The Official Star Wars Thread!

[AwkwardlySet]

The title says it all. Instead of derailing countless threads with SW theories and references, maybe we can channel our inner nerds here in this thread.
From what I've seen so far, there are plenty of fans of SW in the AH, but more than that, there are more than a few hardcore fans who are willing to get angry when someone steps on their toes. *Chuckles at Wanda*

Anyway, let's start with KOTOR, as that is one outstanding piece of the SW universe that not everyone is familiar with. And they should be.

KOTOR is short for Knights of the Old Republic, a (2003) SW-themed role-playing game from BioWare. It reached a legendary status, not so much because of the gameplay as for the excellent story and characters.

I'd rather not be the one to start the discussion about it, so please share your opinion of the story in the game and whether you are happy with how it was continued in KOTOR2 (sort of) and in the MMO SWTOR. I wasn't.

 

[MillieDynamite]

Games, I don't play games. But when Jo gets home, I can ask her about it. She plays lots of games. Video games, not mind games, sex games (with others anyway), nor does she game the system.

 

[CyranoJ]

I'd rather not be the one to start the discussion about it, so please share your opinion of the story in the game and whether you are happy with how it was continued in KOTOR2 (sort of) and in the MMO SWTOR. I wasn't.

I'll bite. KOTOR is actually one of my favorite Star Wars stories: classic good vs. evil redemption storyline stuff. The revelation that the game gradually unveils for the player is extremely cool. (Should I spoiler-tag this? I feel like it shouldn't be necessary with more than 20-year-old media, but just to be on the safe side:

The moment when I learned that my protagonist was actually a former Sith Lord is one of my favorite all-time game moments in anything period, not just in a Star Wars property.

I felt like KOTOR 2 was a surprisingly good sequel that was working its way up to something along these lines, but unfortunately, it's possible to get to the final mission of that game with a party composition that simply can't complete it. When I discovered this, I lost the will to go back and replay it, and I don't know how it ends (or what the "canon ending" is) to this day. And I can't speak to the MMO, I've never been an MMO guy.

 

[AwkwardlySet]

I'll bite. KOTOR is actually one of my favorite Star Wars stories: classic good vs. evil redemption storyline stuff. The revelation that the game gradually unveils for the player is extremely cool. (Should I spoiler-tag this? I feel like it shouldn't be necessary with more than 20-year-old media, but just to be on the safe side:

The moment when I learned that my protagonist was actually a former Sith Lord is one of my favorite all-time game moments in anything period, not just in a Star Wars property.

I'll sign every word there.

I felt like KOTOR 2 was a surprisingly good sequel that was working its way up to something along these lines, but unfortunately, it's possible to get to the final mission of that game with a party composition that simply can't complete it. When I discovered this, I lost the will to go back and replay it, and I don't know how it ends (or what the "canon ending" is) to this day. And I can't speak to the MMO, I've never been an MMO guy.

I'm surprised at your difficulty in completing it. My problem with the game part of it was the exact opposite. The main character simply became too overpowered, and the fights posed zero challenge. I remember finishing off the fight against Kreia in like three hits or so. You must have gone for some unusual build.

When it comes to the story part of KOTOR2, I think parts of it were great and parts of it sucked. The mentoring thing done by Kreia was excellent, for example, and the idea that the player is the void in the force is really good as well. I just think that the main character lacked depth by being nameless and practically standing in the shadow of Revan. But the game didn't really ruin any of the story from KOTOR.
SWTOR though...

 

[filthytrancendence]

That thread was dead and 3x derailed before I derailed it a 4th time with my KOTOR diatribe, lol. I don't think that counts as derailing if it's already a half mile from the rails.

Here's the diatribe if anyone wants to argue with me about it.

I'm pretty disillusioned with taking Star Wars at face value at this point. The Rise of Skywalker was such a knife through the heart of the franchise.

For this reason, my favorite bits of SW media are KOTOR 2 and The Last Jedi. The imperfect works most people hate that are primarily concerned with deconstructing the bad ideas wrapped up in the Jedi in particular and the force in general. I hear Andor is dope but I think I need a few more years to detox from Rise of Skywalker before I'm ready to engage with that one like it deserves.

 

[SimonDoom]

Thank you for explaining what KOTOR meant. I had no idea. I'd never played the game. I'd never heard of it.

I'll share an old fart's Star Wars perspective. I was 12 when the original movie came out in 1977, and I remember being enthralled. It was like no movie that anybody had ever seen before. And part of the beauty of it was that it wasn't serious. It was pure entertainment. It was tongue in cheek. It wasn't burdened by backstory, and Wikis, and fans, and Force theorists, and cosplay fanatics, and analysts who wanted to root it in Joseph Campbell. We just watched it, and loved it, for the pure fun of what was happening on the screen. Something totally new and utterly delightful.

It's with a combination of amusement and bemusement now, much older, that I see the seriousness with which the Star Wars mythology is treated. I get it, sort of. But I can't help but think that something has been lost, and I wish young people today could see the original Star Wars movie the way I did. I don't think it's possible, and I think that's too bad.

 

[AwkwardlySet]

That thread was dead and 3x derailed before I derailed it a 4th time with my KOTOR diatribe, lol. I don't think that counts as derailing if it's already a half mile from the rails.

Here's the diatribe if anyone wants to argue with me about it.

I'm pretty disillusioned with taking Star Wars at face value at this point. The Rise of Skywalker was such a knife through the heart of the franchise.

For this reason, my favorite bits of SW media are KOTOR 2 and The Last Jedi. The imperfect works most people hate that are primarily concerned with deconstructing the bad ideas wrapped up in the Jedi in particular and the force in general. I hear Andor is dope but I think I need a few more years to detox from Rise of Skywalker before I'm ready to engage with that one like it deserves.

There are points I would likely want to touch on. I am unfamiliar with the Hero with a Thousand Faces, though, so I'll have to look it up first.

 

[ShelbyDawn57]

The title says it all. Instead of derailing countless threads with SW theories and references, maybe we can channel our inner nerds here in this thread.
From what I've seen so far, there are plenty of fans of SW in the AH, but more than that, there are more than a few hardcore fans who are willing to get angry when someone steps on their toes. *Chuckles at Wanda*

Anyway, let's start with KOTOR, as that is one outstanding piece of the SW universe that not everyone is familiar with. And they should be.

KOTOR is short for Knights of the Old Republic, a (2003) SW-themed role-playing game from BioWare. It reached a legendary status, not so much because of the gameplay as for the excellent story and characters.

I'd rather not be the one to start the discussion about it, so please share your opinion of the story in the game and whether you are happy with how it was continued in KOTOR2 (sort of) and in the MMO SWTOR. I wasn't.

I can't speak to KOTOR, but I played all eight character classes to level fifty( a few of them more than once) in SWTOR. If the game play and story lines in KOTOR are on par with SWTOR, it is an amazing game. Both my boys swear by it. I just never got around to playing it myself.

 

[TheRedChamber]

I think I'm done talking about Star Wars om the Internet. There's nothing more to.aay after 50 years about the old movies and the less said about the new stuff the better.

Edit. Have never player more than the tutorial/first planet of kotor. Will get round to it one of these days.

 

[jsmiam]

It’s quite difficult to see any of the films in their original unaltered form. All of them have been altered after the fact.

So when our fourth most common question “how do I edit my story” or “should I edit my story” comes along, perhaps we should say “yes, yes, yes”

(By the way, I said “yes, yes, yes” like Yoda. I put the third yes where the first yes was supposed to go)

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Changes_in_Star_Wars_re-releases

 

[CyranoJ]

That thread was dead and 3x derailed before I derailed it a 4th time with my KOTOR diatribe, lol. I don't think that counts as derailing if it's already a half mile from the rails.

Here's the diatribe if anyone wants to argue with me about it.

Well, got a hot take for you: I think Joseph Campbell is not very useful as a lens for analyzing Star Wars, and that a lot of the affiliation of his (not-particularly-impressive, if I'm honest) form of literary analysis with the franchise actually distracts from its real roots and what really drives it.

The seminal piece on this topic is Steven Hart's piece in Salon from... holy shit, twenty-three years ago. The basic point of which still holds up, I think.

(I realize that you're making the point that Star Wars creators have been self-consciously trying to build stories around the Joseph Campbell hero's journey template, which is to some extent true; it's just that the template is sufficiently vague that I'm not sure its associated contentions regarding the supposed power of the 'monomyth' are impressive enough to matter. Whereas the roots of Star Wars in the universes and 'rules' of pulp science fiction are a much more salient and interesting lens that actually explains a lot more about the franchise's strengths... and its limitations.)

I'm not as down on a lot of new Star Wars content as some parts of the fandom are. OTOH I think a lot of it is... let's just say inessential. Of course, some of it is actively bad (The Rise of Skywalker deserves its poor reputation[1]), but where that happens it's usually a case of indecision about whether the format should grow beyond pulp space opera, or lean into it, and which audiences it should or shouldn't be aimed it while either growing or declining to grow. I think the indecision is often understandable, and is a big part of why I don't get particularly mad about the franchise's awful outings (which in any case are simple enough to ignore for purposes of my own enjoyment).

[1] What happened with TROS pisses me off in terms of Disney's comprehensive cowardice in the face of a strident minority of the fanbase, and thus its total lack of any real creative vision, which is certainly reflected in the shitty and chaotic product but is much more about real-life entertainment industry stuff.

 

[FrancesScott]

Frances with an unpopular opinion #408

The Rise of Skywalker was illogical gibberish. And - as someone who likes Rian Johnson’s other work a lot - The Last Jedi wasn’t much better. The prequels leave me cold, even as excellent actors as McGregor and Portman can only read the lines they are given (cue Harrison Ford quote).

But, I’m fond of The Force Awakens. And I think Daisy Ridley doesn’t get enough credit for being a much more interesting protagonist than Luke, and a better actor than Hamill was in 1977. It’s clearly a pastiche of ANH, but I like it. IMUO of course.

Anyone else dream of a 1977 vintage Ford Fisher MFF? Or is that just me?

 

[CyranoJ]

Frances with an unpopular opinion #408

The Rise of Skywalker was illogical gibberish. And - as someone who likes Rian Johnson’s other work a lot - The Last Jedi wasn’t much better. The prequels leave me cold, even as excellent actors as McGregor and Portman can only read the lines they are given (cue Harrison Ford quote).

Agreed with most of that except that I think The Last Jedi was substantially better than either of the other sequel movies. That of course doesn't mean it's perfect -- and specifically the Very Slow Space Chase it revolves around is something you really have to squint at -- but it at least had some creative ambition and made interesting (albeit flawed) choices.

In a lot of Star Wars media, there's often a lot of good ideas on paper that just don't wind up translating to the screen; that's definitely the story of the prequels. Usually because the creative team couldn't quite decide on which direction to go with the finished product.

 

[FrancesScott]

I think The Last Jedi was substantially better than either of the other prequel movies

I think the novelty of a main female character being a force wielder had an emotional connection for me. TLJ seemed to be a reboot, that then got booted.

 

[StillStunned]

At uni, I wrote an essay drawing parallels between Star Wars and the Percival legends. Essentially, I used the whole "Luke, I am your father" thing to argue that the Red Knight didn't in fact kill Percival's father but Percival's father became the Red Knight. Borne out by the fact that Percival himself then kills the Red Knight and takes his armour, and is mistaken for the Red Knight. (There are other arguments as well, if anyone's interested.)

If anyone's interested in derailing this thread, I can go on about mythological elements in chivalric romance.

 

[Nynah]

Re-routing my reply to @onehitwanda 's post here:

Entirely fair. I would follow Jennifer Hale's voice to a galaxy far, far away and back again.

Agreed with most of that except that I think The Last Jedi was substantially better than either of the other prequel movies. That of course doesn't mean it's perfect -- and specifically the Very Slow Space Chase it revolves around is something you really have to squint at -- but it at least had some creative ambition and made interesting (albeit flawed) choices.

I agree with this. The Last Jedi was better than the two films that bookend it; only by a little for The Force Awakens and by several parsecs for the pile of bantha excrement that is Rise of Skywalker. Johnson made a lot of interesting and subersive choices narratively that didn't resonate with a lot of fanboys but I think they were, as you say, creatively ambitious, and drove the story in fascinating directions rather than retreading an Original Trilogy movie beat for beat.

The Very Slow Space Chase was indeed a questionable choice though; I keep wanting to play Yakety Sax whenever the movie cut to wide shots of the Resistance fleet being chased by The First Order's massive warship.

 

[AchtungNight]

Love Star Wars. Favorite scene is from the original trilogy when Luke tells Vader “my father is truly dead” and you can see the conflict over that in Vader even with his mask. The three part battle that follows is brilliantly choreographed and acted. Great films all around.

On video games, Jedi Fallen Order and Survivor are my favorites. Erotic novelization of the latter on AO3.

 

[Bramblethorn]

Entirely fair. I would follow Jennifer Hale's voice to a galaxy far, far away and back again.

Facts.

That thread was dead and 3x derailed before I derailed it a 4th time with my KOTOR diatribe, lol. I don't think that counts as derailing if it's already a half mile from the rails.

Yeah, there were already quite a few answers to OP's question and probably not much more to be said there. Derailing that happens after the thread has served its original purpose is a whole different thing to derailing that gets in the way of an ongoing discussion.

 

[Voyeurkenneth]

It’s sad to think that Andor might be a flash in the pan. I hope whoever heads up the Star Ward IP next doesn’t just have 8-year-olds and toys/merch in mind.

 

[KittyOfSteele]

The Jedi are hypocrites.

Entirely fair. I would follow Jennifer Hale's voice to a galaxy far, far away and back again.

*Mass Effect peeks out.* Hey babe. I'm Commander Shepard and this is my favorite post on Author's Hangout. We'll bang, ok?

 

[onehitwanda]

I wrote fan mail to Jennifer Hale once.

She never responded

Oh my God I'd buried that shameful memory...

 

[TheRedLantern]

I'm not a huge Star Wars fan, but the lightsaber fight in Phantom Menace is one of the great martial arts cinematic scenes of all time.

When those laser walls come down, and Darth Maul's adrenaline is up to his mouth and he's pacing back and forth while Obi Wan kneels and meditates ... total shivers.

 

[FrancesScott]

Oh my God i'd buried that shamefuk memory...

Is shamefuk like pity fuk, but the other way around?

 

[onehitwanda]

Is shamefuk like pity fuk, but the other way around?

... that'll teach me to type on my phone without my glasses.

 

[Nynah]

I wrote fan mail to Jennifer Hale once.

She never responded

Oh my God i'd buried that shamefuk memory...

She's probably due for a convention visit to the UK/EU area in the next few years, perhaps you could tell her in person if that's the case? I had the good fortune of meeting her once at one and she was lovely. She even said my favorite line from KotOR. My biggest regret was not recording it in some way.

I'm not a huge Star Wars fan, but the lightsaber fight in Phantom Menace is one of the great martial arts cinematic scenes of all time.

When those laser walls come down, and Darth Maul's adrenaline is up to his mouth and he's pacing back and forth while Obi Wan kneels and meditates ... total shivers.

Star Wars is an embarassingly large part of my fandom predilections so I'm going to be the pedant who points out that it's actually Qui-Gon who is kneeling and meditating, Obi-Wan is rocking on the balls of his feet many laser walls downwind. But I agree with you, it's a fun cinematic set piece that set the bar very high for subsequent films.