Is it me, or is the Prequel hate based on a whole lot of double-standards?

Like I said, I don't think that Greedo shooting first changes a whit of Han's character. There's no moral difference between shooting a guy who shoots first and shooting a guy who points a gun at you and gloats about how he's going to shoot you. That's a blaster that Greedo's carrying, not a damn wallet.

Anyway, I just prefer the original version of the scene for aesthetic reasons. The editing there is crisp and perfect-- add Greedo's blast in the existing footage, and I'm cool. It's that shoehorned long-shot that throws it off.

 

Yep. I hear you. Funny also that no-one complains about the (re)editing. The complaints are all centered on a split-second moment where one shot is fired by one character before another. But my point is very simple: the bad-buttery of Han is most palpable after the point of contention (i.e., the sudden firing of blasters plural in that pokey little cantina), not during; and since that part of the film remains unchanged, so, by extension, does the "shoot first, don't ask questions later" quality of Han Solo himself. Also, it is Greedo who massively antagonizes Han when he says that Jabba may just take his ship, which causes Han to reflexively respond, "Over my dead body!" Han Solo: you can try and take his life, but you'll HAVE to take his life to take his ship.

 

It's funny because if there's any issue I have at all with the revised cantina shootout, it's that it slightly disrupted the flow of the scene. It's better on the 2004 DVD edition.

I understood even as a 7-year-old in 1977 that Greedo was threatening Han, so Han shot him before Greedo could pull the trigger himself. But in the intervening years, that scene was retroactively reinterpreted by the moral relativist pop culture gurus as Han killing somebody in cold blood and that made him "cool." I don't think Lucas wanted kids to see Han as an awesome guy because he's a murderer, so he clarifies the danger to Han by making Greedo fire first. As others have pointed out, it doesn't change Han's character. He still treats the incidence with insouciance, casually tossing the bartender a credit chip or coin or whatever. It still recalls the Western saloon shootout. The whining comes from one faction that doesn't want anything in "their" Star Wars changed ever or from another faction that throws a fit every time moral clarity ruins their vision of a nihilistic saga.

--MissPadme

 

I'm sorry to say, I still dont think it makes any sense... on any level. As Cryo has said, any attempt it may have been to reinterpret Han's ruthless attitude is pretty much removed by Solo's reaction to the event - "sorry about the mess" and the flip of the coin, they way he delivers both, is indeed an indication that this is who he is... killing is no big deal to him. He cares not one bit about what he's done or been forced to do. And thats still evident in the newer versions. Equally, any attempt to add a new dimension and make Greedo's threat appear more real (hence justifying Han's shooting him) is unnceccessary... Greedo says "I've been looking forward to this for a long time" - he's making it clear, he's about to kill Han. He simply doesn't realise Han already has his own gun pointing back, otherwise he'd have just done it already.

It used to be a classic moment. I think it has been spoiled. Han appears fortunate where before he appeared above it all. He allows Greedo the chance to get his shot away. And whats more annoying is, whatever the agenda, there was no need for any change. Anyone who believes it changes Han's character is mistaken (for the reasons stated above), as is anyone who believes it wasn't previously clear Greedo was going to shoot Han anyway - that much was always clear. The only thing the change has succeeded in making me think is that a) Greedo is a lousy assassin, and b) Han's incredibly lucky. To me its as pointless and misleading as the SE Luke scream on Bespin in ESB. While that was removed, I somehow doubt we'll see the Han/Greedo alteration reversed. Its become such a publicised thing that any reversal by Lucas would make him look weak.

Does anyone really believe the change is either neccessary or an improvement on the original? I don't think anyone could convince me of either. But hey, I'm open to persuasion

 

OBI-WAN: In my experience, there's no such thing as luck.

Han is now "lucky" to escape a death blast earlier in the film, just as he considers Luke "lucky" to successfully block multiple laser blasts from a hovering droid while physically blind (onboard his own Millennium Falcon, no less). And his attitude to both is more or less the same: Eh, whatever.

In my opinion, the cantina change superbly feeds into the idea that Han is essentially a strong, unconscious Force-user in his own right (again, his cynicism about the Force -- at least, initially -- makes it that much sweeter). Other details support this: e.g., Han's piloting in the asteroid field in TESB. Threepio tells him the odds of success are amazingly slim and even Leia freaks out. Where have we seen this before? Oh, yes: the podrace. You must have Jedi reflexes if you race pods.

* * *

Anyway, I agree (narcissistically, I would) .... good discussion, guys. Love the last few posts.

 

Having seen all of the PT in the theaters when they were originally released, and growing up with my contemporaries for whom the PT really came as an afterthought to years of loving the OT, an interesting thing has happened in I would say, the last 4-5 years. I've met quite a few people who aren't that much younger but are just at that age where growing up, the PT was their first introduction to SW and they have NONE of the PT hatred.

They either like SW or they don't, as with anything else; but I've never really heard from anyone who's now in their early 20s say that GL lost his touch, was just cashing in with the PT, the PT had no heart, etc. And just to clarify, these are NOT all SW nerds. Some, yes, lol; but some are just casual movie goers, young guys in that target demo, who like the SW movies the same way they like the Spiderman movies, XMen, or any other fantasy franchise.

My guess is that the guy who wrote the RLM rebuttal falls into this category, because he seems to have the same sort of clarity and point out a lot of the same virtues that I notice many younger SW do; and that's a good thing!

 

I'm interested in seeing how the Clone Wars Generation of kids 12 and under react to the 3d versions of the films.

It's starting to look as if the prequel hate phenomenon may be starting to erode. After all, the really hard core bashers are mostly 30+. But then again, they'll probably still be at it when they are in their 50s. But some will outgrow it and move on, hopefully.

 

It's kinda like the American South. Every year you pray to Christ they'll finally put away the Confederate flags and admit their "great cause" was the preservation of chattel slavery, but they always disappoint.

 

drg never disappoints. He's more entertaining and quicker-witted than the Emperor, The Joker, Clarence Boddicker and Bill O'Reilly put together.

 

This.

Also, expectations of today's filmgoers for movies of this type are extremely lofty in comparison with those in the late 70s and early 80s. Back then, the audience was thrilled with popcorn pulp; they had never witnessed anything quite like Star Wars before, and so most shortcomings were easily ignored. Today's audience expects all films to have substance, regardless of the genre. They want to be able to feel for the characters. They want to laugh, cry, and feel suspense. They want to leave a movie with the sense that they took part in a significant event.

The CT films compared favourably against other films of their day, whereas the PT films do not compare favourably with many contemporary films of their genre. I for one feel that the CT stands up to today's standard even greater than the PT does.

I consider Star Wars to be Space Fantasy, so we'll compare the PT with another fantasy. You mentioned LOTR, so I'll use those films as an example. The LOTR films are so universally loved not because of the special effects, not because of the fantasy elements, but because of the well-conceived plot (based on the novels) and because of the profound character development. By the end of The Return of the King, there was hardly anyone in the theatre without a lump in their throat. The PT just did not have that kind of an emotional impact on most of the audience.

 

I see where you're coming from -- and opinions are, of course, subjective -- but I must also say that I struggle to think of bigger "event" movies than the Star Wars films. Any of them. All of them. They're like religious happenings (and have been exploited to the hilt in this manner, on various levels).

Fair enough. I would have to somewhat disagree about the originals "standing up" to today's films on technical or aesthetic levels. Even with their obvious escapist bent, I think the originals would only have done a modest box office -- if just coming out today -- next to the likes of more self-serious work like Christopher Nolan's blockbuster entertainments or J.J. Abrams' flashy "Star Trek" movie. On the other hand, I think a lot of the humour in Star Wars, particularly the original movie, has broad, trans-generational appeal, allowing the films to stand out against even modern offerings. It's a tough one to call.

You called, MrFantastic? Well, here I am. Now, this may just be your resident LOTR-basher speaking, but those movies, while inspired on some levels, perhaps, also strike me as a load of dreary nonsense. Personally, I think they're a very "mass market" version of Tolkien's books; which is to say, rather, I find them loud, brutish and stupid. I could cite numerous examples here, from the ridiculous "lighting the beacons" sequence, to the jettisoning of various material, to things being swapped out and put into strange contexts. A good example of the latter, for me, is a line from the books, "the stars wheeled overhead". This is from the opening passages of "The Return Of The King", and is Tolkien describing Pippin's faint perception of the passing of time as he rides with Gandalf, falling in and out of consciousness, on their way to Minas Tirith. It's beautiful -- to me -- because it contrasts the very big with the very small: a literally-diminutive hobbit catching glimpses of a larger reality; flickerings of the cosmos itself; unity, order, grandeur, magnificence; as perceived by one of the smallest and feeblest characters in the story. In the films, they decided to stuff this line into the dialogue (understandable, but awkward), giving it to the reincarnated Gandalf of all people. By having Gandalf voice it -- a powerful wizard and "good" supernatural entity -- that contrast is lost. Further, Gandalf talks about straying out of thought and time. Stars appear to "wheel" on Earth, or Middle-earth, because we're on a planet that rotates. It's a poetic line, but it acquires that poetry through its fidelity to truth. In the films? Not so. This is a tiny example, but it's so revealing of

 

But your wrong, when ROTS came out EVERYONE in the theater had lumps in there throat --more lumps than any other star wars movie actually.

and you cant compare LOTR with star wars they are two very different things, star wars is a lot more kid friendly where as LOTR is made by pretentious movie geeks for pretentious movie geeks. Also no one feels like watching a movie thats almost 4 hours long where as star wars is fun, exciting and most of all...simple.

 

the only lumps i had in my throat was vomit!!!!!!!!

the prequel hate is cos the films sux bigtime!!!!!!!! luca$ completely sold out and ruined his saga

deny it all you want, you know its truw

 

Not that I laughed, (I might have, a few times), cried, or really felt suspense in the PT, I still felt for the characters. I'm sure many others here were the same?

This is not entirely true. Both TESB and ROTJ were not nearly criticly prasied as ANH, infact some reviews have complaints of wooden dialog and average acting from the cast. The CT and the PT has this in common, in the critics eyes, they do NOT stand up with movies like LOTR. Then again, critics like Roger Ebert still loves the Star Wars movies so I don't know WTH is wrong the the other ones.

I disagree here. If the PT did not have an emotional impact on it's audience then it wouldn't have been praised. It may not not be univerversally loved like the LOTR, but Star Was has had the fans from the last thirty years to back it up, and it's growing in numbers.

 

I didn't really read the original post, but here's my opinion on the prequels:

They are great movies, but poorly executed. Everyone always complains about Jar Jar being the worst part about Episode I... I honestly think he was the most truly Star Wars thing about Episode I. He had a personality, while everyone else was monotone. The original trilogy had a posse of characters with likeable personalities: the everyman Luke Skywalker, the bold woman Leia, the rogue Han, the wise Obi Wan, the badass best friend Chewbacca, and the comic relief of the droids. These made up the "good guys". The only good guys with personality in TPM were Jar Jar, Qui Gon, and Anakin. Anakin, I cannot tolerate. Jar Jar is to this day one of my favorites, I don't care what anyone says. Lucas should've stuck to his guns and kept Jar Jar as part of the main cast in Episodes 2 and 3. There is no clear protagonist.

The antagonists of the original trilogy were clearly defined too: the scary Vader, the overlord Palpatine, and the cold and cunning Imperial moffs and admirals. Darth Maul had such great potential as a Darth Vader for the modern age, but they gave him little screen time and then killed him off. As with the good guys, there is no clear "bad guy".

Attack of the Clones is in my opinion the worst movie of the saga. It had great action, and great potential. However, Lucas decided to invoke nostalgia of the darkness that came along with Episode V back in 1980. However, it was forced. Too forced. The dark writing in ESB came along naturally, but this movie ended up being overly melodramatic. It had a clear hero, but he was too unlikable. It had a clear villain, but he was just uninteresting.

Then Episode III came along and fixed many of these problems: it had the clear and charismatic villain in Palpatine, the (tragic) hero of Anakin Skywalker. It didn't force the darkness upon itself, it had the heart of the originals with the feel of the prequels, balancing the fun action scenes with dark material in a well executed way.

 

No worries.

LOL! Well, I have to say: Tolkien isn't my "beloved", literally or figuratively. I have a great admiration for his writing and the various levels of wit and acute detail he put into his books (or those that I've read), but I'm less sold on Tolkien The Man or Tolkien The Aesthete. I believe he was fairly detached from modern life -- anti-intellectual, ruthlessly rural and elitist -- and this distances me from a lot of his allegorizing and wish-thinking. On the other hand, I don't think it invalidates his work or means that it shouldn't be experienced or appreciated. Quite the opposite. If anything, it is this part of my character that finds a degree of contempt for Peter Jackson's (in my opinion) mangling of Tolkien's work. And Peter Jackson aside, I just don't think LOTR works outside of the books. The poetry and imaginative quality of the books rests in the prevailing sense, for me, that you're reading a written account of something -- like an epic poem (Tolkien himself was devastatingly fond of "Beowulf" and there are striking parallels in his "The Lord Of The Rings") -- and that this is coming to you as the only record of a past. In and of itself, this powerfully underscores themes of the work itself: namely, the transient nature of human experience, and the importance of language, memory and tradition in the preservation of history, and the remembrance of things that should not be forgotten, so that old struggles be honoured and lessons be learned. There's a sanctity to the writing, however batty some of Tolkien's hankerings may (or may not) have been. And I love the way this theme finds constant expression in even the smallest details and asides in the books. Virtually all of this is missing from the films; and, as I've more or less said, because they're films. In short, Star Wars and "The Lord Of The Rings" work best, for me, in their native mediums. Just as Star Wars is so visually fantastic and abstract that it must be depicted in a cinematic mode, adding directly to its quiescence, so must "The Lord Of The Rings" be told in prose, because what it says is so precious and specific and encrusted with language that anything else would be a savage detraction and destruction of its very essence. Something like that, anyway. For me, the LOTR movies demonstrate the brutality of the cinematic experience; how cheap and denuding it can be. Yet Star Wars paradoxically calls to mind the brilliance and sublimity of cinema as a modern art form, with deep ties to our evolutionary and cultural past, present and future. Books are a reduction of Star Wars (in my opinion). Movies are a reduction of "The Lord Of The Rings" (in my opinion). They're like inversions of each other. Between them, they make a glorious whole.

 

Cryogenic, you should amass a collection of your posts and convert them to a voluminous dissertaion of some kind. I may not always agree (I usually don't), but your points are thought provoking.

 

Thank you for the kind thoughts. And, for the record, I didn't mean to sound like I was rubbishing yours or anyone else's tastes/preferences. Art is highly subjective. In theory, there is room -- and why shouldn't there be? -- for an infinity of perspectives. Thanks again.

 

I assumed this was an homage to the end of Shane--one that really, really doesn't work, for in Nolan's ?realistic? narrative, the composed, inquisitive little urchin should in actuality be clutching to his mother, wailing and in desperate need of a psychiatrist.

Kids tend to do that sort of thing, after being held at gunpoint by a guy with half a face. (Scratch that...we all do.)

 

I'm reminded of another of Armond White's observations. This one, totally on the ball, in my opinion: "though the film's violence is hard, loud and constant, it is never realistic".

There are many troubling attitudes to violence in Nolan's movies, especially TDK, in my opinion. Here are a few:

- Guns aren't that bad. Several examples here: 1) The Joker kills a bunch of people in the opening sequence but never draws blood or suffers shrapnel. This reaches a faintly absurd level (in my opinion) when he shoots the William Fichtner bank manager. 2) Gary Oldman's Lt. Gordon dives in front of the Mayor and takes a bullet. A rife bullet. At almost point-blank range. That he thought this was a salient tactic is strange enough, that the character is later still alive, let alone walking around completely without incident, is, well... I lack the words. 3) Gary Oldman's Lt. Gordon (sorry, now he's COMMISSIONER Gordon) wrestles with a wayward cop who improbably tries to kill a person in Gordon's custody. With a shotgun. At point-blank range. A shot subsequently goes off. But where's the shrapnel damage or hearing loss?

- Explosive rockets aren't that bad. Again, several examples: 1) Batman fires off multiple rockets or shells in a multi-storey car park. Improbably, no-one appears to be maimed or killed. 2) The Joker fires off an RPG/bazooka in a busy underpass. A police car is struck and overturns, but the damage appears relatively superficial. 3) Batman fires off multiple rockets or shells in a line of parked and gridlocked cars. Two kids watch with amazement in a waiting car. It's a miracle no-one is killed or injured. 4) Batman fires off multiple rockets or shells in an alley-way. This blows a massive stack of debris into the connecting street. Again, no-one appears to be hurt or killed.

- Stabs/punches/bludgeoning. 1) What happens when The Joker kills that gangster with the pencil? Not a hint of blood. 2) What happens when The Joker kills that gangster with a knife to the mouth/cheek area? Again, no blood. 3) Batman enacts his share of brutality in this picture: he attacks another vigilante with his spiked glove (strong enough to break a katana blade in the previous movie), he snaps a criminal's arm during The Joker's assault in the penthouse sequence, and he gets involved in a series of improbable scenarios with SWAT team members at the end, even clothes-lining some down a flight of stairs. What else? Oh, a woman (female cop) is punched in the side of the head. Hard. Before making an additional call she says she'll need to make (during the first call) to enable the person who punches her to get what he wants (Gordon's wife and kids).

- Survivals. 1) Two people fall from a skyscraper and land on the hood of a taxi. No cuts, no bleeding, no broken bones, no whiplash. Nothing. 2) A person is deliberately dropped off a third or fourth storey building and lands on concrete, suffering only a broken ankle. 3) A person with HALF HIS FACE MISSING and no apparent pain, speech impediment or

 

Now I regret hesitating to point out that if Lucas adhered to Nolan's "realistic treatment," Vader wouldn't even be garbed in a mask. At the end of ROTS, his scorched tuckus would be carted off to Coruscant, handed two regular-strength aspirin, and sent on his merry, vengeance-fueled way.

I'm telling ya, he was just asking for trouble in prefacing his movie with, "A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away...." People start asking questions.