Tuesday, September 12, 2006

Star Wars and its Inconsistent Jedi

In honor of the original, non-Special Edition Star Wars DVD release:

It's no secret that I absolutely hate the "Prequel Trilogy" of Star Wars. And by hate, I mean totalitarian hate. The only saving grace is the fact that the uber-beautiful Natalie Portman is in them. Other than that, I cannot name a single positive aspect about The Phantom Menace, Attack of the Clones, and Revenge of the Sith. Even their titles are stupid, save for Revenge of the Sith. Hell, I'm still trying to figure out exactly what "the phantom menace" is. A code word for bad movies? Yeah, that must be it.

Anyway, it's my hypothesis that George Lucas, while a visionary and an adept businessman, is a bad director (a fact that NO ONE can disagree with) and a horrible, horrible writer. Face it, people, he got lucky with American Graffiti. Other than that, and his "different at the right time" short films, he's crap. He didn't write The Empire Strikes Back, the best of the series, nor did he write Return of the Jedi. He didn't even write the novelization to Star Wars, a fact that recently crept into the limelight, despite taking credit for it for the last 30 years.

What's worse is that, when he does write, he takes no account for what is already written. I mean, is there anyone else that was wondering why Anakin and Obi-Wan simply didn't "Force push" those stupid metal-eating droids off of their fighters at the beginning of Revenge of the Sith? And why wasn't Morgan Freeman Mace Windu instead of Samuel L. Jackson? Oh, wait... Lucas is a businessman, not a director, that's why.

Okay, that's enough... on to the purpose of this "Inconsistent Jedi" rant... the, well, inconsistencies of the Star Wars movies. I'm not going to go over all of them, mind you, but enough to prove that Lucas had no clue what he was doing when it came to the prequel trilogy. Some of these are admittedly weak, but their very existence should help convince you of Lucas' ineptness when writing. Now... on to the show...

- In Episode IV, Darth Vader seems mum over the significance of his home planet. Anyone think that's a little, I don't know, weird?

- In Episode IV, Owen purchases C-3PO and R2-D2, quite obviously having never seen them before. It is revealed in Episode II, however, that Owen LIVED with C-3PO and had MET R2-D2 when Anakin showed up.

- In Episode IV, Beru, over conversation, implies that she knew Anakin rather well ("he has too much of his father in him."). In Episode II, they met for what? Two minutes?

- In Episode IV, Obi-Wan rather blatantly points out that he's never owned a droid (much less R2-D2). Um, yeah... should I even explain this one?

- In Episode IV, Obi-Wan states that Owen didn't want Anakin to get involved in the Clone Wars, which, among other things, implies that Owen and Anakin grew up together. In Episode II, the Clone Wars had just about started by the time Owen and Anakin met for the first time.

- Related to the previous point, in Episode IV, Obi-Wan states that Owen didn't want Anakin to leave Tatooine. Yet, when they finally meet in Episode II, Anakin wasn't exactly living on Tatooine, was he?

- Episode IV – Obi-Wan states that Darth Vader was a "young Jedi." In the prequels, Darth is clearly a Sith honorific.

- Episode IV, V, & VI – R2-D2 knows nothing. Episode III? R2-D2 knows EVERYTHING.

- A little more specific, in Episode V, R2-D2 clearly does NOT know Yoda. Episodes I, II, and III? Yes, yes he does.

- Episode V – Obi-Wan implies that he was not aware of Leia (also, his actions in Episode IV imply that he didn't know, but this is arbitrary)(conversely, in Episode VI he is quite clear that he knows who she is, although Yoda may have told him in Episode V)... BUT... Episode III – Obi-Wan was present during the twins' birth.

- Episode V – Obi-Wan clearly states that he was instructed by Yoda and in Episode VI, Obi-Wan clearly reiterates this. In Episode I, Obi-Wan is taught by none other than Qui-Gon Jinn.

- Episode VI – Leia states that she remembers her real mother. Episode III – Padme dies during childbirth. I guess this means that Leia's cognitive memory formed at an early age, right?

- Episode V – in delirium, Luke repeatedly moans "Yoda" and nobody seems to know what it means. Episode III – Chewbacca and Yoda were clearly friends (sure, Luke and Han may not have mentioned Yoda to anybody, but how likely is that?)

- Episode V – Darth Vader does not recognize C-3PO, despite having built him in Episode I (true, Vader never actually saw C-3PO in person in the original trilogy, but come on...).

- Episode V – Darth Vader does not seem to know who R2-D2 is (and vice versa). Episode I, II, & III? HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Actually Vader is in the carbon freezing chamber with Threepio...and Threepio is quite talkative throughout.

Yeah, there are alot of inconsistensies...I wonder sometimes if Lucas even watched the OT while writing the new ones. (Evidence suggests that no, he did not.)

Posted by Geoffry on September 12, 2006 - Tuesday - 1:01 PM

Anonymous said...

Oh, damn... I totally didn't realize... Well, that just PROVES my theory.

Posted by JeffScape on September 12, 2006 - Tuesday - 1:09 PM

Anonymous said...

Preach the word, brother. Amen.

Posted by **JEAN** on September 12, 2006 - Tuesday - 8:21 PM

Anonymous said...

You suck for deleting my comment.

This is war.

Posted by Jessica Lynn on September 16, 2006 - Saturday - 10:46 PM

Anonymous said...

i thought they were so bad i couldn't even stomach the idea of wasting a single moment picking out what was bad with it, although much of what's wrong with them is glaringly obvious.

and yeah, he's a shitty director. great at visuals, effects, and set design, but terrible at writing and directing.

hollywood blacklist here we come.

Posted by Johnny O™ on March 25, 2007 - Sunday - 4:56 PM

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