Star Wars - getting a decent explanation for Force Ghosts into the prequels?

[FoolsFollowing]

I've been really getting into the Star Wars prequels fanedits recently, L8WRTRs Shadow of the Sith and Kerr's Dark Force Rising are superb films that I find just as enjoyable as Adywan's A New Hope and the original Empire Strikes Back.

But what seems to be the most glaring absence (aside from definative edits of ATOTC and ROTJ) is the major role that force ghosts play in the Original Trilogy and their total absence in the Prequels. Personally I *really* dislike the tacked on Qui Gon subplot at the end of ROTS - it comes from nowhere and seems like a last minute addition more than anything - and I am glad that neither Kerr nor Stancpak's editions have included it. But when watching the entire series, this does leave a very big plot hole.

So, has anybody had any ideas of how to explain the force ghosts presence in the OT via edits in the PT? I guess the biggest problem is that if the jedi truly can transcend death, it creates even more plotholes in the PT. Why didn't Syfo Dias come back after his murder and tell the jedi what the hell was actually going on during Attack of the Clones. Couldn't Mace instantly warn the rest of the jedi. The fact that jedi don't truly 'die' - their soul remains on in a very instructional manner - could, potentially, completely change the way we percieve the PT. Their massacre certainly becomes a lot less moving, etc. Another possibility would be the heretical notion of altering the OT - which as Adywan has demonstrated, is less sacreligious than once considered - but the force ghosts are central to the entire trilogy.

Perhaps, with enough technical skill, a force ghost could be put into the PT. Reinsert a character by pasting from a previous scene... i dont know, it all sounds very implausible. Any ideas?

 

[Omaru1982]

Spence's superb edit does away with the ghosts from the end of Jedi which makes Vader's death all the more poignant.

 

[L8wrtr]

Well, even if you remove the ghosts at the end of Jedi, you still have Obi-Wan popping in and out helping Luke from beyond the grave in ESB, and even just vocally in ANH, so the problem remains.

The whole Force Ghost thing is an un-intended problem that Lucas created at the last minute in the final revision to the ANH screenplay. Up until the very last draft Obi-Wan survived the entire movie, after dueling with Vader he escapes with everyone else on the Falcon, and then along with Leia watches helplessly (uselessly) in the command center. Killing Ben is supposedly his wife's idea and makes great sense if ANH is a stand alone movie, but Lucas did always intend Luke to complete his training with Ben should he get to make any more movies. Yoda was created to fill the void left when he killed Kenobi off. ANH already established that Kenobi could communicate with Luke from the spirit-world, and then this was further exaggerated in ESB and so-on, which leads to the problems gugliemo describes.

gugliemo describes the Qui-gon explanation as being shoehorned in at the end of ROTS, and it is to a degree, but I believe that Lucas did actually plan this out when he started plotting out the PT. One of the biggest WTF moments of TPM, even more than medichlorians was that Qui-Gon didn't vanish when he died. Everyone in the theater was expecting it. Once that didn't happen, I figured that the explanation would arrive in Episode 3, it was simply too huge a question for even Lucas to not have a plan for.

In both the original script of ROTS, and in particular, the novelizations, this is handled wonderfully. Yoda is distant/distracted a great deal, (particularly in the novel) and is often meditating because he senses a greater, and familiar consciousness emanating via the Force which he cannot understand. Finally on Polis Massa, he breaks through while meditating and they actually communicate. Then in the briefing room in the Tantive IV, after Bail has gone, Qui-Gon actually reaches out and communicates directly to Obi-Wan, and this is the training that will allow Ben to become more powerful than Vader could possibly imagine. It actually worked really well and it is one of the things I find most disappointing with E3, because Lucas had actually conceived of something clever yet subtle that bridged a major issue between the PT and the OT. They even state that it is they who have won in the end because they have achieved that which the Sith have been trying to accomplish, immortality. The Sith had been focussing on cheating death by twisting/perverting the force (saving people from death/forcing the Force to create life).

But like so many of his PT ideas that were even somewhat well done, he gave-up on a quality execution of it and opted for the highly abridged crap that we got in the theatrical version.

Someone, I think it was ADM but I can't recall for certain, cleverly cut together Liam Neeson dialog and to have him speaking with Yoda in a few scenes.. it doesn't fully restore what Lucas had intended, but works reasonably well in my opinion.

Such a waste.

 

[Gaith]

They even state that it is they who have won in the end because they have achieved that which the Sith have been trying to accomplish, immortality.

Well, except in Zahn's wonderful Thrawn trilogy, it's established that Force ghosts can only stick around for a while before they, too, move on to the next phase... which I find awesomely poetic.

But yeah, Anakin's got no place becoming a Force ghost any way you cut it.

 

[FoolsFollowing]

Out of curiousity L8WRTR, how do you plan to deal with force ghosts in your edit of Revenge of the Sith? Also, are you considering doing any work on the OT? I may have mentioned it before, but I'm a massive fan if your edits of I and II.

 

[FoolsFollowing]

Ah yes, I forget Spence cut the force ghosts too. A very good decision IMO.

 

[TomH1138]

Great analysis, L8.

The PT needed to be constructed in such a way that Anakin would know how to become a Force ghost, so that the final scene in RotJ makes sense, but so he doesn't know how to disappear when he dies, which is why Luke still has to burn his body.

A really clever screenwriter could have come up with a way to make this work. Instead, we got Yoda's vague words tossed off to Obi-Wan at the end of III that explain basically nothing. Lucas might as well have given us a title card that read, "Poochie died on the way to his home planet."

Still, that's what fan edits are for, I guess. If anyone knows how to make a ghostly Obi-Wan, please share it with the rest of us. That's probably the best solution.

 

[Nic]

Part of me wishes there were an added scene in Return of the Jedi where Qui-Gon visits Vader, telling him he does not hate him for the things that happened...or something like that, I'm not entirely sure. Maybe it could just be him appearing for a split second, maybe a cut that shows he will pull Anikan out of the force. It's all very infuriating, and if fans hate the blu rays for adding pointless cosmetic changes, imagine the hate that will come from scenes or dialogue that actually have substance to them.

 

[TMBTM]

One of the things Lucas said about the force in "recent" interview is that the force itself slipts in two.

"Double" seems to be the key word when it comes to Star Wars in Lucas mind nowadays:
Master and apprentice, double personality of various characters (Padme, Palpatine), the entire saga is splited in two quite different parts OT/PT, the force itself have the dark side and the "jedi way", the main character of the saga (Anaking/Vader) needs to bring "balance" to the force...
Like Frink usualy said to mock the prequels: "Now they are two of them".

The force is explained by Lucas this way:
there are two sides of the force. Not just the dark side vs the "bright" side, but the Force AND the Living Force.
The Living Force is what you can physicaly do with the force. Mind tricks, levitation ect... And there is THE Force, the spiritual side of it. That deals with your destiny and the way you use it to make bad or good things.
I myself think that the midichlorians are more part of the Living Force in Lucas's mind. They basicaly just are receptors of THE Force that can help you to practice mind tricks, levitations etc... But midichlorians have nothing to do with WHAT IS the Force. The "true" one.

 

[Sunarep]

threads like this make me think that in 100 years jedi will be a real religion

 

[Tom Andrews]

I completely disagree. What was shown in Episode 3 was exactly what was needed. You are looking at it from the wrong point of view.
The scene at the end of ROTS is a lousy answer to a question raised by the OT and Qui-Gon not dissappearing from TPM. But that is the wrong point of view.

When watched in proper numerical order. There is no question to be answered. As we would have no reason to think Jedi disappear when killed. Qui-Gon dies about the way you'd expect anyone to die if they were stabbed by a lightsaber. Instead, the scene at the end of ROTS is simple and slight and is just enough to create a question. What does this mean? What is he talking about? The answer to that comes awesomely in the form of Obi-Wan telling Vader that he will become ore powerful than he can possibly imagine, and then he dissappears. That is a Holy Crap awesome moment now, where it used to be ho-hum all Jedi disappear when they die.

Lucas did the right thing here by not explaining it thoroughly. Thats the kind of cool extra stuff that is great for books and further reading. Cinematically its perfect as a tease that gets paid off in the next three films.

-T

 

[addiesin]

Well said, Tom. I like your perspective.

 

[L8wrtr]

Overall Tom, I agree, but I do think that he watered it down too much. It comes out of nowhere without any build-up, and I think that's one of the things which people find so aggravating. The way Lucas handled it was pretty much a deus ex machina where a hugely important reward is suddenly dropped into our heros' collective lap without them having done anything to earn the reward. The novel solved this by demonstrating that Yoda and Qui-Gon had been reaching out to each other until finally at the end, they breached the barrier. What would have been even better is if they had demonstrated in TPM that Qui-Gon was a highly scholarly/spiritual Jedi, constantly reviewing ancient Jedi texts with a far deeper knowledge than most Jedi. I believe the novelizations hint at the fact that Qui-Gon was this way, and that he sought to understand things which the current generation of Jedi simply took for granted, which also explains why he was so stubborn and had the attitude of "I will do what I must Obi-Wan" regarding why he didn't always listen to the council. He knew that blindly following a self-appointed council was not the Will of the Force, but rather becoming in-tune with the Force (which is exactly the same analogy which one could make with most organized religions) It wouldn't have had to been a major point, it could have been done quickly, efficiently and without much fuss, which then would have had a huge payoff at the end of ROTS. This way if you're watching the films in order, you get the important puzzle pieces in E1, then at during E3 you see Yoda struggling with something that he doesn't share with the rest of the council, and then finally it all clicks into place at the end.. and it also becomes bitter-sweet because we see that had the Jedi not been so arrogant, they could have avoided this. That's just how I see it at least.

gugliemo, thank you! I haven't done the film research yet, but I'm at a bit of a cross-road in terms of how to handle the Force Afterlife. My current structure for the ending of Episode 3 cuts out the conversation on the Tantive IV, but I've also been considering finding Liam Neeson dialog from other films to prompt Yoda to leave the Senate room when he's losing to Palpatine, and again when he's meditating on Polis Massa as was done by ADM. However, without the Tantive IV scene, it becomes a WTF.

Additionally, I've begun considering if there is a way to imply Yoda meditating in Episode II by repurposing the scene where Yoda senses Anakin's pain. I've never been a huge fan of the scene, and if I could put in some very echoey, ethereal Liam Lines, it would help build the case of Yoda working a long time to this.

So for now, I have no good answer to the ghost question