Star Wars: The Acolyte official trailer

[warty goblin]

The way that CD put it was "just accept it. The Star Wars you grew up with is never coming back."

I've never been exactly nuts about Star Wars in the first place. My favorites are hands down Empire Strikes Back and Revenge of the Sith, and it's blatantly obvious that the series is never hitting that level of overall craft (Empire) or epic bleakness (Sith) ever again since pretty much the first five minutes of Force Awakens. Which is fine, I'm well aware that I'm an outlier, and don't expect the series to cater to my whims. Being halfass competent in writing and structure would be nice, but 90% of everything is crap, and since there's a lot of Star Wars, the quality filters are off so there's gonna be even more crap.

[gbaji]

For any story involving the Jedi Order to be at all interesting, the threat has to be significant enough to matter for the story (threat to the Order and/or Republic as a whole) *and* is has to be perpetrated by people who can avoid/bypass/confuse the Jedi so they can do it in the first place.

Not all Jedi are Obi-wan, or Mace. Some of them are nameless, faceless, not-ever-going-to-be-on-the-council, aren't they? So not as potent, but still Jedi. Yes, Mace is OP for Durn Cattle Rustlers...but maybe Gin the Rookie might be appropriate. And I think we'd be better looking at the spy/intrigue land for ideas rather than just the Old West.

I don't recall saying anything about who the Jedi is, or how well known they are. Only about whether it involves the "Jedi Order". I suppose we could expand that to being "about any Jedi", but as long as the Jedi exists and the Order exist (at the same time even!), then my statement stands. Heck. It probably stands even if it is about a Jedi and there is no Order (see... Original Series for reference).

And sure. You can do spy/intrigue stuff with a minor Jedi rookie character, off on their own, doing something, somewhere. But that's where the second part of the statement comes in. If the consequences for failure are minor and the character isn't one we've heard of before the story started, you're going to have a hard time getting audience buy-in.

I guess the counter I'm trying to make is that you can write the same great spy/intrigue story, involving a character who does have connections to other known characters, and involving things that have relevance and import to other things (maybe even "really important things"), and then have a great story *and* tie-ins to other things that will draw more viewers and, everything else being the same, generate more revenue.

Bad writing is bad writing. Changing the characters to unknowns, and the consequences to "nothing that affects anything the audience cared about before", isn't going to change that. It'll just default to a lower viewership rate in the first place, and then go downhill from there. What is "wrong" with most of the recent Disney SW projects is not "they keep using Jedi, and Sith, and Imperial-like bad guys". That's seriously not the problem. So removing them isn't going to be the solution. We'll just get more crappy stories, with crappy plots, and crappy dialogue/interaction, and nonsensical twists/decisions/idiot-balls, but with different characters, against different bad guys.

Winter Soldier was the best Marvel movie, and would have been better without the heli-carriers. Important stakes, but less flashy and making use of one of the lowest powered Avengers. Use this model and we could finally see tales of the Jedi from when they were an effective peace keeping force of not-Generals.

So. Use an established character, in an established setting, with established bad guys, but add a plot twist (OMG! Shield is Hydra!), and then set up a world threatening situation which our heroes must deal with?

Your example is almost a perfect one for what I'm saying. What made Winder Soldier a great film was the writing and story. You can certainly do that *and* use established characters and organizatiions from the existing setting *and* use "massive global threat" as the conflict.

You just need good writing.

[Mordar]

I don't recall saying anything about who the Jedi is, or how well known they are. Only about whether it involves the "Jedi Order". I suppose we could expand that to being "about any Jedi", but as long as the Jedi exists and the Order exist (at the same time even!), then my statement stands. Heck. It probably stands even if it is about a Jedi and there is no Order (see... Original Series for reference).

Not tracking...are you saying any story that involves any Jedi during the time period that the Order exists de facto involves the Order and must feature galaxy-threatening stakes?

Also...note that I said the Project Insight component of WS actually worsened the movie...the stakes didn't need to be that high. That entire sequence just set the stage for "Hydra guys are Uber and the SHIELD loyalists other than one agent all collectively suck".

- M

[Zevox]

But if there is no threat to something bigger, why bother making the character a Jedi?

There could be any number of reasons, from wanting to tell a story that involves Jedi spirituality and philosophy in some way, to wanting a story that involves cool lightsaber battles. But really, there doesn't need to be a reason for that at all. They're setting out to make a Star Wars story from the outset, doesn't matter whether its one that could only be a Star Wars story or not, just that it's a good story people would like to watch (or read, or play through, etc depending on the form of media).

[BananaPhone]

Where is this now? Never heard of it, but sounds very interesting.

If you've got a spare 10 hours lol: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PL...Lle3eG1g2VQe8T

But there is an in-depth summary, readable version: https://swtorista.com/articles/imper...depth-summary/

[Errorname]

I think it's fair to say that you could tell a story where the Jedi aren't horribly flawed, but in order to make that story interesting you need to move the focus somewhere else. The Order stops being the driving force of the plot and becomes a secondary setting detail, the distant origin where your Jedi character comes from or the authority who come at the end of a story to clean things up after the drama has resolved.

The reason things like KOTOR and the Prequels portray the Jedi as so deeply flawed is because those stories are about the Jedi, and without the Order being catastrophically flawed there is no story, and the Acolyte is obviously continuing in that model of storytelling because in many ways it's what the Jedi are built for.

[gbaji]

Not tracking...are you saying any story that involves any Jedi during the time period that the Order exists de facto involves the Order and must feature galaxy-threatening stakes?

Not at all. First the part before the "and":

I'm saying that if the Jedi Order exists in the setting, and one of the characters is a Jedi, the story (or at least that charater's part in the story) is going to be connected to the Order in some way. Just look at the number of posts in this thread taking the actions of Jedi characters in stories set in the time period when the Order existed as representative of the "Jedi Order". You kinda can't decouple one from the other, unless you go out of your way to make the Jedi some kind of rogue or outlaw or whatever (in which case, you are still "involving the Jedi Order" via the point of this one being an exception).

The part after the "and":

Everything else being the same, making the stakes "bigger" will also make your audience draw "bigger". Recall that I was responding to talk about the trend in D+ SW projects (in the negative/downward direction). Obviously "good/bad" are subjective valuations of those projects. However, "dollars earned" is not. And that has everything with number of viewers.

Audiences somewhat expect that if you have a Jedi in a SW story, the stakes are going to be "big". I mean, we could argue this for any kind of character, but it seems doubly so for Jedi. Kinda hard to have a character who is part of an organization known for being the "peacekeepers of the Galaxy" and not have them involved in something worthy of that title.

Don't get me wrong. You *can* do other stories in the SW universe. And you can have Jedi characters involved in those stories. And I'm actually somewhat partial to those kind of "day in the life" sorts of things myself. However, I'm also aware that the kinds of things that tickle my fancy story wise are not always the kinds of things that draw large numbers of viewers. And that's ultimately what we are talking about here.

And I also followed this up (a couple times now) with an observation that if you have good stories and good writing, you will have a good result. But, there's no reason why you can't have a good story, and good writing and *also* have "big threats" involved. And if you do that, you'll both make the result appreciated by fans *and* get the viewer numbers you want. When you get that combo is when you have the greatest success. The problem with the more recent SW projects is not that they have big threats and big consequences and focus on Jedi/Sith/Imperial type conflicts, but that they are poorly written.

Fix the writing and the problem will solve itself. I was responding to folks saying that the character types, or setting time period, or presence/absence of specific threats was somehow the issue. I disagree with that. We've seen plenty of really great (and highly profitable) SW films and shows that included Jedi, Sith, Imperials, and massive galaxy spanning threats. So what has changed? That's where the problem lies.

Also...note that I said the Project Insight component of WS actually worsened the movie...the stakes didn't need to be that high. That entire sequence just set the stage for "Hydra guys are Uber and the SHIELD loyalists other than one agent all collectively suck".

It didn't need to be Project Insight specifically, but are you certain that if there hadn't been a similarly sized/scopped "threat" involved in WS, that the film would have been as popular, and generated as many ticket sales?

We can certainly speculate that the "big threat" angle wasn't needed, but that's just speculation. You'd need to show that an otherwise nearly identical film absent that level of threat would sell similar numbers of tickets. I'm only arguing that the presence of those things doesn't make the project fail (so removing them isn't going to turn failure into success, which was the argument I was opposing). It's present in WS and it was a massive success. Ergo, the presense of "big threats" isn't what makes projects fail (yes, even somewhat hamfisted ones like in WS).

My point is supported by the success of WS. Your point requries that we speculate that if we removed that "big threat" aspect from the film, it would have done just as well (or even better) as a result. But we don't know if that is true, while we do know that it was succesful as filmed.

There could be any number of reasons, from wanting to tell a story that involves Jedi spirituality and philosophy in some way, to wanting a story that involves cool lightsaber battles. But really, there doesn't need to be a reason for that at all. They're setting out to make a Star Wars story from the outset, doesn't matter whether its one that could only be a Star Wars story or not, just that it's a good story people would like to watch (or read, or play through, etc depending on the form of media).

Sure. And there may very well be a small niche customer base really interested in seeing the story of a Jedi doing minor things, or working through personal issues, or otherwise having minor conflicts with minor players that doesn't affect anything outside of a smallish circle of people around them. Again. I actually find such storys fun and entertaining. Some of my favorite short stories and novellas involve such character driven storylines. But those don't tend to make for big blockbuster numbers.

And, everything else being equal, if you include those elements in a project *and* up the scale/scope a fair bit, you will tend to attract a larger audience. This is not an either/or situation IMO. You can tell great stories, and delve into charcter personalities and development, while also having "big stakes" involved as well. The really great stories do just that. Heck. We can argue that the entire SW OT was exactly that. The story follows the growth and development of Luke, as he discovers his history, and deals with this, and then matures into making really hard decisions. That growth and development was not made less because the stakes were super high (literally the fate of the galaxy). I would argue that it was made greater because of those stakes, in fact.

And yeah. We also see growth and development of the Han Solo character as well. And with a great setting. And with good writing. And well paced. And... all the other stuff I've been talking about which actually make good films "good" in the first place.

[t209]

For some reason, part of me keep reminded me of Knights of the Old Republic 2 when I see the premise.

[Mordar]

Everything else being the same, making the stakes "bigger" will also make your audience draw "bigger". Recall that I was responding to talk about the trend in D+ SW projects (in the negative/downward direction). Obviously "good/bad" are subjective valuations of those projects. However, "dollars earned" is not. And that has everything with number of viewers.

Audiences somewhat expect that if you have a Jedi in a SW story, the stakes are going to be "big". I mean, we could argue this for any kind of character, but it seems doubly so for Jedi. Kinda hard to have a character who is part of an organization known for being the "peacekeepers of the Galaxy" and not have them involved in something worthy of that title.

Don't get me wrong. You *can* do other stories in the SW universe. And you can have Jedi characters involved in those stories. And I'm actually somewhat partial to those kind of "day in the life" sorts of things myself. However, I'm also aware that the kinds of things that tickle my fancy story wise are not always the kinds of things that draw large numbers of viewers. And that's ultimately what we are talking about here.

I'm curious about the accuracy of the prediction that audiences expect big stakes in every SW movie. I think you're probably right, but I am not certain. But I am certain that a crap-ton of "cop" movies have done great (or at least good) box office, sometimes with big budgets based on star power, with distinctly local scopes of impact. Similarly (though less so) some spy movies.

And I also followed this up (a couple times now) with an observation that if you have good stories and good writing, you will have a good result. But, there's no reason why you can't have a good story, and good writing and *also* have "big threats" involved. And if you do that, you'll both make the result appreciated by fans *and* get the viewer numbers you want. When you get that combo is when you have the greatest success. The problem with the more recent SW projects is not that they have big threats and big consequences and focus on Jedi/Sith/Imperial type conflicts, but that they are poorly written.

Fix the writing and the problem will solve itself. I was responding to folks saying that the character types, or setting time period, or presence/absence of specific threats was somehow the issue. I disagree with that. We've seen plenty of really great (and highly profitable) SW films and shows that included Jedi, Sith, Imperials, and massive galaxy spanning threats. So what has changed? That's where the problem lies.

No dispute. However, my point is that you don't *have* to have big threats to be good, or profitable. Lots of very successful dramas based on small scope of impact.

It didn't need to be Project Insight specifically, but are you certain that if there hadn't been a similarly sized/scopped "threat" involved in WS, that the film would have been as popular, and generated as many ticket sales?

We can certainly speculate that the "big threat" angle wasn't needed, but that's just speculation. You'd need to show that an otherwise nearly identical film absent that level of threat would sell similar numbers of tickets. I'm only arguing that the presence of those things doesn't make the project fail (so removing them isn't going to turn failure into success, which was the argument I was opposing). It's present in WS and it was a massive success. Ergo, the presense of "big threats" isn't what makes projects fail (yes, even somewhat hamfisted ones like in WS).

My point is supported by the success of WS. Your point requries that we speculate that if we removed that "big threat" aspect from the film, it would have done just as well (or even better) as a result. But we don't know if that is true, while we do know that it was succesful as filmed.

Yes, I am certain. The big set piece in the end? Could have been done on a much smaller scale, saving a ton of production cost at zero risk to the story. I don't recall the advertising terribly well, but I do know it featured Cap and Bucky very heavily, and flying aircraft carriers less so. The theatrical posters are a mix, but the Insight ships are a faded background if and when they are included. I just rewatched the trailers - they do show the carriers, and a money shot of one crashing, but they show *a lot* more of the tight, interpersonal conversations and the conflict with Bucky. The threat to SHIELD was sufficient, IMO. The set piece does give a payoff, but it is mostly window dressing.

It is investment in the stakes that matters the most, I think. Not the scope of the stakes.

Important to note I said WS was the best, not the most successful. It ranks 21st on the list of MCU box office gross. Out of 33, not counting the re-releases of Panther, IM, GotG and No Way Home. Behind some smaller scope stake movies.

I think the MI movies are a good example, for the most part. They have a range of potential stakes - from some spies getting dead, to a girlfriend getting dead, to maybe nuclear Armageddon. Despite the differences in stakes, the investment is always high because of the (as you have pointed out) good story and good writing. But in all cases, these stories could work well in the SW universe at the same scale (e.g. up to a small part of a planet, not a whole galaxy) with a Jedi and team instead of Ethan and the IMF. Except maybe not MI-3 because, you know, girlfriend.

- M

[Mechalich]

Captain America: The Winter Soldier, cost $170 million dollars to make (in 2014 money, so around $220 million now). The most recent MI movie, Dead Reckoning Part One, cost $290 million to make, and, wait for it, lost money at the box office despite having arguably the world's biggest movie star at the helm. The most recent big 'cop movie' that comes to mind is Bad Boys for Life, from 2020. Even that movie cost $90 million to make (though it did make money, despite slamming into Covid late in its theatrical run).

Ultimately any live action Star Wars film is going to cost $100 million plus no matter how contained the story is, and pretty much any episode of Star Wars live action TV is going to cost $10 million dollars at a minimum. Note that Andor, which used practical sets instead of the screen technology Disney used for Mandalorian called The Volume, cost upwards of $20 million per episode because building stuff costs money. This is a fundamental cost floor imposed on making Star Wars that looks good enough to put on TV and any story written for Star Wars has to be big enough to justify that kind of heavy investment, where even an 8-episode show is lightly to cost $100 million or more (this isn't unique to Star Wars, it impacts basically all high-fidelity genre fiction).

Star Wars can, and does, tell good, smaller scale and scope stories all the time, including during Disney's control, but it does them in animation, comics, novels, and occasionally video games. Personally, I think Disney would be much better served to focus story development in those media, which are much more forgiving, and then only bring something to live action when it has proven itself as a commodity. They have tried this: Boba Fett is a proven draw as a character, and Ahsoka was basically a live-action sequel to Rebels. Those shows leave a lot to be desired, to be sure, but I believe they both did better economically than Andor, which is rather telling.

The Acolyte, notably, has even less ties to the broader franchise than Andor, which was at least about a pre-existing character everyone knew was part of the Rebellion. No one has any idea what this show is and therefore most people don't care about it. This puts a lot of pressure on it to both be really good and to please the existing hardcore fans of the franchise who care about everything in Star Wars and will control early word-of-mouth as a result.

[Palanan]

Originally Posted by Mordar
Except maybe not MI-3 because, you know, girlfriend.

Jedi has girlfriend, only his team knows about it. Must complete mission without Jedi Order discovering his +1. Shenanigans ensue.

That could be played lightheartedly, or as a serious potential compromise for the mission, with both Jedi and team members wrestling with tactical issues as well as moral questions about disclosure and personal attachments.

[Zevox]

Sure. And there may very well be a small niche customer base really interested in seeing the story of a Jedi doing minor things, or working through personal issues, or otherwise having minor conflicts with minor players that doesn't affect anything outside of a smallish circle of people around them. Again. I actually find such storys fun and entertaining. Some of my favorite short stories and novellas involve such character driven storylines. But those don't tend to make for big blockbuster numbers.

And, everything else being equal, if you include those elements in a project *and* up the scale/scope a fair bit, you will tend to attract a larger audience. This is not an either/or situation IMO. You can tell great stories, and delve into charcter personalities and development, while also having "big stakes" involved as well. The really great stories do just that. Heck. We can argue that the entire SW OT was exactly that. The story follows the growth and development of Luke, as he discovers his history, and deals with this, and then matures into making really hard decisions. That growth and development was not made less because the stakes were super high (literally the fate of the galaxy). I would argue that it was made greater because of those stakes, in fact.

And yeah. We also see growth and development of the Han Solo character as well. And with a great setting. And with good writing. And well paced. And... all the other stuff I've been talking about which actually make good films "good" in the first place.

You can do that, yes. But note that I never said you couldn't, I pushed back on your argument that you *have* to have a more significant threat to have an "at all interesting" story about Jedi, which I think is clearly just factually wrong, and gave the opinion that a smaller-scale story would be a nice change of pace at this point.

[gbaji]

I think I see where the conflict/confusion is. I was specifically speaking about live action films and series on D+ (since that seemed to be relevant). As someone mentioned above, there is a very very high overhead for such projects, so you have to have bigger scope/stakes involved to bring in the viewers to justify that cost.

You can absolutely do less large scale stories in a written or animated format. But that's not what I was trying to zero in on. It may not have been super clear what I was talking about initially though.

A story about a Jedi tracking down local smugglers/thieves causing problems for a friend works in an episode of Clone Wars. It does not have enough gravitas to stand alone as a feature film, or major story arc in a live action series. That's what I was getting at with my comments. You can absolutely have these elments in there, but somewhere there must be something "bigger" to make the whole project worth the cost.

And yeah. To follow some of my other posts a bit, that is going to include a lot of the iconic things from the SW universe that people, well, expect to see. So if your complaint about SW shows is "too much Jedi vs Sith", and "too much Rebels vs Imperials", or some relatively minor variation/replacement thereof, you're probably going to just be out of luck. That's literally what the franchise was created with, and it's what the vast majority of the paying customers expect to see.

You think Grogu being the same species as Yoda was just an accident? Nope. It's this same principle in action. You think Luke showing up at the end of season 2 was an accident? Again. No. Andor could be about a guy living during the Imperial period, but have him entirely engaged in smuggling for some previously unheard of criminal cartel out on the rim, with no mention or interaction with the Empire or the growing Rebellion at all. You know how well that series would do? Poorly. I'm sure some hard core fans would love it. The vast majority of the viewing audience would be like "this isn't SW". That's why the story is about his gradual involvement in and recruitment by the rebellion.

Take those elements away, and you have a generic sci-fi story. Might be very good even. But it wont be viewed as a "SW story" by most people, if it doesn't contain those elements. Again. You can do this in a short story, or novel, or animated episode or even arc, and that's fine. Once you get into the realm of live action films/series though, you're pretty much throwing money away if you don't include the very identifiable elements that the franchise is known for and identified with. Fair or not, that's how you get audiences.


Which, just to follow my logic to an end point, means that removing those things will not fix any of the problems that recent D+ SW projects have had. If anything, they would make them worse (at least from a monetary pov). The actual problems lie elsewhere. Which, I suppose, means that this specific project is not going to succeed or fail based on the fact that it is about members of the Jedi order, nor about conflict with a rising Sith threat, much less one tied directly to the eventual Emperor Palpatine. If anything, those tie ins are a positive in terms of viewership. What will cause it to succeed or fail is how well the material is treated, how well the charcters and plot/story are written, and whether or not they inject silly/dumb/idiot-ball elements into it.


Just looking at Ahsoka. The actual plot of the series? Perfectly fine. Heck. Very good really. Fills in some gaps. Continues the story left off from Rebels. Adds in some additional Evil/Grey force wielders. All good so far. It's the execution of that plot, and the specifics of the character choices, actions, and dialogue that makes it not a great series. It has pacing problems (serious pacing problems!) as well. We had a whole thread about it, and IMO, it wasn't really the fact of the inclusion of Ahsoka, nor of Baylin, nor of Wren (though some issues with what they did with that character), nor the Night Sisters, nor Hera, nor the New Republic fleet/politics. None of that simply existing in the story was the problem. It was how those things were used that was.

The series would have been just as poorly recieved if every one of those characters was replaced with some altnerative that wasn't an iconic standard trope of SW, but otherwise had the same pacing, dialogue, and action/decision issues that the actual series had. We'd still be complaining about how stupid X action was, or Y dialogue was, or that some episodes were pure filler, or the dumb actions by the bad guys, or equally dumb actions by the good guys. But there would also probably be fewer people who watched it to complain about those things in the first place.

[Infernally Clay]

Jedi has girlfriend, only his team knows about it. Must complete mission without Jedi Order discovering his +1. Shenanigans ensue.

That could be played lightheartedly, or as a serious potential compromise for the mission, with both Jedi and team members wrestling with tactical issues as well as moral questions about disclosure and personal attachments.

They already did that with Anakin/Padmé and Obi-Wan/Satine on separate occasions and even Quinlan Vos/Asajj Ventress. At this point the whole “forbidden love” thing for Jedi is honestly kinda played out.

[Palanan]

Originally Posted by Infernally Clay
They already did that with Anakin/Padmé….

They did it laughably poorly with Anakin and Padmé, so there’s plenty of space for a better-executed approach.

[KorvinStarmast]

But if there is no threat to something bigger, why bother making the character a Jedi?

I'll give you an in-universe answer.
The "bigger" bits / threats are the result of the death of a thousand cuts: a whole lot of little bits of corruption and rot become a larger problem if they are not nipped in the bud. There are thus periods in the Jedi time span where one or two go out to lance the boil, so to speak. You use Jedi because a galaxy is so freaking big, and the Jedi are so few but they are very effective. (See also Jason Bourne, Jack Reacher, MI, James Bond, etc).

You can make a variety of stories using a Jedi in a vein similar to High Plains Drifter or general Man With No Name Clint Eastwood films where something local is wrong. The whole plot is to uncover what is wrong, get at the source, and use the unique Jedi powers to find a solution that is implemented by empowering the locals to solve the problem. They just need a little help from their Jedi friends. This isn't Shane.

At the end, the Jedi rides off (not necessarily into the sunset) as he or she gets another mission notice.

You can toss in hooks to "larger scale" issues as a part of any plot.

With the hundreds of in habited worlds in a galaxy, and the chance for corruption in both The Republic and The Empire, going on a small scale mission to root out the rot can make for some good films. Each can have its own plot twist. (And FWIW, short stories along the lines of how Elmore Leonard writes them might be a good baseline to begin with...) They don't all have to be of a grand scale.

And it raises the point I just made: Why bother making the character a Jedi in the first place?

Because a Jedi's unique power allows them to peel back the layers of the onion to find the rot that needs to be rooted out. This is the kind of mission that Obi Wan and Qui-Gon Jinn were on in the first Prequel movie. It is fertile grounds for more stories on different worlds.

It is the kind of thing that makes Mission Impossible or James Bond movies work.

... 90% of everything is crap, and since there's a lot of Star Wars, the quality filters are off so there's gonna be even more crap.

Sturgeon's law lives on.

Jedi has girlfriend, only his team knows about it. Must complete mission without Jedi Order discovering his +1. Shenanigans ensue.

This needs to be light-hearted. They have already done the 'heavy' version of that in the prequels - it fell flat.

[Lemmy]

Even if this didn't look like total garbage, I refuse to give 1 cent or 1 second of my time to anything involving Leslie Headland.

[Infernally Clay]

They did it laughably poorly with Anakin and Padmé, so there’s plenty of space for a better-executed approach.

That depends on what you're talking about. In the movies, yeah, it wasn't done very well... but in The Clone Wars? It was fantastic, because they used it to explore both characters inside and outside of their relationship, how they hid it from others (both well and poorly) and how other Jedi handled their own love.

Obi-Wan, for example, told Satine that if she had asked him to he would have left the Jedi Order. Yet when Padmé asks the same of Anakin, he can't do it. He can't let go.

[Errorname]

A story about a Jedi tracking down local smugglers/thieves causing problems for a friend works in an episode of Clone Wars. It does not have enough gravitas to stand alone as a feature film, or major story arc in a live action series. That's what I was getting at with my comments. You can absolutely have these elments in there, but somewhere there must be something "bigger" to make the whole project worth the cost.

Even in animation, I don't think very many people rank episodes like "Trespass" as their favourite Clone Wars episodes.

The "bigger" bits / threats are the result of the death of a thousand cuts: a whole lot of little bits of corruption and rot become a larger problem if they are not nipped in the bud. There are thus periods in the Jedi time span where one or two go out to lance the boil, so to speak. You use Jedi because a galaxy is so freaking big, and the Jedi are so few but they are very effective. (See also Jason Bourne, Jack Reacher, MI, James Bond, etc).

Literally all of those franchises are about individual badasses who at best have to go rogue in order to save the day and at worst are actively fighting against the organization that trained them.

I agree that a story about a cool dude who is a Jedi doesn't need to get into portraying the Jedi Order as a flawed thing, but that's because the Jedi as an institution aren't the focal point of the story, they're a secondary element that exists as part of the hero's backstory rather than an active presence in the story.

[Infernally Clay]

Even in animation, I don't think very many people rank episodes like "Trespass" as their favourite Clone Wars episodes.

There was a pretty cool arc in The Clone Wars where Obi-Wan faked his death to infiltrate a mercenary group planning to assassinate Palpatine, but the strength of even that story is that the Jedi Council screwed up by refusing to tell Anakin what was going on and then being surprised that he went on a rampage to hunt down Obi-Wan’s killer.

[Errorname]

There was a pretty cool arc in The Clone Wars where Obi-Wan faked his death to infiltrate a mercenary group planning to assassinate Palpatine, but the strength of even that story is that the Jedi Council screwed up by refusing to tell Anakin what was going on and then being surprised that he went on a rampage to hunt down Obi-Wan’s killer.

Even Trespass has the pretty clear subtext that if the negotiations break bad, the Jedi are expected to side with the racist jackass who's been escalating the conflict because the alliance with his people is too politically important to risk for the sake of preventing a non-spacefaring tribe from being wiped out

[ecarden]

Eh, I think we need to distinguish between 'I personally believe is good,' 'is popular' and 'is good for the long term health of the franchise.'

It seems likely that just playing the greatest hits is likely to be more short term popular than experimenting with new stuff, but it's not an infinite well and you end up running through your own fans. You need to expand and make more things that can be included in your greatest hits.

Like, I personally would find a series that focused on some sort of Jedi Dispatch service in the High Republic really, really fascinating! How do you deploy thousands of Jedi amongst millions of worlds. How do you prioritize? Some stuff, sure the Senate decides to send you as envoys, but how do you decide whether to dispatch Jedi to investigate corruption on world X, murder of an ally on world Y, or off to train on world Z? Who is making those calls and how do they live with the consequences? After all, the Jedi only know they got in some good training on World Z, they don't know that a murder went unsolved and corruption spread. But the person who made that call probably does.

Do I think that would be popular? Probably not. Would I enjoy the heck out of it? If it was any good at all.

[gbaji]

You can make a variety of stories using a Jedi in a vein similar to High Plains Drifter or general Man With No Name Clint Eastwood films where something local is wrong. The whole plot is to uncover what is wrong, get at the source, and use the unique Jedi powers to find a solution that is implemented by empowering the locals to solve the problem. They just need a little help from their Jedi friends. This isn't Shane.

Sure. You could do this. I'm not sure how well modern audiences would appreciate it though. There's a reason why modern series' have largely moved away from "purely episodic" to "story arc" formats. Stranger riding into town and solving a problem is good. Stranger riding into town and solving a problem which is a symptom of a larger plot going on that he's really tracking down.... is much much better.

As to film formats? I'm not sure you could possibly sell a plot of "jedi walks into town and saves them from the greedy local water baron" to any studio and get funding. And they'd be right. The audience would get to the end of the film and be like "What? That's it? The whole problem was just this one local guy and his small gang of thugs holding a small town in the middle of nowhere on some random planet hostage by controlling their water supply? This sucks!". Those kinds of stories tend to be the "weak ones" in an animated series (like Clone Wars, but even then would have a tie in to the war going on). No way can that carry an entire live action film.

With the hundreds of in habited worlds in a galaxy, and the chance for corruption in both The Republic and The Empire, going on a small scale mission to root out the rot can make for some good films. Each can have its own plot twist. (And FWIW, short stories along the lines of how Elmore Leonard writes them might be a good baseline to begin with...) They don't all have to be of a grand scale.

Except that if you are tying it into corruption in the Republic or Empiire, then you are tying it into "something bigger".

Because a Jedi's unique power allows them to peel back the layers of the onion to find the rot that needs to be rooted out. This is the kind of mission that Obi Wan and Qui-Gon Jinn were on in the first Prequel movie. It is fertile grounds for more stories on different worlds.

Right. So why didn't they put any of the other missions that the two of them did on the screen? Why pick this one? Because it's the one mission that lead them to a larger plot, and "something bigger". If this had literally just been a minor trade dispute, and they sat down with the relevant parties and helped them hammer out a solution (perhaps even with a small amount of "aggressive diplomacy"), then it would be just like all the other missions, and it would not be on the screen.

Heck. In Jedi tales we see a single mission with Dooku and Jinn. Why did they put that one in, even in short animated form? Because it's a key mission that showcases the reason for Dooku leaving the Jedi order, and later becoming a leader of the Separatists. That's the "bigger thing" going on here. If it was just a mission to deal with a dispute between a Senator and the folks working on a planet he controlled, and there was nothing else larger going on? We would not see it. I mean. They could literally do 100 shorts showing all of the other missions they went on. But... there's a reason they didn't.

It's somewhat similar to decisions made when GMing an RPG. One of my players may have a character who works as a bouncer at a local bar in between adventures. Guess what? I'm not going to spend table time having him roleplay out dealilng with handsy drunks, or local gang members, or whatever. When am I going to actually run something that happens on that job? When the action that occurs is a "hook" that leads to an adventure. I'm not going to waste table time in a game on things that aren't relevant to the game as a whole. Similarly, studios aren't going to waste screen time on things that aren't relevant to the "bigger story" either.

We can certainly assume that those Jedi are off doing a ton of other things, all the time. But we're only going to spend screen time on the ones that tie into the very "bigger" (and often "galactic") threats out there that I'm talking about.


Again. It's not like you can't do other stories, and have them be complete and self contained and have no connection to anything else. But I don't think audiences will like them (at least not in a SW setting). So... In a discussion about "what can Disney do to improve it's flagging numbers", saying "stop doing stories about big galactic threats, and evil Sith/Imperial plots" is really not a very good approach IMO. Those are exactly what they should be doing. The've just done them very poorly for quite some time now. The type of story is not the problem. It's the execution of those stories that is.

[Mordar]

Sure. You could do this. I'm not sure how well modern audiences would appreciate it though. There's a reason why modern series' have largely moved away from "purely episodic" to "story arc" formats. Stranger riding into town and solving a problem is good. Stranger riding into town and solving a problem which is a symptom of a larger plot going on that he's really tracking down.... is much much better.

As to film formats? I'm not sure you could possibly sell a plot of "jedi walks into town and saves them from the greedy local water baron" to any studio and get funding. And they'd be right. The audience would get to the end of the film and be like "What? That's it? The whole problem was just this one local guy and his small gang of thugs holding a small town in the middle of nowhere on some random planet hostage by controlling their water supply? This sucks!". Those kinds of stories tend to be the "weak ones" in an animated series (like Clone Wars, but even then would have a tie in to the war going on). No way can that carry an entire live action film.

I think this is the fundamental disconnect between what I am thinking and what your are thinking on scale/scope. A village is the right scope for High Plains because the entirety of the known universe is the Old West. In Star Wars we can move that to a whole planet. The point is to get away from "the whole Jedi assembly can come help if it is really that big a deal" but still have sufficient number and power of adversaries to be a challenge to our "street level" Jedi. A planetary threat is smaller scale when you have a massive Galaxy as the backdrop.

I think you understate the marketability of such a film, you think I overstate it. Fair enough. But Disney knows the score on the sequel trilogy (diminishing returns on the MEGA events...see also MCU). They planned more non-Skywalker movies. The branched into more streaming series to see what buzz they could generate (while making more money), and what were the most successful? An Old West themed story with some tenuous connections to the "main narrative" and a pair of Easter eggs.

Except that if you are tying it into corruption in the Republic or Empiire, then you are tying it into "something bigger".

No more than having a Jedi or a light saber (or a Mandalorian or a Wookiee) does. That is just shared cinematic universe.

Right. So why didn't they put any of the other missions that the two of them did on the screen? Why pick this one? Because it's the one mission that lead them to a larger plot, and "something bigger". If this had literally just been a minor trade dispute, and they sat down with the relevant parties and helped them hammer out a solution (perhaps even with a small amount of "aggressive diplomacy"), then it would be just like all the other missions, and it would not be on the screen.

Because the Prequel Trilogy isn't really about the Jedi, particularly not Qui-gon or Obi-won. It is about Darth Vader. Every thing in the three films existed to serve the story of Vader. It wasn't a discussion of "What Jedi stories should we tell?" or "How many missions should we show Jedi most people have never heard of completing to provide greater insight into the Jedi Order?". It was "How did this backwater kid become the most powerful Jedi of all time (as defined by the current era, anyway) and the most iconic villain *ever* to appear in any film?".

Heck. In Jedi tales we see a single mission with Dooku and Jinn. Why did they put that one in, even in short animated form? Because it's a key mission that showcases the reason for Dooku leaving the Jedi order, and later becoming a leader of the Separatists. That's the "bigger thing" going on here. If it was just a mission to deal with a dispute between a Senator and the folks working on a planet he controlled, and there was nothing else larger going on? We would not see it. I mean. They could literally do 100 shorts showing all of the other missions they went on. But... there's a reason they didn't.

Skywalker Saga. It wasn't that they couldn't tell a different story. It is that this was designed to feed the Skywalker Saga. Not all Star Wars needs to do that. Especially not now.

It's somewhat similar to decisions made when GMing an RPG. One of my players may have a character who works as a bouncer at a local bar in between adventures. Guess what? I'm not going to spend table time having him roleplay out dealilng with handsy drunks, or local gang members, or whatever. When am I going to actually run something that happens on that job? When the action that occurs is a "hook" that leads to an adventure. I'm not going to waste table time in a game on things that aren't relevant to the game as a whole. Similarly, studios aren't going to waste screen time on things that aren't relevant to the "bigger story" either.

Or because you also have several other players at the table who would be sitting around while you do a solo story with this one character? But maybe it would be a fun game when it is just the two of you that have time to play. A huge number of other film franchises have been very successful without a "bigger story", or without every entry being about "Phase X".

We can certainly assume that those Jedi are off doing a ton of other things, all the time. But we're only going to spend screen time on the ones that tie into the very "bigger" (and often "galactic") threats out there that I'm talking about.

If your goal is to tell the Skywalker Saga, yes. If your goal is to make a successful standalone movie, it does not have to be the case. Rogue One tied to the Skywalker Saga, but tenuously and unimportantly. And it was engaging. Jedi off doing a ton of other things ties tenuously and unimportantly to the Skywalker Saga in that they both have Jedi. And it can be engaging.

Again, Mission Impossible. There is a plot thread that connects the Syndicate movies. Elements in those movies must serve the Syndicate Saga. But the other movies? They don't care about the Syndicate. So they don't need to tie to the Syndicate to be relevant movies. Indiana Jones. Didn't need a unified big theme (not even Goosesteppers are Bad!) to make 3 great movies and 2 other things. Not every film has to serve the same goal.

Again. It's not like you can't do other stories, and have them be complete and self contained and have no connection to anything else. But I don't think audiences will like them (at least not in a SW setting). So... In a discussion about "what can Disney do to improve it's flagging numbers", saying "stop doing stories about big galactic threats, and evil Sith/Imperial plots" is really not a very good approach IMO. Those are exactly what they should be doing. The've just done them very poorly for quite some time now. The type of story is not the problem. It's the execution of those stories that is.

Mandalorian was a self-contained story. The Grogu joins Luke for a minute at the end of the series (oops, Spoilers!)? Easter egg. Irrelevant to the success of the series. Seems audiences loved that one a lot more than most anything else.

We're seeing a lot of discussion in the film media about recalibrating expectations. Making lower cost films with more heart. We've seen what can be done (Godzilla Minus One for instance). The situation now to me seems to be a little bit like a pizza place that is struggling with sales because people don't find the pizza as appetizing as it once was. The answer isn't automatically "Let's make the same pizza, but bigger and with bigger pieces of the same pepperoni, because people used to like our pepperoni pizza". It might be "Let's explore our ingredient options and try a few new things on the menu, because we're not the only pizza shop in town anymore, and that last General Manager was kind of an a$$ to people and that drove them away. Maybe we need to add some pasta dishes and salads to the menu."

That type of story isn't a problem. But the fact that they screwed the last few iterations of that type of story *is* a problem, and that taste lingers. You've just eaten three bad eggs in a row. Wanna have another egg from the same box right now?

Disney is in a unique position in that they can reasonably do both. They had sort of planned to before the numbers of the Sequel Trilogy gave them pause (thankfully since it seems some of the choices were ungood). But I think they should go with some new appetizers and pasta dishes. Because their sauce is good, but the rest of the ingredients have suffered lately.

- M

[Zevox]

I think I see where the conflict/confusion is. I was specifically speaking about live action films and series on D+ (since that seemed to be relevant). As someone mentioned above, there is a very very high overhead for such projects, so you have to have bigger scope/stakes involved to bring in the viewers to justify that cost.

You can absolutely do less large scale stories in a written or animated format. But that's not what I was trying to zero in on. It may not have been super clear what I was talking about initially though.

A story about a Jedi tracking down local smugglers/thieves causing problems for a friend works in an episode of Clone Wars. It does not have enough gravitas to stand alone as a feature film, or major story arc in a live action series. That's what I was getting at with my comments. You can absolutely have these elments in there, but somewhere there must be something "bigger" to make the whole project worth the cost.

Very well. Modern media's endless pursuit of everything being a "safe investment" that will make as much money as possible preventing them from ever trying new things is a well-known problem, and one I don't expect to go anywhere anytime soon. I'm not interested in discussing that, as I think that discussion is ultimately pointless, since it will only change if and when people in a position to make those decisions so stop thinking that way. I only objected to the claim that you need higher stakes for an interesting story; if you're backing off that one, then I'm good.

[gbaji]

I think you understate the marketability of such a film, you think I overstate it. Fair enough. But Disney knows the score on the sequel trilogy (diminishing returns on the MEGA events...see also MCU).

It wasn't the mega nature of the events that were the problem. That's where I think the actual disagreement is here.

It was the absurdly laughably bad nature and treatment of those mega events which were the problem.

No more than having a Jedi or a light saber (or a Mandalorian or a Wookiee) does. That is just shared cinematic universe.

A plot involving "corruption in the Republic/Empire" is, by definition, "more than having a jedi or a lightsaber" in a story. So yes, having those things is connected to "bigger things" a lot more then merely having a Jedi, or a lightsaber, or a Mandalorian, or a Wookie. One is a setting element. The other is a plot tie-in to the very "bigger things" I was talking about. If we do a story about a Jedi, using his lightsaber to make a sandwich (and nothing else), there is no "bigger thing" involved. If, however, the sandwich is discovered to have a mind control drug in it, which will cause everyone who eats it to become slaves under the control of some evil bbeg, and that guy in turn is working secretly for some corrupt arm of <insert galactic power/government/whatever here> then... guess what? We're now involved in a "bigger thing".

If I asked people which of those two stories they'd like to see in a film, involving a Jedi with a lightsaber, want to guess which one 99.999999% of people would say? (hint: it's not the guy sitting in his kitchen just making a sandwich). Heck. If I presented the same choices to the same group, and had one version where the evil mind control plot was just something a local warlord was doing on his own, and a second one where the local warlord was secretly testing out said mind control drug for a larger galaxy wide group, guess which one they would then poll as wanting to see more?

Again. Everything else being equal, the "bigger the plot", the more audiences tend to like them. Our hero rescuing one person from evil kidnappers? Good. Our hero, while trying to rescue that one person, discovering a large number of other people held captive by the same bad guys and rescuing them as well? Better. Same story, but with the bad guys kidnapping those same people, but for use in an even larger conspiracy, of which their operation is only one part? Much better.

The limits to this process should be based on the format and duration of the storytelling vehicle itself, obviously. But if you are doing a series, or full length film (or series of full length films), you probably want to think about something "bigger" in your plot.

Because the Prequel Trilogy isn't really about the Jedi, particularly not Qui-gon or Obi-won. It is about Darth Vader. Every thing in the three films existed to serve the story of Vader. It wasn't a discussion of "What Jedi stories should we tell?" or "How many missions should we show Jedi most people have never heard of completing to provide greater insight into the Jedi Order?". It was "How did this backwater kid become the most powerful Jedi of all time (as defined by the current era, anyway) and the most iconic villain *ever* to appear in any film?".

Right. The story of Skywalker, and the rise of the Empire, and Vader, and whatnot is the "bigger story".

Again. Why did they show this one mission and not others? Because that's the mission that ties into the "bigger story". I think you are getting caught up in the details of what exactly the "bigger story" is. I'm not talking about that. I'm just saying that you really need to have one to make the story complete, and make the scenes you are filming pay off at the end.

Skywalker Saga. It wasn't that they couldn't tell a different story. It is that this was designed to feed the Skywalker Saga. Not all Star Wars needs to do that. Especially not now.

Again. It's not about the specifics of the 'bigger story" (it could be something totally different and not involve the Skywalker familiy at all). It's about the idea that, at least in this setting and this format (feature film), you really do need a "bigger story" to tell.

If your goal is to tell the Skywalker Saga, yes.

It is not about the Skywalker Saga. That's irrelevant to my point. It could be about the Knights of the old Republic, but... to tell that story, you need to find something "big" that they are dealing with. Otherwise we're left with the question of "why are you telilng this story?".

If your goal is to make a successful standalone movie, it does not have to be the case. Rogue One tied to the Skywalker Saga, but tenuously and unimportantly. And it was engaging. Jedi off doing a ton of other things ties tenuously and unimportantly to the Skywalker Saga in that they both have Jedi. And it can be engaging.

Again. I think you are equating everything I'm talking about being a "galactic threat" to having to be tied to the Skywalker Saga. That's not at all what I'm saying. The threat could be literally anything. Group of previously unknown dark side force users, who are manipulating the New Republic to do "evil things" on some grandish scale. Evil aliens invading from outside the galaxy. Smugglers have found the ancient doomsday device that will end all life in the galaxy if not destroyed (and there's a mad scramble to find/use it by multiple parties).

Pick something. But that's the point. Pick something. If the only story you have is "local person deals with purely local issue, and it has no impact elsewhere in the setting", it's probably not going to be well recieved. You can certainly do this kind of story, but if you are bothering to set it in the SW universe, you should really tie it into something "bigger". Otherwise, as I said at the beginning of this, there was no point in including any identifiable elements from SW in the first place. You certainly can do a story where a Jedi arrives on a planet, and helps them deal with some local problem, then flies off never to see them again, and never for their problem to have any impact on anything else outside their own planet. But... overwhelmingly the response would be "what was the point of the story?".

I'll also point out that, focus on the "Skywalker Saga" aside, the events in Rogue One were absolutely and completely about "a galactic threat". Take away the whole "steal the plans for this new battle station and get them to the rebellion", and.... you have no ending to the film. No reason for the final assault. No reason for the heroic sacrifice of so many lives. We have no story or resolution. Just... what? One character finds her dad is working for the Empire making weapons, tries to talk him out of it, he is killed, and she escapes. Then... we're done? Life goes on, I guess? That film and its plot was far far far from "uimportantly" connected to the "galactic threat" going on. It was front and freaking center to it.

Again, Mission Impossible. There is a plot thread that connects the Syndicate movies. Elements in those movies must serve the Syndicate Saga. But the other movies? They don't care about the Syndicate. So they don't need to tie to the Syndicate to be relevant movies. Indiana Jones. Didn't need a unified big theme (not even Goosesteppers are Bad!) to make 3 great movies and 2 other things. Not every film has to serve the same goal.

I can't speak to the MI films (never watched more than the first one). The Indiana Jones films though? I think you're conflating "all have to have the same threat" with "all have to have a big threat to deal with". The first film is about them literally preventing a powerful divine artifact from being used by the bad guys with "global world domination" on the table (wasn't going to happen anyway, but no one knew that at the time). The second, which is not remotely the best out of the first three, is about preventing an evil cult from obtaining the 5 stones of the gods, which will... wait for it... allow them world domination. The third film is about preventing evil people from finding the holy grail and the immortality it grants. Of the three, two of them absolutely have "setting wide threats", and while the third is a bit less than the others, is still up there in the realm of "bad guys with this object can do great harm".

Now. Remove the Arc of the Covenant, the Sankara Stones, and the Holy Grail from those three stories. What is the motivation of the characters? The bad guys literally have nothing to do, and no reason to be antagonists. The good guys have no reason to oppose them either. There is no plot without those "big threats". We could certainly have stories where Indiana Jones fights bad guys while exploring ancient ruins and finding old (but non-magical and non-threatening) artifacts. But... shockingly, the three films all involve magic artifacts, that represent significant threats if found by "bad men", and Indie is trying to stop that from happening.

Almost like there's a pattern here for "action based blockbuster films".

Mandalorian was a self-contained story. The Grogu joins Luke for a minute at the end of the series (oops, Spoilers!)? Easter egg. Irrelevant to the success of the series. Seems audiences loved that one a lot more than most anything else.

Right. Take Grogu out of the story. There is no neo-imperial plot to steal this child and tap into his midiclorians or whatever, to make force capable clones to bring about the rise of a new empire (or return of the old, or whatever). We take that character out, and we've removed the "big galactic threat", right? Once again, we could have just had stories of Mando as a bounty hunter wandering around, taking bounties, and having adventures. But, shockingly, we only start seeing his adventures right when he takes the first job which leads him right into the "bigger plot/threat" that the story is actually about. To that, we add details and side plots like the dark saber, and the other factions of Mandalorians, etc. But all is focused around that single "big/galactic threat".

This is what makes these stories interesting to the audience.

The situation now to me seems to be a little bit like a pizza place that is struggling with sales because people don't find the pizza as appetizing as it once was. The answer isn't automatically "Let's make the same pizza, but bigger and with bigger pieces of the same pepperoni, because people used to like our pepperoni pizza". It might be "Let's explore our ingredient options and try a few new things on the menu, because we're not the only pizza shop in town anymore, and that last General Manager was kind of an a$$ to people and that drove them away. Maybe we need to add some pasta dishes and salads to the menu."

Absolutely. But the answer is never going to be "continue to use the same crappy ingredients, made by the same crappy cooks, but make them smaller and with fewer toppings, because clearliy the problem is that we've been making big pizzes with lots of toppings".

The fact that making the pizzes "bigger and with more of the same toppings" isn't the solution, does not make "smaller and with fewer toppings" the solution either. That's literally all I'm saying here. To follow the analogy, the problem isn't with the size or type of toppings, but with the quality and use of those toppings.

Failing to resolve those issues will make the same failure's occur, regardless of how we change the size or topping quantity on our pizzas. And it'll still fail even if we shift to making other dishes. We're still using poor quality ingredients and having poor quality chefs prepare the dishes. That's the problem that needs to be fixed.

That type of story isn't a problem. But the fact that they screwed the last few iterations of that type of story *is* a problem, and that taste lingers. You've just eaten three bad eggs in a row. Wanna have another egg from the same box right now?

The analogy is getting a bit strained, but which response would make you want to eat at the restaurant agian:

1. We've identified the problem with our ingredients being bad and have gotten all new high quality ingredients, replaced all of our equipment, and have replaced and/or retrained our cooking staff in the proper and safe way to handle these ingredients, so that our food meets or exceeds current safety standards.

2. We've kept our ingredient sources the same, kept the same equipment we haven't serviced or cleaned in years, and are using the same staff with the same unhygenic habits, but we changed our meal overings from egg salad to chicken salad. Please come on by and try it!

I'm pretty sure which one would get me to give the restaurant another try. Again... strained analogy though.

Disney is in a unique position in that they can reasonably do both. They had sort of planned to before the numbers of the Sequel Trilogy gave them pause (thankfully since it seems some of the choices were ungood). But I think they should go with some new appetizers and pasta dishes. Because their sauce is good, but the rest of the ingredients have suffered lately.

Yeah. I agree with this. I actually think we're largely talking about the same thing, but are using our terminology differently.

I'm not saying "make every story tie into the Skywalkers, and Emperor Palpatine, and this Empire/Rebel conflict". To follow the analog, I have no problems if they make other dishes. Create new villians, and new threats, and new problems to deal with. I was only saying that whatever those threats are, if you're going to do a story involving Jedi in a SW feature film, the threat needs to be "big" (like galactic level or close).

Heck. I'd be fantastically happy to see stories involving "good force users" who are not Jedi. This is totally unexplored teritory. It could be set in the distant past. Or could be set in the post ST time period (but that has its own problems). Heck. You might even be able to squeeze it in between the OT and ST timewise. But again, regardless of who these force wieilders are, and how their powers manifest, or what their ideology is, if we're going to make the story worthy of a feature film or life action series, it needs to show these people dealing with at least somewhat "big threats".


And yes, I also am somewhat hesitant at the time period and presumed purpose of this current project. But I get it. To follow the food analogy, you normally only branch out into doing new/different dishes once you have established your current menu and it's successful. If the ST had been a smashing success, it's very likely we might have gotten more films and series set in different times, and covering different topics. Given the critical problems with the ST, I'm not surprised that they're more or less "circling the wagons" and sticking to "stuff people already know".

I'd love to see them do something more/different as well, but I totally get why they're doing what they are doing. I guess my broader ponit is that, just as there's no reason the pizza shop can't make a great pizza if they use good ingredients and hire good cooks, there's no reason why a series set as a pre-prequel story to the Palpatine story can't also be hugely successful. It'll have elements that viewers will be familiar with, and tie into a story they already know. That's generally a plus for something like this. IMO, it'll all come down to how they handle the story itself.

There's nothing innately wrong with the concept itself. I'm hopeful, but... not super confident. We haven't seen any indication that Disney has actually fixed the problems that have been causing so many of their projects to fail. Never know though, this could be an exception.

[Mechalich]

We're seeing a lot of discussion in the film media about recalibrating expectations. Making lower cost films with more heart. We've seen what can be done (Godzilla Minus One for instance).

Godzilla Minus One was made in Japan by a Japanese studio. There are various economic and labor reasons why it was possible to make that film as cheaply as was done. These are similar too, though legally different, from the various rules surrounding 'indie' films that can be made in the US extremely cheaply. However Disney cannot make a Star Wars indie film, it's simply impossible to do so. There is a very real cost floor as to how cheaply any film or television episode can be made with Star Wars over the title (and because of the labor strife of 2023 it is now a higher floor than ever before).

Rather than Godzilla Minus One, a better comparative example is last year's The Creator, which cost $80 million to make and was praised for how good it looked despite the comparatively low price point, with numerous reviews mentioning how it looked as good or better than films that cost twice as much. Of course, it was also a massive flop, so, it's not exactly a vote in favor of experimentation.

[gbaji]

Very well. Modern media's endless pursuit of everything being a "safe investment" that will make as much money as possible preventing them from ever trying new things is a well-known problem, and one I don't expect to go anywhere anytime soon. I'm not interested in discussing that, as I think that discussion is ultimately pointless, since it will only change if and when people in a position to make those decisions so stop thinking that way. I only objected to the claim that you need higher stakes for an interesting story; if you're backing off that one, then I'm good.

I think the issue is over the word "interesting". Interesting enough as a short story, or novella, or art house film plot? Sure. Interesting enough to a broad audience to bring in the revenue dollars Disney needs to make a live action film/series worth doing? No.

And, as someone who has traveled around the sun a fair number of times now, expecting people to "change" in ways that make them less money is a recipe for disapointment. Tell you what. You go start a small business, and then when someone criticizes you because you don't carry some obscure indie products that will sit on the shelf and no one will buy, while you instead fill your shelfs with products that everyone buys, and see if your response is "you're right. Change has to start with me. I'll take a loss to do this".

It's terrifically easy to critiize other people when it's their money and livelihood on the line and not yours. And... You do realize that a lot of those big studios do, in fact, fund occasional art house style "labors of love" that they know are going to lose money, but they do them anyway because they want to (or are hoping to get an award for their dollar losing efforts). But they don't model their core business around that because if they do, they wont have a business anymore. And, to follow the analogy I used in the previous paragraph, lots of retail/grocery stores also donate goods to charities to help people who can't afford stuff. Again though, they don't just put an "everything is free" sign on the front door of the actual business though.

I am more than willing to criticize production companies/studios for a wide asssortment of deicsions they make. "making money" is not one of them. Where I usually criticize them the most is when they are doing things that are actually making their products less appealing to their own audience. So yeah... Saying "Fix this by making it even less appealing" is never going to be a position I can get behind. And as much as we may dislike it, the reality is that film formulas "work". There absolutely are elements that, everything else being the same, your film will do better with than without.

It's the "everything else being the same" that is the trouble here.

Rather than Godzilla Minus One, a better comparative example is last year's The Creator, which cost $80 million to make and was praised for how good it looked despite the comparatively low price point, with numerous reviews mentioning how it looked as good or better than films that cost twice as much. Of course, it was also a massive flop, so, it's not exactly a vote in favor of experimentation.

Yup. And that's the problem in a nutshell. Unfortunately, it seems like the same folks who "praise films" for various reasons, seem to almost obsessively be looking for things that are also going to make those films very unlikely to appeal to a broad audience (and therefore actually make money).

Every once in awhile though, we get a film that hits both categories. But rarely. I'm usually satisfied as long as it's "good enough", witih the story/plot/characters/etc, and can both make money *and* be what I consider to be a "really good film". And within the SW genre, there are definitely ways to do this. There have been past projects that have hit that standard, in fact (or "close enough" anyway). The OT. First two seasons of Mandalorian. Most of Clone wars (there are some problems, but by and large I think it hit the mark). Rebels (eh, some storylines aside). Bad Batch. Andor. Heck. I'll even give the PT an 80% score here.

What's actively been "bad" (as in stinking steaming pile), is the ST. Last season of Mando leaned in to the "bad" direction (kinda middle really). Kenobi and Boba Fett I kinda put in similar "leaning towards bad" categories. Not full on steaming bad, but "too meh to be good". Ahsoka was "bad" unfortunately, despite me really really wanting to like it. By themselves, this isn't a problem (a percentage of projects will miss the mark, despite the best of efforts), except it's a trend when we plot that against the release timeline. The more recent a project is, the more likely it is to fall towards (or fully in) the "bad" category.

But yeah. I'll still stick with my initial argument that the problems with recent SW projects have not been because they have included lightsabers, or force wielders (both good and evil), or big space battles, or evil galaxy-wide bad guy schemes to be dealt with by our heroes. None of those things are the problem, because all of those things have also been present in SW projects that have been monumentally successful and widely appreciated by fans, critics, and the general viewing public alike. It's how they are used that matter. It's the details that matter. And, of late, those details have been pretty darn bad.

[Mordar]

It wasn't the mega nature of the events that were the problem. That's where I think the actual disagreement is here.

It was the absurdly laughably bad nature and treatment of those mega events which were the problem.

I agree with the quality commentary. I don't believe it was the fact that they were big event movies that made them bad, but I do believe the fact that these three big event movies were seen as bad poisons the well (at least somewhat) for big event movies for Star Wars for a while. Choices are go a different direction, stay the course but maybe wait a little extra while (and improve quality), or self-destruct and continue the same course.

If I asked people which of those two stories they'd like to see in a film, involving a Jedi with a lightsaber, want to guess which one 99.999999% of people would say? (hint: it's not the guy sitting in his kitchen just making a sandwich). Heck. If I presented the same choices to the same group, and had one version where the evil mind control plot was just something a local warlord was doing on his own, and a second one where the local warlord was secretly testing out said mind control drug for a larger galaxy wide group, guess which one they would then poll as wanting to see more?

I mean, obviously. But if it is the choice between a Jedi investigating murder/kidnapping/rumors of strange aliens on Backwater Quanta IV and "Rey starts the new Jedi Academy" I think you might find a different split. [Aside: I like Rey. More than I like Luke in EIV with a watch as an adult] I just don't think there needs to be a bread crumb that goes back to Empire or the Witches or Thanos. Because, as you've said, if you tell a good story with good execution, people will enjoy it.

Again. Everything else being equal, the "bigger the plot", the more audiences tend to like them. Our hero rescuing one person from evil kidnappers? Good. Our hero, while trying to rescue that one person, discovering a large number of other people held captive by the same bad guys and rescuing them as well? Better. Same story, but with the bad guys kidnapping those same people, but for use in an even larger conspiracy, of which their operation is only one part? Much better.

Respectfully, please prove. Would people have liked Silence of the Lambs more if it turned out Lechter, Buffalo Bill *and* Crawford were all working for the Illuminati? Would Untouchables be better if Capone was a space alien sent to Earth to use bootleg Canadian whiskey to undermine the US government and make it easier to mind control the President?

Again. I think you are equating everything I'm talking about being a "galactic threat" to having to be tied to the Skywalker Saga. That's not at all what I'm saying. The threat could be literally anything. Group of previously unknown dark side force users, who are manipulating the New Republic to do "evil things" on some grandish scale. Evil aliens invading from outside the galaxy. Smugglers have found the ancient doomsday device that will end all life in the galaxy if not destroyed (and there's a mad scramble to find/use it by multiple parties).

Pick something. But that's the point. Pick something. If the only story you have is "local person deals with purely local issue, and it has no impact elsewhere in the setting", it's probably not going to be well received.

I'll also point out that, focus on the "Skywalker Saga" aside, the events in Rogue One were absolutely and completely about "a galactic threat". Take away the whole "steal the plans for this new battle station and get them to the rebellion", and.... you have no ending to the film. No reason for the final assault. No reason for the heroic sacrifice of so many lives. We have no story or resolution. Just... what? One character finds her dad is working for the Empire making weapons, tries to talk him out of it, he is killed, and she escapes. Then... we're done? Life goes on, I guess? That film and its plot was far far far from "uimportantly" connected to the "galactic threat" going on. It was front and freaking center to it.

To be clear, I did not equate Skywalker Saga as the only galactic level impact...I just don't think the movie needs to pre-build a sequel, or threaten all of existence, or have scope beyond the local area (and that area can be the single planet). See, I like your smugglers thing...or any kind of "if word of this gets out it could have galactic impact"...just so long as it is wrapped up in a single film. And doesn't involve another unknown pair of Sith. Or the Dith, Mith or other pseduo-Sith. Not a trilogy, or an expansion to multiple other movies and streaming series making effectively a sub-franchise. The only thing that needs to be potentially moving forward from the movie I envision is a character or two.

But Rogue One only exists because it was answering a question that didn't need to be answered about the Skywalker Saga. To the good, it did like 75% of it well, because it focused on the human drama, not the galactic melodrama.

I guess I don't have a problem with elements being included that could turn into threats of broader scope, but I don't want it to be hamfisted, prebuild sequels or sub-franchises where we keep getting escalating stakes and power creep because "Make the Death Star Bigguuhhhh!". But just because I don't have a problem with them doesn't mean I want them. After all...many of the movies I've mentioned have things like this that could be "worldwide threats" if they get out...but the McGuffin is less important than the story and quality (as you've said), and I think the bigger the McGuffin the more it acts as a crutch or tail-wagging-the-dog.

The point about Indy? It is always local. Always within reach of his whip or his fist. Yup, the McGuffin can be scary, but notice how all 3(.5) of the movies ended up completely wrapped by the time you left the theater? That's a good thing. [Aside: Were the Thugee really trying for World Domination? I don't remember it that way (really)...more of a personal power and maybe getting rid of the colonizers]

Almost like there's a pattern here for "action based blockbuster films".

Jaws, Rambo, Die Hard, Top Gun, Equalizer, Point Break, Taken, Deadpool, Nikita (I think...), Bourne, Wick, Speed, Total Recall, Lethal Weapon...lots and lots with no threat to the whole world.

Absolutely grant that there are tons with the big stakes too, though.

Absolutely. But the answer is never going to be "continue to use the same crappy ingredients, made by the same crappy cooks, but make them smaller and with fewer toppings, because clearliy the problem is that we've been making big pizzes with lots of toppings".

The fact that making the pizzes "bigger and with more of the same toppings" isn't the solution, does not make "smaller and with fewer toppings" the solution either. That's literally all I'm saying here. To follow the analogy, the problem isn't with the size or type of toppings, but with the quality and use of those toppings.

Full agreement.

The analogy is getting a bit strained, but which response would make you want to eat at the restaurant agian:

1. We've identified the problem with our ingredients being bad and have gotten all new high quality ingredients, replaced all of our equipment, and have replaced and/or retrained our cooking staff in the proper and safe way to handle these ingredients, so that our food meets or exceeds current safety standards.

2. We've kept our ingredient sources the same, kept the same equipment we haven't serviced or cleaned in years, and are using the same staff with the same unhygenic habits, but we changed our meal overings from egg salad to chicken salad. Please come on by and try it!

I'm pretty sure which one would get me to give the restaurant another try. Again... strained analogy though.

And yes, I also am somewhat hesitant at the time period and presumed purpose of this current project. But I get it. To follow the food analogy, you normally only branch out into doing new/different dishes once you have established your current menu and it's successful. If the ST had been a smashing success, it's very likely we might have gotten more films and series set in different times, and covering different topics. Given the critical problems with the ST, I'm not surprised that they're more or less "circling the wagons" and sticking to "stuff people already know".

I think maybe we have different levels of dislike for the Sequel Trilogy (I didn't mind TFA, TLJ is actively and intentionally insulting, and RoS was trying to recover from TLJ and had some cool visuals but no one should have talked in it and 45% of it should have been cut).

I got sick once as a little kid from spaghetti. As such, I didn't eat spaghetti for literally decades. That's what I'm feeling about the big mainline expanded universe stories these days. I am prime target audience (age notwithstanding) for MCU and Star Wars...and I just have lost interest in the scope of the films they are both putting out. It isn't Superhero Fatigue, or Event Film Fatigue...I'm still all over the new Godzilla, for instance. It is kind of like why I enjoy K-dramas so much...a contained story, 10/12/16 episodes long, expressly not following the US television model of "milk it for as many seasons as you can until it is a hollow shell of why people liked it". And yes, some of the shows are just variations on a theme...and that is perfectly fine. Same reason MI, Bond, and Indy worked.

So give me contained stories, make them with better ingredients...and if your pizza didn't make me sick I'll probably come back for it. But the next couple times I order I might go for the ravioli or the antipasto salad instead.

Godzilla Minus One was made in Japan by a Japanese studio. There are various economic and labor reasons why it was possible to make that film as cheaply as was done. These are similar too, though legally different, from the various rules surrounding 'indie' films that can be made in the US extremely cheaply. However Disney cannot make a Star Wars indie film, it's simply impossible to do so. There is a very real cost floor as to how cheaply any film or television episode can be made with Star Wars over the title (and because of the labor strife of 2023 it is now a higher floor than ever before).

Rather than Godzilla Minus One, a better comparative example is last year's The Creator, which cost $80 million to make and was praised for how good it looked despite the comparatively low price point, with numerous reviews mentioning how it looked as good or better than films that cost twice as much. Of course, it was also a massive flop, so, it's not exactly a vote in favor of experimentation.

Always hard to pin down actual production budgets...but rumor says Minus One came in around $15M. There are a number of animated films out of Japan that are said to be in the $30M+ range. The point was more one of "you can do it cheaper than you are" rather than "you can do it for the same price as G-1". Instead of $275M for Solo, could you find a way to do it for $175M? TG: Maverick was done for ~$175 and involved a megastar, a few middle stars, and a lot of practical effects.

[Zevox]

I think the issue is over the word "interesting".

Indeed, seeing as how you immediately start appending another word to it after this comment: "interesting enough" (implicit: to make unspecified amounts of money off of). Which is not what I was ever talking about. Again, that subject I see no point in discussing. My remark was about the statement:

For any story involving the Jedi Order to be at all interesting, the threat has to be significant enough to matter for the story (threat to the Order and/or Republic as a whole) *and* is has to be perpetrated by people who can avoid/bypass/confuse the Jedi so they can do it in the first place.

That, I argue, is wrong. What matters for an interesting story is if the threat is one the main character, and through them audience*, will care about seeing stopped, not its scope or the exact nature of the people posing the threat. That is all I care about in this discussion.

*Assuming the story can get the audience to care about the main character. But if it can't, it's probably already a failure.