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George Lucas on the Prequels Before He Started Writing Them
I was going through some old boxes of computer games the other day, and amongst my various notes on hints and cheats I found a print-out of a secret message that was contained in Star Wars Screen Entertainment — the Star Wars screen saver program that was released in 1994. This was written by George Lucas before he started the prequels.
A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away Good and Evil battled to determine the fate of the Universe. The struggle is chronicled in STAR WARS, nine episodes which depict the reign of the Empire and a small, brave band of rebels who threatened to topple it. The middle third of the story was told in Star Wars: A New Hope, The Empire Strikes Back, and Return of the Jedi. We followed a young farm boy, Luke Skywalker, and his commitment to the Rebel Alliance. We watched as Luke learned about the Force from Obi-Wan Kenobi and Yoda, and felt his pain when he discovered that Darth Vader, the most highly regarded commander in the Imperial Navy, was his father. The STAR WARS saga actually begins 40 years before Luke has the pivotal meeting with Obi-Wan that sends him down the path to his destiny. The first three episodes begin with the friendship of a young Ben Kenobi and Luke’s father, Anakin Skywalker. When Ben meets Anakin, he sees that the talented pilot is very strong with the Force and decides to train Anakin in the ways of the Jedi. But the Emperor senses Anakin’s growing power, and determined to harness it for the Empire, sways the young Jedi to the Dark Side. Anakin Skywalker ceases to exist, and in his place Darth Vader emerges. The new movies will feature all the action of the first three. Much of the drama, however, will revolve around betrayal — between friends and within the Empire. In this part of the story, things are not always as they seem and you never quite know who the good guys and bad guys are. I plan to start the screenplay for episode one by the end of 1994, and release the prequels by the year 2000.
George Lucas
Pretty interesting look at George’s thought process at that point in time there. I’ve always wanted to have the giant book of drafts and scratch paper for the prequels, to see where some of the ideas in the movies came from. It intrigues me to think about the things not mentioned above, like Qui Gon Jinn or the fact that Anakin is some sort of messiah figure, and wonder why George felt the need to add them into the saga. I mean, does it really matter that Anakin is special? Or could it just be that he’s a pivotal figure, as human, or at least Jedi, as anyone else?
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One of those Veggie Melt Days
Yesterday, I went to the cafeteria downstairs where I work to grab something for lunch at my desk. It was just one of those days, you know, where you give up and eat lunch at your desk.
I stopped at the display of food at the cafeteria entrance, trying to decide on something fake-healthy for lunch. You know, it’s not oats and fruit, but if most of the population saw you eating it, they’d say, “Oh, eating healthy, huh? Good for you!”
I settled on the Veggie Melt Ciabatta. Nice mushrooms and peppers and herbs, which by themselves are mostly healthy, along with some melty cheese and oil and some big fat bread so my subconscious would be fooled into thinking it was something more akin to a Whopper.
So I go to the deli counter, and ordered the Veggie Melt, gesturing to the sign.
“The what?”
This is not the first time I have had this experience. I did a little Vanna White action at the sign. “The veggie melt?”
“The what?”
Fine. I pointed.
The guy turned the sign around and pondered it a bit. “Wow…veggie melt?”
Then, accepting the quest on the sign, he leaped into action. He read each line of the description, carefully adding each item to the sandwich. On at least two occasions, he goes off on a quest to find the ingredient. When he came back with the bowl of mushrooms, I silently hoped that he didn’t find them growing back behind the building.
Finally, he handed me my sandwich, which actually looked quite a bit like the display one by the entrance…except…it’s a veggie melt…and it’s not actually melted.
“Thanks,” I say. It was just that kind of day.
At least the sandwich was good.
Two Ends of the Animated Spectrum: The Avatar and the Frog
Over the last two weekends, I did something I hardly ever do nowadays. I went to the movies.
I don’t have kids, and generally I have time to go. For me, not going to the theater is all about the quality of the experience. Netflix and a reasonably nice TV trumps a crappy quality version of the film (you know, with all that schmutz flying by on the FILM!), sitting behind talking people and being charged 3000 times more than the bucket of popcorn is worth. So, if I go, I tend to be critical. I want the experience to blow me away.
So what did I see? Two ends of the animated spectrum: The Princess and the Frog and Avatar.
Have to say, neither one of them really engaged me much. Both were absolutely beautiful films. I liked the story of Frog better, mostly because I liked the characters more. Disney (the company whose theme parks I work for) did a nice job reinventing the classic princess story. I respected Tiana and her belief that hard work was way better than any magical spell. And I really like contrast they set up between her and Charlotte, who happens to be exactly the spoiled, cliched princess the movie is aimed at skewering. Charlotte is one-dimensional and yet not painted as worthless or evil. That’s tricky to pull off.
What’s regrettable is that the music in Frog is so … meh. I can’t say I remember any of it. No “Be our guest, be our guest…” here. Despite a nice number for the villain, and the swinging zydeco bit for the HSAs (happy, singing animals). Randy Newman’s effort just doesn’t cut it here, which is a shame considering the movie is set in New Orleans, which is really a paradise of music. (If you’ve never been there, and you like music, why not?) There’s just something too Disney and not authentic enough in this soundtrack.
Overall, Frog was enjoyable. A good movie, just not a great one. That left me especially sad, because I really wanted this movie to prove that the difference between success and failure in animation has nothing to do with traditional 2D versus shiny round 3D. Frog is a gorgeous movie. It deserved to be richer in story and song.
Avatar. Hrm. $300 million for that movie confuses me. Let me start by saying, I am firmly in the “3D is a gimmick” camp. After about 15 minutes wearing the glasses annoyed me. This may be partly because I have had 20/15 vision most of my life, and wearing the glasses feels like an imposition. But I also feel like 3D depth in a movie is mostly wasted on me. If it’s not John Candy’s old cheap 3D tricks from SCTV, I don’t really see the point.
Part way through the movie, I got tired and tilted my head and half the screen went blurry. Yeah, call me when you don’t need glasses.
Avatar’s a TREMENDOUS achievement in terms of special effects. There are some shots that are just amazing mixes of the real and the virtual. And there’s also some stuff that reminded me a lot of the old video games that had full motion video in them. It had that, “shot in the same warehouse” feel that those did. Maybe it was the 3D, but some of it just looked sort of cheesy.
Reading the WIRED article about how Cameron was reinventing effects made me hope we might now have a cheaper way of making movies of the “unfilmable” fantasy novels out there. Watching the densest credits ever roll by at the end, I realized this movie was great because they spent a TREMENDOUS amount of time, effort, and money on it, so I don’t know how much of an improvement it will be for people who can’t command the incredible budgets Cameron can.
Story? There’s a document making its rounds on the net that satirizes the fact that Avatar is basically Disney’s Pocahontas. That pretty much speaks to it for me. The sci-fi elements were unique, but they weren’t particularly challenging or thought-provoking. The characters were pretty thin and cliched too, which made it really hard to want to identify with anyone strongly.
So I’m back to my monastic Netflix existence until the next big event pictures come out.
The End (And I Like It That Way)
My roommate and I in college once had a big argument about books.
We both loved the “Apprentice Adept” trilogy by Piers Anthony. We bonded over those books, which was good because we didn’t always have a whole lot else in common.
Apprentice Adept Series Collection
But then, the unthinkable happened. Piers Anthony wrote a sequel.
My roommate was ecstatic. He raced out to the bookstore and brought it home. Held it before me like he’d claimed the grail. He cleared his calendar, scampered to the top of the loft, and buried himself in his sleeping bag and the book.
For me, it was like he’d just brought home a copy of the Venus de Milo, but with groovy arms cemented on, and painted to look realistic.
“That series…it was over. There was an ending,” I said to him, and he looked up from his book, startled.
“Yes! And now there’s more!” And he plunged back into the book, nestling deeper into his sleeping bag.
Over the ongoing days of his reading the book, it ate away at me. But the ending was beautiful. The entire reason for the story disappeared, closed, done forever. No possibility of sequel. The story was over. Everything was tied up in exactly the way that life truly and exactly never is. Happily ever after achieved, check the box and close the curtains.
All of this I argued at him, on and off as he read it.
And all he would say was, “You have to read it, though.”
Eventually, I did. At least the first 50 pages or so. But every word was like a slap in the face to your fairy godmother. I mean, come on…you told me everything worked out the way it worked on. And now, you’re saying, “Oops, I was wrong?”
I think Anthony even had an author’s note at the end of his book, where he said something like, “Hey, the fans wanted more.” I know an artist has to please the audience, but really, writing more Xanth, or something new, probably would have achieved the same thing.
I never finished the book. I sold it at a used bookstore some months later. Probably bought more Xanth novels with it.
I still have the original Apprentice Adept books. To me, they’re the only ones that exist in that series.
I guess I just like to believe in the “ever” in happily ever after. What about you?
Super Elastic Blog Plastic
If my blog looks a little odd for a bit, it’s because I’m working on a new design using the Elastic Editor. Fun to play with and I’m learning things, too.
Wham-O
Star Tours Update
As I previously mentioned, Star Tours is getting an update. You can read about it (and see a really kewl clip from the updated attraction) here:
Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides
So they announced something at the D23 Disney Fan Convention that totally blows me away. No, there won’t be free massages from the princesses in a totally revamped Fantasyland. They actually announced the sub-title of the new Pirates of the Caribbean flick — On Stranger Tides.
Reading this announcement caused me to spit shredded wheat and soy milk. Why, you ask? Because I just read that book!
On Stranger Tides by Tim Powers
On Stranger Tides is actually a piratey novel written by Tim Powers. I read a few months ago that Ron Gilbert had quoted it as being more of an inspiration for his Monkey Island computer games than the PotC attractions that most people thought were the inspiration.
Of course, technically you can’t copyright a title…
I’m not really certain whether to be excited or a bit disappointed about this. On the one hand, I have to admit to casting a bunch of the PotC actors in the movie in my head when I read the book. On the other hand, I really loved the book and I’m feeling that normal dread of them totally screwing with it to get it to fit into the PotC world. There’s been speculation that Depp’s Sparrow would be placed in the role of the protagonist of the book, Jack Shandy. I think it’s more likely it will be like the other movies, where Shandy will be the pirate wanna-be played by the Orlando Bloom replacement, and Sparrow will replace the Piratey mentor character, Davies.
It’s funny, I had heard a while back that Pirates 4 was going to have them going after the fountain of youth, and I was surprised when I read OST that the fountain was the object of their search. Go figure. I guess that’s further confirmation that they’re adapting it.
The book is well worth the read, if you want a head start on the movie. Powers is a great writer who really knows how to wrap you up in a larger-than-life adventure story.