F--k you, George Lucas

(I can't explain why) but here are some of my main irritations as far as plot holes/continuity, and most of it centers around R2 and 3PO:

Young Anakin/Vader built C3PO. It was easily/lazily explained away by having his memory wiped at the end of Sith. We know Vader saw 3PO at least in Empire, wouldn't he have said "Hey, wait a minute" then?

Seeing as how R2 didn't have his memory wiped, when things were going down throughout the course of the original three, wouldn't he have chirped up with some insight as to facts?

In Clones, R2 had the ability to fly, but he didn't do so in 4/5/6 which were 20+ years later. Did he lose the ability?

Owen and/or Beru met 3PO (and maybe R2, can't remember) in Clones. So later when the Jawas brought them around in New Hope, shouldn't they have said "Something is familiar." There was also some dialogue in New Hope between Owen/Beru/Luke about Obi Wan that didn't jive with their knowledge knowing what goes down at the end of Sith. Obi Wan's "I don't remember owning any droids" lines in New Hope. That cane be explained by him using the word "owning" but that's lazy BS to explain it away.

Also, in Empire when Han is questioning why Luke went to Dagohaba, after watching Sith, couldn't Chewie have spoke up and said "Yoda is there." (technically, Yoda put himself in exile after the battle at Kashyyk, but Chewie obviously knew Yoda).

 

I'm mad that the original trilogy is coming out in 3D, but I'll still go opening night,

 

Sorry, OOP. I should have used blue font. I liked that he threw us a curve. Hated the midichlorians thing, hated that they wasted Christopher Lee, hated that they had a couple of dangling plot threads that were never resolved (Sifo-Dyas, etc.).

Didn't mind Jar-Jar as an experiment and now a seminal moment in movie special effects (still haven't heard anyone say "He looked fake!" as their main complaint).

Loved the political stuff. The Emperor took over not because he had the biggest army, but because he was smarter and more clever than everyone else, including the arrogant Jedi. Never thought Lucas would depict the Jedi as anything but infallible heroes. Really liked that the famous Purge happened in one fell swoop.

The love dialogue was horrendous, but I wouldn't expect a boy raised by warrior priests to be any better at talking to the opposite sex than a girl raised as a politician from the time she was five. They should have kept the deleted scenes with her family; the relationship would have been more of a logical dramatic progression.

Vader's turn back to good makes a lot more sense now, since his turn to evil was a desperation move that he regretted for the rest of his life. Didn't mind that Anakin was a whiner, since (as we all saw with Luke, and we find in our own lives), it's easy to be frustrated when things aren't going the way you would like. Most of us have been there, especially at that age.

Why? What would have been the point? Easily explained away as a guy wanting to forget his previous life, and also in the fact that protocol droids of that make are a dime a dozen.

Nope. Again, for what purpose? At what point was there a moment when this would have helped? "Beep boop beep, which means . . . your mom died in horrible fashion. Be depressed." He did always seem three steps ahead of everyone, though . . .

The first, easy answer is: when was there a point he could have used them? I guess on Dagobah, but no sooner had he gotten out of his cubicle, the ship shook and he was waterlogged.

Better answer:

At the time AOTC came out, StarWars.com did this faux online newspaper from the prequel era. There was a story about a stolen air speeder, color gold. Obviously, a reference to Anakin's exploits at the start of AOTC, which I consider the worst of the series.

Another story on there was about how people were complaining that the warranty on their astromech droid's built-in rockets sucked, and the rockets tended to break down after about 20 years. Do the math, and takes you to the old films. Not spectacularly clever, but a nice little nod. Kind of like how Lucas says the bug-like Geonosians as Death Star engineers were a response to the guys in Clerks wondering about the construction workers at the second Death Star.

Obi-Wan was lying to Luke. He lied to Luke more than once . . . "from a certain point of view."

What was Owen supposed to tell Luke? "Don't talk to Obi-Wan! When the universe went to hell, he brought you here, and . . . " I think the dialogue between Beru and Owen after Luke whined and went away was more indicative.

"Wow, this protocal droid (that I don't need) looks just like that droid who we hung out with for a couple years. Looks like every other protocol droid, too . . . that astromech droid there looks kind of familiar, too . . .like every other damn astromech droid."

(OK that last one was a bit too much of a coincidence. Or the FORCE! Yeah!)

When did Han question why Luke was going to Dagobah?

 

Nah, I should just pay better attention. I still think there was too much filler where the Clone Wars should have been and I still would have liked to see more of Vader as a badass.

Though obviously, the way Lucas did things was meant to make him more of a sympathetic fallen hero, though it's kinda tough to do that when you have him killing kids.

 

All the "what's the points" are easy fixes.
I'm pretty sure the information would have been nice to have from R2/Ben/Owen --- "Well, Luke, there is about to be some big stuff go down. Your dad is really the baddest mofo in the galaxy, and you're going to have to defeat him to save everyone. Oh, and that chick you've been kissing is your sister. But, you'll figure it all out."

Let's say Owen didn't tell Luke anything. That's plausible. But I'm pretty sure when Ben and Luke hooked up, it would have been more "I've been expecting you."

And as for the droids looking like all others of their make, that's true. I once had a gray 1991 Thunderbird that I'm sure looked pretty much like all other gray 1991 Thunderbirds. But I'm pretty sure if the car had a personality and we had been caught up in interstellar intrigue together, I'd be able to pick that particular one out of the crowd.

Maybe Han didn't question why Luke went to Dagobah. I just thought he did about the time they were in/around the asteroid field. But at a minimum, with Han and Chewie being best friends and cruising around the galaxy as smugglers looking for topics of conversation, wouldn't at some point Chewie have offered up "Yeah, this Emperor pisses me off. There was this one time after they invaded and destroyed by home, me and another guy got this cat named Yoda away safely. We could really use him now."

 

I can't blame Lucas for tweaking little things in the original series. It's his baby. He can do what he wants with it.

Really, it's no different if any of us wrote some amazing, super-duper sports feature for SI and SI decided to keep releasing it in different versions every five years or so and gave you the option of tweaking a word or two here and there.

Could you stick with the original? Sure. Maybe you should. But if you have a chance to fix something that, in your opinion, needs to be fixed, why not do it?

Maybe in the next version Lucas can find a way to make Luke less of a whiny douchey prick.

I'd buy that.

 

I remember when the original three movies came out Lucas was talking about them being the middle chapters in the story and how there were still movies to be made for Chapters 1-3 and then 7-9. I'm scared to think what three sequels to Return of the Jedi would look like if he decided to make them.

 

All those protocol droids looked the same and C3PO still didn't have his annoying personality developed yet in Sith, so Vader/Anakin wouldn't have recognized him.

R2 didn't have the need to fly in 4-6. Although he didn't have his memory wiped, he was likely programmed not to reveal anything.

Owen and Beru never met 3PO or R2 -- Obi Wan just brought Luke to them. The droids stayed with Leah.
You also need to pay closer attention to the dialogue. In the original 3PO told Luke that R2D2 was looking for an ObiWan Kenobi. Luke assumed it was a former owner, but 3PO never said they were owned by Obi Wan.
Additionally, ObiWan was being deceitful to Luke - telling the truth that he never owned the droids, but lying in that he didn't reveal that he recognized them.

Chewie never knew where Yoda went into exile and didn't know if Yoda was alive. All Chewie knew was that his home planet was wiped out and Yoda didn't die there. I also don't recall if Han knew where Luke went, Han just knew that Luke didn't meet the fleet at the rendezvous point.

 

Anyone catch Curb Your Enthusiasm taking a dig a George Lucas in the latest episode?

Larry is arguing his bill with a shrink who says that a certain Hollywood director would hire prostitutes by the hour but finishes his business in 3, 4 or 5 minutes and still pay them for the full hour.

This director directed Star Wars.

Larry says it's not right to be talking about his patients like that. Everyone knows who directed Star Wars, and the shrink says not everyone is in the entertainment industry.

It was hilarious.

 

I may be mistaken, but I'm pretty sure at least 3PO was with Anakin when he went back to search for his mother in Clones, where Owen met them. Yes, they may all look alike in a vacuum, but seeing as how you've been hiding a child for the last 20 years to keep him from falling in with the Emperor, I think pretty much anything out of the ordinary would set of bells and whistles.

Do you have to have a need to fly? Probably not ever for a droid, plus it would have been handy instead of trying to roll through sand.

Why would Ben/Obi-Wan have a desire to be deceitful to Luke? "You're about to be the central player in turning the entire galaxy on its head, but details are over rated."

 

We also don't know what Obi-Wan told Owen and Beru about Luke. He could have just told them that he was Anakin's son and Anakin was dead.

 

Never thought about the Chewbacca angle as much...also in the first film (episode 4), he could have barked out when Han was dissing the force, "hey dillweed, I served with some jedi before your stinkass saved my life so talk shit about the force again and I will go all wookie upside your head...life debt or not."