Star Wars: The Force Awakens

[Matt Defis]

Which is no longer canon although Omega squad do exist as they have a cameo in the Clone Wars series.

[TehStu]

True, which is a shame. The incompetency of young Knights thrust into the role of General was an interesting take on a group of people who are supposed to be goody two shoes. I haven't got far enough into Clone Wars to see if it's echoed there. Both definitely treat the clones as expendable, though. Suspect that's lost on younger viewers.

[Matt Defis]

The way the Clones feel about the war and how they're treated as commodities is definitely explored more as it goes on.

[And]

Oh, new Star Wars news.

Boring cartoon chat. Get your own thread you dweebs.

Do you want the puns back? Is that what you want?

[Fury4k]

Which is no longer canon although Omega squad do exist as they have a cameo in the Clone Wars series.

The way I see it it'll always be our Canon. This new stuff is a Canon for our children.

[RubberJohnny]

A little tidbit from that Apple piece, the new lightsaber "blade" was designed by Jony Ive:

And Ive once sat next to J. J. Abrams at a boozy dinner party in New York, and made what Abrams recalled as “very specific” suggestions about the design of lightsabres. Abrams told me that “Star Wars: The Force Awakens” would reflect those thoughts, but he wouldn’t say how. After the release of the film’s first trailer—which featured a fiery new lightsabre, with a cross guard, and a resemblance to a burning crucifix—I asked Ive about his contribution. “It was just a conversation,” he said, then explained that, although he’d said nothing about cross guards, he had made a case for unevenness: “I thought it would be interesting if it were less precise, and just a little bit more spitty.” A redesigned weapon could be “more analog and more primitive, and I think, in that way, somehow more ominous.”

[And]

Will there be a bit where the baddy can't get it to work because he's holding it wrong? Or will he need to charge it twice a day?

[Jumble Jumble]

You could get a job at the guardian with that shtick.

[Mr Cochese]

Are the Guardian not still Apple's unofficial PR department then?

[And]

You could get a job at the guardian with that shtick.

Nah, I can spell.

[Treble]

The only thing that should bother you about 'canon' is whether this means you won't get any more of a storyline - or characters - you like. Otherwise, ignore it - who cares what some fat middle-manager at Disney thinks is the 'right' direction to point the universe in?

P.S. Clone Wars thread is here.

[RJames]

How good are those? I've never downloaded them, I guess partly because I don't watch them very often, but also partly because I assumed there'd be constant egregious jumps to SD quality.

Just wanted to chime in and say that I think the despecialized editions are incredible. The special effects and model shots often look better than many modern sci fi films.

The tone and colour are just amazing too. Watched all 3 again with my ex- (who wasn't my ex at the time and hadn't seen them) and they were great (and she loved them).

Recommended.

[Sabreman]

Do those get updated regularly? I have a set from a few years ago, which I think are 720p. Pre-Blu-ray release.

[b00dles]

Are such things only available on the high seas? I very nearly bought the blu-ray release but I'd really rather do without stuff like the extended song in ROTJ etc if I'm honest but I'd still like to see them in shiny one thousand and eighty peas.

[Sabreman]

I'm sure they're easier to obtain these days, I think. I had to jump through some crazy hoops to get them.

[Glasgowchivas]

There's an 11 gig file with all three films sitting on kickass torrents right now.

[Mogster]

Do those get updated regularly? I have a set from a few years ago, which I think are 720p. Pre-Blu-ray release.

It's up to version 2.5 now, as of 2013 I think. It uses higher quality stuff from the Blu-Rays but it's still 720p.

I think BT is still the only way to get them, but there's talk of a higher quality physical Blu-Ray version on the way.

[dataDave]

I'm slightly crazy in that I'd really like HD versions of 1997's theatrical Special Editions. I quite like the additional CGI parts, and Palpatine's updated face - those were the days before Hayden Christensen, at least.

[Space Renegade Ulala]

Yeah, the annoying part is that there are some changes that do work and improve things, if only you could just approach it like a salad buffet and take this, not that or that, definitely have some of that, etc.

[Commander Jameson]

I really like a lot of the work in Empire. I think the updated Wampa, being an actual physical suit, works well. Likewise, the fixing of the compositing of the speeders is good to see. The Bespin stuff is not bad and probably a little dated compared with CGI now, but not offensive like Jabba.

[Alex W.]

Maybe it's just because we had Empire in this format when I was a kid, but I think the clean-up work they did for the digitally remastered VHS versions (pre-SE) was all that you really needed.

[glb]

I don't mind the souped up Death Star explosion in Star Wars, but the original syncs so well with the score - the strings twinkle in time with the burning embers of the destroyed spacestation. It's like John Williams did it on purpose.

Weren't there rumours of an official Disney BD release of the original, pre-SE versions? Guess their marketing will go into overdrive in the next few months, but those discs would be top of my wishlist (along with some new Star Wars Lego).

[Hanzo the Razor]

I'm slightly crazy in that I'd really like HD versions of 1997's theatrical Special Editions. I quite like the additional CGI parts, and Palpatine's updated face - those were the days before Hayden Christensen, at least.

Palpatine wasn't updated until the 2004 DVD editions. They filmed it while filming Revenge of the Sith.

I agree though and would love to have a Blu-ray edition with the original, 1997 SE, 2004 and 2011 versions.

[Mr.Crowley]

Updated Palpatine looks just as crap as he did in Revenge of The Sith. Just leave it the fuck alone.

[makkuwata]

Updated Palpatine is objectively better than the original. You're insane.

[Jumble Jumble]

I can't really imagine anyone being against the re-compositing of the snowspeeders. "No, it looked better when you could totally see that it was fake!".

As for the death star explosion in Star Wars - yeah, the original was better. Those weird disc shockwave things are just weird, like, they wouldn't happen, and it's just not so climactic an explosion. It looks too much like someone designed it, and not enough like something blew up.

[TehStu]

Yeah, it's an ILM signature explosion. Who knows how a Death Star would blow up, but it looked super odd when Praxis exploded.

[Davros sock drawer]

Updated Palpatine is objectively better than the original. You're insane.

No. Original is better.

1) It's weird and creepy

2) It actually looks like it was filmed in 1979, which is good as it matches the rest of the film

3) The new version of Palpatine looks worse than in RotJ

4) It's actually interesting that it's different to how he looked in RotJ

[TehStu]

This could have been simplified had he made Sith palp look like Jedi palp.

[makkuwata]

No. Original is better.

1) It's weird and creepy

2) It actually looks like it was filmed in 1979, which is good as it matches the rest of the film

3) The new version of Palpatine looks worse than in RotJ

4) It's actually interesting that it's different to how he looked in RotJ

1) Both are weird and creepy, only one looks like a living person and the other looks like clumsy rubber with monkey eyes composited on.

2) Nothing in that make-up couldn't have been achieved in 1979 if Ian McDiarmid had already been cast.

3) Not going to argue, ROTJ is the definitive Emperor look, but that doesn't change the fact the Empire update looks better than the original, and certainly a closer approximation to Jedi.

4) Eh?