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And now ROTJ is a bad movie?? Wow....

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Has anyone actually said this?

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Is it because so many of you grew up on the prequels that you value ROTS so highly? Like someone pointed out, yes, ROTS is the best of the prequels, but that was a really freakin' low bar to get over. And now ROTJ is a bad movie?? Wow....

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I value ROTS slightly more than ROTJ for a number of reasons, most notably because it did depict the ultimate fall of Anakin Skywalker, "birth" of Darth Vader and that epic duel between mentor and padawan. Oh and by the way, I was 9 when Star Wars first came out, 10 when I finally saw it, so I grew up on the OT.

Never seen it said that Jedi is bad, but I have seen ROTJ lambasted for the Ewoks. Hell, when I left the Lake Theater on May 25, 1983 in Lake Jackson, TX, after having just seen it, I was conflicted over whether I even liked the movie or not simply because of those g***mned teddy bears. The opening Jabba sequence and the final big act involving capital ships, the Death Star, Vader, Luke and the Emperor, and Han Solo copping a feel ultimately overrode my irritation with the Ewoks, though, and I decided that Jedi was quite a great movie. Still hate the Ewoks more so than Jar Jar, but Rose is giving the teddy bears a run for their money here.

All the New Things We Learned From the Star Wars: The Last Jedi Blu-Ray

Everything Rian Johnson Has Been Forced to Explain About The Last Jedi (So Far)

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Before he even wrote the movie, writer-director Rian Johnson had these very specific ideas in his head: The idea of a casino planet where the one percent of the Star Wars universe lives.

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No wonder this wasn't considered on the chopping block

Well this should make fanboy heads explode all over the galaxy...

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While writing, Johnson considered having Luke use the Force for some massive attack at the end, but felt it went against his idea that the Force is not a superpower.

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redline248 said:

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Ewoks worse than Jar Jar? I mean, the ewoks were capable of building elaborate traps/snares...and you know...could actually walk without falling over. And weren't cowardly little *****es, either.

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Absolutely. You know that little kids have known about teddy bears for many, many years. Yet to ole George, he thought he had something new for people. I could never buy the notion of cuddly teddy bears setting all those traps, I mean, they felled all those trees and were able to pull them high enough into the trees to be able to smash a chicken walker! Goodness, that is awful. Had George simply gone with Wookiees, I would have bought into that entire aspect of Jedi. Jar Jar was a mental midget and a klutz, but he was far more important to the overall SW universe than this fierce bunch of teddy bears - he was the easily susceptible fool who was manipulated into requesting ultimate power for the chancellor.

This has been chronicled a dozen times in this thread alone. Lucas couldn't have "simply gone with Wookies." He wanted to and he tried but doing so was too expensive. That's WHY we got Ewoks. They were discount Wookies, essentially.

Not every decision on a movie is creative. So many compromises constantly have to be made and more often than not those compromises result in less than optimal situations.

TCTTS said:

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This has been chronicled a dozen times in this thread alone. Lucas couldn't have "simply gone with Wookies." He wanted to and he tried but doing so was too expensive. That's WHY we got Ewoks. They were discount Wookies, essentially.

Not every decision on a movie is creative. So many compromises constantly have to be made and more often than not those compromises result in less than optimal situations.

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I haven't heard this before.

Can you elaborate on this? Assuming all other set pieces are identical: how is finding a bunch of dwarfs and dressing them up as teddy bears cheap, but finding tall people and putting them in walking carpet outfits expensive?

Solo Tetherball Champ said:

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TCTTS said:

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This has been chronicled a dozen times in this thread alone. Lucas couldn't have "simply gone with Wookies." He wanted to and he tried but doing so was too expensive. That's WHY we got Ewoks. They were discount Wookies, essentially.

Not every decision on a movie is creative. So many compromises constantly have to be made and more often than not those compromises result in less than optimal situations.

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I haven't heard this before.

Can you elaborate on this? Assuming all other set pieces are identical: how is finding a bunch of dwarfs and dressing them up as teddy bears cheap, but finding tall people and putting them in walking carpet outfits expensive?

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Wasn't budgetary from what I've heard.

But more a combination of these:
1. wanted a more primitive species and wookies (via Chewy) seemed too advanced technoogically
2. wanted more of an underdog role/appearance - wookies are imposing
3. marketability - ewoks are cute, wookies are scary

So it seems the story has been muddied/conflated over the years. Here's the real reason...

https://www.yahoo.com/entertainment/how-the-ewoks-in-return-of-the-jedi-started-out-as-wookiees-122043597.html

i.e. they were too expensive for the FIRST Star Wars movie.

amercer said:

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Well this should make fanboy heads explode all over the galaxy...

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While writing, Johnson considered having Luke use the Force for some massive attack at the end, but felt it went against his idea that the Force is not a superpower.

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That's funny, considering Kylo and Snoke demonstrate more power with the force than any of the greatest Sith/Jedi we know about. Hell, Rey is more powerful than was Luke at the end of Empire. JJ unlocked that particular door, and Rian kicked it off the hinges.

TCTTS said:

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This has been chronicled a dozen times in this thread alone. Lucas couldn't have "simply gone with Wookies." He wanted to and he tried but doing so was too expensive. That's WHY we got Ewoks. They were discount Wookies, essentially.

Not every decision on a movie is creative. So many compromises constantly have to be made and more often than not those compromises result in less than optimal situations.

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I'm very much aware of why he went with Ewoks. I get it, but on the other hand, Star Wars was the most profitable movie ever made up until ET, and he did quite well with Empire and Raiders as well. He would have been better served in spending whatever it would have cost to go with Wookies.

redline248 said:

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I have no problem with Ewoks, nor do I find it unreasonable that they could succeed in guerrilla warfare vs Imperial troops.

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Plus their actions in the battle of Endor lead to their complete eradication after RTJ, so the haters should really show some respect.

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but as now, so much of what I remember of ROTJ - from the Tatooine/Jabba first act, to Endor, to the epic Luke/Vader/Palpatine - is just so incredibly iconic in the best ways that I've never really had a problem with any of it.

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That's basically what I meant when I mentioned nostalgia.

People accuse me of being overly-nostalgic towards the prequels (which I don't dispute), but a lot of the flaws in the OT (mostly in ROTJ) are overlooked because of the iconic status of the movies.

Personally, I think the popular opinion on ROTJ is helped by the almost universal love for ANH and ESB, with the opposite being true for ROTS.

Of course, there's no quantifiable evidence for any of this, these are just my thoughts.

the music mix in that is way too high, but otherwise not bad

SeattleAgJr said:

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the music mix in that is way too high, but otherwise not bad

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Yes, it's real bad when Rey's grandma gets slaughtered.

Oh you!

So is the chosen one prophecy all done with?

dromo07 said:

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Oh you!

So is the chosen one prophecy all done with?

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yes. it was over with Vader & Luke..
the prophecy was the destruction of the Sith which Luke/Vader brought about.

Dammit and here I thought all the episodes had to do with the "chosen one"