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Star Wars Indoctrination


Metropolis
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Anybody have to do this before? My wife has never seen Star Wars. It wasn't an issue for either of us until that How I Met Your Mother episode where Ted's gf admits to him that she's never seen a Star Wars movie. We tried back then, but we both fell asleep during ANH, and it never came back up.

 

Fast forward 2015, we're going to an 8:00pm show next Thursday, and she does not want to go in not knowing what the hell anything is about. So we're about to start. I originally planned on watching 4,5,6,1,2,3. Partially because there are things in the PT that sloppily rely on a previous knowledge of the OT. I've now decided to watch 1,2,3,4,5,6 because the OT will be fresh in her mind, and that TFA is a direct sequel to the OT.

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Well she liked TPM. Though she says she has a lot of questions for me. I knew that was going to be the case. She knows of the SW universe and its characters, but she's never seen the movies.

 

Funnier moments

 

- Where's RD-D2? Moments after they escape Naboo

 

- What? They're not taking the mom?

- Sam Jackson looks so young.

- I thought Padme was the queen, but I wasn't sure.

 

- He does not like that haircut.

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I have a few preferred ways of watching.

 

The main one is this:

Episode 4... then 5.. then 6.

fini

 

You could watch a handful of the best episodes on TCW, and then the above too.

 

If you have saga OCD and HAVE to watch all six, try this:

Episode 4

Episode 1

Episode 5

Episode 2

Episode 3

Episode 6

 

Finally, I watched an interesting fan edit this last weekend called The Empire Begins. It showed the duel from Episode 1, then Episodes 2 and 3 heavily edited all into one 2.5 hour movie. It almost worked, and for the first time Anakin;s story almost made some sense. But it was still turd polishing at the end of the day-- but the editor tried really hard.

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The one thing I didn't convey to her was that Episode 1 was set 30 prior to Episode 4. She asked me why they kept calling Luke Anakin.

 

I'm kinda anticipating a change of opinion tonight. She thought Jake Lloyd was cute and loved how kind hearted he was. Hayden is going to flush all that down the toilet.

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I have a co-worker who's never seen Star Wars. She asked if she should see any of the movies before watching The Force Awakens with her kids. I said NO, I want you to go in completely fresh (she knows Vader is Luke's father, I think that's about it). I'm basically using her as an experiment. :p

 

When she does watch the originals, though, I told her to watch them in release order. I'm a firm believer on consuming things in release order the first time.

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I'd never push Star Wars on anybody.

 

The originals are kinda cheesy by today's standards, and I'm not sure they could be magical to somebody who didn't grow up with them. The prequels are just straight-up bad.

 

But if somebody said they were interested, I'd show them a copy of the non-SE originals (4-5-6) with the caveat that the FX and pacing (at least in IV and V) might not be up to today's standards. Then, if they liked those, I'd recommend TPM with the caveat that it's not just a movie that is "child friendly," but quite possibly a movie that was written by somebody with the mind of a child. If, after TPM, they still wanted more, I'd cautiously recommend AotC and RotS with the caveat that they'd be wise to lower their intellectual defenses with heavy drink/smoke prior to viewing.

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I'd never push Star Wars on anybody.

 

The originals are kinda cheesy by today's standards, and I'm not sure they could be magical to somebody who didn't grow up with them. The prequels are just straight-up bad.

I agree 100%. Everything that people complain about the PT was there in the OT, just to a much lessor degree and not nearly as bad. At TV Tropes they call the phenomenon "there all along" which means the precursors of something that was eventually gonna suck was there all along. Which makes sense because the same guy behind the PT was behind the OT.

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How I experienced Star Wars way back when, in order:

 

1. read the ESB novelization

2. picked up a couple of random Marvel Star Wars comics; couldn't figure out why a green bunny

3. saw ROTJ twice in theaters

4. saw ANH on VHS sometime after 1990

5. saw ESB several years after that

6. saw all three Special Editions in theaters with JC; spent most of the ROTJ screening commenting MST3K-style and making it hard for her to concentrate

 

...and that takes us up to 1999. This completely out-of-order experience may explain why my minority opinion of the OT is "it's extremely not-bad".

 

Fortunately I married a woman who's seen all the films way more times than I have, so I never had to put any effort into reeducation like some of y'all have apparently had to.

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Interesting idea, positioning the prequels as flashbacks within the OT narrative. If there were any way you could extract just the most useful and salvageable PT scenes and insert them before and throughout ROTJ (definitely saving them till after the "I AM YOUR FATHER" moment), one could basically reconstruct the series using a pattern similar to The Godfather I/II.

 

(And dumping the leftover PT dross in much the same way I'd dump Godfather III.)

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I've got an idea. This one is for those with kids.

 

Make your ten year old watch TPM first.

Then show him AOTC, but make him wait ten years later as twenty year old.

Show him ROTS three years later. Make sure he gives you a grand child, and assume immediate costody of the baby.

show him ANH twenty years later.

Next show him TESB, and reveal to your grandson who his true father is.

next show him ROTJ and let your middle-aged son throw your old ass down a laundry chute.

 

This way, your kid can absorb the ultimate star wars experience and actually live the tragedy of Darth Vader from a first-person perspective.

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Interesting idea, positioning the prequels as flashbacks within the OT narrative. If there were any way you could extract just the most useful and salvageable PT scenes and insert them ...

 

That's what I'd love to do if I ever had time to sit and edit hours worth of somebody else's movies.

 

I'd do it something like this:

 

A New Hope

 

Flashback 1 in Ben's hovel:

 

LUKE

No, my father didn't fight in the
wars. He was a navigator on a spice
freighter.

BEN
That's what your uncle told you. He
didn't hold with your father's ideals.
Thought he should have stayed here
and not gotten involved.

LUKE
You fought in the Clone Wars?

BEN
Yes, I was once a Jedi Knight the
same as your father....

 

FLASHBACK HERE

 

An extended montage of battle footage on the various planets from AOTC and ROTS. Over this, run Ben's lines from later in the scene:

 

BEN (voice over)

For over a thousand generations

the Jedi Knights were the guardians
of peace and justice in the Old
Republic. Before the dark times,
before the Empire.

 

(now footage shifts focus to Obi-Wan and Anakin from AOTC)

 

BEN (voice over)

Your father (recycled from somewhere)...

He was the best star-pilot in the
galaxy, and a cunning warrior....

And he was a good friend.

LUKE (voice over)
I wish I'd known him.

 

RESUME SCENE

 

BEN

I have something here for you. Your
father wanted you to have this when
you were old enough, but your uncle
wouldn't allow it. He feared you
might follow old Obi-Wan on some
damned-fool idealistic crusade like
your father did.

THREEPIO
Sir, if you'll not be needing me,
I'll close down for awhile.

LUKE
Sure, go ahead.

Ben hands Luke the saber.

LUKE
What is it?

BEN
Your fathers lightsaber. This is the
weapon of a Jedi Knight. Not as clumsy
or as random as a blaster.

Luke pushes a button on the handle. A long beam shoots out
about four feet and flickers there. The light plays across
the ceiling.

BEN
An elegant weapon for a more civilized
time.

Luke hasn't really been listening.

LUKE
How did my father die?

 

Ben gives that pensive look and we show a quick FLASH of Anakin on Mustafar-- but the shot from behind, or one where his face is obscured-- idea being that we DON'T see this as Anakin, but present him JUST as Darth Vader.

 

Then resume, and--

BEN
A young Jedi named Darth Vader, who
was a pupil of mine until he turned
to evil, helped the Empire hunt down
and destroy the Jedi Knights. He
betrayed and murdered your father.
Now the Jedi are all but extinct.
Vader was seduced by the dark side
of the Force.

 

Later, when Tarkin tells Vader he's all that remains of the Jedi after discussing Obi-Wan I'd do one other flashback-- showing Anakin from TPM-- leaving his mother, meeting Obi-Wan, being told he'd be trained.

 

Kicker being, his name is never mentioned, so we have no idea that this little boy and the Anakin we see in the earlier flashback are the same person.

 

Basically, I'd do this in each of the films in the scenes where they talk about the prequel era. Very little of the PT dialog needs to be seen or heard-- everything is mostly just visual.

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