> Give me his unrestrained vision. Put it in my veins.
His unrestrained vision is The Phantom Menace. It’s the sand dialogue. It’s JarJar.
His unrestrained vision is The Phantom Menace. It’s the sand dialogue. It’s JarJar.
I've generally found that most people who didn't like are people who were already adults when it came out, and had a different vision of what they wanted it to be.
I can sum up my biggest problem with the prequels (well, with Lucas really) in one word: midichlorians.
When he decided to explain how the force works, he took something that had been so eloquently portrayed in the OT*, and reduced it to something banal and mechanical. And there was no reason to do that. It's not like Darth Vader needed a blood sample to know that Obi-Wan was on the Death Star. And yet Lucas chose to do it anyway.
That choice showed such a baffling level of cluelessness. Like here's this guy, this supposed visionary, who has carte blanche to do whatever he wants (with what is supposedly his own story, no less) and he just.. doesn't really seem to get it?
It really made me question whether the OT were as a good as they were because of him or in spite of him. Apparently I got something out of the story that he did not.
* I'm referring particularly to Yoda's speech to Luke about the force in ESB. "Luminous beings are we, not this crude matter!". Beautiful writing, still gives me goosebumps. No wonder ESB is often considered the best one.
> It really made me question whether the OT were as a good as they were because of him or in spite of him.
He didn’t get it with the original trilogy either, but had Marsha Lucas to tell him no and patiently explain how normal people work. For the prequels he was surrounded by yes-men.
The worse part of that is seeing clips from between takes: they actually have chemistry! They were actually directed to be unrealistic and unbelievable.
> It really made me question whether the OT were as a good as they were because of him or in spite of him.
Harrison Ford is why Han Solo says "I know" in response to Leia's "I love you". Contrasts directly with Anakin/Padme. "in spite of him" is at least a big chunk of it.
It can be both. Good art tends to allow a measure of interpretation outside of what the artists originally intended.
Dunno how in tune you are with random factoids but Lucas is on the record saying that his favorite episode in "The Clone Wars" is "A Sunny Day in the Void", where a bunch of droids are stuck in the desert. So...yeah, there's definitely _something_ he gets out of this series that might not line up with the fanbase at large.
He also wanted to double down on the midichlorians and the Whills for the sequels, so it definitely wasn't a one-off for him.
As for me, I don't hate the idea that a spiritual quality can have a physical component to it. (Makes you think about if a parting of the Red Sea or an ax head floating are "truly supernatural" events or more "natural, with mechanisms we can't understand".) I suppose it's a bit coarse that it's used to boil mysticism down to a number for comparison, and it certainly wasn't _necessary_ to move the plot along, though.
And after some deep-dive videos I learned that I've missed so much in those prequels. So for lore-heads and theorists there is a lot to chew on.
They are enjoyable movies for everyone!