The Good Old Days thread

[|iR|Focalor]

I wouldn't call myself a "Star Wars nerd" at all... I'm just a casual fan.

I was bored and felt like watching all 9 of the main movies, mostly with the intention of watching the newest 3 over again. I've seen all 3 of them, but I remember feeling incredibly confused by the strange ending of the last one, so I wanted to watch them again... probably just to confirm how stupid and awful they really are.

When downloading the movies, I came across a torrent that was called the "despecialized trilogy". I looked up some more info on it...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harmy's_Despecialized_Edition

It's the original trilogy compiled from several sources (35mm film, laser disc, capacitance disc, etc) with the original sound effects, music, and color timing, none of the later added CGI effects and characters, and restoration of all of the original scenes that were later changed or removed by George Lucas for the re-releases.

I've gotten through New Hope and Empire Strikes Back so far. Right off the bat, I notice the color is definitely different from the DVD version I have. It looks a lot more like a movie from the 70's and 80's, more similar to the technicolor process used in the 60's and 70's which made colors pop out a little better. Maybe I'm mis-remembering, but it seems like this de-specialized version has a lot of extra scenes in the bar where Luke and Obi-Wan meet Han. Or maybe it's the removal of all the CGI crap that makes the scene look so different.

Biggest thing I notice in Empire Strikes Back is the re-inclusion of the original scene where Darth Vader communicates with the Emperor via hologram. The Emperor looked different in the 2nd movie, and his voice was not the same as in the 3rd one either (less deep voice, less evil sounding, no english accent). He only appears in the Empire Strikes Back just that one time as a hologram. In the George Lucas re-releases, this scene was changed to include the Emperor as he appeared and sounded in the 3rd movie for the sake of "continuity".

Again, I'm not really a Star Wars nerd, but I'd definitely call myself a movie nerd. I do agree with the fans who like these de-specialized versions of the films more. I don't like the fact that George Lucas decided to change those films so drastically. Remastering, color tweaking, that's one thing. Even if you're gonna add shitloads of extra footage like the later re-release of Apocalypse Now did, that's fine, because you're not "changing" the movie all that much. Fans of the de-specialized versions argue that George Lucas effectively "vandalized" the movies by changing them so significantly, and I definitely agree. I kinda liked the prequel movies, but I was not a huge fan of the large amount of CGI used in the prequels. It was what I'd call "believable enough" but it still looked very much computer generated. Conventional effects and puppeteered characters may not look 100% real either, but at least they don't look 100% fake like all the computer generated characters do.

I didn't watch the first movie too much as a kid, but I remember in the 80's and 90's, HBO used to show The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi quite frequently. I used to watch them a lot when they'd come on. My mom was especially a fan of Empire Strikes Back, but I liked Return of the Jedi more because of the ewoks and the speeder bikes. It's cool to finally be able to see them once again like they were back then.