Last time, I watched Star Wars: A New Hope and found an appreciation for the older movies that I didn’t know would be there, having only seen (and hated) the prequels.
I went into watching The Empire Strikes Back with slightly higher expectations, tempered by the fact that this was, after all, still Star Wars. Three of Lucas’ movies had already failed me, after all, even if the fourth turned out to be quite good against my expectations.
But could I chance another failure?
Well, heck yeah. I can hate Star Wars with impunity if need be.
As for The Empire Strikes Back…
The Empire Strikes Back left me stunned.
It truly did. Every moment hit hard. The music hit hard. The characters hit hard. The reveal, which I already knew about, hit hard. Even the plot hit hard, and I was not expecting that.
I had a little trouble putting together this post, because I didn’t want to leave the Star Wars universe. Not with Han Solo encased in carbonite. Not with Lando and Chewie going off in the Millennium Falcon, which I’m starting to view as being a sort of… friend that can jump into hyperspace and who has their failings, but hell if they can’t kick it with a little help when it’s needed. The little ship that could.
And I didn’t want to leave with the unresolved feelings that Luke now has towards Vader. Those feelings. Why did Luke’s anguish touch me in a way that Anakin’s anguish in Revenge of the Sith never did? I mean, both of ‘em go “NOOOOOOOOO!” in possibly the most hammy way ever, and I was entirely prepared to hate the ham, but… I didn’t hate it.
I felt Luke’s “NOOOOOOOO” was earned. Not because he’d suffered more than his father, but I think it’s partly because I’m just more sympathetic to Luke, whereas I didn’t have much sympathy for Anakin even after all his limbs got chopped off and he burned in lava, and that’s saying something. I never did like the slaughterers of children. Also the acting is better. It felt like there was more build-up to the big no than there was with Anakin-now-Vader in the prequels.
The prequels have left me… a bit confused when it comes to The Empire Strikes Back. For instance:
- Just when was Obi-Wan Kenobi (hereafter called “Ben”) as rash as Luke? I don’t think I saw that side of him in the prequels. But then again, he was older, so perhaps he was, but… I would have expected to see a more hot-headed Young Ben.
- I thought Ben’s master was Qui-Gon Jinn, not Yoda. Did I miss something? Maybe Rash Young Ben was first taught by Yoda, and then handed off to Qui-Gon when he was less of a burden? (I would have liked to see that.)
- Yoda here is so different from Prequel!Yoda that I’m not sure what to think about the change. Prequel!Yoda probably wouldn’t know a joke if it poked his backside, while Yoda here is very… muppety, for lack of a better word.
- Every time I see Yoda I think about him bouncing around like a hyperactive tennis ball around Count Dooku. But I guess this Yoda wouldn’t mind that so much.
Somehow I feel like we should have a Star Wars 0.5 and maybe a Star Wars 3.5. As it is, the character changes feel too… sudden.
No, scratch that. Let’s not give people ideas about revisiting the prequels. Although that book series by Terry Brooks is intriguing me…
Han Solo is now veering firmly over into the territory of “good.” But fortunately we’ve got some of the grey back in the form of Lando Calrissian. I had no idea Lando would turn out to actually help folks, even though he was obviously in a gray area of morality. In a way, I understood Lando’s character arc, hidden though most of it was offscreen and before the plot. He grew up from being a scoundrel like Han to being respectable and responsible. The acting sold that depth so well.
Man, I like Lando a lot. Are there Lando fan clubs? Can I get a stuffed Lando? Can I get Lando on a mug? Or better yet, on a rug?
But what I really want to talk about? It’s that reveal.
How can a reveal I already know about shock me this much?
Well, first, I didn’t know all the details. “Luke, I AM your father,” leaves so much context out. I admit that, in this case? The prequels did deepen the relationship between Vader and the Emperor. When the reveal was made to Vader, I understood why Vader might try to not only kill the Emperor for deceiving him about his son’s existence (and wow, wonder what happens when Vader finds out about Leia), but also tempt his son to the dark side so that they could rule together.
Vader promised the Emperor he would kill Luke if Luke refused. Instead, Vader gave Luke every single chance he could to say yes. If Luke hadn’t decided to let go of the railing, I think the conversation would still be going on.
After all that he had gone through, Vader still felt love.
That’s incredible. That’s touching. The prequels actually did flesh that out, and well.
And Vader grew up enough to know that screaming right away and trying to flail at the Emperor would get him nowhere. Of course he’d grow up. The details were probably interesting…
… Can we have a Star Wars 3.75?
I wonder now if, when Lucas first plotted the prequels, if this moment was what he concentrated on. I wonder if the prequels could just have been condensed down into one movie—because I feel that’s the only part that came remotely close to working. Sometimes, anyways.
Man, C-3P0 still annoys me. Annoys me a lot. I know, I know, he has a purpose as a translator rather than as goofy sidekick who sticks his tongue into motors. But he still grates on me. Also, I don’t like his card in Star Wars: The Card Game.
Of course, there’s also that love story between Han and Leia. It’s pretty well done. I did not expect that. Subtle and nuanced even though they exude a hate-each-other-so-much-it’s-love tension. How does that even happen?
Well, it happened here.
“I love you.”
“I know.”
Five words. Five words got across more emotion than the entire “No! It’s because I’m so in love with you” conversation. Of course, the compressed meaning in that conciseness is due to context and plot and character development.
I gotta say it. I love this movie. I see why other people love it. Heck, I’m 36, have little nostalgia for Star Wars, and I still loved this movie.
There is so much good here. Will there be as much good in Return of the Jedi, especially since I only have access to the latest digitally remastered (and then some) original trilogy movies?
I hear I’m going to see Anakin’s face again. I really hope not. Also, do the massacred kids stay in Jedi heaven or whatever it is that Ben speaks from? If so… how awkward that must all be.
Star Wars 6.5. And that’s it, I promise you.
Ava Jarvis née Arachne Jericho is a freelance writer, techie, and geek. By day she writes about high-tech topics, and by night she writes about board games at her blog, the Elemeeple.
It’s so fun to see this movie through fresh eyes! Thanks for your article, Ava.
You’re right about Prequel Yoda being very different from Original Yoda. Me, I think “muppety” Yoda is preferable, because he is solid and physical; the way the light plays off of the figure, the way Hamill interacts with the puppet (amazing work from Hamill), the way Frank Oz manipulates the puppet – it all just sells Yoda so much more than any CGI can, imo. I also always note that Yoda’s grammar in the original trilogy is nowhere near as convoluted and perpetually backward as it is in the prequels. I am admittedly biased toward the originals, but Empire‘s Yoda is always my standard.
Looking forward to your review of Jedi now! I personally don’t think you’ll find as much good, but there is much good, and of course your mileage may vary!
Love the post! Although I’m still trying to figure out how someone 36 gets to the prequels without ever having seen the originals…
(I’m 33, and I’m sure I saw them several times without ever being a fanboy. The prequels on the other hand? I watched the first one and still haven’t gotten around to watching the other two. It was that meh.)
Yoda was the first master of ALL the younglings. My understanding is he was the primary instructor until they were “padawaned” off to other Knights.
No, the younglings aren’t in “Jedi Heaven, or wherever Obi-wan is coming from”
Yoda tells Obi-wan in Ep III that Qui-Gon had discovered how to defeat death in that way. He taught Yoda, and Yoda taught Ben. The other younglings had died already.
Of course, that leaves a hole at the end of VI that I can’t talk about until you watch it.
Be warned that the latest edit to Return of the Jedi has added a hammy NOOOOOO that utterly ruins (or at least really stains) an otherwise great scene. You’ll know it when you see it – it’s not supposed to be there.
: ) : ) : )
Glad you liked the movie. I’d been waiting for this review.
There were several moments of dialogue, like the ones you mention, that the prequels didn’t bother to stick to. As much as I am one of those rare individuals who can enjoy the prequels, I wish they had stuck to those things better.
Not gonna lie, I cheered when I saw that this movie left you stunned. This is by far the best Star Wars movie and that would have been heart breaking. It’s so fun to see it through new eyes, thanks for doing this!
The Han and Leia romance hits so much harder than the Anakin and Padme romance for so many reasons…better chemistry, better character development, better dialogue….but this was the first on-screen romance I shipped and it influenced my love of bickering couples so much that a “forbidden love” was bound to fall flatter with me regardless of how well it was done.
I started rewatching the prequels yesterday and it hit me what a travesty Obi-Wan’s character in Phantom is. That’s the one movie where he is a Padawan and still in training…that’s where we should have seen him being hot-headed and reckless and there’s not a bit of that. If anything, Obi-Wan is frequently the voice of reason and Qui-Gon is the reckless one. We should have been treated to so much more Obi-Wan, not just because it makes more sense with this conversation in the originals but because his bond with Anakin is all important to the prequel arc and they barely say two words to each other the whole film.
This is fun to read. I never thought I’d see someone who hadn’t experienced the glory of Empire. Unlike the first four films, Empire was a serious collaboration. Lucas had Leigh Brackett write the original script from his treatment, then Lawrence Kasdan rewrote it, and Irvin Kershner directed. I think that’s what made it so good–Lucas built the monomyth but he let others build a good movie on top of it.
In an alternate universe, Lucas did the same thing with the prequels, using a script by Joss Whedon and direction from Ridley Scott or Michael Mann or someone along those lines, and in that alternate universe, they’re great. Sigh…
C3PO is the Jar Jar of the original trilogy. The only reason he isn’t hated more is we first met him in movies that weren’t terrible.
Yeah, this is the best one. I just posted in the ANH thread about how the original trilogy wasn’t well-regarded by critics at the time, how it was never really meant to be more than entertaining popcorn movies — but this is a really good entertaining popcorn movie, the one that brought substance and nuance and darkness to the story beyond what the original film achieved. Leigh Brackett and Lawrence Kasdan deserve great credit for adding richer characterization and meaning to Lucas’s sword-and-planet fantasy homage. And I continue to be amazed that SW fandom is mostly whining about J.J. Abrams rather than getting excited that Kasdan has come back to the series. (@9/Spencer Ellsworth: When the prequels were being made, I kept hoping Lucas would get Kasdan to write or direct them, or maybe Frank Darabont from The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles. I was so glad when I found out that Episode VII would be made with Kasdan’s involvement and without Lucas’s.)
When I first saw it as a kid in 1980, I’m not sure I really appreciated all that, though. The main thing I remember about my reaction after walking out of the theater was being convinced that Darth Vader was lying about being Luke’s father. I didn’t believe it was true until ROTJ confirmed it three years later. So for me, the lack of confirmation undermined the impact of the revelation. After all, bad guys lie, right? Vader didn’t offer any proof beyond “Search your feelings, you know it to be true,” which doesn’t mean a thing. So this is the sort of thing that is perhaps more potent on a rewatch where you know he’s telling the truth, or on a binge watch where you see the payoff in ROTJ shortly after seeing this one.
Also, I was 11 or 12 at the time, so I probably didn’t have much patience for the mushy stuff with Han and Leia.
Great to hear insight from someone who’s seeing this masterpiece for the first time. Before watching “Jedi,” however, do yourself a favor and track down an original theatrical release version. I have the DVDs with both the original releases and Lucas’ revisionist history remakes, and the originals are the only ones I’ll watch – superior by far!
Hating the prequels is juvenile. They had a hard job of setting up everything that happens in the original trilogy. I personally found them entertaining and very worthy of the name Star Wars.
Reading this is bringing tear pricks to my eyes! I’m so excited for you. I was bouncing in my chair!
I first saw this movie in 1997 (special editions) towards the end of April (at our little one screen cheap theater that got late run movies). Like I said, the first one really surprised me with its depth, so I was definitely game to see the sequel. I was even a little more interested because the preview seemed to show that there was a temptation aspect and so I was looking forward to a more character driven story. Wouldn’t you know it that the SAME DAY I went to see the movie, my friends and I were joking around before school and one of them mentioned the ‘I am your father’ scene – I had gotten all through my 14 years of life without even knowing this! I still wish I’d had a chance to really be shocked properly by it.
But it didn’t matter. I remember sitting in that theater and waiting for the movie to start. The preview for Return of the Jedi showed first, and it showed Luke all in black by Vader’s side – which made me wonder what happened!
Stunned is a good word to use. Because I still remember sitting in that theater, on the edge of my seat, during the last few scenes in the medical frigate. There was no way the movie could be ending NOW. There was a brief swell of music, and for a moment I thought they were going to be transitioning to the next scene – but then ‘Directed by Irvin Kershner’ flashed on the screen I just stared, unwilling to believe the movie was actually over. I went home and raved about it in my journal. And I just could not stop thinking about it. That was the point I became truly obsessed. I’m no longer as obsessed as I was as a teenager – but at the time the movies filled a kind of void I had (plus as a teenager I was just more obsessive in general, and had more time/energy to devote to such things – actually, in writign this comment I’m finding I can remember some echoes of that fervor I used to feel back then) and from that moment I sought out as much Star Wars as I could find.
I remember feeling bitterly dissapointed that my parents couldn’t take me to see the movie a second time…I remember writing in a journal that it was almost as if the characters were friends I couldn’t see (and yes, even at that time I knew what a bizarre thing to feel that was). Thankfully that summer I was able to get my hands on a VHS tape (they had been mostly discontinued to prepare for the eventual marketing of the SE tapes) and I watched it pretty much every single day and analyzed it to death. The first day I bought it I watched it 3 times, lol. And yeah, I shipped Han and Leia HARD. I used to watch it and keep a list of every little ‘moment’ they had that hinted at their romance. (I also completely fell in love with Luke Skywalker, but that’s another story, haha). So as a result, of all the Star Wars movies, I’m probably the most ‘attached’ to this one, and feel like I know it the best. (Revenge of the Sith is probably the next ‘attached’ for various reasons relating to my life at the time it came out).
We got Return of the Jedi a few weeks later, and I will say that at the time, I liked it better (the ending was really, really powerful to me), but within a few years I had decided Empire was the better movie. There are some cheesy elements to RotJ you may not like – some people claim it’s as bad as the prequels but I don’t think that (and I like the prequels). I think it’s a solid movie.
There’s a huge amount of expanded universe material that covers all of these questions, although a lot of it is no longer ‘true canon’ anymore. That summer I consumed it obsessively though…anything to stay ‘connected’ to these characters :) I remember this feeling of joy upon stumbling upon the EU shelf at our local bookstore (after seeing RotJ) – there was MORE!
Oh, and Lando! My husband loves Lando :) I think he gets the short end of the stick quite a bit! I wish he were going to be in the new movies! We were very excited when Hallmark eventually released a Lando ornament though. But at least Billy Dee Williams has gotten to reprise the role in the LEGO Movie and various Robot Chicken skits :)
As mentioned by other readers, it is wonderful to see a review from someone with a fresh take on the movies and to see the quality of the original films verified in this post-prequel age. Personally, I prefer to introduce people to the original trilogy, and I will likely show my kids the original movies when they are old enough before they discover that the prequels even exist.
I did have one comment regarding the “muppety” nature of Yoda. I totally understand where you’re coming from by making this statement, so I don’t mean to correct this viewpoint like some diehard, geeky fanboy. I was simply surprised that the presence of a puppet and practical effects in an early eighties movie came as a surprise to you.
The puppet Yoda represents an amazing era of practical effects that has given way to our age of digital overlay. Comparing my experience of the original trilogy with the prequels, the original trilogy’s practical effects always possessed a stronger sense of “reality” for me. Even in the moments when you could tell that Frank Oz was manipulating Yoda and you could “see the strings,” so to speak, hanging from the rest of the movie’s effects, the texture of a real object seemed to succeed more frequently in suspending my disbelief than any green-screen Yoda (I love your simile with the tennis ball, by the way).
I hope you enjoy “Return of the Jedi” as a newcomer to the trilogy, because it does serve as a satisfactory conclusion to the story and I’ve always felt that it is the one movie of the bunch to fully exhibit the strangeness of this fictional universe. We could have done without some of the Special Edition additions, but I hope they don’t detract from your enjoyment of the film.
My wife hadn’t watched Star Wars until last year. She’s 35 now.
We watched nomachette order (IV-V-I-II-III-VI), and when Vader said he was Luke’s father, she turned to me and asked “Is that true? He’s lying, right?”. Interesting reaction.
@14/Lisamarie: Billy Dee Williams has also reprised Lando canonically in Star Wars Rebels.
I am of the opinion that when Han arrived in Cloud City, Lando’s greeting was meant as a subtle warning.
He seems like a grey character, but he did have a metaphorical gun to his head for the entire movie.
Kershner and Ford came up with the “I know” line. In the script Han replied with the lame “I love you too.” Of course Lucas was initially against the change. Typical.
http://www.starwars.com/news/interviewing-kershner-a-conversation-with-the-director-of-the-empire-strikes-back
@17 -awesome :) I haven’t watched Rebels yet. Well, glad somebody hasn’t forgotten him! I’m still holding out hope he shows up in one of the new movies.
I think I spoiled the big reveal for myself by reading the novelization before seeing the movie; but I also remember spending a fair amount of time afterwards trying to convince myself that Vader was lying.
@13 It’s not juvenile to hate movies (and all art/entertainment in general). It might be juvenile to go on message boards and rage at people who like/dislike it and call them names, though. People can like all sorts of things, and maybe some people are capable of turning off their brains and enjoying the prequels as “popcorn movies” but some of us just can’t. And considering that they are objectively bad movies (in regards to dialogue, plot, and production value) then I don’t see how disliking them can in any way be considered “juvenile”.
Anyhow, I will echo the chorus that it’s fun to see the fresh take. However I am not sure if your questions surrounding continuity are sarcastic or not. Clearly they ret-conned some things when making the prequels — Ben’s master being Qui-Gon, for one, midichlorians for another, and basically all personality being stripped from every character– these things were all changed in the prequels and is part of what makes the fandom of the originals hate them so much. Sure, there are people out there who rationalize some bits (like saying Yoda was his “first” master and then Qui-Gon) but in general you can just chalk it up to Lucas scrapping/ignoring previously set in place canon.
And that’s not entirely a bad thing, I understand that if you’re working on something a decade later then certain pieces might not fit in your new vision. But I think what irks me most about a lot of these changes is that they weren’t necessary and in fact even made the prequels worse. Like changing Yoda’s personality from impish but also worldly teacher into a overly-serious backwards talker and also a tiny rubber banding lightsaberist. Basically Yoda got Flanderized in all the wrong ways, and I was incredibly disappointed that he fought like a cricket instead of just using his mind/The Force which seems more appropriate from what we know of him in Empire (“Wars not make one great”).
Anyhow, I don’t bother trying to rationalize the changes because it’s not really important. The continuity is kind of there, if you squint and don’t think too hard. And generally that’s the mindset you have to be in to even watch the prequels in the first place.
@Lisamarie:
How’s this for a description: Return of the Jedi is my favorite, but I acknowledge that Empire is a superior film. That’s how I feel about it, anyway.
@22:
Of course, there are legitimate reasons some of those complaints were retconned. The need to have Obi-wan and Anakin have a fraternal relationship instead of a paternal one led to the creation of Qui-Gon Jinn. After all, Gollum had not yet happened, and Yoda was still mostly a puppet in Ep I. Given those requirements, the need to retcon Obi-wan’s master is perfectly understandable.
And the retcon IS a solid one. The fact that younglings aren’t immediately assigned to an individual master also makes perfect sense–Not every Knight is ready to be a master, there are a limited number to begin with, and you are not going to take a child in to almost any situation Jedi find themselves in. So it makes sense that they are trained in groups by Masters who mostly stay in the temple (like Yoda) until they are ready to move from youngling to Padawan. And the younglings would certainly refer to these group masters as masters. That’s their actual title, after all.
That’s not a “rationalization”. That’s the actual intent of the creators. Was it a retcon? Certainly. But it was a well-thought out one. It wasn’t just a continuity error that they ignored. And its not fans making it up. Its obvious what the intention was from the context of the movies.
@16 Ryamano
Technically what you describe is The Ernst Rister Order, which puts I, II and III between V and VI. The Machete Order skips I all together.
@23. Exactly how i would put it too. There is no doubting Empire is a great movie, but I still love Jedi in a way that Empire can never hope to match.
When my nephew saw Empire for the first time, he was convinced that Vader was lying as well (He was 7 at the time. My brother videotaped “the moment”) But my nephew thought about it and determined that Vader had lost a child and wanted Luke to be his son, replacing the one he lost. Terribly clever for a 7 year old. Of course when Yoda revealed it in the next movie- then he bought it. Yoda wouldn’t steer him wrong.
@23 – hah, yeah, I could go with that :) Although depending on my mood the one I like the most can change.
@22 – I actually think (perhaps partially inspired by the novelization) that Yoda’s personality change makes some sense. He’s been brought down/humbled and perhaps has realized the way the Jedi’s haughtiness/complacency allowed evil to temporarily win. The Jedi ended up sucked into a war they never should have been a part of.
Bill @15: I’m pretty sure that the OP was referring to Yoda’s personality as “muppety”, not the fact that he’s, well, an actual Muppet in ESB. Like naupathia @22 says, in ESB he’s impish with an obvious sense of humor (even if it’s just an act to test Luke).
And regarding the rationalization of the “retcon” of Qui-Gon, I’m with Anthony Pero @24 that it’s a good one. After all, IIRC there’s a scene in AotC where Obi Wan interrupts a class being taught by Yoda. That’s how I’d imagine this being done; you’d have a basic level of instruction before being assigned to a particular Master.
Ava, if you want to see some of the missing bits between Anakin and Obi Wan, I HIGHLY recommend the Clone Wars cartoon. Yes, it’s a cartoon, but the cartoon Ani is so much better than the live action one, and you get to see a lot of the stuff that they only hint at in the originals (or do badly in the prequels).
And, me? I actually saw this at a drive-in theater, double feature – Empire Strikes Back and Flash. Good times….very good times…
Yoda’s sense of humor is interesting. He DOES joke around a bit in the prequels, usually in the form of sarcastic remarks (“Lost a planet, Master Obi-Wan has! How embarrassing…How embarrassing.” *laughing from the kids*). The difference in Empire Strikes Back comes from a few things: First, in AoC and RoS, there isn’t a lot of humor in the world with the politics and the war, which Yoda is in command of, so the responsibility forces him to be subdued. Also, by Empire, Yoda had been alone on Dagobah for 20+ years. That will do things to even a Jedi Master’s grip on sanity.
“I wonder if the prequels could just have been condensed down into one movie.”
Yes. The prequels could have been shrunk half a movie focusing on why Anakin was sullen and what turned him into Darth Vader. Three movies were just wasting time to get to this point. Lucas should have released episodes 3, 2, and 1 in that order. And handed the script supervision to someone else. I’m not as big a fan of this movie as most people. Although I thought most of the conversations between Yoda and Luke had heart, various settings of Ice, Jungle, and Sky planets were interesting, I also thought the “I am your father” reveal did real damage to the original movie. Not as much as Episode 6 and certainly not as much as the prequels, but I prefer to watch the first (in its original form) and pretend the only sequel was the book “Splinter of the Mind’s Eye”.
@31/Kefka – Also, by Empire, Yoda had been alone on Dagobah for 20+ years. That will do things to even a Jedi Master’s grip on sanity. I was always under the impression that Yoda was putting on an act as a kind of test of Luke (we learn in the prequels, after all, that the Jedi are big on testing). I think lines like “Wars not make one great” show that Yoda’s sanity is perfectly intact, let alone the fact that, once he feels he’s learned enough, he drops the act and starts talking to Ben as his “real self.” (The more pressing question is why Artoo, whose memory has supposedly not been wiped since the prequels – has it? – doesn’t start bleeping and blurting to Luke, “Hey, hey, cool it, Master, this is Yoda!”)
Re: the retconning of Obi-Wan’s training (@24, @29) – I guess it makes sense that we don’t see a really reckless Obi-Wan in Ep I because Yoda’s already trained it out of him, along with the rest of his “entering class” of younglings. I highly doubt it was the filmmakers’ intentions all along since 1977, though. There is plenty of documentary evidence that Lucas made up a lot if not most of this as he went along (read, e.g., The Secret History of Star Wars by Michael Kaminski). That the six movies work together as well as they do is not nothing, even if some of the seams really do show.
@33:
If it was planned from the beginning, then it wouldn’t be a retcon. As far as retcons go, its a pretty good one. There are definitely seams, though, as you say.
@29/bad_platypus: Technically, Yoda was more a Creature than a Muppet. By Henson definitions, Muppets are stylized, caricatured creations of felt and foam, while Creatures are more elaborate, lifelike puppet/animatronic creations.
Also, Yoda wasn’t a creation of Henson’s Creature Shop. There was some creative input from Henson and technical assistance by his people, and Yoda was performed by Muppet performers Frank Oz and Kathryn Mullen, but the puppet was built by Stuart Freeborn at ILM.
Count me in the camp that Yoda’s personality in ESB is a front. He drops it quickly enough once Luke figures out who he is. To me, that’s who he is when he’s not training someone. A thoughtful, serious person. He acted like a mad little imp in order to annoy Luke and test him. Luke failed the test. I don’t see a discrepancy between Prequel Yoda and Original Yoda. If our original introduction to Yoda wasn’t a front put on to test Luke, if he always acted that crazy, he would never have risen to Grand Master of the Jedi Order.
I have to ask, how old is Obi One in the first prequel? Because even if he’s around 30 at the end of Ep 3 only 20 years pass before Luke finds him and suddenly he’s looks older than 75. Is his species short lived? He should only be around 50 at best in A New Hope and not look so frail.
The only episode of TCW I’ve seen in full, was an episode that focused on Yoda. And I loved it, because it showed while his silliness in ESB was an act, it wasn’t AS MUCH an act as we think.
If you want to see the original Vader and not Christenson, you’d better find a VHS. I am not sure if the first DVD was already “improved”.
CLB @11- I hoped Vader was lying, too!
ihatefanboys @13- The prequels were polished turds. The original trilogy doesn’t need to be set up.
@37:
Alec Guinness was 60 when production on Star Wars started. Men were not as, erm, well preserved back then as they are today. (Thanks, HGH!)
So, lets say he’s 60 at the beginning of A New Hope. That means he was 42 at the end of Revenge of the Sith, 38 at the end of Attack of the Clones, and 28 at the end of The Phantom Menace. But I could see that flexing 5 years in either direction. So, he could be as young as 23 when he was promoted from Padawan to Knight. He’s 15-20 years older than Anakin.
@39:
The first DVD releases were in 2004. Hayden Christiansen is the Force Ghost of Anakin in them. There was a Laserdisc and VHS re-release in 1993. The changes to those was minor, but there have been changes in EVERY single re-release of the movies since 1981. Most of the changes are for the better.
I don’t know why the Anakin force-ghost change upsets people so much. Is it just that they hate Christiansen?
It’s kind of an FU to Sebastian Shaw, I guess (to say nothing of Jeremy Bulloch and Clive Revill/old monkey lady who also get erased). Plus it’s just kind of nonsensical – I get the idea is that ‘young Anakin’ is when he was ‘last’ a Jedi and that’s when Anakin truly died. But you could also argue that by killing the Emperor Anakin lived again and was an old man.
But whatever, of all the changes it’s not the most offensive to me and who knows, maybe Jedi can control how they appear and that’s how he wanted to appear. (Also I thought RotS Anakin was super hot, lol. Although I still can understand why it’s a jarring change. Personally, I miss the Ewok song more!)
(And yes, I know that Shaw did at least get some other scenes and I think Jeremy Bulloch has an uncredited cameo in Cloud City as the guy grabbing Leia when she yells it’s a trap).
@42, I always saw their Force projection as how those people viewed themselves. And Anakin would more likely remember himself looking like that, than as Older Anakin whose face he never saw in a mirror
Yeah, Obi Wan has spent 17 years alone, brooding and mourning on the loss of nearly everyone he holds dear and every value system he’s ever sworn to uphold, that’ll prematurely age anyone. Throw in two suns, when even one sun will turn someone to jerky, in the wilderness of Tatooine and it is no wonder he is looking older than dirt.
@41/Anthony Pero: Well, I don’t have strong feelings about the change (although Christensen was really, really bad in the role), but it does seem odd that Anakin would manifest as his decades-younger self when Obi-Wan and Yoda manifest the way they looked at the time of their deaths. Besides, it feels like a change made just for the sake of change rather than something that really improves the scene. It even works against the scene. The scene is Luke seeing the Force ghosts of Obi-Wan, Yoda, and Anakin and recognizing that they’re together now. But has Luke ever seen the face of the young Anakin? Would he even recognize it? Sebastian Shaw’s face has meaning to Luke, and to the viewer, within the context of ROTJ itself, because he and we have both seen it recently. Hayden Christensen’s face is an intrusion from a different set of movies, a continuity nod that doesn’t contribute anything within the context of the scene and story it inhabits. I feel that anything in a story should serve that story’s needs first and any other story’s needs second.
@46: It would seem to me that since they are manifesting, they are in control of the projection, whether unconsciously or not. Anakin has no idea what he would look like as an older man. He’s never seen himself in a mirror. As far as context… I’ve seen Jedi, what, a hundred times at least? One can infer that its the same actor, but with the egg head, the scars, the pallor… I’d have been hard pressed to pick the force ghost out of a line up as the man in the suit. They look radically different, and you don’t get much time to look at either.
Besides which, the context that matters is the context of viewers. Everyone under 20 (and everyone who will follow after, a number far greater than what came before) will recognize immediately who that dude is. Can the same be said of an older Sebastian Shaw? For that group of people, there is probably a larger cognitive dissonance involved. “Who is that dude? OH! Its VADER, he’s a force ghost now!” as opposed to immediately recognizing Anakin, because you just watched the Prequels last week.
The musical changes bother me far, far more. The extra scenes bother me a little bit more, although I like SOME of them. The cleaned up CGI space battles don’t bother me in the slightest. I have pre- Special Edition VHS tapes. The battle sequences are horrendous and the whole movie doesn’t stand up because of them. Much better now, when watched with the prequels, which I think are hideous as movies.
And this is the crux of the matter. When I talk to my kids about Star Wars, the story is the story of Anakin Skywalker’s fall to the dark side and subsequent redemption. That’s the story. Jedi is the sixth part of that story to them. Is it a retcon on Lucas’ part? Sure. But that’s how the current generation, and subsequent generations, will see Ep I-VI. If it was not his intention when filming Jedi, it most certainly was his intention while filming The Phantom Menace. With that in mind, it does serve the story’s needs, because these are not separate stories.
@47/Anthony Pero: “Besides which, the context that matters is the context of viewers.”
Yes, but “viewers” are not a monolithic mass. It’s a basic principle of series writing that any installment may be a reader’s or viewer’s first, and so you should try to make it work well on its own terms instead of just assuming that everyone in the audience has the same prior knowledge. That’s a universal rule of good storytelling, and it absolutely applies here as well. After all, not everyone is going to watch the series in numerical order or Machete order or whatever. Some will just watch the original trilogy because they were told to skip the prequels. Some will watch the movies in release order because that seems more natural to them. Some will just happen across this particular movie on TV or on DVD at the library and check it out from curiosity. So it’s unwise to assume that everyone seeing this movie for the first time will have already seen the prequels. It may be your view that the series should be treated as a single 6-part story about Anakin Skywalker, but you’re a fan who only needs to think about your own individual experience or that of your family. The creators of a story need to consider all the possible ways it may be approached or interpreted.
“I have pre- Special Edition VHS tapes. The battle sequences are horrendous and the whole movie doesn’t stand up because of them.”
You’re probably referring to the visible “garbage mattes,” the rectangular outlines that surround the ships in the space scenes. The problem is that, while those looked fine on the big screen in theaters, the video conversion process exaggerated the contrast and made the near-invisible garbage mattes stand out blatantly. This is often the problem with watching movies on TV/video when they were meant for the motion picture screen. What may have worked fine in the original, intended medium will often lose something in the translation to video. (For instance, the video conversion process for Star Trek: The Motion Picture and other movies of the era tended to wash out the colors, leading to the perception that the movies were drab and colorless when they actually weren’t.)
I saw the original trilogy on the big screen, and the battle sequences looked fantastic at the time. All the Star Wars films, and everything ILM did back then, were on the absolute cutting edge of visual effects, pushing the state of the art forward with every new film. Their effects may not have been perfect, but there was nothing else out there at the time that did any better, and very little that reached the same level.
It sounds like then, Lucas is going for the context of the viewers that are watching the prequels in order. I can see a nice kind of emotional/visual circular symbolism in seeing ‘good’ Anakin show up again. Although thematically I’d say it does make more sense that it is the Anakin that represents the sum total of all of his experiences that really shows up (instead of reverting back, which ironically, perhaps shows that he can’t let go after all…). So I can go either way with it.
So much of the commentary, both in the article itself and in the responses, cries out for this advice:
Wait until you’ve finished RotJ. Then, watch the How it Should Have Ended sketches for each of the Star Wars films, followed by all the Robot Chicken Star Wars sketches. So many things get super funny, and often surprisingly insightful, treatment.
Regarding your desire for a 1.5 between New Hope and Empire – there are two great novels you should look at reading. “Razor’s Edge” by Martha Wells and “Honor Among Thieves” by James Corey. They are stories of Leia being a diplomat and leader for the rebellion and Han trying to work for the rebellion but running into bounty hunters. Luke is in the books around the edges in both, but the books are mostly about Han and Leia and they are wonderful.
There is also Timothy Zahn’s “Scoundrels” which is a Han, Chewie, and Lando story that takes place in the same time frame – but I haven’t read it yet so I can’t offer advice there.
@24 and subsequent discussions of retcons. (For perspective, I was about 8 when ESB was released.) The seams show badly between the two trilogies precisely because of the “we’ll make it fit” mentality of George Lucas. It was pretty clear (to this viewer) that the Jedi Knights had not been a large—somewhat bureaucratic—Order, based on Obi-wan’s descriptions and conversations with Yoda in the original trilogy. More like individual knights taking apprentices (no talk of youngling padawans at the time). Hewing to this “built world,” there would have been no need for Qui-Gon Jinn, because Kenobi would have been a full Knight out on his own when he met an already accomplished pilot named Anakin Skywalker; perhaps a veteran of a few battles in the (multiple) Clone Wars (against a conquering Empire?), but certainly at least as old as Luke in the first movie. Jedi (and other Force sensitives) were such a rarity that even only twenty years after their supposed extinction, a well-traveled smuggler hadn’t even really heard of the Force, and Imperial Officers were only aware of one practitioner of their religion. Of course, this leads into Anakin’s eventual fall, his training was not complete (like Luke), and Obi-wan was not equal to the task of training him, as he himself admitted.
Somehow in the intervening 16 years, Lucas’ concept of the Jedi morphed into a large organization that systematically convinced parents to give up their children to be raised by monks a planet far, far away. And where a 10-year-old was “too old” to begin the training. (Ignoring the fact that leaving him to his own devices was infinitely more dangerous.) Much better, I think, to have kept Jedi both extremely rare and their training more of a “hermit on the mountain” affair. Of course, my head canon prior to the prequels resembles more more closely the practice of the Sith and their Rule of Two.
Anyway, like you, Anthony, as well as Lisamarie, I can look at ESB and see that it technically the superior movie, but ROTJ will always be my personal favorite. I still vividly remember going to see it (when I was about 11) in a way I do not remember the other two movies.
[Edited to fix a little grammar.]
@52/rowanblaze: I don’t think Han hadn’t heard of the Force, just that he didn’t believe in it. Which doesn’t necessarily mean that Jedi were all that rare or obscure. After all, there are people who don’t believe in the Moon landings. Some people just don’t have the imagination to believe in the extraordinary, even when it’s extremely public.
@13 Count me in the adult camp that never liked the prequels. Not only was the acting from much of the cast wooden and subpar, the films seem so bland it seems that they wanted tweens as the main target audience. This was a foolish decision; the core audience of Star Wars by that point was in their 30s. My brother was born in 1969, and was raised with the originals, and when he saw the prequels, felt they had not targeted his demographic.
There an old saying: when you try to appeal to everybody, you end up appealing to nobody. There’s a lot of truth to this statement. Most people I encounter on a day-to-day basis do not think highly of the prequels.
Fortunately, it seems like the sequels will be much more edgy and adult-oriented.
@54/RMS81: It is not at all a foolish decision to aim for a new, young audience rather than the core audience. Indeed, that’s the whole point of doing a new continuation of a franchise: To attract a new audience to replace the old fans who’ve aged out or moved on. You can never succeed by appealing strictly to the people who are already fans, because there just aren’t going to be enough of them. You have to draw in new people who aren’t fans already, casual viewers and first-timers, and hope that enough of them will stick around to keep the fandom viable into the next generation.
It’s also a common mistake of laypeople to assume that a work of fiction is supposed to be targeted at a single audience. That makes no sense. There are a lot of different types of viewers out there. If you want to succeed, the best bet is to make your work appeal to multiple audiences at once. A successful continuation is one that satisfies the core fanbase and turns novice audiences into new fans. Those aren’t mutually hostile goals; they’re parts of a single strategy.
The prequels weren’t bad because they targeted a new audience, they were bad because they didn’t have a new writer or director. Because Lucas had spent so many years existing in a bubble of success where he could do whatever he wanted and nobody dared to contradict him that he’d lost all ability to tell good ideas from bad. And so he made the prequels as a vanity project which turned out as badly as most celebrity vanity projects do.
Also, Star Wars is not supposed to be “edgy and adult-oriented.” It boggles my mind when people say that. It’s supposed to be for children and for the young at heart. It’s a celebration of cinematic innocence, of the Saturday matinee adventure serials that Lucas liked as a boy. It’s a broad story of black-hat evil and white-hat good, where bad guys can be killed without moral qualms because they’re faceless and interchangeable. It’s a franchise that has always been driven almost as heavily by its toys and other children’s merchandise as by the movies themselves. It’s unapologetic popcorn fare, and I’m so sick of the self-importance of Star Wars fans who try to pretend it’s some elevated, complex, dark, adults-only story. No. That’s Blade Runner. That’s Solaris. That’s Ex Machina. Star Wars is space wizards and laser swords and explosions and cartoonishly evil bad guys and sentient teddy bears. It is meant to be welcoming to children, and to adults who aren’t afraid to be childish. And there is nothing wrong with that.
“Also, Star Wars is not supposed to be “edgy and adult-oriented.” – THANK. YOU.
I also want to add that ‘edgy/adult oriented’ are not the only ways to be good/profound/complex, etc.
As for “hotheaded young Obi-Wan,” there was an EU kids’ book series that IIRC did a decent job of portraying the character when he was a padawan (though of course it’s not canon any longer). I think it was called “Jedi Apprentice.” Followed teenaged Obi-Wan during his apprenticeship to Qui-Gon and was written for sort of a middle-reader audience.
I keep hearing the “C3PO was so annoying” and then folks comparing him to that horrible Disney-knockoff stupid sidekick Jar Jar, and it really, really pains me.
C3PO and R2D2 were fulfilling the sorts of roles Eric Blore, Helen Broderick, and Edward Everett Horton played as friends, maids, aunts, and butlers in black and white movies like Top Hat and Swing Time (Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers flicks), and the coworkers in Desk Set (Hepburn and Tracy, and it’s streaming now, actually).
They were there for comic relief, yes, to take the strain out of situations, and give you a laugh – but they also fulfilled another important function (believe me, humor is incredibly important in stories) – they, by not being the main characters, could come in and out of scenes, and add in knowledge and history and timing that the main characters wouldn’t, and sometimes couldn’t, know. The had more freedom of movement, too, which allowed them to push a plot point ahead for the main characters, for the story, without having to come up with some really awkward device to do so – the same thing with imparting knowledge the main characters would never have known.
And they could do so in a way the heavies of the secondary characters, like Obi Wan Kenobi, couldn’t, since his was such a serious character. For the most part, anyway – that man could act, and that included the difficulties of doing comedy, since comedy is harder to do.
Go back, watch a few older movies, look at how the characters function, in relation to each other, in relation to telling the story, and in moving the plot along, then re-watch those two droids and see if that doesn’t give you a thrill, seeing them fulfill such a traditional role in storytelling so well.
Then you’ll see why my reaction to Jar Jar is to want to kick him down a well, lol.
Per your confusion points on the continuity issues between these films and the prequels, this is the reason true Star Wars fans hated them…aside from their being horrible movies in the first place. It’s best to do as we do and pretend they never existed in the first place. As your bullet points and questions made clear, they only hurt the experience of watching the originals. Lucas had one major ball drop after another. I understand that you’re coming from only having viewed the prequels and trying to see how they fit with the storyline/experience of the originals. Waste of time because they don’t. If comparisons need to be made, make them as between completely separate trilogies of films. Myself, personally, am still waiting for the prequels that the originals deserve (Ben training with Yoda and being reckless, Anakin being as complex and interesting a character as Darth Vader…etc, etc.).
PS – 36 and you never saw these films!!! I’m 37 and can’t remember a time in my childhood without a Star Wars connection somewhere. I could understand if you were in your teens or 20’s and had to be introduced via the prequels. Shame! ;)
@59/jmzervoulei: I didn’t like the prequels any more than you do, but please don’t use that obnoxious and egocentric rhetorical device of claiming that “true fans” are only the ones who agree with you. True fans are diverse in their tastes and opinions, and what makes their fandom true is that their feelings are sincere and personal. That means they can be true fans even if they love the things you hate.
Actually, I have never described myself as a Star Wars fan, just a casual observer of it. This is for the reasons I listed. I’ve never thought it intended to make any elevated, complex statements, and that’s one of its main issues I have with it. I watched the original Total Recall when I was 10 and loved it, so by comparison, Star Wars felt juvenile. I think if the sequels were more adult-oriented they could still be appreciated by kids.
At 58: Actually C3P0 & R2D2 are a direct transplant from Kurosawa’s “The Hidden Fortress”. Lucas has commented that that movie was his inspiration for the original Star Wars. :-)