OPINION: What Lucasfilm Got Wrong About Fandom

I think the main thing they got wrong in regards to fan reaction is simply if you set up a mystery then a huge number of fans will expect an answer fitting of that mystery.
Granted many fan will also just enjoy the ride, or be happy with a subversion (as we saw with the last Jedi)

But a large faction of fans will be angry if they feel they are been fobbed off with a subversion, the answer doesn't fit with the set up, or it feels like the writers didn't have a plan for the mystery when they set it up.

Star Wars isn't the only property where creators have had this issues, Lost, Game of thrones, How I met your mother, Battlestar Galactica, DC, Sherlock and many others have all rubbed fans up the wrong way, with the way they have hooked fans in with mystery's then failed to provide decent fulfilment of that mystery leaving fans frustrated.

 

A lot of fans have notions of ownership of the narrative. We probably all do to varying degrees. Ambiguities undermine those notions and so it feels to some like the narrative is also undermined. Both going forward and retroactively.

 

The simple answer is disney put the message before the story. Instead of crafting a fantastic heros journey like lucas did for the first 6 movies. Disney put politics first and then wrapped a story around it. Just like the Ghostbusters reboot and dark fate...when the message comes before the story, it always fails.

 

I quite like the story of Ben Yoda Skywalker as a jedi though.

 

Nailed it on the head! The particularly frustrating part is that there didn't have to be mysteries. That's not a traditional element in Star Wars. When it was done, it was rare and eventually completed. I'm thinking of Yoda's "No. There is another". Other than that, there aren't many things that were set up as a big mystery. Were there details that people wondered about? Sure. But not many bombs like "There is another". I'm actually struggling to come up with even one more. Maybe Sifo Dyas?

Some may argue that Anakin's conception is one but I don't think it is. He was conceived by the force. That was made clear in TPM. Palpatine's line about creating life is vague and not even known to be true. Maybe that could be one but it's iffy.

 

Yep. Totally agree. I might be one of the few, but I feel like they set up things in the Force Awakens, only to then pull the rug out from under fans. This whole "subversion" thing is, in my minds, garbage. I'm a huge ASOIAF fan, but George doesn't do subversion. In my mind subversion is "pulling the rug out from under" the reader, while what George does is to set things up and you simply don't see it happening because you think characters, i.e. "the hero" has plot armor. At the end of that first book, A Game of Thrones, you should realize this world is different. It's not subverting though, as it was nicely set up (you just didn't think it would happen). Subversion would have been for Ned Stark to somehow break free and kill Joffrey right at that point. Instead, Ned pays for his mistakes with this life. It reads much more like history, at least in my mind, than a novel.

To make a long story short, and I am sure I've said this before, Disney underestimated (and continues to underestimate) the fans and their intelligence. People aren't stupid, so stop treating them as if they are.

 

Clear but annoying maybe to the point of flst out stupid and at least a delusion of grandeur to me.

Prophecies, virgence, baby stealing, out of touch monks, rule of two, and midichlorians are all extreme rubbish and are best forgotten if not rebooted and rewritten ground up for my money.

Shoddy lore that shrinks rather than expands the universe and philosophy while doing nothing for the story at hand either.

 

I have respect for the EU for one reason: It helped Star Wars (along with LucasArts) survive the "dark ages" of Star Wars which were the early to mid 90s. That's about it, I think the writing is absolutely terrible and the number of people who made noise about the EU was so incredible small, it is def. not what Lucas/Disney got wrong, in fact (even though it sounds harsh) it was OK to not continue with the EU, the quality of it was just terrible - I wouldn't want to work with material of that nature as a writer. What they did get wrong is that they produced movies in favor of the product, not knowing Star Wars is the only movie franchise on the planet which didn't require to be promoted/marketed as a product, it draws people to the movies by default! THAT'S what they didn't get. The toys, merchandise, comics, EU and what not rides on the wave of the films - not the other way around.

 

Honestly, I wouldn’t be opposed (actually I think I’d rather enjoy) if Disney ever decided to continue some of the old EU stuff. Some of the storylines were out there, but I really enjoyed a lot of that material. As long as they differentiate between canon and “Legends” I honestly think it could work, at least from a fans interest stand point. For instance, if Disney announced tomorrow that they were continuing the planned Jaina Solo/Jagged Fel books that were set after The Fate of the Jedi series, but they’d still be branded as “legends”, I’d buy it in a heart beat.

 

Yep. Absolutely. I haven't actually made any Star Wars related purchases since sometime in 2012. The continuation of the EU would be the thing that would change that. Unfortunately, Lucasfilm has moved on from the EU audience because we're apparently such a small minority of fans these days. At one time, the EU audience was the only audience. We were the ones who kept Star Wars afloat by buying up every last novel, game and comic. Now, all that has been swept under the rug. Like Skipper the Penguin in Madagascar: "You didn't see anything." As for me, though, I'd take Michael A. Stackpole over JJ Abrams any day.

 

I think the problem lies in the artificial distinction between Canon and Legends. Marvel and DC figured out long ago that the answer is a Multiverse. Everything is Canon in its own universe. Disney could heal a lot of fan anger by simply saying that the Star Wars universe is a multiverse. This means that the EU is just as much Canon as the Sequel Trilogy.

 

But I am a "vocal older fan" that blows up your assumption. I love all Star Wars.

 

Only got to see The Rise of Skywalker now....and needed to register to get a few things off my chest and to see if I'm going mad.

The fact that I was barely in a rush to see it sort of shows where I've got to with the franchise.

Some general observations about the Sequel Trilogy:

- The whole premise of the Sequel Trilogy was wrong because it undid all of the achievements in the Original Trilogy. The series started with all of the work that the heroes did in the Original Trilogy being undone, the characters regressing to what they were before the start (Hans back to being a smuggler, Leia back to being the leader of a Resistance/Rebellion and Luke all alone) and to make things worse, all three main characters being responsible for the creation of yet another monster in Ren. The reason Abrams did this was because he wanted to remake A New Hope so he needed the big bad empire v the resistance/rebels.

- Despite this depressingly, awful premise, Abrams did do a reasonable job of remaking A New Hope and created some interesting characters and threads. The biggest threads he left dangling were Snope, the Knights of the Ren and, most importantly of all, that the force had somehow awoken in Rey, This last point has been completely overlooked and is the source of so much frustration. How was Rey able to do the things she did? The obvious answer was because she had somehow already been trained or had powers given to her and they awoke in The Force Awakens.

- Putting aside the justifiable criticism of The Last Jedi, the biggest criticism I would make is that Johnson failed to develop any of these key threads. Snope was killed (albeit in the best scene in the movie), the Knights of the Ren didn't even feature and there was zero explanation for Rey's powers. And, as others pointed out, this generally points to a lack of planning of the trilogy.

- Despite these massive flaws in The Last Jedi, Johnson did do something awesome, he broke from the past. Johnson handed the next director a completely clean slate with which to re-start the franchise without it being tied to the Skywalkers (or as it transpires, the Palpatines). The one issue is that the Sequel Trilogy was supposed to be the final part of the Skywalker story but, hey, that story had already been told in 6 movies.

- And then again Abrams in The Rise of Skywalker, fails to take advantage of this thread, and worse (and even more inexplicably since it was his own work) fails to pick up the threads in The Force Awakens! Sure Snope was dead (although resurrecting Snope would be less offensive to the achievements in the Original Trilogy than resurrecting the Emperor) but he still had the Knights of the Ren to play with, a fully dark Ren and, most importantly of all, an explanation for what force had awoken in Rey. Plus he had a clean slate to leave the Skywalkers behind and really expand the universe.

Based on the above it is difficult to work out which is worse: The Last Jedi or The Rise of Skywalker. Bringing back the Emperor, in the manner it was done (in the opening credits for god sake) was just the final insult to the Original Trilogy.

At least if there had been some ceremony which showed the Emperor rising from the grave that would've given some kind of gravitas to the moment where Darth Vader's sacrifice had all been in vain. Or, in keeping with the whole theme of the Force awaking, why couldn't Rey have been somehow "infected" with the Emperor's powers which is why she was abandoned? This would set up an internal struggle within Rey as she fights Ren and his Knights. How much more awesome would that have been?

I also could not believe my eyes when The Rise of Skywalker started to roll back everything that had been done in The Last Jedi. Like I said, despite it's many flaws, it at least wiped the slate clean. By rolling back on everything Abraham actually recreated the problem that Johnson had solved. Meanwhile the movie had to move at a ridiculous pace to tell the story that Abrams wanted to now tell in this third film (which was even a different story to the one he told in his first film!).

For me this makes the Sequel Trilogy movies the worst of all of the Star Wars movies (including prequels and spin offs) because the trilogy is fundamentally at odds with the rest of the franchise, it undermines the achievements and development of the characters in the Original Trilogy, and even then, lacks its own internal consistency.

What could've been......

 

i didn’t see bringing back the Emperor as an “insult”. An “insult” to whom? To characters in a movie? He had a story to tell and went the route of bringing back the Emperor. But I appreciate your thorough post.

 

An "insult" to the original characters (and, by extension, the fans who followed their journey).

Darth Vader sacrificed himself to kill the Emperor and then, low and behold, he returns - in the credits.

And like I said, he had other options.

He could have resurrected Snope. There were no rules for Snope as he was a completely new character.

He could have played with the notion that Rey was his granddaughter and that the Emperor had attempted to live on by possessing her.

Rey could have been a nobody (consistent with The Last Jedi) who was possessed by the Emperor (and when the force awoke in her so did the Emperor).

Ken and his Knights could've been the big baddies.

And if he really wanted to raise the Emperor from the dead than their could've been some kind of ceremony (basically Ren struggles to go it alone, finds some book, resurrects the Emperor and that triggers his redemption journey).

There were so many better options than announcing his return in the credits and undoing all of the work of the Original Trilogy.

 

You might heal the anger of some fans, but annoy others. For me Multiverse is a terrible idea. That just means Leia in the book is not Leia in the comics, is not Leia in the movies. I appreciate that all takes place in the same connected universe.

 

They should have stuck to their guns, and not given AF about any of the Haters. Point blank.

Regardless of which route they chose to go story-wise, this should have been the main basis on which they operated the franchise moving forward.


This is the way.


This was the way George Lucas had pretty much always operated up until AOTC. Instead of sticking to his guns like he should have, he acquiesced to the Haters. That ruined the Prequel Trilogy as a whole, and severely messed up the stories of AOTC/ROTS.

Disney/LucasFilm ended up doing the same thing... effectively killing the momentum of the Sequel Trilogy as a whole, and messing up the story of TROS.

Rebranding the EU as 'Legends' was the absolute right move. They ignored the Haters and forged forward. It was brilliant!

(Side Note: I loved most of the EU, and still do!)

TFA was released, there were many Haters. Did Disney care? Nope. TLJ was released, and again... there were Haters. Did Disney care? Yup.

Wait... what?! WHY NOW?!

They got scared... same as GL did after the hateful backlash from TPM. What they should have done was move forward with their original plan...

Three movies. Three directors. Ignore the Haters.

Colin Tevorrow couldn't please The Mouse? Fine. Replace him... with someone different than the first two directors.

(Side Note: I loved most of his original DOTF script.)

That even follows the formula of the OT as well. Three movies. Three directors.



The spiritual core of Star Wars, even more so than Duality, is Faith. This is applicable to both sides of the Fourth Wall.

It's always been about sticking to your guns, staying true to the person you are, and having Faith no matter what obstacles we face.

Disney/LucasFilm almost got it right. They were so close...

Instead, they gave into Fear... and Hatred, which as always... leads to Suffering.





"Ride the Tide"

-SOAS

 

For me, having "different" Leias is a good thing.

Does anyone really buy that the Leia we see at the beginning of The Empire Strikes Back just came from defeating vampires in a haunted Gothic mansion? The comics say that's what she was doing just prior to TESB.

A multiverse just makes official what everyone already seems to accept, that the Leia in the comics is not Carrie Fisher's Leia, etc..It also has the added bonus of making all of the EU canon, and letting fans decide what their favorite universe is without tipping the scales by labeling some of Star Wars as Canon and some as Legends.

 

LucasFIlm did a lot of SNAFUs when it came to the ST. decanonizing the old Expanded Universe did not help them one bit and as a old EU fan I was agitated but open. The biggest issue with the Sequel trilogy was that LucasFilm learned the wrong lessons from the prequels. Much as I like the Prequels, they aren't good movies. They have plenty of objectively bad elements. But they also had some great elements, like the world building.

LucasFilm failed to take what worked in the prequels and meld it with what worked in the OT. That being the world building, lore and characters. Something KOTOR did excellently. They also rushed the production of these movies in an attempt make a return. And finally, they DIDN"T have a plan.

That baffles me. You spend 4 billion dollars and allow two directors to have what is the most expensive game of "And then" on screen. WTF. It is as you said; LF thought nobody would notice that they could slap the label on the SWs brand and people would slop it up.

That's not how the franchise works! While fans can undeniably be obnoxious and take things too far, we are customers at the end of the day. If enough of the customer base is disastisfied we have a right to gripe. LucasFilm, in their hubris, chose to ignore that instead allowing access media to gaslight fans. It is only after the merchandise sales tanked, Galaxy's Edge failure and Solo that they'd perked up.

Because, yes; these movies will still appeal to casual/ normies. But at the end of the day, hardcore fans are the blood of this franchise. The 80/20 rule still applies as we will buy most of the merchandise. And LF decided to split the fanbase.

I really do not care where people stand on the Sequel trilogy. Like it or dislike it. But I will never forgive Kennedy for showcasing such incompetence.

People said that these movies are about the new characters and not the older ones and I'm like "Why can't it be about both?" Cobra Kai did this exceptionally well. Why couldn't Star Wars? Legends did this well to. Heck, Boruto, the sequel to Naruto(which is mediocre) managed to handle its legacy characters well.

Regardless, what happened with the ST needs to be studied. I suspect a lot of books, documentaries and interviews will come out in the later years about this. What happened to the ST never should have happened. Period.

 

Unpopular opinion: All the EU was basically published fan-fiction anyway.

--- Double Post Merged, Feb 21, 2020, Original Post Date: Feb 21, 2020 ---

I don't want to sound like one of those white-knighting soyboys, however it is worth noting that she likely has a whole team under her advising her. It is equally up to them to intercede when they think that she is making a mistake.

--- Double Post Merged, Feb 21, 2020 ---

The whole point of making films with characters of an established franchise is to attract new customers first with the fans coming a close second. It is something of a prickly nettle to grasp.

The Dredd film with Karl Urbain had the opposite problem, attracting many fans but not proving popular with 'normies' to be a financial success or to warrant a sequel. Another example of 'excessively' trying to please the fans was the adaptation of the Watchmen comic series in which the director did exactly what he thought they wanted only for some of the fans of the book to not like it as it was too close to the original.

Pat Mills in this interview a book by Robert McKee, the most sought after scriptwriter and lecturer on scriptwriting in the world, called Story which is an extensive guide on how to tell stories by visual media/screenwriting. The knowledge gained from this book also has applications in comics and novels. It may be worth reading this and encouraging others to do the same.

https://mckeestory.com/books/story/

--- Double Post Merged, Feb 21, 2020 ---

You are right, Disney were so close. But there are still things that they could have done better. In terms of the notion of giving into fear, you may have a point there.

Certainly the first film in the sequel series was more like a proof of concept with a few bits of recycled Ralph Macquarrie artwork thrown in. Frustratingly, the ideas they did not use would have been better.

The Rise of Skywalker- boy did things go into Overdrive, with autistic essence instead of Hamon and JJ Abrams being the equivalent of Ultimate Life Form Kars and the fan-base being like Joseph Joestar with the same tragic consequences.

Going with the whole JoJo analogy, George Lucas would definitely be Ceasar.