What if the prequels were made first?

[Falaskan]

I was watching the 3rd Hobbit prequel with my sister (who has only seen LOTR) when she asked, "why didn't they make these first?" I tried to explain why but she didn't get it. Then I started thinking about many film sagas. State Wars, LOTR, and the like, and tried to imagine the prequels being written first. Can you imagine the OT being released in place of the PT? Or LOTR in place of the Hobbit prequels? Do you think they'd be that different? Do you think they'd be as good? Postulate!

[Poya]

They still would've been bad film. Even if they revolutionized effects in film, they certainly wouldn't be remembered for anything else. Might as well say that the Transformers films would've been received better if they came out in the '20s.

[Al_The_Strange]

Making The Phantom Menace back in 1977 would mean sacrifices--no city planets, no podrace, no big droid-vs-gungan battles, probably a less impressive space battle, and of course no Jar Jar. Would it have been better? Maybe--limitations would have forced Lucas and the team to work around their problems and focus on the story more, but Anakin's arc really wouldn't have much weight as it did in 1999 without knowing what happens first. With A New Hope, they were a little wiser--the kicked the saga off in the middle of everything, which is not only exciting, but was also a pretty slick way to drag all the main leads into the story and characterize them along the way (and do so by making Luke, Han, Leia likable while still concealing their secrets). I'm not convinced TPM made first would have pulled that off as well, because it would need to work off a clean slate. If it didn't perform, no sequels.

Assuming The Hobbit wasn't under WB's pressure to zip through the production and spit out three bloated films, chances are Jackson, Walsh, and the crew would have had the time to refine the story and make two (not three) decent films. And LOTR might still be greenlit.

[PLG1962]

State Wars????

[kwisatzhaderach]

The prequels would have been completely different films if they had been made in the 70s.

[Falaskan]

Originally Posted by PLG1962

State Wars????

It's not letting me edit, but I am on my phone. 😂

[PLG1962]

I sometimes think of people's enjoyment of Star Wars if they saw it as it was released in the cinemas or actually watching it 1-6 for the first time
Would the twist in Empire be as impactful if you already knew it

[KRW1]

Originally Posted by PLG1962

I sometimes think of people's enjoyment of Star Wars if they saw it as it was released in the cinemas or actually watching it 1-6 for the first time
Would the twist in Empire be as impactful if you already knew it

Is there anyone alive now who doesn't know it? Serious question, it blew my mind when I was 10 but I don't think it has the same impact now.

[PLG1962]

Originally Posted by KRW1

Is there anyone alive now who doesn't know it? Serious question, it blew my mind when I was 10 but I don't think it has the same impact now.

I was thinking more about kids/teenagers
Would be interesting to show one child 1-6 and one child 4-6 1-3

[Falaskan]

I think they'd have a different revelation in that order. They'd reveal Padme was still alive, or that Obi was a sith too, or something.

Heck, the old rumor was going to be that Vader was going to tell Luke that Obi was his father in ESB. Maybe there's something to that. I think they are going to reveal that Obi is Rey's grandfather in Ep VIII.

[Al_The_Strange]

Originally Posted by Falaskan

I think they'd have a different revelation in that order. They'd reveal Padme was still alive, or that Obi was a sith too, or something.

Heck, the old rumor was going to be that Vader was going to tell Luke that Obi was his father in ESB. Maybe there's something to that. I think they are going to reveal that Obi is Rey's grandfather in Ep VIII.

I think the story went that the ESB script originally had "he is your father" instead of "I am your father." I forget if it was Lucas or Kershner, but one of them pulled the actors aside on the set and gave them the real low-down. Can't remember if they shot that scene in secret too.

If the PT came out first, Anakin's fall to the dark side would probably be a bigger gut-punch, and Sidious and Vallorum being one and the same would probably be a bigger "holy sh*t" moment. If they wanted to conceal Luke and Leia's connection to Vader, they'd have to spin that story a totally different way.

[Ernest Rister]

Originally Posted by Falaskan

I think they'd have a different revelation in that order. They'd reveal Padme was still alive, or that Obi was a sith too, or something.

Heck, the old rumor was going to be that Vader was going to tell Luke that Obi was his father in ESB. Maybe there's something to that. I think they are going to reveal that Obi is Rey's grandfather in Ep VIII.

Great-grandfather, maybe. 30 years separate Jedi from The Force Awakens.

As for the OP's question, if they took the exact same script for Episode I and produced that in 1977, there never would have been an Episode II.

[shinobipopcorn]

Originally Posted by Al_The_Strange

I think the story went that the ESB script originally had "he is your father" instead of "I am your father." I forget if it was Lucas or Kershner, but one of them pulled the actors aside on the set and gave them the real low-down. Can't remember if they shot that scene in secret too.

If the PT came out first, Anakin's fall to the dark side would probably be a bigger gut-punch, and Sidious and Vallorum being one and the same would probably be a bigger "holy sh*t" moment. If they wanted to conceal Luke and Leia's connection to Vader, they'd have to spin that story a totally different way.

It said "Obi-Wan killed your father".

As far as making prequels first, I think for the Hobbit/LOTR it might have made sense, then again I don't think Hobbit needed to be 3 movies. But for Star Wars, the story worked fine as it was without any prequels, so that would have been awkward to see Wahnakin first. No one would have taken Darth Vader seriously.

Maybe having Rogue One before A New Hope would have been okay, and possibly Revenge of the Sith, but not the other two. No Pod Racing.

[Al_The_Strange]

Originally Posted by shinobipopcorn

It said "Obi-Wan killed your father"

You're right.

[master gandhi]

If the Star Wars prequels had come first, Lucas wouldn't have had the creative freedom he had in the late '90s. If Phantom Menace had been made/released in '77 instead of A New Hope, Lucas would have been under some restraint and not surrounded by Yes men. So it would've been very different. I'm happy things played out the way they did, though. A New Hope was the perfect place to begin, and in hindsight, the prequels don't really need to exist. Still, I do love pod racing, Darth Maul and other aspects of those films.

The Hobbit could've probably been made first and turned out okay, but I'm not sure that it would've built up enough excitement for the Lord of the Rings trilogy, so I'm happy those turned out the way they did too.

Same with Prometheus and Alien Covenant. I'm sure most of us are happy that the original Alien came first. That film has a lot of mystery and unanswered questions, and I love every minute of it.

Most of the time, prequels weren't even conceived of until after a story becomes popular. It's not like Jar Jar Binks was a character that Lucas had in his head in the '70s.

[stvn1974]

If the Phantom Menace was the first Star Wars film and released in 1999 it would have bombed and be lumped in with Battlefield Earth and After Earth forever as terrible films. I don't see any different outcome if it was released in 1977 either, except it might have been even worse.

If the Hobbit films used miniatures and real actors instead of a bunch of bad CGI like LOTR I could see them being hits.

[Ironhorse75]

The Hobbit would have been closer to the book. I don't think anybody would have given the greenlight to turn a 300 page book into 3 three hour movies.

[James_Younger_Gang]

It really depends on what the prequels are or wpuld have been. According to George Lucas there was a brief draft or summary of the prequels and the sequels back in the 70s, and apparently he decided to make the sequels first because they felt more exciting. I honestly don't believe that's true. I doubt that back when the first star wars was made George already had characters such as qui gon jin or darth maul written. I think that perhaps the only existing element that existed in the 70s was the father son sagas. So looking at things that way, the series could have gone either way if the prequels werevmade first. I am sure that the groundbreaking effects would receive praise. They definitely need to hire a better actor to play anaking. Imagine crybaby anakin as the first exposure to star wars. The series would have bombed.

[stvn1974]

George Lucas' memory of Star Wars changes more often than his home video releases of Star Wars. Never take anything he says in an interview seriously.

[imsounoriginal]

It's impossible to have this discussion because the prequels we ultimately got for both Star Wars and The Hobbit wouldn't be even remotely the same if they came out first. The Star Wars prequels, both aesthetically and story-wise, would be enormously different in 1977-1983 than what we got in 1999-2005, and ditto for The Hobbit, which probably would have just been a straightforward, single-movie adaptation and would not have gathered anywhere near the acclaim and popularity of LOTR (because it's simply not that good of a book).