I think the main problem with the prequels is Lucas should have taken the best parts from TPM and AOTC and made them into one movie, the first movie of the prequel trilogy. Having the Trade Federation as the main villain in Episode 1 and then having the Separatists return in Episode 2 was confusing, repetitive and wasted screen time. Similarly wasteful is having Palpatine become chancellor in Episode 1 and then repeating a similar story line when he approves the clone army. Child Anakin was irrelevant to the rest of the movies. He was so young for all intensive purposes he is a different character. We had to suspend disbelief to believe he could build a podracer or fly a starship.

The first half of the movie should be similar to TPM except Anakin is 14 instead of 9. When they get to Courascant Palpatine would get himself elected chancellor by promising to approve the clone army to defend against the Trade Federation and The Separatists. The Jedi Council would refuse to train Anakin because he's too old and a slave so Anakin would become Obi Wan's pilot. Against Padme's demands the Republic would attack the droid factory on Geonosis because it's of greater strategic importance than Naboo. Obi Wan would fight Darth Maul in the powerplant of the droid factory. Sensing something is wrong Anakin would run from his ship to save Obi Wan and use force pull to kill Darth Maul with his own lightsaber. At the end of the movie the Jedi Council are forced to train Anakin because he's too powerful and they are afraid of losing him to the sith. Darth Maul pulling his lightsaber out at the start of the duel would be the first time the audience realizes he is a sith lord and would mark their return.

I think this would have been an epic way to start off the new trilogy. It would explain how Anakin entered training as a Jedi, how Palpatine became chancellor, where the clone army came from and how Anakin met Padme. It would accomplish the task of explaining the setting for the prequels allowing the next movie to focus on character development. Making these changes would make the plot simple and easy to follow. The next movie could start with them saving Naboo, Anakin visiting his mom and show the development of the relationship between Anakin and Padme. It would end with the Republic losing to the Separatists as they make their way towards Courascant, preparing the audience for the start of Revenge of the Sith.

Adults wrote this movie....

Whenever you bring up these new streaming shows have such "new" looking clothes that generally look amateurish (looking at you everything to do with The Witcher), people will be like well these new studios don't have the large prop warehouses of old studios. Well, how does that explain how shitty the Jedi outfits look in The Acolyte?

I was looking at Qui Gonn's outfit while he was kneeling and waiting for the final part of his fight with Maul, and it looks very lived in and like he had actually been wearing it for a while. Disney is as old a studio as they come, so I'm just very confused why self-respecting costuming professionals on these shows have less pride and worse work than a bunch of people in an independent studio almost 30 years ago.

"According to the ancient way of Mandalore, a Mandalorian cannot remove his/her helmet in front of another living being. If he/she does that, then they will no longer be a Mandalorian"

Who the fuck wrote this shit? This reads like a fanfiction written by me when I was 6 years old. It nicely fits into the theme of taking small details from the movies and making them into it's own things. Like every character that appeared for more than a nanosecond has to have his own book or a comicbook with exciting backstory. Boba Fett always wore a helmet? He obviously had to be from a warrior culture where everyone wears a helmet because it's a tradition!

It's just so cringe for no reason. Mandalorians, especially bounty hunters could wear helmets most of the time for protection and concealing their real identity. Why make it a rule?

Throughout the entire series I could count on two hands the amount of times the Separatists win any battles, and that’s me being generous. When the bad guys often loose, and often in easy fashion, it removes any tension. The B1 battledroids are nothing but comic relief, which isn’t good when they make up the majority of Separatist screen time. General Grievous is a moustache twirling coward who lacks even the slightest bit of battle tactics. I could go on.

I though stormtroopers were supposed to be intimidating, not looking like they just saw their ex cheat on them. Whats even worse is that everyone thinks this is peak design. I can't be the only one right?

How much worse does Star Wars have to be before you quit? Not just quit watching, but actually give up thinking or caring about it.

Does it need to be twice as bad? 3x? Just 25% worse? Does it need to throw out the entire canon (again)? Is the next series being terrible finally going to break you or do you need another one? How about a whole trilogy of terrible films... again (and again)?

The myth is dead. The franchise is just drifting by on bugman inertia and sunk-cost fallacy right now. The people I know who still watch everything that comes out are either stuck in a zombie consumption-marketing loop, or recognise that they have Stockholm syndrome with Disney.

Look at the next post and the one before it. Is this really what you're going to pass on to the next generation? Will your kids and grandkids care how bad the Bad Batch was, or the Acolyte, or the next thing?

Probably not. They will probably find it better to just give it up after the OT (or the Lucas saga). Maybe you should too.

"A lot of people get confused about the Force. They see it as a special thing that you can pick up and put it on your head and suddenly you have the Force. Whereas it's always been designed so that every human being has the Force."

• George Lucas

This has always been apparent, especially with The Prequels but the Sequels and most specifically The Last Jedi present this notion as a wholly unique idea.

Luke has already been growing his skills in the Force when we meet him again in Empire, which takes place 3 years after A New Hope whereas the first two Sequels take place within a week of each other and Rey legit gets a "Force Download" in TFA.

Then Rian Johnson completely misunderstood the Force because he has Rey lifting rocks after only being taught about it after a couple of days or having Broom Boy at the end having complete control with his use of the Force and people think it's some profound statement by "democratizing" the Force.

It's annoying when trying to have discussions with people about the Sequels and The Last Jedi in particular because it's a *complete misunderstanding of Star Wars and the Force.

I've rarely been so underwhelmed as I have after the conclusion to The Bad Batch. After seasons one and two I thought it was overall on the positive side of Disney Star Wars. It had some really good moments, especially at the beginnings and towards the ends. Season three, however, was utter rubbish. A plot point is literally REPEATED in a single season. Nothing really happened. In season one and two, there were plenty of filler episodes, but at least watching them paid off when the actual plot thickened. I was invested then. In this season, nothing happens. They break out. Then they break out again. Not just that, but in this season, Omega seems unreasonably skilled. Sure, she is a clone. She is gifted, but she literally broke out of a "maximum security" prison twice, the Empire's "finest". A cool Legends character dies a meaningless death. And I could have sworn that at least Crosshair's arc would come full circle in his sacrifice, but no, literally nobody of importance dies, it felt so unfulfilled. Then that ridiculous scene where Omega still has her pin (of course) and stabs Hemlock and Crosshair literally shoots the handcuffs, which where obviously much closer to Omega than Hemlock himself. He could have just nailed him in the head, he wasn't even standing at the ledge. Worst of all, I was expecting a full-on Clone rebellion reminiscent of "The Last Samurai". Instead, we got what barely counts as a prison riot. It's really disappointing, they could have done much better in concluding this series, it had a lot potential. Thank you for coming to my Ted Talk, make sure to tune in when The "Acolyte" releases.

TLDR: Season three was a pile of pants (shocking news).

The design of what the Grysk look like have been revealed and they are disappointed.

What Grysk look like

If you were given free reign to design the Grysk in any way you want, what might they look like?

I've thought of two designs for them. The first is 7 to 8ft tall creatures who look like the Cabal aliens from Destiny but orange, wearing Elvis Presley style power armor and wielding sonic sound-based weapons. They are like if the Imperium of Man was ruled over by the greediest Rogue Traders.

The second design is mollusk-like, resembling a hybrid of aliens from Independence Day and the Great Race of Yith from H.P. Lovecraft's 'The Shadow Out of Time'. These Grysk would be a race of Dark Side empaths, with negative emotions, pain, and misery being like a drug or the sweetest wine to them.

What are your ideas for how the Grysk could look instead of having Stormtrooper helmets as the heads of aliens?

The MCU-style quips and gags feel so out of place.

Rey is not even a character and is just a self-insert. She acts as a vessel for the audience where you, as Rey, pilot the Millennium Falcon better than Han Solo ever could, use Force abilities without any formal training and take on and defeat the big bad.

It’s a shameless rip-off of A New Hope without the understand as to why A New Hope worked so well.

This was supposed to be a continuation of the OT, yet this movie is so obsessed with its mystery boxes. Why on Earth would you do this for the 7th installment of an established franchise?

So much to unpack, it’s a lot to write. I’m very much open to discuss!

I don't think any of us have much love for RJ because of what he intentionally did to the SW universe.

But what about other shows? Do you refuse to watch his stuff?

An example: My wife and I started up Poker Face because it has Natasha Lyonne from Orange is the New Black in it. Saw RJ as writer and director in the opening credits and I said out loud, "Well, I already hate this."

And the first episode turned out to have the same kind of dumb twist typically found in RJ movies/TV. My wife hated it, too, so we stopped watching after the first episode.

Anyone have such feelings?

https://comicbookmovie.com/sci_fi/star-wars/star-wars-the-phantom-menace-returns-to-theaters-and-find-surprise-box-office-success-for-25th-anniversary-a210818

Everyone seems to be enjoying the theatrical re-release of The Phantom Menace, myself included. Outlets act surprised that the "worst" Star Wars movie is so successful as a re-release, but there's more good will towards the Lucas films than ever it seems. Professional critics no longer control the narrative for what's good and bad Star Wars anymore.

Anyways, Star Wars has always been a theatrical experience; at a time where the films are more accessible than ever via streaming, audiences will still turn out to theaters. I'm glad Disney has rolled back the original decision to cancel the theatrical re-releases when they first purchased Lucasfilm.

Lately I've been hearing that the sequels are aimed at a younger audience. I don't even know any kids who have seen those movies, but I wonder if they succeeded.

I ask this because for me the sequels are an abomination that defecated on two generations that grew up watching Star Wars, but maybe that was Disney's plan from the beginning.

I need feedback from the community. Since childhood I've been the biggest fan of star wars I personally knew. I played every game, watched every movie, read as many comics as I could afford even though my family couldn't afford all the books and stuff, I was still happy for whatever I got from nearest comic shop. I loved every movie, every cartoon, I remember the old marketing and how it gave me chills, how even lego games made me feel epic - not to mention OLD REPUBLIC games and how they I think shaped my whole perception of the franchise bringing me into epicness of the Star Wars Legends world, vast and super atmospheric.

Anyway, fast forwards, we arrive at the Disney movies. I watched every single one - but after that I think I was so much disappointed that I kinda lost interest, which you could say that isn't what a fan should do but nonetheless. The only thing I watched later was Mandalorian and Kenobi, least partially.

But as epic as Mandalorian was, I never felt the same thrill watching Star Wars ever since that day.

Okay, now we arrive at the conclusion. Yesterday I opened Star Wars: The Force Unleashed for the first time in many, many years.

And it constantly hit me. The moment music played, amplified by epic feeling that the menu gave me, I just melted and wanted to cry, and I feel like tons of memories suddenly flew through me and at the end I felt some sort of regret that my favorite world of Star Wars isn't and will most likely never be what it is used to me.

Now I am not sure? Am I idealizing thee past through nostalgia lens and actually I shouldn't react like that? Is that reaction valid, did anybody experience anything remotely similar? I don't know.

https://preview.redd.it/69ld5zu6lsyc1.jpg?width=1280&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=beb44014d2ac7235797b6ac968469cd3aca1ccb4

(Spoilers for X-Men '97)

Right so I've been on X-Men '97 like a lot of people and I'm especially loving how they wrote Bastion in this show. I remember someone on this sub describing Thrawn in Ahsoka as a stupid person's idea of a smart person which really stuck with me. The biggest defense I've seen of Filoni's writing of Thrawn is that the heroes are just super competent, but frankly it just doesn't work. My biggest gripes after the first season ended was that we really have no clue what Thrawn's plan was upon returning to the main galaxy, and thus there's no investment which was just one of many, MANY things Filoni just didn't develop properly in the scripts.

In '97 we not only learn exactly who Bastion is as a character, but he's genuinely got the jump on the X-Men in the latest episode where he establishes himself as the main threat to the heroes and after what Magneto did I'm more invested in the next two episodes than I am in an entire new season for Ahsoka.

Just had to get that off my chest, maybe you guys have other thoughts...

I've talked about this here before, and I had a feeling I would be back here after the end of the final season. There was so much potential for TBB but they just squandered it and for the life of me I cannot figure out why. The finale was fine - good even, I enjoyed it and it rounded out the story. However there is so much more room to talk about more stories within this universe that they decided to continue.

I looked at TBB S1 and the differences are insane. The characterization, the risks they were taking, and then when it came to S3, they had one less episode then the last 2 seasons, and spent a good 15% of it focusing on single stories against dumbass monsters or animals that everyone will forget it's mindblowing. They absolutely ignore the Clone Underground save 2 episodes, they absolutely ignore Rex, they LITERALLY write Echo out of the story and give him NO fucking character development I am LOSING my mind over it. You have this character that has been around since 2008 and is now a full member of the squad who can't figure out his own identity and you don't give him ANY fucking development whatsoever? They bring him back for the last two episodes and while he does great work, they could have done so much more with it and his history within series. They fucked his character and just used him when they needed him, and then he literally waves goodbye and leaves. Don't get me started on the CX clones at the last bit. They were cool but I'm tired of them pulling out stupid ass uniforms and weaponry that clones had previously never used - also, your big bad guys don't seem very scary when they survive on screen for less than 25 minutes.

It felt like they sprinkled in anything about the other clones to keep anyone else drawn in hoping they would do something interesting with it but just threw it in at the end so that they could say they did something. TBB needed one or two more seasons to fill the story they were trying to tell imo - although if they had focused less on goofy, forgettable standalone episodes the story would have been rounded out better.

Rant over. I just want good Clone content and TBB writing mid most of the time outside of some incredible standalone moments and it's incredibly well done music and art direction. Also that Ventress episode sucked and was such a waste of an episodic timeslot.

It makes zero sense how he survives all his bullshit in the CW and is ALWAYS saved by plot

In the middle of a blaster fight? He stands there and nobody decides to shoot him or use a force ability on him.

Oh he’s got tubes to prevent force choke? Then rip those tubes off wtf? Plus it’s not going to save a crushed esophagus.

KO’d by Ahsoka then holds her hostage? Every character gets badly hurt by force abilities and he somehow is able to no sell it then KO her. Then cuffs somehow prevent her from using the force to defend herself? Then Anakin comes and gives in? There’s zero reason Anakin doesn’t just force crush his gauntlet or just break Bane’s hands to prevent him from doing anything. Bane could’ve been a vegetable in this scene

Clones have him at gun point outside of melee range? WHY BOTHER HOLDING HIM UP???? He’s literally committed violence and crimes against you. You have every right to set blasters to stun and knock him tf out. I’d say you could Swiss cheese him before he even turns around

Oh he’s facing both Obi wan AND Vos? Let’s write it so he gives TWO JEDI MASTERS A FIGHT. Like what? How do both Jedi masters not just immediately force grab him and turn mash him? If it’s for “Disney friendly reasons” throw him on his head and KO him immediately

Oh he’s gunna fight Boba? Let’s have him fight Boba after Boba has taken multiple blaster shots and had to endure combat. Then have him come in and “duel boba.” If he’s so badass and dangerous he should’ve been in the fight. Not taking advantage of a fatigued fighter. It gives you zero credence and again you are saved by plot reasons.

I could go on and on. But goddamn, there are so many better ways Bane can be a threatening character without so much BS plot devices to save his ass

Yes. I decided to torture myself. I honestly tried to go into it with an open mind to see how the sequels fit with George Lucas' story. Long story short, they don't. Visually, tonally, acting, and story-wise, from the moment Episode 7 came on it felt like we jumped into a different franchise that was plagiarizing Star Wars and not doing a very good job. It was rough. Even the acting this time around was worse than I remembered with a lot of actors portraying "meta Star Wars" kind of like a Scream movie. The humor was outright consistently bad and has aged horribly. Jokes that landed in theaters when they premiered are duds now. The plots were nonsensical especially in relation to the prior 6 films. It made me really miss the captivating weirdness George Lucas brought to the films. Episode 2 is not a good film but God damn is it hypnotizing and fun to watch. I can't say the same about any of the sequels this time around having found all of them pretty boring. Also, there was a HUGE drop off in audience attendance after Episode 6 was over and an even more pronounced drop off after Episode 7. This was at the El Capitan in Hollywood.

Yes, even more so than JJ Abrams and Rian Johnson whose unholy contributions were stab wounds to the Star Wars mythology. Nevertheless, those were only three movies relegated to some far off point in the Star Wars timeline, and we can be sure that Disney will never again allow Abrams or Johnson to come near the franchise. On the other hand, Filoni continues to produce more and more poorly written animated dreck (live-action too!) that bulldozes through both Canon and Legends lore. Now in some instances this is fine like with Andor replacing the lore of TFU. However with Filoni, his replacement is ALWAYS inferior. A few examples come to mind:

• Takes of the Jedi —> Tales of the JediAhsoka
• Dooku: Jedi Lost —> 40ish minutes of middling content from TotJ
• CWMMP —> TCW
• Ahsoka Novel —> 15 min Tales of the Jedi Ep.
• Delta Squad —> The Bad Batch
• Kanan Comic —> TBB pilot
• Heir to the Empire —> Ahsoka Show

In every case, his version is just shallow rip off that purposely butchers EU characters to prop up his OCs.

Rather than being a stab wound, Filoni’s influence on the Star Wars universe is more akin to an infection. Literally every section of the Star Wars timeline is tarnished and polluted by his poorly written, puerile slop: pre-TPM (Tales of the Jedi), CW era, post-RotS (Bad Batch, Tales of the Empire), pre-ANH (Rebels), post-RotJ (Ahsoka).

Now it’s one thing to water down the lore of a fictional universe, it’s another thing to completely alter fundamental lore in a way that’s universe breaking such as saying that anyone can become a Jedi e.g. Sabine in Ahsoka.

There seems to be a sort of underlying narcissism in Dave Filoni’s work. Everything he makes must be central to the core narrative of Star Wars. His work has a parasitic relationship to the main saga; he never makes anything truly original, only ever working in the shadow of another movie or novel made by far more talented writers (Heir to the Empire, OT, TotJ, etc.); but always, he tries to recontextualize those stories to place his characters at the narrative forefront. All of his OCs are kept alive inexplicably throughout the whole arc of the Skywalker story; often times long after their arcs have reached a natural and satisfactory ending point. Stylistically he relies far too heavily upon callbacks and cameos to keep his stories engaging. He constantly talks about George’s mentorship over him to give people the impression that he is a sort of inheritor to the Star Wars legacy, which legitimizes his fan-fiction. When he wants to be taken more seriously, he parrots the aesthetics of greater respected works like Blade Runner or Akira Kurosawa’s filmography, but always misses what made those films truly special. This became clearer than ever to me with Tales of the Jedi, a darker, self-serious series which attempted to paint itself as mature political and moral commentary (According to Filoni, long, drawn out scenes with no dialogue means his work is deep. He continues this gimmick in Ahsoka). However Ahsoka was released in the shadow of Andor, and when you directly compare how these two works approach the same themes, the surface-level nature of his writing becomes incredibly apparent.

Let us also not forget how completely hypocritical Filoni is when it comes to the treatment of writers' original characters. He's against anyone else writing for his own OC's (Ahsoka novel) and demonstrates this in his Tales of the Jedi retcons, yet he'll gladly take another writer's OC (Thrawn) and butcher their character beyond recognition. Filoni has a knack for taking once beloved characters and making them into shells of their former selves to bolster his preferred characters (what he did to Barriss to make Ahsoka look better is a prime example of this). But that's what you have to do when you don't have talent.

It’s astounding how someone so talentless acquired so much power and so much say over the most popular fictional universe on planet Earth. People say that if time travel was real, they’d go back in time to 2012 to stop Lucas from selling Star Wars to Disney. However, I’d go even further back to 2006 to stop Lucas from hiring Dave Filoni.

I loved watching that show when I was younger, but now I look at the list of episodes and I can’t remember half of them. And out of those that I do remember, I remember not liking half of those even as a kid. A lot of the plots and characters are very basic and the Separatists are never a viable threat. Don’t even get me started on how they butchered my boy Grievous.

As someone who is far more open to the new stuff (while I can acknowledge that most of it is shit) I am hella frustrated with Dave Filoni. How can someone be so fucking inconsistent with his own writing? It’s one thing to strip EU characters like Barris from her personality and make her a murdering terrorist - I am not attached to her as a character so I really don’t mind that development - but to make her compassionate as an Inquisitor and have her show mercy to innocents when she bombed the temple, framed her supposed best friend and tried to kill Anakin AT THE JEDI TEMPLE is just beyond inconsistent, beyond stupid. It’s like having her albeit strange development into a murdering, treacherous Jedi and throwing it out the window the moment he wants to tell a new story.

See, I can completely accept even some of the more dumb parts of TCW and I can enjoy it even though I like the old EU more in that regard. But please for gods sake stick to the own narrative you created for the character you butchered and don’t butcher her again wtf

Full disclosure; I don't think TPM is that great of a movie. Anakin and Jar Jar are both pretty insufferable (no disrespect to Ahmed and Jake, they did their best with what they had), but the movie had heart.

It was so refreshing to see totally new and unique settings, paired with amazing new themes from John Williams. Somehow a now 25 year old movie made Star Wars feel fresh again. Not all of the ideas may have landed, but at least we got to experience new things in the universe. The pod race and DotF are both still incredible sequences, and it was awesome to see them in theaters.

The last thing I want to point out was how not empty the theater was. I was definitely expecting the theater to have maybe 5-10 people in it max, but there were a solid 20+ seats filled in this medium sized theater. It gave me hope that others also missed the time when Star Wars used to take risks. Hopefully this re release is successful so the right people realize this.

I mean, I’m not trying to sound rude by asking this. But I’ve never personally favored the whole “yeah we know that we’ve got to kill the Jedi off and not even think twice about it lol” explanation for the Clones mindlessly going along with Order 66. Much less knowing about their ultimate purpose and the fates of their commanding officers from day one.

It’s just too big of a conspiracy to make sense on a practical scale, with too many people involved and too many variables to account for. You’re telling me that out of the millions (possibly even BILLIONS) of their brothers, not a single Clone Trooper stepped forward and decided to come clean? I get that they’re envisioned to be indoctrinated, thoughtless fleshy robots in terms of personality. But the various Jedi that they served under coupled with Jango Fett’s buddies from his days on Mandalore and as a Bounty Hunter imbibed many Clones with a sense of individuality from the start. Maybe not to the extent of the Nulls, but they at least had some personality to them that was instilled independently of Kaminoan “education” and training.

More than that, the Clone Troopers also never seemed to have any problems shedding this individuality in their service to the Empire. After almost 3 years of fighting and being treated as comrades by most of their commanders (assholes like Pong Krell and Rampart aside), this sort of stuff WILL stick. The Clones, even despite their indoctrination from birth, can’t seem to be just all-too-willing to shed what makes them unique such as armor markings and uniform customization without a second thought.

I get that there’s a case to be made for a grey-esque level of morality when it comes to the Clone Troopers and being indoctrinated. But I just can’t completely wrap my head around this. There isn’t really a shade of grey to be factored in when every single Clone Trooper went along with it and no one decided to speak up about how they knew that it was inevitable that Order 66 would be launched under false pretenses. Or that any Kaminoans who were outliers in not being borderline-sociopaths didn’t decide to spill the beans at some point.

It's spring here in Toronto. Lots of pubs and bars have star wars trivia on may the 4th. I used to be a HUGE star wars nerd back in the day (expanded universe included - I once wrote a big blog post on why the potentium theory of the force was bunkum, way back when blogs were a thing).

On brushing up my facts in prep for one such trivia contest, I realized something. Star wars has passed from the hands of a storyteller to a corporation that views it as a product.

When lady Kennedy took over, she was likely given marching orders as follows - " the old, middle aged dads who grew up with sw are not viable customers. Make it appeal to a new fan base. If you need to torch down the old guard, so be it". Hence the literal and figurative burning of the old lore in the last Jedi. And the nonsensical lore treatment of 'jedi hubris'.

George Lucas always wanted star wars to appeal to kids, but he wasn't trying to gun for statistics (I don't think, at least). He just wanted to tell a good story of the good guys winning, and establish good morals in the process (see the good in people and all). Some merch along the way.

Disney REALLY underestimated how much 'die hard' fans loved the franchise, and how much the scorched earth tactics would backfire. In some sense, nothing matters to Disney - lore consistency, Jedi being Jedi, not romanticizing the sith: none of these are important or sacred. Does it sell ? Then that's what they do.

It's like an AI driven algorithm that cobbles together things that appeal to the largest audience, and makes it canon. For the record, Ive switched back and forth on this, and as I was revising my SW lore today, I realized what a gaping hole has been left in my heart, where this story used to live.

I don't have a 'so what' to the rant. Just felt stupid when going through my old wookieepedia bookmarks (which are all suddenly 'legends'), and I can't help but feel sad for the way they screwed Luke Skywalker up.

My rant aside, I hope everyone tries and watches some sw content for star wars day, and have fun with memories of going to the movies with friends or family when they released.

May the force be with you all.