Star Wars and the Wrong Direction of Storytelling

Star Wars used to be a great franchise that told a great story that caused its fans to really examine and explore the ideas of good and evil. The first three movies (the original three) really took that exploration and exploded in a great way for all of the fans. Sure, good triumphed over evil, but evil was REALLY evil, and you knew it.

Then these three prequels came along that told the story of Anakin Skywalker (Darth Vader), and to be honest, other than the moment where he becomes Vader, the three movies are really lame and pretty much destroy the very foundation of the mysticism behind Star Wars. The Force, an ever-present, omnipotent fabric of dimensional existence quickly gave way to a genetic defect (at least that's how they explained the Force with the young Anakin Skywalker..."he's got lots of mytowhoziwhats in his blood, which makes him the greatest potential jedi of all time"). And Anakin was just Luke Skywalker, Jr., except you knew there would be no redemption for this character; he would only have to get worse and more evil as the storyline continued. I had a really hard time "cheering" on the worst hero of science fiction history. I found his brooding, passive-aggressive disposition to want me to learn how to be a jedi just so I could kick his complaining ass.

Now, a new movie is being released as a cartoon, which is supposed to "fill in the gap" called the Clone Wars. I'm sorry, but I don't really feel there's much of a gap here. I don't really care about the Clone Wars. And I really don't care about a series where Anakin Skywalker is to be seen as the "hope" of the Republic. I'm sorry, but Anakin is the death of the Republic; no amount of cartooning is going to make him into the good guy again, no matter what time line they interject this story.

Star Wars actually has a rich, mystical history that needs to be explored, but they keep coming back to this overdone storyline. I don't care anymore about Darth Vader. There is a whole Knights of the Old Republic era that is hinted at in the series, and has been seriously developed in lots of the Star Wars media (not the movies). The birth of the Sith sounds like so much more interesting than brooding action heroes who complain about their girlfriends. Honestly.

When I was doing the old computer game work, there was a project that was started at Lucas Arts that never really saw the dawn of light, but it should have. It was about a rebellious colonel during the Star Wars era (think "Empire Strikes Back" time) that was fighting a mysterious revolution against the empire during this time. There was so much rich information coming from this particular thread, and then it just died away so that we could focus on brooding, complaining young jedi.

I regret that all we have to look forward to is a cartoon movie and a potential television series (cartoons) of the Clone Wars. What a horrible choice to develop. I would love to see something way prior to the whole Star Wars saga (like tens of thousands of years before), or hundreds of years AFTER Return of the Jedi. But instead, we'll get nothing but product placement shows and movies that will try to sell us a cute robot toy or stuffed ewok, or whatever stupid "in" toy that comes from the next kiddie series that sadly fills the gap that doesn't need filled.

Stumble It!