Challege: Improve George Lucas' Career

Stolengood

Banned
You could always make the Warner Bros.-backed American Zoetrope more successful; they had five movies after THX 1138 that were lined up to produced, including Apocalypse Now (to be directed by Lucas) and The Conversation -- who's to say Star Wars wouldn't have been added on after the fact, if Warner Bros. hadn't bugged the fuck out at THX?
 

Archibald

Banned
bringing this back to life if only for the Young indy chronicles. Wikipedia has some intensive coverage, yet otherwise the series seem largely forgotten - even on this board. :)
Does someone remind this series ? Or even watched them ?
Just stumbled on an episode - got mixed feelings about it.
Just curious...
 
bringing this back to life if only for the Young indy chronicles. Wikipedia has some intensive coverage, yet otherwise the series seem largely forgotten - even on this board. :)
Does someone remind this series ? Or even watched them ?
Just stumbled on an episode - got mixed feelings about it.
Just curious...


I seen several episodes of the series and I have to say it wasn´t very good. It tried to hart to be a history-drama, always shoveling cameos of historical persons in it. You know, Indy meets Picasso, DeGaulle, Lenin, Pancho Villa etc. etc.. I assume for people not interested in history it was kind of boring and for people interested in history the history was to faulty. And it doesn´t really felt like Indiana Jones movies. I mean an Indiana Jones movies normaly has mystical elements. Just one episode had something like it, were Indy meets Dracula. And this episode was actually quite good.
 
I seen several episodes of the series and I have to say it wasn´t very good. It tried to hart to be a history-drama, always shoveling cameos of historical persons in it. You know, Indy meets Picasso, DeGaulle, Lenin, Pancho Villa etc. etc.. I assume for people not interested in history it was kind of boring and for people interested in history the history was to faulty. And it doesn´t really felt like Indiana Jones movies. I mean an Indiana Jones movies normaly has mystical elements. Just one episode had something like it, were Indy meets Dracula. And this episode was actually quite good.

I was mostly annoyed with the lack of a continuity. How on earth could Indy manage to be in the trenches in France, in Africa, in a POW camp in Germany and in the middle of the Russian revolution all at the same time
 
Here's what should happen:

Scenario 1:

-What should have happened is that after Star Wars success, he retires from that franchise. After Zahn popularizes it in the 90s, he passes the torch to Steven Speilsburg but is allowed to retain some of the ideas.

Scenario 2:

-He is kept to a creative role for the prequels, someone else directs it and improvises his idea into a more effective script.
 
Don't cast Jake Lloyd, remove all of Jar-Jar Binks' jokes (keep him around, just quiet outside the necessary Gungan scenes) and the Midi-chlorians scene and Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace will pretty much shoot up in the minds of every person who ever watched it.

I can't really clean up Episode II, which definitely my least favorite of the films, and as long as Ep. 1 is saved, I think Ep. 3 is saved by lack of association. I've always felt Ep. 3 was a mostly beautiful film that just gets lumped in with it's two inferior predecessors.

But overall? I'd say butterfly away all the extra anticipation and buildup. Don't let fans have such high expectations in the first place. Make the movie more of a surprise to people when it comes out, and I think they'd give it a lot more credit without the hype.

I'm relatively a kid, and I find Ep. 1 and Ep. 3 solid and enjoyable films - definitely inferior to their predecessors - and I chalk that up to the lack of hype for me for Ep. 1, and the fact I hadn't seen the original movies as such a younger person in comparison. To a certain degree, Ep. 1 was as much a part of my childhood as the OT.
 
EP II could have been saved if they had better actors to portray the romance arc from EP II and III. Or both good actors + a decent script. If the script is good the actors still could have sucked as.......

For Ep. I, remove Jar-Jar lines but keep him there just with odd alien language along with Battle Droid voices and midichlorians. Also don't cast Jake Lloyd and explicitly define that Obi-Wan is the main protagonist. I think Lucas' intentions was that TPM had a main character but it wasn't properly defined so we were left in the dust.

It wasn't just that Lucas couldn't write a good script, but Hayden and Natalie had almost no chemistry, so blame on both sides. Had they had decent chemistry, they could have in theory saved the script from it's problems.

I do sometimes find EPIII lumped with the prequels despite not being bad for it's day. However they should not have made the decision to make Anakin's motivation to go dark side based solely on attempt to save Padme, should be misguided belief that Jedi is actually evil that had him turn on them.
 
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EP II could have been saved if they had better actors to portray the romance arc from EP II and III. Or both good actors + a decent script. If the script is good the actors still could have sucked as.......
I don't think Hayden's the only truly subpar actor. Natalie Portman didn't have much to work with for her character and did well for what she had, I think.

For Ep. I, remove Jar-Jar lines but keep him there just with odd alien language along with Battle Droid voices and midichlorians.
I think the Battle Droid voices can survive.

Then again, if the midi-chlorian scene had different dialogue, even that could be saved. But my point here isn't to re-write the script.

Also don't cast Jake Lloyd and explicitly define that Obi-Wan is the main protagonist. I think Lucas' intentions was that TPM had a main character but it wasn't properly defined so we were left in the dust.
Huh?

It wasn't just that Lucas couldn't write a good script, but Hayden and Natalie had almost no chemistry, so blame on both sides. Had they had decent chemistry, they could have in theory saved the script from it's problems.
Lucas has always been bad at writing romance. The most defining moment for Han and Leia was, after all, Harrison Ford ad-libbing. So just replace Hayden Christiansen I think.

I do sometimes find EPIII lumped with the prequels despite not being bad for it's day. However they should not have made the decision to make Anakin's motivation to go dark side based solely on attempt to save Padme, should be misguided belief that Jedi is actually evil that had him turn on them.
I think if they had included a few more quiet reminders about Shmi, a few more Palpatine manipulation lines, a couple more romantic Anakin/Padme lines, that issue could've gone away much easier than we'd think.
 
I don't blame the actors. Try delivering that dialogue and try acting in an 'epic' when all you're really doing is sitting in a sterile studio in front of a green/blue screen.

Lucas always had the sensibilities of a cartoon/comic book guy rather than a movie guy.

As technology advanced he could do more and more cartoon stuff and less about human character development.

In TPM there shoudn't have been a Qui Gon Jin. I'm not sure why Obi Wan couldn't have done everything. It would have also made the relationship with Annakin look closer. Instead it just looked like they were lumbered with each other in the later films and there was no real friendship at all.

The relationship between Annakin and Amidala was also forced and weak. It would have been better if Amidala had been shocked at how tall and handsome he was and tried to seduce him. Annakin would try to resist saying he was a Jedi but he still had a crush on her so he eventually gives in. It would have been more dramatic and believable.

That kind of thing was/is beyond Lucas's emotional capacity. He's just a kid fulfiling his fantasies.
 
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