I love the Original Trilogy; I greatly enjoy some of the Extended Universe; I like some of the video games (though I specifically dislike Revan); and I like some of the Star Wars series (animated and live-action). The Prequels are bad. The Sequels are bad (especially episode 8). That's a kind of foundation for you to understand my point of view as I write this blog essay. Instead of just writing about the mistakes I think were made in the movies, I'm going to try to just write my ideas for how things could have gone that I would have been happier with. And since this is one essay trying to address 11 movies (I'm including Solo and Rogue One), it'll be a framework rather than a treatment.
I'm doing it in release order partly because that's how I experienced them, but also because there's some importance to the story being told that way in the form of the big reveal in Empire Strikes Back. And seeing how long this is getting, I think I'm going to break it up into 3 posts for the original trilogy, the prequels, and the sequels.
Episode 4: Star Wars, A New Hope
The only thing I'd change is some of the details. When Han delivers the lines: "The engines are at full power. I'm going to have to shut down. They're not going to get me without a fight", it sounds like those things are connected and somehow shutting down IS the beginning of fighting back. It just sounds weird to me, but the fix is easy. The tractor beam is overpowering the engines so Han says the first part about the engines being at full power and needing to shut down, possibly adding something about preventing them from burning out or breaking. Then Han pauses and starts looking around like he's desperately thinking. He turns to the other people in the ship and flatly states that they're not going to get him without a fight. The pause and body language tell us that the engines are no longer the focus and we get the clearer idea that Han is intent on not giving up. It also makes the following line from Obi-Wan, "You can't win, but there are alternatives to fighting", make more sense.
I would also adjust the Death Star wait-time reason when it is trying to destroy the rebel base. Instead of being blocked by a planet and orbiting until you can see the moon you want to destroy, why not put in the detail that the hyperspace jump took all the power from the capacitors and they need to charge again before they can fire? Hyperspace jumping a moon-sized station from the Alderaan system to the Yavin system has to take a lot of power. It would make sense that the station couldn't jump and shoot a beam powerful enough to destroy a planet-sized moon in rapid succession. Instead of the line that explains they need to orbit the gas giant to shoot at the moon, have a line that says something like, "15 minutes to charge capacitors for firing the main cannon", and move on.
The trench run is one of the best scenes in all of Star Wars. Great story telling for getting the viewer on the edge of their seats. I've seen it at least 50 times and it works on me every time. But logic underlying it needs to be fixed. Since an exhaust port implies releasing a gas like an exhaust on a car, and losing resources out an exhaust port into space doesn't make sense (what kind of power plant can handle a small moon sized ship that has exhaust? Is that thing burning fuel?), I'd change that to a maintenance tunnel. For a huge power plant you might need to fly maintenance ships into the moon base for (carrying large machines and supplies), you just have a ship sized tunnel. It's no longer a flaw in the design... just a weakness the rebels figured out to exploit.
The weakness isn't perfect for the rebels. It is covered by massive doors when not in use and because it is a known entry point to the station, it is surrounding by a ridiculous number of turrets. There's no trench, just that the closer you get, the harder it is to not get shot down. And missiles fired from too far away get shot down before they can be helpful. So, you have to get people close enough to fire the missiles. The first run is a bunch of Y-Wings with the sole purpose of blowing a big hole in the door (possible secondary of blowing up shield generators around the door). The second run is to take the shot if the path is clear, or to at least clear more of a path. The third run is only needed if the second run didn't blow up the power plant. Everyone has a computer lock for the guided missiles to use long in advance, and the obstacle is getting close enough to fire such that the turrets can't take out the missiles. Luke's use of the Force to save the day isn't about "timing" a shot for a guided missile (that makes no sense). It's about flying evasively enough to not get shot down by enemy fighters or the surface turrets on his way close enough to get the shot off.
(Quick side note: Greedo never shoots)
Episode 5: The Empire Strikes Back
The Battle of Hoth just needs to explain better why Star Destroyers that can level cities can't just break down the rebel base shield, but for some reason, AT-ATs can walk up to the generator and shoot it. And do the Ion Cannons ignore shields? Or did the Star Destroyer not have its shields up despite the situation? If Ion Cannons ignore shields, why don't Star Destroyers have them too? Couldn't they have shot the shield generator from space and then just pummel the base? Or if Vader's purpose includes capturing Luke, why not just bounty hunters in the first place? Or if not bounty hunters, why do the military leaders think it's important that the shield can withstand bombardment? Why aren't they immediately talking about sending down resources to capture people?
I think to maintain the desired ground battle, we let the imperial military leaders think it's about wiping out the rebels while Vader has his own plans, and it's just convenient the rebels have what is described as an umbrella shield that protects them from bombardment from space, but appears to have been put up in a hurry because there's a lot of space at the ground level where the shield wasn't lined up. The AT-ATs go down to blow up the shield generator still because they can walk under the umbrella. Vader is shown realizing Luke is on the ground and takes the chance to say something like, "someone at this rebel base is to be brought in alive. There will be no bombardment. I will be joining the ground assault. Capture any ships that attempt to flee."
When the rebel ships are ready to flee, they say something about redirecting the power for the shields to the ion cannons to give some indication of how powerful it is. They then say they need to hit the Star Destroyers multiple times to make sure shields are knocked out and then to knock out enough systems to cripple them temporarily.
The second thing I'd like for ESB is more clarity around the lesson Luke is supposed to have learned at the cave. If Luke had listened to Yoda and not brought weapons with him, what was supposed to happen that Luke would have learned from? What would have been the ideal way it would have transpired? Luke is faced with Darth Vader and then what? Or was it always known Luke would bring his weapons anyway, and part of the lesson is that using weapons was the wrong choice? Was Luke's face inside the helmet a foreshadowing of familial relation, or a warning of some kind that he could end up on the dark side like Vader? Was it a more blunt message that if he chooses violence, he'll be the one that gets hurt? And then Yoda describes it as a "failure at the cave". How was it a failure? Just that Luke didn't listen to the suggestion to leave his weapons behind? That Luke drew his lightsaber first and struck down Vader?
So, I looked it up to see what other people came up with and the answer that clicked with me the most was that Fear was Luke's failure. His fear of what he might find made him take his weapons with him; his fear of Vader made him draw his lightsaber first; and he was confronted with his fear of falling to the dark side in seeing his own face behind the mask. I found an answer on starwars.com that seems like it might be accurate and includes mention of the fear bits, but is WAY TOO INVOLVED for what an average movie-goer (including me) would be familiar enough with to recognize it the way the movie presents it. Then again, I can really only speak for myself, so maybe this whole segment of clarification I'm yearning for would only be useful to me. Anyway, the succumbing to fear explanation works for me, especially since fear of Vader dragging Leia to the dark side is what makes Luke lose control in Return of the Jedi. He almost fails again, but seeing his father's stump wrist jolts him out of it... the connection between the movies is really good this way.
If I were adjusting the cave scene for clarity without making it blunt to the point of losing impressiveness, I think I might have added a scene prior to the cave where Yoda addresses it. Something maybe with Luke growing impatient because he feels like he needs to get back out there and Yoda digs a little to make Luke say the words that he's afraid of what will happen to his friends if he's not helping them. It leads nicely to the point where Luke has a vision of his friends being hurt that sets him off to go help them. I might need to think this one through a bit more, but as it stands, the cave scene feels a little to obscure to me.
Episode 6: Return of the Jedi
This is my favorite of the Star Wars movies, though the original trilogy movies are all very close. This one edges the others out because it has the duel between father and son that the whole story is built around... I mean... it's the story of Anakin Skywalker. It's his hero's journey. Luke gets a kind of mini one, but Lucas's original intent for Star Wars was 9 episodes that focused on Anakin. When he got to make a movie, he started in the middle thinking it was the most exciting part and not knowing if he'd get to make any more movies. He crammed his episodes 4 and 5 into the one movie that he labeled as episode 4. Anakin story episodes 6 and 7 became movie episode 5, and 8 and 9 became movie episode 6. Lucas finished telling his story with Return of the Jedi and the scene where Anakin faces his son and is saved from the dark side by his son... it's the best scene in all of Star Wars.
That said, there are two things I'd like to change about Return of the Jedi. First is that the plan to rescue Han from Jabba is much too convoluted. Implant Lando as a guard; get the droids there so the lightsaber would be there; get Chewy captured which maybe implants Leia (but why wouldn't Lando just be the one to unfreeze Han?); try to bargain with Jabba (including using the Force) and if that worked, try to extricate Chewy and the droids (and Leia since she got captured); and then finally just fight your way out with the lightsaber?
I think I would have rather seen them get Lando in there to do the unfreezing at the most opportune moment and he'd have a way to signal that he needs the cavalry. Lando unfreezes Han, but another guard happens upon them trying to leave. Lando sends the signal, and the Millennium Falcon comes in hot and blows open the front door. They land and fight their way part way into the building, but stop when the bad guys show Lando and Han on their knees with blasters to their heads. They get captured. Jabba keeps Leia because he's into that sort of thing. But then he plans a grand party on his barge where he is going to execute Han and the friends who tried to rescue him. The good guys are told that they are being thrown into the Pit of Carkoon and that they will be immobilized and digested slowly as they die of dehydration unable to escape. Jabba keeps Luke's lightsaber because it's a super rare item and he can say he captured and executed a Jedi. When Luke takes his lightsaber back, it's not because R2 had it. It's because Luke just takes it back from Jabba in a way Jabba wasn't expecting... didn't have enough experience with Jedi.
The second thing I'd change is to put back Lucas's original intention for Endor with a modification. His original intent was to use wookiees as the primitive species that the rebels get help from. He decided to change that because Chewbacca was already technologically advanced and for some reason Lucas couldn't get past the idea of the species on Endor being primitive. Unfortunately, ewoks are not believable as a fighting force that could defeat storm troopers, and the fact that it worked out that way just hamstrings storm troopers even more and ruins any tension they might bring. So, I want to put wookiees back in.
Wookiees in the lore and known to be a species that the Empire enslaved and Chewbacca befriended and promised a life debt to Han based on Han having rescued Chewy from slavery to the Empire. It would have been so easy to say that the Empire just put a huge slave force of wookiees on Endor to do work to build the second Death Star. Ewoks can even still be native to the planet and help the rebels to free the wookiees... and then the wookiees start fighting back and taking weapons and we have a believable fighting force that can take on storm troopers. No stupid traps that the ewoks set up. No storm troopers panicking as arrows bounced off their armor. Just big terrifying wookiees freed from restraints and pulling apart storm troopers. Way better. I'm sad that that's not what we got.
Other Star Wars Movies
Already linked near the top...
- Episodes 1, 2, and 3
- Episodes 7, 8, and 9
- Standalone movies
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