The Force Awakens - Figure discussion (with SPOILERS!)

[HammitChris]

Here is a link to the article where Abrams confirms it was Obi-Wan (both Ewan McGregor and Alec Guinness)....also he mentions that Rey's backstory will be fleshed out more in Ep. 8
J.J. Abrams reveals Obi-Wan and Yoda are secretly in 'Star Wars: The Force Awakens' | EW.com

And within this, we hear at least two familiar voices: Obi-Wan Kenobi and Yoda. On Saturday night, I interviewed director J.J. Abrams and his co-screenwriters Lawrence Kasdan and Michael Arndt after a Writers Guild of America screening, and they revealed how – and why – that scene came together the way it did.

Abrams also confirmed that some iconic actors reprised their roles: Ewan McGregor, Frank Oz… and a clever editing movie also brought the late Alec Guinness, who died in 2000 at the age of 86, back to the Star Wars universe.

“The idea of the voices was, we wanted the audience to feel – but not necessarily be presented right in your face — this idea that familiar, Force-strong voices were connecting with her. At least as well as they could,” Abrams says.

As they worked on editing the dream sequence, Bryan Burk, a longtime Bad Robot collaborator and one of the producers of the film, surprised Abrams one day with the gift of a single word: Obi-Wan Kenobi’s voice saying the name “Rey …”

“I said, ‘That’s cool, is that the thing from Ewan McGregor?’” Abrams recalled. “He said ‘No, we took a line from Alec Guinness saying ‘Afraid.’”

Not only that, but the lilt in his voice from that truncated word happened to fit exactly what Abrams had in mind. “They cut it, and you hear the performance – he’s saying it the way I would have begged Alec Guinness to have said it. It is so crazy perfect,” Abrams says. “So when you hear Obi-Wan talk to Rey it is both Alec Guinness and Ewan McGregor doing the voice.”

 

[lordregnis]

Not my words but I'll just leave this here.

1) A droid has important information that must be delivered to the good guys (Episode IV, anyone?)
2) so the bad guys hunt for the droid on a desert planet (IV)
3) Storm troopers raid a village, killing everyone (IV)
4) A girl is captured by the bad guys and the good guys rush to the base to the rescue. (IV)
5) The girl and the boy have a friend zone relationship through the film (Ep IV, Luke & Leia, wouldn't be surprised to learn that they are siblings in Episode IX)
6) The stormtroopers, elite soldiers of the bad guys, still can't hit a barn door. On the other hand, the good guys always hit, even when they use a weapon for the first time in their life
7) Supreme Leader Snoke = Emperor with a silly name
8) The bad guys have a magnificent new weapon that can destroy planets (Ep IV)
9) They use it to destroy a planet loyal to the rebels (IV)
10) The weapon has shields that can be destroyed by going down on the planet and disabling the shield generator (VI)
11) The epic villain wears a mask that distorts his voice (IV) and sadly, looks better with the mask on than without it.
12) The good guys can only destroy the weapon with an attack by X-Wings on the exact target (IV)
13) The X-Wings have to fly in a tight trench in order to reach their target (IV)
The screen writers had absolutely no new ideas to show for their money. A bunch of monkeys could have written better dialogue. A 1st grader could have made a plot that had less holes in it. The special effects were pretty much of the same quality as in the first Star Wars movie that was released 1977. I'd expect something way better in 2015.

 

[Wulf]

Pretty much yeah except for the special effects being the same as in 1977. Wtf? All my respects to the classics and the special effects techniques limited to them but the specials effects in The Force Awakens was much much better.

 

[koon]

Um, we all saw those moments and knew what they were. That's why I wondered if he lost his hand or not. A perfect parallel we would have accepted among those you've listed and many more. There's been so much excitement and so much to take in while viewing the first time, I was bound to miss something. In fact I did, a key story point too while taking in the awe. I was so excited I forgot to read the crawl. Something about Luke Skywalker... and missed he went hermit coz of his padawan.

 

[koon]

I don't get R2's time on screen. Someone mind telling me? What did BB8 have again?

 

[HammitChris]

I don't get R2's time on screen. Someone mind telling me? What did BB8 have again?

R2 was in low power mode and contained most of the map to Luke...he was only "awoken" when Rey arrived on the base...I don't think that is coincidence. Look on the bright side, even though R2 didn't get much screen time, he was still the hero...he had most of the map!

 

[mattinglymint23]

Is there any reason why we couldn't have a kenobi force ghost played by ewan straight up? Yoda is easy - and what about anakin?


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[InebriatedGnome]

One thing I found very interesting about the whole R2/Luke situation is that it appears Luke didn't give R2 the map. Can't remember where I read it now, but I believe Abrams said in a podcast that R2 downloaded the information from the Imperial archives during its time on the Death Star—which is why R2's piece fits BB8's exactly, just like Ren believed the New Order's map would.

Is there any reason why we couldn't have a kenobi force ghost played by ewan straight up? Yoda is easy - and what about anakin?


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Force ghosts come later perhaps after they've explored the relationship between Obi-wan and the current main characters (i.e., REY) some more.

 

[Buttmunch]

Is there any reason why we couldn't have a kenobi force ghost played by ewan straight up? Yoda is easy - and what about anakin?


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Only if they go back and re-edit the force ghosts to be Ewan in V and VI and make a younger Yoda ghost. It would make more sense with Young Anakin IMO. Never liked he got 'rewarded' for 'dying' young and getting a young force ghost when Obi-wan and Yoda got the shaft for being good till the end.

 

[mattinglymint23]

Yeah the whole editing force ghosts got nuts. I wonder if Disney has ability to unwind all the edits and give us original cuts of the OT. Would be nice to just keep things as they were and build on top with the new trilogy. I'd live with keeping Alec in the OT and just have ewan aged to Alec-esque look for new appearances.


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[plasticcrapmoneywaster]

The same issues? You mean the worse then cheap pseudo-Shakespearian love story? Or maybe the overwhelming amount of political blabbering and the staggering amount of people sitting in circles and wondering? Or maybe the inability to really believe that the environment the characters are evolving is real? or the complete absence of emotion with the exception of Sidious (who was actually both cheesy and damn enjoyable!) and Anakin (I'm not even going to touch that. Although I did not dislike Lloyd too much for a child actor). Or the "ballet" style lightsaber that shows no emotion (even after Obi Wan witnessed the death of his master!)? Or maybe the racist undertones of half the new alien species introduced in episode 1?

When I saw the prequels, there was no clear cut with the OT in my mind because I practically saw 4-5-6-1 in a row (I discovered SW in 99 when I was 11 and instantly became fan for life). And I liked Phantom Menace, not as much as the rest but I liked it. Even today I don't hate the prequels (except maybe for episode 2. Even as a 14 years old this movie was as bad as it gets and unforgivably boring). Even if it's thematically dissonant and sometime fails at visual storytelling, I still like the pod-race, the Maul fight or Yoda confronting Sidious. But even without hate that doesn't make these movies good ones.

Now you don't seem to want to hear any argument about why we prefer TFA to the prequels (accusing people of intellectual dishonesty because they don't share your opinion...) so I'm not going to bother more than that: TFA >>> prequels.

@Buttmunch: "As far as Leia and Chewie not exchanging anything" No matter how I justify that after the fact, it was super weird in the movie and I did not like it at all. Even my girlfriend who's not the greatest SW's fan picked up on it and was stunned, that's not a good sign.

You're damn right I am. You have probably spent the last fifteen years blabbering that Lucas can't direct or that the dialog in the prequels sucked and now you just ignore those same glaring flaws in TFA. Glaring intellectual dishonesty indeed. The Force Awakens was a good movie but frankly, even Phantom Menace had a more cohesive story arch and decent f-ing villain.

 

[Wulf]

Only if they go back and re-edit the force ghosts to be Ewan in V and VI and make a younger Yoda ghost. It would make more sense with Young Anakin IMO. Never liked he got 'rewarded' for 'dying' young and getting a young force ghost when Obi-wan and Yoda got the shaft for being good till the end.

Not rewarded. The younger force ghost was explained as a projection, symbol of Anakin when he was younger and still pure and untouched by the dark side. Back to a time before he died and became Vader. I don't think adding a younger Obi-Wan would fix anything. It would only make things more complicated given the reasons why Anakin was shown as a younger self.

 

[plasticcrapmoneywaster]

Not rewarded. The younger force ghost was explained as a projection, symbol of Anakin when he was younger and still pure and untouched by the dark side. Back to a time before he died and became Vader. I don't think adding a younger Obi-Wan would fix anything. It would only make things more complicated given the reasons why Anakin was shown as a younger self.

Lucas was correct in re-editing Hayden Christensen into Jedi. I mean think about it, wouldn't an old Anakin Skywalker simply be floating torso?

 

[JCFETT]

You're damn right I am. You have probably spent the last fifteen years blabbering that Lucas can't direct or that the dialog in the prequels sucked and now you just ignore those same glaring flaws in TFA. Glaring intellectual dishonesty indeed. The Force Awakens was a good movie but frankly, even Phantom Menace had a more cohesive story arch and decent f-ing villain.

I haven't watched Phantom menace in over 10 years. I've seen it twice. My wife bought me the whole "complete saga" dvd set for me for christmas a few years back, never put in any prequel discs into my player. This weekend was the first time I was able to see a Star Wars movie premier with my wife in a movie theater. She wasn't a star wars fan until she met me and I kinda "forced" it on to her haha. SHE LOVED FORCE AWAKENS. So did I. So I said hey, why don't we watch the prequels and see what we think now that we've seen a new star wars movie we can go back and compare and just see how it feels with more honest eyes. We watched phantom menace.... and it sucks. Still sucks. Always will suck. The artist work was great, costume and prop building was great. The story was there... but it just fails miserably to carry the torch of what Star Wars is. Between the CGI and the goofy crap, I mean Jar Jar literally destroys the movie with every dumb ass word out of his mouth. I mean c'mon... a CGI beast farting in the face of Jar Jar Binks.. wow that's so star wars to me. Did you ever look forward from the Original Trilogy and be like.. I can't wait for the new Star Wars movie where a CGI animal is going to fart on screen and I'm going to laugh and have such a great time. It sucks dude. Everyone needs to deal with it. It hurts more to be on the side of the fence of those who feel the pain of knowing these prequels will never get remade and unfortunately this burning pile of crap is part of our Star Wars than the other side who says the prequels don't suck you're all just bitter. Trust me it sucks for me that the movie sucks. I'm going to continue on with watching the next two prequels this week with my wife as we're determined to finish what we've started. The Prequels has it's place in the story line, but anyone who loves Star Wars will say the same.. it does not FEEL like Star Wars and thus it is not Star Wars to us. The Force Awakens is an honest attempt at following the feel of Star Wars. The fault of the Prequels is it catered to a new audience and wanted to completely stand on it's own with the technology of that time and was over ambitions and felt like it was just trying to play catch up and over explain everything. It felt like a disney adventure, which is oddly funny considering disney didn't own it yet. Oh yeah let's have like a 20 minute race sequence about racing ships where we root on the hero. The only things that stood out from that movie was Qui Gon and Maul, and because that's what the difference of great actors and concepts do. Other than that it was like a bunch of crazy ass ideas by george lucas trying to reach the new kids and a bunch of super creative and anxious people got in a room and just started going crazy with their ideas and that's what we ended up with. Again, the story was there.. it was just told wrong and without proper direction or filter or creative approach.

 

[JCFETT]

lol #rant, that was only suppose to be 5 lines, a little carried away, whatever. *wipes away tear* the pain is real man... the pain is real

 

[Hitman84]

I've read several pages in this thread and it really feels like, for everyone who didn't like the movie it didn't "give them a sense of awe, and magic, or made them feel like a kid when they first saw star wars the first time"
My question to them is, is did you really expect to? With all the special effects and crazy graphic video games and moves these days to ever expect a movie in 2015 to give you a sense of awe like the first time you did in the 70's, 80's or even 90's is just too much.
Weather its movies, music or hell video games NOTHING is like the first time.

No game for me is like my favorite RPG of all time, weather new games, sequels or remakes.
I've tried to find a new MMO for over a decade that gave me the feeling the first time I played WoW, it just won't happen.
The new movie was entertaining, with characters and stories we literally grew up with, moving into a new generation with new characters, is that so bad?

 

[Wulf]

Lucas was correct in re-editing Hayden Christensen into Jedi. I mean think about it, wouldn't an old Anakin Skywalker simply be floating torso?

Pretty much. I'm actually one of those who loved that change because to me it makes sense and it was more rewarding seeing the face of the Anakin we knew and followed through the prequels. I don't know, just made the ending of ROTJ so much better. The only thing I dislike about is that I find it a bit questionable that you remove an actor from a movie a couple of decades later and replace that actor with another. Story-wise makes sense tho.

 

[plasticcrapmoneywaster]

I haven't watched Phantom menace in over 10 years. I've seen it twice. My wife bought me the whole "complete saga" dvd set for me for christmas a few years back, never put in any prequel discs into my player. This weekend was the first time I was able to see a Star Wars movie premier with my wife in a movie theater. She wasn't a star wars fan until she met me and I kinda "forced" it on to her haha. SHE LOVED FORCE AWAKENS. So did I. So I said hey, why don't we watch the prequels and see what we think now that we've seen a new star wars movie we can go back and compare and just see how it feels with more honest eyes. We watched phantom menace.... and it sucks. Still sucks. Always will suck. The artist work was great, costume and prop building was great. The story was there... but it just fails miserably to carry the torch of what Star Wars is. Between the CGI and the goofy crap, I mean Jar Jar literally destroys the movie with every dumb ass word out of his mouth. I mean c'mon... a CGI beast farting in the face of Jar Jar Binks.. wow that's so star wars to me. Did you ever look forward from the Original Trilogy and be like.. I can't wait for the new Star Wars movie where a CGI animal is going to fart on screen and I'm going to laugh and have such a great time. It sucks dude. Everyone needs to deal with it. It hurts more to be on the side of the fence of those who feel the pain of knowing these prequels will never get remade and unfortunately this burning pile of crap is part of our Star Wars than the other side who says the prequels don't suck you're all just bitter. Trust me it sucks for me that the movie sucks. I'm going to continue on with watching the next two prequels this week with my wife as we're determined to finish what we've started. The Prequels has it's place in the story line, but anyone who loves Star Wars will say the same.. it does not FEEL like Star Wars and thus it is not Star Wars to us. The Force Awakens is an honest attempt at following the feel of Star Wars. The fault of the Prequels is it catered to a new audience and wanted to completely stand on it's own with the technology of that time and was over ambitions and felt like it was just trying to play catch up and over explain everything. It felt like a disney adventure, which is oddly funny considering disney didn't own it yet. Oh yeah let's have like a 20 minute race sequence about racing ships where we root on the hero. The only things that stood out from that movie was Qui Gon and Maul, and because that's what the difference of great actors and concepts do. Other than that it was like a bunch of crazy ass ideas by george lucas trying to reach the new kids and a bunch of super creative and anxious people got in a room and just started going crazy with their ideas and that's what we ended up with. Again, the story was there.. it was just told wrong and without proper direction or filter or creative approach.

At least the Phantom Menace is its own original story and not a remake of the original Star Wars. Lucas intended to make Phantom Menace light hearted, it is the first entry into a macro story. Yes, the humor does go flat with adults but try watching that film with your kids. Every kid I know prefers the prequels to the originals, the problem is some people who grew up only on the OT is blinded by nostalgia. Phantom Menace and The Force Awakens are BOTH solid films who fail in very similar ways to find their footing.

 

[plasticcrapmoneywaster]

lol #rant, that was only suppose to be 5 lines, a little carried away, whatever. *wipes away tear* the pain is real man... the pain is real

lol...it's all good. We can agree to disagree. We are both Star Wars fans.

 

[karamazov80]

I don't get R2's time on screen. Someone mind telling me? What did BB8 have again?

I'm not 100% sure why R2 didn't awaken until he did, but I think I was coming back from the bathroom. BB-8 had part of a map to find Luke Skywalker. R2 had a larger map, just missing that one chunk that BB-8 had for some reason. I'm sure they explained it, but I didn't catch the whole explanation and it seemed weird to me that Luke would, for some reason, send two droids out with partial maps of how to find him. Did he want someone to find him, or not? And why send two droids? Was it some kind of prophecy that the Ghost of Obi-Wan told him to do it, because it would help bring together Rey and friends? I don't know.