PT should we drop the "prequel" tag from the prequel trilogy ?

The Magician's Nephew written in 1954 also predates They Shall Have Stars.

Anyway...to answer the OP.

 

The (K)Cypria is probably the first prequel in western literature, but I was referring to the first use of the term, which seems to be in the 1950's.

 

Ease of use means they'll continue to be labeled as the prequels for a long time. Personally, though, I think of I-VI as the original saga more so than dividing them into two trilogies.

 

If you did, what would you call the trilogy? Calling it the first trilogy would be confusing because it will make some of the public think it came out first until they do more research. Second trilogy would be confusing because people might think it takes place after the original trilogy.
Prequel Trilogy is still a pretty good title, as it takes place before the Classic/Original Trilogy.
I suppose you could call it the Anakin Trilogy, Republic Trilogy, or stuff like that.

 

I've always found ANH to be an ideal introduction to the GFFA at large. TPM seems to hit the ground running with the expectation that the viewer has at least a generalized understanding of what's going on. I'm not sure the Prequel tag will ever be dropped and I don't think it should be. 4,5,6,1,2,3 is the way most people are introduced to Star Wars even for people who prefer the prequels like myself.

 

TPM is much better as the introduction.
the universe is very small in 4-6. in TPM we get to feel the universe is much larger than what we get in ANH. also much more detailed. we get that by seeing more planets, more aliens, space, ground and deep under the sea. we see cities, homes, palaces. we see corusant and qui-gon says its one huge city. we learn of slavery while in ANH the we knew is scum and villainy. we see the senate. we see the jedi order. we learn how the force works, we see force powers and jedi at their peak.
4-6 is after the downfall, when all of the previous information was destroyed and there is no one left to teach it except for two old masters who live in exile.

it makes sense and we get better understanding of the star wars universe as a whole.

we also find out that both villmain characters CAN die in this franchise.


prequels dont serve as the ideal introduction to a franchise. but TPM is.

 

The bit about the universe is smaller in ANH is exactly why it is the best point of entry.
TPM is bigger and it could be bigger because the OT existed and had done much of the legwork.

Take the MCU and Avengers Infinity War. Could they have made that film first? That instead of Iron Man, they started with Infinity War?
No they could not, because the earlier films built up the Universe, explained the characters and set up the lore. You don't exactly have to have seen all the films in order to follow it but if they had made Infinity War first, it would not have worked nearly as well.
Iron Man is a much smaller film that Infinity War but it had to be, it set up the world.

The smaller Universe is also why ANH does not work as well after RotS, you had a big movie, big scenes, loads of effects, really fancy fights, rapid pace and then ANH comes along and the pace slows down, the scale is much smaller and some prominent characters just vanish. Yoda is not even mentioned and Palpatine and Bail are never seen. And Vader is now in a much smaller role. There are aliens but in far reduced roles.

Also, ANH has the main villain die, Tarkin. He is the big villain in this film. He is Vader's boss. Vader has more of a personal connection to Luke but he is not the main villain.

Bye for now.
Blackboard Monitor

 

and it makes the most sense as it acts as the 4th chapter of the story. in the 3rd chapter the jedi order and everything good had fallen. in chapter 4 the resurrection is starting, but they will never get to what they were before because the sith destroyed everything.
it works.

star wars galaxy was very small throughout 4-6 compared to TPM. and ANH did not introduce much. it introduced enough for the 3 movies, but the EU had to explain ALOT.
TPM does not leave much room for the EU when it comes to explanations on the basics. it explained everything we needed to know for episode 1-3.

 

What?

The EU didn't need to explain anything. The OT stands just fine on its own.

 

like what?

 

It was not made as the fourth chapter, it was made as the first chapter in part due to the fact that there were no Star Wars movie made before ANH.

The bit about the EU is hysterical to me given the number of times I had questions about the PT. And very often I have been told, "Read this EU book" or "watch TCW" or "Lucas explains this in the commentary" or "read the script" or "watch the deleted scenes".

Also, when the OT was made, there was not much EU. "Splinter in the Minds eye" was the first book, published in 1978 but for a number of years there was not much and much of it was sporadic and unrefined.
So the OT had to stand alone and it did.

The PT, in my opinion, was way more dependent on the EU and used it more as a crutch.
"Who was Sifo-Dyas?" The EU explains him. "What did the prophecy say" The EU explains it.
Questions that I saw arise from TPM alone.
"What does Bring balance to the Force mean?"
"Who made the prophecy and when?"
"Why do the Sith want revenge?"
"What was Papatine's original plan?"
"Why did the Jedi not come in as witnesses in the senate?"
"Why did the TF remove the blockade?"
And many others.

And no, ANH had to introduce everything in that film because again, there were no films made prior to it. It was literally the first one.

Bye for now.
Blackboard Monitor

 

I have since many years ago dropped the "Prequel" characterization when I talk about 1-3.

They are and will always be "The 6 classics" or "The George Lucas saga" and they are treated as one entity by me.

A long movie divided in 6 parts.

 

The prequels are not more dependant than the originals on EU either, George Lucas didn’t think many of the viewers were familiar with the EU and didn’t follow it. Even many explanations of lore not told in the movies about political factions and technology like the gungan plasma or droideka shields was developed by George Lucas and the crew and can be learned about from behind the scenes material

 

all of these questions does not affect the story whatsover. these questions are irrelevant.
BUT there is one important question that the exact answer is unknown to this day: "What does Bring balance to the Force mean?"
yoda answered it in episode 3. "a prophecy that misread could have been".
the prophecy was always meant to be vague. the fact that its vague is also a critical part of the story.

"why do the sith want revenge?"
i dont know, but i think its more of a play of words on RotJ. i read its working title was supposed to be "revenge of the jedi". so george just replaced jedi with sith and replace Return with Revenge. also the 'R' is kept so it because RotJ and RotS.
also Return has a positive connotation (happy ending) to it while Revenge have negative connotation to it (sad ending).

 

Hardly, they do matter. Why the sith want revenge gives us a motivation for the bad guys as well as some world building.
What makes the prophecy special matters because all Force users have an ability to see the future but it is always in motion. The prophecy is somehow different. The prophecy is also why Qui-Gon is so adamant to train Anakin, so again character motivation.

The TF removing the blockade impacts the story majorly because if it was still there, Padme's ship could get blown up or captured. Since the plot does not want that, the blockade is just gone, no reason given. Because this is a contrived plot.
The Jedi being there as witnesses might make the senate believe Padme and Valorum is not removed, which again has major impact on the story.

In the OT, most often, events happen is ways that makes sense, not always, there are instances of "Just go with it."
In the PT, to me, the plot is more contrived, events happen because the plot needs it, not because it character of in-universe sense. Again not always, at times the plot proceeds more organically.

Bye for now.
The Guarding Dark

 

In once sense, yeah...they are irrelevant.
But if you want to make an interesting if not captivating story for your audience, answering some of these I'd say is down right essential.

 

all of these details you want, does not affect the main story, they will just create a side story within a movie and cause a distraction. when you tell a story, you need to follow a specific thread, if you stray, you get all confused.
we dont want that.

the TF blockade removal, as far as i remember, the blockade was never removed. they just slipped through.
it was removed when the control ship was destroyed.

1. your claim says (in your opinion) why its special, not why its correct interpretation is integral to story.

2. i dont really understand what you want. its very clear the jedi believed the prophecy means to that there is one jedi who will destroy the sith. its also very clear that they werent sure of it since episode 1.
but george wanted everyone, characters and audience, to not know what is the true meaning of the prophecy. its part of what drives the story. the unknown.








and why the sith want revenge,
ok, lets assume we did found out all the details (which might take another trilogy), how will it affect the story ? it wont. it will just raise more questions and confuse the audeince. because the point of the movie is not the revenge of the sith, its the downfall of the jedi and rise of the sith.
*i believe its just a playword of return of the jedi and the original working title of episode 6 "revenge of the jedi".

its not like the clones attacked. titles are sometimes just what they are. titles.

 

Oh I definitely like this better than just reducing it to "the PT"

 

First, I suggest that you watch TPM again as it is very clear that the blockade is gone when they come back to Naboo. At the start of the films there were loads of ships, now just one.

The details DOES affect the main story, if the blockade had not magically disappeared then Padme's ship could have been destroyed, killing her, Qui-Gon, Obi-Wan and Anakin. Which would have made the rest of the films impossible.
Had the Jedi appeared as witnesses, then the senate might have believed Padme, she would not have made the call against Valorum, she would not have gone back to Naboo, Qui-Gon would not have died, Maul would not have been killed. Massive impacts on the story.

A good story is one that moves along naturally, where events makes sense and follow organically from each other.
That is not what we have in TPM or the PT. We have chess-piece story telling, character goes here, character says this, pawn to King 4. Things happen because the plot needs it to happen, not because it makes sense. They take a nine year kid to a war-zone for no reason. Why? Because plot. Anakin needs to be there so he climbs in a Naboo fighters, strats fiddling with the controls, flies up and randomly blows up the TF ship.
The blockade is gone because the plot needs it. The Jedi don't appear because the plot needs Valorum to be removed. And so on.

No why the prophecy is special is because all jedi have the ability to see the future. Luke did in ESB. But that was not called a prophecy. And Yoda told him that always in motion is the future, so it is not set.
This prophecy is different by the simple fact that it is a prophecy and clearly the jedi think this is different than their normal ability to see the future.
So the question is obvious, why?

TPM does not say anything about what the Jedi think the prophecy means. They just say "Bring balance to the Force." AotC also says nothing about what they think it means. Only in RotS do we get an idea and that is a bit unclear as the Jedi think they might be wrong.
And then in the OT, the whole prophecy thing is never brought up.
So why even bother with this?

It would hardly require a trilogy.
Take ANH, Luke is told that his father was a Jedi and that another Jedi, one that had turned evil, had betrayed and murdered him. That is enough backstory for Luke to want revenge against Vader for what he did.
Take "The Princess Bride" and Inigo, we get his backstory and why he wants revenge, we did not need a whole film for that.

It would be simple, after Qui-Gon fought Maul on Tatooine and escaped. Obi-Wan asks who that was and Qui-Gon says, "I am not sure but that Red Lightsabre, only Sith Lords know how to make one." Obi-Wan can say "But that is impossible, the Sith are centuries dead." And Anakin can ask "What is a Sith?" And Qui-Gon can give a short explanation. Dark side force users, cruel and destructive, they used to rule a large part of the galaxy but the Jedi and the forces of the Republic fought them and destroyed most of their forces and killed all the Sith in massive battle at Condawn.

Bye for now.
Old Stoneface

 

I notice this a lot. Whenever you talk about clarifying something in the PT, people say it would cause the film to become bloated with exposition. Somehow, tons of films get released each year that make perfect sense, but when it comes to the PT... it's an impossible request without a four hour run time.

 

I mostly agree with this. But I believe all three of the titles have clear meanings that can be learned by paying attention to the movies. The Attack of the Clones is their attack on the separatist army on Geonosis, and the revenge of the Sith is revenge for the Jedi and the republic overthrowing their former rule.

 

The movie doesn't actually say this.

And to clarify... I'm all for having to infer certain information as opposed to being spoon-fed, but when you can't even be bothered to clarify what is essentially the entire thrust of your trilogy, especially when, by your own admission, your target audience is children, it's ridiculous that the movies themselves don't actually tell us what the Sith are taking revenge for.

All we know is that the Sith went extinct 1000 years prior to TPM (stated by the Jedi in TPM) and that the Sith were apparently once in control of the galaxy (stated by Palpatine in ROTS) prior to going extinct. We also know that (despite what ANH stated) the Republic was born at around the same time the Sith went extinct (1000 years prior to TPM) AND that there was a massive war that led to it's formation (stated by Sio Bibble in AOTC).

Am I to assume the Jedi wiped out the Sith in a war that also led to the creation of the Republic 1000 years prior to TPM? Seems weird that none of this is outright stated by any character for the entire 6 hour runtime of this trilogy.

Also weird that this contradicts previously established info (that the Republic was a 1000 generations old, not 1000 years old) stated by Obi-Wan in ANH.

 

You are not to assume anything, because it really doesn't matter.
It is ancient history and provides the necessary context.

 

@FightoftheForgotten I think what people are trying to say

'assume what you want, it doesn't matter, nothing matters'

which is quite detrimental to the argument they are trying to make in defending decisions not to include details and making a story compelling,

but ho hum.

 

What? Well, if backstories to the current narrative don't matter... then I have some bad news about the backstory to the OT everybody seems to like so much. Apparently, by your own admission, the PT doesn't matter.

This is, "Just turn your brain off" but with slightly bigger words.

If one of these theatrical presentations says "George Lucas" anywhere on it, it doesn't need to be compelling. As long as it has the right brand name, people will continue to consume it. These haven't been films since the 80's. They are strictly products.

Even the PT was basically just three special effects demo reels, each bumped up to feature length so they could be shown in theaters.