Blue and Yellow -- The ULTIMATE SW Colours?

Here comes Cryogenic with another of his madcap colour threads.

The title may be cryptic, but my assertion is simple: the pre and post film text of each Episode matches the colour of the droids. Has anyone else ever noticed this before?

"A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away..." = Blue = Artoo

Main Text Crawl = Yellow = Threepio

End Credits = Blue = Artoo

This seems like something of a preternatural coincidence. Lucas has always said that the droids are the storytellers. Artoo's colour of note is blue. He is also the subconscious. The knowledge he possesses seems to be beyond the realm of the mortal players. Hence blue for the text EXTERNAL to the inner narrative of each Episode itself. Threepio's colour of note is gold / yellow. He is the conscious. He is fraught, verbose and animated. He even tells the story to the Ewok tribe in ROTJ. Hence gold / yellow for the text crawl conveying information specific to the INTERNAL narrative of each Episode.

And with the prequels, Lucas has now linked Anakin and Padme to the droids. Notice how Padme is most frequently associated with blue? Like Artoo, it's her "colour of note". Her motif. Notice how Anakin always flies yellow vehicles? His podracer and the Naboo starfighter (TPM), an airspeeder (AOTC) and a Republic starfighter (ROTS) are all painted yellow. Like Threepio, yellow is his "colour of note". His motif. Padme and Anakin are the true heart and soul of the saga.

Well, I thought I'd share this connection with you.

 

Hmm. Something to think about. I honestly think it's probably all coincidence, but hey, maybe you're on to something.

 

Awesome. Another thing to add is that water usually represents the sub-conscious mind, blue represents water, right? So that fits your analogy about R2.

While yellow represents reality. Yellow sun. Daytime.

I think Lucas is making a point at the start of ANH with the two droids separating and then being reunited. Almost like the two mindsets parting and then being reunited by destiny due to the balance that the two need to uphold.

 

In EU they kinda refer to C3PO as a story teller of the group, which he does show in ROTJ.

However, I never considered the opening scrawls to be matched up with the droids, but now that I do it kinda does make sense. Artoo is the subtle one who makes one or two worded replies and never gives off the full story, so he'd be 'a long time ago...' while 3po never shuts up and fills everyone in all the time.

Just like at the begining of AOTC VHS with the special feature of Artoo and 3po telling the whole story. Obviously, we barely understand artoo aside from the tone so 3po is made to tell it all, but it does connect. It does match up.

Good job Cryogenic, good job.

 

Can I just ask, how is blue Padme's colour of note?

 

It's been touched on, but it's water. Padme comes from a verdant, watery planet. She wears a lot of blue in AOTC and ROTS. She also looks like Ophelia in the final shot of her in the PT. It seems to be the colour she wears in scenes where she's anchoring Anakin: during his first private rant about Obi Wan and being held back ("Don't grow up too quickly"), during his confession of the Tusken slaughter, when he tells her to "wait for me" before flying to Mustafar and when she holds the snippet (i.e. his remaining goodness) in the casket. Interestingly, Palpatine also wears blue in TPM, most prominently while he's still a senator, perhaps indicating both the fact that he's standing for Naboo (or seems to be) and is rather fatherly and non-threatening (or seems to be).

Naboo seems to be the key to all of this: It's the planet which really kicks the saga into motion. Padme, Palpatine, Jar Jar and Artoo all come from there. And it seems to be a place that Anakin loved (it's in the most beautiful spot that he came out with his infamous "sand" line). When Padme dies, it's like Naboo dies, for until the closing moments of ROTJ, it's never seen again. And blue is its colour. By contrast, Tatooine is sandy, and more or less yellow. Yellow and blue. Blue and yellow. You know it makes sense.

 

Interesting.

 

You might want to explore this aspect at some point in your "visual storytelling" thread, DarthWolvo.

(P.S. I really like your recent screenshots. Technically, I mean. How did you get them to look so vibrant?)

Because of the way the PT works, and because of this feature I've tried to describe, an old poster like this thrills me:

[image=http://farm1.static.flickr.com/124/332702731_f9750357e9.jpg]

I see Anakin and Padme, and an epic journey, nearing its end. Old friends, like old lovers. The timeless narrators to a timeless story. And the union of the sons of the suns.

 

Never mind...

 

I think you may be reading a bit too into the color choice, as I believe Lucas said he chose yellow for Anakin's starfighters because it represents Courage in the Japanese culture.

 

A more simpler explanation is that yellow and blue are complimentary colours. They work well as a design aesthetic so you will find them paired up frequently.

 

Screen captures straight from DVD on Cyberlink player

Upload to Photobucket.com

Bob's your uncle

 

It was actually more to do with the yellow racing colours Lucas liked to have on his car when he was a racer. He used it in American Graffiti and then again in SW with Anakin ships etc. He likes the colour.

 

Still, I think Cryogenic is on to something.

 

Thats fine. But Lucas has said himself that Anakins pod and speeder colour was down to the fact that he liked yellow racing cars.

 

color has always been very important in the series. Everything from the shades of grey of the imperial officers, to the black and white stormtroopers to the black garbed Sith represent something significant. Cryo's observation is a completely valid observation in my view. Anyway if I'm not mistaken; the series is supposed to have a predominently silent film era quality to it and Lucas has always had a fascination to films and ideas that have little to no narrative.

 

Im not disagreeing. Im just saying that the yellow colours used with Anakin is more to do with Lucas' past.

As for colours - I think they do play a role. Lucas is interested in abstract cinema. But I think he went with simpler ideas - such as the rebels have natural colours and the empire having mechanical and unnatural colours.

 

I think you're ALL right.

If there's one thing I've learnt through studying this saga,....... it's that there are many layers and none are mutually exclusive.

Yellow is definitely a vibrant "boy racer" colour. And we can see it prominently in "American Graffiti":

[image=http://www.leonhard-styline-design.com/img/american_graffiti_32.jpg]

 

I completely agree with your analysis Cryogenic. I've found that blue represents the subconcious and yellow represents the concious. Lucas says in his ROTJ commetary that color plays a huge role in the Star Wars movies. I had never quite connected R2 and Padme to blue and 3PO to yellow, but I'm glad you've pointed it out. Green obviously plays a big role too. Representing nature, green is touched on in Naboo, Kashyyk, Endor, Yavin as well as the lightsabers of Yoda, Qui-Gon and eventually Luke (the most enlightened of all Jedi). Red represent evil with Palpatine and Maul and so forth. I can't think of any others.

I'd like to add that Coruscant is an intresting planet when looked upon in the color-theme aspect. Throughtout the prequel trilogy the planet is lit completely differently. You have the cold blues and blacks in ROTS, the yellow and red sunsets in AOTC and TPM. The blue nightclub in AOTC. The silver and white in TPM. This seems to be the only planet that actually changes its color schemes. Tatooine is the only other one that changes when Anakin kills the Tusken raiders. I like to think about it since it says that because the planet is entirely made up of people, people's decisions and actions determine how the planet will look. In other words, you make your own bed. When Anakin and the Queen arrive from Naboo the planet is bright and cheery. When Palpatine spreads evil across the galaxy the planet dims. When Anakin is falling to the darkside the planet looses its conscious feel (yellow suns) and drops down into the black of night. There's never any green at Coruscant as it has no nature. What a great planet Lucas chose to use as the galaxy's capital.

 

Interesting. I never really paid that much attention before to the coloring.

 

Oh, alright. I hate when you've thought of something more complex and it's just "Eh, I liked the color."

 

So the green lightsabre of Luke in ROTJ could be symbolic for "conclusion"? Where the EXTERNAL meets the INTERNAL?

I dunno..

 

It could be, but I think it's one of those occasions where fans read more into it than was actually intended given that the only reason we had green blades originally was because blue didn't show up against the sky.

 

there is something to be said for reading too much into a movie =) yet i cant help but think Cryogenics thoughts on the matter are genius, reading this thread kinda blew my mind a bit.

i imagine it comes down to what Qui-gon Jinn said in Ep.1, "your focus determines your reality" seems to me that would apply here, well just about everywhere for that matter =D

 

You know, I've always found it funny that before then, they never showed it quite that dark on Tatooine. Just as soon as one sun was setting, the other rose. IIRC, in AOTC, when Anakin killed the Tuskens it was portrayed as alot darker than that, which is supposed to be impossible on Tatooine.

I may be wrong, but I remember it being pretty dark... *shrugs* Just something that caught my attention.