The “Better Idea” People And The Destruction Of Franchises

I can pull two articles out of one news story. I haven’t gone over this first one as a primary topic in a while.

Kathleen Kennedy was at a recent showing of the original, non-special edition version of the first Star Wars. What’s interesting here is Kennedy’s comments that, to quote the article:

“I really think that now we’re in a position where it’s broadened the possibility of stories and filmmakers we can bring in to tell stories that mean something to them,” she said. “It doesn’t necessarily have to connect to every little thing that’s been done in Star Wars; it can actually be a standalone story that then builds into many many other stories.”

This is after Mark Hamill cut remaining ties with DisneyFilm recently, an empty gesture given the only living characters among the original cast are played by dead actors except for Lando and C-3PO. Luke’s dead, so’s Han and Ackbar, and Chewbacca had to be reworked back into being alive. Meanwhile Carrie Fisher, Peter Mayhew, James Earl Jones, Kenny Baker (who role could be replaced with a real robot according to what I’ve seen at cons and the fact that BB-8 IS “played” by a robot), Alec Guinness, and Peter Cushing are all deceased while only Vader and Tarkin are dead in continuity. All this confirms is that New Star Wars will now reflect not the world that survived through six movies, four cartoons (pre-Disney, though one happened during the change over), three TV movies, and a ton+ of books, novels, and video games, but the world Kathleen Kennedy envisions, or Dave Filoni as the two fight over which of their daughters are going to be the new face of Star Wars. Of course they aren’t going to follow what Lucas created (and not doing so is WHY Hamill dropped out for even future flashback and Force Ghost appearances) but their “better idea”, which gets this article on topic while setting up a future one (possibly tomorrow’s depending on available topics).

So many complaints about “woke SJW activists” taking over franchises are out there that the real problem, or at least the reason the culture warriors were able to take over, comes not just from Hollywood types who want to look like allies to live their grandparents’ “glory days” of fighting for a cause (forgetting the cause wasn’t the fight but creating what they saw as a better world), but creators who insisted they had better ideas than their predecessors and opted to change all the things so that the popular thing was now what THEY wanted it to be, not what fans had come to love. This nonsense predates the current push of the culture warriors, but when you combine that ego with the ego of the modern activist the problem gets worse. And as I’ve said before, the fans are responsible for letting it happen.

Classic Starbuck…in more ways than one.

Let’s start with my “favorite” example since it sort of ties to Star Wars: Battlestar Galactica. The original concept from Glen A. Larson, back when it was still about Earthlings leaving a dying planet rather than people from a dying planet looking for Earth, was reminiscent of a spiritual journey. It wasn’t about the horrors of war, the struggles of refugees, or what it means to be human as AI gets to close to be alive thanks to man’s hubris. Further backstory of the original Cylons, which I think came from the novelization of the pilot movie “Saga Of A Star World”, was that the Cylons turned on their lizard people creators and got into a war with humans, though we get human and non-human planets subjugated by Cylons so this isn’t some Terminator style “wipe out the fleshies” situation. The Cylons hated the colonies of Man and that was their whole thing. No attempt to be human, no Cylons having sex with humans (ignoring at least one comic take–because Rob Liefeld’s company) because they weren’t making human duplicates to infiltrate. They just wanted to wipe them out, not hook up with them.

The story of the humans itself, while acknowledging the refugee status at times, was not about people surviving a war, but making a new life. They altered their culture to life aboard a “ragtag fleet” of ships rather quickly, even with their own spaceship casino. The only antagonist among the humans besides Baltar disappears after the pilot, though Sire Uri would continue to be a pest in the Marvel Comics spin-off (barely a tie-in). They did their best to keep their way of life. The story was about a spirit quest more than the philosophy of “what is humanity”. We got beings of light to stand in for angels, and Count Iblis to stand in for Satan and sharing a voice with the Cylons’ “Imperious Leader” (which was either the hint fans make it out to be or just wanting more use of Patrick Macnee, who also narrated the intro) while Baltar tried to obtain the power that was promised by the lying Cylons. On the human side, you had Apollo’s journey from pilot to single father to whatever the beings of light had planned for him if season two had happened, with Starbuck only being brought in as his “squire” because ABC wanted their own Han Solo. It was a more positive, hopeful view of surviving a manbot-made catastrophe and finding themselves and their place in the larger universe.

Ron Moore had a “better idea”.

I partly start with him because his idea was accepted by sci-fans of the day, looking to avoid the allegedly “campy” (apparently we didn’t watch the same show–the kid and his dog isn’t enough to be “campy”) nature of the family show because $#%#$ families, they want dark and depressing thought pieces rather than spiritual quests and the occasional action. Now Earth is a lie, or dead depending on the season. All the more “alien” parts of the colonies are replaced with something much closer our own, including “Apollo” and “Starbuck” being codenames for Lee Adama (no longer just the commander’s name) and Kara Trace, because humans have last names. (At least in the west.) More focus was put on the struggles. The Cylons want to be accepted by humans or get vengeance on them. We have a character so happy she commits suicide rather than be sad again. The more spiritual elements are gone, replaced with a deep dive into what it means to be human, and not always being the most pleasant answer. It’s not a remake, it’s a reimagining.

And as a fan of the original series I hate it.

Were it a new property I’d probably just ignore it or maybe be curious about it and give it a shot. Maybe it could have won me over as an original series inspired by the old 1979 TV series. But then they told me “this is your Galactica now”, and I dropped out immediately, with plenty of classic fans sharing that perspective. I still haven’t watched it and don’t really plan to because from everything I’ve heard and read about it, as listed above, this ISN’T my Galactica. Ron More had a “better idea” than the original creator and turned it into something unrecognizable.

“Why do you remind me of my father? Oh right, no hair.”

I could list a bunch of other examples, some even existing in continuity. The New 52 exists as one huge “better idea” after giving us things like Barry Allen’s new tragic backstory, Connor “Superboy” Kent’s human DNA donor being Lex Luthor instead of Paul Westlake like it was for “Retcon” Geoff Johns showed up and also gave us the various “emotional spectrum” Lanterns, and after the New 52 you have characters aged up, gay, or both. I was happy they undid the “better idea” reimagine of Firestorm, though those concepts could have been a separate IP like with Battlestar Namesake. The whole “Timeless Child” thing in Doctor Who, along with other attempts to make The Doctor the most important being in the universe isn’t necessarily woke because we don’t know what the Timeless Child’s gender was originally. Admittedly we meet the Child as a little black girl and get this revelation during the female presenting regeneration BECAUSE of sociopolitical BS, but it would have been a terrible idea regardless if all parties were white males. Some of these ideas might work in an original property, but they want that capital n Name to sell their idea to studios ever adverse to making something new when they can use (or rather abuse because of who they give it to, ruining the entire end goal) nostalgia to be as risk adverse as possible.

You may like the changes I’ve been talking about, but that doesn’t change the fact that they tossed out what original fans loved. Even things I like have made “better ideas” that went against multiversal continuity and I haven’t liked. My favorite take of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles is the 2003 series–yes, even the admittedly Fast Forward period, and I don’t like the Shredder being an Utrom or Tang Shen being removed from Hamato Yoshi and Splinter’s backstory, because it alters important core elements. At least it still took other essential elements of the original comic, cartoon, and live-action movies to create their own story, and most of it I like. Ultimately (“Turtles Forever” aside) it had what was lacking in my other examples: respect for what came before while trying to do something different with the concept, not just using nostalgic “memberberries” to draw in older fans to their “clearly superior” takes. Also from that period, there are elements of He-Man & The Masters Of The Universe that made the villains much more frightening, but they made very few changes of the important elements, and the only ones I didn’t like were minor and have no bearing on the series or the franchise.

My favorite Transformers take is the Dreamwave comics, and that was ruined by crappy ownership and greed behind the scenes. I’m working on part two of my own Transformers lore that takes the toys into main consideration and only uses other series to fill in gaps and create a brand new history. My all-time favorite movie is a series of “better ideas”, which is why I don’t mind them doing a proper adaptation of The Neverending Story down the line. The author and the books fans have every right to call them out. I’ve seen so many different takes on Superman and Spider-Man with little to complain about except in quality or personal preference. I’m not bothered by change. I’m bothered by change that replaces rather than builds on what came before for ego reasons.

None of these were as “woke” as the gayfication of existing characters, or making the woman more important than the originally male lead, or changing the race rather creating new characters or lifting existing characters who hadn’t gotten the Name yet. Bionic Commando failed for it’s reimagining (I also hear the gameplay was bad, like the next three games I’m about to list) and they just made it worse with Assassin’s Creed: Shadows or Dragon Age: The Veilguard. The culture-related changes to those games made it worse, but it’s not like every change was made because of political ideology. It was just the main reason for so many of those changes. Suicide Squad: Kill The Justice League isn’t woke. It’s just crap because it’s anti-hero, unless that qualifies as “woke” for being anti-heroism. Someone tried to reinvent the wheel rather than build upon an existing idea because they had a “better idea” about the wheel and it fell apart because in reality the idea was wrong. They just hated what came before and decided it needed to be made for them and not the original fanbase.

Kathleen Kennedy thinks she has a “better idea” for what to do with Star Wars. So does Dave Filoni, who made the Jedi into a group that deserved to be torn apart. Their only difference is deciding whose “daughter” takes over for those boring old classic heroes: Rey the clone or Ahsoka Tano. The novels, games, and cartoons build on what came before, not trying to replace it. It’s about replacing the existing concepts that made the Names so big with their “better ideas”, under the belief that the Name is what keeps them there and not what made the brand popular enough to continue making stories about them. It turns out it’s the fans with the real better idea: ignore their nonsense and just stick with what they already enjoyed.