Peeve Farm

g r o t t o 1 1

Peeve Farm
Breeding peeves for show, not just to keep as pets

  Blog \Blôg\, n. [Jrg, fr. Jrg. "Web-log".
     See {Blogger, BlogSpot, LiveJournal}.]
     A stream-of-consciousness Web journal, containing
     links, commentary, and pointless drivel.

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Monday, January 28, 2002
22:22 - George Lucas, it's Time to Shut the Hell Up	(top)
Yesterday, A&E showed a special all about George Lucas-- how he came from humble comic-book-geek beginnings to become one of the most powerful and most respected filmmakers of our time. What is this, a commercial for the guy? Sure, maybe Lucas was a great filmmaker, one who shook up the world-- right up until the 90s got started. Sure, Star Wars and its sequels had become pretty much the universal default "Movie"-- the first example of the concept that springs to mind when you mention the word. But then he sort of vaporized and faded away, never to be heard from again. ...Until, that is, 1999. Oh, the anticipation with which we awaited Episiode 1. The trailers, the effects, the-- well, not quite sure what that floppy-eared-looking guy was about, but-- the effects! The action! The explosions! Darth Vader as a kid! How could it possibly miss? And then we saw it... and we stared in gaping horror and confusion. Was that ... it? That? Was George Lucas even involved? No... surely not. It couldn't have been that bad. It couldn't possibly. Let's go back and see it again-- maybe in a different theater, with different friends. Maybe take different drugs beforehand. Maybe even leave off the Darth Maul costume we'd built based on the .014-second clips of him in the trailers. Let's look at this thing. Maybe we just missed something. ... But no, it didn't get any better the second time around, or the third. That... thing was still in it, the "Me so solly!" apparition of Nickeloden-esque fart jokes personified into a Lucasian alien. The video game was still in it-- the pod race, which took some fifteen minutes of screen time and featured two-headed announcers (yelling, of course, "That's gotta hurt!"). And the mitochondria thing-- 'scuse me, midichlorians. That's right, the Force is no longer a mystical power flowing through the Universe. It's an amphetamine manufactured by your cells that can be counted by a detector from the bridge of Voyager. Look, I don't care what you say: George Lucas was not involved in this monstrosity of a movie. Sure, the guy sitting behind the camera operators was named George Lucas, but it wasn't the same man. Not by a long shot. He didn't even remember meeting the real George Lucas, whenever that took place. The memory had been lost. This was the guy who "improved" the first three Star Wars episodes (IV, V, and VI, that is) by adding fart jokes, extreeeeeme camera angles (like sticking it down the throat of the newly-CG bar singer), and robots swatting each other out of the air in Mos Eisley. The man responsible for that was not the same man who did THX 1138, and no matter how much DNA evidence you show me, I won't buy it. Episode 1 demonstrated one thing: George Lucas (the new one, that is) doesn't let anything interfere with his artistic and creative vision; he doesn't listen to anything his underlings tell him-- not about merchandising, not about tie-ins, not about tailoring the storyline to match people's toilet-humor expectations... just like the old one. However, the new guy demonstrates his independence and autocratic zeal by taking merchandising and tie-ins and butt jokes to a level no underling would ever suggest. Pod Racer video game? Out before the movie hit theater screens. Toys and action figures? Impossible to avoid. An all-summer-long Taco Bell/Pizza Hut/KFC/Pepsico ad blitz extravaganza? Overpowering beyond the limits of anybody's previously sighted limits. Sure, the guy's a rebel and a visionary. He even sees dollar signs where the marketing weasels don't. So now apparently A&E has decided to run an hour-long ad of the new "George Lucas", presumably to help remind us all of how great this guy is, and how dare we be horrified at his masterwork-- especially now that Episode II is about to be released? Remember, this is George Lucas^TM! The comic-book geek who grew up to be the Idol of Millions! Changer of Worlds! Owner of Your Wallet's Destiny! Just like Bill Gates-- the American Dream of rising from humble, wimpy, nerdy beginnings to world domination is personified in this oh-so-humble man, who so graciously gave his consent to be profiled in our meager little A&E special. You know what, "George Lucas"? I'm giving Episode II one chance... and if it doesn't demonstrate to me within one half-hour that you have released the real George Lucas from his dank cell and given him back his identification documents and clothes and belongings, I'm not going to watch Episode III. And I'll consider George Lucas' career to have ended with Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. And even there we should have seen the decay beginning to set in. Hiker reminds me: The decay set in long before Last Crusade, my friend. The decay was in full swing by Temple of Doom. In my very humble opinion that movie is MUCH worse than Episode I. Why? Four reasons: 1: The special effects are lousy, lacking the seamlessness of Raiders. 2: The story makes no godamn sense whatsoever. It's one disconnected event leading to another until the budget ran out. 3: Irritating racist charicature for a child sidekick. 4: Irritating and whiny love interest that I seriously wanted to kill before the end of her opening song number. Too true... too true.