Star Wars: The Force Awakens (12/18/15)

[Gully Foyle]

Exactly.

It could've been worse:

>using your kid's college fund to buy multiples of the entire Van Helsing toy line.

>taking out a student loan to purchase every Last Airbender landfill liner.

>spending any money whatsoever on Sucker Punch.


_____

 

[cilantropants]

I still have a tub of figures from the PT that I amassed out of typical fanboy blind faith to a franchise eager to take advantage of me. Couldn't sell any of them for a buck each at my last garage sale. Just a Padme, because the guy had a friend who was obsessed with Portman.

At least I have a small collection of originals from the 70s on cards for consolation, including the Fett mail away. But the closer 2018 comes, the harder I think I'll find it to hold onto him.

 

[VintijDroidGutzz]

I got rid of most of my PT SW figures in the last 18 months - except for the recent Hasbro Ep1 stuff I own, like some of the Vintage Collection figures, Legacy Collection bits & pieces, & the odd EP1 Collection thing like Sidious & the Flash Speeder. Still really dig all those things.

 

[spindrift]

I got rid of most of my PT SW figures in the last 18 months - except for the recent Hasbro Ep1 stuff I own, like some of the Vintage Collection figures, Legacy Collection bits & pieces, & the odd EP1 Collection thing like Sidious & the Flash Speeder. Still really dig all those things.

How did you get rid of them? Bonfire? Throwing out the car window? Tell me how!!!

 

[jye4ever]

How Much Of George Lucas’ Vision Is In THE FORCE AWAKENS?

Short answer: not a lot.
By DEVIN FARACI May. 08, 2015

George Lucas approached Mark Hamill and Carrie Fisher before he sold Lucasfilm. He sat them down almost a year before and talked to them about a new Star Wars trilogy; if my sources are correct Disney basically inherited the deals he made with them. Lucas had a plan for the new trilogy, had an outline, and over the last couple of years fandom has speculated about how much of that outline actually made its way through the sale and then through JJ Abrams' development process. How much of George Lucas' vision made it into The Force Awakens?

Depends on who you ask.

Talking to Vanity Fair Lucasfilm honcho Kathleen Kennedy said:

“We’ve made some departures” from Lucas’s ideas, Kennedy conceded, but only in “exactly the way you would in any development process.”
​

That sort of doesn't line up with what is said elsewhere in the same article, which lays out the process that Lawrence Kasdan and JJ Abrams took once they got Michael Arndt off the project:

As of early November 2013, the studio walls and whiteboards were filled with ideas, but the actual narrative hadn't been set in place. Abrams and the Empire Strikes Back/Return of the Jedi co-writer Lawrence Kasdan took over, starting from something very close to scratch. “We didn’t have anything,” Kasdan told Handy. “There were a thousand people waiting for answers on things, and you couldn’t tell them anything except, ‘Yeah, that guy’s in it.’ That was about it. That was really all we knew.” The two men then hashed out the story in conversations as they walked around Santa Monica, New York City, London, and Paris, and kept refining the script even as production began.


​

The Vanity Fair story seems to throw Arndt under the bus a bit, saying he never managed to finish his script (presumably based more on Lucas' ideas). That feels unfair to me, and my sources have indicated that Arndt got shut out of the process as opposed to 'failing to pull a script together.'

What was Lucas' version like? It's not clear, but the article intimates that it focused on teens, and that Disney was worried that more teens would make the new films feel like a return to the Prequel Trilogy. They wanted to get back to the tone of the Original Trilogy, and so they aged up the characters. It does seem as if everything was thrown out, although some elements remained - this is a generational story, after all, and so some of the characters in both Lucas' and Abrams' versions are related to the original trilogy characters.

The final answer to the question in the headline: Star Wars: The Force Awakens probably bears little to no resemblance to what George Lucas had planned. We're entering a whole new phase of Star Wars, one with the most minimal Lucas participation possible. Whether that's good or not is up to your view on Lucas' last few decades of work. For me? This is part of why I am so excited about the future of Star Wars.

 

[cilantropants]

Works for me.

 

[Darth Madden]

That last paragraph makes me dance in the streets. I am thankful to George all the time for bringing this great story to life and having it become such a big part of my childhood and life but after ROTJ he either lost it mentally or had too many yes men or his ego got the better of him because with few exceptions the PT is garbage and I am so glad this one has little to do with what he was planning… it gives me A New Hope for these movies.

 

[jye4ever]

Good thing Arndt was canned.

 

[VintijDroidGutzz]

How did you get rid of them? Bonfire? Throwing out the car window? Tell me how!!!

Believe it or not, I sold all of it on eBay for more than good money.

Pretty chuffed actually.

That last paragraph makes me dance in the streets. I am thankful to George all the time for bringing this great story to life and having it become such a big part of my childhood and life but after ROTJ he either lost it mentally or had too many yes men or his ego got the better of him because with few exceptions the PT is garbage and I am so glad this one has little to do with what he was planning… it gives me A New Hope for these movies.

Nicely put.

I've really tried to stay spoiler free with EPVII - except for the character reveals, which are inevitable.. but, yeah. It remains to be seen whether minimal George = great SW films. He was the father of the whole thing, so part of me is very sad that he's not involved anymore. That said, new blood pumps fresh life into things, so with no baggage to deal with, the new team can work relatively uninhibited & create a great new arc to set the next era in motion.

Cautiously optimistic.

 

[Cixx]

I'm not sad of lack of involvement. Because he had 3 films to get it right and blew every one. And quotes like "the younger generation loves the PT and dislikes the OT" shows how outta touch he is.The 70's/80's were a different time and he had other people around him who knew what they were doing.

I sit cautiously optimistic as well, but deep down i have high hopes cause i KNOW they can't be prequel bad. Get ready for the bad taste to be washed away folks.

 

[jye4ever]

3 trys and they got worse and worse

 

[VintijDroidGutzz]

I'm not disagreeing with that sentiment.. it's just.. respect, you know?

Uncle George had a polarizing effect on the fans with his approach to everything over the years - not least of all to mention being the endless tinkering, but still.

He'll always be a legend for obvious reasons.

 

[meanstreak]

Looks like this may be what they did with the beautiful Lupita Nyong'o

INDIE REVOLVER EXCLUSIVE: First Look at Lupita Nyong

 

[spindrift]

So JJ and Kasdan did the script in six months prior to filming...NOW i'm worried.

Still will be better than the PT..

 

[jye4ever]

Boooo, I wanted her real face in the movie.

She looks like a black version of the Kamino aliens.

 

[Xenoburger_]

Looks like another boring and generic design. Do not want.

 

[RIDDICK]

Looks like this may be what they did with the beautiful Lupita Nyong'o

Totally not as racist as Neimoidians from PT. Nope, not even close. Lucas be damned...

 

[The Clown Prince of Crime]

Looks like this may be what they did with the beautiful Lupita Nyong'o

INDIE REVOLVER EXCLUSIVE: First Look at Lupita Nyong

 

[abake]

Don't care what people say, George has better ideas and stories than 90% of the filmmakers out there, including Abrams.
What he needed was a good scriptwriter and a better director to give focus to his stories.
I'm really not sure at all that Abrams can come up with a better story to tell, but hopefully it'll be well crafted and acted.

 

[Rorywan]

Don't care what people say, George has better ideas and stories than 90% of the filmmakers out there, including Abrams.
What he needed was a good scriptwriter and a better director to give focus to his stories.
I'm really not sure at all that Abrams can come up with a better story to tell, but hopefully it'll be well crafted and acted.

Good post man. I concur.