Tuesday, February 24, 2009

a long time ago in a galaxy just outside of hollywood...

This Saturday, in our apartment, in front of the 73 inch HD television set that Patrick bought one day on a crazy, wild-eyed whim, we four are going to do something we've been talking about since our friendship began...


We are going to watch all six "Star Wars" movies in an epic marathon of Bantha sized proportions.

It's an endurance test, to be sure. Like most, we really hated the prequels and since those three will encompass the first SEVEN hours of the marathon, we will be like Rocky and Apollo at the end of "Rocky II" before we even get to the opening crawl of "A New Hope."

Which was also a place of debate...

You see, there was some discussion about which versions of the original trilogy we should watch. Should we watch the ORIGINAL theatrical cuts, with their brisk running times and Muppet puppet budget dance numbers? Or, should we watch the crappy, crappy special editions with the CG Puddle of Jabba, Han Shooting Kind of First, the Audrey II Sarlacc Pit, and, most infamous of all, THE HAYDEN CHRISTENSEN GHOST...


Now, of course, we all prefer the original cuts to the Special Edition. But Patrick and I made an argument for the Special Editions. If we were going to do this marathon correctly, we were going to have to do it the way "George Lucas intended." (For those of you who are too young to remember the trailers for the Special Editions from '96 and '97, the narrator kept saying, "The way George Lucas intended") Even if the way George Lucas intended was crappy and Jar Jar Binks-y, we wanted to see just how well the CG added to the original trilogy fit in to the prequels.

So, we're watching the Prequels and the Special Editions.

Now, there's another issue.

Recently, Brian and Patrick suggested we add "The Clone Wars" to the line-up. I am incredibly against this. A) I don't consider them part of the storyline. B) I DON'T WANT TO SEE STINKY THE HUTT IN ACTION.

Then I said, "If we watch that, we might as well watch The Star Wars Holiday Special!"

So, now that debate is out there.

The marathon starts Saturday. I plan to blog and vlog between the movies to let you know our progress. Please comment below on whether or not you think we should watch "The Clone Wars."

MAY THE FORCE BE WITH YOU!


8 comments:

Unknown said...

you probably shouldnt watch the clone wars or the xmas specail... whatever you end up doing will be wrong though, as you should just spend the 7 hours looking at that picture of kristen bell..

Nom de Plume said...

Veronica Mars?!

Aaron W said...

You are assuming that what the marketers said about George Lucas' wishes (or even what George Lucas may have said about his own wishes) when the special edition movies came out is accurate.

I haven't read all of it, but "The secret history of Star Wars" makes a pretty convincing case that Lucas didn't actually have 9, 6 or even three movies in mind when he started out (notice that in the original theatrical release of New Hope, there is no "Episode 4" in the crawl). So, there is no reason to assume that what current Lucas wants in the movies is really what 1979 Lucas would have wanted in the movies.

I say go with the original theatrical releases. You watch movies because you love them, not because some billionaire thinks you should watch them, so watch the ones you love. For the same reason I think you all should skip "clone wars" & the Xmas special (I haven't seen either, but neither has a good rep). I would recommend the Genndy Tartakovsky Star Wars: Clone Wars microseries - it is everything the prequels could have been, but weren't.

Finally, on a completely different matter, a while back you wrote that people keep asking about when WNG is going to be on TV, but that there isn't much to write b/c you are in the morass of pre-pre-pre-production. I think a post about all of what it takes to get a tv show to a pilot (and where you guys are in the process) would be very interesting & could help all of us who don't know the industry, but can barely wait for new WNG episodes.

Z said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Z said...

Oops, major typos.

If you're really going to do things right you need to add Ewok Adventures to the line-up.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0087225/

"Caravan of Courage" and "Battle For Endor," both of which star Warwick Davis as Wicket, are narrated by Burl Ives - solid gold.

StevenMcFly said...

that's not a bad idea, aaron w. maybe i'll write such a post soon.

GTPeach said...

I still say watch the original. WHo's to say that the special edition was the way LUcas intended? Lucas would have made the originals that way if he'd really intended. Also, Lucas would say/do anythign these days to sell his swag... so none of us really know what Lucas intended outside of selling things.

But I don't recommend watching the Clone Wars or X-mas Special. Your brains will be dead byt he time you get to the trilogy...

Avi said...

Do not watch the Clone Wars! Do not. Why torture yourselves needlessly? Personally, I say you shouldn't even own a copy of Revenge of the Sith. It's a giant ball of horribleness. Absolutely terrible! I watched Phantom Menace recently and I was surprised - aside from the awful corniness of midichlorians, young Anakin, Jar Jar, and virgin birth, it was actually...good! The Pod racing was exciting, so was Coruscant. Liam Neeson and Darth Maul are so awesome. Unfortunately they get killed off immediately and Hayden Christensen comes in. Watch episode 3 if you must but never do it again. Sell the DVD. Don't let your children watch it. I haven't watch ep 2 in forever so I don't remember what the quality was. Probably not the best. I do remember ep 3 was horrible and I only saw it once or twice, yet the details of the plot are so familiar for some reason, suggesting I saw it multiple times. Yet I know for a fact I saw it very few times. God, I love the original trilogy so much.