Jump to content

What was Lucas's original Plan for Ep. 7?


Quetzalcoatl
 Share

Recommended Posts

1 hour ago, Jedigoat said:

The ST clearly needed people riding rancors, Luke fighting 50 emperors, Luke's X-Wing running out of gas and just sitting in space for a long-ass time, and tons of clones named Lu'uke and A'ana'aki'in, and Ha'an.  Sooooooper awesome.  ;)

One Emperor was bad enough!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Nope, you're wrong. Anything can be a good story with interesting characters. I've seen it happen. Hell, even Kevin J. Anderson's abysmal Jedi Academy trilogy was reworked by Michael Stackpole into the phenomenal I, Jedi, regarded by many as the best Star Wars book ever written.

My feelings toward Dark Empire, to which you are referring, are mixed. It feels very rough-drafty but also has lots of potential for interesting stories. Granted, there are glaring problems, but they could have been smoothed out with more work. I don't even mind the Emperor coming back because it totally fits within his character. Now, I know Choc is going to point out that something like that undermines what was accomplished in the films, and I would actually agree with that; but I can forgive that (or anything, really) if the story is good and the characters are believable, which they are.

By the way, the Emperor plot was George Lucas' idea. The original plan involved a Vader impostor claiming to the rightful heir to the imperial throne.

If you still don't believe me that anything can be good no matter how silly the concept, just look at the original Trilogy itself. Have you ever read some of the older scripts, with Luke Starkiller, General Darth Vader, Prince Espaa Valorum, the Jedi Bendu of Ashla, or the Sith Knights of the Bogan? Pretty funny stuff!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I'm a well known EU disliker for the same reasons as you guys, but execution and quality of story and idea are entirely subjective. Giving shit to zerimar for liking what he likes is kinda dumb. And wanting to know the minutiae and the details that Choc derided caring about is subjective as well, and we all know Choc has a hard time understanding people not thinking the same way he does. He admits it in that post, even.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

When someone says they don't like the Canto Bight scenes, although I've come to find them pretty endearing, I can understand it. When someone needs to reconcile Palpatine saying the Republic has existed for 1000 years with Obi Wan saying it had for 1000 generations I can't understand it.

And I can love the minutae of stuff. I love ASOIAF and the long, long history. The difference is that is meant to be that. Martin doesn't write something and then send other writers on some scramble to reconcile what he's wrote. Thats the problem with Star Wars in this way. There is such a clear hierarchy to it. What's the point of this long and detailed history if its going to constantly have to be reworked and reimagined to make sense and fit every time the far more important movies or tv shows or whatever decide they just don't want to pay attention to it?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

And here is the thing about it undermining the films. I don't really care about that. Thats not a big deal. But here is why the EU doesn't work for me I think. The movies are the most important thing. If someone feels some book written in the 90s is as important and matters as much as the movies to Star Wars well I don't know what to say. For me and the vast vast majority the movies take a huge precedence. So by definition the books and other media take a backseat.

Basically the OT movies are the great labors or defining moments of Luke, Leia and Han's lives. What happens next simply isn't as important. It can't be. Its not that anything that happens takes away from the movies. Its that the movies have to take away from the stories being told in books. 

This is why the main storyline needs to be generational. The ST works, well 2/3 of it anyway, because its not abot Luke, Leia and Han. They play roles, even important roles but the story is not about them. The ST is the great labors of Rey, Finn, Poe, Kylo's lives. Its their defining moments. 

The EU feels like these lesser adventures of our great heroes going forward. Thats not to say all of it is bad. Im just some of it is good, some of it is bad and the majority is just mediocre. It's just lesser and it has to be. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I agree about the EU undermining the films, being contradictory and unnecessary. The only Star Wars that's Star Wars to me is in live action, so they're easily dismissible. But there's a lot, a LOT of bullshit in the live action that flat out doesn't make sense. Just because you can put it on film doesn't mean you can't question it, as you've done multiple times. You just don't understand it when people question different things than you, that's all. If it doesn't matter to you, if it's something you can gloss over or not care about, you act as if no one should. I agree with most of your ST takes, but still feel too much of it was just far too coincidental and we're told not to worry about it because "it doesn't matter."

Link to comment
Share on other sites

37 minutes ago, Jedigoat said:

I remember reading that shit as early as 7th grade, a SW lover desperate for SW in any way I can get it.  And even at that age, I had to ask, multiple times, 'WTF is this shit?!'

 

Multiple times.  

 

In 7th grade.  

 

In 7th grade!

 

Multiple times!

lol yeah I was a year or two younger, but pretty much the same. I think I read six or seven or so of the books and it just... not only didn't at all feel like Star Wars, it didn't feel good enough to read on as a separate entity. But again, it's all subjective. I hate Catcher in the Rye and think it's total garbage, yet it's hailed as a classic.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

9 minutes ago, Darth Krawlie said:

I agree about the EU undermining the films, being contradictory and unnecessary. The only Star Wars that's Star Wars to me is in live action, so they're easily dismissible. But there's a lot, a LOT of bullshit in the live action that flat out doesn't make sense. Just because you can put it on film doesn't mean you can't question it, as you've done multiple times. You just don't understand it when people question different things than you, that's all. If it doesn't matter to you, if it's something you can gloss over or not care about, you act as if no one should. I agree with most of your ST takes, but still feel too much of it was just far too coincidental and we're told not to worry about it because "it doesn't matter."

My major problem with people getting on the ST or PT is when they criticize them for things that are also present in the OT but they just forgive the OT for it. For instance people complaining that the bombs dropped straight down in zero gravity in TLJ. Well in ESB Han, Leia and Chewie walk out into what they think is empty space on an asteroid with no space suits. At the end of the movie Luke and Leia stand on a ship looking out an open window that is completely open to the vacuum of space. Why is one a huge problem and the other isn't? 

The same goes for coincidences or things not being explained in the OT. Ill grant the ST may be a bit heavier on it but its not like stuff like that doesn't happen in the OT as well. We have no idea where the Emperor came from in those movies. He disbands the Senate off screen. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I also think there is a difference between things that arent explained but easily could be and make sense and things that are just ridiculous. How Maz got the saber is something that can easily make sense. There are a dozen ways she could have gotten it. You can't say "there is NO way she could have gotten that, it makes no sense!". Where as the Sith dagger I guess it was lining up to show exactly where the wayfinder was on a wreck in the middle of a raging ocean where Rey has to be standing at the exact right place for it to even work? I don't think there is a reasonable explanation for that. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Agreed on the bombs. Didn't realize it on my initial reaction but I've retracted my criticism on that. And yeah, the asteroid is a good one too. That's a very fair response, I even just started a thread about dumb OT questions, though I didn't include that one. But I never got that Luke and Leia were in front of an open window on that ship at the end of ESB. I last re-watched it a week or so ago and that thought has never occurred to me.

The lightsaber one bothers me, not because THERE'S NO WAY, but because it's ridiculously coincidental that it ended up there, and I feel like it required an explanation other than SHE HAS IT BECAUSE REASONS. And I don't remember enough about TROS because it sucked so much lol.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

It is coincidental and Im not saying Im against an explanation for that. Or for how Artoo turned on or why there would be a map to Luke or a few other things. I do think though that if we got an explanation for each and every one of those things that it would severely bog the movie down. 

Even in ESB the Falcon travels at sub light speeds between star systems. The nearest star to us is over 4 light years away. So travelling at the speed of light it would take 4 years to get there. So even if Bespin was the very closest system to the Falcon at the time it would take years for them to travel to Bespin. Now I know the timeline of Empire isn't 100% clear but I don't think anyone could make a case that years were supposed to have passed.

It just bothers me when people gloss over all this stuff in the OT and then go so crazy over it in the ST or PT. Some people will say "well the OT is great so I don't think about it". Well you saw those movies when you were a kid and none of that mattered to you. If you saw the OT fo the first time at 40 all this crap may bother you and you might not think the OT was so great.

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, The Choc said:

My major problem with people getting on the ST or PT is when they criticize them for things that are also present in the OT but they just forgive the OT for it. For instance people complaining that the bombs dropped straight down in zero gravity in TLJ. Well in ESB Han, Leia and Chewie walk out into what they think is empty space on an asteroid with no space suits. At the end of the movie Luke and Leia stand on a ship looking out an open window that is completely open to the vacuum of space. Why is one a huge problem and the other isn't? 

The same goes for coincidences or things not being explained in the OT. Ill grant the ST may be a bit heavier on it but its not like stuff like that doesn't happen in the OT as well. We have no idea where the Emperor came from in those movies. He disbands the Senate off screen. 

I personally agree with that, and have the opposite problem - I hate when the technology is explained. Which was a total downside of the EU. Star Wars has always been more magical/fantasy than science fiction to me, so bringing the science in, in books or things like OJ Simpson chase in TLJ just grinds my gears.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, The Choc said:

I also think there is a difference between things that arent explained but easily could be and make sense and things that are just ridiculous. How Maz got the saber is something that can easily make sense. There are a dozen ways she could have gotten it. You can't say "there is NO way she could have gotten that, it makes no sense!". Where as the Sith dagger I guess it was lining up to show exactly where the wayfinder was on a wreck in the middle of a raging ocean where Rey has to be standing at the exact right place for it to even work? I don't think there is a reasonable explanation for that. 

The Force

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, Darth Krawlie said:

lol yeah I was a year or two younger, but pretty much the same. I think I read six or seven or so of the books and it just... not only didn't at all feel like Star Wars, it didn't feel good enough to read on as a separate entity. But again, it's all subjective. I hate Catcher in the Rye and think it's total garbage, yet it's hailed as a classic.

You know, now that I think about it, I may have been in 6th grade when the EU came out.   Maybe 5th. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, Darth Krawlie said:

Agreed on the bombs. Didn't realize it on my initial reaction but I've retracted my criticism on that. And yeah, the asteroid is a good one too. That's a very fair response, I even just started a thread about dumb OT questions, though I didn't include that one. But I never got that Luke and Leia were in front of an open window on that ship at the end of ESB. I last re-watched it a week or so ago and that thought has never occurred to me.

The lightsaber one bothers me, not because THERE'S NO WAY, but because it's ridiculously coincidental that it ended up there, and I feel like it required an explanation other than SHE HAS IT BECAUSE REASONS. And I don't remember enough about TROS because it sucked so much lol.

I'm pretty sure there's a glass window or something on the medical frigate at the end of ESB. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

You're right. I've thought that about the Death Star before, in both ANH and ROTJ.

I find the science a lot easier to dismiss than the plot conveniences, though. Brando's right, Star Wars is fantasy dressed up as science fiction. Bombs dropping straight down and open hangars may be irritating intermittently, but they're not as significant and lightsabers appearing conveniently or clones suddenly appearing from a man who apparently had children that were never mention before. This ain't Interstellar, trying to be as scientifically accurate as possible.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

30 minutes ago, Fozzie said:

I personally agree with that, and have the opposite problem - I hate when the technology is explained. Which was a total downside of the EU. Star Wars has always been more magical/fantasy than science fiction to me, so bringing the science in, in books or things like OJ Simpson chase in TLJ just grinds my gears.

In ROTS when Anakin makes the decision to go and try to save Palpatine from Windu and the others it goes from daylight to darkness very quickly. Obviously to symbolize him going dark. In the novelization there is a whole explanation for this. Its sometihng like Coruscant is small and rotates quickly so the periods of day and night are very short. Then there is this whole thing that in order to make the day and night periods more condusive to sleep cycles they installed this whole like series of mirrors I think it was so they could like reflect the light of the star and control when it was day and night and that when it goes from day to night it happens fast.

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I don't know, guys. The sequel I saw (Episode VII) seemed to me like everything you're describing the EU as being. To boot, it was just an EU story retold with different names!

Along the same lines, I can't wrap my head around how Dave Filoni's The Clone Wars is treated like it's the best thing ever around here, by the same people who dump on the EU, when the former feels to me exactly how the they describe the EU: some good stuff, some terrible, and mostly mediocre. Especially given how big the EU is and how much of it I've been exposed to, I can't help but think, this is what they adore?

But then again, you all said it: it's all subjective. None of us is right or wrong.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

 Share

×
×
  • Create New...

Important Information

By using this site, you agree to our Terms of Use.