quote:Originally posted by FlyingCow: Eps 1-3 were bad because one person controlled all aspects of production, from concept to writing to directing to editing to screen. The would have benefited from a good editor to look over Lucas' shoulder and say "George, this part is clumsy, this is just poorly written, and this other part has some of the worst acting I've ever seen. Clean it up."
That's typically the producer, right? So are we saying that Rick McCallum is the reason the prequels generally suck, and not George Lucas?
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Lucas bashers don't like listening to crazed pro-Lucas rantings. Unless you're wearing a brown coat whilst professing undying loyalty to Whedon, your rantings about Lucas NOT being an incompetent fool will sound like gibberish.
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Yes and no. With a new director, it's typically the producer. With George Lucas, I don't think any producer would have been able to budge him off anything he wanted to do.
Could he have tried harder? Maybe, but I don't think any force on earth would have been able to stop Lucas from making the stupid changes he did to the original trilogy or mutilating his franchise with the prequel trilogy.
It's like OSC said about Steven King a while back after From a Buick 6 came out. Lucas needs an editor with enough of a backbone to stand up to him and tell him when certain things need to be changed - and he needs to have the humility to listen to that editor.
I don't think Lucas has that humility, and I don't think he'd continue to employ someone who said "no" to him all the time regarding "his vision" of what he wanted to do with Star Wars.
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Lucas bashers don't like listening to crazed pro-Lucas rantings. Unless you're wearing a brown coat whilst professing undying loyalty to Whedon, your rantings about Lucas NOT being an incompetent fool will sound like gibberish.
So, does that mean you think having Greedo shoot first in SW:SE, giving all the police flashlights instead of guns in ET, and getting actors with previously strong performances in other films to act the way they did in Revenge of the Sith were all displays of his brilliance?
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Lucas bashers don't like listening to crazed pro-Lucas rantings. Unless you're wearing a brown coat whilst professing undying loyalty to Whedon, your rantings about Lucas NOT being an incompetent fool will sound like gibberish.
So, does that mean you think having Greedo shoot first in SW:SE, giving all the police flashlights instead of guns in ET, and getting actors with previously strong performances in other films to act the way they did in Revenge of the Sith were all displays of his brilliance?
I thought changing it so Greedo shot first was pretty stupid. I've only seen ET once, so I don't know. And I thought much of the acting in Revenge of the Sith was fantastic.
Not that picking three random things out of an entire career in films isn't fair or anything...
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posted
Bob--I was planning on it before you mentioned it. That's my story and I'm sticking with ti.
Rivka--Yes, but not by me--yet.
B34n--Evil--incompetent and stupid? I've been evil, yes that is in the handbook. Only the "Super Genuses" get to be competent. They still have to be Stupid.
However, back to
STAR WARS/STAR TREK BATTLES IN THE STAR-DOME>
This week, The Ultimate in Macho Sci Fi--
Chewbacca vs Worf.
Chewbacca stands proud in the middle of the arena. He holds up both hands and roars to the crowd.
The crowd goes wild.
Worf enters the ring, cradling his batlet. No simple phaser will dishonor this battle. Chewbacca looks at him and grunts.
"Mr. Wookie," begins Worf as the blade dances in his hands, "I am going to trim your fur till you look like an earth poodle. As you die from the shame of it, I may concede to dispatch you with honor."
Chebacca howled. He grabbed his laser crossbow and began to fire. Worf dodged the blasts easily, since the famed Wookie Laser Crossbow is known for three things: 1) Being overly cumberson. 2) Inspiring oponents to giggle or say, "A laser what?" and most important of all, 3) Being even less accurate than standard innacurate stormtrooper blasters.
However, just as Worf was about the begin the dreaded hairtrimming, out of thin air materialized a wall of dreaded fanboys.
Defiantly they stood between Worf and his opponent. As one the recited, "Chewbacca will not die!"
A small voice in the back added, "again." This was quickly followed by a loud slap, some whispering, and that same small voice saying the mantra, "Any worthless book that depicts the death of Chewbacca is not only not canon...it is heresy."
"Then allow me to breed heresy!" growled Worf. But as he swung, his weapon was deflected by shields of Wookie trading cards.
Chewbacca howled a howl of triumph.
Worf glared. The wall wavered, but did not break under that glare.
"You think you are tough? You think I have no fans to wipe the walls with your entrails? Come all who have a true Klingon heart!"
A stampede filled the arena, as a wall, twice as high and four times as wide filled the space between the combatants.
Chewbacca howled in dismay.
Then as one the second wall of fanboys turned and glared at Worf. Worf noticed there was not one prosthetic forehead in the bunch. There were costumes of the Federation. There were Vulcans and Romulans, Ferengei and Andorians. There was even a Gorn or two. There was no Klingon.
"Where are my Klingons" demanded Worf.
"We posted signs, in Klingon, directing your fans to this place. But we purposefully fowled the Klingon Syntax. As a result they are all bickering over Klingon grammar and rewriting all we wrote. They will not arrive in time."
"And who are you to face the wrath of my Klingon fans?"
One young man stepped forward, the acne cream almost completely covered by his green Vulcan makeup. "We are the fans of Jadzia Dax!"
"Jadzia! Growwwwwwwllllll" said the wall.
The spokesman continued, "Whom you had the audacity to marry, and then not save so she died and left the show. We are the fans of Loxana Troi"
"Loxanna! Growwwwwlllllll" said the wall lustfully.
"Whom you had the audacity to seduce and ruin for the rest of us. Your macho masculine heroics and deep brooding have destroyed this refuge for us. You've had more [whisper] sex[/whisper] than anyone on DS9 accept Commander Kira."
"Commander Kira! Growwwwllllllllll!!!!!!!!!" This time many from the Wookie Fanboy wall joined in the growl.
"What few females dare to enjoy Star Trek used to be enthralled by a good intelligent Vulcan or honorable Cadet, now drool over you thrice cursed Klingons. You used to be the badguys."
Worf looked at all those poor lonely boys and men, who's only hope for romance lay in there intelligence and fanatical knowledge of Star Trek trivia. They were fools, but he realized, as they descended upon him and tore him limb from limb, that maybe, in the Nerd's paradise that is both Star Trek and Star Wars, being the best Mr. Macho was not the best idea.
Lucas bashers don't like listening to crazed pro-Lucas rantings. Unless you're wearing a brown coat whilst professing undying loyalty to Whedon, your rantings about Lucas NOT being an incompetent fool will sound like gibberish.
Some hatrackers already saw this, but its funnier than most wikitrash.
I recommend you check out the discussion page, where the discussion is really just written for laughs. But in a very serious way, 14 year olds playing the dangerous game of revert-war. Funny.
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quote:And I thought much of the acting in Revenge of the Sith was fantastic.
Really? Which parts? And what about Eps I and II? (Personally, I thought Yoda was the best actor of the bunch - which is both a testament to the cgi technology and a damnation of the other actors/direction.)
quote:ET was Spielberg, not Lucas, no?
My mistake. Yes, this idiocy was Spielberg (I had associated all doctoring after the fact with Lucas, but it was apparently his good bud instead). And yes, it did happen. In the scene when all the cops are out chasing the kids and alien through town, they used to all be carrying their sidearms. Now the guns have been digitally replaced with walkie-talkies (not flashlights, as I had previously said). Also, the boy who dressed up as a "terrorist" has now been labeled a "hippie" - to be more sensitive to the global/political environment.
quote:Not that picking three random things out of an entire career in films isn't fair or anything...
See, I'm a huge Star Wars fan. I love a lot of what Lucas has done. I just think all the fame and money has gone to his head.
He hasn't directed anything that was really great since 1977 - in fact, until Phantom Menace, he hadn't directed *anything* since 1977. He also, in my opinion, hasn't executive produced anything worthwhile since the Young Indiana Jones Chronicles in 1993.
Before that? I love American Graffiti, Star Wars, Empire, Return, Temple of Doom, Raiders, Last Crusade, Labyrinth, Willow... even the Land Before Time and the two Ewok movies were good kids films. And I enjoyed the Young Indy series for what it was. (Of course, he only directed two of those.)
ILM has done amazing things for special effects technology, and Lucas has really pushed the envelope on what can be done with computer graphics, giving birth to some really cool things. But as cool as great effects are, they can't carry a rough plot, cardboard characters or uninspired direction.
Star Wars can benefit from new blood running the show - Timothy Zahn, Michael Stackpole, etc. Some of the novels were better crafted than anything in the current filmed SW universe (e.g. Zahn) with far greater depth of vision, character and environment. (For example, Zahn used the wookie homeworld for specific reasons that were crucial to the plot and set up conflict that could not have happened anywhere else - Lucas used the wookie homeworld so people would get to see Chewbacca and go "kewl, wookies" while the same conflict could have happened on any other planet with any other race.)
I'm not knocking Lucas' entire body of work, or even Lucas himself. I just think a large proportion of the decisions he's made in the last ten years have been ill-advised.
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"I know exactly what you mean," began C3PO. "I'm not much of a fighter either. I do hope the will spare us the indignity and just shoot us."
Data stepped forward. Lore stood next to him. Lore smiled, "Of all the powerful technocratic beings they could have teamed me up with, it had to be you. I mean a Borg, an XO-Comp, even one of Mudd's aquaintances could be more useful than you."
"Brother, having my nemisis fighting by my side does not encourage me either."
"Beep be-beep whistle, twirp"
"What is the little one saying?" asked Lore?
"Here, let me adjust my Universal translator."
Instead of beeps and whistles, RD suddenly had a voice. It was a deep, smooth, Barry White voice at that. RD said, "Well, hey there gorgeous." His one electronic eye winked at Data.
"Excuse me?" Data was confused.
"I think you've made a conquest little bro" laughed Lore. "That little phallic symbol on wheels likes you."
"Ohh, don't be jealous. There's enough of me to go around." RD whistled.
"We are here to fight." Data insisted.
"But I'm a lover, not a fighter."
"How dare you!" demanded C3PO. "What, am I not here? Don't you care that you are breaking my heart?"
"What, are you two a couple?" asked Lore.
"Well, duh." said C3PO. "I'm the high maintenance flamer, and he's the butch heart breaker. We're the most popular outted couple since Bert and Ernie. Aren't you two a couple?"
Lore looked at Data. Data looked at Lore. Both shivered and answered together. "No!"
C3PO turned to RD, "Denial." "Sure thing Baby." said R2. "But they are cute, especially the innocent one over there. Are you sure you wouldn't want a little personal interface?" R2's interface connection reached toward Data.
"Oooooooh! You are so mean to me." C3PO, on the verge of a crying jag, ran up to Data. "How could you, you homewrecker." Slap.
Lore grabbed C3PO by the arm. "Nobody slaps my brother." He then ripped C3PO's arm out of his sockent, and then tore him into several various peices.
C3PO screamed. Then he looked up at Lore and said, "More. I've been a bad bot. Punish me big boy."
With a snicker Lore kicked C3PO's head across the room, where it bounced off a wall and rolled to land at R2's feet. Lore then turned to Data. "Nobody touches my brother, but me."
He launched himself at Data, hoping to take him unawares, and totally destroy him. Data was not surprised, and the two began a long, heavilly choreographed fight scene.
R2D2 did what he has shown a penchant for doing through 6 dangerous movies. He sat quietly on the side. He did his best to impersonate a trashcan. As the two twins proceeded to destroy each other completely, C3PO looked up at R2D2. "You are so mean to me."
"Yeah, baby." said R2 before even the Universal Translator was destroyed by the twin-bots. "And you love it."
posted
I LOVE this thread! Especially the battles... Star Trek. And I haven't even watched much of it, either.
It is not nerdy that when someone mentioned "Klingon blade thingies" a type of Klingon weapon popped into my head unbidden. It's not, I tell you!
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posted
You know, Dan, I worry about you sometimes. And by "sometimes," I mean when I can stop laughing long enough to catch my breath.
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posted
These keep coming to me and I can't stop them: Please pardon all the misquotes to follow. I don't have time to look them up
Next Round:
Old Ben Kenobi (Old/Original ObiWan) vs Captain Picard Battle of the English Accent:
Picard set down his cup of Earl Grey tea and nodded respectfully as the long robed senior combatant entered the ring.
Obi-Wan lifted his un-lit saber from its holster and nodded back.
"Engage!" commanded Picard as he shot. The crowd applauded the line.
Obi-Wan deftly deflected the phaser fire with his light saber and slowly closed in on the Captain. "Indeed." he said.
Picard fired twice more, moving around the ring."
Obi-Won quickly deflected them. "If you kill me," he added. "Another will arise stronger than you can imagine."
The audience applauded the line with vigor.
"Indeed" said Picard. He stepped away from the slow moving Jedi who seemed to have none of the energy, flare, or special moves his younger self displayed in the later films. Time travel physics always gives me headaches too.
But Picard had no headache. He was willing to play to the crowd. "There Are THREEE Lights!!!" he yelled.
Obi-Wan was a bit confused, but the crowd loved it.
Obi-Wan smiled, then waved his hands at Picards direction. "These are not the droids you are looking for."
The crowd leapt to there feet.
Picard thought hard, searching 7 years of shows for one good line. Finally, he said,
"He that outlives this day, and comes safe home, Will stand a tip-toe when the day is named, And rouse him at the name of Crispian."
Obi-Wan stopped, immune to the applause of the crowd. He stared at Picard. "You got to do Shakespeare? Don't tell me that you got to do Shakespeare."
Picard smiled. "Certainly. We quoted Shakespear, Doyle, all the greats."
"Where's my agent. Marty! Marty! I'm stuck in a wool body-robe in the middle of the #@$#@$@# Sahara and he gets to do Shakespeare?"
Picard winced. Deserts were filled with sand dunes, and the one thing that was lethal to Picard--well to Patric Stewart--was DUNE.
"It gets worse my friend." Said Picard. He reached for the most lethal weapon possible. "Here are the lines your character gets to say in the prequels." He handed Obi-Won the scripts for Star Wars I-III (obtained from the computers database of course).
Obi-Wan looked them over, the screamed "Marty!!!!!, oh forget this." Using the force he grabbed Picard's phaser out of the captain's hand, and fired point blank into his own chest.
"At last, the pain is over."
"Rest in peice my Sir Guinness. Rest in peice."
Yet before he died he whispered one last bit of torture to Picard. "I won an Academy Award for the Bridge Over The River Kwai. This movie is my DUNE. This show is your River Kwai."
Well, since Star Wars got me a free cruise, and since I had to pay for every Star Trek cruise and convention I've attended, I'll have to go with Star Wars.Posts: 13680 | Registered: Mar 2002
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Well, since Star Wars got me a free cruise, and since I had to pay for every Star Trek cruise and convention I've attended, I'll have to go with Star Wars.
I hate you, but in a nice way.
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The two kids stared at each other across the arena.
"I'm not really a killer. I'm not a lover either. I just whine a lot and save the universe" explained Wesley Crusher to explain his lack of action. "Heck, they don't even trust me with a phaser."
The young kid, barely 9 if a day, shook his head in agreement. "I don't try to kill people either. I just get in these vehicles and next thing I know people are dieing."
"I'm glad there's no vehicle here." smiled Wesley. "I am older than you, and bigger. Maybe you should just give up."
"Oh, when I get older, I don't save the Universe, I sink it into utter despair and destruction. Kind of like your career after this show." Wesley flinched.
"Hey, at least I get a girl by the end of the show." snapped Wesley.
"Yeah!" pouted the punk kid, "By the end of the movie I actually sleep with one. That's something neither you nor ObiWan ever did."
"All right short stuff, at least I know who my father is--unless its Picard, which was hinted at a time or two, but hey, its definatley narrowed down to two people. And my mother lives, unlike yours."
"Don't get me mad. You won't like me when I'm mad."
"And what happens when you get mad short stuff?"
"I use The Force!"
"What's The Force?" snickered Wesley.
"I am" answered Chuck Norris, stepping out of the previous post--er--shadows. He then does the thing most requested at any Star-Trek convention. He round kick's Wesley Crusher's head clean off his shoulder, and into orbit. He then smiles at Anakin before disappearing back into the shadows.
In orbit Wesley's head slowly revolves to show Q's smiling at him. Q smiled, "Watching that was almost worth...this. Hey kid, here's a life lesson. Don't #@$@#$ with the Force."
posted
*Wipes tear from eye* Beautiful. Just beautiful. Especially the part where that annoying son of a--er, I mean, when Wesley Crusher dies. Awesome.
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posted
To be honest I don't even think it's close. i think star trek is miles and miles better. The characters in star wars are more threadbare than those in Spencer's Faire Queen, Lucas seemed to lose all ability to draw characters effectively after American Grafitti. Sure he and Steven came up with Indiana Jones together but as far as I can see beyond Han Solo, what great character did he develop following Grafitti? I can't think of any.
Empire, and 4 and 6 to a degree mesmerized me as a kid, great stuff, but it doesn't hold up, even a little, over the passage of time, beyond Empire. The dialogue and acting are wooden, the characters are cardboard, and by the time of the prequel's he was just seemingly interested in manufacturing money, what a collosal nightmare it was to see that nearly twenty years of time to flesh out the prequel's resulted in the elephant poop that was Phantom Debacle, and Attack of the Plotless Movie Clones.
I understand why people love it, David Brin wrote some great essays about it still archived in his website that speak to that love but I also agree with much of Brin's critique, far more well reasoned and argued than any I could come up with. Apparently Brin and another guy have even written a book involving putting Star Wars on trial (just came out in June). Suffice it to say, the movies connected with me as a child and some aspects of them still do, particularly Han Solo, the father and son redemption arc, and the 4th, 5th and 6th episodes which range from solid to very good.
But when I watch star trek there is a lot more depth and complexity to it, far more really, better characterization, plotting, story arcs, acting and beyond, the only problems star trek has had has been in the inconsistency of its movies, a few have been great (I, II, IV, VI, VIII) but just as many have been mediocre or poor but unlike Star Wars which suffered the same problem, Star Trek could redeem itself with TNG, DS-9, Voyager (which came into it's own after struggling badly in its first 18 months on the air), the original, and even the most recent.
My only question with regards to Star Trek is why they never chose to create a movie built entirely around Klingons. Watching some of the Klingon eps particularly with TNG you really grasp the potential richness of a movie based on them entirely, I've always been baffled as to why they did not do that, or at bare minimum a movie built around them and the federation with the klingons the centerpiece (rather than III, or VI, which featured heavy Klingon involvement, but not in the same sense).
Suffice it to say, Star Wars touched something deeper in me as a child, but Star Trek was always better to me in all ways that mattered over the passage of time.
posted
Last night I saw the TNG episode where Worf kills the embassador who dishonored his father. It was very good.
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posted
btw in terms of language, STNG had that absolutely classic episode in which Picard and an alien dual with some stealth bipedal cloaking device using triceratops thing. The whole episode revolves around trying to figure out a way to communicate with another species/culture which is utterly alien finally finding resolution in the metaphor concept. That episode was beyond brilliant and was one of the best pieces of entertainment I've ever seen. Fantastic stuff.
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quote:My only question with regards to Star Trek is why they never chose to create a movie built entirely around Klingons.
They have made at least one videogame entirely around them.
Star Trek VI was technically about them? More than any other movie at least. That might be an interesting series.
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The two manly men enter the battle arena, weapon conspicously holstered. The formal martial arts bow has been minimized by these man to the most manly quick nod of the head.
"Didn't Captain Cisco kill you earlier?" Riker asked?
"Yeah. But I'm Harrison Ford. I got better."
Riker nodded understanding. "Well if he could do it, then I guess this shouldn't be difficult for me."
"He is a Captain, a ship's commander. I am a ship's commander. You never got out of your Captain's shadow."
"Yeah, but I got something my Captain, and you, hardly ever received--sex."
"Hey. I get the Princess in the end." Ford responded.
"Yeah, well I got three princesses, twelve bar maids, five holographic porn stars, and one she-male in an episode about sexual discrimmination that I'm still trying to forget. And that is far from the whole list."
Miffed Han retorted, "Yeah, well, my gun's much bigger than your's is. I don't know how you can even find that piddly little thing."
"I've had no complaints." argued an angered Riker. Why did they wait till DS9 to pass out those big manly guns anyway. "At least I don't have the name Han Solo. Sounds like the love life of some of our more pathetic fans..."
"Wait a minute. The site moderator doesn't want this becoming one of "those" types of threads."
"Oh, excuse me." Riker called up to our moderator. "Where were we?"
Han looked around. "I think we were about done with our witty banter. I'm done. You?"
Riker pulled out a computer pad with some banter notes carefully prepared. "Um, yes. Mostly good. I could get into the whole, 'Blasters can't hit their targets' thing..."
"Hey." interupted Han, "Most blaster's can't hit anything they are pointed towards. Mine is special. I hit more things while blinded than the entire Empirical Army for the past 2 years. Trust me, you'll find out all about my accuracy shortly."
"Then I'm ready. Whenever you are."
A moment of silence filled the arena.
With a flash, Han's blaster cleared his holster before Riker could find his small phaser. But Han didn't shoot. He dove to the floor and spun around. As he guessed, George Lucas's digital hand was coming into the fight to re-edit it. He was attempting to again stop Han from shooting first.
Han shot first, several times, directly at Lucas.
Riker did the only honorable thing. He also shot Lucas. With a thud, Lucas's abused body fell from the digital workshop onto the battlefloor.
Han stood up. "Do you have any idea how long I've wanted to do that?"
Riker moved over to the body. "He's dead Han. I wonder if I've violated the prime directive. Murder? What are the legal..."
"Riker, calm down." Han's smile was large. "Let me explain. I appreciate your help. You'll never know how much." With that he shot Riker. "But honestly, I have one advantage that you missed." He shot Riker again. "I was a pirate, a smuggler, a bad man living in bad times. I just don't have that high Starfleet ethical code you do." He fired a third time, obliterating Riker's smile, and his ability to play annoying saxophones ever again. "Thank's Commander, but now I have to go."
posted
star trek 1 was bad, 2 was good, 3 was good, 4 was good but pushing it. 5 was funny but bad and 6 was pretty good. 7 was good, 8 was imo the best one. 9 & 10 not so good
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