The Obligatory Special Edition Hate Thread

[Invisible NanoGhost]

My biggest complaint with Empire was them cutting Vader's really pissed "Bring my shuttle!" line as he's stalking through bespin.  [...]
It  [...]      c) got rid of a great line that shows how disgusted Vader is with his own failure.

I took that as a sign of how disgusted he was with all the morons around him.  "Geez, all these weapons and you guys can't even handle a handful of little ships?  We're supposed to be running a GALACTIC EMPIRE here you know -- okay, damn it, I guess I'll have to do it."

[dalem]

A bit ironic to complain about unnecessary things Lucas did, and then unnecessarily swear off watching Empire again because they showed Darth Vader getting on a spaceship.

As I've written, I see the Empire hack of Vader getting back to the SSD as far worse than many (any?) of the other changes because it destroys the pacing and tension of an already well-put-together action scene.  Like going back to Raiders and adding shots of Marion and Salah making their way back to Omar's garage into the scene where Indy's wasting all the Nazis and going underneath the truck.

It's breaking the movie, not breaking Star Wars canon, or whatever.

But then, I'm a  geek.

-dale

[bratpop]

How do you guys remember such insignificant things from 17 years previous? If you hadn't told me, I wouldn't have known the Vader ship scene was new. It affects nothing.

[Thrifty]

STAR WARS IS AWESOME YAY!

Except for the 3 prequel movies, and the Return of the Jedi movie, and the original movie because, like, some guy shot a split second before some other guy.  So even though only one movie in a 6 movie series doesn't suck, Star Wars is awesome.

_{The previous post was dripping with disdainful sarcasm.}

[Nunyerbiz]

Well, I think Thrify was poking fun at Star Wars fans who claim to "love" the franchise but spend time slamming huge chunks of it.... but maybe I'm reading too much into his statement.

[Thrifty]

Well, I think Thrify was poking fun at Star Wars fans who claim to "love" the franchise but spend time slamming huge chunks of it.... but maybe I'm reading too much into his statement.

That kinda sounds like what I was going for.  I mean, for something that's so highly regarded in geek culture, it seems like the more hardcore fans hate about 70% of the franchise.

Star Trek, in my experience, is pretty much the same, but that's a whole different thread all together, and I won't risk further derailment by expanding upon it.

[MartyS (Gromit)]

Well, I think Thrify was poking fun at Star Wars fans who claim to "love" the franchise but spend time slamming huge chunks of it.... but maybe I'm reading too much into his statement.

That kinda sounds like what I was going for.  I mean, for something that's so highly regarded in geek culture, it seems like the more hardcore fans hate about 70% of the franchise.

Star Trek, in my experience, is pretty much the same, but that's a whole different thread all together, and I won't risk further derailment by expanding upon it.

Trek is more complicated due to all the different incarnations.

But what they both have in common is that they started out so good, creating a large fan base.  Trek was all over the place as far as how good it was over the years, but unfortunately Star Wars went downhill and never recovered (people seem to like episode III but it's still far below where the franchise started out).

I think it's interesting to compare the Star Wars special editions to The Lord of the Rings special editions, the changes made to the Star Wars theatrical versions don't help at all and some actually detract, but I like the extended cuts of TLOTR.  What's the difference?  The plot for Star Wars is a very old classic myth, not a lot of complexity to it, so shorter, tighter, "get to the point" style fits it better, TLOTR is so much more complicated the additional footage gives you more real information most of the time.  

Later,
Marty

[MartyS (Gromit)]

Well, and one was a book first, so had to leave out all sorts of stuff when it made it to screen.

I guess the obvious thing that points out is that Lucas is not a writer, all the books for Star Wars were written by other people, even the first one that only had Lucas listed as the author was ghost written by Alan Dean Foster.   Lucas should have hired a real scifi writer to help with the scripts, imagine how much better the movies would have been...  All of the the really good stuff by Lucas was either in collaboration or working under time/budget constraints.

[Thrifty]

I guess if you include the EU, then yeah, I hate "big chunks" of Star Wars. Otherwise, no, I generally like it.

I didn't really consider the European Union, since, I think, this is an American film series.

[Thrifty]

Well, I think Thrify was poking fun at Star Wars fans who claim to "love" the franchise but spend time slamming huge chunks of it.... but maybe I'm reading too much into his statement.

That kinda sounds like what I was going for.  I mean, for something that's so highly regarded in geek culture, it seems like the more hardcore fans hate about 70% of the franchise.

Star Trek, in my experience, is pretty much the same, but that's a whole different thread all together, and I won't risk further derailment by expanding upon it.

Trek is more complicated due to all the different incarnations.

But what they both have in common is that they started out so good, creating a large fan base.  Trek was all over the place as far as how good it was over the years, but unfortunately Star Wars went downhill and never recovered (people seem to like episode III but it's still far below where the franchise started out).

I think it's interesting to compare the Star Wars special editions to The Lord of the Rings special editions, the changes made to the Star Wars theatrical versions don't help at all and some actually detract, but I like the extended cuts of TLOTR.  What's the difference?  The plot for Star Wars is a very old classic myth, not a lot of complexity to it, so shorter, tighter, "get to the point" style fits it better, TLOTR is so much more complicated the additional footage gives you more real information most of the time.  

Later,
Marty

I mean, I can sort of understand the enmity for episodes 1 and 2, although I don't agree with them (I though all 6 movies qualified as "okay movies").  There at least people are considering and condemning a whole movie.  A lot of the criticisms of the original trilogy are people knocking on movies they claim to like.  And they're knocking on these movies for really petty and nitpicking reasons.

[MartyS (Gromit)]

Well, I think Thrify was poking fun at Star Wars fans who claim to "love" the franchise but spend time slamming huge chunks of it.... but maybe I'm reading too much into his statement.

That kinda sounds like what I was going for.  I mean, for something that's so highly regarded in geek culture, it seems like the more hardcore fans hate about 70% of the franchise.

Star Trek, in my experience, is pretty much the same, but that's a whole different thread all together, and I won't risk further derailment by expanding upon it.

Trek is more complicated due to all the different incarnations.

But what they both have in common is that they started out so good, creating a large fan base.  Trek was all over the place as far as how good it was over the years, but unfortunately Star Wars went downhill and never recovered (people seem to like episode III but it's still far below where the franchise started out).

I think it's interesting to compare the Star Wars special editions to The Lord of the Rings special editions, the changes made to the Star Wars theatrical versions don't help at all and some actually detract, but I like the extended cuts of TLOTR.  What's the difference?  The plot for Star Wars is a very old classic myth, not a lot of complexity to it, so shorter, tighter, "get to the point" style fits it better, TLOTR is so much more complicated the additional footage gives you more real information most of the time.  

Later,
Marty

I mean, I can sort of understand the enmity for episodes 1 and 2, although I don't agree with them (I though all 6 movies qualified as "okay movies").  There at least people are considering and condemning a whole movie.  A lot of the criticisms of the original trilogy are people knocking on movies they claim to like.  And they're knocking on these movies for really petty and nitpicking reasons.

Think of it as a favorite dish at your favorite restaurant, something you've enjoyed for years, then they go and change some ingredients and you don't like it as much any more, you get POed every time you think of how good it used to be.

[Doctor Who?]

Also the cook destroyed the old recipe cards just to spite you so that you can never eat it again.

I love Star Wars but I love the movie as it was when I was a kid,the Star Wars SEs remind me of the way other playwrites ruined MacBeth after Shakespear's death by adding music numbers and dancing to it.

Also Lucass didn't write the screenplay or direct two of the movies so in two of the cases he is messing up other people's work not just his own

[Thrifty]

I mean, I can sort of understand the enmity for episodes 1 and 2, although I don't agree with them (I though all 6 movies qualified as "okay movies").  There at least people are considering and condemning a whole movie.  A lot of the criticisms of the original trilogy are people knocking on movies they claim to like.  And they're knocking on these movies for really petty and nitpicking reasons.

Think of it as a favorite dish at your favorite restaurant, something you've enjoyed for years, then they go and change some ingredients and you don't like it as much any more, you get POed every time you think of how good it used to be.

I get the analogy, but it seems more like the cook just changed from iceberg lettuce to romaine lettuce.  The taste is the same, but some minute detail was altered, and people go all batshit over it.

[Doctor Who?]

Sorry but no.

He changed something more them that.

First off CGI looks weird when put together with old film,second he change character arcs,third he added all kinds of CGI "gags" into scenes that were suposed to have tension in them and destroyed the tension,and forth there are scenes where you now can not see the actors who are talking because he crammed so much CGI in there.

It's not the same dish at all.

I think my comparing it to what some playwrites did to Macbth is a good way to look at it,there is a reason why most directors now adays leave out those added scenes.

It like Lucass is dropping a big mac in front of us when we ordered really good pizza and he wants us to call it pizza.

[MartyS (Gromit)]

I mean, I can sort of understand the enmity for episodes 1 and 2, although I don't agree with them (I though all 6 movies qualified as "okay movies").  There at least people are considering and condemning a whole movie.  A lot of the criticisms of the original trilogy are people knocking on movies they claim to like.  And they're knocking on these movies for really petty and nitpicking reasons.

Think of it as a favorite dish at your favorite restaurant, something you've enjoyed for years, then they go and change some ingredients and you don't like it as much any more, you get POed every time you think of how good it used to be.

I get the analogy, but it seems more like the cook just changed from iceberg lettuce to romaine lettuce.  The taste is the same, but some minute detail was altered, and people go all batshit over it.

People have different tastes, some more discriminating than others.