Would These Make It Better?

[Lman316]

I like the Phantom Menace, and I'm not going to dispute that. But I just want to see what a lot of you would have done to change it, given the chance. However, you'd have to leave Jar Jar in it to pretty much the same capacity, . I just KNOW that's going to tick people off . If you had to redo part of the movie, what would you change? But leaving most of it alone.
I'll give a few examples that I've heard people would've liked, and then I'd like to see what other people want. I'm just curious about it.

- Qui-Gon was the apprentice and Kenobi was the Master. This leads to Qui still getting killed by Maul, and Obi taking on his new apprentice - after finding him on Tatooine (or some other planet, as some have wanted): Skywalker.

- Anakin was about 11 or 12. I had read someplace that Lucas made him 9 so that he would be more distraught when leaving his mother. But I think that if Shmi was the only family he knew, it would be just as painful at any age. They showed us this in AOTC.

- Make Anakin's part in the space battle more skillful rather than lucky.

- (One of mine) Get rid of Jake Lloyd!

Okay, that's what I've got. What other changes would you make to the movie, without changing it entirely?

[Darth Nihilus]

Turn Jar Jar into a serious character. If he doens't have anything constructive to add to a scene then just keep him in the background.

Take out R2's intro - god that was so trite it sickened me.

Change the purpose of the Podrace - A crucial part of an action sequence is the tension. You don't get that in the Podrace because the stakes are so high that there can be no other outcome. Keep it as a showcase of Anakin's skill, sure, but find another way to get everyone off Tatooine.

Cut out the colloquial language - "Brainless, braindead, wizard" have no place in the Star Wars universe.

Oh bugger - I'm too tired to list everything i would change.

[jjreason]

A lot of dialoque. AOTC apparently had a dialogue consultant.
"Now THIS is podracing!" No it's not. You're flying a fighter, silly.
"No matter what Universe you're from, that's gotta hurt!" Brutal, distractingly brutal.
I can't think of any others off hand, but there are more. If someone had just gone over this and been honest about how it sounded, they could have done a lot of good.

[darthvyn]

Originally posted by Darth Nihilus
Cut out the colloquial language - "Brainless, braindead, wizard" have no place in the Star Wars universe.

remember the line, "that wizard is just a crazy old man..."? that's from ANH...

however, i never liked the tarzan yell from chewie on endor...

[Darkross]

Originally posted by darthvyn


remember the line, "that wizard is just a crazy old man..."? that's from ANH...

however, i never liked the tarzan yell from chewie on endor...

C'mon the Tarzan yell was classic! The dialogue in E1 definitely has to go though!

[Mr. JabbaJohnL]

I say:

*More time and dialogue for Maul!
*No GD fart from the Eopie!

I liked the rest, for the most part . . .

[LTBasker]

I'd gladly get rid of Jake Lloyd and make the space battle more like the ANH run with having different Droid fighters - Regular ones, squadron leaders and "advanced" fighters for the Darth Vader/Luke type of suspense, here's how I'd play it out:

Anakin is flying through the battle trying to think of what to do then decides he should take out some those dish arrays on the control ship to try to take down the shields for the other fighters. Ric Olie finds out over the voice comm that it's Anakin in the Naboo Fighter then orders another Naboo Fighter to join up with him to flank Anakin for his protection so they do so and are trying to get Anakin to return but Anakin tells them that he can help because he has the force with him and so Anakin believing that he could do something finds an opening in the shields where he could fly into a hangar bay because of his shooting the arrays but some advanced droid fighters find this out so while Ric and the other Naboo pilot are following Anakin to try to talk him out of it the other Naboo pilot get's blown up so Ric is trying harder to get him to pull away but Ric gets nicked and can't keep the speed and Anakin goes ahead with it while Ric provides any cover fire he can from the advanced fighters figuring that he isn't a threat like Anakin is so they fly past him.

Anakin flies inside the control ship into a hangar bay with the Droid fighters on his tail and R2 helps him lock onto the main generator but he's still got the Droid fighters on his tail so he uses the force to guide him through the series of tunnels to the generator which helps him lose some of the droid fighters because they can't keep up with the twists and turns but that one advanced fighter stays on his tail when they finally get to the generator so when Anakin is getting a lock on the generator, the droid fighter is getting a lock on him due to the openess of the area but Anakin with the help of the force is able to fire at the generator without getting a lock on it which causes the huge explosion and a girder to fall on the droid fighter which causes it to crash into the exploding generator which Anakin then is able to fly out of a hatch in the same room the generator was in that was a droid fighter deployment hatch but since the shield got destroyed by destroying the generator then he could fly out and etc. etc.

It's more like the ANH trench run and the ROTJ chase to the core through those narrow corridors and if you played Starfighter on X-box or PS2 then you know what I mean by the tunnel system and destroying those arrays on the control ship. Seems more heroic and would be something to Yoda would consider to let Obi-Wan take Anakin as his padawan since he was able to control the force so much without alot of training throughout that instead of him just doing so because of Qui-Gon.

I'd definitely change a few Jar-Jar Binks parts too, I'd give him some more. Like showing up in General clothing at the celebration with the rest of the Gungan council with Boss Nass instead of just Boss Nass getting up there next to Padme for the ball.

[Darth Nihilus]

Originally posted by darthvyn
remember the line, "that wizard is just a crazy old man..."? that's from ANH...

however, i never liked the tarzan yell from chewie on endor...

Yes, but that was an off the cuff insult aimed at Ben's abilities. Kitster says it in TPM like "Cool", which I've never heard anyone use in that context.

[stillakid]

Originally posted by Lman316
I like the Phantom Menace, and I'm not going to dispute that. But I just want to see what a lot of you would have done to change it, given the chance. However, you'd have to leave Jar Jar in it to pretty much the same capacity, . I just KNOW that's going to tick people off . If you had to redo part of the movie, what would you change? But leaving most of it alone.
I'll give a few examples that I've heard people would've liked, and then I'd like to see what other people want. I'm just curious about it.

- Qui-Gon was the apprentice and Kenobi was the Master. This leads to Qui still getting killed by Maul, and Obi taking on his new apprentice - after finding him on Tatooine (or some other planet, as some have wanted): Skywalker.

- Anakin was about 11 or 12. I had read someplace that Lucas made him 9 so that he would be more distraught when leaving his mother. But I think that if Shmi was the only family he knew, it would be just as painful at any age. They showed us this in AOTC.

- Make Anakin's part in the space battle more skillful rather than lucky.

- (One of mine) Get rid of Jake Lloyd!

Okay, that's what I've got. What other changes would you make to the movie, without changing it entirely?

Everything you said, plus:

Use Jar Jar's life debt to the advantage of the story. Instead of being a lame "general," he follows the heroes into the palace and ends up becoming martyr to save the Queen.

Lose the Midichlorians as the cheap idiotic plot device to "prove" that Anakin had potential for using the Force. Instead, when he's showing off 3PO, have him reach for a tool, and instead of grabbing it, it moves "just an inch or so" into his hand where Qui Gon can see it. Subtlety is the key word here.

Lose the "podrace is the key to getting off the planet" plot device, and use the race as the way the heroes are introduced to Anakin (see him using the Force to fly) and he leads them to the junk shop right after the race. They pick up the parts and leave the planet. This does away with the silly slavery thing which was entirely abandoned anyway by Lucas in AOTC. Had Schmi died as a result of a "slavery" issue, that would have been a valid reason to keep Ani and her as slaves. Instead, it turned out to be a useless element in the saga.

More political sequences, probably pulled from the AOTC script, and less silly extended useless sequences (Pod Race, final battle) This would "loosen" up the time restraints in AOTC and allow that movie to become a better, more fleshed out story.

[chris]

There's alot of cahnges I would make, but the main ones are:
cut out some of the bad dialogue
change Jarjars character- he can still bea source of humor, without beijg annoying
change around the Tatooine sequence of events, including the poderace
and, change the space battle at the end, of all the things in that movie that i disliked, Anakin's place in that scene was really bad.