STAR WARS

[johnnYYac]

I was 10 years old, in my pajamas at a drive in theater, for the original release of Star Wars- Episode IV: A New Hope in May of 1977.  Since then, the Star Wars movies have been through a lot.  Now comes the next do-over for George Lucus...

From a news story-

"Finally, fans can see Jar Jar Binks in glorious three dimensions!

"Star Wars: Episode I The Phantom Menace" has an official 3D theatrical release date.

The first part in the space saga will hit theaters on Feb. 10, 2012.  The remaining 5 episodes will be converted to 3D and released about one year apart.

3D conversions are being overseen by Industrial Light & Magic."

Also-

The entire 6-film "saga" is being released on Blu-ray disc Sept. 27, 2011. 

http://www.amazon.com/Star-Wars-Complete-Episodes-Blu-ray/dp/B003ZSJ212/ref=sr_1_1?s=dvd&ie=UTF8&qid=1299602793&sr=1-1

After a little debate, I introduced Star Wars to my 2 older daughters last week, starting with Episode IV- A New Hope.  I'd considered starting with Episode 1- The Phantom Menace, but decided to go in order of their release.  Also debated, the original version or the "enhanced" version.  I went with the enhanced, mostly due to the improved special effects in the latter trilogy, Eps 4-7.  By the way, they loved it! 

[Bigsky]

This is sweet news...I remember when the re-mastered movies came out and how everyone was dressed up at the theater. I habitually watch The Clone Wars on the Cartoon Network...great series, you should check it out. How old are your girls? I have a 4 year old daughter who  might be ready...

[johnnYYac]

This is sweet news...I remember when the re-mastered movies came out and how everyone was dressed up at the theater. I habitually watch The Clone Wars on the Cartoon Network...great series, you should check it out. How old are your girls? I have a 4 year old daughter who  might be ready...

Katherine is 9, Maddie is 7 next month, Lauren is 3 in July.  I actually started showing A New Hope a couple of years ago, when Maddie was 4.  They were bored with it and didn't last an hour.  I think Lauren was napping when we watched last week. 

My girls say many of their classmates are into Star Wars, but that means Eps. 1-3 and the Clone Wars series.  So, I figured I'd go retro with my kids.  If you start with Episode 1, you don't get the shock value of Darth Vader's admission to Luke at the end of Episode V (is a SPOILER ALERT necessary?) that he is Papa Skywalker or from Episode VI that Luke and Leia should stop making out.

[Jaimoe]

I too saw the original Star Wars at a drive-in in 1977, but I wasn't wearing my jammies; although I was only 9.

Lucas has done his best to ruin the Star Wars legacy. The last three movies are fucking brutal and his past tweeks of the original trilogy did little to make them better. In fact, he made them arguably worse.

3-D doesn't make films better and most films don't need to be in 3-D in the first place. Toy Story 3 is still a great film in 2-D, but Despicable Me becomes heavy average in 2-D as does 300, Beoulf and especially Avatar. del Torro quit The Hobbit I and II as director because the studio wanted to make the two movies in 3-D and he thought it would ruin the dark themes and horror that he intended to add to his version of the films.

Lucas the Hack realizes that he has no more good ideas and thus continues to find ways to cash in on his only viable cash-cow. On an aside, I think his animated Star Wars series is good.

[capt. scotty]

Lucas has done his best to ruin the Star Wars legacy. The last three movies are fucking brutal and his past tweeks of the original trilogy did little to make them better. In fact, he made them arguably worse.

I disagree with the most recent 3 being brutal. Phantom Menace was pretty bad with only a few highlights, but I though Attack of the Clones and especially Revenge of the Sith were both pretty good.

I'll probably get shunned for this, but overall I think the Star Wars series is quite overrated. I think with how ahead of their time and amazing they were when they came out they get more credit today for, where they good but nothing special IMO. They havent aged very well it seems. Hell, Alien came out just a couple years later and I still think that is fantastic.

[Jaimoe]

Lucas loves CG way too much. Where's the suspense and drama of having humans battle robots and CG characters or even worse, robots fighting robots such as we see in Attack of the Clones? It's hard to get involved with CG characters since they have no soul, Gollum excluded.

I agree that Sith is pretty good, but prequels by design are anti-climatic since we already know the fates of the main characters. 

[johnnYYac]

I agree with all those who find Lucas to be milking the Star Wars franchise for all its worth.  His love of CG and, apparently, 3D puts more focus on effects and less on story.

I agree with those who found the prequel trilogy to be disappointing, big time, especially Ep. 1.  Lucas manages to take GREAT actors (Liam Neeson, Ewan MacGregor, Natalie Portman, Hayden Christensen, Samuel Jackson, Jimmy Smits) and make 'em suck.

The plot holes are HUGE!  Why doesn't Obi Wan recognize R2 or 3PO?  How is it he has Anakin's light saber to give to Luke?   And you'd think Darth Vader would have seen C3PO and been like "Holy shit!  I built you!  And here you are on Bespin!  Small galaxy!"   

But, hey, its STAR WARS!  So even the bullshit is awesome.  I mean... its STAR WARS! 

When Anakin's fried limbless body gets crammed in the Vader suit, the table gets raised, and he busts out of the wrist irons and clops onto the floor doing some sort of Boris Karloff spoof, part of me laughs, part of me cries, but I LOVED IT! 

Nooooooooooooooo!

[Jaimoe]

Although, johnnYYac, why should loyalty override logic when something once great begins to suck? The Simpsons has been largely unwatchable for the last 10 years, but there are some fans that still watch and give out forced loyalty laughs instead of the genuine kind. I know a few people who still watch the Simpsons and when I ask them why, they say: "I grew up with the show". It seems with certain Star Wars fans, its not all that different.

I'm a big Planet of the Apes fan and love Star Trek, but I can recognize that none of the Apes movies were any good after the original and Star Trek has several of hits and misses in its film and television catalogue. Heck, the Stones and Who should have packed it in in 1978.

[johnnYYac]

I guess I'm saying a bad Star Wars movie beats a good Twilight movie.  I've seen Ep. 4 dozens of times, Ep. 5 dozens of times, Ep. 6 maybe 4 or 5 times, Ep. 1 maybe twice, Ep. 2 maybe twice, Ep. 3 maybe 3 times.  Its all proportional. 

Have The Simpsons gone downhill?  Yep.  But I watched it last week for the first time in a while and its far better than most of the crap on TV. 

Anyway, they're just movies and take up 2 hours of your life. 

[Jaimoe]

I guess I'm saying a bad Star Wars movie beats a good Twilight movie.  I've seen Ep. 4 dozens of times, Ep. 5 dozens of times, Ep. 6 maybe 4 or 5 times, Ep. 1 maybe twice, Ep. 2 maybe twice, Ep. 3 maybe 3 times.  Its all proportional. 

Have The Simpsons gone downhill?  Yep.  But I watched it last week for the first time in a while and its far better than most of the crap on TV. 

Anyway, they're just movies and take up 2 hours of your life.

To us mature 40+ folk like you and me they are just movies, but tell that to the hundreds of thousands of losers that fill any Comic-Con or lineup for weeks before the premiere of the next Twilight flick. I work with this Bible-thumping engineer that can speak fucking Klingon! Yes, he's single.

[aMillionDreams]

Never seen it.  Not all the way through.  I don't really get into Science Fiction.  I've tried to watch it a few times but, sorry, it's boring!  I don't get why it's "cool" to be into Star Wars among people my age.  People my age weren't born when the first one came out.  Is it the advent of the VCR that made Star Wars a cult hit?

[Jaimoe]

   Is it the advent of the VCR that made Star Wars a cult hit?

No, but it didn't hurt. But it wasn't just a cult hit, it became one of the biggest films ever.

[lyricjunkie]

I have a 10 year old son who absolutely LOVES Star Wars and everything he can read, watch or learn about it.  He had the Lego Star Wars games and all the movies (that his dad saved in case one day his son would enjoy them) and he even dressed as a Clone Trooper for Halloween this past year.  So as far as I'm concerned... Star Wars Rocks....even the new cartoon.   

[iLikeBeer]

This is sweet news...I remember when the re-mastered movies came out and how everyone was dressed up at the theater. I habitually watch The Clone Wars on the Cartoon Network...great series, you should check it out. How old are your girls? I have a 4 year old daughter who  might be ready...

Katherine is 9, Maddie is 7 next month, Lauren is 3 in July.  I actually started showing A New Hope a couple of years ago, when Maddie was 4.  They were bored with it and didn't last an hour.  I think Lauren was napping when we watched last week. 

My girls say many of their classmates are into Star Wars, but that means Eps. 1-3 and the Clone Wars series.  So, I figured I'd go retro with my kids.  If you start with Episode 1, you don't get the shock value of Darth Vader's admission to Luke at the end of Episode V (is a SPOILER ALERT necessary?) that he is Papa Skywalker or from Episode VI that Luke and Leia should stop making out.

Congrats on the introduction of your kids to Star Wars.  I got my girls to watch it for the first time 2 summers ago driving down to North Carolina.  My wife was taking a shift driving so I sat in the back with my girls and put in Episode IV.  I sold it based on the fact that there was a Princess in the movie!   8)  They were 6 and 4 at the time!