Can the Magic of Star Wars be Recaptured?

your experience of OT Star Wars and mine are completely different.
stands to reason that your experience of the ST and mine would also be completely different (and it looks like they are).
you're older than me by a couple of years and maybe that's why.

all we can do is speak to our own experience and as far as i'm concerned, the magic is back.
that doesn't mean the ST is perfect (but the OT wasn't either).
nevertheless, the ineffable joy of it is there for me. that's all that matters so far as i'm concerned. : D

 

The grass was greener
The light was brighter
With friends surrounded
The nights of wonder...

THAT's the problem. The magic itself never left.

 

Making a priority out of addressing today's issues is a recipe for something that won't stand the test of time. And one of the great things about Star Wars is that it's timeless. I don't negate the influence of Vietnam etc. on ANH, but that's not what makes it great (I mean, it may for you and that's fine). What's magical is that everybody, even those who didn't live in the 70s, can relate to the universal themes of these movies. Good, evil, family, friendship. And it's fantasy first and foremost. I, for example, appreciate the escapism of Star Wars and political commentary is anything but this. I don't watch these films to be reminded of the problems of reality, I have enough of it on the daily basis.

What you're talking about is just one aspect of it all. One element which may make it magical for a specific group of people. For others - and I would argue that they are the majority - magic is something completely different.

 

I think the magic lives. Perhaps the scale is smaller, because back then it was something new, it was the big thing. Now we have all these movie franchises and video games... Kids have a lot of it.

But I think every new Star Wars fan (and they keep coming!) has the same powerful personal experience and this is the most important thing. You, for example, may find it unthinkable, but to me the PT era was totally magical, because I grew up with them. I also acted scenes out, collected figures. I drew Darth Maul, Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan all the time in kindergarten (I even wrote my own sequel to TPM). I think the same thing may be going on right now for new fans. And there's a lot of them. I see kids with Star Wars shirts and backpacks all the time.

 

Wouldn't you agree, though, that the hype and buzz around the release of TFA was huge? Could be as close to the ANH craze as we can get (definitely not the same, for sure). I think it was quite significant and arguably magical. For older fans it was a big "Star Wars is back" moment and for the new ones it was a perfect climate to get the feeling of how special this franchise is.

But yeah, Star Wars will never be "the only one" again. That's a sign of the times. You miss it because you've lived it. My generation doesn't, because we don't know it. I miss George. The generation growing up on ST won't, they will have other things to miss when they grow up.

That said, I'd like to emphasise - new Star Wars fans will keep having that great personal experience of discovery that you had in 1977 and I in the 90s. That's what really matters at the end of the day.

Thanks for the elaboration!

 

I was 5-6 years old, growing up in a craphole of a country (that I thankfully left) and these movies about alien planets, space ships and magic was so new and exciting, something I haven't seen before. The "magic" also came back with the PT because it felt fresh and new, and with Rogue One.
So, how can a movie feel "magical" to you? Well, being relevant to current socio-political issues wouldn't work, because a)if you agree with it's position, then the movie would seem boring and repetitive and b) if you don't - it would seem dumb and annoying (see "Kathleen Kennedy's SJW agenda"). So, based on my personal experience here's what a movie needs to do to feel "magical" - it needs to feel new and relevant to you personally.
Since "magic" is subjective, I'll keep using my personal examples.
Disney Star Wars:
TFA didn't quite work because, while I like it a lot, I've seen and read tons of sci-fi/fantasy adventures by then and I stopped caring about stuff like fan theories a long time ago.
TLJ came out I was going through a major depression and this not a movie to watch at a time like this (because it's about failure, not because it disrespected Luke or whatever).
Rouge One, on the other hand, worked perfectly. At the time my Warhammer 40000 collecting was really kickin in and through that I was discovering things about my life and what I should really do with it. So, a sci-fi war movie with a ton of references to my childhood stuff is just what I needed at the time.
I can provide some good examples with non-SW movies, but the general idea is that the "magic" is subjective and you'll probably have to look for it yourself.

 

The magic is just getting a similar felling to when you saw it for the first time. The magic is not quantifiable outside personal experience.

For me the only media to make me feel that way since the original trilogy was Rogue One and a few episodes of Rebels. A couple of moments in TFA and the prequels also but no the whole movies. For others it is difference.

 

The OT is not the be all, end all of Star Wars, sorry. And for the most part and some it seems the only SW movie that matters is TESB, why I don't know. If that's where you're stuck then more power to you, but it's just as exciting now and magical as it was any other time. I have a few friends who are stuck in a certain era of music and never experience anything else and claim everything else sucks, but that is subjective.

Just as someone else in this thread has stated, that is your experience, not everyone's. If isn't magical to you, fine. I'm never stalled at a certain age, or genre, or era and time. If that's you, ok, cool.

 

To me, there are at least two forms of "magic" that are applicable to the topic. First there's an individual kind of magic. How the films relate to us as individuals. For me, you recapture the magic of Star Wars, for example, by simply igniting a lightsaber onscreen. By hearing the engine scream of a TIE fighter or the plugging sound of X-Wing blasterfire. It's an immersion in the sensory experiences unique to Star Wars. So to me, that is an easy thing to do. I think this is what is the core of being a "fan", the desire for immersion in the unique things related to the franchise.

I think the OP is steering in the direction of a social magic that spans the proverbial spirit of the social medium in general. In that case I think the magic was simply a result of something spectacularly new to cinema. It was the special effects that really are responsible for the love of the OT as we know it. Much like with the new Jurassic World movies, the question is echoed. But what made the magic of the original Jurassic Park wasn't about the story being so fantastically great, not about the acting or anything - it was about never having seen CGI dinosaurs to that level before. It's not as magical now because, we've seen it before. CGI spectacles are a dime a dozen.

The same goes with Star Wars. What made them such big movies wasn't the stories, it was the cinematic experience being so new. That caused the social reaction across the board. That's what makes the OT so beloved by most people. That gave them a status as proverbial sacred cows. Really, Star Wars movies are all about on the same level, but the OT gets the benefit of the doubt because of the "magic" which caused a social reaction across the board, and that magic on that social scale was simply, awesome never before seen on this scale special effects.

 

I don't want the "magic" of the OT to be recaptured. And I don't need it. Besides, Disney has already tried that with the ST . . . and failed in my eyes. Why? Because Disney seems incapable of creating something that is entirely new. The OT was lovely, but it wasn't perfect. It had its flaws. And more importantly, it belongs in the past. Let it remain in the past. What Disney should learn to do is create its own kind of Star Wars magic. The closest they have come to this are the stand alone films. And even they are too heavily dependent on the OT. Star Wars should move forward, not backward.

And the stories. I don't think the ST has produced a really good story that is also original. I only believe that the stand alones have done that . . . but only to a limited extent.

 

Yes, I believe that the magic can come back to Star Wars.

I would have loved it if George and crew would have started a sequel series in 1986, followed up with Episode 8 in 1989, and then Episode 9 in 1992. This would have further expanded all of the established characters in the Original Trilogy, added new ones, greatly expanded the fan base and the Star Wars universe as we could have known it. A worthy consolation is the Thrawn Trilogy by Timothy Zahn, but even those novels had their flaws. Most of the Expanded Universe just didn't know what the heck to do with the character development of Luke Skywalker.

So, therein lies the biggest obstacle as to how good/successful a Sequel Trilogy would be: how does it develop Luke Skywalker? Does it give him 5 seconds of screen time at the back end of the first movie, and then completely re-write his character in the second, even killing him off before we get to the third?

Probably the best ideas that I have come across for developing Luke is to continue on the trajectory of bravery, risking his neck to save his friends, able to at least partially see the future, and eventually growing into a grizzled, wise Jedi Master, able to hand the "force baton" to whoever comes next.

But Lucas was showing signs early within the Prequels that he wasn't clear anymore as far as which direction he wanted to take with The Force. He underscores this in a recent interview with James Cameron when he mentions a completely new direction. He was never good at writing dialogue; that is a proven fact. But to take The Force in the Original Trilogy as more of a spiritual/hero quest, and then turn it into a scientific/biological concept (the Prequels), and then try to turn it back into something that is spiritual, but guided in some way by The Wills (proposed Sequel Trilogy) shows that: at best, he is trying to show us different viewpoints of the Force; at worst, he is grasping at straws about how to expound upon his universe in new ways, but forgetting that the Original concept worked in a marvelous way that no one wanted to see changed. This is where he loses "the magic"; by changing the original under-riding 'formula' of how the universe interacts each time (The Force), instead of simply developing the characters and showing how they change or grow within their interaction of The Force and each other. He keeps on wanting to tinker with the mechanics rather than just give us a story that furthers the characters and universe that we all know and love.

We could also discuss at length about how the emphasis on special effects and the methods used in making the Prequels changed dramatically from how the Original Trilogy was made. This further shows that George lost sight of what really made these movies work (losing 'the magic.')

As for making a movie feel "like Star Wars," the Prequels pass the test for being episodic within a 'pulp sci-fi' nature, much in line with the old Flash Gordon and serial way of telling a story. Also, we already knew the over-arching story within the Prequels, and that was definitely something that fans wanted. So, the actual story is, for the most part, forgivable.

But these new Disney movies don't even have that; The Force Awakens benefited from clever editing that ultimately gave a false hope of this sci-fi episodic serial story telling, while The Last Jedi really gave us the true picture, which was a glorious train wreck and complete destruction of everything familiar, everything tried and true about Star Wars. Arguably, Rogue One did the best in its actual depiction of the story, leading straight into A New Hope. SOLO hugely benefited from Ron Howard's understanding of this type of storytelling. But The Last Jedi was where the wheels really came off in a spectacular fashion; effectively giving a movie version of 'the middle finger' to fans everywhere.

At this point, they might just be better off trying to regain that magic with a whole new trilogy with a completely different storyline and characters.

 

I have to disagree with you right here. I think Lucas knew exactly what he was doing with the Prequel movies. Granted, you may have disliked it, but I loved it. What I loved even more about the Prequel Trilogy is that it managed to form ties with the Original Trilogy, while at the same time, offer audiences something really new and original.

I wish Disney had done this with the Sequel Trilogy. Granted, I will give them kudos for making leads out of the likes of Daisy Ridley, John Boyega and Oscar Isaac. Very original of them. Otherwise, with the ST, I feel as if I'm watching a clumsy remake of the Original Trilogy.

 

Lucas has made changes to the Original Trilogy with just about every release. The Special Editions (Greedo shot first?) showed that Lucas didn't consider anything exempt to change. So, with the Prequels, he changes the very dynamic of the Force by saying: # of midichlorians = how attuned you are to The Force. This changed the whole dynamic from what we knew about the Force at that time, and it was met with a very mixed reaction. In a recent interview, George revealed that he would have introduced a new way that The Force interacted with people; a way that included direction from The Whills. Basically, with each new Trilogy, there apparently has to be a new/different way to interact with The Force. Consistency is the key; don't change the way that The Force works with each new Trilogy if it is working.

There were a lot of things that I liked about the Prequels, but to myself and the majority of the fanbase, the Prequels do not measure up to the Original Trilogy.

 

I think that one area both fans and dissenters of the Prequels will agree is that on the scale, while they may not offer as much as the OT did, they still offer more than the ST currently does. And that, I believe, is down to aspects like originality, creativity, drama, world-building, etc. The ST is failing at all of those by recreating the conflict and scenarios of the OT to the point of exhaustion.

I'm pretty elitist about how I think the Force works as well, and I wasn't thrilled about the midichlorians, but that was one aspect of one film--the PT as a whole besides that were fine. They offered new things, expanded the universe, offered new conflicts and scenarios, they were original, for goodness' sake.
The ST has plenty of Force elements I'm not a fan of, but I wouldn't care as much as long as the conflict and story surrounding the Force elements were even remotely original or creative.

But they're not.

 

LOL, yes - definitely! I would take the Prequels any day of the week over the Sequel Trilogy. At least there are things within each Prequel movie that I can genuinely say that I really liked! Not so sure I can do that with The Last Jedi.

 

I'm a fan of the Prequels. I don't agree that the trilogy did not offer as much as the OT did. I believe the Prequels DID.

 

The sequel trilogy was never going to be about 'the further adventures' of Luke Skywalker. Just as the prequels were about a previous generation, the sequels were always going to be about the next generation. It's why Lucas let all those other stories be told in the expanded universe in the first place. Because he wasn't going to do that.

Luke Skywalker would have no doubt died in the ST even with Lucas at the helm.* Probably in the first movie and not the second. Just like Ben Kenobi did in ANH, and Qui Gonn before him in TPM.

Because that's how Star Wars 'works'.

Disney and Rian probably gave us far more focus on Luke in the ST than Lucas would have given us.

(* Okay, there was a point when the OT was perhaps going to be a Hexalogy, but that was before Lucas decided to make Ep IV the conclusion to that arc.)

Yet there are people who think the ST should pay duty to that version of Luke.