Star Wars angst

*sigh*

I've said from the get-go that I don't give two shits about Star Wars BRD's. Couldn't fucking. Care. Less. I don't own an HDTV or a Blu-Ray player in any case. But my killer-app for Blu-Ray? Assuming there even is one, it's sure as fuck not revised (yet again) Star Wars films. I would happily plunk down my money for HD versions of the original films (I'll come back to this in a moment). Maybe not right away but eventually.

But until then, I've got the DVD's. Those are good enough for me. Now I can watch the saga any time I please.

"The original films". "The saga". Notice I don't use the word "trilogy" anywhere in there. I like the prequels. I like them a lot, in fact. I find the prequels to be way over-criticized and the first trilogy to be way over-praised. The truth, as is sometimes the case, lies somewhere in the middle. They're simply good, entertaining films that I can watch again and again.

In their original theatrical presentations*. I don't care to see revisions, corrections, updates, modifications, whatever the hell you want to call them. Couldn't. Care. Less.

See, I started out fairly pro-Special Edition. Hey, why not bring 'em up to scratch, right? That'll strengthen continuity, right? After all, it's not like moviegoers will accept vintage 70's special effects in (then) modern films, right? Besides, it's only this one time, right?

Rationalizations, all of them. Revisionism is revisionism. I much prefer facts and history these days. Truth. And the simple fact of the matter here is that no amount of "fixes" will ever make the prequels flow organically into the original trilogy. CAN'T FUCKING BE DONE. You'll always have continuity problems of some kind or another. So just let it go. The original trilogy and the prequel trilogy were made in different eras of filmmaking. Don't hide it; accept it.

The other thing here is that revising the original trilogy erases some amazing effects work from the record. Seriously, go back and watch any of 'em. For me, watching the original edition of Empire is what did it. It seriously blew my mind what those ILM effects technicians were able to achieve with duct tape, Styrofoam, models, wires and popsicle sticks. For my money, those films did far more visual effects development than 5,000 Lord of the Rings movies (and were more fun to watch in any case). That should be preserved.

But the other thing? Fuck it guys, I'm thirty. I'm at that age when I'm sick to fuck of "expanding my boundaries". I'm not open-minded (never have been really; and fuck you, I don't think that's something to apologize for or equivocate about), I don't like "experimentation" and I've come to believe that newer isn't necessarily better. All I fucking want is the movies I grew up watching in decent quality. Is it really so much to ask?

Here's the thing. I grew up watching New Hope, Empire and Jedi. But I didn't care about them. I was more of a comic book kid. I liked superheroes, action figures and cartoons more than movies about old decrepit samurai fighting old decrepit samurai in iron lungs. I just didn't get why everyone spooged their pants about Star Wars. Yeah, the movies were decent but, seriously, what's the fuss all about?

You know what changed all that? The motherfucking Phantom Menace! After walking out of that movie, I suddenly understood why people were so obsessed with the star ships, the lightsabers, the characters, the story, the mythos/history of the galaxy far, far away, all of it. How did this Palpatine dude come to attain absolute power? How and why did the Republic become the Empire? Now that you mention it, how in the hell did all the Jedi get wiped out? And since we're on the subject, if Obi-Wan is supposed to be this amazing, badass Jedi, how did Anakin become a Sith on HIS watch?!

Is that the way some blowhard original trilogy douchebag purist would want me to have joined the party? Probably not. But I don't care. That's my baggage. At the risk of sounding like a Lucas apologist (although I don't know how that's possible at this point), this really is a six film saga. None are complete without the rest.

I don't need a CG Yoda through all of The Phantom Menace. Yeah, the puppet in the original version was ten different kinds of fucked up. But (A) that's the puppet that was in the movie originally and (B) I don't care what anybody says, the CG replacement is NO improvement. I can deal with a CG Yoda in AOTC and ROTS because those films were designed for a CG Yoda and, indeed, he NEEDED to be CG in order to do all the walking, talking, emoting and fighting he did in those movies. Period. But the puppet Yoda in TPM? Not perfect. Not even close. But that's the best option available and the most true to history.

All of this to say, I won't be buying this BRD set or, indeed, ANY Star Wars set that doesn't include the original versions of ALL SIX FILMS. I have several of them on DVD. I will spend no more until those versions are made available. And don't believe George's bullshit excuse, THEY DO EXIST. 90% of the remastering work for them was done ages ago just in making the 1997 Special Edition (which looked GORGEOUS in theaters, even if no home video presentation ever reflected that). All that leaves on the table is a whoppin' 10% (ie, the "modified" effects sequences) that would need to be remastered to modern standards. If you can't do that work for less than $90 or $100k, GET OUT OF THE FUCKING BUSINESS.

All I want is my original versions, y'all.

* Yes, I know "original theatrical presentations" can be a dicey, ambiguous term; it's just that I don't give a fuck.

I feel ya man. Love the star wars series. One of my all time classic film series. I know this is a sticking point for alot of fans. I wish we could get a release of all edits of the films. So we can go watch which ever verison we like from originals, the 97 special edition, the dvd release, to now the bdbrelease. There has been so many films like close encounters, blade runner and others. That had multi cuts over the yrs and then do another rerelease of all cuts together. Why the hell is lucas so againt that? Now I don't know all changes from any of the edits. So have been ok changes. Some things changed I didn't see need too. Now for some of those new rumor changes. I think blinking ewoks look alright from clip I seen. I don't see need to change the sound fx for the obi wan scene with the tusken raiders. And god I hope the rumored vader no from prequels isn't in the return of jedi scene.

webhead2006 wrote:And god I hope the rumored vader no from prequels isn't in the return of jedi scene.

...

Whatever you do, don't watch that very first YouTube video up there then.

EDIT- Oh yeah, and I moved this to Misc. Movies & TV Series... where it would've gone originally if I wasn't such a shit head.

Oh I know of the vader. But I seen on a few pages no one is sure if the vader no one is 100% real. Last I read that is. If its been confirmed crap. But ya man I would love to see original verison of the first three films of the series. Been yrs since I seen them.

I grew-up a HUGE fan of the 'Star Wars Trilogy', and I even remember going to the theater to see 'Empire' as a child. I had, and probably still do, VHS copies of each of them that I watched probably 100 times apiece. The action figures, the books, I wanted it ALL. I would even surmise to say I was into 'Star Wars' MORE than I was into Superman. But not by much.

Unfortunately, unlike a lot of people who were the same as me, I found other interests as I got older. Sports, being the main one. I switched from being a "geek" to being a "jock" when I was around 12. I started to get tall, and realized just how AWESOME it was to get good at baseball/basketball/football. But I digress. I was VERY interested in the prequels when they were announced, and even more so when the first trailer came out:


It promised so much, and after seeing it, delivered so very little. I think I had the OPPOSITE reaction to colors. The prequels killed the majority of interest I had in 'Star Wars'.

Oh sure, I still enjoy watching them from time-to-time. But this is usually when SpikeTV is showing them constantly for entire weekends. I haven't popped-in one of the DVD's in a LONG time. Oh, and the only prequel I own on DVD is 'Revenge of the Sith'. And that was a gift....

These changes fat-necked Lucas has made to the original films is just icing on the shitcake for me. I have ZERO interest in buying an over-priced set of Blu-Rays that have been bastardized as much as they have.

Oh I know of the vader. But I seen on a few pages no one is sure if the vader no one is 100% real. Last I read that is. If its been confirmed crap. But ya man I would love to see original verison of the first three films of the series. Been yrs since I seen them.

Here's something I found kind of interesting.

A few weeks ago, George Lucas himself finally signed up a facebook account. I found out about it fairly early so I friended him and he (or, more likely, one of his employees) accepted it. He didn't seem to ever post anything but, hey, it's kinda cool to have him as a friend on fb, right?

So the above videos leak out. Then suddenly he closes his facebook. Maybe it's wrong to connect the two but it seems kind of interesting as far as timing goes. Anybody want to bet that people sent him a shitload of irate messages about yet more alterations to the films so he closed the page just to spare all the invective?

Not much has changed concerning the original point of this thread. I haven't bought the Blu-Rays and really don't intend to. My DVD's are good enough.

But that doesn't mean I'm not interested in the 3D rerelease. Not so much the "3D" part as the "rerelease" part. 2D showings are out there and by golly that's how I'd like to see the movie. As I said in the first post, unpopular though the sentiment may be, Episode I is what made me Star Wars fans. I liked the trilogy growing up but didn't understand why people went crazy over it. After Episode I, the original trilogy became infinitely more important to me.

The downside is that in recent years, the original unaltered trilogy has become the REAL original trilogy for me. I don't care to see Lucas do various hackjobs on those movies when the original effects were already good enough... and would look even better with a proper remastering job rather than unnecessary CG garbage thrown in.

The changes made to the prequels though have largely been more subtle. Yeah, the Yoda puppet has been replaced but otherwise the prequel changes are mostly more subdued and easier to overlook if you're not pretty familiar with the movies. So I think I can sit through them.

But the changes to the original trilogy... it's just too much. I don't think I'll bother seeing those when they're rereleased. And it's not because I don't care but because I DO care. Maybe too much.

Of course, the irony here is that I was originally supposed to see TPM at midnight but that didn't happen for various reasons. This is the first time in a long time that I've not seen a Star Wars movie on opening day. And it kinda saddens me, esp for this movie.

Ya for the 3d thing really like to just se the original series, well either original theater release verison or hell 97 edition.

You might enjoy this revisionist piece of bullshit, colors:

http://www.aintitcool.com/node/53489

The controversy over who shot first, Greedo or Han Solo, in Episode IV, what I did was try to clean up the confusion, but obviously it upset people because they wanted Solo [who seemed to be the one who shot first in the original] to be a cold-blooded killer, but he actually isn’t. It had been done in all close-ups and it was confusing about who did what to whom.

I put a little wider shot in there that made it clear that Greedo is the one who shot first, but everyone wanted to think that Han shot first, because they wanted to think that he actually just gunned him down.

The sad thing is, he probably actually BELIEVES THIS.

Ha not that debate again lucas has flip on that a few times hasnt he.

Apologist Puncher wrote:You might enjoy this revisionist piece of bullshit, colors:

http://www.aintitcool.com/node/53489

The controversy over who shot first, Greedo or Han Solo, in Episode IV, what I did was try to clean up the confusion, but obviously it upset people because they wanted Solo [who seemed to be the one who shot first in the original] to be a cold-blooded killer, but he actually isn’t. It had been done in all close-ups and it was confusing about who did what to whom.

I put a little wider shot in there that made it clear that Greedo is the one who shot first, but everyone wanted to think that Han shot first, because they wanted to think that he actually just gunned him down.

The sad thing is, he probably actually BELIEVES THIS.

I saw that elsewhere. If I'm not mistaken, in that same interview, Lucas also tries to argue that he always wanted a CG Yoda in TPM but "we couldn't get it to work". First, that contradicts contemporaneous statements he made way back when, it contradicts statements made by Rob Coleman (the animator who took credit for pushing for George to go with a CG Yoda in Episode II) and it ignores the fact that ILM was somehow able to make a CG Jar Jar run around acting a fool in TPM but somehow a Yoda who sits and has one walking shot was somehow beyond their abilities.

I. Don't. Buy it. Sorry, but he can take the bullshit someplace else. I like the prequels, I think they're the better than they're given credit for but, any way you care to slice it, Lucas believes entirely too much of his own spin. I love the guy but he's completely full of shit.

webhead2006 wrote:Ha not that debate again lucas has flip on that a few times hasnt he.

Fuck's sake, I live for the day when you write something worth reading.

thecolorsblend wrote:I. Don't. Buy it. Sorry, but he can take the bullshit someplace else. I like the prequels, I think they're the better than they're given credit for but, any way you care to slice it, Lucas believes entirely too much of his own spin. I love the guy but he's completely full of shit.

I think the fact that you can start counting the mis-steps with the Prequels almost from the first 5 minutes on is MY biggest issues with them.

They should have been amazing. Instead, they were "decent at best".

I know this ain't Star Wars I'm about to bring up but honestly this is the 1st time I've read this post. Period. I didn't even know it was here. I found out tonight by looking for the little icons for new posts. Anyway, speaking about 'digitally altering' a classic show like this, they also did something like that with the original STAR TREK TV series. I think they actually aired the episodes somewhere a few years back but I didn't get to see them. Then if I'm not mistaken, they re-released the TV boxed sets in 'HD DVD', the format that Blu-Ray made the equivalent as Beta tapes to VHS. Anyway, I think this release had both the original episodes as-is & also the new 'CGI' episodes. I think I may have seen an example of this online at some point in the past. I think the point for them doing this was this. Remember how 'fake' other planets & effects & all looked on the original series? But you still loved them to death because they had good acting and good stories! About like the original TWILIGHT ZONE or OUTER LIMITS. The effects were as cheesy as all get-up but are still worth watching to this day. Well, in place of the cheesy effects, they're supposedly replaced with superior CGI-enhanced planets, landscapes, phasers, etc., to look 'real' I suppose.

Since I've not seen enough of this to form an opinion, have any of you guys seen what I'm talking about? And is it worth it in the case of Star Trek as opposed to Star wars?

I have seen some of the star trek remastered of TOS. Also non if you got netflix its up on there of trek remastered for TOS. From what i seen online from trek fans most were pretty pleased and liked those changes. Where as we have seen with star wars fans alot of the changes were not needed and were pointless. I from what i seen of the remastered tos was fine with the little touchup/additions they made to it. Same with watching original verisons of TOS. So for me i dont have much bad to say about trek remastered. Where there is plently of bad to say about star wars changes. Some were ok like touching up lazers and space effects and ships, but then you get changes like the vader noo, to the anakin change in jedi and other stuff it like come on did they really need to change that.

Moriarty tells the story about showing Revenge of the Sith to his young sons. Sure, AICN is a joke nowadays but... this is worth reading, if you ask me.

http://www.hitfix.com/blogs/motion-captured/posts/film-nerd-2-0-revenge-of-the-sith-devastates-the-kids-as-anakin-falls-from-grace

nice read there colors. didnt know that aicn guy was still around.

Saw TPM in glorious, digitally projected 2D. No freaking 3D for me. Not if I can avoid it.

If you didn't like the movie before, not much has changed. If you liked it before... not much has changed.

But one obvious improvement was the digital projection. I don't remember looking so crisp and clear in the original theatrical run. Maybe it did and my memory (clouded by an at best questionable DVD transfer lo these past 10'ish years) is playing tricks on me. But "new" details consistently popped up through out the whole movie.

One thing that became apparent is how misframed the DVD is. I can't speak to the Blu-Ray (I'm boycotting until the original unaltered trilogy is released, remember?) but that DVD has very apparent misframing issues. The best example I can think of is the bit where Jabba has fallen asleep after the podrace and Bib Fortuna pokes him in the head to wake him up. In the DVD, Fortuna is partly cut out of the frame. In the projected version I saw tonight, after Jabba wakes up, he's still planted solidly within the frame. Makes me wonder what the hell else might be missing. I always knew the DVD had issues but good night this is a big problem to have. I'd wager 5% to 10% of the intended image could be missing. Maybe as much as 15%. Yeesh...

Another treat was the restored colors. I'd forgotten how colorful the movie truly is. Several sections from the DVD had a noticeable tint to them. Usually a soft pink tint. The digital projection suffered no such problem.

I mention all of this to say that when people criticize THX and what a joke it is these days, shit like this is partly why.

I to may see it this week when not busy with work. A bit slammed this week. As for sets it still sucks lucas won't release a complete. Verisons of the films. Original 97, dvd. And blurray verisons. I know plently of fans would kill for that. Hell I would love to see original verisons. Been ages since I seen them.

Downloaded and then printed these out to use as replacement/alternate covers for my oh-riginal, unaltered trilogy DVD's.



Basically, these VHS tapes were released in 1995. Remember the "one last time" rerelease of the trilogy? Yep, here you go. And yes, they look very cool sitting on my DVD bookshelf.

EDIT- Oh, and there is some authenticity in using those covers. The unaltered trilogy DVD's released by Lucasfilm in 2006 (and only recently withdrawn quietly from the market) were sourced from the very same transfer from which came the 1993/Definitive Collection and 1995/"Faces" releases. So putting those custom covers into the DVD cases is actually pretty accurate in many ways.

I actually have that VHS set somewhere. I just need to find it...

Nice covers

I was bored a little while ago, and found a download link for the original trilogy unaltered version. So I am in process of dling it/then burning. Been a few yrs since I seen the original verisons. I used to have a vhs copies of them but lost them over the yrs. But do have the special ed vhs, thefirst full trilogy set on dvd. Didn't bother with bluray set. I still wish the br set included all versions. That would have been my first pickup if that was case. But speaking of changes is the total count of versions this original, special ed, dvd release, bluray? But will be sweet to see the altered versions once it dl and bburnt. I as I said haven't see that take in ages. So will bbe fun to watch how they where after all this time.

A couple of things.

For the first time in years and years (and maybe the first time ever in widescreen), I rewatched the original unaltered trilogy when Lucasfilm did that 2006 DVD rerelease. Needless to say, it was a mindjob to see the original films with the old school effects in context. If you ask me, it's a much truer (and better) representation of the films and the vision behind them than all the CGI in the world could ever be. Trust me, I think you'll realize what a treat the original versions are, especially A New Hope. For example, it's very easy to forget that Mos Eisley was originally conceived to be a very dangerous border town (kind of like El Paso in the late 1800's/early 1900's) rather than a "bustling space port" that Lucas tried to transform it into later.

Second, and unrelated to the above, I've been a fan of the prequels for a long time. However, the Episode I 3D release was a chance to watch the whole thing start to finish in theaters (where Star Wars belongs). I still really do like the movie and feel it's gotten better with age but for the first time I was distracted and kind of annoyed by the length of the podrace (the sequence itself is great, it just goes on too long) and by Jar Jar's antics. Guess I hadn't realized how often I skip ahead when watching the movie. But without a "forward" button... man, those two things really stand out. And not in a good way.

Mmm, so yeah...