George Lucas Criticizes Latest ‘Star Wars’ Installment

Not to stir the pot, but it's interesting to read his opinion and about face. Kind of creepy.
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/12/31/mo…stallment.html

Selling something means you don't have it any more.
Any criticizing of something you sold in such case is won't say moronic but at least unfair.

Next time, don't sell.
Although I think… There won't be next time.

Btw I won't read the article, don't want to see spoilers.

Originally Posted by joxer
Btw I won't read the article, don't want to see spoilers.

There isn't any.

He comes across as a bitter old man. He's ticked off that his prequels sucked and JJ's new versions are getting raves from fans and critics.

Originally Posted by DarNoor
He comes across as a bitter old man. He's ticked off that his prequels sucked and JJ's new versions are getting raves from fans and critics.

Maybe…
Its hard to give up your creative idea and watch people change it.

Well, he's not wrong.

But genre formulas exist for a reason: they're fun.

Originally Posted by Wisdom
Maybe…
Its hard to give up your creative idea and watch people change it.

He should have known that if he sold it, there was a strong possibility that people would create their own vision for the franchise.

Originally Posted by Hexprone
Well, he's not wrong.

But genre formulas exist for a reason: they're fun.

I think that after the prequels, Disney was afraid of losing the original fanbase. After all, without that fanbase, the new vesions would fail. That's why they brought back the familiar settings. I think now, you are going to see the films go into unfamiliar territory. Which would be good for the franchise.

Originally Posted by joxer
Selling something means you don't have it any more.
Any criticizing of something you sold in such case is won't say moronic but at least unfair.

Thank God here in Germany "intellectual property" cannot be sold by definition !
Because what one invents, belongs to the inventor eternally. One can only sell plans, rights, etc. …

Besides, I'm having a discussion with a group of Star Wars fans now, about "marginalising the original Rebel's efforts in the older movies by showing how the Empire is in the new movies".

My point is that because Disney wants thios setting to sell, it is stuck in an "Eternal War" setting now. There just will be no pece, because peace doesn't sell.
To me, that's the GAU of a setting, because I as a writer very firmly believes that "a good story needs a good end", and Star Wars has mainly always been a *story* to me.

In short, all of the artistical effort George Lucas was putting into this story and setting becomes marginalised to bow before the profit interests of the capitalism.

I'm not against Disney wanting to make mone with this setting - but please without raping it - or twisting it into a direction it was never meant to be.

( I do know that the "Expanded Universe" always had that "Eternal War" setting already, but that was everything non-movie, so I and other fans could easily dismiss that. )

From the article :

But he was harsh in criticizing the film industry for focusing on profit over storytelling.

Exactly my point.

Whereas here in the United States, pretty much everything anyone creates belongs to The Walt Disney Co eternally.

The exaggeration is a small one: this single company has been the driver of repeated changes to copyright law that strangle fair use while giving nothing to the artist.

Well, I often have the impression as if artists - especially american artists - are sucked dry by those "creative" companies. Extremely put, it's like parasitism, in which the parasite sucks all life out of … the artists.

In an recent newspaper article someone put it like that : Art is becomming commercialised, and that means : Art becomes a ware. And with becoming a ware, art ceases to exist as an artistic good … It becomes part of the capitalistic property, so to say (these are my words now).

The greatest example of this parasitism is to me those "patent troll" companies.
They live because they took something someone else has invented. It's like viruses : Stolen life.

But he was harsh in criticizing the film industry for focusing on profit over storytelling.

Holy shit, he's completely senile! This from the guy who after Raiders was such a success told everyone he worked with "Story doesn't matter, audiences just want a roller coaster ride." This from the guy who told Gary Kurtz after ESB, when they were arguing over the direction of ROTJ, "We could have made just as much money without as good a story." (To which Kurtz responded "BUT IT WAS WORTH IT!!!")

I'm just blown away at how someone could be clueless of their own history.

“They wanted to do a retro movie,” he continued. “I don’t like that. Every movie, I worked very hard to make them different, make them completely different with different planets, different spaceships, to make it new.”

Yes, that's why Tattoine shows up in 1, 2, 3, 4 and 6.

Are we sure this is not a parody piece?

One other thing…
Don't forget Lucas is 70+. Think of all the 70+ year olds you know and imagine someone thrusting a microphone in front of them and asking them to comment on something.

he talks as if he had no choice but to sell it …

Well, I heard a completely different story about why he sold it … But I think that this doesn't belong here - and I can't even verify it at all …

Originally Posted by Alrik Fassbauer
Well, I heard a completely different story about why he sold it … But I think that this doesn't belong here - and I can't even verify it at all …

Mind sharing it anyway? I'd be quite curious to hear it.

A friend (a Star Wars fan, actually) told me he sold it because some company had done a kind of "porn parody" out of the movies. He told me that George Lucas became so much … angry and devastated by it that he wanted to sell the Franchise. (Sounds to me a bit like the equivalent of "ragequit".)
I really don't know if that is true … - but it is reasonable at least, if it is / would be true. If I was a movie maker, I wouldn't like to see - or even hear about it - that such a form of "parody" would exist of my movie …

Originally Posted by Alrik Fassbauer
A friend (a Star Wars fan, actually) told me he sold it because some company had done a kind of "porn parody" out of the movies. He told me that George Lucas became so much … angry and devastated by it that he wanted to sell the Franchise. (Sounds to me a bit like the equivalent of "ragequit".)
I really don't know if that is true … - but it is reasonable at least, if it is / would be true. If I was a movie maker, I wouldn't like to see - or even hear about it - that such a form of "parody" would exist of my movie …

I'd be mad too if the porn was better than my prequel "masterpiece"

The thing I find funny if you can find anything funny with the referral of "Slavery" is Georges charter of JAR JAR There was a lot of write ups about it being a stereotype of black people.

Either way sour grapes I say.

HE said Disney act like "white slavers" …. how did they enslave him exactly, by offering him something he couldn't refuse?