Cameron

continued from

Original Star Wars Trilogy Being Re-Released On DVD...The Non-SEs -- September 12th

Wannabe

I'd like to add that I have a somewhat new respect for the updated movies after viewing the detailed changes on Starwars.com.

My biggest gripe had been the 1997 reworking of the Mos Eisely section of Star Wars - which is a little jarring. Most of the other Special Edition changes don't bother me that much. Now that George has documented the changes in detail, I can relax knowing that I don't have to buy those junky non-amamorphic DVDs.

The updates/fixes made to Empire Strikes Back are exquisite - I don't feel like I need to even revisit the orginal version now.

Supermallet

To carry over a question from the last thread: Have we confirmed that the first discs on these are in fact the exact same versions as the previous DVD release, or did they make more cosmetic changes?

Cameron

everything i have read so far say its the exact same disc...commentary holds over, bit rate etc. but again, i do not have the disc

Egon's Ghost

Those cosmetic cleanups are not enough to make up for the other shit they did to the movies.

coli

If Lucas would have just touched up the special effects, I think many wouldn't have complained. If he just put the ring in the death star, the new ObiWan hut, clean up the dogfight, and expand Cloud City & Mos Eisley, it wouldn't be jarring to the viewer who saw the movies for 20 years.

But every scene change blows, whether it be changing Han shoots first, to the new Jabba Scene, to putting in Vader arriving in his shuttle in ESB, to the new JediRocks song in ROTJ, to Hayden inserted as a force ghost. Those scenes truly ruin anything that Lucas did with the updated effects.

What it did was make you chose:

Do I want updated effects and awful scene changes like Han shooting second?

Do I want no changes at all, and just the originals before 1997?

I will take the originals before 1997 in Anamorphic. I guess you have to say that now when you specify what you want in a DVD.

Bugg

The old shot looks better. The building on the right looks like a real building, with a slight glare on the window and even rust streaks running down it. In the new shot the building has that sterile cgi look.

bboisvert

I know I wouldn't have. A nip and a tuck here and there, recomposing the existing effects, cleaning up the image, even adding some subtle CGI improvements (during the original Death Star battle, for instance) would have been fine with me.

Making Mos Eisley into a freaking zoo, han shooting first, Luke's now-white saber, changing dialog in ESB, changing Fett's voice, removing the "Bring me my shuttle" line, changing the ESB Palpatine scene, Vader's added cruise in the middle of a tense ESB sequence, adding Hayden... all of that shit is just over the top for me.

David Cornelius

They are the exact same discs. The only change is to the disc artwork itself, which now adds a "DISC ONE" line under the title.

coli

Exactly, it is like Lucas just didn't know when to stop, he couldn't leave well enough alone. For me, it is still the insertion of Hayden that drove me from a person who could deal with the SE, to a person who now hates the SE. I have never watched ROTJ SE since I first saw Creepy Hayden in the same screen as Alec Guiness!

ceeece

Same here. He RUINED Return of the Jedi. Just RUINED it. I could live with everything until he inserted Hayden at the end. I still hate the Jedi Rocks song and the cheesy CGI in it but showing a young Anakin as a ghost after the Old Anakin is revealed to Luke is retarded. Especially when the old Obi Wan and old Yoda are there. And Hayden looks like he is smirking and STILL on the Dark Side! I HATE YOU HAYDEN!!! (and Lucas!!!)

Drop

I'm one of the few (or maybe it's many) that the changes don't bother mich if at all. The only one that gets to me is Jabba dance routine, and that's really only when I think about it. For some reason when I watch it I'm not nearly as disgusted as I think I will be. I actually prefer ESB how it is now, except maybe for Fett's voice change (only if because Morrison's delivery is strange, the accent is fine).

On the issue of the Anaking ghost; if you consider the prequels apart of the saga, his Hayden ghost is fine, it makes about as much sense as the Shaw one. If you don't like the prequels, then the Hayden ghost is something hard to stomach.

FRwL

Lucas is technically re-directing Irvin Kershner's and Richard Marquand's movies. He has the right do whatever the heck he wants with SW and the prequels since he directed those (even though it's wrong to neglect the ones shown to the masses originally), but you don't really mess with other directors' artistic visions like this, for shame.

Kershner should have done something to stop this, and there should've been some respect for the late Marquand. Doesn't matter if Lucas owns these movies, films are not something to cut around with and sow things on by someone who wasn't the direcctor. Doesn't he have any respect at all?

Maklershed

Well for me this is a win win situation because I havent purchased the SEs yet. So I'll be getting two versions for the price of one basically. I'll be a little less pleased next year when some kind of crazy awesome new set is revealed however.

bboisvert

I'd love for you (or anyone else) to explain this to me. Using just what we see in the films themselves.

Because, honestly, based on what we see in Episode I-VI... I don't think it makes a damn bit of sense. It's amazing to me that he's been able to produce 3 prequel films and add a bunch of changes to the previous stuff. And he still ends on an image that is supposed to be Ultra Important, but makes everyone pretty much scratch their heads and say "huh?"

Josh Z

Listen, I hate every single change that was made to the films since 1997. Every single one. However, to deny that Lucas was always the primary creative force behind these films is just blind. Kershner and Marquand were hired hands brought in to do the grunt work of directing, but Lucas made all of the artistic decisions.

Anyway, I don't think I'd trust the director of Never Say Never Again or RoboCop 2 to make the best decisions for these movies either.

digitalfreaknyc

Obviously Richard couldn't do anything about it but Irvin gave George his blessing. Really, what the hell was he going to say??

rennervision

The new Obi-Wan hut, Death Star battle, and Cloud City I don't really mind because they blend seamlessly into the movie.

I do however have a problem with how Lucas changed Mos Eisley. We should have never seen a number of strange creatures in the city before the cantina scene. The cantina scene was originally designed to create an abrupt transition from a world of mostly humans to a world of alien creatures. I'm surprised Lucas no longer realizes or remembers this. (Not to mention these CGI creatures can be a distraction when we should be focused on dialogue in the scene.)

And as for the ring in the Death Star explosion - an iconic film like Star Wars should never, EVER stoop to ripping off other sci-fi films. (In this case, Star Trek VI.)

Breakfast with Girls

He sure rolled around a lot after that abysmal musical number.

Snowmaker

I just want to be able to hear Luke tell R2 he's lucky he doesn't taste good rather than he's luckily to have gotten out of there.

Jason

It's an arbitrary change. One looked like a matte painting, and the other is CGI, but there's no real reason to change the shape of the building other than the fact that they can.

sirbrady

The changes in ROTJ annoy me a little, Jabba's dance scene and the ending. I really don't care about Star Wars anymore. I may get Empire and pass on the rest.

FRwL

In fact TESB was the least messed with by Lucas during production. Kersh was given creative freedom himself & made it known Lucas was rarely on the set, also Lawrence Kasdan who wrote the screenplay of ROTJ and the prequels took back seat to scifi veteran writer Leigh Brackett of whose original draft being virtually identical to the one in the film (before any further draft revisions by Kasdan after she passed away). Haven't you noticed TESB's writing is on a different tonality and tempo from ROTJ and the prequels?

Yes, Never Say Never Again, a 4.5/5 star film and one of two most expertly directed Bond films along with From Russia with Love.

Disc-Flipper

Have they fixed the low level of music, the reversed rear audio and some of the horrendous video levels which the 2004 version had?

rennervision

Take this from one Bond fan to another - that is definitely your opinion.