PT Belated Media: "What if Star Wars Episode 1 was good?"

Very interesting video. I must say it is fun to think about what this film would have been like on screen.



Last one was just two weeks ago.
http://boards.theforce.net/threads/what-if-star-wars-episode-i-was-good.50013909/

 

IBTL!

 

Not sure why you think this would be locked, it is an interesting topic and something to discuss. That is the point of a discussion forum, no?

 

There are already threads for this kind of stuff.

 

This was posted on YouTube like 10 minutes ago, I assure you there are no threads on it.

 

The only thing I would change about EPII is putting the scenes with Padme's family back in. Otherwise, I always thought it was great anyways.

 

What if angry fanboys would stop whining about other people's work and start making their own films?
That would be Paradise.

 

For one, there's a thread called "Red Letter Media and other prequel reviews."

 

That thread is locked, and this has nothing to do with Plinkett and it is not a review. It is a wonderfully put together 'what if' and I felt it had some merit for discussion.

Of course PT fanboys immediately think that this thread is a 'Prequel Hater' thread though I gave no indication of that intention. I thought it would make for a fun discussion but I guess the JC has gone downhill since I last posted here regularly.

 

But Episode II IS good.

Not only that, it's totally rad.

Let me break down how wrong this reviewer is:

A) The relatively infamous Naboo = Alderaan notion does not hold water.
B) The reason Anakin falls to the Dark Side is his forbidden love; focusing on this element is not a misstep.
C) The assumption that we should always be seeing Anakin and Obi-Wan as best buddies is just wrong.
D) Counter-proprosal for revelation of clone army is weak weak weak WEAK.
E) Good lord this whole video is just counter-proposal isn't it?
F) When Yoda does some thing that is "totally counter to everything he stands for"... then isn't that kind of the whole point of him doing it in the first place?
G) Obi-Wan's failings in training Anakin are erased
H) Critique of Anakin's mother's death is just off-base.

I've had enough of this. It's painful to watch. Not even funny like RLM. I don't know what kind of story this belated media dude is trying to tell, but it isn't Star Wars Episode II. It's certainly pretentious of him to think his ideas would make Episode II "like, really really good".

 

The guy has some interesting ideas, yeah.

 

I'd watch but I'm not sure I want to...

 

Yeah, it's really more of a visceral undermining of what is personally my favorite episode of the saga. Save yourself the trouble of watching it and just imagine a movie that's the complete opposite of AotC and you'll get the picture.

 

Ib4 Sx3 lock

 

Um....actually. I really like this guy's ideas. I think I would've liked *his* movie better. And he does do a good job of tying the two trilogies together. I don't know. I think this would've been a version I could really get behind. *shrug*.

 

"What if"? Last I saw it, it was still a good movie (before the dark times, before the Blu-ray version).

 

Well, this is going nowhere fast. Locking.

 

I'm surprised that this thread hadn't been created already (Mod Edit: Try using the search function next time. It works. ~Sx3 ) but I want to discuss a youtube video, titled What if Star War Episode 1 Was Good? that went viral, with close to 2 million views now:



The video features a person supposedly fixing the so called "problems" in the phantom menace that stopped the movie from being well-received by a greater portion of Star Wars fans. And as always with every video that bashes, jabs, or points out some sort of supposed defect within the Prequel trilogy, the like bar was pure green...

My take: his altered version of the TPM was pretty much nonsense. I see his fans as very dim-witted individuals who are swayed by the mass portrayal of the Prequels as terrible movies in dire need of correction. The tremendous praise that his video was met with, is merely another symbol of the animosity directed to the Prequel trilogy and of the success in smearing the Prequels.

Still, I think actual Prequel fans need to take a stand against this rubbish and actually examine this guy's treatment of TPM which is often comprised of rectifications of general slandering towards the PT: bad characters, bad plot, bad dialogue, bad [insert anything about film here], etc.

So like LukeSkywalker did in the RLM rebuttals, I'm going to do the unenviable task of systematically transcribing this guy's video, part by part, so that we can examine his version and see if it holds to the laudation it received (or any praise for that matter). With that said, let's jump right into the first minute of his 12 minute video:

"What if Episode 1 was good? Like really good? What if I were a story exec at Fox and George Lucas came to me and was like 'This is the film I'm directing' and I was like 'No, let's go through this right now, let's go through all the points that don't work and I'm going to rework it right now with you.' So here, bearing in mind to what George Lucas presented to all of us, we're going to get my version of Episode 1. So here we go with what if..."

"Now the big thing whenever you're making a sequel or prequel, whenever your revisiting the franchise, things need to feel old or new at the same time. Now George Lucas made the misstep of thinking familiarity meant character; however the same can be accomplished through theming and parallels."

"It also helps to have a main character ... Episode 1 was very muddled in that regard you aren't really sure who to point to and it's really apparent who it should be: it's Obi-wan's story! Much as the way the original trilogy was about Luke. However, the overarching story will be about Darth Vader. With that in mind, we open..."

 

I've seen this before (it's been awhile- probably around the time that I saw Ep 1 in 3D) and actually thought the guy made a few decent points. I actually really liked his point about making Obi-Wan the central focus of the film and having the overarching story of both trilogies be about Anakin while having the PT be about Obi-Wan like the OT was about Luke.

And yes, I realize that stuff like this is water under the bridge, but if GL continues to edit weaknesses in the OT there's no reason fans can't suggest elements of the prequels that could have been fine tuned as well. It's just the way that these things are presented (by calling it "What if Ep 1 was good?") that rub people the wrong way. I like Ep 1. Yes, it has some flaws but it's not a bad movie by any stretch of the imagination. I get the idea that this dude loves Star Wars and this was probably cathartic in some way.

 

That question (What if Episode I....) only applies to people living in an alternate universe (hello J.J. Abrams ) where Mike Stoklasa (the Star Wars hooligan also known as RLM guy) directed Episode I.
In our universe the film is already good .

 

I think he makes several good points, though he talks so darn quick and goes from scene to scene so fast that it's hard to really map out exactly how the film would play out.

I for one strongly agree that Maul should have survived and that Yoda should have been absent, not just from TPM, but from the PT altogether.

A work around would be to not show the Jedi Council scenes. We can meet some of the Council members in passing, like in the halls of the Jedi Temple, but we would only hear about Yoda's decisions during the Council sessions (which we would not see) or if they did enter the Jedi Council chamber, then Yoda should be absent. I agree with this.

I also think that there should have been a villain that lasted from TPM to ROTS other than Palpatine.

If we're going to play "what ifs" and it were up to me to revise Lucas' script in the same way that the guy in the video seeks to do, I would try to make a PT that can be watched in order with the classic trilogy (1-6) without spoiling anything, or at least as little as possible, while also addressing some minor things like how Leia can remember Padme and maybe even imbuing a little more truth into what Obi-Wan tell Luke.

Some changes:

TPM

1. No Yoda
2. Replace Qui-Gon with Obi-Wan as the person that discovers Anakin and has faith in the boy. Give Obi-Wan an apprentice in TPM, Obi-Wan's apprentice is Dooku's son (Jedi are allowed to marry). Obi-Wan is older, roughly 40 by the time of TPM and in his early 70s by ANH.
3. Count Dooku is on the Jedi Council in TPM, Dooku is shown to be sympathetic to Obi-Wan. He believes that the Sith have returned while the rest of the Jedi doubt it, and he pushes for stronger Jedi involvement in the Naboo crisis.
4. Alter the plot about taxation of trade routes to something more accessible and easily understood for the audience (specifically kids): E.G. Naboo was once ruled by a tyrant, there was a revolution that replaced him with Queen Amidala. The previous king was severely in debt to the Trade Federation which has now come to collect and the Naboo don't feel like they should pay. Make the blockade about the TF trying to twist the Naboo's arm for money, not about a protest in the taxation of trade routes. This would also give the Trade Federation a more legitimate reason to invade, if the Republic is debating over the legality of Queen Amidala's rule and whether or not she is the rightful ruler of the planet.
5. In TPM introduce a masked Sith Lord named Darth Vader.
6. There are no midichlorians, Obi-Wan merely senses that Anakin is strong in the Force.
7. Palpatine is not a popular Senator that becomes Chancellor. He is actually more of a renegade like Julius Caesar and has many enemies in the Senate but is much loved by the people. He orders the Jedi to go to Naboo in the beginning, not Valorum. And he walks out of the Senate in protest when the Senate will not do anything regarding the Trade Federation blockade.
8. Palpatine is approached by another Senator that sympathizes with him and contributes some ships and a small force to help the Jedi and Amidala re-take Naboo. The space battle takes place earlier in the film as these loaned ships help Amidala run the blockade.
9. Vader fights Obi-Wan and his apprentice and kills the apprentice. Vader then flees. We never learn Vader's identity, but he clearly is not Anakin.
10. Anakin's mother did not have a miraculous birth. Anakin is an older child and not so innocent. More like the child Voldemort in the Harry Potter film, a troubled child with great Force potential that Obi-Wan feels will benefit from Jedi training. When asked about his father, Anakin tells Obi-Wan that he died shortly after Anakin was born and that "he was a navigator on a spice freighter."
11. At the end of the film, it is Mace, not Yoda that is strongly opposed to training Anakin (to keep things more consistent as Mace doesn't trust Anakin is later movies as it currently stands). He eventually concedes however that Yoda is for training Anakin (again, we hear this, but we don't see Yoda).
12. Sidious never appears in the flesh, and any time he communicates via hologram, it is distorted.

AOTC

1. Dooku has left the Jedi Order following TPM and the death of his son and is unaccounted for.
2. Obi-Wan discovers that Palpatine ordered the clone army without consent of the senate. When the battle on Geonosis breaks out, Palpatine arrives to save them. The senate is furious that Palpatine has raised a private army, but feel like they can't touch him since he is being celebrated as a hero for his victory against the CIS in the first battle of The Clone Wars.
3. Jango did not know who the clone army was for and is killed by Dooku for providing an army for the Republic
4. Dooku shows up on Geonosis at the head of the CIS.
5. Anakin discovers that his mother was sold and that they are no longer on Tatooine, instead realizing that she lives on a farm on Dantooine (or some other planet). There he meets the Lars. Similarly, something bad has happened to Shmi and Anakin races off to save her and slaughters those responsible (same basic event, different planet).
6. Anakin marries Padme and this is common knowledge, not a secret.
7. Grievous is on Geonosis and is part of the meeting that Obi-Wan spies on. He is promised control of the largest army in the galaxy if he pledges his allegiance to the CIS cause.
9. Dooku demonstrates a strong degree of respect for Palpatine, saying that had people like him been in charge, perhaps he could have fixed the Republic.
10. The Jedi remain loyal to the senate which is trying to use the Jedi in a military capacity, which is creating tension among the Jedi and has them on edge if the Senate attempts to use the Jedi against Palpatine.
11. Obi-Wan and Anakin see Vader fleeing the scene on Geonosis and go in pursuit to the hangar. When they have him cornered, he unmasks himself to reveal that it's Dooku. They have an exchange in which Obi-Wan cannot believe that Dooku would kill his own son and doesn't even seem to care. Dooku then counters that the entire Republic didn't seem to care and that the life of a Jedi is meaningless to the Republic and that the Jedi will always be seen as expendable.

ROTS

1. Grievous is kicking the Republic's butt and Republic forces are withdrawing to the core. Anakin, concerned for his family, is trying to get Owen, Beru and Padme (who is pregnant and due any day) to safety by fleeing to the core. Obi-Wan agrees to get them to safety while Anakin insists that he can't go with them since he feels the Republic's only hope is Palpatine and rushes off to meet him. Before he leaves he tries to give an old lightsaber to Owen to give to his unborn child when he/she is older, in case Anakin doesn't return. Owen tries to talk Anakin out of abandoning his family, but is stern and tells Anakin that if he is to raise the child himself, he will see to it that the child never becomes a Jedi. Padme is ill and begins to take a turn for the worse (this is ultimately what kills her).
2. Palpatine and Anakin lead a mission against Grievous. Anakin kills Grievous. Palpatine is mortally wounded during the assault but survives the would-be mortal wound by calling on the power of the Force. Anakin sees this and discovers that Palpatine is a Sith. Anakin then pleads with Palpatine to use this power to save Padme's life and pledges his loyalty to Palpatine.
3. Palpatine returns to Coruscant celebrated as the savior of the Republic by the ecstatic civilians, though the Senate is fearful of him and gives him the Chancellorship for life. Palpatine pardons the senate for having their doubts.
4. Anakin in interested in finding Padme ASAP, but Palpatine instead sends him to Mustafar where he will find Vader and the CIS Council and be able to finally eliminate the last remaining opposition.
5. While Anakin is gone, Palpatine calls a session of the senate where he encourages the senate to scapegoat the Jedi for being responsible for the decision to withdraw from the front line (leaving Palpatine's forces alone in the Outer Rim and leaving many worlds defenseless). The Jedi are declared enemies of the state. The Jedi don't catch onto this until it's too late and many scatter. Mace goes after Palpatine but is killed. Palpatine senses Anakin is in danger and goes to Mustafar.
6. Obi-Wan goes to Mustafar in search of Anakin but comes across a single corpse. He rolls it over and is in shock, but we don't see what Obi-Wan sees.
7. We then see as surgical droids work away on a charred individual and encasing them in a suit, Palpatine is elaborating that Anakin Skywalker is dead and that half the Galaxy was under Darth Vader's control, and that with Darth Vader and Palpatine joining hands, they will unite the galaxy into an Empire that will last thousands of years.
8. Palpatine tells Vader (now Anakin going by that name to keep up the charade that Vader never died) that Obi-Wan is unaccounted for as is the senator from Naboo, he then gives Vader mandate to hunt the Jedi down and exterminate them by any means necessary.
9. We see the birth of Luke and Leia, but do not hear their names. We see Padme teary eyed and looking sickly holding her twins together for the first and last time as she is encouraged that they need to split them up for their own safety. It's implied that Padme will take one of them with her into hiding to stay with a friend of hers (Bail).
10. The final shot fasts forward a few years to Owen and Beru on Tatooine with a toddler Luke looking off into the sunset.

That's really the best I can think of doing to really preserve as many surprises as possible in the Classic Trilogy.

-You'll know that Luke has a sibling, but you won't know it's Leia until ROTJ
-It just dawned on me that this doesn't add up since Dooku was never Obi-Wan's pupil. Instead of rewriting everything regarding Dooku, the alternative would be to make Vader turn out to be his son from my revised TPM.
-You'll be just as surprised as Luke to find out that this all powerful Yoda that keeps getting mentioned is this little green frog man

etc.

Tl,dr version: My ideal PT would have preserved the twists of the CT and you wouldn't constantly be one step ahead of Luke.

 

Could be wrong, but I think this video might've been brought up before. Nonsense to me, nonetheless.

Had he come off as less opinionated, I'd take his video more seriously.

 

What if that guy in the clip ease up on the coffee so I could actually understand a word he was saying???!!!

 

To be honest…his opinion doesn't bother me either way. If people agree with him, that's fine, but he's just another dude with an opinion.

And honestly, I often can't take such opinions very seriously because they always seem to miss the point of Star Wars entirely.

As a particularly egregious example: people who say Qui-Gon shouldn't exist as a character. They do not understand at all how important his character is to the story and it's mind-bogglingly sad. Qui-Gon is absolutely essential to the series. He's there to act as a counterpoint to the Jedi Council, to show how the Jedi went wrong and how the Sith were able to take control -- and to act as a father figure to Anakin, the alternative to Palpatine that Anakin lost. That people feel the PT could have been told without him shows to me that they understood nothing of what they were watching and are still hopelessly attached to their own imaginings. They'd rather have the PT reflect the universe they made up in their heads than acknowledge the breadth and depth that exist in the films.

Let them. It's their loss -- they can't unlearn what they have learned and that is their failing.