[net.sf-lovers] Star wars minutiae & coming episodes

David.Smith@CMU-CS-IUS@CMU-CS-A (12/29/82)

This stuff about stormtroopers' armor and lightsabers makes me think
you all take SW too seriously.  When I first saw SW4, I thought it
was a lot of fun, but a poor movie full of stock lines and settings.
(And I am not a frequent movie-goer.)  On later reflection, however, I
figured that Lucas was intentionally parodying westerns &c.  Consider
how C3PO and R2D2 shuffled and rolled (respectively) slowly across the
corridor to get to the life pods, while storm troopers filled the air
with blaster bullets.  Intentionally implausible.  Then there are
spaceships maneuvering in space like airplanes, and on and on.  If the armor
seems ineffective, it is because they are the bad guys.

The speculations on the other trilogies prompted me to get out my
copy of Time magazine for May 19, 1980 -- the one with Darth Vader on
the cover.  From a box:

	... The remaining movies, fore and aft, have not yet been laid out
	in detail, but Lucas has the framework, a kind of history of what
	happened in that galaxy long ago and far away.  A preview:

	For years the universe was governed by a republic, which was regulated
	by the order of Jedi Knights...  But eventually the citizens of the
	republic "didn't care enough to elect competent officials," says Lucas
	the historian, and so their government collapsed.  A sorcerer, a bad
	counterpart of Yoda, blocked all opposition and declared himself
	emperor...

	The emperor subverts Darth Vader to his side, and together he and
	Vader betray the other Knights, nearly all of whom are killed in their
	trap.  Ben Kenobi escapes, and after a fierce struggle he does such
	injury to Vader that forever after Vader must wear a mask and that
	noisy life-support system.  The fall of the republic and the rise of
	the empire will form the first of Lucas' three trilogies.

	The second trilogy ... centers on Luke Skywalker, who will be seen as
	a child in Episode 3.  The "Empire" continues the Skywalker story, and
	... [RotJ] will end it, with either Luke or Darth Vader walking away
	from their final bout.  The last three episodes involve the rebuilding
	of the republic.

	Only two of the main characters will appear in all nine films, and
	they are the robots, Artoo Detoo and Threepio.  Says Lucas: "In
	effect, the story will be told through their eyes."