Why is it About Star Wars That Makes People So Passionate About It?

[MithrandirOlorin]

I am willing to bet eventually in the next 100 years, Star Wars will be remade.

You make that sound as if it's a good thing...

The best place for it to be would be to remain as what it was, three films from 1977 to 1983 unaltered with flaws and all.

That is where the magic is.

Not saying it would be a good thing. Just saying it will be remade. Probably after Lucas dies. It is what it is. Hollywood likes to remake things.

If I rebooted the OT there would only need to be one Death Star, prematurely destroying the first causes many of the OT's flaws.

[McAvoy]

I am willing to bet eventually in the next 100 years, Star Wars will be remade.

You make that sound as if it's a good thing...

The best place for it to be would be to remain as what it was, three films from 1977 to 1983 unaltered with flaws and all.

That is where the magic is.

Not saying it would be a good thing. Just saying it will be remade. Probably after Lucas dies. It is what it is. Hollywood likes to remake things.

If I rebooted the OT there would only need to be one Death Star, prematurely destroying the first causes many of the OT's flaws.

It wouldn't surprise me if the trilogy would end with the Death Star itself in a merging of New Hope and Return of the Jedi type of ending. That the first movie would be entirely set on Tatooine trying to get off.

Or it would be just a carbon copy but made in hologram form.

[Beastro]

Nostalgia makes the Heart grown fond and the eyes blind.

The issue is the scope and what is being focused on.

Ask yourself what the originals focused on and then what the Prequels later did. I do know at the time much of the annoyance at Lucas and satire mocking the films was about how they turned exciting, fantastical Star Wars into a bunch of political dealings that no one asked for nor wanted.

Sooo, would this be a bad time to mention that the original Beauty and the Beast fairy tale was basically just propaganda for Arranged Marriages and it was only in the retelling that it became the classic that we know it as?

The archetype of Beauty and the Beast goes back a lot farther than three centuries, it's just become the primary one people express the archetype through: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Animal_as_Bridegroom

No one can argue that Star Wars will continue to be honed like BatB, but they have arisen in different social contexts. BatB came from a time that allowed it to become transcendent as a fairy tale that can be told many ways but remain the same thing. Star Wars is stuck as "a franchise" beholden to the commercial whims and ownerships of our times. Indeed, it arose out of them as a blockbuster. At least Tolkien's work has the legitimacy around it built up from his efforts to stake out its canon clearly and definitively, but Star Wars lacks that. Indeed, it wasn't even entirely up to Lucas that made Star Wars what it was and he continually missed that point himself.

That is why I say his work will endure and be talked about. All that came after him and his son can be sloughed off as illegitimate (which it already is treated as right off the bat) while Star Wars remains confused as to what is. Is there room for the EU in Disney's world to be adapted to them, or should Disney's crap be sloughed off and the franchise restored to what it was before they took over? If so, should more be taken off such as the Prequels?

[MithrandirOlorin]

Lucas's Sexology is more coherent then Tolkien's writings.

[Winter]

Nostalgia makes the Heart grown fond and the eyes blind.

The issue is the scope and what is being focused on.

Ask yourself what the originals focused on and then what the Prequels later did. I do know at the time much of the annoyance at Lucas and satire mocking the films was about how they turned exciting, fantastical Star Wars into a bunch of political dealings that no one asked for nor wanted.

Times change and those same elements that many hated at the time have gained a large fanbase. And In recent years many have have admitted to liking the political angle of TPT and keep in mind, these same concepts were used in Star Wars before in the highly critical acclaimed story The Thrawn Trilogy to great effect.

You act as if the films are the only media in Star Wars that matters when, as I said at the start of this, Star Wars has had major critical success in almost every media there is. And not in a, "Oh this well liked by fans of the series." No! I mean many stories outside the films are seen as great stories that remain pop-culture icons and are as well known as the films. Everyone knows who Ahsoka, Thrawn, Mara Jade and Revan are because their stories are as well known as TOT is.

Hell, Knights of the Old Republic getting a remake was news worthy as it's still seen as the best Star Wars game and made BioWare a mainstream studio.

My comment about Nostalgia is that people tend to over blow how great things were and would rather just let a story end at a certain point, even though that point in time wasn't the only time the "Magic" happened. Keep in mind that for a time Star Wars was pretty much DEAD as a franchise with hardly anyone talking about it for YEARS after Return of the Jedi. What changed, what got people to Star talking about the series? Three books that were written as a sequel to the original Trilogy that many felt captured the Magic of that Trilogy.

So, ask yourself, what is it about this series that keeps everyone coming back and why it has so many successes outside the films?

Sooo, would this be a bad time to mention that the original Beauty and the Beast fairy tale was basically just propaganda for Arranged Marriages and it was only in the retelling that it became the classic that we know it as?

The archetype of Beauty and the Beast goes back a lot farther than three centuries, it's just become the primary one people express the archetype through: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Animal_as_Bridegroom

No one can argue that Star Wars will continue to be honed like BatB, but they have arisen in different social contexts. BatB came from a time that allowed it to become transcendent as a fairy tale that can be told many ways but remain the same thing. Star Wars is stuck as "a franchise" beholden to the commercial whims and ownerships of our times. Indeed, it arose out of them as a blockbuster. At least Tolkien's work has the legitimacy around it built up from his efforts to stake out its canon clearly and definitively, but Star Wars lacks that. Indeed, it wasn't even entirely up to Lucas that made Star Wars what it was and he continually missed that point himself.

That is why I say his work will endure and be talked about. All that came after him and his son can be sloughed off as illegitimate (which it already is treated as right off the bat) while Star Wars remains confused as to what is. Is there room for the EU in Disney's world to be adapted to them, or should Disney's crap be sloughed off and the franchise restored to what it was before they took over? If so, should more be taken off such as the Prequels?

That's not the point. The story of Beauty and the Beast by the original author, Gabrielle-Suzanne de Villeneuve, was meant as a means to convince anyone reading it that Arranged Marriages were good and that mindset shouldn't be questioned. The story in question is filled with convoluted affair of contrived coincidences and last-minute exposition, in which the Beast and Beauty were revealed to be first cousins, and Beauty is half-fairy (on her mothers' side), and royalty (on her fathers' side).

It wasn't until Jeanne-Marie Leprince de Beaumont reworked the story, got rid of a lot of the dumber elements and condensed the story and made it more about love that gave us the version we know today. Yes, the story of a beautiful woman falling in love with a man whom others see as a monster, is a tale as old as time. BUT the story that many think of as THE Definitive version of that idea had no depth, no real symbolism and no real meaning beyond "Marry the person your parents tell you to".

It again, ties into that point I made, Nostalgia makes the Heart grown fond and the eyes blind.

The version of Beauty and the Beast that most people are familiar with was retooled by another writer to make it apple to a wider audience and in doing so made what many see as one of the best love stories of all time... even if it happens to be more then a bit problematic because the basic premise of the story is "Kidnapper showers hostage with gifts until she likes him." I kid, of course as there is more to the story then that but in the end, it is a simple story like any good story is.

[BridgeConsoleMasher]

I outlined a lot of what's being said in the last thread like this.

Taking a step back from the frame and picture again, what Star Wars does in comparison to Star Trek is simplify the landscape instead of making it complex. It's effective because you believe people are walking around and talking to beasts like it's sesame street. While Star Wars makes it all normalized, even TOS is trying to make the landscape bigger than we imagined, prompting us to learn about what we see.

It's something that's not quite sold as well in the prequel trilogies, and something taken for granted in the sequel trilogy.

[Frustration]

Lucas knows more than anyone else. See the look on his face in that interview where he says he feels like a parent who sold their child into white slavery, then after a pause, finally has it all hit him what he did.

But Lucas did quite a bit to ruin Star Wars before the sale. The re-releases demonstrated that, like some other famous directors known for revolutionizing cinema, he didn't actually understand what made his films great, and his best works were essentially lucky flukes.

The prequels are flash and bombast but demonstrate a complete lack of understanding of the philosophies they reference, as well as not grasping what the mythic arcs of the original films were important. The Palpatine-Yoda fight is perhaps the best example - Yoda is supposed to be a Master, but the fight is flashy moves against flashy movies. Even real-life martial artists espouse the "minimal effort for maximum result" ideal - Yoda should have been making small responses that were exactly enough to avoid the attacks directed at him, while his Sith enemies were expending themselves on powerful attacks that accomplished nothing.

[Beastro]

Lucas's Sexology is more coherent then Tolkien's writings.

In what ways?

The only issue plot wise I've run into with him is his need to plot dump in places to catch the reader up on things he can't explain any other way. The monologue Gandalf has about Saruman's plans after he returns is the worst example and robs Saruman of a chance of being his own character in the novel.

People like to say Jackson robbed Saruman of his place, even Lee said it, but Tolkien didn't offer him any room to work with.

So, ask yourself, what is it about this series that keeps everyone coming back and why it has so many successes outside the films?

I'd say for many a sense of scope and wonder that hasn't been there for quite some time.

Besides that, it's the retreading of the old established settings that are played and replayed over and over like Coyboys and Indians were once long ago and Superheroes still remain. A good amount of people just want lightsabre battles while others want space dogfights.

That's not the point. The story of Beauty and the Beast by the original author, Gabrielle-Suzanne de Villeneuve, was meant as a means to convince anyone reading it that Arranged Marriages were good and that mindset shouldn't be questioned. The story in question is filled with convoluted affair of contrived coincidences and last-minute exposition, in which the Beast and Beauty were revealed to be first cousins, and Beauty is half-fairy (on her mothers' side), and royalty (on her fathers' side).

It wasn't until Jeanne-Marie Leprince de Beaumont reworked the story, got rid of a lot of the dumber elements and condensed the story and made it more about love that gave us the version we know today. Yes, the story of a beautiful woman falling in love with a man whom others see as a monster, is a tale as old as time. BUT the story that many think of as THE Definitive version of that idea had no depth, no real symbolism and no real meaning beyond "Marry the person your parents tell you to".

It again, ties into that point I made, Nostalgia makes the Heart grown fond and the eyes blind.

The version of Beauty and the Beast that most people are familiar with was retooled by another writer to make it apple to a wider audience and in doing so made what many see as one of the best love stories of all time... even if it happens to be more then a bit problematic because the basic premise of the story is "Kidnapper showers hostage with gifts until she likes him." I kid, of course as there is more to the story then that but in the end, it is a simple story like any good story is.

This is getting, at least for me, into the unconscious aspects of writing. From one side it's what goes into a work that isn't consciously intended and from the other it's what resonates with people that can be truer to a work even if the original writer says otherwise. And no, I'm not speaking from the perspective Death of the Author, but that a work isn't just a void from which someone consciously crafts something, they come from something and more than our consciousness in us builds it and resonates with it. This is why a creator will then completely miss the mark on later additions to a work as they are out of touch with the form of that work. Ridley Scott is an excellent example. You watch Prometheus and Covenant and you'd never think he had a hand in the original given what he keeps wanting to make Alien into that has nothing to do with the form of the work.

But Lucas did quite a bit to ruin Star Wars before the sale. The re-releases demonstrated that, like some other famous directors known for revolutionizing cinema, he didn't actually understand what made his films great, and his best works were essentially lucky flukes.

They weren't flukes, they arose from compromise and pressures which restrained his creative output and forced him to allow others greater input. Every time he had greater control he made things worse. We aren't even speaking of the role technology played as well. CGI has allowed for excess that was impossible beforehand that kept spectacle in line.

The worst thing you can do is allow a creator absolute control and the time and money to fiddle with their work. Even Tolkien ran into that as I've described in his aims that would have ruined Galadriel.

[Madner Kami]

Lucas's Sexology is more coherent then Tolkien's writings.

Hexalogy. Sexology is something very different

[Winter]

But Lucas did quite a bit to ruin Star Wars before the sale. The re-releases demonstrated that, like some other famous directors known for revolutionizing cinema, he didn't actually understand what made his films great, and his best works were essentially lucky flukes.

They weren't flukes, they arose from compromise and pressures which restrained his creative output and forced him to allow others greater input. Every time he had greater control he made things worse. We aren't even speaking of the role technology played as well. CGI has allowed for excess that was impossible beforehand that kept spectacle in line.

The worst thing you can do is allow a creator absolute control and the time and money to fiddle with their work. Even Tolkien ran into that as I've described in his aims that would have ruined Galadriel.

This is not the case as stated by Chuck in his look at Lucas and Star Wars. Lucas never intended to be so heavily involved with Star Wars after the first film and in the Prequels he DID try to get people who wouldn't just agree with everything he said because he knew his flaws as a writer. He wanted Spielberg to direct episode 1, he was busy making another film. He wanted someone to come in a fix the scripts with all three episodes but they were also all busy or just not interested.

People created this image of Lucas as a sort of made genius who got out of hand but the truth of the matter is Lucas knows he's not the best writer or director and is best served as more as an ideas man. Keep in mind that everything everyone likes about the Original Trilogy, the Prequel Trilogy, the Clone Wars and even some of more interesting ideas of the Disney Sequel Trilogy came from Lucas. Just as an example, the former Storm Trooper who joins the rebellion, I'm pretty sure that is a Lucas original and most agree that it was a good idea just executed horribly.

Hell, even the Thrawn Trilogy borrowed ideas from Lucas' original plans for the sequel Trilogy (Mara as the mysterious other, Thrawn and C'baoth sharing the role of the Emperor and visiting the heart of the Empire (now the New Republic)) were all ideas by Lucas that Zahn just re-tweaked to better fit the story Zahn had in mind.

And I've mentioned before that TDST could have been great as shown with the She-Ra reboot which shares many of the same ideas but executed Brilliantly. Honestly if TDST was more like She-Ra and the Princesses of Power we would be having a VERY Different conversation right now.