jbow
I am thinking of getting some sort of Star Wars collection to watch with the grandkids. However, after browsing at Amazon (mostly) I am totally confused about what to buy. Apparently, episode 1 is not the original Star Wars, I'm not even sure what they call it or what collection has the original 1977 movie or if they have a new name for it or what.
I am not interested in watching in some new order, I'd rather watch in the order that they were released originally. I guess I can figure it out but as of now I just closed the browsers in confusion.
Are any of you Star Wars fans who can direct me to a collection that is in the order of release? I prefer DVD but Blu Ray would be OK. I'm not really interested on remakes or editions that "fix things". I guess I would rather watch in the order that came out so I wont go from better special effects to worse. The movies made sense when they came out, even though some were stories older than the first movie. I'm thinking that if it was understandable then, it will still be and I don't have to watch them in some new kind of order. Mostly I want to be sure I get the original Star Wars and not some episode one that is not the original.
Thanks for any help!
Julien
Episode I, The Phantom Menace is the first chapter of the prequel trilogy, the history of how Anakin became Darth Vader.
Some people hate it. I personally enjoyed most of it, Anakin/Darth Vader being the reason why I dug Star Wars in the first place.
I think the biggest part of the negative comments towards Episodes I, II and III emanate from people who are so taken by the old Star Wars that they've forgotten how lame some of the acting, dialogues and characters were back then too.
As for the old trilogy, starting w/ Episode IV, A New Hope... Unfortunately, the unaltered versions are nearly impossible to find. Lucas had them pulled off the market and claimed that the originals were permanently altered , though I think that one of the Blue-Ray box set does include the original theatrical release. Costs a pretty penny, though.
There are many kinds of changes.
Minor cosmetic fixes, like the blur between the ground and Luke's floating Landspeeder. It now looks clean.
There are some characters digitally added to existing scenes. For exemple when Luke and Obi Wan arrive to Mos Eisley. The streets are a lot busier than in the original version because Lucas had a bunch of creatures digitally added. In some cases it works, in other cases, they went a little nuts with it and it's actually distracting.
Some special effects (such as explosions) were replaced by digital effects - which is a slap in the face to the people who worked so hard on creating the award winning effects in the original, but which shouldn't bother the casual spectator.
Some scenes were added - the whole dialogue between Han Solo and Jabba the Hutt before the departure from Mos Eisley. The scene had been shot with a stand in for Jabba but would have been too costly to complete back in the days. Now it's re-integrated with a CGI Jabba. It doesn't look good and, furthermore, it brings nothing to the table because when they cut that scene, the integrated the useful bits of info into other scenes of the movie.
A relatively minor offense for the newcomer, I guess. But it irks the fans.
There's also the "Who shot first" debate which reels up the fans. In the original, Han shot Greedo to get out of a tight spot. In the revised version, Lucas made it so that Han only shot after Greedo shot at him (and missed
at point blank). That's a change that modifies what kind of character Solo really is, his morality.
And there are scene which are completely different or newly created. The silly CGI canteen band scene which goes on forever and the whole Return of the Jedi finale which has been butchered to include celebrations scenes from all across the galaxy with an entirely new score featuring IIRC some gosh darn peruvian flute.
And they also replaced the original Anakin as he used to appear so that he looks like Anakin in the prequel...
Personally, I dig some of the changes but can't stand some of the others. I'd like to make my own cut.