Your top 5 No No's

Yep those lightsaber blade sounds send my mind spinning.

 

I liked seeing that Anakin vs. Obi-wan fight. Sure, it's a bit long but it really demonstrates the emotions of anger and despair that both characters put into that fight (Anakin with the anger and Obi-wan with the sadness of seeing his friend, who was like a brother to him, go down the dark path and feeling that he had a dilemma to face). This match was epic and pivotal to the saga and it stand high up there in the list of top Star Wars lightsaber duels.

P.S. For all the flack that Christensen gets for his dialogue and acting in Star Wars, when it came to having his character display raw emotions such as anger and evilness, he delivered.

 

Yoda would have clearly one that fight had Sidious not resorted to using the force to often.

The cloud city duel was a victory no doubt for Vader, Luke was not ready then to fight him.

 

That fight was epic as well, I agree. I would say that both these fights are up there in regards to epicness and pivotalness with emotional factors intertwined in them. I would argue that both of these duels could be placed in the top 5 best lightsaber duels of the saga. Definitely top 10 but top 5 for me.

 

The prequels are a master class in Star Wars no-nos. I think if we can go ahead and avoid 90% of the things contained within said movies, we're on the right track.

- Stop giving things explanations that are better off not explained.
- Don't try and give the series your own take- leave that with the Anthology movies.
- Avoid making reference to things that happened before unnecessarily, particularly reusing old lines in a different way.
- George Lucas involvement. He has lost his touch and in hindsight, it was only fleeting in the first place.
- Don't listen to what the fans want too much. The fans don't know what they want.

 

I get what you're saying but me, I look at the relativity of things. That fight was when both Anakin and Obi-wan were in their prime and there was an established Jedi Order. Formal training both of these characters went through to where their lightsaber skills were honed to a particular lightsaber duel style. That said, I get what you're saying that those few seconds of that duel seemed a bit show-off-y to you, and yeah, good thing that there weren't many of those (otherwise that would've taken away from the moment).

 

That whole Jedi in their prime thing is just more of the nonsense that Lucas liked to make up on the fly. The reason that fights are so different is down to nothing more than the fight choreographer, the fact that the props in the prequels were considerably lighter and George Lucas just wanting a change. Don't listen GL's explanations, as he fabricates answers on the fly.

I hate the fighting style in the prequel. Sure it looks spectacular, but they don't carry any dramatic weight. Too many lightsabers on show in my opinion. The only lightsaber fight I liked in the prequels was Qui-Gon's first fight on tatooine against Maul. Very dramatic and very cool. None of this fancy blast. Good old fashioned, hard fought, brawl.

 

Lets face some facts Christensen, Portman, Lee, and McGregor are all world class actors. They have turned in stellar performances throughout their careers. I don't think I can fault them for the performances that ended up on screen in the Prequel Trilogy.

 

I have seen nothing to suggest that Hayden Christensen is a world class actor to be honest. He has the charisma of piece of lint from my belly button.

 

World class is a bit a relative term (i.e. anyone who works in hollywood can probably considered "wolrd class") but his work in Life as a House and Shattered Glass was actually pretty impressive. I guess my point is that these actors are all capable of turning in good performances and shouldn't be blamed 100% for what ended up being kept for the final cut of the film.

 

Let's get this out of the way first, the dramatic weight of a fight does not necessarily tie with someone's fighting style. I'm not saying that these two are necessarily mutually exclusive but just looking and talking about fighting style only in its pure form, dramatic weight is irrelevant.

Second, as I mention, the PT had an established Jedi Order with Jedi going through formal training. Yes, we see the ending of all this in Ep. III but before that, there was a formality to things. So it makes sense that the fighting style are more honed in the PT than what we see with Luke in the OT. And no, my opinion has nothing to do with GL explaining things this way. Based on the circumstances in the PT, this makes sense. Yes, GL alludes to this as well (hence why there's a choreographic look) but no, I'm reaching my conclusions my way (and what's wrong with taking some of his explanations? It's his story, his vision, he's the creator. I don't have to believe everything he states but when it's rational and makes sense within the stories, I have no reservations in taking it in). You can disagree with me all you want but that isn't going to take away from my understanding of the rationality as to why the Jedi appear better trained in the PT.

And I'm sorry, but "Don't listen GL's explanations, as he fabricates answers on the fly." type of statements are just poor form and essentially state to not be creative. It's as if you're stating that filmmakers shouldn't try new things, that they should just go with what has been previously proven to work (which said previous body of work was a gamble/risk in and of itself) - which goes against many things in the world of cinematic art. Do you think that GL and others already had in mind that Vader was going to be Luke's father before they wrote ANH (or even right after ANH was released in theaters in Day 1)? Did he have ESB and ROTJ already planned out when ANH was being written? No, this stuff was invented after the fact, as they went along in making the OT (they went as they go).

 

I do disagree with you and you're perfectly entitled to disagree with me. I'm just expressing my opinion. That said, you're wrong-

 

I'm interested in seeing Christensen in Jumper and Takers to see how his performance is like in those movies (Takers in particular because Paul Walker is in it (I like him from his Fast and Furious work )).

 

Agree to disagree is the best route to go

 

1) Dead Lando, just no.
2) Everyone related, it would seem too forced.
3) Too much exposition, leave some stuff to our imaginations.
4) Too much "comic relief", especially if it's not actually funny.
5) Over egging the fan service, we already have the OT cast, that's more than we could have hoped for.

 

1. Thin back story, i'd like there to be about 12 films worth of material squeezed between Episodes VI and VII (not that I want them made though..)
2. Too many people related to each other.
3. No Yoda or Obi Wan.
4. Too many force users/lightsaber users being introduced at once.
5. Cutesy stuff (Jar Jar and Ewoks)