water based. It starts as a tadpole and then matures into something else. That is a big difference. Still undeveloped, like the chracters of TPM, especially Anankin, but all of them seemed to lack character in a way.
That bothered me too about the movie, but it's starting to all make sense.
As for whose destiny is initiated, again multiple destinies. That seems onvious to me.
Don't be so attached to what you want it to be. If you refuse to see something, then so be it, but its there. Look a little deeper than the surface. Ask why you are so repulsed by something?