Lit THE END...

To me, no one wants to feel that they have to do homework before see8ng a film.

Afterwards? That's a bit different but the trick is encouraging exploration, without requiring it

 

Star Wars never required homework, every movie, even in middle or end of a trilogy works on its own. Heck I was started on Star Wars with ROTJ, knew of Vader being daddy before seeing TESB, and I dug deeper and deeper still.

That's what the opening crawls are for, no homework needed unless you like and want it!

If people shy away from numbered movies, or in general from stuff they fear may be too much to digest time/money/effort-wise, then that is less a problem of the franchise or medium, but more of their personal insecurity and fear. Those would not watch it regardless of numbering or crawls because they feel overhelmed or "if I like it I need to get/see/do too much for completeness". They fear more the afterwards than doing homework before. I mean, there are way more complicated confusing movies and shows out there that people watch anyway than Star Wars which basically introduces everything in the first few minutes or has people learn along the way if not spelled out verbatim. Some stuff, like "what is a droid?" "why is that called this or that" is not always neccessary and can be learned from context.

 

Cross to the Executive side of the Force, it will all become clear.

More seriously, there's a reason Marvel are past 20+ films and no one minds that much, part of it is low movie number. 1, 2, 3 is less off-putting than 10. Even F&F is trying to avoid it with Fast X.

 

Marvel is releasing movies regardless of reception though, just give them no sequels if not meeting expectations, and continue with their plan. The story is known, fans do not wonder what is next but can check in comics. All that is new is how it will be mixed for the MCU and condensed. Like Ultron was handed to Stark instead of Antman.

Marvel is less releasing them for immedeate success, which they do have anyway built in already, but more to do the whole tapestry cinematic. That is why DC is different, it is reactionary, rebooting, retelling the same stories and does not get off the ground much despite trying.
SW is the middle ground, sticking to a longterm plan, yet altering it always somewhat due to reactionism.


Numbers aside, the focus was always on the titles for SW. Not the numbering. they were just placeholders when titles were not announced yet mostly.


The psychology behind not using higher numbers is really stupid. TV shows proof that people do not care about numbers. Some start a show not at the beginning or only later when it proofed itself as good. The entire movie business fear of numbering got to tv lately too with shows not being renewed despite good reception and fanbase, shorter seasons, only one season... all to make shows into episodic longer movies rather than have Bollywood 4+ hour movies. A good show needs its seasons and can run 20+ episodes per season or more than 1-3 seasons.

Fans actually are turned off of shows that are cancelled too early or have fewer numbers/episodes/seasons because why invest in them if they get cancelled unresolved anyway. Higher numbers are a proof of value and success, not the opposite!

 

You're way off on Marvel here.

None of the films have been a direct adaptation of the comics, they've been pretty canny on how they draw on them.

As to releasing films regardless, not necessarily. They do course correct, often quickly enough for it to not get too much attention. Recently Frige said they'd be looking to change the frequency of releases. Going back to the post Avengers films they hit a bad patch where they changed things and the subsequent films were both better and more individually distinct.

In an age of streaming long running series are fine, as the material can be accessed but those shows tend to be built to be very easy to jump onto. Old Trek in the 90s was the same. The trick is avoiding a sense of inaccessibility.

DC isn't as reactive as you think - if they had been they never would have done either Man of Steel or BvS. Mire recently both Peacemaker and The Batman brought a fresh take to material people might have thought they knew. DC films haven't been as good as Marvel but they haven't been that bad either. In some ways their depiction of superpowers has been way ahead of Marvel.

There's been five SW films since 2015. Of those only one I can't make work for me, a 80% hit rate ain't bad.

As to TV / animation there's nothing to match Picard for sheer awfulness, so that's doing fine too.

The ST frequently gets cited as LFL having no clue how to plan and put material together cohesively. Yet alongside the ST they did Rebels into Rogue One, with book and comic support. Which has been added to since with Bad Batch, Clone Wars S7, Andor and Kenobi.

Plans aren't always needed, a general sense of direction yes, plans? Not always. Especially if new pieces are put out in such a way as to fit really well with their predecessors. So well that it looks as if they were planned to....

 

Only the Star Wars Legends Universe had an Ending in Legacy Volume 1 and 2 with Darth Krayt defeated i would like to imagine that Darth Talon and other Sith were also defeated by Cade Skywalker, Ania Solo and the Triumvirate i highly doubt that the Legends Universe resurrects so Legends really had an Ending the Story Ended Legacy Comics was like a Farewell to the EU i believe the New Canon would not have an End they could Expand that Universe for many Years and i really doubt that the Skywalkers Story will End with Rise of Skywalker maybe the New Canon will have a Reboot but im sure that will not happen soon

 

God how I wish this is what we got

 

You know, I'm going to be pissed if and when they do this...because it would just go to show that rebooting the old EU wasn't necessary to begin with.

 

@Jedi Ben

Picard season 3 has been pretty damned good. Season 2 was dreadful.

 

It's better than S1-2 but that, by default, doesn't make it good.

The character conflicts feel forced, artificial and hollow. Villains are weak. The best stuff in this ep? Worf, no question. He had the bad ass intro and continued from there.

Picard's biggest problem is the one that also blights the Sequels. The writers only think in terms of "everyone's personal life must go to ****" for continuing the story.

 

True sadly, but what is the alternstive?

The old guard characters drinking tea as the galaxy around them goes to $%&(/&% and them no longer caring to save it? That is kinda what longlived species do.. sit it out, not care about the younger species squabbles, stay local.

While there is something to a character finding his personal peace in the midst of chaos and wars, stepping out of the looping wheel of history, the message needs to be brought across that everybody can do that and not repeat the cycles. It should not look like not caring or abandoning a cause, as essentially Jedi were accused of when they did that and cut their support or taking sides off.

Even late Legends had the old heroes take a step back while still in the game and the next generation got to get wasted in their place.

 

It's generally accepted that another story needs a new enemy, which in turn requires something going wrong somewhere. That doesn't mean feeding the old heroes into a meat grinder. The one doesn't have to lead to the other.

In both Trek and Wars, the prior endings did not set up future dysfunction and disaster. The end of Jedi, All Good Things or Nemesis, do set a certain direction that would be more creatively challenging.

In Wars terms, why couldn't we see Luke's Jedi Order and a more effective Republic? In effect paying off both the PT and OT. Instead we got "it's all gone to crap, here's a greatest OT hits remix".

Plus, in the limited ST era books we have, the world sketched of the pre-ST galaxy is one where it has moved beyond war dominating lives. (E.g. Bloodline)

 

You been playing Stellaris?

 

Even if you divorce the Heroes from leadership and have them not end up forever as future leaders, generals and business magnates, nor as spiritual figureheads and neither as superrich due to their service and earned or inherited wealth, you need a good reason for what you do with them.

They could retire like a monk, not needing or wanting much, until the next generation finds them to be trained by them. Or you deconstruct the heroes to the point of accepting them as average people instead of larger than life, like Rian Johnson did perfectly. He balanced the Legend of the Heroes and the real people, deconstructed their myth and still neither diminished them nor build them up as larger than life.

Luke could take a step back and isolate himself. Leia was still a central figure, but not a galactic leader anymore, more a merry band of misfits defying government and enemies alike. Han always had been an outcast that went respectable general, Lando, too, but both kinda returned to their old simpler ways after having tasted leadership, heroism, and being famous.

Can you imagine your political, business, spiritual leaders do that in the real world?

TLJ is a masterpiece for highlighting that with every character, be that larger than life Legend of Luke Skywalker, be that charismatic Leia that fails to get support to Crait as the call is not answered, or be it newbie hero Finn and his fangirl Rose being shocked at his real self, yet still seeing over time the underlying true nature of him that the flaws, the heroic legend often ignores or leaves out, are an essential part of the heroes and make them human and even more loveable than the myth of their perfection.


How can one thus evolve future heroes without stereotyping them into the leadership angle in all kinds of fields? What are heroes that are never leaders?

Even those that do not want to lead are often leaders of some kind... Jesus fellowship... Ghandi's passive rebellion... Albert Schweizer or Mothere Therese also are historical hero figures that in their own way lead, even if not directly.

What about Marvel or DC heroes? They try to stay anonymous to keep private life and loved ones safe and fail epically in that, being revealed to the public and becoming famous, threatening their loved ones. Heroes are pushed into the spotlight, into fame, into leadership and even into the larger than life myth as expectations grow with each help they give. As soon as they are not there, not enough, can not always help, they are cursed, condemned and people start to think they are selfish, choosey or out of form. They are normal people that are heroic, not gods that can always be there or around and witness and stop everything... not even Doctor Who with his timemachine can as the dark and grim spinoff Torchwood highlights in a very very ultradark way to the point of Earth having to sacrifice a child to save itself because the Doctor was not there to safe them this time around.

The thing is, a hero is nice to have, but if people get complacent because heroes will safe the day... it is the wrong message. If a hero inspires people to follow in his footsteps so he has not to do all by himself or always be there and can have a normal life, that is the better message. Like the people fleet at Exegol, or nonames saving Spiderman and other heroes from certain doom even in some comics.

Heroism needs be utilized right, not take responsibility away but give it to the people and have them learn from their example. Also if heroes who have superpowers like Jedi have it easier to help and save than average joes and janes, we need to see that despite the cost for ordinary folks people save others and help, that superpowers are not needed and that Jedi having it easier is no excuse for others to stand by and watch as the heroes either win or fail.

 

Severely disagree on TLJ but those conversations never go anywhere good so let's sidestep it entirely.

I do tend to go with the idea that if you're looking for actual life advice from stories, then that's a big problem. They're not designed for that either.

One recurring bugbear for me is creators wanting to do deconstruction, where they spend so much doing that there isn't sufficient time left to reconstruct and deliver a satisfying pay-off. I think deconstruction can work but not in either isolation or as a majority element. Might I see ESB differently if RotJ did not exist? More than likely. As a duo they work well together but apart? Both are diminished.

 

You do not have to like TLJ, it is controversial on purpose after all.

I think SW is designed as life advice from stories, like all mythology is and SW tries to be a modern myth. The Expanded Universe though not always adheres to that core line throughout SW proper, explores individual aspects isolated or does not indeed return to the core premisse, which is problematic for some sources but not SW overall.

I agree with you that creators fall short of their plan sometimes and that the payoff is missing or they did not fully understand or think through what they started. Even movies, like the PT or ST are lacking something that other additional material later tried to provide but should have been integrated from the start. Heck, even the OT does.

But even aside life advice in stories, imagine a hypothetical post-ST trilogy, what could they do with the ST heroes in that?

Have them as leaders was what some fans advocated... but that'd be the OT heroes Legends fate all over with new faces.
Have them deconstructed would be what the ST did to the OT folks... Rey, Finn, Poe, even Kylo post mortem, not as leaders but as a gimmick. "Search this old hero who is missing", "Do missions for X", "Follow the lead of Y who tragically sacrifices him/herself so you have to take over", "Next Gen looses faith only for a quote and smile of the old Hero reigniting hope and having next gen win the day", etc.

So what if we do neither... have new heroes, new symbols, new stories, but even if the old elite appears, its in the most unlikely, uninspiring way without trashing them or ruining their lives.
Say, could you imagine Rey as an old woman selling scrap, cleaning up the desert because somebody has to do it, no longer hero-ing around or doing any Jedi stuff? I kinda liked Kenobi in his own show having a dayjob on Tatooine lol. Show Rey happy, as old woman contempt with the little stuff she does. Having had a life, had heroism, had fame, but happy to be forgotten and feed her birds and pick trash from the desert ranting about "Nobody ever getting back to Jakku". Kinda like funny old Yoda on Dagobah before revealing himself as Jedi Master in hiding, explicitely without such a reveal happening when the new trilogy heroes stumble upon her, wondering and leaving her be.
Or Finn as a dad with a dayjob that has kids, but the galaxy has forgotten him and still remembers Rey, Leia, Luke, even if no idea if Rey is even still alive. Poe kinda living his Top Gun 2 life... having refused any promotions and higher ranks and staying in the cockpit, training newbies. And post mortem, Ben Solo aka Kylo Ren finding recognition post mortem, not for his redemption or help in the end which nobody learned about or remembers, but for his rule as Kylo Ren which despite the atrocities he did personally while Snokes servant, he was a capable leader and politician in the shortlived time the First Order reigned on few worlds directly, while merely raiding others. A trait he inherited from his mother perhaps and a paralell to a not light sided, but good Emperor Vader what if potential that never happened.

 

I think the biggest problem SW has in this respect is its tendency to so not know what to do with older generations on later stories, it kills them off. I don't think it is a sustainable way of operating for an ongoing story.

But that's kind of it, isn't it? RoS brought it to an end. A post-ST story would be a restart, but with a finite end in mind or a continuing adventures model?