I thought these were both interesting arguments that I completely disagree with, and here's why:
SouthtownKid said:
Blah blah blah, the new movies suck, blah blah blah. The original trilogy were children's films, these are children's films. If you can't enjoy them, it's more your fault than theirs. The money they've brought in is proof that they still work pretty well with kids. Bad dialogue? Yes, but there was plenty of that to go around in the originals as well. Watch Jedi objectively; it's almost a parody of the first two. Harrison Ford barely disguises his contempt for some of the dialogue he's forced to utter. Do I like the new movies as much as the originals? No, but I'm not 7 anymore.
This makes assumption that there's only one way to make a children's movie.
I don't think you fully realize what Lucas was doing when he first made the Star Wars series (and I'm not pulling this out of my ass): He wanted to make something that rivaled the classic serials from his own childhood, the "Flash Gordons" and the similar B&W classics that people used to watch at matinees. Yes, to an extent, these were kids films -but they were much more comic book like than the other style of "children's movies" we ended up getting hints of in ROTJ.
The first two movies were very similar to the sci-fi serials, never getting to cutesy and instead going for the high-action, good vs. evil, adventure model. As you point out, in ROTJ the series starts to take a turn for the more "Sesame Street" style of children's movie (complete with Muppets). From all the script tweaks (Revenge to Return; Wookies to Ewoks; the destruction of the Falcon) it became clear that Lucas started to look at the series less as Sci-Fi serial and more like the Childrens movies we saw in Eps 1 and 2.
Sadly, we don't really see many movies in that old sci-fi serial style (although you could turn to Anime movies like "Princess Monoke"). Instead we see movies like "Spy Kids" that mimic the same style of Children's movie that the new Star Wars movies have become.
Is this particular sub-genre of children's movie worse than the other? No. However, it really throws off a lot of fans because it doesn't mesh with how the earlier two movies were made... That's a big reason why I don't enjoy the new movies as such.
For the record, I've shown the original movies to several people who'd never seen them before (and after they'd seen Episode 1 and 2), and they immediately noticed a difference in quality. To say that "we like them more because we saw them as kids" is complete bunk.
Verbatum said:
Well said.
Something else everyone is forgetting is that the original Star Wars films actually did pretty horribly back when they originally released. IN fact, Empire Strikes back was considered one of the worst movies of it's time. Man, I still remember how people on the news were just ripping it apart.
So, the way I see it, history is just repeating itself.
What? Where are you getting this stuff from?
Star Wars: Nominated for Best Picture, Director, Supporting Actor, Writing (and a bunch of others)
ESB: Show me the bad reviews. I'm not talking about "Anchorman"-style newscasters. Show me the proof that fans didn't like it (their dollar take disproves that outright), show me the proof that critics didn't like it.
Return of the Jedi: No arguments on this one. I had problems -it was the first clear warning that Lucas was aiming squarly at kids (his own probably had something to do with this).
As a second note: the horrid "Special Editions" only proved that Lucas' taste and desires had got really tacky in the years in between.
...in about...ten months...
