Kevin's Watch

Posted: **Sat Jun 04, 2005 3:12 am**

Foul - it was an accusation we were not treating the scene logically. Perhaps you think were too worked up over it? I think it was stupid. End of story AND argument.

Posted: **Sat Jun 04, 2005 3:17 am**

Loremaster wrote:Foul - it was an accusation we were not treating the scene logically.

Well, um, how is opinion logical?

Look, what I said was a possibility, that's all. I said "maybe you were overreacting, and the "no" won't bother you as much next time". It's just something I put out in the open air, that's all. I mean, the only reason I felt you might have overreacted was the fact that I overreacted to the "no" the first time I saw it, so I was speaking from a bit of experience. I thought “hey, could be the case with them”. Or not. That's all.

Again, it's not like I said the "no" wasn't bad. I still think something better could have been done, rather than that "no". Your reaction to it was perfectly natural; heck, I had the same reaction. But I had a different reaction upon the 2nd viewing. You might, too. That's what I meant, in a nutshell.

Call the argument ended, sure, but I'll stand by my view that at no time was my initial "overreacting" statement an attack or a form of condescension. Although, I do apologize for any dryness or rudeness in the subsequent, more argumentative posts, in which heated language is the norm.

But hey, If you want to call the "overreacting" statement an accusation, then sure, I’ll concede to that. It technically was an accusation, but I don’t think it’s anything world-shattering. It wasn't even a "you ARE overreacting". It was a "might", which I thought I delivered pretty softly. If I didn’t, then I apologize for that too.

Posted: **Sat Jun 04, 2005 3:49 am**

I suppose you are right, but I didn't like the comment. No problems, Foul. Sorry for having a go at you mon ami.

Posted: **Sat Jun 04, 2005 3:53 am**

Well, these arguments were pretty civil. Nowhere near the fun I had with danlo and Mhoram in that wonderful eBay thread! I wish I had it saved somewhere; would frame that sucker!

Posted: **Sat Jun 04, 2005 4:00 am**

Really? Wow. Ah the old days at KW. Like when Revan and myself had the intense Love argument. Good times.

Posted: **Sat Jun 04, 2005 4:01 am**

Foul,

Huh, what eBay thread?

Posted: **Sat Jun 04, 2005 4:02 am**

Lord Mhoram wrote:Foul,

Huh, what eBay thread?

See? It was so intense that he blanked it from his mind.

Spoiler

*drawms Mhoram aside*

Um, buddy. It was ages ago, but I had, oh, 800 posts, and I made a thread complaining about needing a credit card to use eBay, and I posted it in Announcements, of all places. In the same thread, I also asked if anyone wanted to buy what I had, since I couldn't sell it on eBay. Of course, that erupted into oodles of fun, as well remember (or try not to, heh).

Posted: **Sat Jun 04, 2005 4:04 am**

Posted: **Sat Jun 04, 2005 10:09 am**

Actually, Jar Jar says "excuse me" in ROTS.

Where?

Posted: **Sat Jun 04, 2005 11:20 am**

Now I think about it, I remember noticing his voice in the scene after Palpatine's rescue, when the senators are all walking past.

Posted: **Sat Jun 04, 2005 11:20 am**

I'm glad that argument's finished; it wasn't pretty. I think you were both overreacting

It surprised me that two such reasonable people were suddenly and inexplicably at each other's throats - almost like Anakin going to the Dark Side

dlbpharmd wrote:
Actually, Jar Jar says "excuse me" in ROTS.
Where?

I second that question.

Posted: **Sat Jun 04, 2005 2:43 pm**

When he bumps into another Senator that's standing behind Palpatine. It's the scene right after they crash land that huge ship. It happens near the end of the scene, after Palapatine is done talking, and the camera is panned way back, so it's kind of hard to notice, but he does his characteristic "excuse me"--or rather, "squeeze me".

Posted: **Sat Jun 04, 2005 2:53 pm**

That sounded more like a droid to me, will have to listen for it again.

Posted: **Sat Jun 04, 2005 3:31 pm**

Ah, I vaguely remember that thread LF.

Um, good times?

LOL

Posted: **Sat Jun 04, 2005 3:41 pm**

Yeah. It gave me this twitch in my left eyebrow.

Posted: **Sat Jun 04, 2005 3:42 pm**

In the book, Palpatine has been working on Anakin since he came to Coruscant.

Particularly in feeding his ambitions, and those ambitions were a fairly large part of him turning to the dark side, as well as a lot of tension between he and the Jedi, and the cause of his distrust and disillusionment with them. The stuff with his fear for Padme was sort of the last straw.

I don't think that came off very clearly in the movie, though.

Eventually (if I can ever find time), I hope to see the movie again. When I saw it I was so disappointed about how much of the good stuff in the book they left out, I probably did not give the movie a fair shot as a piece of art in its own right.

Posted: **Sun Jun 05, 2005 11:56 am**

duchess of malfi wrote:In the book, Palpatine has been working on Anakin since he came to Coruscant. ... I don't think that came off very clearly in the movie, though.

Well exactly. To the filmgoer, it doesn't make a jot of difference what the book says - if it doesn't come over in the film, the film is lacking.

Posted: **Mon Jun 06, 2005 5:11 am**

From the book:

This is Anakin Skywalker:

The most powerful Jedi of his generation. Perhaps of any generation. the fastest. The strongest. An unbeatable pilot. An unstoppable warrior. On the ground, in the air or sea or space, there is no one even close. He has not just power, not just skill, but dash: that rare, invaluable combination of boldness and grace.

He is the best there is at what he does. The best there has ever been. And he knows it.

HoloNet features call him the Hero With No Fear. And why not? What should he be afraid of?

Except -

Fear lives inside him anyway, chewing away the firewalls around his heart.

Anakin sometimes thinks of the dread that eats at his heart as a dragon. Children on Tatooine tell each other of the dragons that live inside the suns; smaller cousins of the sun-dragons are supposed to live inside the fusion furnaces that power everything from starships to Podracers.

But Anakin's fear is another kind of dragon. A cold kind. A dead kind.

Not nearly dead enough.

Not long after he became Obi-Wan's Padawan, all those years ago, a minor mission had brought them to a dead syatem: one so immeasureably old that its star had long ago turned to a frigid dwarf of hypercompacted trace metals, hovering a quanttum fraction of a degree above absolute zero. Anakin couldn't even remember what the mission might have been, but he's never forgotten that dead star.

It had scared him.

"Stars can die?"

"It is the way of the universe, which is another manner of saying that it is the will of the Force," Obi-Wan had tols him. "Everything dies. In time, even stars burn out. This is why the Jedi form no attachments: all things pass. To hold on to something - or someone - beyond its time is to set your selfish desires against the Force. That is a path of misery, Anakin; the Jedi do not walk it."

That is the kind of fear that lives in Anakin Skywalker: the dragon of that dead star. It is an ancient, cold dead voice within its heart that whispers all things die...

In bright day he can't hear it; battle, a mission, even a report before the Jedi Council, can make him forget it's even there. But at night -

At night, the dead-star dragon sometimes sneaks through the cracks and crawls up into his brain and chews the inside of his skull. The dragon whispers of what Anakin has lost. And what he will lose.

The dragon reminds him, every night, of how he held his dying mother in his arms, of how she spent the last of her strength to say I knew you would come for me, Anakin...

The dragon reminds him, every night, that someday he will lose Obi-Wan. He will lose Padme. Or they will lose him.

All things die, Anakin Skywalker. Even stars burn out...

And the only answers he ever has for these dead cold whispers are his memories of Obi-Wan's voice, or Yoda's.

But sometimes he can't quite remember them.

all things die...

He can barely even think about it.

But right now he doesn't have a choice: the man he flies to rescue is a closer friend than he'd ever hoped to have. That's what puts the edge in his voice when he tries to make a joke; that's what flattens his mouth and tightens the burn-scar high on his right cheek.

The Supreme Chancellor has been family to Anakin: always there, always caring, always free with advice and unstinting aid. A sympathetic ear and a kindly, loving, unconiditonal acceptance of Anakin exactly as he is - the sort of acceptance Anakin could never get from another Jedi. Not even from Obi-Wan. He can tell Palpatine things he could never share with his Master.

He can tell Palpatine things he can't even tell Padme.

Now the Supreme Chancellor is in the worst kind of danger. And Anakin is on his way despite the dread boiling through his blood. That's what makes him a real hero. Not the way the HoloNet labels him: not without fear, but
stronger than fear.

He looks into the eye of the dragon and doesn't even slow down.

If anyone can save Palpatine, Anakin will. Because he's already the best, and he's getting better. But locked away behind the walls of his heart, the dragon that is his fear coils and squirms and hisses.

Because his real fear, in a universe where even stars can die, is that being the best will never be quite good enough.

Posted: **Mon Jun 06, 2005 8:16 am**

Well, finally watched it. And enjoyed it thoroughly. There were a few minor negative points, the much lamented "Nooooo!" was pretty cheesy, but as someone here mentioned, more in the tone of it than the concept.

Also found Anakin's "descent" to be too quick. Seems (as someone said I think?) that a whole movie or two could have been better devoted to that aspect of it.

(To whoever mentioned dissatisfaction at the "lying on lava" scene, I thought I'd point out that he wasn't actually lying on the molten rock. Merely on the "crust" which had hardened over colder portions of it. (Still hot, but not even nearly molten.) The fire damage was done to him mainly by his clothes igniting.)

Overall, I enjoyed it a lot. Some of the acting was lousy, sure, the "emotional" scenes looked like they were maybe trying too hard, some of the dialogue was perhaps a bit stilted, but it's certainly the best of the prequels.

(The whole "Grievous" thing wasn't done too well either. Inadequately explained.)

Sometimes I think we overanalyse things though. Our expectations, our involvement with the whole mythos of it, makes us exacting in ways which we do not perhaps even realise.

Above all, Star Wars is a great story. Sit back and enjoy it on that level alone if you can, and it'll look a whole lot better straight off.

--Avatar

Posted: **Mon Jun 06, 2005 4:41 pm**

Avatar wrote:Our expectations, our involvement with the whole mythos of it, makes us exacting in ways which we do not perhaps even realise.

True enough, but I think Lucas himself must share even this fault. After all, it was Lucas who made the prequels pretentious and (aspiring to) portentous, thereby setting the bar too high to reach in such a short time.

Kevin's Watch

I just watched ROTS