Red Letter Media’s final thoughts on the state of Star Wars were pretty insightful: It’s become a container with a very specific aesthetic that Disney can pile an infinite number of things into: multi-quadrant science fiction blockbusters, preschool cartoons, carnival rides, political dramas, kids adventures, whatever.
It’s since stopped being a finite thing anyone can love anymore. When something becomes everything, it loses distinctness. That distinctness, whatever it was, is what early fans originally fell in love with.
Of course, those original objects still exist, but you have to specify them. You’re an “original trilogy” fan or an Andor fan or the made-for-TV Ewok movies fan†, but saying you’re a Star Wars fan is basically meaningless now. And for people who proudly wore that mantle, through eyerolls and ridicule, that’s a genuine loss.
† Teek from Battle for Endor has a posse.
“Want to sell a lot? Just brand it Star Wars!”
The motivation for making a new show should be “We want to tell an amazing new story set within the Star Wars universe” but it’s actually “We want to make loads of money, therefore our new thing is going to be Star Wars.”
I’ve only seen ‘Attack of the Clones’, so I guess I’m a fan of that.
honestly, Disney’s treatment of the franchise killed my life long love for it
Lucas had already taken it out to the woodshed several times.
The franchise has historically been at its best in the fallow years, when people were just tapping into the IP to tell their own stories.
But you can say the same of Trek, of Harry Potter, of Marvel and DCU. Any time the suits take over, content trends towards slop
Agreed… however, I do have a specially dark and bitter place in my heart for Disney. They have a rotten touch and ruin every IP they buy
I mean, I generally like their original work. Moana, Lilo and Stitch, The Incredibles, Zootopia - all very entertaining, creative, and packed with talented performances.
And they can even make solid kids action movies. Disenchanted, Hocus Pocus, the original Pirates of the Caribbean, Tron - it’s clearly within the capacity of the studio to make good films.
When they buy up these outside franchises and “Disney-fy” them, though… Woof.
disenchanted was disney? i thought that was primarily a groening project.
Disenchanted, the movie. Not the Netflix cartoon. The feature length movie is a sequel to Enchanted, a live-action parody of the traditional Disney Princess trope.
I thought Incredibles predated the Disney takeover? Otherwise I agree
The sequel came out in 2018 and was enjoyable
LucasArts did some of the best Star Wars games. I loved Jedi Outcast, best jedi experience out there, and X-Wing Alliance thanks to the amount of ships the game gave you
I have watched every single Star Wars movie in theatres since I was a kid and they released the special editions in theatres. But last Jedi was so bad that I didn’t even bother to go see rise of skywalker. Not just in theatres, i still haven’t watched it to this day.
how will you learn how palpatine came back for reasons now?
so you haven’t watched every single star wars movie in theatres since you were a kid
I still haven’t seen 9. I just stopped being interested in Star Wars after seeing 8 in theaters. I wasn’t a Star Wars nerd or anything but I did really enjoy everything Star Wars until seeing episode 8.
I absolutely love the Republic/Imperial Commando series by Karen Traviss which ended in a massive cliffhanger because Disney took over and didn’t allow her to continue.
Fuck Disney, all my homies hate Disney!
There are dozens of us!
I’ve actually come to dread when they add a sequel to a good movie.
For every Terminator two there’s a Phantom menace.
It’s sad. For almost ten years people have argued about what went wrong with Star Wars.
Too many genres? The EU was scattershot and unfocused at times, but never hurt the brand in a significant way. In fact, it led to some great books and games
Too much politics? The villain of TPM is named after Newt Gingrich, and nobody really cared. ANH was inspired by Vietnam, and was still a box office hit.
The fanbase hates (insert minority)? While the internet has magnified the extreme weirdos, all six films have some mix of assertive female leads and non-white characters. Lando blew up the Death Star, Mace Windu was considered second only to Yoda. Every clone, etc. Still had a successful brand. Clone Wars focused hard on the clones and is put above the prequels by many of the hardcore fans. This isn’t to say there aren’t awful people who acted unhinged, but that goes for basically every large group of people in human history, let alone fandoms on the internet.
The answer is quality of writing. The originals were written well, and had coherent world building. The prequels struggled with character writing and general complexity, which is why they are more divisive. Good writing is the difference between the comedy of C-3PO and Jar Jar. It’s the difference between Luke and Rey. And it’s the difference between soul and slop.
The people at Disney either don’t understand this, or don’t care. It is an organization of Nico Harrisons who don’t understand the fundamentals of their industry. This pattern has been repeating across pop culture since the 2010’s, and was blamed on culture war instead of the real issue. It’s a miracle that something like Rogue One or Andor was ever greenlit.
Also, did you know the box office drop-off between 4 and 5 is the same, down to the percentage point, as the drop-off between 7 and 8? And yet, 5 is the most beloved, while 8 had so much backlash that Disney panicked and turned 9 into damage control, instead of working off of 8.
The difference? ESB is well written. TLJ broke space combat entirely for a cool visual. I don’t want to absolve TFA, which gets off way too easy because of what followed, but this comment is already too long…
It wasn’t just panic over fan backlash that made them screw up 9. 8 basically left them nothing to work with to get to the ending they wanted. Especially with the tragic loss of Carrie Fisher, who was meant to be the central character of 9.
That was down to a critical lack of planning.
I dunno if Disney cares much about the writing so long as the property makes money. It’s hard to determine the cash return on streaming shows, though the viewership numbers definitely point towards a trend. Disney likes to characterize the production process as a product in an of itself, but subscribers are unlikely don’t translate that into viewership past the first couple episodes 🤷♂️
Yeah, I just stopped paying attention altogether. The sequel trilogy is worse than the Holiday Special lol. I saw Rogue One and I was bored to tears. The Outlaws game requires an EA account to play. Star Wars is dead to me.
I saw Rogue One and I was bored to tears
Alright, hold up
I like Rogue One, but for the life of me I can’t figure out why people love Rogue One. It’s a decent enough Dirty Dozen riff in a Star Wars Skin Suit, but it has terrible pacing, a story that didn’t particularly need to be told, unengaging leads (rewatch after Andor helps some but not entirely), and too much fan service. It’s nice that it allows some whisps of moral ambiguity into the Rebellion, and it’s absolutely saved by the climactic battle, but I do not get the universal and enthusiastic acclaim.
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. Episode 8 is better.
I can’t figure out why people love Rogue One.
On its face, its a good movie. I think what put it over the top was the way in which they folded the final scene so neatly into the opening scene of New Hope.
it has terrible pacing, a story that didn’t particularly need to be told, unengaging leads (rewatch after Andor helps some but not entirely), and too much fan service
Eh. Rewatched it recently and I’ll spot that it feels like three shorter films stapled together. But they’re three good movies. I’ll also say that “story that needs to be told” is the absolute wrong philosophy for the Star Wars setting. The show is at its best when its just people bumping around the Galaxy in the shadow of the tentpole events. You could write a Star Wars sitcom that’s just imperial bureaucrats fucking around in the style of The Office and it could be solid gold. Hell, that’s on-and-off what made The Mandalorian so good.
Lucas made a fun setting full of creative little asides and bits of exotic Sci-Fi art that anyone would peel off and do their own thing with. That’s what makes it so great for video games, TTRPGs, EU novels, comedy sketches, amateur art renditions, cosplay… The franchise is this elaborate sandbox full of fun little toys. Just grabbing a few and swinging them around is fun, whether or not you have the whole history of the extended universe committed to heart.
Also, incidentally, what makes “We’re doing the Death Star again” so hack. You don’t need to build a new death star when you can just play with the one you’ve already got. Test firing on Jedha is fun. Running around a construction site full of spare Death Star parts is fun. Rescuing an engineer is fun. Getting stuck in a trash compactor on the detention level is fun.
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. Episode 8 is better.
I don’t think you really have to choose. You also don’t really need to throw $30M at every episode (or whatever Andor’s budget was) to have fun in the setting. One reason I enjoyed Solo so much was in how it got back to that slumming-it style of Star Wars. The little vinette of Han as an imperial commando trying to survive the trenches of some mudhole was perfect Star Wars material and didn’t require a metric fuckton of CGI to pull off.
Isn’t Outlaws Ubisoft?
Yes, but regardless, the real LucasArts Outlaws is on GoG.
OH MARRRRSHALLLLLLLL!!!
Oh yeah, I confuse them. My bad.
The original trilogy is enjoyable, and The Empire Strikes Back stands out as the strongest of the three.
Andor is top tier, with Rogue One serving as a decent conclusion.
Beyond that, nothing else really leaves a lasting impression for me.
“Which did you like better? ‘Jedi’ or ‘The Empire Strikes Back?’”
“‘Empire.’”
“Blasphemy.”
“‘Empire’ had the better ending. I mean, Luke gets his hand cut off, finds out Vader’s his father, Han gets frozen and taken away by Boba Fett. It ends on such a down note. I mean, that’s what life is, a series of down endings. All ‘Jedi’ had was a bunch of Muppets.”
Trek, baby.
Call me when they make a competency porn series again.
I’m over emotion trek.
Star Wars, Star Trek, Marvel, DC; it’s all creatively exhausted corporate entertainment product at this point.
The next time they reboot superbatspiderman is gonna be better for sure. who doesnt want to see another origin story of fucking spiderman
The sequel trilogy sucks. Nothing they (Disney) come out with comes to par with TOR which was for the few trailers it had, were the only thing that captured the essence and vibe of Star Wars since the original 2D Clone Wars animated show. The Mandalorian is alright but it has too many Disney aspects to it that remind of how they mucked up sequel trilogy. GL failed us and sold the franchise to this realms Jabba The Hut.
Me thirty years ago. In 1977 my entire life revolved around Star Wars. Still haven’t seen the last movie
Same. 8 was such a ridiculous clusterfuck of a film that I lost all interest in seeing 9.
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Did you have that pop up book?
Is that the one the came with a vinyl for the audio? My dad had one of those that we dug out of my grandma’s basement
I just remember a thick book with thick pages, it popped open to a scene from ANH and you could move some of the things. We also had a blue LP that had the Cantina Band song on it.
Not that I recall. I do have a toy chest full of SW stuff but i don’t think that’s in there
Let me blow this wide open. I don’t think anything went wrong with it, there was just too much Star Wars and I stopped caring. The same with Marvel stuff , I watched it all and then bam I couldn’t be bothered to watch Endgame and I haven’t watched any since. And I’ve always been more of a Trekkie. I watched every single episode of every season of every Star Trek but I just can’t be arsed to watch the last seasons of New Worlds, it is fine but I have had my fill. Or maybe I got old and it just doesn’t do it for me any more?
This whole thread is just ignoring Clone Wars, Rebels & Bad Batch. (And the “Tales of” series.)
I view television as an inferior form of media to film when it comes to a series like this.
If you can make it good in the length of a movie, that’s more impressive than doing it over multiple episodes and it doesn’t take 20 hours to get there.
I have ADHD.
different media have different goals and require different writing skillsets. sometimes the story is better in long format compared to being abbreviated.
The last Star Wars movie I enjoyed was Jedi: Survivor.
Ironically, the last Indiana Jones movie I enjoyed was Indiana Jones and the Great Circle.
so you prefer cinematic games to movies? no criticism, that’s just what it looks like. me too.
It’s total happenstance that the best stories told in those worlds have come from game developers. Making those stories interactive as well as cinematic is an entire extra layer of difficulty upon the creative process, and they cleared that hurdle too.
Jedi Survivor even made the struggle of staying human, confronting anger (and the dark side), and the fight for survival far more nuanced and well-written than the third trilogy did.
