The Force was not strong with these George Lucas Star Wars ideas and plans...
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00:00 From small screen flops to perhaps not getting the best out of landscape shifting technology,
00:05 it's safe to say the force was not exactly strong with these particular Lucasforged Star Wars
00:11 elements. Gareth the Hutt here from WhatCulture Star Wars and here are 10 things that did not
00:16 go the way George Lucas wanted. 10. The Holiday Special
00:21 In isolation, the concept of putting together a light-hearted holiday special, riffing on
00:25 elements from a beloved franchise is pretty harmless, and even potentially a fairly entertaining
00:31 endeavour if executed well. Just look at the success of Star Wars' own Lego variety of holiday
00:37 treats, and the understandable buzz surrounding James Gunn's upcoming Guardians of the Galaxy
00:42 riff on the festive season. However, with high levels of anticipation can sometimes come a bit
00:47 of a lacklustre end product. Evidenced in this Galaxy Far Far Away's first attempt to bring a
00:52 bit of festive cheer to George Lucas' corner of the small screen universe. Absolutely destroyed
00:58 by critics upon landing on CBS in November 1978, despite roping in the majority of the feature
01:04 players from the smash hit that was A New Hope, Lucas' odd desire to have much of this TV Star
01:09 Wars adventure centre around Chewbacca's Wookiee family didn't exactly bear the sort of fruit he
01:14 was hoping for. Outside of the animated introducing of instantly iconic bounty hunter Boba Fett,
01:20 there's a reason Lucas has done everything in his power to distance himself from just about
01:24 everything to do with this ill-fated special as the years have gone by.
01:28 Star Wars Underworld Long before Disney+ were unleashing fresh
01:33 new live-action Star Wars tales by the quarter on their streaming service, George Lucas set out to
01:38 tell his own small-screen space-age story set between the events of Revenge of the Sith and A
01:43 New Hope. Yet with this still being the mid-to-late noughties, the idea of throwing tens of millions
01:48 of dollars at a project designed purely for televised consumption wasn't as widely accepted
01:53 as it is today. So despite putting together some rather intriguing test footage that would later
01:58 leak online in 2020 and dreaming up a potential 100 hours of content for the show, Star Wars
02:04 Underworld ultimately didn't make it onto our screens due to budget concerns. Simply put,
02:09 forking out $2-4 million per episode was a pretty steep investment back then, and Lucas and co.
02:14 felt that it was probably best to put the entire project on hold until technology caught up and
02:19 allowed them to produce the show on a smaller budget. In the end, though, upon being purchased
02:24 by Disney, Lucasfilm opted to steer clear of Lucas' Underworld branding when firing up their
02:28 streaming service and telling their own post-prequel TV tales seen in the likes of this year's Obi-Wan
02:33 Kenobi. 8. Midichlorians Don't Go Down a Treat
02:37 Instead of dropping jaws around the world and leaving fans feeling wholly satisfied at the
02:42 revelation of microscopic organisms in the blood of all living things known as midichlorians - being
02:47 the reason some folks can move rocks with a whither the hand - the entire Phantom Menace exposition
02:52 dump Qui-Gon Jinn delivers to a baffled future Darth Vader felt like a needless way of over-complicating
02:58 matters. Sure, it helped establish how ridiculously OP Anakin Skywalker was from the second the
03:03 unorthodox Jedi Master stumbled upon the Tatooine lad, but the complete lack of midichlorian nonsense
03:09 in the celebrated tales that would follow this table-setter of a trilogy only further hammered
03:13 home the pointless nature of adding some bizarre, concrete science to this mystical way of manipulating
03:18 the energy around us. And with many of the folks involved in bringing elements of the franchise
03:23 into existence - like Death Star Legends author Steve Perry, also noting how the concept of
03:28 midichlorians was less than inspired - it's clear Lucas didn't convince a great many that this
03:32 prequel addition was in any way essential. 7. Han Definitely Shot First
03:38 As time would trickle on by, it soon became clear that a few seemingly innocuous beats
03:42 housed within the likes of A New Hope were not to the creator's liking in the slightest.
03:47 So on top of eventually stuffing a dreadful amount of clunky CGI into later special editions of his
03:52 OG set of flicks, Lucas set about chopping and changing one specific scene involving everyone's
03:58 favourite smuggler blasting an alien into next week. With Han Solo infamously firing first in
04:03 his tense exchange with Greedo on Mos Eisley, Lucas quickly decided that he actually didn't
04:08 want his lovable scamp to come across as a cold-blooded murderer so early in the Star Wars
04:13 day. But his multiple attempts to reframe the moment by letting loose a surreal red laser shot
04:18 from the green alien's blaster a millisecond before the eventual general does has only added
04:23 further fuel to the Han Shot First fire, and another hilariously clunky sequence to an already
04:28 perfectly fine 1977 entry. 6. An Epic Love Story Fails to Deliver
04:34 It's evident that George Lucas had some rather high hopes for certain facets of his prequel
04:39 trilogy, particularly the passionate romance between Anakin Skywalker and Padme Amidala
04:44 that would prove to be the catalyst for the creation of the most iconic villain in the galaxy.
04:49 However, what could have been a tragic tale of forbidden love ultimately wound up being
04:53 remembered more for its highly memorable attempts to conjure up some genuine chemistry between two
04:57 actors trying their utmost to make lemonade out of some of the worst dialogue ever committed to
05:02 this galaxy far, far away. And oh boy, is that saying something. Perhaps even more tragically,
05:07 looking back on the hours of behind-the-scenes footage available on these early 2000s adventures,
05:11 tells the story of the likes of Lucas, Natalie Portman and Hayden Christensen all very much
05:16 treating the love epic with the sort of care and respect needed to give Skywalker's eventual turn
05:21 the dramatic hoof it so desperately deserved. But all of the good intentions in the world
05:26 couldn't save anyone from monologues about sand and Shaq frolicking in the fields of Naboo.
05:31 5. A More Uncompromising Anakin Skywalker Was Not PG-13
05:36 George Lucas was under no illusions when it came to the birth of the unmistakable force that was
05:41 Darth Vader in his prequel flicks. He had to be as terrifying and unstoppable as humanly,
05:46 or cyborg-ly, possible. But that is quite a tough task when you're faced with producing a flick
05:51 that has to fall in line with a strict PG-13 rating. And it led to Lucas having to slightly
05:56 censor his diabolical fallen Jedi in the editing room. In particular, an infamous scene which
06:01 depicts Anakin savagely setting the stage for the massacring of a number of innocent younglings
06:06 was said to have been originally much darker, according to Palpatine actor Ian McDiarmid.
06:10 And while McDiarmid felt it was probably a good idea to cut out the more gruesome version of the
06:14 Order 66 scene, he did also recall a conversation with Lucas about the grisly cutting down of the
06:20 next generation of Jedi. On the other hand, George says, "That's what he's like, this guy. He's
06:25 uncompromising. People should know it." But sadly, they weren't allowed to fully know it back in 2005.
06:31 4. Letting Ewoks Bring Down an Empire As already noted, Lucas' original trilogy
06:37 is widely regarded as one of the most celebrated cinematic feats in moviemaking history. Yet that's
06:42 not to say that each and every component of this intergalactic machine completely clicked with the
06:46 paying public out of the gates. In fact, the sight of a bunch of teddy bears taking down the Big Bad
06:52 Empire that had been wreaking havoc on the galaxy for three films was divisive to say the least
06:56 during Return of the Jedi. Lucas has gone on record to defend the inclusion of the Ewoks in
07:01 the Battle of Endor over a previously planned Wookiee population by stating that they were
07:05 merely a way of distracting the Imperial troops. But that still wasn't enough to convince most
07:10 that these cuddly souls possessed the firepower to hold off the most advanced army of the time.
07:15 In reality, the Ewoks were likely designed as little more than a way to appeal to the younger
07:19 demographic and sell some stuffed toys upon release. But either way, they still sit as another
07:24 of the rare opinion splitters in this generally cherished original trilogy.
07:28 3. Blue Screen Work Doesn't Mask a Lack of Soul
07:32 Few would argue against the fact that George Lucas helped thoroughly change the game with his use of
07:36 computer-generated imagery in the prequels. With his utilising of blue screens and combining of CGI
07:42 with practical costumes and sets being genuinely groundbreaking at the time. But for all of the
07:47 mesmerising digitally enhanced battle scenes, beautifully computer-crafted locales, and fully
07:52 animated clone and droid troops seen over the course of the prequels, there's no escaping the
07:57 fact that this reliance on the artificial over the real deal robs Star Wars of some of its heart.
08:02 With the original trilogy of flicks regularly finding itself shooting on location or fully
08:06 built sets, due to technology not giving Lucas the tools needed to digitally craft his own
08:11 imaginary worlds, the planets we occupied and stories that were being told felt tangible and
08:16 came equipped with a touch more soul. And while undoubtedly impressive in execution, the reality
08:21 of actors being forced to exhaust their imaginations by constantly performing in front of little more
08:26 than a bland blue background eventually led to a set of features that, while visually ahead of
08:31 their time, felt unfortunately hollow. 2. Jar Jar Binks CGI Groundbreaker
08:36 And speaking of CGI endeavours not exactly landing in the way Lucas would have hoped,
08:40 what once looked destined to be perhaps the most important Star Wars development of the time,
08:45 quickly devolved into little more than a stick to beat the creator's precious prequels with.
08:49 I'm of course talking about the controversial Phantom Menace debut of the first ever fully
08:54 computer-generated supporting player in a live-action flick by the name of Jar Jar Binks.
08:59 Blatantly designed to once again appeal to the younger demo, an admittedly impressive
09:04 technological feat was very quickly overshadowed by the need to present Binks as little more than
09:08 lazy slapstick comic relief. Despite all of the backlash sent the character's way though,
09:13 Lucas defiantly stands by Binks being his favourite character in the series, saying as much when
09:18 saluting Ahmed Best for his dedicated work in bringing the Gungan to life on set and in the
09:23 recording booth throughout the flicks. With Ewan McGregor admitting to wanting to work with Best
09:27 again in the future whilst promoting Disney+'s Obi-Wan Kenobi, perhaps now may be as good a time
09:32 as any to rehabilitate a CGI character in need of some desperate TLC. Misa thinks so very, very much.
09:39 The Sequel Trilogy
09:41 Despite ultimately deciding to all but part ways with his galaxy far, far away in 2012,
09:46 upon Disney's purchasing of Lucasfilm, George Lucas still found himself involved in the process
09:51 of bringing the House of Mouse's sequel trilogy into existence, acting as a creative consultant
09:56 during its early stages of development. However, as Lucas would later go on to confess in a
10:00 conversation with CinemaBlend in 2015, pretty much all of his original ideas for the next trilogy of
10:05 Skywalker saga flicks, and The Force Awakens in particular, were binned off early on.
10:10 Later on, Lucas would frequently take aim at Disney's direction heading into The Force Awakens,
10:15 criticising the first entry's retro feel, with the sequels definitely going down a
10:19 completely different road to the one previously planned by Lucas many moons ago. As revealed in
10:24 the Star Wars Archives 1999-2005, Lucas wanted to centre the tale around Leia Organa's rebuilding of
10:31 the Republic, with Darth Maul returning to train the new Darth Vader in the form of a girl known
10:35 as Darth Talon. Aside from Leia acting as the leader of the Resistance in a supporting capacity,
10:40 though, it seems Disney had little interest in sticking to Lucas' initial plan for the
10:45 stories that would follow his sacred original space opera trio.
10:48 That ends our list! Know any other things that didn't go the way George Lucas wanted?
10:52 Let us know in the comments section below and don't forget to like,
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10:59 Also, if you feel the pull of The Force towards this sort of stuff, then head on over to
11:02 WhatCulture.com and find some more awesome articles just like the one this video you're
11:06 watching right now is based on! I've been Gareth from WhatCulture Star Wars, may the
11:10 Force be with you, thank you very much for watching this video today, and hopefully I
11:13 will see your faces very, very soon. Bye!