I definitely think that the change of Anakin to be a teenager instead of a child should he’s been kept. It would make the character much better and also explain why he was “too old” to be trained as a Jedi
I said the exact same thing from the start. Think of an actor like young Edward Furlong playing Anakin. And he was about the right age at this time. What a missed opporunity!
@@Сайтамен The movie was shot in 1998 and when did the age stop an actor playing an older or younger character? I cannot say if Furlong was already in a bad state the years before, but I guess there could have been other actors around of the same capabilities as Furlong. And Furlong could play good persons as well. If I think of his character in T2 or even in American History X. He could play this type of character who has the possibility to be good or evil.
See this is the thing I can't stand about criticism of the prequels. Anakin being a kid doesn't hurt the story in any way. In fact almost none of the alternate versions I've seen fans come up with are better than George Lucas ideas. His overall story was good. The problem was his execution of that story. His dialogue & lazy directing style is the problem. A better director & a couple of screen writers would've cleaned up his dialogue & better directed the action, pacing & actors.
I always thought that having Anakin be this older kid, like 17 or so, would have made a great opportunity for romance between him and Padme, as he's this rugged, down to Earth, charming young mechanic who prefers living life in the moment. It also would have given his moonlighting as a racer a much stronger AKIRA-type vibe that would have really made him stand out as a lovable, roguish character. If he took care of his mother instead of her taking care of him, it would have cast his character in a much more interesting light come time for her to die. He would blame himself much more for leaving her to fend for herself and his rage would be more relatable later on...
Except that one of the main themes in Star Wars is nature v nuture, and if Anakin was 17, he wouldn't have the same kind of dependence on his mother, and neither would we see how he needs a father figure (Qui-Gon) not an older brother. The time jump also means Anakin will have had time to train, Palpatine will have had time to make his clones, Shmi will have had time to have been freed. There's also an obvious deeper link in how Anakin and Padme contrast each other. Padme uses diplomacy and cooperation, while Anakin relies on his instincts and ability - which he had to as a slave boy. It means that Anakin relies on his power (and therefore ego) instead of negotiating or compromising. In AOTC, we see how Anakin is eager to distance himself from the slave boy Padme met, and the shame and inadequacy of his former life. Now both Anakin and Padme understand the burden of political/Jedi life, and stifling pressure. She is also indebted to him for how he risked his life (twice) for her gain, and then saved her from assassination. While she wants to establish a rebel alliance, he relies on his own intuition and own powers. The whole principle behind Star Wars is that people can choose to do good or ill. There are no bad people; every person has a line and two sides of themselves. Anakin was driven to the dark side because of his arrogance, greed, ego. Anakin was manipulated by a father figure, as Palpatine drove a wedge between him and the Jedi, who repeatedly undermined him. Anyone who wants Anakin to turn because of 'PTSD from the clone wars' or a love triangle, or guilt over his mother doesn't understand the saga. And anyone claiming your post is 'much better' hasn't bothered to actually think about the creative choices Lucas made. Having said that, you are entitled to your subjective opinion.
@@Ruylopez778 That is literally the worst take I've ever read. You've essentially given an explanation for the plot, filled it with validations by appealing to random, disconnected things, then said it's "better" with a bow on it. It could have easily worked the other way without the ridiculous and forced subplots about a "father figure" which is debatable. Moreover, Obi Wan was more of a father figure, not Palpatine, so that's conjecture. And that was never the original intention anyways as they were "friends" according to Obi Wan in A New Hope. And your diatribe about the "contrast between Padme and Anakin"? Complete mumbo jumbo you pulled from your behind. And finally, "Nature Vs Nuture"? I mean, if you were writing a school project you could probably argue that it's there, but that's mostly projection from you. It's not The Wire, it's Starwars. You quite literally just said nothing of meaning and over exposed yourself as a mindless fanboy. Stay away from the pen 🖊️
What makes Darth Maul almost running Anakin over with the speeder so sinister is that you get the impression that he is so hateful that he simply does not care who the boy is, and that he is simply in his path, and that he is with his foe and therefore why not run him down.
That makes absolutely no sense with the movie. The whole point of having Maul attack Obi Wan and Qui Gon was to get Anakin to get trained to eventually be Palpatines new apprentice. Horrible writing.
@@rickwilliams967naw not at all, kill the child Mail knows Palpatine would replace him with. Mail would run over Anakin, killing him Obi-wan and Qui-gon. Then tell Palps “oops, seem the boy died due to the Jedi’s interference.” Palps … “what a pity”
Or maybe Anakin was just between Maul and Qui-Gon, and he didn't care? I dunno seems like it makes larger scenes less important by trying to make every little action have a hidden meaning.
Things I like about this previous draft... 1. Making Anakin older 2. Jar Jar 3. Anakin and Padme spending more time together 4. Anakin's actions being more deliberate Things I prefer about what we got... 1. The prophecy: I know it's a cliche, but the reason I think it works is that the Jedi's misinterpretation leads to their downfall. I like the complexity of the good guys being just as responsible for the Galaxy's fate as the bad guys. 2. The Gungun/Naboo relationship: I think it was smart of Lucas to keep that part of the story simpler as it is not supposed to be the focus. Also, this would have made Padme less likable which would make it difficult to relate to the love story (which ended up a problem anyways because of the age gap). 3. Maul: I get people wanting Maul to be more like the Clone Wars version, but I think what we got works best. The reason he is more talkative and developed in The Clone Wars is because he has spent so much time with nothing to think about but revenge. 4. Qui Gon: the more of this character, the better. It makes more sense for Obi Wan and Anakin to have the relationship we got given how it ties to Vader's resentment of Obi Wan.
Why is the age gap between Anakin and Padme a problem? He's a 9 year-old boy who develops a crush on a 14 year-old girl. When they meet again and become lovers, he's 19 and she's 24.
@strikerfc-gv7pc I’ve been a 14 year-old that’s had a child have a crush on me. I’ve also been with women more than 10 years younger than me. It’s not a big deal.
Others have made a good point in noting how robbing Obi Wan of the protagonist’s role in TPM also robbed him of a chance to establish an essential bond with Anakin. We never get to see this bond develop in the prequels because the two characters quickly split up after the first act of AOTC. When the two go at it in ROTS it doesn’t have the tragic impact it’s supposed to have.
I think Maul having so few lines is part of his mystique. Like Boba Fett what made Maul so fascinating to viewers were the mysteries surrounding him. The original draft does sound a bit like a soft-reboot of A New Hope honestly. I'm glad Qui-Gon became a more major character, but the original space battle sounded way cooler.
He has less than 6 minutes of screen time only counting the films and he's a character that's stuck with me for more than two decades. Less can be so much more for certain characters because actions speak louder than words. Qui-Gon is also a character that's grown on me more as time has gone on.
Just because The Force Awakens was a soft reboot, doesn't mean you can throw that at any Star Wars thing you dislike without the slightest clue what it means.
Indeed. The idea of Anakin using the Force to come out of hyperspace... because Ben tells him to...is too much of a callback to Luke in the Death Star run.
why is it good that qui-gon was such a major character? the prequel trilogy at its core is supposed to be about anakin and obi-wan. why spend most of the first movie developing this character of qui-gon and his relationship with anakin when you could be spending time developing the relationship between OBI-WAN and anakin? and then they kill qui-gon off immediately. that is so weird to me.
@@jacksonelh I think George Lucas created Qui-Gon for the purpose of showing how hypocritical and stuck in their ways the Jedi Council were. He is an outlier Jedi who finds unorthodox ways of doing things, but still achieves results. While the Jedi were right about Anikan's immediate future, Qui-Gon was right in seeing the eventual potential of Anikan in destroying Sideous. Qui-Gon also shows us how arrogant Obi-Wan is at a younger age and how he was not prepared enough to train Anikan as his apprentice. Qui-Gon being killed off early was done by George to show that Anikan's training would not go well under Obi-wan's tutelage. I think had Qui-Gon trained Anikan, things would have gone much better because Qui-Gon is more patient than Obi-Wan and willing to listen without persecution. I suppose George could have done away with Qui-Gon as a character and we would have gotten what many people wanted in a more Obi-Wan focused movie, but I think that removes much of the depth that George added to Obi-Wan by making him a flawed character. In George's version we get an entirely new perspective and a new character to appreciate. I think people dislike Qui-Gon because it robs Obi-Wan of a standalone film and people's perceived identity of Obi-Wan which differs from how George perceives the entirety of Obi-Wan.
Just imagine this: When they pull that off, they plunge into the ocean, which saves them from a fatal crash. Then someone with them points out that if there was land beneath them, or if they were even half a nanosecond off, then they'd be dead right now. Then he whacks Obi-Wan and Anakin in the head, saying "Never! Do. That. AGAIN!"
@Pirate Raider Aye, things should never be TO easy for a beginner. An admonishing with a little hint of respect from a respected elder would have been just right.
I’m so gratified to hear someone else talk about Anakin’s age. I’ve been screaming about it for 25 years: the romance with Padme doesn’t work in TPM. It works if he’s 13-15, a rebel without a cause, a risk taking grease monkey and thrill seeker… with elegant Padme as his counterbalance.
There was no romance in The Phantom Menace, Anakin had a crush on Padme since Phantom Menace and when they get reunited 10 years later that's when the first hints of a romance starts, with Anakin being awkward yet bold in his first scene with Padme. Anakin and Padme were simply just friends in Phantom Menace.
@@skywalkerorder2170 Now think about how much more compelling it would’ve been to explore that romance going back to TPM. Something irresistible for both characters that are raging with teenage emotions.
@@omorales81 not that compelling. much more compelling to have a young child be taken away from his mother and develop freudian and jungian complexes because of this, and then having the relationship with padme exacerbate that...leading to vader. your version is just a reskin of han and leia. with anakin it goes much deeper.
I appreciate Qui Gon having more screen time and story around him, as well as Obi Wan being more of a reluctant older brother figure to Anakin. But the age gap between Padme and Anakin really is just too much, and a teenage Anakin would've been much more fitting. It also would've made the thought of him being too old to be a Padawan much more plausible.
How is a 5 year gap too much? That is nothing. 18 year old girls sleep with 30 year old men all the time. And the romance didn't even start until 10 years later, when Anakin was 19, so wtf are you even talking about? Oh no, a 24 year old woman is too old for a 19 year old male; are you smoking crack?
@@jerryballstein I think the idea was that he's already attached to his mother, and that would cause problems. The Jedi Council did sense this in TPM, and in AOTC he DID end up disobeying orders to go save his mother and (when he failed) he committing an atrocity in his anger.
Does sound a little better, but tbh I like that Obi Wan is more of a brother figure and kind of has training Anakin forced on him, makes it so that Qui Gon was the mentor Anakin needed but didn't get, it also makes the end of revenge of sith more painful with the 'you were like a brother Anakin, I loved you' the bond between brothers I would argue is stronger than father/son relationships
@@user-vi4xy1jw7e Brothers bond allows to have a more equal bond between them than a mentor figure, so it creates a unique thing in the Jedi ranks, because even Obi-Wan sees Anakin as its equals, he do not feels above him, despite being his master at some point. This also creates a better point of divergence between the two, because two brothers can be really different, it doesn't imply a path to follow instructed by the mentor, and it allows for a better dichotomy in the OT, because now that the brother bond is broken, all of what is left, is only ressentment between the two and that's where the master-pupil bond is exagerated between the two. It's kind of like when a friendship is broken and you only see the most caricatural thing to then represent it. So overall, I think it's better that Obi-Wan was more of a big brother than a mentor.
The change from Obi-Wan to Qui-Gon as the mentor who discovered Anakin worked better for the story. However, it also created a plot hole in Return of the Jedi that once again made Obi-Wan less than truthful about how things played out. He told Luke that he discovered Anakin and was amazed how strongly the force was with him, and then took it upon himself to train him as a jedi. The original script is in keeping with this account. The change made that whole scene in ROTJ as awkward as "Vader betrayed and murdered your father." Also, with Qui-Gon as Obi-Wan's mentor, clearly Yoda was not "the Jedi master who instructed" him, as he told Luke in The Empire Strikes Back.
@@jonathancampbell5231 "When I first knew him, your father was already a great pilot. I was amazed how strongly the Force was with him. I took it upon myself to train him as a Jedi. I thought that I could instruct him just as well as Yoda. I was wrong." Not exactly the story we got in The Phantom Menace, is it?
I like a lot of what was going on here. I would definitely keep Qui-Gon In a bunch of the film, making his death more impactful, and the lessons he taught obi-wan and pass down to anakin. It would have been nice to see more chemistry between anakin and padme, who I think should have been more closely aged together, and interactions between anakin and obi-wan. Also, more Darth Maul lines would have been great, as in the clone wars and other media he doesn't act like this silent assassin. Also, Jar Jar binks being a funny but not annoying charfacter with real traits of seriousness and courage when needed would obviously have been a well-liked character by me. As for the medi-chlorians and backstory of the force, I am mixed about that, I wouldn't care if they made it more scientific or mystical overall, though I guess the latter if a jedi was describing it. Anakin being a more confident character during the battle scenes and who can prove his force powers in other ways would also show people his potential and not just an annoying kid.
Agreed on Darth-Maul and Jar-Jar and especially on keeping Qui-Gon to maximize the impact of his death. I think keeping Obi-Wan as a younger padawan also would allow for a potential attraction between him and Padme, which could give a more Camelot-type tension that contributes to Anakin's eventual downfall. I think it would also have been an interesting point if, either in the pod-race and/or in the final battle, Anakin demonstrates his Force powers, but in a frightening way (like crashing someone else's pod). So, he saves the day, but the concern is that he will be hideously dangerous if left to his own devices. Can't get on board with the midichlorians, though. Ugh...
Why Lucas insisted on people seeing a kid Darth Vader is beyond me. Probably wanted to sell more toys or something. The character's humanity could have been set up so much better with a teen/young adult actor.
-9 year old accidentally blows up an entire control center- 15 y/o blows up control center with the help of Padme and squadron during a well coordinated attack.
Jedi Knight Obi-Wan & teenage Anakin was what many of us expected. There had to been a love triangle for the plot to actually work, whether it be Obi-Wan or Bail Organa.
Its hard for me to admit this because The Phantom Menace is so near and dear to my heart...but I agree. Especially about The bit about Anakin being older. Makes sense. I love Qui Gon (favorite jedi) that would be my only complaint about seeing less of him in the concept film.
I like the idea of Padme being Anakin's gunner in the final act. We've always gotten indications that Luke inherited his piloting expertise from his father, but this also indicates that Leia inherited her marksmanship from her mother.
I like the Phantom Menace we got better. Fun fact: Benicio del Toro was cast as Maul, but dropped out when Lucas cut most of Maul's dialogue. But I love how Ray Park did the character, just this demon who barely speaks and moves like a ninja. The duel with Maul is fantastic.
I want to see the version showing Maul walking back to his ship on Tatooine, in his black robes, after flipping off his bike to fight Qui-gon. Didnt notice the bike kept going and wasnt seen in the over head shot did you? Yeah, he definitely had to walk home. 😅
The reason we didn't see the Clone War through all trilogy is because life of heroes didn't depend on it and it wasn't war for their survival as in OT, it was polotical game controlled by Palpatine from both sides. Separatists were destined to lose and Republic - take over whole Galaxy to become Empire, the ultimate purpose of the clone army was to eliminate the Jedi. Therefore only important parts were the setup for the war, how it started and how it ended.
This goes for everything involving the conflicts in the prequels. I think that's why so many people hated it, but it makes perfect sense. We already know that in the end the Republic will fall and Empire will rise, we don't know how and the how just so happens to be tied greatly to Anakin's journey as a Jedi, which was NOT what it was expected to be both for the audience and him. The Clone Wars, the origins of the CIA and the taxed trade routes that seemingly began all of the conflict isn't important at all, the political games, overly religious dogma, and a kid being chewed through it and spit back out was the story of the prequels.
If you had read Terry Brooks' novelization, it would've been a bit closer to what you want. For example, Anakin destroying the command ship was the first instance he realized the command ship reactors are that way. On screen, poorly handled. Novelized? Anakin, literally, finally touches the Force and was like, "Oh..." and allowed the Force to guide him, aka, your Skywalker moment.
I’ve always felt anakin should have been older in TPM. Closer in age to Padme to support their future romance and older to make him flying a fighter more realistic. And I too don’t like the accidental way Anakin destroys the control ship and that the battle droids stop working without the control ship
Or have padme as a child queen. Leave her diplomacy for part 2, when her and Anakin are teens. Have her as a helpless child, with diplomacy done by, say, and aunt or uncle.
I remember being worried in the mid-90's by some of the things George Lucas said about the upcoming prequel trilogy. Someone asked him if he felt boxed in by having already made so many statements about the past and he said that he didn't because he didn't necessarily have to interpret those statements the way that he had meant them before. It turns out that my worst fears have been realized. Though I had a good time with TPM for a while and still "like" it, I am overall greatly disappointed by it. Most of that for me is because it forever changed (and I think ruined) the relationship between Obi-Wan and Anakin. In Obi-Wan's statements to Luke he says that HE was the one to discover Anakin and that HE had been the one blown away by him and that HE wanted to train him. TPM flipped ALL this so that Obi-Wan didn't want anything to do with him and really only took him on because his dying master asked him to and he had given his word. I like Qui--Gon as a character but his being shoehorned in there ruined it all. I think the story is much better with Obi-Wan and Anakin becoming best friends at the beginning rather than it being more like step brothers who were forced together against both their wishes. We see no bonding between the two, then in AOTC their relationship is nothing but strained. We see them be buddies for 20 minutes in the beginning of ROTS and then they're back to being at odds with each other. Yes, we have The Clone Wars but movies should not need supplemental material. Also, Obi-Wan's regret in ANH would have been that much better because it wasn't that his master asked him to do it but that HE took the task on. His statement almost implies a situation where Obi-Wan, as a Jedi, apparently had a choice but may have been advised to pass Anakin on to a more seasoned master to train. It kind of puts a little bit of brashness and pride to Obi-Wan's younger self, which is commensurate with his statement to Yoda "Was I any different when you taught me?" to Yoda's statements about Luke being reckless. We never really saw the reckless Obi-Wan, and, of course, Qui-Gon's inclusion also changed the dynamic between Obi-Wan and Yoda, who was clearly the original master of Obi-Wan instead of simply being the Jedi Kindergarten teacher. Not that I'm a good writer (I had wanted to be for a while) but I've written out some rough drafts of what I thought I had wanted to see in the prequels and I hate to say it and I know they would need TONS of work, but I like my ideas better (though they were really just flesh-outs of Lucas' pre-supplied backstory). I guarantee that Star Wars is WAY too important to me as a 50 year old father of 4 (I was at the theater at 4 years old in '77) but this makes me very sad. If I ever own Disney's successor and buy the rights to Star Wars, I'm doing another canon flush and only the original three will remain with everything else being redone. If anybody doesn't like that, well...I"m sure you don't have anything to worry about :)
Obi-Wan is definitely reckless in the prequels. Case in point, the scene where he jumps out the window to grab that droid that was killing to kill Padme. Obi-Wan does this because he wants to one-up Anakin. Hinted in a conversation that they had before. OBI-WAN It's too risky... and your senses aren't that attuned, young apprentice. ANAKIN And yours are? OBI-WAN Possibly.
Obi Wan never said he discovered Anakin though and he was blown away by Anakins Midichlorians count and he eventually did want to train him. So no TPM did not flip any of that. Qui-Gon was not shoehorned in and it did not ruin anything. Nah it is better the way it is and they were not forced together they both agreed on it. Yes we do with some scenes on Tatooine and Naboo with them talking and interacting with each other. No it is not strained. Not really they are mostly good friends until Anakin turns to the dark side. And the prequels do not need it The Clone Wars just makes it better. Well he still did take the task on himself so it is good enough as is. We did actually, he did act impatient at times in Episode 1 and he got reckless fighting Maul after he killed Qui-Gon Jinn, he was also reckless in Episode 2 during the scene where he jumps out the window to grab that droid that was trying to kill Padme. Not really as Yoda still taught Obi Wan at some point as the Jedi kindergarten teacher and it was not even clear that Yoda was the original master of Obi-Wan as Obi-Wan never even called Yoda his master or main teacher.
In ANH, Obi-Wan also said to Luke that there was a student of his named Darth Vader who betrayed and murdered Luke's dad... Obi-Wan was already an unreliable narrator from the start.
@@onemoreminute0543I chalk that up to metaphor, with the 'Darth Vader' he talks about being the dark side in Anakin, eventually overthrowing the good in him, or 'killing' him.
The whole chosen one bit fucked up the relationship for me as well. Anakin should have just been a really talented Jedi who Palpatine got to. Anyways, I'm just glad I got to see Star Wars as a kid before any prequels or god forbid, Disney crap ruined a lot of the mystique.
The biggest mistake with Phantom Menace was that they didn't have Hayden instead of the little kid. The scene in the shop could have been hot young attraction instead of cringe crush. The highlight of the movie, the podrace, comes off as an amusement park ride instead of Darth Vader earning his spurs in a vicious, deadly Ben Hur like race which in turn would have explained better why the Jedi Council was leary of this kid. The climax on the Trade Federation ship would have seemed heroic, not stupid.
I think Lucas second guessing himself was a hint of his sensitive nature. Hes not the super confident person many believe him to be, his first draft was more acceptable but once he started trimming pieces its like he was running away from himself.
There were some changes Lucas made for the better though. Making Qui-Gon more prominent, making Maul more mysterious and having Obi-Wan as the reluctant mentor were the right decisions. I will admit the original script was overall better, its just with the aforementioned changes I mentioned TPM would have been an even better film. However making Padme prejudiced against a Jar-Jar who is actually heroic and not a bumbling fool would make her a bit unlikable as a character. The Midichlorians will always be controversial addition as some fans hate the concept while others like it.
I don't hate midichlorians, but god damn, they are dumb from a storytelling/aestheic/worldbuilding point of view. The Force, IMO, works much better as space magic than something to do with particles in one's bloodstream. Obi Wan's description in Ep. IV pretty much sums it up and need no further explanation. Even so, I just ignore them, as its only really mentioned briefly in the film and never brought up again afaik, and for good reason.@@madgavin7568
@@madgavin7568they could have had something a bit in between with Padme. If she doesnt value the Gungan then does at the end, without being a massive overt racist it would work well. Liam Neeson may be the only reason we like Qui Gon, if someone else does the interesting stuff he did, it would matter less if he was a small part
I love this rough draft version, I have been arguing all of these changes, (age gap, teenage Anakin, more aggressive plot) for the past 25 years with other Star Wars fans. Small details in storylines have huge effects on movies. Something as simple as changing all the Jedi outfits from brown to black would have completely changed the tone of the movie. I think George Lucas was to focused on making a movie for his kids and selling merchandise which led to him giving a G-Rated movie.
I honestly believe that if Lucas truly wanted to capture the spirit of the original trilogy he should have done the prequels right after he finished Return of the Jedi. His ideas were fresh at that time and would have worked much better.
One of many problems with The Phantom Menace was that we don't even know who the hero of the story is. Is it Obi-Wan? Qui-Gon? Anakin? Jar Jar? Nobody knows. It was hard to get behind any character. People who weren't old enough or not even alive in 1999 just don't know how much this movie divided and enraged the Star Wars community.
I agree with your assessment. It pains me to think of what we got instead. It hurts, growing up seeing the original trilogy in the theaters, only to wait 15/30 years to get the prequels/sequels that we got. Damn.
A lot of those would have been better unchanged, but Qui-Gon's bigger role, and Padme's role in the finale, are much better in the final version, I think, and that's enough for me to say I'm happier with the movie we got. The finale of Phantom Menace is the only time we really get to see Padme leading her people, and the fact that she has her own mission, with it's own challenges, and is able to overcome them, adds a lot more weight to claims of her competence. And I think she NEEDS to get that in Episode 1, because there weren't many opportunities for it in 2 or 3. Having her spend the finale piggybacking with Anakin would have made her feel a bit too close to being a damsel, to me.
I like the concept of Anakin and Obi Wan being older, but you can't recast Ewan McGragor. Beyond that, Qui-Gon is too great to be reduced, and Darth-Maul is best as a silent assassin type.
16 to 18 year old Anakin. Obiwan is a full fledged Jedi paired with an older Jedi Master due to the seriousness of the issue at hand. Obiwan and Qui-Gon could have both been trained by Yoda with Obiwan being his most recent protégé. Everything would have matched up with the original films. CP-3O could have been a Naboo droid in the palace thus his quirky protocol personality.
That's pretty amazing. It was almost perfect from the beginning. Subtract the love triangle and add more Qui-Gon and you've got it. An older Anakin Skywalker would have really made it, because so many other things just fall into place. And as a bonus it would have made the next movie far better, because then the Anakin-Padme romance would be infinitely more believable and less awkward.
imo it's quite a mixed bag, with Anakin being a little older (not too much so as to keep him as the somewhat reckless young adult he was in the next movies) that could make his relation with Padme more comfortable and relatable, and that added with them both in the N1 starfighter could make for some way better development than what we ever got in the prequels. But as for the love triangle i honestly think that's a horrible idea with Obi Wan's general (yes ik about Satine lol) respect for the Jedi way, and also just the fact that he's so much older than Ani and her. I'm also not a fan of Qui Gonn's potential scarcity since he was already not in the story for very long and his death would be even less dramatic. Anyway if anyone bothered to read all this just remember it's my opinion and i respect yours.
"Obi-Wans respect for the jedi way" He literally attacks unsuspecting people from behind without warning and goes on reckless adventures to save people he's built an attachment to. He doesn't respect the code any more than Anakin does.
@@chadbane167 so, first he linges at an unsuspecting General Grievous who has his back turned to strike him with his lightsaber, in the battle of Saleucami in TCW, he does it again in the Obi-Wan show, where Darth Vader doesn't even have his blade out. He goes on the reckless adventure to save Satine from Darth Maul in season 5 of TCW, because he loves her, despite the Jedi council not supporting this decision, he even said that he would have left the jedi order for her. This doesn't sound like respect to me.
@@dannyneufeld8846 now that I think about it you're right lol, but I still think the idea of a love triangle between them is a terrible one, for one thing because of his age and also the fact that he doesn't seem the type to damage relations with Ani over love
The story I came up with when I was a kid was that Anakin was Obiwans ilot because Obiwan isn't a pilot. He senses how strong Anakin is and decides to train him.
I heard as early as 1978 that there was a love triangle between Obi Wan and Anakain and Padme in the unmade first three chapters. That was the thing that would turn Anakin to the dark side.
It would've been awesome to give Maul more dialogue, but the problem is that Ray Park isn't an actor so his lines were kept to a minimum and the lines that Ray did speak were dubbed. There weren't many martial artists who could fit what Lucas wanted with the character and even fewer who could actually play the part.
So thats where they go the idea to come out of lightspeed above the surface in the force awakens. It's crazy that even the stuff that seems original in that movie still isn't.
It seemed that the Obi-Wan vs Maul fight was more interesting in original version. Obi-Wan, hanging by his fingernails, certainly didn't think Maul had the "high ground" so it would be useless to try !
It does sound like a better version of the film. The prequels would have been much better films if Lucas did not direct them. That was his biggest mistake. He just wanted to rush though filming them, wasn't interested in getting good acting performances and rarely gave actors a second take. He was much more interested in going digital and the technology behind the film and would have been better suited in the producer role.
The problem was not him directing and writing, it was he didn’t have anyone to question him or help guide him like the original trilogy. He was surrounded by yes people in the prequels and he didn’t have someone like his ex-wife Marcia to help him with the story like she did with A New Hope by fixing the Deathstar battle, killing Obi-Wan, and a few other instances that made the difference of A New Hope from being a boring silly sci-fi dud with no hope of a sequel to the magnificent franchise it quickly became.
@@JohnFourtyTwo For sure being surrounded by yes people was also part of the problem but that was Lucas's own doing. Same goes for the script, yes he should have had the dialogue touched up. But that goes back to what I said, he wasn't as interested in the details like that. I agree with most of your points but him directing was the biggest problem. Any errors during filming his answer was to fix it in post rather than to reshoot it. To begin with Lucas is a creative genius, but he is not a good director, its never been his strength. Add to that all the points I said before, it would have been far better to get someone else to direct. Even Spielberg offered to direct atleast one of them.
On one hand, I think it's a shame Kasden didn't take a swing at the script. On the other hand, from my understanding, it was Kasden that removed virtually all of the world-building and context from The Force Awakens. So who knows.
It may have come down to those removed as regurgitated to the original Trilogy especially now Knowing how Kennedy moved so wickedly behind scenes concerning everything from George etc..
It seems trivial, but if I had to point to a single decision that sent the entire prequels down the path they took, it would be the Jedi robes. You touched on it early in this video. Why are knights dressed like monks? The inspiration for Star Wars and its entire purpose was to re-create the space opera adventures of the Flash Gordon serials and others from that era. I always imagined the prequel heroes to have similar costumes: Something sleek and retro-futuristic. You see some of that in Ralph McQuarrie's early artwork for the original film, but you can also find it in the conceptual designs for the prequels. However, once Lucas settles on Jedi in robes, everything about the Jedi shifts and the gears start to grind in an audience full of cognitive dissonance about what they're seeing: Are Jedi knights or monks? They can't fight in their robes, so they have to cast them onto the and awkwardly collect them between scenes. Monks can't have romantic relationships, so there's a weird asexual chemistry of saving the princess and not getting a kiss (unlike the Luke/Leia exchange or the flirtation with Han), and then we're supposed to believe somehow Anakin is able to slip away from an order of mind-reading monks to sleep with the queen every night? And when she gets pregnant no one even suspects Anakin? The monk version of the Jedi caused so many problems for the prequels, and it really feels like it can all be traced back to the costume altering the role rather than underscoring the idea that they are Jedi KNIGHTS. (Note that the Clone Wars cartoons often appended armor to the cinematic costumes. No one saw the Jedi as proper knights, and subsequent creators retroactively modified the costume to correct for the mistake Lucas made.)
Saving the princess and then not actually having a sexual relationship comes more from knighthood than monkhood, actually. One of the ideals of chivalry was a dedication to a lady, for whom the knight quests and serves and has a theoretically platonic relationship with it. People being people, that wasn't always the case of course, most famously in the case of Lancelot and Guinevere. Honestly, Anakin's love for Padme leading him to ruin sounds like something straight from an old chivalric romance/tragedy.
Yeah I always expected Jedi's to dress normal or like Luke in RotJ. I assumed Obi Wan was wearing that big ass dirty robe in Star Wars because he was trying to look like a hobo and blend in with the farmers. Why wear his standard Jedi costume if he's trying to hide?
1:13 I've heard this criticism before. But looking at it from another point of view. It can show how little regard for life Maul has. He's so focus on catching the Jedi to attack them that he doesn't care who gets hurt along the way
This is incredibly interesting. It's got a lot of the points I've made over the years regarding ep 1. I think this would have been an overall better movie. Maybe add a little more Qui-Gon. Somewhere in between what we got and what you described was in the first draft. Since George is such a fan of editing his own work. Once Disney has finally finished tanking the brand, maybe he can buy it back at a discount and make the; STAR WARS PREQUELS "SPECIAL EDITIONS". And not totally eff them up this time around.
@Syliva, OK. So? I think we're all pretty used to retcons and changes in what's cannon and what's not at this point. It would all be worth it to have a GOOD version of the prequels.
@A W, I'd like to see those numbers. If they've made so much money off of Star Wars, why are they so scared to do more movies and only churning out TV shows now? TV shows which, with the exception of Mandalorian, have also not been well received. And at the point it seems Mandalorian is also on the decline. From what I've seen/read, b/t Marvel and Star Wars flops and the legal battles in FL, Disney is not in its best spot financially. They might not be quite ready to sell yet but never discount what could happen down the road if they can't right the ship soon.
Also, also. Who wouldn't want to be able to scrap the new sequel trilogy in favor of Heir to the Empire / Thrawn Trilogy. Honestly at this point no one would really care if they recast Mark, Harrison and Carrie. As long as they found ppl who were close enough, (Sebastian Stan, cough, cough) it would be a vast improvement over the trash that is the sequel trilogy.
I always thought as a kid way before the prequels came out that moisture farmer Owen was a Jedi in hiding hence why he was wearing the robes. There could’ve been a great dynamic between he and his half brother Anakin like that of Luke and Han Solo. Imagine if they both were students of Obi Wan?
I think that those robes are used because are so common and disposable, the jedi are against attachments, including material attachments. So maybe Jedi chose the most simple and common robes (like the ones of a simple farmer) to reflect that.
I like the idea of Obi Wan being the protagonist rather than Qui Gon. It streamlines the script more, it gives Obi a character we're familiar with more to do and develops him more. And if this was Obi Wan's first solo outting as a Knight, we could have kept the dynamic of the brothers which I think is necessary for their relationship and helps with the future films.
Young Anankin not showing "jedi skills" in Ep1? The boy could maneuver and pilot like a pro, as easily as he could blink and fearless. That was his force skill he could sense his way. Han Solo in the Falcon shooting him off of Luke during Death Star battle at the end of Ep4, he's shocked he didn't sense it coming.
My biggest problem was that they killed Maul (and him coming back after being cut in half is just dumb) they could have had him escape and be an additional antagonist in episode two...either he gets bested by Obi Wan and Anakin and they get their revenge ( so Maul still is mysterious but we get more of him) or they could have made him the main villain through the clone wars instead of Dooku and he gets killed in the beginning of episode 3. Also I always loved Qui Gon so, would have been cool if he died by the end of episode 2 and Obi Wan and Anakin still can build their relationship through the clone wars. I just always found it a shame we got so little of these 2 characters
Completely. Have his childhood be a flashback or something. When Phantom Menace came out was really looking forward to seeing this incredible pilot and Jedi knight, who was a good friend to Obi-Wan. Never really felt the prequels delivered on that sadly.
@@Panzer_the_Merganser The reason why Lucas stated he set Episode 1 where and when he did, is to show the Galactic Republic as it was before the empire. Thing is, he could've done the same thing with Episode 2. But yeah, AOTC, should've been Episode 1. That way George could've used Episode 2 to fully flesh out Dooku and Grevious, and show how brutal the conflict turned out to be that would end the Republic.
@@homelessjesse9453 Right just do a big flashback prologue, like in LotR, showing the Republic in its prime, then cut to the Clone Wars with Anakin and Obi-Wan kicking ass.
Midi Chloriens were actually part of the original concepts of the force in the 70's, I don't know why Lucas waited 20 years to introduce them, but they were there in the beginning; also, making Anakin as young as we got, helped make the separation from his mother, all the more difficult for him.
Georgey boy missed a trick big time which really screwed up Star Wars, although Disney has taken it to new lows never thought imaginable. There was little to connect with the characters in Episode I, so come Episode II there was little care already - then suddenly we're 10 years forward or something. Had it started with Anakin being older and not going so deep into a back story would have been a wiser move. George was too busy marketing CGI, than valuing Star Wars to pass onto a new generation.
I am someone who really likes the Phantom Menace, but there are definitely some cool things in this original script that I like better than what we got. Stuff like how the gungans are portrayed, Anakin actually using the force, and Anakin and Padme working together during the Battle of Naboo are really interesting and should've been in the actual movie. I also like how Obi-Wan is the lead character in this version, especially seeing as how he doesn't do much in the final version. Only downside is that we don't get as much time with Qui-Gon, making his death less impactful.
I always figured that Obi Wanand Qui Gon should've both been Jedi Knights but Obi Wan looks up to the more seasoned Qui Gon. Qui Gon is the one who sees Anakin potential first but Obi Wan says he is too old for Jedi training, Qui Gon promises to train the boy regardless of Councils choice but along the way Anakin and Obi Wan strike up a friendship so that when Our Gon dies at the hands of Darth Maul its easier to accept that Obi wan would take Anakin as a Apprentice because 1. his role model Qui Gon was going to and 2. he and Anakin are already friends. MAUL MUST LIVE this will give Obi Wan a revenge quest throughout the trilogy to chase after. Another thing never talked about is the fact that Shmi should have been mother to Anakin AND Owen with Anakin being older of course and Owen being born of a real dude and NOT Force sensitive.. the little brother tries to talk Anakin out of leaving with Obi Wan and Qui Gon to no avail. The core group of adventurers in this film should've been Qui Gon as the wise mentor, Obi Wan as the brash young Knight, Padme as the headstrong young leader, Anakin as the kind yet adventurous slave that they meet along the way and they first three shouldn't have been separated once landing on Tatooine.
Honestly, this was a way better script than what we originally got. Still I rather have the Qui Gon having more screen time with an older Anakin than a kid Anakin. With Anakin Older in this version of the story, then it would have save time, Truma and money towards the original kid. Also I am so in for a more heroic Jar Jar in this script.
Coming from someone that likes the version of Episode I that we got, I actually like this version of the script more. It is more similar to the original trilogy and it does an awesome job at painting a picture of what Obi-Wan was like prior to the events of the original trilogy.
I prefer the movie we've got now. Lucas did the EXACT opposite, what did Disney with The Force Awakens. Going the safe route with callbacks. The romance between Anakin and Padme was to me always more like a "child crush" from Anakins side. I also like that Anakin was seeing the force different in form of visions. His "deams". Also he bested that test in the council. His progession with the force was more humble, what I totally get.
While I agree the Gungan racial tension is heavily sedated in the final film, I always kind of assumed the strained relationship was related to some sort of societal strain.
Lucas is a master plot writer, apart from the script and delivery, every idea in the trilogy is fascinating. He should have had someone else write the script and direct.
Holy hell. That would have been, atleast, an INTERESTING movie. Much better than the one we got. Problem still persists in the SCRIPT. Which Lucas penned himself, while afterwards admitting he is not very good at writing dialog. So yes this sounds like a way better movie, i think the script still would have killed it, at least for me.
I honestly think the bigger issue is not Anakin's age but the fact that Natalie Portman does not come off as a 14 year old (she was around 16 at the time of filming). Two years is a big difference when you're talking about the early teens and you could be forgiven for thinking Padme is alot older than she's supposed to be. It really undercuts not just the Anakin Padme romance, but also how out of her depth Padme is really supposed to be in the story and the surprise when she turns it around at the end of the story. I think younger Anakin really works for what they were going for, showing the character at his most innocent and optimistic...something you wouldn't have gotten with a thirteen or fourteen year old. Beyond that though the prequels really suffer from too much happening off screen. There was a lot more narrative ground to cover than three films could really do justice to. Its not a coincidence that the prequels were re-appraised by fans after Clone Wars came out and added the additional context that the theatrical experience was missing.
This would have improved the film a ton! Much better script! I agree - this is TPM we should have gotten. While it's kind of sad that we lose the larger part that Qui-Gon has, I believe he feels more important in the movie we got because the rest of the film suffers so. In the script you talk about, I doubt the character would have been missed.
I was always under the impression that, while ambiguous, the implication was that Anakin was SO strong with the Force that his ‘accidentally’ torpedoing the command ship was anything but, even if he didn’t consciously realize it. “In my experience, there’s no such thing as Luck.”
my main gripe with Anakin building C3PO is that Anakin is a mechanic, yet he builds a protocol droid. Padme is a diplomat, yet she has the astromech droid, the one used for repairs. It should've been reversed. Anakin should've built R2D2, while C3PO should've been around on Padme's ship when they escaped Naboo
Whilst I like the idea of complicating the relationship between the Gunguns and the Naboo, doing so my making Padme overtly racist towards a *less* annoying and heroic childlike Jar-Jar, might have made her rather unlikable. Perhaps if they'd leant into her relative youth and inexperience, and made her naive to the problems of her homeworld, thereby making her leadership role in the destruction of the Federation an arc of hers. Having teenage Anakin makes much more sense, and honestly I love the idea of the two piloting a ship together. The sequel Trilogy had its problems, but Finn and Rey blasting Tie-Fighters together when escaping Jakuu - and subsequent attempts to give the other all the credit for their escape - is one of my favourite moments in all of Star Wars.
Pretty much everything about this version is an improvement compared to what we got, and with a few tweaks would have been a fantastic introduction to the prequels. Making Obi-Wan a freshly minted Jedi Knight on his first assignment without his master would have split the difference perfectly between "father figure" and "reluctant mentor", especially if Anakin is a bit older too. Plus Obi-Wan being dressed in black like Luke in RotJ before disguising himself in robes makes infinitely more sense than Jedi dressing like they're on Tatooine all the time. Tone down Jar Jar too and he'd fit in with Obi-Wan putting together his crew of Padme, Panaka, Anakin and eventually Qui-Gon for a return to Naboo before facing off with Maul. That's the kind of twist on the Star Wars formula that would have felt familiar but still had enough that's new.
2:18 I have to point out, the age gap between Anakin and Padme isn't really that great, as it's only 5 years after all. In Phantom Menace, Anakin is 9 and Padme is 14. In Attack of the Clones, which is set 10 years after, they are respectfully 19yo and 24yo. To me that sounds like a normal couple in Attack of the Clones, considering their "romance" didn't really start yet in Phantom Menace. On another point, when it comes to Mace Windu saying "He's too old", it does make sense considering Jedi start their training anywhere between ages 4-8. So Anakin indeed was too old to become a youngling, but just old/young enough to become Obi Wan's padawan, ofc having to still learn everything a youngling would.
@@MrJGamer no natalie was 17 when they were shooting and jake was 9 thats why its looks wierd the way it is i get natalie is short but her face is really mature. i thjink 9 is too young 12-13 is perfect lines up with padme
I always felt that having Anakin older really would have made The Phantom Menace a much better film. Having him and Padme work together during the final battle would have made for a much more powerful ending than what we'd gotten. Plus it would have been better to have had the same actor portray Anakin throughout the entire trilogy. Not being in the first film really took away Hayden Christensen's opportunity to show the full rage of his character arc.
This makes me sad for what could have been. I’ve always had a nagging feeling that what was implied in the original trilogy was not delivered in the prequels. And now to hear he had an entire treatment of the first film that seems like it would have at least started them out in the right direction… 😞
Its a mixed bag. Qui Gons role as something of a grey jedi really helps give a Ben Kenobi mentor role to the film while also juxtaposing a young and inexperienced Obi Wan to the man he'll later become. Maul's quiet and menacing minimal screen time is what made him such a fan favorite like Boba even if him sticking around could have been better. The duel of the fates is a near masterpiece of every component of production and it really works as Obi wans coming of age, showing what a jedi Master can do, and all this slow burn into a sith in his prime and the dual lightsaber reveal. Racism toward Gungans might have come across a little heavy handed but also might have made turned the audience against Padme too.
I wish Lucas would have just made episodes 6,7& 8 starting in 99 and then Disney could have made the prequels. It would have worked because it wouldn't have to be 30 years later but 16 years later. Hamill , Fisher and Ford were all young enough in 99 to be the main characters
For me, if i could have ONE THING to take out of The Phantom Menace, it wouldn't be Jar Jar. It would be C3PO. It's enough of a coincidence that Luke happens to grow up on the same planet as Anakin/Darth did. It's even crazier that Luke, years later, just happens to acquire the droid that his dad built before he turned evil. 🙄
Seeing the Disney sequels, with Rey "Mary Sue" Skywalker-Palpatine, made me appreciate the prequels even more. Even that bumbling idiot Jar Jar can do no wrong.
I definitely think that the change of Anakin to be a teenager instead of a child should he’s been kept. It would make the character much better and also explain why he was “too old” to be trained as a Jedi
I said the exact same thing from the start. Think of an actor like young Edward Furlong playing Anakin. And he was about the right age at this time. What a missed opporunity!
@@oliverhaake7552 Furlong was 21 in 1999 and already drug addicted.
George Lucas wanted to show that even Darth Vader was once an innocent naive boy loving his mom, that anyone can become evil.
@@Сайтамен The movie was shot in 1998 and when did the age stop an actor playing an older or younger character?
I cannot say if Furlong was already in a bad state the years before, but I guess there could have been other actors around of the same capabilities as Furlong.
And Furlong could play good persons as well. If I think of his character in T2 or even in American History X. He could play this type of character who has the possibility to be good or evil.
See this is the thing I can't stand about criticism of the prequels. Anakin being a kid doesn't hurt the story in any way. In fact almost none of the alternate versions I've seen fans come up with are better than George Lucas ideas. His overall story was good. The problem was his execution of that story. His dialogue & lazy directing style is the problem. A better director & a couple of screen writers would've cleaned up his dialogue & better directed the action, pacing & actors.
I always thought that having Anakin be this older kid, like 17 or so, would have made a great opportunity for romance between him and Padme, as he's this rugged, down to Earth, charming young mechanic who prefers living life in the moment. It also would have given his moonlighting as a racer a much stronger AKIRA-type vibe that would have really made him stand out as a lovable, roguish character. If he took care of his mother instead of her taking care of him, it would have cast his character in a much more interesting light come time for her to die. He would blame himself much more for leaving her to fend for herself and his rage would be more relatable later on...
Congrats, you just put 10x as much thought and narrative chops into the story than Lucas ever did.
Nice! Sounds good. Here’s me now wishing you wrote the script.
No. Lucas wants the rage to be against the Jedi not himself.
Except that one of the main themes in Star Wars is nature v nuture, and if Anakin was 17, he wouldn't have the same kind of dependence on his mother, and neither would we see how he needs a father figure (Qui-Gon) not an older brother. The time jump also means Anakin will have had time to train, Palpatine will have had time to make his clones, Shmi will have had time to have been freed.
There's also an obvious deeper link in how Anakin and Padme contrast each other. Padme uses diplomacy and cooperation, while Anakin relies on his instincts and ability - which he had to as a slave boy. It means that Anakin relies on his power (and therefore ego) instead of negotiating or compromising. In AOTC, we see how Anakin is eager to distance himself from the slave boy Padme met, and the shame and inadequacy of his former life. Now both Anakin and Padme understand the burden of political/Jedi life, and stifling pressure. She is also indebted to him for how he risked his life (twice) for her gain, and then saved her from assassination. While she wants to establish a rebel alliance, he relies on his own intuition and own powers.
The whole principle behind Star Wars is that people can choose to do good or ill. There are no bad people; every person has a line and two sides of themselves. Anakin was driven to the dark side because of his arrogance, greed, ego. Anakin was manipulated by a father figure, as Palpatine drove a wedge between him and the Jedi, who repeatedly undermined him. Anyone who wants Anakin to turn because of 'PTSD from the clone wars' or a love triangle, or guilt over his mother doesn't understand the saga.
And anyone claiming your post is 'much better' hasn't bothered to actually think about the creative choices Lucas made. Having said that, you are entitled to your subjective opinion.
@@Ruylopez778 That is literally the worst take I've ever read. You've essentially given an explanation for the plot, filled it with validations by appealing to random, disconnected things, then said it's "better" with a bow on it.
It could have easily worked the other way without the ridiculous and forced subplots about a "father figure" which is debatable. Moreover, Obi Wan was more of a father figure, not Palpatine, so that's conjecture. And that was never the original intention anyways as they were "friends" according to Obi Wan in A New Hope.
And your diatribe about the "contrast between Padme and Anakin"? Complete mumbo jumbo you pulled from your behind. And finally, "Nature Vs Nuture"? I mean, if you were writing a school project you could probably argue that it's there, but that's mostly projection from you. It's not The Wire, it's Starwars.
You quite literally just said nothing of meaning and over exposed yourself as a mindless fanboy. Stay away from the pen 🖊️
What makes Darth Maul almost running Anakin over with the speeder so sinister is that you get the impression that he is so hateful that he simply does not care who the boy is, and that he is simply in his path, and that he is with his foe and therefore why not run him down.
I agree ☝️ Ditto 💯
That makes absolutely no sense with the movie. The whole point of having Maul attack Obi Wan and Qui Gon was to get Anakin to get trained to eventually be Palpatines new apprentice. Horrible writing.
@@rickwilliams967naw not at all, kill the child Mail knows Palpatine would replace him with.
Mail would run over Anakin, killing him Obi-wan and Qui-gon. Then tell Palps “oops, seem the boy died due to the Jedi’s interference.”
Palps … “what a pity”
It's almost as if Darf Maul is a bad guy that does bad things.
Or maybe Anakin was just between Maul and Qui-Gon, and he didn't care? I dunno seems like it makes larger scenes less important by trying to make every little action have a hidden meaning.
Things I like about this previous draft...
1. Making Anakin older
2. Jar Jar
3. Anakin and Padme spending more time together
4. Anakin's actions being more deliberate
Things I prefer about what we got...
1. The prophecy: I know it's a cliche, but the reason I think it works is that the Jedi's misinterpretation leads to their downfall. I like the complexity of the good guys being just as responsible for the Galaxy's fate as the bad guys.
2. The Gungun/Naboo relationship: I think it was smart of Lucas to keep that part of the story simpler as it is not supposed to be the focus. Also, this would have made Padme less likable which would make it difficult to relate to the love story (which ended up a problem anyways because of the age gap).
3. Maul: I get people wanting Maul to be more like the Clone Wars version, but I think what we got works best. The reason he is more talkative and developed in The Clone Wars is because he has spent so much time with nothing to think about but revenge.
4. Qui Gon: the more of this character, the better. It makes more sense for Obi Wan and Anakin to have the relationship we got given how it ties to Vader's resentment of Obi Wan.
5-6 years is really not that big an age gap between adults. And since that's when their romance starts, I don't think it's really so bad.
Why is the age gap between Anakin and Padme a problem? He's a 9 year-old boy who develops a crush on a 14 year-old girl. When they meet again and become lovers, he's 19 and she's 24.
@strikerfc-gv7pc I’ve been a 14 year-old that’s had a child have a crush on me. I’ve also been with women more than 10 years younger than me. It’s not a big deal.
Qui Gons part was expanded when Liam Neisan expressed interest. George rewrote it for him.
Just as well, because Qui-Gon was easily one of the best parts of the film.
@@madgavin7568 Agree.
Do you have a source for that?
Qui Gon was supposed to be an old man, like Alec Guinness.
Others have made a good point in noting how robbing Obi Wan of the protagonist’s role in TPM also robbed him of a chance to establish an essential bond with Anakin. We never get to see this bond develop in the prequels because the two characters quickly split up after the first act of AOTC. When the two go at it in ROTS it doesn’t have the tragic impact it’s supposed to have.
I think Maul having so few lines is part of his mystique. Like Boba Fett what made Maul so fascinating to viewers were the mysteries surrounding him. The original draft does sound a bit like a soft-reboot of A New Hope honestly. I'm glad Qui-Gon became a more major character, but the original space battle sounded way cooler.
He has less than 6 minutes of screen time only counting the films and he's a character that's stuck with me for more than two decades. Less can be so much more for certain characters because actions speak louder than words. Qui-Gon is also a character that's grown on me more as time has gone on.
Just because The Force Awakens was a soft reboot, doesn't mean you can throw that at any Star Wars thing you dislike without the slightest clue what it means.
Indeed. The idea of Anakin using the Force to come out of hyperspace... because Ben tells him to...is too much of a callback to Luke in the Death Star run.
why is it good that qui-gon was such a major character? the prequel trilogy at its core is supposed to be about anakin and obi-wan. why spend most of the first movie developing this character of qui-gon and his relationship with anakin when you could be spending time developing the relationship between OBI-WAN and anakin? and then they kill qui-gon off immediately. that is so weird to me.
@@jacksonelh I think George Lucas created Qui-Gon for the purpose of showing how hypocritical and stuck in their ways the Jedi Council were. He is an outlier Jedi who finds unorthodox ways of doing things, but still achieves results. While the Jedi were right about Anikan's immediate future, Qui-Gon was right in seeing the eventual potential of Anikan in destroying Sideous. Qui-Gon also shows us how arrogant Obi-Wan is at a younger age and how he was not prepared enough to train Anikan as his apprentice. Qui-Gon being killed off early was done by George to show that Anikan's training would not go well under Obi-wan's tutelage. I think had Qui-Gon trained Anikan, things would have gone much better because Qui-Gon is more patient than Obi-Wan and willing to listen without persecution. I suppose George could have done away with Qui-Gon as a character and we would have gotten what many people wanted in a more Obi-Wan focused movie, but I think that removes much of the depth that George added to Obi-Wan by making him a flawed character. In George's version we get an entirely new perspective and a new character to appreciate. I think people dislike Qui-Gon because it robs Obi-Wan of a standalone film and people's perceived identity of Obi-Wan which differs from how George perceives the entirety of Obi-Wan.
An older version of anakin pulling off that hyperspace stunt would’ve been cool asf. Hearing how much cool shit got cut genuinely annoys me.
JJ Abrams must have read that script because Han Solo does that in episode 7.
Just imagine this: When they pull that off, they plunge into the ocean, which saves them from a fatal crash. Then someone with them points out that if there was land beneath them, or if they were even half a nanosecond off, then they'd be dead right now. Then he whacks Obi-Wan and Anakin in the head, saying "Never! Do. That. AGAIN!"
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@@ricopena2053 Yeah.
It just makes a hell of a lot less sense
@Pirate Raider Aye, things should never be TO easy for a beginner. An admonishing with a little hint of respect from a respected elder would have been just right.
I’m so gratified to hear someone else talk about Anakin’s age. I’ve been screaming about it for 25 years: the romance with Padme doesn’t work in TPM. It works if he’s 13-15, a rebel without a cause, a risk taking grease monkey and thrill seeker… with elegant Padme as his counterbalance.
There was no romance in The Phantom Menace, Anakin had a crush on Padme since Phantom Menace and when they get reunited 10 years later that's when the first hints of a romance starts, with Anakin being awkward yet bold in his first scene with Padme. Anakin and Padme were simply just friends in Phantom Menace.
@@skywalkerorder2170 Now think about how much more compelling it would’ve been to explore that romance going back to TPM. Something irresistible for both characters that are raging with teenage emotions.
@@omorales81 19 and 25 is still that age.
@@omorales81 not that compelling. much more compelling to have a young child be taken away from his mother and develop freudian and jungian complexes because of this, and then having the relationship with padme exacerbate that...leading to vader. your version is just a reskin of han and leia. with anakin it goes much deeper.
The got together when he was 19 and she was ~31 , that's not exactly unheard of, just look at Achraf Hakimi
I appreciate Qui Gon having more screen time and story around him, as well as Obi Wan being more of a reluctant older brother figure to Anakin. But the age gap between Padme and Anakin really is just too much, and a teenage Anakin would've been much more fitting. It also would've made the thought of him being too old to be a Padawan much more plausible.
I mean why even include the “too old” shtick again, it served no real purpose in the movie
Padme is supposed to be 14 in the movie (was 15 when cast, 16 by the time of shooting).
How is a 5 year gap too much? That is nothing. 18 year old girls sleep with 30 year old men all the time. And the romance didn't even start until 10 years later, when Anakin was 19, so wtf are you even talking about? Oh no, a 24 year old woman is too old for a 19 year old male; are you smoking crack?
@@jerryballstein I think the idea was that he's already attached to his mother, and that would cause problems. The Jedi Council did sense this in TPM, and in AOTC he DID end up disobeying orders to go save his mother and (when he failed) he committing an atrocity in his anger.
no shes not
Making Anakin older is the main thing that needed to happen and making Jar Jar purposefully capable instead of poor comedic relief.
Jar Jar could still have been comical without being a moron. (Like Han Solo, for example.)
exactly @@chrism1503
@chrism1503 Maybe something alike the Demoman from tf2
Does sound a little better, but tbh I like that Obi Wan is more of a brother figure and kind of has training Anakin forced on him, makes it so that Qui Gon was the mentor Anakin needed but didn't get, it also makes the end of revenge of sith more painful with the 'you were like a brother Anakin, I loved you' the bond between brothers I would argue is stronger than father/son relationships
A bond between brothers is stronger? It honestly depends on the father, son, brother, no?
@@user-vi4xy1jw7e Brothers bond allows to have a more equal bond between them than a mentor figure, so it creates a unique thing in the Jedi ranks, because even Obi-Wan sees Anakin as its equals, he do not feels above him, despite being his master at some point. This also creates a better point of divergence between the two, because two brothers can be really different, it doesn't imply a path to follow instructed by the mentor, and it allows for a better dichotomy in the OT, because now that the brother bond is broken, all of what is left, is only ressentment between the two and that's where the master-pupil bond is exagerated between the two. It's kind of like when a friendship is broken and you only see the most caricatural thing to then represent it. So overall, I think it's better that Obi-Wan was more of a big brother than a mentor.
The change from Obi-Wan to Qui-Gon as the mentor who discovered Anakin worked better for the story. However, it also created a plot hole in Return of the Jedi that once again made Obi-Wan less than truthful about how things played out. He told Luke that he discovered Anakin and was amazed how strongly the force was with him, and then took it upon himself to train him as a jedi. The original script is in keeping with this account. The change made that whole scene in ROTJ as awkward as "Vader betrayed and murdered your father." Also, with Qui-Gon as Obi-Wan's mentor, clearly Yoda was not "the Jedi master who instructed" him, as he told Luke in The Empire Strikes Back.
@@davidpowell9218 ObiWan never says that he was the one to discover Anakin in RotJ.
@@jonathancampbell5231 "When I first knew him, your father was already a great pilot. I was amazed how strongly the Force was with him. I took it upon myself to train him as a Jedi. I thought that I could instruct him just as well as Yoda. I was wrong."
Not exactly the story we got in The Phantom Menace, is it?
I like a lot of what was going on here. I would definitely keep Qui-Gon In a bunch of the film, making his death more impactful, and the lessons he taught obi-wan and pass down to anakin. It would have been nice to see more chemistry between anakin and padme, who I think should have been more closely aged together, and interactions between anakin and obi-wan. Also, more Darth Maul lines would have been great, as in the clone wars and other media he doesn't act like this silent assassin. Also, Jar Jar binks being a funny but not annoying charfacter with real traits of seriousness and courage when needed would obviously have been a well-liked character by me. As for the medi-chlorians and backstory of the force, I am mixed about that, I wouldn't care if they made it more scientific or mystical overall, though I guess the latter if a jedi was describing it. Anakin being a more confident character during the battle scenes and who can prove his force powers in other ways would also show people his potential and not just an annoying kid.
Agreed on Darth-Maul and Jar-Jar and especially on keeping Qui-Gon to maximize the impact of his death. I think keeping Obi-Wan as a younger padawan also would allow for a potential attraction between him and Padme, which could give a more Camelot-type tension that contributes to Anakin's eventual downfall. I think it would also have been an interesting point if, either in the pod-race and/or in the final battle, Anakin demonstrates his Force powers, but in a frightening way (like crashing someone else's pod). So, he saves the day, but the concern is that he will be hideously dangerous if left to his own devices.
Can't get on board with the midichlorians, though. Ugh...
Why Lucas insisted on people seeing a kid Darth Vader is beyond me. Probably wanted to sell more toys or something. The character's humanity could have been set up so much better with a teen/young adult actor.
Minus making obi wan older and taking qui gon out, that first draft sounds pretty great
-9 year old accidentally blows up an entire control center-
15 y/o blows up control center with the help of Padme and squadron during a well coordinated attack.
Jedi Knight Obi-Wan & teenage Anakin was what many of us expected. There had to been a love triangle for the plot to actually work, whether it be Obi-Wan or Bail Organa.
Its hard for me to admit this because The Phantom Menace is so near and dear to my heart...but I agree. Especially about The bit about Anakin being older. Makes sense. I love Qui Gon (favorite jedi) that would be my only complaint about seeing less of him in the concept film.
If there's one thing George Lucas did correctly in TPM, its rewriting Qui-Gon to have a much more prominent place in the film courtesy of Liam Neeson.
I like the idea of Padme being Anakin's gunner in the final act. We've always gotten indications that Luke inherited his piloting expertise from his father, but this also indicates that Leia inherited her marksmanship from her mother.
I like the Phantom Menace we got better. Fun fact: Benicio del Toro was cast as Maul, but dropped out when Lucas cut most of Maul's dialogue. But I love how Ray Park did the character, just this demon who barely speaks and moves like a ninja. The duel with Maul is fantastic.
I want to see the version showing Maul walking back to his ship on Tatooine, in his black robes, after flipping off his bike to fight Qui-gon. Didnt notice the bike kept going and wasnt seen in the over head shot did you? Yeah, he definitely had to walk home. 😅
One would hope that the speeder bike would have stopped automatically when the rider came off, much like motorcycles (eventually) and jet skis do now.
The reason we didn't see the Clone War through all trilogy is because life of heroes didn't depend on it and it wasn't war for their survival as in OT, it was polotical game controlled by Palpatine from both sides. Separatists were destined to lose and Republic - take over whole Galaxy to become Empire, the ultimate purpose of the clone army was to eliminate the Jedi. Therefore only important parts were the setup for the war, how it started and how it ended.
This goes for everything involving the conflicts in the prequels. I think that's why so many people hated it, but it makes perfect sense. We already know that in the end the Republic will fall and Empire will rise, we don't know how and the how just so happens to be tied greatly to Anakin's journey as a Jedi, which was NOT what it was expected to be both for the audience and him. The Clone Wars, the origins of the CIA and the taxed trade routes that seemingly began all of the conflict isn't important at all, the political games, overly religious dogma, and a kid being chewed through it and spit back out was the story of the prequels.
If you had read Terry Brooks' novelization, it would've been a bit closer to what you want. For example, Anakin destroying the command ship was the first instance he realized the command ship reactors are that way. On screen, poorly handled. Novelized? Anakin, literally, finally touches the Force and was like, "Oh..." and allowed the Force to guide him, aka, your Skywalker moment.
I think you're right about pretty much everything, and that Lawrence Kasdan should've been contacted much earlier, so he'd have been willing to do it.
"Anakin never used the force in Episode 1"
Hello...pod racing? No human can do it besides Anakin.
I’ve always felt anakin should have been older in TPM. Closer in age to Padme to support their future romance and older to make him flying a fighter more realistic. And I too don’t like the accidental way Anakin destroys the control ship and that the battle droids stop working without the control ship
He should have been a teenager because now the he's too old as an 8 year old is weird that the Jedi only take babies.
Or have padme as a child queen. Leave her diplomacy for part 2, when her and Anakin are teens. Have her as a helpless child, with diplomacy done by, say, and aunt or uncle.
@@Golfstar17 yes but in a modern sophisticated society like Naboo is presented as a child queen seems ridiculous
He didn’t even need to be that much older. Couple of years. 12 instead of nine would have been enough (Padme was 14).
Would’ve preferred a mix of the two
I remember being worried in the mid-90's by some of the things George Lucas said about the upcoming prequel trilogy. Someone asked him if he felt boxed in by having already made so many statements about the past and he said that he didn't because he didn't necessarily have to interpret those statements the way that he had meant them before. It turns out that my worst fears have been realized.
Though I had a good time with TPM for a while and still "like" it, I am overall greatly disappointed by it. Most of that for me is because it forever changed (and I think ruined) the relationship between Obi-Wan and Anakin. In Obi-Wan's statements to Luke he says that HE was the one to discover Anakin and that HE had been the one blown away by him and that HE wanted to train him. TPM flipped ALL this so that Obi-Wan didn't want anything to do with him and really only took him on because his dying master asked him to and he had given his word. I like Qui--Gon as a character but his being shoehorned in there ruined it all. I think the story is much better with Obi-Wan and Anakin becoming best friends at the beginning rather than it being more like step brothers who were forced together against both their wishes. We see no bonding between the two, then in AOTC their relationship is nothing but strained. We see them be buddies for 20 minutes in the beginning of ROTS and then they're back to being at odds with each other. Yes, we have The Clone Wars but movies should not need supplemental material.
Also, Obi-Wan's regret in ANH would have been that much better because it wasn't that his master asked him to do it but that HE took the task on. His statement almost implies a situation where Obi-Wan, as a Jedi, apparently had a choice but may have been advised to pass Anakin on to a more seasoned master to train. It kind of puts a little bit of brashness and pride to Obi-Wan's younger self, which is commensurate with his statement to Yoda "Was I any different when you taught me?" to Yoda's statements about Luke being reckless. We never really saw the reckless Obi-Wan, and, of course, Qui-Gon's inclusion also changed the dynamic between Obi-Wan and Yoda, who was clearly the original master of Obi-Wan instead of simply being the Jedi Kindergarten teacher.
Not that I'm a good writer (I had wanted to be for a while) but I've written out some rough drafts of what I thought I had wanted to see in the prequels and I hate to say it and I know they would need TONS of work, but I like my ideas better (though they were really just flesh-outs of Lucas' pre-supplied backstory). I guarantee that Star Wars is WAY too important to me as a 50 year old father of 4 (I was at the theater at 4 years old in '77) but this makes me very sad.
If I ever own Disney's successor and buy the rights to Star Wars, I'm doing another canon flush and only the original three will remain with everything else being redone. If anybody doesn't like that, well...I"m sure you don't have anything to worry about :)
Obi-Wan is definitely reckless in the prequels. Case in point, the scene where he jumps out the window to grab that droid that was killing to kill Padme. Obi-Wan does this because he wants to one-up Anakin. Hinted in a conversation that they had before.
OBI-WAN
It's too risky... and your senses
aren't that attuned, young
apprentice.
ANAKIN
And yours are?
OBI-WAN
Possibly.
Obi Wan never said he discovered Anakin though and he was blown away by Anakins Midichlorians count and he eventually did want to train him. So no TPM did not flip any of that. Qui-Gon was not shoehorned in and it did not ruin anything. Nah it is better the way it is and they were not forced together they both agreed on it. Yes we do with some scenes on Tatooine and Naboo with them talking and interacting with each other. No it is not strained. Not really they are mostly good friends until Anakin turns to the dark side. And the prequels do not need it The Clone Wars just makes it better.
Well he still did take the task on himself so it is good enough as is. We did actually, he did act impatient at times in Episode 1 and he got reckless fighting Maul after he killed Qui-Gon Jinn, he was also reckless in Episode 2 during the scene where he jumps out the window to grab that droid that was trying to kill Padme. Not really as Yoda still taught Obi Wan at some point as the Jedi kindergarten teacher and it was not even clear that Yoda was the original master of Obi-Wan as Obi-Wan never even called Yoda his master or main teacher.
In ANH, Obi-Wan also said to Luke that there was a student of his named Darth Vader who betrayed and murdered Luke's dad...
Obi-Wan was already an unreliable narrator from the start.
@@onemoreminute0543I chalk that up to metaphor, with the 'Darth Vader' he talks about being the dark side in Anakin, eventually overthrowing the good in him, or 'killing' him.
The whole chosen one bit fucked up the relationship for me as well. Anakin should have just been a really talented Jedi who Palpatine got to.
Anyways, I'm just glad I got to see Star Wars as a kid before any prequels or god forbid, Disney crap ruined a lot of the mystique.
The biggest mistake with Phantom Menace was that they didn't have Hayden instead of the little kid. The scene in the shop could have been hot young attraction instead of cringe crush. The highlight of the movie, the podrace, comes off as an amusement park ride instead of Darth Vader earning his spurs in a vicious, deadly Ben Hur like race which in turn would have explained better why the Jedi Council was leary of this kid. The climax on the Trade Federation ship would have seemed heroic, not stupid.
I’d love to see a little scene where Darth Vader and darth maul are fighting and Vader just shouts “this is for trying to run me over as a kid”
I think Lucas second guessing himself was a hint of his sensitive nature. Hes not the super confident person many believe him to be, his first draft was more acceptable but once he started trimming pieces its like he was running away from himself.
There were some changes Lucas made for the better though. Making Qui-Gon more prominent, making Maul more mysterious and having Obi-Wan as the reluctant mentor were the right decisions. I will admit the original script was overall better, its just with the aforementioned changes I mentioned TPM would have been an even better film.
However making Padme prejudiced against a Jar-Jar who is actually heroic and not a bumbling fool would make her a bit unlikable as a character. The Midichlorians will always be controversial addition as some fans hate the concept while others like it.
I don't hate midichlorians, but god damn, they are dumb from a storytelling/aestheic/worldbuilding point of view. The Force, IMO, works much better as space magic than something to do with particles in one's bloodstream. Obi Wan's description in Ep. IV pretty much sums it up and need no further explanation. Even so, I just ignore them, as its only really mentioned briefly in the film and never brought up again afaik, and for good reason.@@madgavin7568
@@madgavin7568they could have had something a bit in between with Padme. If she doesnt value the Gungan then does at the end, without being a massive overt racist it would work well.
Liam Neeson may be the only reason we like Qui Gon, if someone else does the interesting stuff he did, it would matter less if he was a small part
I'm so glad we got the version we did. Never thought I'd hear someone say "man, I wish we got less Qui Gon" 🤦♂
I love this rough draft version, I have been arguing all of these changes, (age gap, teenage Anakin, more aggressive plot) for the past 25 years with other Star Wars fans.
Small details in storylines have huge effects on movies. Something as simple as changing all the Jedi outfits from brown to black would have completely changed the tone of the movie.
I think George Lucas was to focused on making a movie for his kids and selling merchandise which led to him giving a G-Rated movie.
I honestly believe that if Lucas truly wanted to capture the spirit of the original trilogy he should have done the prequels right after he finished Return of the Jedi. His ideas were fresh at that time and would have worked much better.
Cool story but the FX tech was lacking for what he wanted to show.
One of many problems with The Phantom Menace was that we don't even know who the hero of the story is. Is it Obi-Wan? Qui-Gon? Anakin? Jar Jar? Nobody knows. It was hard to get behind any character. People who weren't old enough or not even alive in 1999 just don't know how much this movie divided and enraged the Star Wars community.
Agreed it’s a mess!
Couldn't one argue that it has an ensemble cast?
That draft of the story sounds really good
Definitely should’ve mixed the two scripts together
I agree with your assessment. It pains me to think of what we got instead. It hurts, growing up seeing the original trilogy in the theaters, only to wait 15/30 years to get the prequels/sequels that we got. Damn.
Are those Chelsea boots?
Lol "Padme has a crush on Obi Wan" I knew the revenge of the middle management was canon
A lot of those would have been better unchanged, but Qui-Gon's bigger role, and Padme's role in the finale, are much better in the final version, I think, and that's enough for me to say I'm happier with the movie we got.
The finale of Phantom Menace is the only time we really get to see Padme leading her people, and the fact that she has her own mission, with it's own challenges, and is able to overcome them, adds a lot more weight to claims of her competence. And I think she NEEDS to get that in Episode 1, because there weren't many opportunities for it in 2 or 3. Having her spend the finale piggybacking with Anakin would have made her feel a bit too close to being a damsel, to me.
This doesn't make sense to me, she would have fired the guns that ended the threat to her planet.
I like the concept of Anakin and Obi Wan being older, but you can't recast Ewan McGragor. Beyond that, Qui-Gon is too great to be reduced, and Darth-Maul is best as a silent assassin type.
16 to 18 year old Anakin. Obiwan is a full fledged Jedi paired with an older Jedi Master due to the seriousness of the issue at hand. Obiwan and Qui-Gon could have both been trained by Yoda with Obiwan being his most recent protégé. Everything would have matched up with the original films. CP-3O could have been a Naboo droid in the palace thus his quirky protocol personality.
That's pretty amazing.
It was almost perfect from the beginning.
Subtract the love triangle and add more Qui-Gon and you've got it. An older Anakin Skywalker would have really made it, because so many other things just fall into place. And as a bonus it would have made the next movie far better, because then the Anakin-Padme romance would be infinitely more believable and less awkward.
imo it's quite a mixed bag, with Anakin being a little older (not too much so as to keep him as the somewhat reckless young adult he was in the next movies) that could make his relation with Padme more comfortable and relatable, and that added with them both in the N1 starfighter could make for some way better development than what we ever got in the prequels. But as for the love triangle i honestly think that's a horrible idea with Obi Wan's general (yes ik about Satine lol) respect for the Jedi way, and also just the fact that he's so much older than Ani and her. I'm also not a fan of Qui Gonn's potential scarcity since he was already not in the story for very long and his death would be even less dramatic. Anyway if anyone bothered to read all this just remember it's my opinion and i respect yours.
"Obi-Wans respect for the jedi way"
He literally attacks unsuspecting people from behind without warning and goes on reckless adventures to save people he's built an attachment to. He doesn't respect the code any more than Anakin does.
@@dannyneufeld8846 i said general for a reason, and can you tell me about the events ur referring to bc i dont remember such things
@@chadbane167 so, first he linges at an unsuspecting General Grievous who has his back turned to strike him with his lightsaber, in the battle of Saleucami in TCW, he does it again in the Obi-Wan show, where Darth Vader doesn't even have his blade out. He goes on the reckless adventure to save Satine from Darth Maul in season 5 of TCW, because he loves her, despite the Jedi council not supporting this decision, he even said that he would have left the jedi order for her. This doesn't sound like respect to me.
@@dannyneufeld8846 now that I think about it you're right lol, but I still think the idea of a love triangle between them is a terrible one, for one thing because of his age and also the fact that he doesn't seem the type to damage relations with Ani over love
@@chadbane167 yeah, you're right about that
I like a lot of the original stuff, but Qui-Gon is arguably the best part of the movie, so I'm glad they increased his screentime.
The story I came up with when I was a kid was that Anakin was Obiwans ilot because Obiwan isn't a pilot. He senses how strong Anakin is and decides to train him.
I heard as early as 1978 that there was a love triangle between Obi Wan and Anakain and Padme in the unmade first three chapters. That was the thing that would turn Anakin to the dark side.
Padme wasn't even a thought back in 78 lol...
It would've been awesome to give Maul more dialogue, but the problem is that Ray Park isn't an actor so his lines were kept to a minimum and the lines that Ray did speak were dubbed. There weren't many martial artists who could fit what Lucas wanted with the character and even fewer who could actually play the part.
I will never understand the critiques of Episode 1, it is a great film. It's like poetry, it rhymes.
Haha I can’t tell if you’re joking
So thats where they go the idea to come out of lightspeed above the surface in the force awakens. It's crazy that even the stuff that seems original in that movie still isn't.
It seemed that the Obi-Wan vs Maul fight was more interesting in original version. Obi-Wan, hanging by his fingernails, certainly didn't think Maul had the "high ground" so it would be useless to try !
Padmé and Anakin taking down the blockade would be awesome! It would add so much!
It does sound like a better version of the film. The prequels would have been much better films if Lucas did not direct them. That was his biggest mistake. He just wanted to rush though filming them, wasn't interested in getting good acting performances and rarely gave actors a second take. He was much more interested in going digital and the technology behind the film and would have been better suited in the producer role.
Spot on here.
The problem was not him directing and writing, it was he didn’t have anyone to question him or help guide him like the original trilogy. He was surrounded by yes people in the prequels and he didn’t have someone like his ex-wife Marcia to help him with the story like she did with A New Hope by fixing the Deathstar battle, killing Obi-Wan, and a few other instances that made the difference of A New Hope from being a boring silly sci-fi dud with no hope of a sequel to the magnificent franchise it quickly became.
@@JohnFourtyTwo For sure being surrounded by yes people was also part of the problem but that was Lucas's own doing. Same goes for the script, yes he should have had the dialogue touched up. But that goes back to what I said, he wasn't as interested in the details like that. I agree with most of your points but him directing was the biggest problem. Any errors during filming his answer was to fix it in post rather than to reshoot it. To begin with Lucas is a creative genius, but he is not a good director, its never been his strength. Add to that all the points I said before, it would have been far better to get someone else to direct. Even Spielberg offered to direct atleast one of them.
This… is just so much better than the movie we got. Unbelievable.
On one hand, I think it's a shame Kasden didn't take a swing at the script. On the other hand, from my understanding, it was Kasden that removed virtually all of the world-building and context from The Force Awakens. So who knows.
It may have come down to those removed as regurgitated to the original Trilogy especially now Knowing how Kennedy moved so wickedly behind scenes concerning everything from George etc..
It seems trivial, but if I had to point to a single decision that sent the entire prequels down the path they took, it would be the Jedi robes. You touched on it early in this video. Why are knights dressed like monks? The inspiration for Star Wars and its entire purpose was to re-create the space opera adventures of the Flash Gordon serials and others from that era. I always imagined the prequel heroes to have similar costumes: Something sleek and retro-futuristic. You see some of that in Ralph McQuarrie's early artwork for the original film, but you can also find it in the conceptual designs for the prequels. However, once Lucas settles on Jedi in robes, everything about the Jedi shifts and the gears start to grind in an audience full of cognitive dissonance about what they're seeing: Are Jedi knights or monks? They can't fight in their robes, so they have to cast them onto the and awkwardly collect them between scenes. Monks can't have romantic relationships, so there's a weird asexual chemistry of saving the princess and not getting a kiss (unlike the Luke/Leia exchange or the flirtation with Han), and then we're supposed to believe somehow Anakin is able to slip away from an order of mind-reading monks to sleep with the queen every night? And when she gets pregnant no one even suspects Anakin? The monk version of the Jedi caused so many problems for the prequels, and it really feels like it can all be traced back to the costume altering the role rather than underscoring the idea that they are Jedi KNIGHTS. (Note that the Clone Wars cartoons often appended armor to the cinematic costumes. No one saw the Jedi as proper knights, and subsequent creators retroactively modified the costume to correct for the mistake Lucas made.)
Saving the princess and then not actually having a sexual relationship comes more from knighthood than monkhood, actually. One of the ideals of chivalry was a dedication to a lady, for whom the knight quests and serves and has a theoretically platonic relationship with it. People being people, that wasn't always the case of course, most famously in the case of Lancelot and Guinevere. Honestly, Anakin's love for Padme leading him to ruin sounds like something straight from an old chivalric romance/tragedy.
I like the fact that they're monks. I have no cognitive dissonance over it. Lol
Yeah I always expected Jedi's to dress normal or like Luke in RotJ. I assumed Obi Wan was wearing that big ass dirty robe in Star Wars because he was trying to look like a hobo and blend in with the farmers. Why wear his standard Jedi costume if he's trying to hide?
What could've been: George picks up the phone, and calls Gary Kurtz.
1:13 I've heard this criticism before. But looking at it from another point of view. It can show how little regard for life Maul has. He's so focus on catching the Jedi to attack them that he doesn't care who gets hurt along the way
💯
This is incredibly interesting.
It's got a lot of the points I've made over the years regarding ep 1.
I think this would have been an overall better movie. Maybe add a little more Qui-Gon. Somewhere in between what we got and what you described was in the first draft.
Since George is such a fan of editing his own work. Once Disney has finally finished tanking the brand, maybe he can buy it back at a discount and make the;
STAR WARS PREQUELS "SPECIAL EDITIONS". And not totally eff them up this time around.
that would result in a lot of recons tho
Disney already made back all the money they bought star wars for, so it's probably never going to get sold.
@Syliva,
OK. So?
I think we're all pretty used to retcons and changes in what's cannon and what's not at this point.
It would all be worth it to have a GOOD version of the prequels.
@A W,
I'd like to see those numbers.
If they've made so much money off of Star Wars, why are they so scared to do more movies and only churning out TV shows now?
TV shows which, with the exception of Mandalorian, have also not been well received. And at the point it seems Mandalorian is also on the decline.
From what I've seen/read, b/t Marvel and Star Wars flops and the legal battles in FL, Disney is not in its best spot financially.
They might not be quite ready to sell yet but never discount what could happen down the road if they can't right the ship soon.
Also, also.
Who wouldn't want to be able to scrap the new sequel trilogy in favor of Heir to the Empire / Thrawn Trilogy.
Honestly at this point no one would really care if they recast Mark, Harrison and Carrie.
As long as they found ppl who were close enough, (Sebastian Stan, cough, cough) it would be a vast improvement over the trash that is the sequel trilogy.
The only thing I don't like is Qui-Gon being less significant as a character. Otherwise the original draft is far superior.
Would love to see you do a video for each movie!! Great content 😁
I always thought as a kid way before the prequels came out that moisture farmer Owen was a Jedi in hiding hence why he was wearing the robes. There could’ve been a great dynamic between he and his half brother Anakin like that of Luke and Han Solo. Imagine if they both were students of Obi Wan?
That would've been cool, but made Owen's death in A New Hope kinda weird.
Plus there was speculation about Owen and Ben being brothers.
I always assumed that was just standard male attire throughout the galaxy, like a jump suit or a business suit.
I think that those robes are used because are so common and disposable, the jedi are against attachments, including material attachments. So maybe Jedi chose the most simple and common robes (like the ones of a simple farmer) to reflect that.
I like the idea of Obi Wan being the protagonist rather than Qui Gon. It streamlines the script more, it gives Obi a character we're familiar with more to do and develops him more. And if this was Obi Wan's first solo outting as a Knight, we could have kept the dynamic of the brothers which I think is necessary for their relationship and helps with the future films.
Hey man great video. Just found your channel. Keep doing those what could have been movie scripts. They're so interesting to hear :)
Young Anankin not showing "jedi skills" in Ep1? The boy could maneuver and pilot like a pro, as easily as he could blink and fearless. That was his force skill he could sense his way. Han Solo in the Falcon shooting him off of Luke during Death Star battle at the end of Ep4, he's shocked he didn't sense it coming.
My biggest problem was that they killed Maul (and him coming back after being cut in half is just dumb) they could have had him escape and be an additional antagonist in episode two...either he gets bested by Obi Wan and Anakin and they get their revenge ( so Maul still is mysterious but we get more of him) or they could have made him the main villain through the clone wars instead of Dooku and he gets killed in the beginning of episode 3. Also I always loved Qui Gon so, would have been cool if he died by the end of episode 2 and Obi Wan and Anakin still can build their relationship through the clone wars. I just always found it a shame we got so little of these 2 characters
I always thought that the whole prequel trilogy should have been in the clone wars with a more teenage Anakin who had been kind of already fighting.
Completely. Have his childhood be a flashback or something. When Phantom Menace came out was really looking forward to seeing this incredible pilot and Jedi knight, who was a good friend to Obi-Wan. Never really felt the prequels delivered on that sadly.
@@Panzer_the_Merganser The reason why Lucas stated he set Episode 1 where and when he did, is to show the Galactic Republic as it was before the empire. Thing is, he could've done the same thing with Episode 2. But yeah, AOTC, should've been Episode 1. That way George could've used Episode 2 to fully flesh out Dooku and Grevious, and show how brutal the conflict turned out to be that would end the Republic.
@@homelessjesse9453 Right just do a big flashback prologue, like in LotR, showing the Republic in its prime, then cut to the Clone Wars with Anakin and Obi-Wan kicking ass.
Midi Chloriens were actually part of the original concepts of the force in the 70's, I don't know why Lucas waited 20 years to introduce them, but they were there in the beginning; also, making Anakin as young as we got, helped make the separation from his mother, all the more difficult for him.
All of this makes way more sense than what we actually got.
I'd keep Qui-Gon and the Maul fight but everything else sounds way better, almost like he'd written it for adults!
Georgey boy missed a trick big time which really screwed up Star Wars, although Disney has taken it to new lows never thought imaginable. There was little to connect with the characters in Episode I, so come Episode II there was little care already - then suddenly we're 10 years forward or something. Had it started with Anakin being older and not going so deep into a back story would have been a wiser move. George was too busy marketing CGI, than valuing Star Wars to pass onto a new generation.
Imagine thinking Disney is doing worse than Lucas
@@MediaLoverChris02 Corporation over art? Yeah, I’ll take the latter any day.
@@arytaco5380 This ain’t art. It’s a mess.
Honestly, I prefer the script we got. This isn't awful, I just prefer what we have.
I am someone who really likes the Phantom Menace, but there are definitely some cool things in this original script that I like better than what we got. Stuff like how the gungans are portrayed, Anakin actually using the force, and Anakin and Padme working together during the Battle of Naboo are really interesting and should've been in the actual movie. I also like how Obi-Wan is the lead character in this version, especially seeing as how he doesn't do much in the final version. Only downside is that we don't get as much time with Qui-Gon, making his death less impactful.
Lucas did make the right decision by making Qui-Gon have a prominent presence as he was an interesting character.
I always figured that Obi Wanand Qui Gon should've both been Jedi Knights but Obi Wan looks up to the more seasoned Qui Gon. Qui Gon is the one who sees Anakin potential first but Obi Wan says he is too old for Jedi training, Qui Gon promises to train the boy regardless of Councils choice but along the way Anakin and Obi Wan strike up a friendship so that when Our Gon dies at the hands of Darth Maul its easier to accept that Obi wan would take Anakin as a Apprentice because 1. his role model Qui Gon was going to and 2. he and Anakin are already friends. MAUL MUST LIVE this will give Obi Wan a revenge quest throughout the trilogy to chase after. Another thing never talked about is the fact that Shmi should have been mother to Anakin AND Owen with Anakin being older of course and Owen being born of a real dude and NOT Force sensitive.. the little brother tries to talk Anakin out of leaving with Obi Wan and Qui Gon to no avail. The core group of adventurers in this film should've been Qui Gon as the wise mentor, Obi Wan as the brash young Knight, Padme as the headstrong young leader, Anakin as the kind yet adventurous slave that they meet along the way and they first three shouldn't have been separated once landing on Tatooine.
I definitely think this version sounds better. I always felt like something was missing from the released version and now I know why.
Honestly, this was a way better script than what we originally got. Still I rather have the Qui Gon having more screen time with an older Anakin than a kid Anakin. With Anakin Older in this version of the story, then it would have save time, Truma and money towards the original kid. Also I am so in for a more heroic Jar Jar in this script.
Coming from someone that likes the version of Episode I that we got, I actually like this version of the script more. It is more similar to the original trilogy and it does an awesome job at painting a picture of what Obi-Wan was like prior to the events of the original trilogy.
I prefer the movie we've got now. Lucas did the EXACT opposite, what did Disney with The Force Awakens. Going the safe route with callbacks. The romance between Anakin and Padme was to me always more like a "child crush" from Anakins side. I also like that Anakin was seeing the force different in form of visions. His "deams". Also he bested that test in the council. His progession with the force was more humble, what I totally get.
While I agree the Gungan racial tension is heavily sedated in the final film, I always kind of assumed the strained relationship was related to some sort of societal strain.
Always thought it made no sense Anakin was “too old” to train, when Yoda trained Luke as a young adult…
Yoda also has misgivings about training Luke due to age so it lines up well enough
Lucas is a master plot writer, apart from the script and delivery, every idea in the trilogy is fascinating. He should have had someone else write the script and direct.
He should've hired someone to tell him no and stop. As soon as empire exploded and he got divorced he became a narcissist.
Everything isn’t narcissism.
Holy hell. That would have been, atleast, an INTERESTING movie. Much better than the one we got. Problem still persists in the SCRIPT. Which Lucas penned himself, while afterwards admitting he is not very good at writing dialog.
So yes this sounds like a way better movie, i think the script still would have killed it, at least for me.
The only upside I see to AI generated art. One day, we'll be able to see this.
The final version we got Wasn't so bad and it's still awesome and great to this day just like the other two
Lucas dumbed down his own ideas like he dumbed down Indians Jones script for a Crystal Skull..
I honestly think the bigger issue is not Anakin's age but the fact that Natalie Portman does not come off as a 14 year old (she was around 16 at the time of filming). Two years is a big difference when you're talking about the early teens and you could be forgiven for thinking Padme is alot older than she's supposed to be. It really undercuts not just the Anakin Padme romance, but also how out of her depth Padme is really supposed to be in the story and the surprise when she turns it around at the end of the story.
I think younger Anakin really works for what they were going for, showing the character at his most innocent and optimistic...something you wouldn't have gotten with a thirteen or fourteen year old.
Beyond that though the prequels really suffer from too much happening off screen. There was a lot more narrative ground to cover than three films could really do justice to. Its not a coincidence that the prequels were re-appraised by fans after Clone Wars came out and added the additional context that the theatrical experience was missing.
2 years isnt really a big difference after 14
This would have improved the film a ton! Much better script! I agree - this is TPM we should have gotten. While it's kind of sad that we lose the larger part that Qui-Gon has, I believe he feels more important in the movie we got because the rest of the film suffers so. In the script you talk about, I doubt the character would have been missed.
You said that Anakin never uses the force during the Phantom Menace, but it's been said that he uses the force during the podrace scene.
he should have force choked his oponents so they lost control and smashed into the canyon walls. subtle forshadowing for who be becomes
I love the idea of saying well lets trust this kid we just met to not smash us into the surface at hyperspace…yep makes sense
😂😂
I was always under the impression that, while ambiguous, the implication was that Anakin was SO strong with the Force that his ‘accidentally’ torpedoing the command ship was anything but, even if he didn’t consciously realize it.
“In my experience, there’s no such thing as Luck.”
my main gripe with Anakin building C3PO is that Anakin is a mechanic, yet he builds a protocol droid. Padme is a diplomat, yet she has the astromech droid, the one used for repairs. It should've been reversed. Anakin should've built R2D2, while C3PO should've been around on Padme's ship when they escaped Naboo
Whilst I like the idea of complicating the relationship between the Gunguns and the Naboo, doing so my making Padme overtly racist towards a *less* annoying and heroic childlike Jar-Jar, might have made her rather unlikable. Perhaps if they'd leant into her relative youth and inexperience, and made her naive to the problems of her homeworld, thereby making her leadership role in the destruction of the Federation an arc of hers.
Having teenage Anakin makes much more sense, and honestly I love the idea of the two piloting a ship together.
The sequel Trilogy had its problems, but Finn and Rey blasting Tie-Fighters together when escaping Jakuu - and subsequent attempts to give the other all the credit for their escape - is one of my favourite moments in all of Star Wars.
a lot of these differences sound pretty great… but the inclusion of Qui-Gon as a major character is a must, with the Duel of the Fates and all that.
Pretty much everything about this version is an improvement compared to what we got, and with a few tweaks would have been a fantastic introduction to the prequels. Making Obi-Wan a freshly minted Jedi Knight on his first assignment without his master would have split the difference perfectly between "father figure" and "reluctant mentor", especially if Anakin is a bit older too. Plus Obi-Wan being dressed in black like Luke in RotJ before disguising himself in robes makes infinitely more sense than Jedi dressing like they're on Tatooine all the time. Tone down Jar Jar too and he'd fit in with Obi-Wan putting together his crew of Padme, Panaka, Anakin and eventually Qui-Gon for a return to Naboo before facing off with Maul. That's the kind of twist on the Star Wars formula that would have felt familiar but still had enough that's new.
2:18 I have to point out, the age gap between Anakin and Padme isn't really that great, as it's only 5 years after all. In Phantom Menace, Anakin is 9 and Padme is 14. In Attack of the Clones, which is set 10 years after, they are respectfully 19yo and 24yo. To me that sounds like a normal couple in Attack of the Clones, considering their "romance" didn't really start yet in Phantom Menace.
On another point, when it comes to Mace Windu saying "He's too old", it does make sense considering Jedi start their training anywhere between ages 4-8. So Anakin indeed was too old to become a youngling, but just old/young enough to become Obi Wan's padawan, ofc having to still learn everything a youngling would.
That kid is NINE? He looks like he's 5!
@@robertodell9193 Does Padme Amidala in turn look 14 in Phantom Menace? Not really xD
@@MrJGamer no natalie was 17 when they were shooting and jake was 9 thats why its looks wierd the way it is i get natalie is short but her face is really mature. i thjink 9 is too young 12-13 is perfect lines up with padme
I always felt that having Anakin older really would have made The Phantom Menace a much better film.
Having him and Padme work together during the final battle would have made for a much more powerful ending than what we'd gotten. Plus it would have been better to have had the same actor portray Anakin throughout the entire trilogy. Not being in the first film really took away Hayden Christensen's opportunity to show the full rage of his character arc.
This makes me sad for what could have been. I’ve always had a nagging feeling that what was implied in the original trilogy was not delivered in the prequels. And now to hear he had an entire treatment of the first film that seems like it would have at least started them out in the right direction… 😞
Its a mixed bag. Qui Gons role as something of a grey jedi really helps give a Ben Kenobi mentor role to the film while also juxtaposing a young and inexperienced Obi Wan to the man he'll later become. Maul's quiet and menacing minimal screen time is what made him such a fan favorite like Boba even if him sticking around could have been better. The duel of the fates is a near masterpiece of every component of production and it really works as Obi wans coming of age, showing what a jedi Master can do, and all this slow burn into a sith in his prime and the dual lightsaber reveal. Racism toward Gungans might have come across a little heavy handed but also might have made turned the audience against Padme too.
I wish Lucas would have just made episodes 6,7& 8 starting in 99 and then Disney could have made the prequels. It would have worked because it wouldn't have to be 30 years later but 16 years later. Hamill , Fisher and Ford were all young enough in 99 to be the main characters
For me, if i could have ONE THING to take out of The Phantom Menace, it wouldn't be Jar Jar. It would be C3PO.
It's enough of a coincidence that Luke happens to grow up on the same planet as Anakin/Darth did. It's even crazier that Luke, years later, just happens to acquire the droid that his dad built before he turned evil. 🙄
I have always said / thought that a live triangle between anakin, obi wan and padme makes the most sense for anakin to turn to the dark side
No. 2 of them are jedi and ones a master.. He's not going to throw away years of training and dedication for some princess pussy.
Seeing the Disney sequels, with Rey "Mary Sue" Skywalker-Palpatine, made me appreciate the prequels even more. Even that bumbling idiot Jar Jar can do no wrong.