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-   -   OT: An Open Letter To George Lucas (http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/showthread.php?t=30243)

Atrocities September 11th, 2006 04:20 PM

OT: An Open Letter To George Lucas
 
I found this on the Maxocg forums. Thought it was kind of interesting.

Quote:

$TAR WAR$: AN OPEN LETTER TO GEORGE LUCAS
An Empire in ruins


Dear Mr Lucas,

Stop. Please just stop.

I can’t take it anymore. A writer more talented than you (not including my 5 month-old nephew) once wrote: “Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, or to take arms against a sea of troubles, and by opposing end them.” Well now is the time when I can no longer suffer and must take arms against your money-grabbing, face-urinating evil ways. You cannot understand my pain; it is beyond your autistic, self-important ivory-towered existence where toadying henchman agree with your every utterance and you wipe your puckering [censored] with the money of eager fans. You have no idea how hard it now has become to be a Star Wars fan. Where once we stood proud (ignoring the convention-goers of course) and held aloft our lightsabers proclaiming “May the force be with you,” now we cast sad eyes upon the ruins of a once great Empire, wiping away a tear as we turn our back upon a legacy and admit, finally, we were wrong.

I, like so many others deceived, stood in line for The Phantom Menace daring to hope that, after 20 years, we would once more be amongst our childhood dreams and heroes. And, like so many others, we filed outside afterwards confused and doing our best to convince ourselves that we enjoyed what we had witnessed. I agree that expectation would never match what would be delivered onscreen, but it felt like a dagger to the heart to witness the gutless excuse of a movie you actually produced. But we took strength and drew hope that Attack of The Clones would prove Menace to be no more than you finding your feet after so many years away from directing and writing. But no, Attack of The Clones was just as poorly executed as Menace. It just had more flashing lights and videogame set-pieces with a little less of that Rasta-haddock Jar Jar Binks. Finally, it was with a heavy heart that I welcomed Revenge of The Sith, accepting it was going to, in the parlance of our times “suck ***.” So great was my reluctance to accept this onrushing faecal juggernaut as the closure to a lifetime’s love of Star Wars that I watched it on pirate DVD. I couldn’t allow myself to give you more of my money simply to watch it for the sake of it completion. To this day, I haven’t bothered to watch Sith on legit DVD nor purchase it – because a shiny [censored] is still a [censored].

I bought the originally trilogy on VHS way back when, it was a regular staple of my movie diet. I went to see the Remastered versions at the cinema because I was a child when they were originally released and wanted to see them again playing wide and loud. And I bought those again on VHS because I’m a fanboy tool. I bought the Star Wars monopoly board game because I’m a fanboy tool. I should’ve known better after The Phantom Menace, but I bought that on DVD because I thought maybe you would include all the cool stuff in the Deleted Scenes section, because there was no way that turgid film was the real Star Wars movie, it couldn’t possibly be. But nope, there it was in my living room in all its THX mediocrity. And I watched Attack of The Clones and bought that on DVD, knowing better but powerless to resist my fanboy urges. And I bought the Original Trilogy on DVD, despite them having pointless additions because I’m a fanboy tool. Now I learn that you are, yet again, re-releasing them on DVD. This time I can get the original, as-seen-in-the-cinema versions as well as the butchered new editions.

Well no more, Mr Lucas.

You shall receive not one more penny from this fanboy tool. Because what was once great has now been reduced to little more than your personal ATM. Tweak an explosion here, insert a new awesome CGI monster called Bungfwap doing backflips and that’s another $400 million you can stuff in your goitre. Nope. Not going to happen. And I’ll tell you why, Mr Artistic Integrity who cried into his beard when Warner told you to edit THX 1138 because it made no sense and was, to be honest, rubbish. You have too much [censored] money.

You have entered your own planetary orbit where you are your own god and nobody has the balls to wrench the controls from your hands as you wilfully sail The Millennium Falcon into the sun.
Whereas you enlisted help with the original trilogy because even your own friends told you the script was piss-poor, you reached such a level of power and autonomy based on those original movies that none of your underlings dared to whisper “Maaaan, George hasn’t got a clue what he’s doing.”
I mean, how do you go from “The circle is complete, now I am the master” and “May the force be with you” to Anakin and Padme rolling about in a field riding CGI cows saying “I love you more, no, I love you more,” huh? That’s another matter entirely: over the course of three really, really dull films, you have reduced Darth Vader from one of the quintessential, all-time-great movie villains into a whiny teen full of angst because his Jedi teacher might tell him off for levitating space-fruit in an effort to woo his beloved.

My child will be born January 2007, and I’m looking forward to sharing it’s first experience of watching classic movies. And you know what? [censored] your new Star Wars movies, they’re out of the picture. It will be Star Wars (stick the New Hope subtitle up your ***), Empire and Jedi – burned onto DVD from the original VHS. And only when they’re old enough to realise your fall from grace will they be able to watch the new ones, because I don’t want to have to explain to a crying child why Han Solo, Princess Leia, Chewie and Luke have been replaced with Pikachus, cut-scenes from Halo and a middle-aged man refusing help and writing himself up his own ***.

So no, I’ll not be buying this month’s reissued Star Wars movies. And I shall now go and thank my mother for giving away all my original toys to the goodwill store and apologise for treating her as a pariah all these years for saying “They were just toys.” Because that’s all they were – ancillary merchandise to allow you to build another wing on Skywalker Ranch to house your ever expanding ego. They weren’t symbols of my childhood dreams and hopes. They were plastic figures that should’ve been called “Ahahaha [censored] you, pay me” toys.

Besides, Tremors owns new Star Wars any day of the week.

Yours sincerely,


Jarena September 12th, 2006 12:39 AM

Re: OT: An Open Letter To George Lucas
 
That's pretty harsh.
Given, of course, Lucas has become business-minded (as many successful artists do) I don't really think that these three new movies were made only to line the pockets of a man who, really, had more money than God from the get-go.
EVERYONE wanted more Star Wars. Lord knows I did. Everyone wanted him to make them, and he said he was going to, and he did. The problem, however, was that he was completey unable. He lost what made the Trilogy incredible. There's an old quote that basically attests to the fact that truly moving art is born of pain and struggle. Lucas is a well-established industry god. He's not trying to prove anything to anyone any more. He's not working within a budget with a team of only what he can afford being stifled by the technology of the day that he had to struggle to work around. He doesn't have any of those pressures or hardships any more. He can squeeze out a half-assed script and turn three movies into a uninteractive video game because, basically, he's all alone. Who's to tell him otherwise? There's never a time where he has to revert to a creative camera angle in some back-studio set that's carefully painted to give the impression that they're in a space ship - he says the word and a multimillion-dollar team of 3D artists makes him any starship he could ever want.
Everything in this universe takes the path of least resistance. It's why planets are round, it's why water collects at the lowest point, and it's why the new trilogy sucked balls - Lucas didn't have anything to prove, he had nothing to give us.
I wouldn't be too quick to blame the man, though. If anything it's sad. HE can't do it. The creator of Star Wars can't revive his creation. It's gone.

Hunpecked September 12th, 2006 01:09 AM

Re: OT: An Open Letter To George Lucas
 
Dear Fanboy,

Considering how much of my merchandise you've already bought, I couldn't care less if you never spend another penny on the Star Wars franchise.

In other words, so long and thanks for all the cash.

Sincerely,

George Lucas

http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Black_Knyght September 12th, 2006 02:03 AM

Re: OT: An Open Letter To George Lucas
 
Oh ouch !!!

Atrocities September 12th, 2006 02:14 AM

Re: OT: An Open Letter To George Lucas
 
R O T F L M A O - Great One!

Atrocities September 12th, 2006 02:27 AM

Re: OT: An Open Letter To George Lucas
 
Troops

Renegade 13 September 12th, 2006 03:48 AM

Re: OT: An Open Letter To George Lucas
 
Quote:

Jarena said:
It's why planets are round, it's why water collects at the lowest point...

I hate to be pedantic, and your point is well made, but gravity might argue with you about it being the path of least resistance that leads water to the lowest point or planets to be round.

I know, I know, a moronic point to make, but I'm tired and felt like typing something. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/smile.gif

dogscoff September 12th, 2006 05:55 AM

Re: OT: An Open Letter To George Lucas
 
OK, get onto your favourite torrent site, and download "Changes", which is episode two of season two of "Spaced". That sums up a great many people's feelings about the Phantom Menace right there. Watch it, p:ss yourself laughing at what I consider the funniest thiry minutes ever committed to film, change your underwear and then go buy both series on DVD (currently just six quid for them both here *). I promise you'll never regret it.

*Yes, I get a referal payment if anyone buys from that link, but it's a good deal and believe me I would be recommending it anyway: Spaced is my all time favourite TV program of all time ever. Please buy it, not because I get a few pence, but because it's sheer genius and I want everyone to laugh as much as I do every time I watch it.

Raging Deadstar September 12th, 2006 08:50 AM

Re: OT: An Open Letter To George Lucas
 
Quote:

dogscoff said:
Spaced is my all time favourite TV program of all time ever. Please buy it, not because I get a few pence, but because it's sheer genius and I want everyone to laugh as much as I do every time I watch it.

This man is an oracle of truth, along with Stephen Colbert. I finally picked up both seasons of Spaced on DVD. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...es/biggrin.gif

If you haven't heard of it the show stars and was made by the same guy who stars and made Shaun of the Dead.

Hugh Manatee September 12th, 2006 09:27 AM

Re: OT: An Open Letter To George Lucas
 
I don't get why people are so pissy about the new trilogy, I liked it, I had fun, it was a good enough movie, just like the OT. The only real difference was it had about 30 years of hype that it could never live up to where the original kinda came outa nowhere with new visual FX technuques that stunned audiences. The OT was just as cheesey(alien swing band, glowy light swords, aerodynamically retarded fighters, man-bear-thing called of all things "wookie"), poorly acted(I mean come on carrie looks lude'd up in every scene, harrison was practically phoning it in, and I'm sorry, I like the guy's voice acting but hammill is not good in movies) and had as much bad turns of phrase as the new(in whiney "aww I wanted to go to the toshi station and pick up some power converters"). Also I'd say the sand people, jawas and ewoks are about as insensitive to certain ethnic and handicapped groups as as jar jar.

Star Wars has always been a large budget cutting edge FX film with a cheesey space epic story line, Jarena was right, everyone asked for it, they begged for it. They got it it wasn't good enough. I think being that the original star wars was worked out to stand on it's own more or less helped it, helped it become a phenomanon in it's own right, and peopleshould consider themselves lucky that the guy still has an interest in telling more of the story after about 30 years.

If anyone else was in GL's shoes, they'd do the exact same thing, with all the matketing, editing and exploitation, anyone who says otherwise is a liar.

Jarena September 12th, 2006 11:33 AM

Re: OT: An Open Letter To George Lucas
 
Quote:

Renegade 13 said:

I know, I know, a moronic point to make, but I'm tired and felt like typing something. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/smile.gif

Haha, I thought that was the point - it wuld take more energy for a planet to make itself square or for water to flow uphill because of gravity.

RonGianti September 12th, 2006 12:46 PM

Re: OT: An Open Letter To George Lucas
 
I would have been with you, except that EPIII blew me away. I and II were disappointing, but III was awesome. To each his own I guess...

Renegade 13 September 12th, 2006 04:20 PM

Re: OT: An Open Letter To George Lucas
 
Quote:

Jarena said:
Haha, I thought that was the point - it wuld take more energy for a planet to make itself square or for water to flow uphill because of gravity.

You are indeed correct...that'll teach me to type while tired http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...ies/tongue.gif

NullAshton September 12th, 2006 05:02 PM

Re: OT: An Open Letter To George Lucas
 
Yeah, Episode III was awesome. Episode I and II... eh, II has too much mushy love stuff. I was okay, but the ending battle kind of sucked.

Atrocities September 12th, 2006 07:17 PM

Re: OT: An Open Letter To George Lucas
 
EP III had very bad timing issues. Little things that just annoyed me too no end. The flow and timing was off and bits of it seemed contrived and way too unimaginative for my tastes. Overall the movie is better than EP I or II but falls way way short of EP VI. EP IV was the best, V was awsome, VI was ok but better than EP I.

NullAshton September 13th, 2006 10:32 AM

Re: OT: An Open Letter To George Lucas
 
It connected episodes I-II, and episodes IV through VI. Plus that battle at the end was really, really cool.

And IV is better than V? Come on! V had the hoth battle, and of course the "I am your father!" stuff. Plus Luke gets jedi training, gets a lightsaber, and the lightsaber battle in Episode V was much better than IV. Plus the escape from Bespin was cool.

Captain Kwok September 13th, 2006 11:29 AM

Re: OT: An Open Letter To George Lucas
 
I really like the visuals of Star Wars and all the ships and stuff, but the actual movies themselves have always been less than stellar by other merits like acting or dialogue etc.

RonGianti September 13th, 2006 01:54 PM

Re: OT: An Open Letter To George Lucas
 
The thing that George Lucas accomplished, which is rarely (and unfairly) not mentioned is that he was really the first person to write and direct a SciFi movie that tried to treat its story seriously, instead of the 3 decades of "look what I can do!" and "ohhh, a shiney spaceship!".

His dialog is lacking, but the story is really good and imaginative. What else has spawned so many spin off books, cartoons and video games? Maybe its not Great, but its the Greatest there is.

Captain Kwok September 13th, 2006 02:14 PM

Re: OT: An Open Letter To George Lucas
 
Another thing to consider is how much money he has put back into developing new technologies for the industry, which has certainly improved the movie-going experience for all.

gregebowman September 13th, 2006 07:00 PM

Re: OT: An Open Letter To George Lucas
 
As someone who saw the original SW trilogy in the theatres, I can certainly sympathize with Fanboy's sentiment. Lucas lost whatever creative urges he had a long time ago. After waiting 16 years from ROTJ to Menace, i was disappointed. Maybe if he had hooked up with Gary Kurtz again, maybe a halfway decent plot would have come up. Instead, he did what most modern directors of films do, rely on special effects to carry the plot. Unfortunately, it didn't work in TPM. At least he heard some fans and toned down Jar Jar for the rest of the trilogy. And he should have gotten Lawrence Kasdan (?) to write the love scenes, since he did such a great job of it in Empire Strkes Back. Also, he should have reread his notes before he wrote the screenplay for Revenge, since there were a couple of continuity errors. Unless people on Tattooine age more rapidly than elsewhere, there should have been another 10 year gap between episodes III and IV.

PvK September 13th, 2006 10:19 PM

Re: OT: An Open Letter To George Lucas
 
I like IV better than V, but wouldn't say either is necessarily better. IV is more of a complete story unto itself, while IV is a bit more like filler between the start and end of a trilogy, and the "training with a dull muppet who talks backwards" has never entertained me much. Getting lost in the snow wasn't very entertaining either, and was as dull for me as the whiney Luke parts at the start of IV. But I also think IV is better than the rest because it includes more non-hero combattants and shows their experience of dying in fear as they fight the forces of the Empire. E.g., the rebel troops on the blockade runner, and the fighter pilots dying one by one trying to attack the Death Star. That kind of thing isn't there as much in V and VI, but in I, II, and III it is almost entirely absent.

I think VI could be as good for me as IV and V if it was a little less straightforward, and if there were fewer cute/unbelievable muppets, like the Jabba's orcs, and of course the kiddy-panderingly out of place and ridiculously victorious Ewoks. If the Ewoks were much less campfire-teddy-bear-like and more alien and believable, and Palpetine's "entire legion of my best troops" were shown as actually competant and even frighteningly effective, but out-foxed somehow far more convincing than the slapstick log tricks etc., it could have been as good as the IV and V.

But although I've ranted on this before, the prequels are IMO so inferior that they inspire me to rail against them again.

The Phantom Menace: Has some good points, but way too many really bad points, at least for my tastes. Alec Guiness as Obi-Wan was of course excellent, but even the actors used could have been directed to show some degree of caution, concern, and smarts, instead of just being "yawn, we're Jedi so we just auto-parry everything and never get concerned by even ridiculous odds. We don't need to use tactics or cunning or anything. Out CGI powers of fakeness are |337. Ho hum are we there yet?" The Gungans and Jar Jar are just insanely embarrassing on so many levels I won't even try to explain. The pod race was a great example of how to make something extremely unconvincing and so impossible to relate to that there is no tension involved. 9-year-old Annakin being Mr. Unkillable Unconcerned Uber Warrior certainly makes him a great candidate for the prequel Jedi, but it just triple-underlines for me the complete error of having totally unconcerned heroes who should be in danger but aren't, and don't even pretend to be concerned. It just detonates any disbelief I might have left, as well as my interest and ability to do anything but balk and scream at the utter waste of resources.

I thought Clones (II) was better than TPM (I), but had the same fake-o lack of concern problems, and more fake-o unbelievable CGI and action scenes. R2D2 with levitation jets? Part of R2D2's character used to be his logical and amusing mobility problems - the mini jets letting him levitate and zip around in some sort of 3D platform-jumping computer game sequence on an assembly line with lava... AAAAAAAAGH! Then Natalie Portman and the Annakin Teen actor in the arena situation, their acting was the opposite of what I was talking about with the rebels in near-death situations in episode IV, and thanks to the CGI, it's not even convincing that they are there, either. That and the amazing CGI overindulgence of over-busy chaotic hyper-fast scenes with action everywhere and no one needing to ever take a second to figure out what the heck is going on around them - it's just like it's all choreographed and no one gets disoriented at all. Utterly unbelievable. I did like the fight with Christopher Lee, and even Yoda, and the surface combat was spectacular and at least more believable than the arena chaos.

I think TPM (III) was overall sort of good, and better than I and II, but again could have been ENORMOUSLY better with not much more application of taste, logic, acting, script, etc. I thought the preview I saw a year or two before III came out hinted at a far more interesting film that III actually was. Annakin's conversion to Vader could (should) have been much more dramatically interesting, convincing, and sympathetic. It could have been about the Jedi actually denying Annakin's right to be a Jedi and to be with Padme. And perhaps this and maybe other real dilemmas could have caused Annakin to rebel and betray the Jedi, causing him to get sliced and diced (a part I did like in III), and then secretly rebuilt as Vader by Palpatine, and then we could have seen Vader participate in Palpatine's attack on the Jedi, and we could see Vader taking revenge on the Jedi in nice wicked battle scenes where we could watch the Jedi getting terrified and overpowered, and not just backstabbed. Of course, III also suffered from the incompetant CGI problems where physics, reaction times, and rationality are disregarded and hand-waved in the interest of making hyper-extreme action that just reminded me of 6-year-old boys playing with toys and getting way carried away. Particularly the scene where they try to kill Obi Wan on whatever planet that is with the holes in the ground and silly amounts of kinetic excess are involved. The stuff going on mainly in the background of the opening space battle over Coruscant though was one of my favorite parts - really nice. I don't believe in air-to-air sabotage droid missiles, though, or the crash-landing-the-battleship-on-manual parts.

Possum September 13th, 2006 10:58 PM

Re: OT: An Open Letter To George Lucas
 
I'm with Fanboy, the guy who wrote the letter in the first post.

But I'd go even farther than he did. Even among the 3 movies of the original trilogy, there was a step downhill trend. Star Wars itself was dynamite; I saw it in the theatre when it was new and loved it.

The next two were a letdown. And the last one, with that incredibly stupid "ewok battle", where they trip the walkers with ropes, oh FFS, that was such trash.

And I'm old enough to remember THX1138, as well. I saw that when it was new also http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Renegade 13 September 13th, 2006 11:06 PM

Re: OT: An Open Letter To George Lucas
 
Quote:

Captain Kwok said:
I really like the visuals of Star Wars and all the ships and stuff, but the actual movies themselves have always been less than stellar by other merits like acting or dialogue etc.

This is my opinion as well.

Atrocities September 13th, 2006 11:55 PM

Re: OT: An Open Letter To George Lucas
 
Quote:


Dear Mr. Lucas:

I am a six year old first grade student and wish to offer my writing talents to you in the sincere hopes that you will NEVER again write another script so long as you live. After watching your writing skills come to life on the big screen in Attack of the Clones, a aptly crappyly named movie if there ever was one, it occured to many of us in my then, pre-school class, that you sir suck horribly as a writer and that any two year old with could have written a better movie script for episode II than you did.

Thank you for reading.

Sincerely;

Little Jimmy Smith

ROTFLMAO....

dogscoff September 14th, 2006 06:52 AM

Re: OT: An Open Letter To George Lucas
 
[image]http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2004/09/22[/image]

Penny arcade is teh cool.


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