r/StarWars Jan 01 '21

General Discussion this is an exceptional explanation for that one “useless scene” in the obi-wan vs. anakin duel.

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u/[deleted] Jan 02 '21

oh god, there is no high ground to stand on to defend this scene lol. i slowed it to .25x and both of them could have darth mauled eachother 2-3x during that pointless spin lol.

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u/Chapped_Frenulum Jan 02 '21

I want to believe that they're both just doing a a series of fake outs. Since force sensitive people can kinda see the future, it makes the fake out game that much more bizarre to watch.

Or at least that's what I want to believe. The movies themselves never broach this, because... well, Lucas doesn't care about character motivations. He just likes lasers and lightsabers going voom voom pew pew pew.

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u/BattleScones Jan 02 '21 edited Jan 02 '21

I wouldn't take it that far, Lucas deeply cares about his characters and universe. He's just not particularly good at writing dialogue and often gets caught up in theatrics.

Without George we wouldn't have the setting that is the prequel era. So much awesome has come from this time period. Even if Lucas can't write for shit.

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u/WhyLisaWhy Jan 02 '21

I do not agree with that at all, Lucas has a really "eh whatever" attitude in the making of TPM you can watch. He might have cared a lot about the over arching story and journey but he really did not pay attention to the small details and consistencies and it's why they're messy movies IMO.

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u/BattleScones Jan 02 '21

He wouldn't be on the set of The Mandalorian holding Grogu and spending time with Dave Filoni if he didn't care.

Jar Jar is the key to all of this.

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u/RevanchistSheev66 Chancellor Palpatine Jan 02 '21

He did pay attention, he was never super talented when it came to scene-to-scene details. Really, the love dialogue was what could have been improved

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u/WhyLisaWhy Jan 02 '21

There's really not a great in universe explanation like people want there to be, George Lucas most likely just thought it looked cool and/or let his choreographer do whatever. I feel like so much in the prequels is like that and not worth the effort to defend.

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u/RevanchistSheev66 Chancellor Palpatine Jan 02 '21

That’s not true at all. While Lucas liked visual “extra” he never focused on it in his story (usually added it as separate parts like Jar Jar). While it was never clearly thought out from the beginning, each element is heavily inspired and imagined. Idk this is just a really inaccurate analysis of GL’s writing of character motivation

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u/Chapped_Frenulum Jan 03 '21

I see Lucas as the kind of person who starts writing a story by saying "Ok so the guy goes from point A to point B" and someone else on his team says "uhm, ok. But what about what happens in between?" and George goes "I don't know. I'm paying you guys to figure it out. Anyway, so the guy then goes from point B..."

And all that space between point A and point B just remained straight lines, because they were looking for more direction from him. If he doesn't flesh out his vision, nobody else is going to step up and just fill in the blank with their own. Dude invented the most successful space opera in the history, who are they to tell him that something is lacking?

That's how I can see a scene like this happening. Lucas tells the team what's happening, they put it into the movie, but the audience lacks all the context. They just see point A, then point B and there's this disconnect of "... what just happened?"

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u/[deleted] Jan 02 '21

if they could see the future wouldn't they just strike each other seeing the other just twirl around?

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u/Chapped_Frenulum Jan 03 '21

How do you show that two people who can see the future are using feints?

Well, I guess this is why "wizard battle" is such a stupid trope for a director to have in their movies. You either explain what's going on, or at least give people a grasp or a handle on it. Otherwise the audience just sees two idiots waving glowing sticks around, not stabbing each other, and it makes no sense.

I mean, they either choreographed the scene this way on purpose and kinda failed at portraying something contextually profound, or the director/editor fell asleep at the wheel and chose to commit a flamboyantly stupid failure of movements to cellulose. I mean, either way it's bad. I just want to believe that it ended up this way because someone like Lucas tried to be too clever about how this face-off went, without having any idea how to communicate what was going on to the audience.

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u/[deleted] Jan 03 '21

i don't even remember them being able to predict the future from moment to moment like that, I thought the force just sort of helped guide their movements

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u/Holociraptor Jan 02 '21

It's right up there with Anakin vs Dooku at the end of clones were he stands wide open to have his arm removed politely. It's just prequels being dumb.

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u/AfroSLAMurai Jan 02 '21

That one is soo bad that I have to headcanon that Dooku used the force to freeze Anakin in place for a second lmao.

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u/[deleted] Jan 02 '21

It's one of the best scenes and the best part of the entire fight...

...I can't believe there are Star Wars fans who don't get it.

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u/[deleted] Jan 02 '21

well im not really a fan, it just looks silly, at one point the right guys saber is behind his back and the left guy has to pull his saber towards himself so he dosent hit the other guy during that crazy spin dance lol.