Dumbing it down

[Aiwendil]

The Saucepan Man wrote:

Also, the latest two instalments of Star Wars are a lot less smooth and do have a number of inconsistencies, which suggests to me that Lucas is not necessarily a better director than Jackson. They both have their strengths and weaknesses. But perhaps it is just a sign of the times, in that Lucas felt that, with the times-a-changin', more was expected of him and that he had to alter his approach to suit a more modern audience. (It is, after all, primarily only the Star Wars fanatics who have been up in arms about the recent films. Hmm, is there maybe a parallel here?

If I can say so without taking the thread off topic, I disagree. I am, it seems, one of the minority of serious Star Wars fans who consider the prequels to be on the same level as the originals. This gives us an interesting counter-example to LotR, for our appraisals of the new Star Wars movies seem to be precisely the opposite of our appraisals of LotR. I was disappointed with Jackson's films; you were disappointed with Lucas's. Perhaps this may allow each of us to better understand the other's opinion; the way you feel about certain points in the new Star Wars movies is probably quite similar to the way I (and many others) feel about perceived flaws in LotR. And just as you point to the popularity of Jackson's movies, I admit I am tempted to point to the box office success of Episodes I and II as an indication that their most vocal bashers do not in fact represent the majority view.

My point is that these inconsistencies don’t seem to have greatly affected the popularity of the films. Nor were they picked up in the many reviews that I have read, which I would expect if they were major issues to anyone but Tolkien fans. It just seems to me that the vast majority of people were not really bothered by them.

But I don't think that this point is in dispute. It seems to me that much of the argument here is at cross purposes.

I didn't like the films.

But look, they were popular.

But I think that this and that are grave flaws.

Well, other people don't seem to think so.

But I'm telling you, I do think so.

This, as you can see, is not really a disagreement at all.