ForceCast.net: Listener Mailbag: December 23, 2011

Listener Mailbag: December 23, 2011

Posted by Eric on December 23, 2011 at 12:20 PM CST

In this installment of the mailbag: a reaction to our interview with HitFix.com's Drew McWeeny, thoughts on how The Old Republic fits into Star Wars, and more!

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Check out this screen shot of me listening to the ForceCast at 11:38! I would be so thankful if you guys added this to the Flickr page!

Thanks for the great show,

Brady from California

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Hi Guys,

I had read those Drew McWeeny articles last month, and I really enjoyed his appearance on the show. Really good stuff. I'm new to your show, so I'm not totally sure what has been discussed with regard to how to show Star Wars to kids or newbies. Obviously the order is the big one. I'm a staunch 1-6 guy. I'm 36 by the way, so an OT guy, but I firmly believe that because GL made the prequels with the 1-6 mindset, then I think that's why they don't work for people who cant change their "OT first....ahem... Point of View."

With that out of the way. There's a second issue that I actually find much more important, that I almost never hear anyone talk about. That is How many times should someone see a Star Wars movie before they move on? No one ever seems to talk about showing the movie more than once and I am stunned by this.

I saw A New Hope and Empire right on top of each other when I was 5 and my memories of that are shaky. I don't know how many times I saw them before Jedi, but it was a few. We laugh about making our kids wait three years. But think about those three years and wonder what they'll miss. Think about just how much talking, theorizing, guessing, discussing there was. Then all that time of thinking about the prequels and then the between years. I saw each prequel 8 or so times at the theater, and then probably 10 more on DVD in the between years. MOST IMPORTANTLY! I revisited the previous ones several times after each new one. It was huge to go back to Phantom after Clones came out, but still before Sith.

So let me lay this out. For as great as Star Wars movies are. I don't think the average adult whose never seen them is going to go crazy over them from just one viewing. Especially throwing all 6 at them over a weekend. What's great about Star Wars is all the nuance. All the details and the amazingness of the universe are overwhelming. For kids I just think they need time to digest and get a real feel for each movie on its own terms.

I've come up with a couple of theories. For both Newbie Adults and for first time kids.

Here's my recommendation for showing a newbie. Adult or young adult. The SW30 method.

1-1-2-2-1-2-3-3-3-1-2-3-4-4-5-5-4-5-6-6-6-4-5-6-1-2-3-4-5-6 or switch order to 4-6, 1-3 if you're so inclined.

I know it's ridiculous and too much work. Your friend will probably say kiss off. But it's so necessary. Complete with lots and lots and lots of talking in between and showing of trailers. You can shorten it of course, because no one really is going to do that. But you still need multiple viewings of each and a review before moving on.

So. 1-1-2-1-2-3-2-3-4-3-4-5-4-5-6-5-6 or something. But this is so key. We were all unmitigated experts on each movie before moving on. I think you have to do it like this. In some way.

For kids it's trickier. Obviously you have the issue of the blatant harshness of ROTS. But as Drew said. If you watch it with them and are willing to stop and talk about it, I think most kids will be fine. My biggest concern for showing them too early is that they may not remember well enough. I fear Drew may have done his younger kid a disservice, because at 3. He will not be able to remember any of this, but his older kid will. I think you'd do better to wait until the younger kid reaches 6. Even though he's going to pick up a lot of collateral plot stuff from the oldest kid. It's still better to have him remember his experience. I have almost no memories of seeing Empire and ANH in theaters. Images really, feelings. And that's a bummer.

One thing that works super well for kids is the existence of The Clone Wars. It helps space things out. My plan for my kids is this. My oldest son Luke (yeah, that's right) is 3 now. We talk about Star Wars. He recognizes Darth Vader and Yoda and Jar Jar Binks and the droids, the names Obi-Wan Kenobi, Luke Skywalker. I showed him The Phantom Menace, just for kicks really and he watched some of it. So we are just playing with toys and chatting about characters. he's getting a lightsaber for Christmas. I see no reason he cant get into the SW universe without having seen the movies yet. We will go see TPM in theaters this year. And I'll keep showing it to him periodically maybe off and on. But Ultimately I'm waiting till he's 6. My plan is for when he's 6 to Show him TPM and start to really get into the plot and stuff and watch it several times over the next months. Then maybe at 6 1/2 show him Attack of the Clones. Then show him that a bunch of times mixed with reviews of TPM then at some point after that, Start on the Clone Wars series. In the end. I'm waiting till he is 8 to show him Revenge of the Sith. We'll watch TPM, Clones and Clone Wars a ton of times between 6-8 then it will be Sith Time. After that, it will be different. At age 8 he'll be plenty old enough to remember everything. So I'll certainly Expedite the Original Trilogy. After a decent-ish time of really figuring out where we are after Episode 3. Then We'll probably move to a Movie Per Month for the OT.

Now I have a daughter (Scarlett) who is 22 months younger than Luke. I would like to do with her on basically the same schedule. But there's just no way to know how well that will work. But Id rather try to space it out for her than give it to her too early.

One thing is. I don't really care that much about spoilers per se. I don't have much use for the "I'm Your Father" line. I actually think it's more powerful to the audience when we know the truth and watch Luke's painful way of finding out. Vs. the big reveal, holy crap moment, which is kind of a gimmick and really only works one time.

But again. Order is important, but it's kind of whatever your taste is is good. Time to digest, discussion, reviewing before moving on. This is the good stuff. If you just chuck all 6 movies at a newbie they are almost definitely going to say "Meh, it was pretty good I guess."

-Tom Andrews

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Hey guys, I wanted to chime in on your discussion about the primary characters in Star Wars.

Jason, you were saying that Star Wars "needs" the core characters from the films or it doesn't work. I don't entirely agree. What makes Star Wars work are the ideas present in it, the ideas that are taken from mythology and philosophy the world over. There's no reason more stories can't be told in the Star Wars universe using those ideas but different characters. Knights of the Old Republic (the game, not the comic) is an absolutely perfect example of a story that has nothing to do with the Skywalkers or anyone else in the films, but uses the same themes of galactic war, morality, personal choices, and redemption to great effect.

As I was flipping through the brand-new art book for The Old Republic at the bookstore today, I noticed a written explanation of BioWare's story strategy when creating the original KOTOR game. Their idea was that they would basically transplant the archetypes and themes from the films into a different era, but not copy the actual characters themselves. So in KOTOR, you've got the same story themes and a few similar character types, but no one in that game actually feels like a carbon copy of a film character. This worked extremely well. Personally, I was shocked at how immersed I was in KOTOR's story and how much it felt like Star Wars despite not having a single character I knew beforehand. Before playing and finishing KOTOR, I was totally in agreement with you (Jason) that Star Wars needed the movie characters or I just didn't care. After KOTOR, my views on everything changed forever. It was like taking a first step into a larger (expanded?) world.

In the SWTOR trailers, you've noticed a lot of characters that seem like simple copies of the core film characters; that's just because of the nature of MMO marketing. When marketing an MMO, game companies always resort to showing the most familiar and distinguishable character types. So while we've seen a ton of movie character lookalikes in the screenshots and trailers for SWTOR, now that the game's being released we're seeing that that's not exactly how the whole thing really is. And perhaps more importantly, those characters are mostly meant to be archetypes that you, as the player, fill in with your own personality, hence why they seem generic on a purely surface level.

If you actually read through all of that, you have my eternal respect and gratitude.

May the Force live long and prosper,

-Aaron

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Hey Jimmy and Jason,

My Star Wars fandom went on hold back around 2007 after celebration Europe. After 10 years of all out "wars" things started to wane. There was rumors of the live action TV series happening sometime but the clone wars didn't really interest me.

Cut to 4 years later, my son Harrison was born on the 9th September this year -- the same day my Blu-rays arrived in the post (4 days early). I got home from the hospital that night on a high and watched the Blu-rays (starting with extras) and was blown away. I got to thinking in what order and when I would show the boy. Sith played on mind.

In the preceding weeks i came across your podcast. I was hooked immediately. I've listened to last 6 months worth and have been surprised how often the subject of showing the Wars to kids comes up.

I've decided 4,5,1,2,3,6 is the order to go

I have a bigger predicament though. The 3D releases. I'd love for his first experience of of the saga on the big screen. He'll 3 for Ep. 4 and 4 for Ep. 5. I'm thinking I'll squeeze the prequels in on Blu-ray before we see 6, but I'm worried he'll going to be too young for Sith?

I've also been using to the force to make some predictions for Star Wars for the next 7 years. The future is clouded though, by the prequel haters:

2012: TPM 3D release, gets more love, people start to realize it's a great, fun movie. The Clones Wars ends with Maul's return arc ....and final death.

2013: AOTC 3D release. Final Clone Wars season (5) ends mid-season surging in ROTS.

2014: ROTS 3D released, Ahsoka cameo insert by GL. Remainder of Season 5 dealing with aftermath of Order 66 and the fate of the clones.

2015: ANH release. Live-action series officially announced for 2016.

2016: ESB release. Live-action Season 1.

2017: ROTJ release, 40th anniversary celebration. Celebration Europe 2 (fingers crossed). Live-action Season 2.

2018 onwards: live action. GL teases holographic re-release in next 10 years.

Though I'd share that with you.

Keep up the great work, Merry Christmas and a happy new year. Can't wait to see what ForceCast has in store for us in 2012!!!!!!

Dan Burgess
London, England

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Thanks to all of this week's mailbag contributors! Keep your emails coming to forcecast@forcecast.net.

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