OT: An Open Letter To George Lucas

[Atrocities]

I found this on the Maxocg forums. Thought it was kind of interesting.

$TAR WAR$: 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]

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]

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

[Black_Knyght]

Oh ouch !!!

[Atrocities]

R O T F L M A O - Great One!

[Atrocities]

Troops

[Renegade 13]

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.

[dogscoff]

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]

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.

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]

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.