The funny thing about the "good" Disney Star Wars content...
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- Опубликовано: 7 фев 2025
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Andor actually deals with the War in Star Wars
Still hoping we get a Saving private Ryan, Fury or Hacksaw Ridge in Star Wars one day.
For the first time in 20 years, i was actually worried when the stormtroopers show up.
I think he means the good shows don’t focus on sith or Jedi as much like the movies
Replace the space ships with trains and the planets with European cities, and Andor is basically a WWII era spy thriller with very little reskinning.
or what happens after one
It seems like the more under the radar the project is, the better the content will be.
uninteresting settings and characters get actual writers
popular settings and characters get KK's friends
@ Kaboosu-q1o ABSOLUTELY CORRECT
That's probably because the people at the top have less direct input on it
I don't understand how they can renew KK's contract when everything she touches withers and dies, unless she has a lot of dirt or a lot of friends. That or Disney is afraid of being seen as firing a female exec.
@@Tyler_W Honestly, I think that's pretty much it.
As great as Andor was on its own, what made it even greater for me was knowing what was at stake, knowing where this all leads, understanding how great a threat the Empire actually was. It used the Star Wars we know and love as a foundation to build something new, and it did it exceedingly well.
Actually helped me developed the Empire in my mind from "clownish generic villains" to "oh shit these guys mean business"
I agree, without the Star Wars aspect it would seem rather meandering and rootless.
@@steele8280 Yeah, exactly. Like everything about knowing what Nemik's manifesto is really talking about, to being able to see the background of Ferrix not being a single case of oppression but instead an example of countless worlds, to knowing what the prison on Narkina V was building, all of it really does rely on the rest of Star Wars to worldbuild and put that emotional weight in the story
@@newsaxonyproductions7871its the anti last jedi while being what that film wanted to be. It's new and fresh but so well integrated with the lore and worldbuilding thst it enhances the story.
Thank you for the response, Thor.
It really warms my heart to hear all the praise for Andor - not just from you, but really every single Star Wars channel nowadays is in agreement how much Andor excels.
What feels weird for me is how often Andor gets a label like being „not really Star Wars“ - And I couldn‘t disagree more on this topic. Andor describes the empire in a way that is absolutely true to the real Star Wars (4-6), and has so many interconnections, references, art and buildings, while still being positively creative in enhancing and expanding this vision. And at the exact time Andor is playing (the years before Episode 4), nearly all jedi are simply dead. So its a neccessity to exclude them. The emperor is actually included in Andor, just in a very indirect way.
Saying Andor is not Star Wars is reducing Star Wars to a very small core and ignores all the worldbuilding in there.
Having finally just watched it (and loved it), I think by far it really suffered from advertising. I would have definitely changed it to like... "Shadows of the Empire" or "Ignite the Spark" or something conveying that it's a spy show about the birth of the rebellion.
In the second arc they even had a perfect tagline for it: "Everyone has their own Rebellion."
It does slightly bug me that I'm getting to like Cassian knowing he's just heading towards his death. They really should have left him and Jyn alive at the end of Rogue One to tell more stories with.
It's about the tone. Most of Star Wars is light hearted Adventure. Andor is Political Thriller. In most of Star Wars the Stormtroopers are a joke because the heros all have plot armour and them never hitting targets is the running joke. Andor makes them as truly menacing as the 3rd Reich that inspired them.
@ Absolutely. They were probably just too scared to create questions like „if Cassian and Jyn were alife, how is it even possible that they didn‘t take part in Episode 4-6??“, or they wanted to underline the huge sacrifice these rebels had to make.
@@saraholson5946 Well, the real Star Wars is mainly Episode 4-6, and there the tone is actually quite dark, especially in Episode 5. In 6, George Lukas started to be more on the kid-joke side with the Ewoks and continued this trend in Episode 1, going back to more serious stories in 2-3. And Andors description of the empire simply reflects their description of episode 4-5.
The bad aiming of stormtroopers is also an exageration - in episode 4, the empire wanted lukes group to flee, hence the bad aiming. (after showing the precisission of Storm Trooper attacks against a Java-Vehicle) Also, most of what we see, it is the empire against people guided by the force. The plotarmor our heroes got there is simply too strong. But the general tone there is a very strong and frightening empire with competent personal. That only gets beaten by a combination of their own arrogance and the power of the force. And this is exactly what Andor takes, and shows us. How they act when they are not facing jedi. How they act when they are hugely outnumbered on Ferix, and start to shoot at the crowd. With deadly aim in most cases. This is the degree of competency a Stormtrouper should always have when not fighting against plotarmor, or Disney-comedy-plots. If you read the Star Wars Books, you will also find out that the majority of them ignores the Comedy aspects in star Wars and instead describes a very harsh reality against the Empire.
Bro, u need to understand that 99.99% of Star Wars fans are dumb and the only thing that "feels SW" to them is when they see a lightsaber. Bunch a idiots.
good disney star wars : original creations that don't rely entirely on memberberries and legacy characters
lucasfilm : "rey skywalker is our only hope"
we still need legacy characters shows tho, they just don't follow the lore
@@khal7702exactly, it’s all about execution. But unfortunately for me, the damage is done with a lot of the legacy characters, for example, even if a like show post ep 6 came out and was amazing, the sour taste would still be there knowing where it all leads.
@@khal7702 They're following the Dave Filoni formula.
@@khal7702 We don't need them. You might *want* them, but that's not the same thing.
@@khal7702Do we? None of them have been particularly good imo and the only good Modern star wars shows have been focusing on new characters like Cassian Andor or Din Jarin, whereas whenever they try to make shows about pre-existing characters like Obi-wan, Boba Fett or Ahsoka they drop the ball
Andor and Rogue One helped to compliment the world of Star Wars. It gave depth to elements that were under explored within the original movies and stories. It gave both the rebellion and Empire more character, more agency, and more human interactions. They don't detract from the stories they leverage, they enhance.
The problem with Disney content that deals with force users they *always* detract. They undermine original characters, their sacrifices, their achievements, etc. It's because Disney was desperate to *replace* Star Wars with something completely under their control. "Kill the Past" was not just a dumb line from TLJ, it was Disney's motto. They needed to supplant the old with the new, so they could better market and generate new content. But they knew that the old was what made the brand popular.
2:20 I disagree. If “Star Wars” was removed completely from Andor it would lose its relevance and it would have no context. Even though it barely touches upon the Skywalker saga lore, that fun from Andor is knowing how that smaller story fits in the larger context. Without it, it would seem somewhat meaningless.
I really couldnt care less that andor ends in, feeds, exists in the background of, the skywalker saga - its a far more grounded world, and if anything the main series being properly considered as part of its integrated whole devalues andor. That is, unless you regard the original films as folkloric tellings of the events that inspired the little people who really overthrew the empire. Thats great to me - but not essential to the series' quality (either series, i mean).
For me, Andor exists as a meditation on authoritarianism, rebellion, resistance, and hope. It needs to provide the context context for the stakes involved, but id argue that star wars historically has deeply belittled (though genre/writing choices) the darkness and danger of the empire. Its always been something appropriately scary for kids. Andor's empire should be unsettling to adults.
Andor does the work of establishing the empire as so much more threatening, and an accurate depiction of fascism or a regime "working to the man" - chaotic yet bureaucratic, normal and cruel, all encompassing, monolithic yet fragmented and corrupt.
So you could, charitably, argue real-world regimes, or other fictional ones, could replace the empire as the context for andor, and provide those context of "stakes", but id argue that andor did that work itself and could ahve substituted an entirely new world.
There is of course the question if whether a series like this would ever be made in a new franchise, becuase the amount of detail and thought put into the concepts around rebellion would be hard to pitch if it wasnt pre-supposed the audience would care about the world.
To be be presises the macro-politics of the Empire/Rebellion are nessary for Andor, but It's notable that all fo the 'Skywalker saga' is optional. Too much of the fans and disney (ande even lucas) think the core of SW is the Skywalker story, but it's not. It's actually the Rebellion.
@@kennethferland5579I disagree and an old republic fan
I completely disagree, it has enough show dont tell and enough original storytelling to stand on its own as a great piece of fiction
@@alisilcox6036 I fail to understand how people have the time to write allat. Well done gang
I think this is a very strong pattern. The more Disney tries to be like classic Star Wars, the shallower it is. When they deviate from the main line, they tend to get deep and rich in ways that we really haven't seen outside of prequel-era Expanded Universe novels. Star Wars has a tendency to feel a bit small for the galaxy it's in, and Rogue One was the first time I ever felt the real stifling, sprawling bureaucracy of the Empire. The galaxy is a big place - and focusing it all on 6 people across 1.5 families doesn't feel big.
I think that might be part of why I disliked the movie Solo as much as I did
I know I'm likely in the minority, but I really enjoyed the animated shows too. Especially The Bad Batch.
You’re definitely not - they were great; likely because creative control was left to the people that understand Star Wars. I think the rule of thumb seems to be that the more popular something is, the more cooks are in the kitchen ruining it.
Clone Wars was fire filling in sooo many gaps. Bad batch is good inspite of the androgynous child
The Bad Batch was a pleasant surprise for me. It started out feeling more like a "kid's show", but sprinkled throughout the series were some intense moments and situations that kids shouldn't be able to relate to. This is one of the rare recent Lucasfilm productions where a main character died...and stayed that way. Upon viewing the first episode, I was afraid the writers would go the route of making Omega another overpowered 'hero' character. Fortunately, they did not do that. Her character made mistakes and learned from them. The writers wove her character's arc into the Force 99 story arc quite well. Sometimes she saved the day, other times, she needed saving.
The Bad Batch was good and could have been even better if Disney/Lucasfilm gave it one or two more seasons. The ending, while not terrible, was definitely rushed.
Clone wars was fine. Bad Batch is surprisingly decent. But Rebels - whoo, that went from a kid’s show to something deep and lasting. ❤
I mean Clone Wars Seasons 6 and 7 happened under Disney and both were amazing and felt so much like classic Star Wars stuff
Two things:
- The force story has largely been told. There just isn't a ton new they can do.
- It's amazing how well media can be when it actually has to work for it instead of just riding on the coattails of previous work.
Hey Thor !
Something I miss from the Clone Wars tv show was how each story arc was it's own self contain story with a different main character each time. Like Kit Fisto facing grievous, Mace Windu fighting on Ryloth, Maul conquering Mandalore, Ahsoka bein hunted down by Trandoshan, Obi-Wan faking his death, Padme dealing with politic intrigue, the Clones defending a base, Anakin commiting war crime lol.
All the new tv show we got since always follow a static cast of main character going on a adventure every week and I feel its limiting the kind of story we can get, like with Rebels and Bad Batch. I wonder if you agree
Yeah I agree, it felt like an actual war with multiple fronts, theatres of war, factions and ongoing campaigns. I enjoyed rebels and bad batch but they felt like a DND party spending all their time together. Sure there were occasional arcs where some characters are busy elsewhere but not in the same way as clone wars did it. The best episodes of bad batch ware about crosshair working basically alone within the empire.
As the other comment said all the politics and intrigue and factions of clone wars all add to its awesome scale it’s hard to do that with only a few focused characters like the bad batch crew and rebels crew
I do think rebels gets kind of close to that feeling obviously a lot more scaled back but there are many different planets they go to and many different problems and creatures to deal with just not as large of a cast as clone wars was
It’s like you’ve said, Thor: Star Wars is a setting. Most genres and stories can have an iteration in this setting - if they stand well on their own, they’ll have good chances of working in a Star Wars setting.
I still want a cooking show or show about a SW foodie tbh, a roadtripping professional like Frasier and a Fast & the Furious style underground racing series.
@ lol not sure if those would be taken seriously, but hey, we had a children’s game show (that I had no idea we had), I see no reason why we can’t have those too
@@GGBlaster tbh I don't think anyone takes the latter seriously, the spectacle is the main point, my hope for the others is to ground the IP, a cooking show could be set among literally ANY "story of the week" setting, a war zone, a survival game of cat and mouse, court intrigue, slice of life on the Death Star... Anything.
@@michaellane5381 a cooking show would be fun, could see some cool ways to make Star Wars dishes irl
@@GGBlaster ideally it could sell the park food if they use "alien" ingredients and unrealistic/exotic dishes, but ofc realistic dishes could be useful for younger audiences.
It seems like what he's looking for is a good version of The Acolyte. I would love that myself--it's a good premise that was poorly executed.
Same I was super hyped for acolyte leading up new faces different places a different time period things I've heard a lot of people ask for me included and then the writing was terrible and the storyline went weird felt a lot like secret invasion
I agree that the best Star Wars content from Disney is non force related. The best example of good story telling about a force sensitve cast is probably the Jedi Survivor series of video games.
I’ve liked Star Wars visions, since we know they’re not canon and they can just have fun with the franchise. And even if it’s not Canon, a lot of these individual creators and Studios get those concepts down pretty well, even if a lot of them are just battles.
If it's on screen, it's canon. Duh.
I like visions in theory... In practice I could pass on like 80% of it, like 2 hours of good content in the whole show.
A couple Visions episodes were really good. Most were trash.
Most of episodes are pass. Especially 80% of season 2. What does upset me though, is that lucasfilm would rather invest into seasons of animated (sometimes good, sometimes not so much) non-canon oneshots, rather than use the EU to at least make a cash grab like a game or some sort of show. They basically have decades old scripts that were liked, which means it'd work, but they either poorly adapt it into sequels-tainted canon, or they ignore it until they can re release the book or game remake under Legends label.
@@Nautilus1972 Visions is explicitly non-canon "what if?" scenarios.
Never thought of this angle before but it hits hard. Your list of "good" Disney Star Wars content is exactly the same as mine. Just didn't have a connecting thread until now
To make a sports analogy, it's like a player who performs brilliantly in mid-season games, but always blows critical plays in playoff games. The fanbase is going to be overwhelmingly sour on that guy because no matter what the contribution overall, when it matters most, he can't deliver.
So, yes, I think Thor has diagnosed this completely correctly. Had the Sequels, in particular, completely put 90% of the fans into the stratosphere with their awesomeness, misses on projects with unknown characters would fade away like mere wisps of smoke.
Rogue One wasn't just a good film, it is good Star Wars. It gets almost everything right about what makes a film a Star Wars film. The Force was handled correctly, the space battles felt like Star Wars space battles, and the droids and aliens felt like Star Wars droids and aliens, even the music felt like Star Wars.😊
I have to agree with you. Even though I hate almost all Disney Star Wars, I absolutely love rogue one. I think it’s one of the best Star Wars movies.
Wasn't it already in production when Disney took over?
@@GodwynDi not that I am aware of.
In the immortal words of that one Tumblr post: Star Wars would be so good if it were good
I’m 40 now, and one thing I have literally dreamt about since my single digit, even before the prequels when I was wearing out tapes of the original trilogy, all I ever wanted to see or at least get a glimpse of was right after Return when Luke would restart the Jedi Academy and a type of reconstruction era, but that’s just me
They did that in the original EU. Luke held off about 6/7 years before setting up a Jedi Academy on Yavin, but the time in between involved helping establish the New Republic, training Leia, and hunting for information about the Jedi since the old Jedi temple library was destroyed.
Truce at Bakura happens immediately after RotJ, and it's a good book. The Jedi Academy trilogy covers him starting the new order.
It would have been nice to see on film.
@ I e read a few books and they weren’t bad, my problems come from anything Lucas didn’t have at least a hand in
That's what I thought the Force Awakens was going to be about. I was so disappointed when I found out what it was.
@ same
If we go back to the OT, the Jedi are super-rare & the Force has almost no explanation. In this Galaxy, the shows & movie that Thor listed make a lot of sense.
My guess is it's likely because the Higher Ups interfere with stuff like Kenobi or anything including jedi, because it should be carrying the franchise. And ignore what they think will fail. Now, Higher Ups will without a doubt start messing with Andor, Kenobi season 3 (if it's even coming out), and Jedi lll if Ubisoft doesn't ruin it first.
You seam to be the only person in the comments that gets it right. "the Jedi are all but extinct". It makes more sense to not have the Jedi/Sith stuff in the Star Wars extended universe. Also, just my opinion, but the Lightsabers/Jedi became so oversaturated and it created the mediocrity everyone whines about. We only got one duel per movie in the OT and it was at the films climax. Now the studio uses any excuse to show lightsabers in action as a lazy way to avoid good writing and people are fatigued with it even though they may not realize it. The Force and lightsabers has stopped being special.
To me, they have done their best to be as inconsistent as possible. The Good: Rogue One, Andor, Mando Szn 1-2, Skelton Crew (so far), Bad Batch, Rebels, and Tales of the Jedi. The Mid: Visions, TFA, and Solo. And the BAD: TLJ, TROS, Obi Wan, Boba Fett, Mando Szn 3, Acolyte, Resistance, and Tales of the Empire
7 good, 3 Mid, and 8
And like you said, although theres almost an equal good v bad; the bad projects were WAY more important to land
Mid-table then ...
3 points for a win
1 point for a tie
0 points for defeat
Disney Star Wars gets 24 points out of a possible 54 - not very good, but they should avoid relegation this season
Not bad. I’d probably slide Solo down; Mando 3 and Tales of the Empire up. Acolyte needs to have its own Shit tier,
I‘d still put tales of the jedi in mid. Only 3 episodes were really good (Dooku 1-2 and Ahsoka 2). Ahsoka 1 was boring and had some uncanny animations (especially the cat). Ahsoka 3 and Dooku 3 were really contrived, Ahsoka 3 even lacked a proper showdown as the inquisitor was a joke.
@@FroggeeSBsolo is ok in mid. It’s a fun little adventure and it’s leagues above episodes 8 and 9. I mean Solo can be enjoyed, it has its flaws but it doesn’t destroy the lore like the last two movies of the sequels, OWK and Alcolyte
@chcucivtxzclccucifudohzfu6766 the 3rd dooku episode felt a lot less forced then the 3rd ahsoka one. That ahsoka episode was a condensed and far weaker retelling of the ahsoka novel. Honestly apart from the beginning at padme's funeral just read the novel
I haven't watched the video but for me the thing they all have in common is that they're all somewhat niche characters and thus the writers have a large amount of creative freedom, another reason for this is probably because the low expectations means Disney isn't breathing down their neck
Andor is the PEAK of Star Wars extra content
tbh the ewok movies are not something you would think are star wars, but it sparked the imagination inside me from how both movies just really tell the story they want to tell using the excuse of the expansive star wars universe. and yet still keeps concepts and overall grounded whimsical tone of star wars (it's not just a disney junior show)
They are looked down on unfairly in my opinion.
Magic aside I still think they hold up.
Nice to see people talking about the Ewok movies. I see so little discussion on them, that I sometimes think I just imagined them.
@@delrunplays2903 same, I had the VHS as a kid, and lost them long ago, found them in bargain bin DVD's and bought them immediately having forgotten them before D+ got huge
I really thought the Acolyte would have the same feel as Andor. Boy was I mistaken.
Jedi Fallen Order and Jedi Survivor are amazing games too
The way R1 handled the Force was actually quite good, which is hilarious given how they constantly botch up the Force/Jedi aspect of the universe (although Ahsoka was more good than bad overall)
Again, this is why I think a Stormtrooper-based trilogy would be stellar. Make it about a platoon of specialist troopers who receive word of Palpatine and Vader's deaths and are really torn on what to do going forward. Some remain loyal to the Empire; others become fugitives on the run from the collapsing regime and the slowly-reestablishing-itself Republic. Sound good?
You might enjoy the single player campaign of Battlefront II
Funny thing is that ever since I was a kid, I didn’t really care about the force or jedi/sith, what I really liked was the universe, the clone troopers, the strom troopers, the klankas, etc.
I only every liked the jedi and sith in the clone wars setting really. By extension, Ive loved everything thats new in starwars that has nothing to do really with the force…
My list:
1. Rogue One
2. Andor
3. Mandalorian (as a whole)
4. Force Awakens
5. Skeleton Crew (thus far)
6. Solo
7. Kenobi
8. Boba Fett
9. Ahsoka
10. Last Jedi
11. Rise of Skywalker
12. Acolyte.
Of those in the top half, I would watch any of them again. The bottom half, not-so-much.
Man Andor was so good, hard to believe that came out of lucasfilm
It was announced alongside other projects, have you not seen it?
The reason for this, as far as I can gather, is that whenever they set sights on a huge legacy-character heavy project, they focus-group and second-guess it into oblivion until any shred of creative vision has been stamped out. But when they make a show about nobodies, they aren't so precious about it succeeding so they allow the creative vision to come through. The more singular the vision is, the better the final product is. The lack of a clear creative vision is why the sequels floundered so much.
My Disney Star Wars recommendations in no particular order…
- Clone wars season 7
- Mando season 1 &2
- Rogue One
- The Bad Batch
- Andor
- Skeleton Crew *
- Rebels
- Tales of the Jedi
I’d agree with all of this except probably rebels S1 and badbatch S2
I notice that certain films and series are omitted.
Good call.
No Ahsoka? It's literally a new live action Rebels season and not even finished yet.
@@steele8280 Lol it's weird to have Rebels on the list but not Ahsoka, imo. Also not including all of TCW is crimnaI. Not necessarily because it's good, but for context if you're gonna watch season 7 anyway. It's the only medium that introduces and develops Ahsoka and Maul to begin with until Rebels came with their older versions.
@@aouyiuclone wars seasons 1-6 are actually pre-Disney star wars
I hate the term “content”. It’s a corporate buzzword for filler, and it degrades art and entertainment. I wish it hadn’t leaked into everyone’s vocabulary.
Let's be real, something like Mandalorian Season 3 can hardly be described as something other than content.
Hey Thor, it's been well established that Lucas was heavily inspired by Frank Herbert's Dune and it's easy to see those connections. Do you think the quality and success of Villeneuve's Dune films will have an effect on the Star Wars franchise going forward as a new point of comparison for the general public? The care and detail put into Dune already put most genre films to shame but that's been an area where many feel Disney's Star Wars has been falling short.
It's pretty clear that George plagerized Herbert's work, but Dune will never capture the hearts and imaginations of children the way Star Wars did in the 80's & 90's.
At this point it's almost Karma that Lucasfilm can not recreate the magic it stole from Herbert.
@@zerubbabelsbridge Plagiarism is a very serious claim to just throw out there with no support
Agreed, even the original trilogy didn’t have that much of the force in comparison with the prequels or sequels. Star Wars is at its best when the force/jedi/sith is not over used. Well at least according to me that is.
In a New Hope, The Empire seemed bigger and more imposing when it was mostly the backdrop of the setting/galaxy. Likewise with "The Force". There were hints of it here and there, but it was simply informing the story in the foreground. The movie was making you imagine a much bigger canvas on which Luke, Leia, Han, etc. were having their adventures. George Martin did the same thing with his books where dragons/magic were at first elements of the past. The trick is bringing those background elements into the foreground TO INFORM what is already happening with the the characters and their inner lives, not simply to have magic make the story cool because you can't think of anything else to include. If you do that, it will be cool for 1/2 a second and then boring every other time you watch it.
@ my thoughts exactly
The way I look at it every show/movie Star Wars or not are all under a microscope thanks to the internet. George’s prequels would absolutely get shit on nowadays. It’s just. Different era of starwars. My dad only likes the OT I don’t blame him that’s what he grew up with. I grew up with prequels and love them.
The thing is though, even though the “good” projects all contain the things that you said, the “fans” who like to complain all the time no matter what still won’t admit that it’s good. Even with something like Andor which is amazing, people still tried hating on it because there wasn’t any Jedi or sith or more prominent legacy characters, I just feel like there will always a be large portion of the fanbase that refuses to like anything from Disney Star Wars and that kinda sucks because it diminishes the good stuff and makes it less likely that we will see more stuff like them ever again
Hey Thor, I have a friend who watches all of the new Star Wars content and says he actually enjoys it. I tell him that I am happy he does, but that I can't bring myself to not only because of poor writing, but also because all roads now lead to TLJ.
There is some of the new Star Wars content that I would watch, but I canceled my Disney Plus subscription for moral add admittedly culture war reasons. I can't think of the last Disney press tour that didn't absolutely sour me on an actor and every project they will ever be in. So, I'm not able to legally watch the new content and I have not hit the high season so long, I don't know that I would know how to do it anymore.
How do I talk with my friend still about Star Wars when I'm no longer able to get myself excited for anything new Star Wars or Star Trek because I have let myself get excited many times before only to receive the deepest disappointment possible.
Both my son and I walked away from Star Wars content at different times. I mostly enjoyed Mando 3, Ahsoka, and a few bits of Bobba, he pretty much hated them. I think I cancelled Disney+ after two episodes of Acolyte (wish I had after the first 5 minutes). He can’t handle even thinking about SWs…while I don’t have any faith in any Disney project, I still try to take them as they come (Skeleton Crew sounded awful but the bits of it Ive seen seem quite good so far). I do miss being able to talk about it, so if you can make the effort to be somewhat informed on what is happening or a least willing to listen to your friend be excited, I’m sure he would really appreciate you making the effort. Staying away from any press promotion is however completely necessary, Disney seems to be intent on making their viewers hate everything before it even airs!
I think this is exactly why I was fine with the Ewok Adventure back in the day - because it didn't mess with legacy characters - but I hated the Droids and Ewoks series.
Agreed, for the most part they've had more success with new characters than the OG characters. Obviously some big exceptions to that (Rey, Acolyte characters etc)
Think what’s also elevated is more success on characters that don’t directly tie in to the skywalker plot
I think there is a more subtle point about the "better" Disney SW products that you might have missed. While I think you're right about the fact that staying farther away from the Force-stuff helped Rogue One, Andor, Mando (S1-2), etc. I think the more important factor was that these are all stories that were constrained by being relatively close to the OT content and timeline AND the responsible writers/directors/showrunners of these shows were all smart enough to understand that they needed to at least TRY to stay true to the spirit of the OT. This, unfortunately is something that even George himself thought he was above of by the time he made the prequels.
George Lucas said that he never understood Star Wars in the way fans did. He tried to give the fans what they wanted, and they hated it.
Which isn't surprising. The story of the Ford Edsel is instructive here.
@@davidwuhrer6704 Yeah, the prequels also - and not hating on them either - kind of showed what George is like as writer without a Gary Kurtz or a Marcia Lucas around to filter and polish his wild impulses. He definitely was never able to understand those movies like the fans did, but we can now understand why. He has said many times that he was never fully reconciled with how those movies turned out, with all these things that he felt were out of his control.
@@ghostbeetle2950 What made the original film such a phenomenon was in part how it subverted established Hollywood clichés. The film starts and ends with the Droids, two slaves who are not invested in the conflict and don't care what is going on or whose side they are on, they are just trying to stay alive. Lucas took this idea from a Japanese film _The Hidden Fortress_ by Akira Kurosawa (which used as backdrop a historic and epochal battle everyone in Japan would know about; not in America though). The protagonist is almost an anti-hero, someone who witnesses the opening battle from a distance, but is more concerned about drinking with his friends, one of whom tries to talk him into joining the navy. He does get suckered into the war later, and tries to rescue a princess, all hero-like, but the princess rescues him.
The princess that rescues herself is already a subversion, but Lucas got the trope of the sexy action woman from exploitation films, the kind that has made Pam Grier famous. The anti-hero protagonist was also highly unusual in American cinema.
In the closing battle (which bash ally copied the war propaganda film _The Dam Busters_ ) the protagonist's navy friend immediately dies a pointless death. This is another subversion, but Lucas already had practice with that with _Red Tails._
The pre-release cut had lots of problems: Awkward dialogue, redundant exposition, pacing, and an unsatisfying climax. George's wife at the time was in charge of editing, and she changed almost everything about the film, removing almost all subversions except the strong woman and the unheroic protagonist, only because there was no footage depicting them any other way. The boastful mentor being defeated unceremoniously was turned into a heroic self-sacrifice (which doesn't make any sense - why did he bother to fight in the first place?) by dubbing new dialogue, and his religion was given more of a role by adding his ghost voice. The pointless death of the militarist had no impact, all of the protagonist's friends were cut. And the stakes of the final battle were raised by adding an animation of the BBEGs fortress _moving towards_ the rebel -fleet- base.
In effect, everything great about The Star Wars was what Marcia couldn't change to something more in line with conventional heroic high fantasy (including John William's score which is mostly an arrangement of Edvard Grieg), and everything bad was no worse than any other Hollywood summer blockbuster film at the time. George Lucas was pretty much the only one who didn't get an Oscar for that film.
It was a commercial success, which is why he got to make a sequel. He took some inspiration from the Star Wars Holiday Special, in particular the idea of Darth Vader, originally just a henchman in a space suit, being the main antagonist, but also Boba Fett, a mysterious bounty hunter working for the government - which didn't really fit into the setting of the film. (The SWHS was more about a gangster family being harassed by corrupt policemen - IN SPACE. That's neither the high fantasy of the theatrical release nor the mashup of American Graffiti with Dune the film was first written as.)
So he wrote the sequel as a fast-paced pastiche of loosely connected action sequences with more merchandise opportunities. The director filmed it as a character drama instead. Fans regard it as the best film of the OT.
Finding the "spirit of Star Wars" between any of that is going to be a challenge. I think its success is in part because everyone can see in it whatever they want - a macho heroic fantasy, a feminist role model, a war film, an anti-war film, an endorsement or a slamming of whatever political view - but also because in 1977 Hollywood had done nothing but produce inoffensive remakes and sequels for years, while blocking imports of foreign media, so Star Wars (with it's many influences, from Dungeons&Dragons, French fantasy comics, Russian films, Japanese films, German science fiction pulp series, to actual Nazi propaganda) was something new and different.
So it's not anything about the setting itself, but fortuitous timing (and a lack of executive meddling), that made it a successful franchise.
I agree that the good Disney Star Wars, like Andor and the Mandalorian, are those which focus on new characters. However, I don't think this means that they don't deal with the core of star wars. Andor, for instance, is essentially a historical war movie, a sort of period piece; its historical period is the Galactic Civil War. This is the greatness of starwars; it's such an established, well known franchise that it starts to act more like history than just a setting. Yes, the story of Andor could be told in a number of historical settings, or in a new secondary world, but the fact that the fight is between The Rebel Alliance and The Galactic Empire gives context and weight to the conflict in the show. Anyone fifty or younger has known what the Galactic Empire was as long as they've known what the Soviet Union was. Sure, you could tell the story of Andor outside of Star Wars; you could write a retelling of Les Mis not set in France. You could tell the story of A New Hope outside of star wars, too; that book is called Eragon.
If you paying attention mostly Disney Star Wars that succeed is not involving jedi or sith and the force. I guess Disney still figuring out how the force really works and they seems fail to understand what is a jedi and sith are. I really suggest they look back at the EU since their only source material they got, probably they learn something from it.
I keep saying this if Disney embracing the EU they’ll literally printing money, i just don’t understand why they ignore it completely.
They ignore it completely because it wasn’t woke enough to bother drawing inspiration from in their eyes.
@@trevorrogers95I always wonder if the Star Wars franchise would make a comeback someday . It’s just I don’t like Disney but I also don’t want Star Wars to fail, I really hope that someday Disney eventually sell Star Wars / lucasfilm I don’t care if we didn’t get new content Star Wars already taken so much damage since Disney acquisition.
@@Quincy299They could sell it to Marvel. Marvel comics already had Luke Skywalker fighting Megatron and Darth Vader fighting Dr Doom. I heard that Marvel have also started doing films.
Hey Thor,
Have you heard the Imperial March / Carol of the bells mix by Samuel Kim Music? It would be an awesome song to have playing in the background (if possible) of say a Christmas edition of a let's talk some Star Wars video.
I had it on during one of my mundane meetings at work and for once everything that people were saying sounded important. It was awesome.
Regardless Merry Christmas my friend, I appreciate your videos and again thank you for all the times you've responded to one of my questions.
Come on Thor, we've had some awesome Star Wars Jedis vs Sith content. Don't sleep on Star Wars Visions !
In just 2 little seasons of shorts, they managed to show so many different directions (both stylistically and narratively) the franchise could go ! Duel, The Twins, Village Bride, the 9th Jedi from s1 alone all felt like pilots of their own series and could all branch out in their own spinoffs.
Here’s what I would recommend:
-Rogue One
-Star Wars TCW S7 (final 4 episodes)
-Mando S1+S2
-Andor
-Star Wars Visions: The Ninth Jedi, The Duel, The Twins, The Elder, Sith, Screecher’s Reach
-Skeleton Crew
-Bad Batch
Christmas Trivia - Michael Carter, an English actor who played Bib Fortuna in Return of the Jedi in 1983, also played the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come in the 1984 TV Movie "A Christmas Carol" with George C. Scott as Scrooge.
The sequels, everyone are angry on each other. Poe is angry, Rey is angry while Ben Solo is not. And they try make chemistry on people who don't want to be there. While Rose do want to be there and Finn want to. They're running their own show who has nothing with the movie.
Hey Thor I know it’s not Star Wars but still it is part of Lucasfilm. Can we get your thoughts on “Indiana Jones & the Great Circle”. I’ve been playing it and so far, it’s fantastic. It feels like a movie. I’m having fun but as a Star Wars fan it’s a bit frustrating. Star Wars games need to step up. Seriously Lucasfilm can do better with the Legacy characters.
TFA was a massive huge success and appreciated and or loved by most, don’t re-write history. Also why did you skip the fact that the prequels made more damage to SW than anything else? Otherwise I tend to agree with your other points.
Sure buddy episode 8 was the grand savior of Star Wars. It wasn't the most trashed on movie ever by literally everyone at all...
@@INCAnitysy?
@@INCAnitysyTFA was Episode 7. It was well-received, then.
@@Sansho54 my thoughts on 7 are mixed, the problem with the sequel movies they give a poor ending point for the next movie to continue off of, like 8 had to explain why Luke decided to go to a location that nobody knows and abandoned his friends in the process whom none of them know where or why and it established the empire 2.0 and being back to square one. 8 gave little room on what to do for 9 as they only had 1 thing to wrap up everything else was concluded
IMHO:
Rogue 1 and Andor.
They had a good thing with mando. Lots of normies watched it. They shit the bed.
The Bad Batch is all this: new characters, minimal hokey religions, few cameos (one completely unnecessary), bold storylines. It is "Firefly" in Star Wars.
I do like Star Wars stories about regular people. It feels like the Jedi and the Sith are just so much more powerful than everyone around them. Those characters tend to outshine and overshadow the supporting cast. No Jedi and no Sith doesn't feel as "Star Wars", but the cast does tend to feel more balanced.
This may have something to do with the fact that I once agreed to run a Star Wars tabletop RPG, and after our first one-shot, it became clear that it was going to be hard to write stories that force users and non-force users could equally participate in and contribute to, and now I can't unsee the dynamic of parallel but separate storytelling for force users and non-force users in the movies and TV shows.
They can't make anything as good as the original SW anymore simply because that time has passed. The original SW trilogy was magic, a product of its time. And it retains that magic because of how original it was. WAS. There's no point trying to replicate that for some of the reasons outlined in the video here. And for the same reasons, Disney should just make new and original content like Skeleton Crew. And for goodness' sake, give up with the member berries!
I think there's more room to mess up smaller stories than big ones. If somebody were to mess up a biography of my life, that wouldn't be a very big deal, but if they were to mess up a biography of George Washington, then that has huge implications on American culture and history entirely.
In the same sense, creating random "nobodies" in the Galaxy Far, Far Away does little harm, but it grows the Galaxy a little bit more and makes it feel lived in. It's when they mess with the fundamentals of the world building (the Force, the Skywalkers, ect.) that it goes wrong.
Hey Thor, about skeleton crew do you think we will see Rogue Squadron in the show after the cancelation of the movie about Rogue squadron considering that the show uses Rogue squadrons X-wings mounted with ION-cannons.
Andor is a masterpiece of television along the likes of Better Call Saul, Breaking Bad, and hell even the Sopranos. Ironically it being tied to Star Wars and Disney Plus is what’s holding it back from reaching the Zeitgeist
It's simpler than that:
The good works were made by creators for creators to be something that they actually want to watch and are passionate about working on.
The bad works were made by marketing executives who thought they had the secret formula to winning with their audience of choice.
Acolyte rested easy on the assumption that Disney fans would support them automatically because they have the right politics.
Andor rewrote its whole script multiple times drawing from actual historical examples of how this setting would work mechanically because they actually _wanted_ their story to make sense on its own two feet, no hashtag required.
This divide between the creatives and the marketing execs is why none of the mainline Star Wars material ever goes anywhere; the marketers won't allow the creatives to risk being "incorrect", so only the small shows "too obscure to care about" have the space to do their work.
I must say that the Darth Vader scene in Rogue One is one of the best things in Star Wars, ever.
Crazy, because it was a last minute addition.
I wasn't until that scene where I got it "Oh...this is why everyone was so scared of him gowning up....I get why people don't like the prequels now. I get it" lol
@@Mord12gpLegions more like the prequels than anything Disney has ever produced, including Rogue One.
Absolutely!!
It is spelled R O G U E. It's literally in the title of the film.
Hot take: Star Wars IS generic sci fi/fantasy. George boiled down a pastiche of pulp fiction, fantasy, Saturday morning serials, westerns, WW2 and religion/philosophy and produced an homage to 20th century culture through film. Everything is an archetype. EVERYTHING. That’s why it’s so powerfully relatable for the audience, it’s all so familiar yet they’ve never seen it all together quite like this.
And that’s just the first film. TESB deconstructed all this to an extent, but also embraced it and solidified SW as a franchise, a brand. And ever since we’ve all been chasing what ‘Star wars’ is supposed to be, when it really wasn’t anything different from what we already knew and loved, just in a combination we hadn’t seen before.
It’s time for a new ‘Star Wars’. Something familiar yet new. I think the recent ‘good’ SW content Thor speaks of is an example of this. It’s set in a familiar setting but explores it in ways we haven’t seen. In a sense, those series and film are ‘Star warsing’ Star Wars, just as Star Wars ‘SW’d’ pop film and pulp literature culture.
Ur 100% right. The best content has been original stories with characters and plot lines that do not screw with the established cannon. The stakes are lower and it’s harder to mess up.
Ya know I sall the thumbnail and I thought. Not a ton of lightsabers ya know?
It's like disney has never figured out the meaning behind the iconography, and therefore been unable to use it meaningfully. As a result, it's been shackles on projects that have it, rather than guidance
1) new, stand alone characters that don’t rely on the larger setting for relevance (ie not everyone is a Jedi or a Skywalker etc)
2) handling the content in a mature way
3) making full use of the setting
Like when you go back look at the old cannon there’s so much older content where they don’t really stick to the themes of the og trilogy, but they let the side characters be side characters instead of being like “here’s every detail of this random dude’s backstory”
Don't forget that the majority of the ones you recommend use some or all of a story created before it was turned into Disney Star Wars:
- Rogue One is the initial mission from the Dark Forces game where Kyle Katarn steals the Death Star plans handing them off to the Rebels.
- Mandalorian S1/2 have roots in the book series "Tales of the Bounty Hunters" which gave significant flavoring to the ideas of bounty hunters, their dealings with others, and world built a number of items with in this show. IG-11 is really just IG-88. Pair this with the story telling methodology Dark Horse Comics brought to the table in the 90's and you'll see where it began. Don't forget some of those great Boba Fett stories that just turned into D'jarn's storyline.
- Andor takes a hint from "Shadows of the Empire" both from Dark Horse and other media (video game and book).
The parts that worked for all of the movies that AREN'T recommended are stolen too. But the shows that work, work because the vehicles they were mirrored from are awesome. That's my opinion, anyone reading this feeling different is welcome to that opinion.
Hey Thor, most people in your polls are saying they’re not watching Skeleton Crew and I was wondering your opinion on this: how much of that is apathy toward Star Wars versus just not wanting to pay for Disney+?
I personally would be watching SC except I don't have Disney+ and I don't want to get it. No doubt I'm not alone.
Maybe don’t call it “content”? That word does devalue these productions, these works of art.
After watching The Last Jedi my reaction was, "If this wasn't Star Wars no one would watch it."
I hate the last Jedi, I think it ruined the new versions of Star Wars. But, I used to not understand people that liked it, and wanted more of it. Now, for some reason, I actually liked the Acolyte, and I understand last Jedi defenders. If you like something, you like it.
This is exactly what I have been saying since the takeover by Disney: Disney should be content to enrich the saga, and not extend it. By focusing on new things (I'm talking about characters in particular), in order to pay homage, and not to reinvent the galaxy. With a few cameos, if they are justified and in the service of the story, and not the other way around.
@Thor Skywalker
I'm a little baffled by what you said makes a show truly good star wars is that it is some jedi vs sith. The original trilogy of Star Wars wasn't really focused on Jedi vs Sith, so does that make the first couple of movies not Star Wars enough? An interesting question would be: If the original trilogy came out today, and all you had seen was the prequels, would the original trilogy of movies feel like Star Wars based on what your expectations are for it now with new shows and movies? The original trilogy was more focused on the Rebellion against the empire, especially in the first 2 movies. The struggle of the Jedi and Sith wasn't really a main point, unlike how it is in the prequel trilogy with Palpatine manipulating events to bring about the downfall of the Jedi and allow the sith to rule the galaxy. Luke wanted to be a Jedi and the Rebels wanted Kenobi to join them because they needed the Jedi's help. But the whole reason the Rebellion was started was to restore democracy and free the galaxy, not to bring back the Jedi and destroy the Sith.
Yeah but the other huge theme for Star Wars is the war part. I think the dynamic of the Jedi being caught up in war and finding their place in peace and conflict is a huge part of the original 6 movies. That’s one of the huge themes they are missing in Disney Star Wars and when they do portray war like in the sequels it’s a goofy unbelievable version of war.
I agree that that the OG trilogy wasn’t specifically jedi vs sith but it was focused on Lukes journey becoming a jedi and resisting the temptations of the dark side and restoring peace to the galaxy.
Its hard to say about how star wars would be received if it had started with the prequels because star wars had revolutionized a lot of film techniques and set a precedent for the time. Its hard to imagine Lucas starting with prequels because he believed the story he wanted to tell was more interesting and only decided to do them after RotJ.
I personally think if they had been released in chronological order the films would look very different than what we saw but perhaps people would feel slightly differently about darth vaders redemption knowing all he had done in revenge of the sith. So its possible that the franchise might not have been as popular as it today but it’s really hard to say for certain.
I think it can be said that the Jedi vs Sith is also about the morality between the two.
Which is why Rogue One was a "good Star Wars movie" in my opinion. Even though there were various challenges with the movie overall it did a great job of "feeling" like it took place in the Star Wars universe. And you don't need the force. You don't need Jedi and you don't need Sith for that.
Rogue One, the Mandalorian, Andor... they all FEEL like they belong in the Star Wars universe more than the prequels do (in my opinion).
In the original film, Darth Lord Vader was the last Jedi (after he defeated that hobo from Tatooine who used to be a general). It was not about Jedi versus Sith, but
It was also not about rebels versus empire. The rebels were part of the empire. It was about a war between political factions within the empire. The rebel alliance was fighting to prevent a governor from usurping power. (The dialogue between the admirals, generals, the governor, and the henchman lays all that out. Only, the title scroll added in post says something about the rebels striking from a hidden base to steal plans being a success against the empire.)
The sequel changed everything. The henchman became the final boss, the dead ex-general posthumously accepted a teaching position, and the Force morphed from an ancient superstition into a tangible tool. Also, the emperor became a character, but politics stopped playing any part.
All this is mostly thanks to the Holiday Special, which, unlike the actual films, depicted an actually evil empire under martial law with a corrupt police force, and an underground resistance (unlike the rebels in the film who had their own military and signature weaponry). The Holiday Special also introduced Boba Fett.
The sequel was supposed to be what fans had seen in the original film, so the setting was changed to something much simpler.
Hey Thor, a second question. There was a video about the sequels calling them the Anti-Trilogy and, among other things, he said that George Lucas always wanted to do something different and that’s part of the reason the sequels failed. The originals were a swashbuckling morality play, the prequels were a dark opera about the fall of democracy, etc. so the logical conclusion is that, to make something that truly feels like Star Wars, you need to do something completely different than what was done before. Would you agree with this? It lines up with your explanation at the end of your video that the best content Disney made was what did its best to be original/deviate from what was done before.
I think it's also because we have higher expectations for the content that deals closer to the lore than for the one further along.
I actually watched Mandalorian without any prior knowledge of Star Wars lore, simply because it was a "dad story". And I became a Star Wars fan exclusively because of it. I also showed it to my friends and a couple of them also became interested in SW after. So I can say from experience that it's a good show even if you know nothing about the greater story.
Totally agree dude. I told friends the other day, Disney is best at Star Wars when it’s genre television set with the backdrop of Star Wars, rather than when they’re trying to “do Star Wars.” It is exactly as you said and I’m not sure that’ll change under current leadership.
2:22 The mythology and legend of the Jedi is pretty important so far in Skeleton crew.
Hey Thor! Do you think Lucasfilm will ever have more than one animated series going at a time? I don't mean airing at the same time, but more alternating like how the live action shows do. I feel like animation is the perfect medium for Star Wars storytelling in the modern age, although live action has its merits for stories like Andor that truly warrant it. A second part to my question would be do you think they'll ever make more adult-oriented animation (not R-rated adult, just more mature themes), or is animation doomed to be seen by Disney/Lucasfilm as only for children and families?
I've definitely noticed this trend in the fandom. Not to say I agree with it in every case, but it certainly seems to be the consensus among the fans
I have to disagree with you here. Before the prequels came out, the Jedi and sith stuff were an aspect of Star wars, but they weren't what Star wars was. The OG was about saving a princess and defeating the evil superweapon, with the force thrown in there. But is that not star wars if a main movie only has the force in it for a few minutes? Sc has about the same amount of force trickery as anh does, so I wouldn't say that star wars has to be about the Jedi and sith only. Fun fact, remove Luke from the last third of the movie and nothing really changes. The death star still blows up and the empire vanquished. So I don't really think that the force is all Star wars is.
I find it so ironic that the tv shows I were not excited for ended up being the best content Disney has produced so far with Star Wars whereas my most anticipated series like Kenobi ended up being so mundane/mediocre and downright disrespectful to the franchise. Going forward I need to tempter my expectations for these shows, but I will be more keen on the ones that do not initially catch my eye.
Good take, I agree with much of what you said. Thanks for sharing your thoughts! Season 1 of the mandalorian was so good I'll bet I watched it three times before season 2 was released. Season two was pretty good, I watched it once through. I have not bothered to watch season 3 yet based on what I have heard from friends.
The sequels are so bad, the damage to the brand is irreversible unless they re-do them. All Disney cannon is poisoned by how bad they were. Until they redeem Luke Skywalker, star wars will die.
No point in redoing them just demote them from the prime canon.
the issue is that now you can see storylines of the mando/ahsoka era shows leading into elements of the sequel trilogy, because the showrunners are boxed into a corner now that the galaxy has to get to that point in a few in-universe decades. Getting rid of just the sequels also starts unraveling their current shows. The only fix I can ever see is the franchise being completely sold or rebooted again, which will never happen.
@@SavvysnekThis is exactly why they need to be redone or retconned. Grogu couldn't be left with Luke because that means him getting murdered by Kylo. The sequels are so bleak, every series set between will have bleak trajectory until they get rid of them.
@@Savvysnek They can be demoted from prime canon as well. Did anyone love KOTOR any less just because it may or may not have actually taken place in the Skywalker timeline?
@@HotDogMan-c6y I've been hoping that they would use the world between worlds concept to do that for the sequels, if they needed an in universe explanation. Who knows, maybe they will still do that in the Mando movie or Ahsoka season 2. Although I think they are too prideful to actually demote them and admit they made a bad trilogy
everything can be summed up as: the things that disney really need to get right, they really can't. the sequels had the monumental dual tasks of recovering from prequel hate AND maintaining the legendary status of the OT, and borked it royally. Mandalorian (and in extension the mandoverse) was really good until it became the face of star wars, where it lost it's direction and stumbled to a halt.
Skeleton Crew really really surprised me. It is meant for kids, no doubt, but a really decent show still. Kinda don't even remember the last time I was actually interested in the story of a Star Wars show. And, despite it being kinda simplistic in plot and dialogues, they do say some pretty deep stuff (don't wanna spoil anything, but the blue dude in ep 4 was spitting facts about war, it hit). So I'm really happy, esp after Acolite....
And if you include the animated shows, Rebels can be tacked onto that list-which is also a show that uses mostly original characters (at least for the main cast).
I have a theory. With the sequal trilogy and all the shows revolving around the established characters, the executives at Disney interfere more. This and that and this has to be a certain way and the directors and writers have to work with limitations. Rey has to be perfect, Boba has to rule a vicious hive of scum and villainy without killing anyone, Leia has to be smart and mature at the age of 10 and they're desperately trying to make it look like Obi-Wan didn't lie about the "death" of Anakin.
I think the good shows are the ones where the guys who make it can do it the way they want to.
The ironic thing is that, in the context of the Star Wars universe, the stuff that 'feels more Star Wars' is the least relevant stuff that's happening. So many people in the universe, especially on non-core worlds that weren't relevant during the Clone Wars, had barely even heard of Jedi or Sith or The Force. Those things had no bearing on their actual lives.
Star Wars I think has or will become the poster franchise for pop culture that shows how franchises can eventually fizzle out over time and sometimes its best to either leave your franchise as it is, or that if you keep pushing it too far you can end up denying your mass of fans and it'll become a series lost to time.
Hey Thor,
I would love to see the back story/life story of Mace Windu in a movie or even trilogy. But, I don't have confidence in Disney to do a good job.
What do you think about the idea?
The problem is us - the OG fans. We all took slightly different notions away from the original movies, world and characters and what they stand for. Those differences are meaningful enough that a large cross-section of OG fans get pissed if their nuanced version gets contradicted in any new content.
Example: My wife and I both love SW. we both love Luke, for many of the same reasons. But she ABHORS the notion from the sequel trilogy that Luke would ever hide from the fight. To her, it shows weakness that doesn’t align with the Luke we know. I love it, because it adds humanity to him. He fucked up big and now he’s afraid to jump back in for fear of making things worse. We’ve all been there. Why should Luke be any different?
And that’s just two people who both love Star Wars. Imagine the scale of this when you talk about the near billions of SW fans out there.
My point is that doing new things - particularly with the old beloved characters and set pieces - is an impossible task for anyone who tries to make content now. This would be true no matter who owned the property. We care so much about this franchise - and for slightly different reasons and notions/ that we cannot most/all be appeased now.
I think the reason I enjoyed the books so much up until Star by Star/The Unifying Force is that there was an overarching theme of Luke Skywalker trying to rebuild the Jedi, knowing absolutely NOTHING about them or the Sith aside from his own personal experiences with Darth Vader and Emperor Palpatine. Likewise, in the X-Wing Rogue Squadron, and Wraith Squadron series, Wedge Antilles is attempting to rebuild a heroic starfighter squadron from his experiences at being nearly the sole survivor of both Death Star runs. There was a common theme of rebuilding, and having never done anything like it before, back in the days where you couldn't just Google the answers or ask an AI to generate it for us. When I was growing up, the Sith as an organized religion were extinct, and all that existed were Dark Jedi--usually self-taught, disparate groups of evil-doers. There was no "Jedi versus Sith" duality, and in fact, it was one of the things I thought was pretty lame about the prequels.
Personally, I liked the idea of the Yuuzhan Vong better than the Rule of Two. Then of course, given the success of The New Jedi Order series, which torpedoed the entire galaxy, and killed off Anakin Solo, the bright hope for the future destined to do "something great" with Tahiri Veila, and of course, Chewbacca, instead of looking back at the past and thinking that "Hey, it took 25 years to establish a really groundbreaking cast of characters, which spent another five years in war, maybe we shouldn't do anything drastic like turning Jacen Solo evil and killing Mara Jade for another 25 years, what do you say?" they decided to torpedo the galaxy and the Solo/Skywalkers AGAIN. And then once they'd done that, they killed off Wraith Squadron, and put a neat little bow around the series where 137 years after the Battle of Yavin, the galactic situation is that the Sith won in those Legacy comic series, leading to a dark and depressing Order 66 type future.
The point I'm trying to say, is that I've seen Rogue One, where "everyone dies" before. And I've seen the Disney trilogy where "everyone dies" aside from the Mary Sue, before as well. I haven't really checked out Andor--because I'm not subscribed to Disney Plus, but the fact is Star Wars was never about Jedi versus Sith. It was all about a Royal Family--and ace starfighter pilots.
Addendum: It's unfair to say that "everyone dies" aside from the Mary Sue Rey (which means King) in the Disney sequels, but I was only paying attention to Han, Luke, and Leia. There are so many things that turned me off watching the trilogy like a Looney Tunes moment where Poe Dameron flies really fast into the barrel of a gun, because if all the guns are trained on you, and you fly straight into them, that's like sticking your finger into the barrels! It blocks all the guns!
Shows like Andor or Mandalorian just prrof that "Star Wars" is mainly just a universe and that the force is also just something hat exists, in that universe. But no matter what you do, a good show will always be a good show. Not to mantion that other Fantasy and science Fiction universes also have Lasers blade weapons or a magic system. But it's the "wizards in space" theme, that really gives us THE Star Wars vibe. So having that in your Story or at least always being a common denominator across all shows, one way or another, is what makes Star Wars Star Wars. But no matter how Star Wars a show is, it's the good show in that universe, that makes us watch it.
And with Andor and Mando whe had just that. With it was even one of the main themes, just from the POV of a bounty hunter. And with Andor we had the raise of the rebelion, which is also an important part in the lore of Star Wars. Although something related to the space wizards, besides the one light saber crystle would have bin nice. But maybe next season...
I said this years ago. Disney doesn’t understand or know what to do or how to handle the force.
Whenever the do it just gets mucked up.
Answering the First question:
I would tell new comers to watch the main line movies first in release order, and to not get too attached to the franchise because it's dragging on and they will be disappointed by most of it.
Answering the whole "Good Star Wars" question:
It is absolutely weird that the side note stories are alright, and the stuff that would be carrying the franchise is bad, as Thor was basically said in the video. That's likely because the Higher Ups interfere with stuff like Kenobi or anything including jedi, because it should be carrying the franchise. And ignore what they think will fail. Now, Higher Ups *will* without a doubt start messing with Andor, Kenobi season 3 (if it's even coming out), and Jedi lll if Ubisoft doesn't ruin it first.
I don't get the love for Andor. It's contradictory to its establishing movie, Rogue One. In R1, Cassian said he worked for the rebellion since he was a child, which is clearly contradicted by the show. If he was telling the truth then the show is out of canon, and if he was lying to Jinn then he's not a protagonist worth building a show around anyways.
He didn't quite say that. The exact words were "I've been in this fight since I was six years old". Which still kinda works as he got involved in the wider galactic conflict as a kid.
I didn't really bond with Andor despite loving Rogue 1. I started to watch it four times and gave up before forcing myself to watch it. By the end of the season, I understood it - but still feel it was better science fiction than it was Star Wars, if you get my point. However, it is one of the shows that underlines that Disney could and can make good shows when it chooses to - which makes excretions like Sacoshyte even harder to understand.
Rogue 1, Andor (yes, I will include it), Skeleton Crew (so far), Bad Batch, Rebels, Tales of the Jedi - all excellent. Then you have some mixed-bag items like Ahsoka and Tales of the Empire. Then there are the shows where you just find yourself wondering how they could mismanage otherwise great ideas as badly as they did like Kenobi.