George Lucas (1) (1944–)

It’s been a long time since I read a proper Star Wars novel, and even longer since I read the original film novelizations, so even though I’m extremely familiar with the story it felt a bit like reading a whole new story. I was surprised that George Lucas actually wrote the novelization of the first Star Wars film, but considering that before the film was taken up by audiences around the world he was just a young filmmaker without a huge fan following and people to do some of the heavy show more lifting for him in terms of marketing. Lucas’ passion for his space opera story and his creativity is evident throughout the novel, even with his lack of professional writing credentials, so while we may be a bit underwhelmed by the choppy storytelling we are swept away by the story itself. What stood out to me most about the novelization is that while the surface action remains decidedly true to the finished film, we get a lot more character development from two of the minor characters who seem to play largely stationary roles - droids R2D2 and C3PO. They are the first major characters introduced in the book, and Lucas reveals many of their thoughts throughout the story, further acting to humanize the otherwise metallic robots and cementing them are far more than supporting characters alongside their human counterparts. Lucas also extrapolates on the galaxy that he has created, exploring the nature of Jawas, the Sandpeople, the Empire’s government officials, and the mysterious Force which act as the supporting backdrop to the fight between the Empire and the Rebellion which drives the plot of the film. These details are largely left out of the film to focus on the action and narration (and for practical reasons based on the narrative differences between film and books), but as a filmmaker trying to sell a pretty out there story Lucas is carefully building the realism that grounds his story. After this initial novel Lucas leaves the writing to established authors, but it was a bit of a treat to see his initial voice put to the page in comparison to the screen. show less

I'm very conflicted about this movie. I enjoy most of the scenes in it immensely in a vacuum (yes, yes, some of the Anakin-Padmé romance scenes are a bit hard to watch, but there really aren't that many of them), and it really showcases McGregor's Obi-Wan -- which might be my favourite character in the entire franchise. On the other hand, the plot makes absolutely no sense whatsoever, even by Hollywood blockbuster standards. Basically, the story is structured around a detective plot where show more Obi-Wan investigates A, which leads him to B. Something at B is weird, so he follows up, ending up at C. Something at C is weird, so he follows up, ending up at D -- but no link in the chain ever has any logical connection to two steps previously. The supposedly intelligent Jedi Master is just running around on a disjointed scavenger hunt (which additionally is full of information that is both pointless and even seemingly contradictory to the facts as established by the end of this film and the following third film), like an easily distracted goldfish, rather than investigate the attempted assassination that started the whole plotline off.

It upsets me, because with the millions spent on special effects, movies like this have no business not having had the few thousand dollars it would have taken to hire someone with a shred of attention span to go through the script or a rough cut of the film, and fix it with a couple of minor scene additions or ADR recordings so it made some semblance of sense.

But even with these huge gripes, I must admit I quite enjoy this film. In addition to Obi-Wan, there's a lot of character moments to enjoy: Yoda's ass-kicking, Dooku being deliciously morally ambigious, Anakin's beginning descent on Tatooine -- which is actually quite gripping -- and the ever-smug Palpatine, to name a few. I just which it did something more with them, so that the sum of the parts would be something greater than they are individually, rather than something distinctly lesser. show less

Star Wars: ****
If it was actually written by Foster, as Lucas admits in his own foreword, it should be credited to him properly. Especially since this book is excellent. It adds quite a bit to the original story, such as fleshing out Luke's life before his adventures began, and is a great read.

The Empire Strikes Back: *1/2
Glut managed to somehow both overwrite and underwrite this story; there is no reason to read this instead of watching the movie. It doesn't work as a good supplement to the show more movie - rather, it reads like Glut (poorly) improvising on the spot as he watches, with no particular insight to the characters or plot and nothing particularly interesting when compared to the final movie script. Terrible. Skip. It's a shame we couldn't get Leigh Brackett's version of what this story could have been as a novel.

The Return of the Jedi: ***
Kahn isn't afraid to actually create a story here, putting his own spin on things in ways that other authors (and the future movies) did differently, and the book reads much better for it. Characters actually have character, and there's more here than just the movie script with unnecessary additions like Glut's. Lando, for example, sees the world as a gambler, which makes sense for his character. Kahn even manages to patch numerous plot holes in the movie's final script, smoothing over some awkward things so they make a (little) more sense with the space he's given. Unfortunately, even he can't save the ewww incest between Luke and Leia from two books ago. show less

Star Wars as a whisky, adventure epic before it became the over saturated and bloated franchise it is today. A not too bad story written by an underrated writer (NOT LUCAS) Allan Dean Foster deserves more credit for his work.