My kids are crazy about Star Wars. My son is one of the zillion kids who’s spent his allowance buying every Star Wars toy ever produced. Me? I’m not a fan at all. The first movie wasn’t bad. It had a plot to it, which is why, I’m guessing, it was the first one produced. Everything since has been back-story. Back-story is the information writers create about characters so they fully understand a character’s motivation before attempting to tell his/her story. It’s the part the author cuts in the final revision before a book goes to print or a movie goes to production. If the author doesn’t cut it, a good editor will. Not so with Star Wars. The back-story is not only left in, it stands alone as a myriad of separate productions.
You don’t believe me? Think about the newest one out on videotape: Episode Two. What is the plot? Think hard. There isn’t one. It’s all an explanation of why Anakin turned to the evil side, and the reasoning isn’t so original that it needed a whole movie to get the idea across. Basically, he got really mad at the good guys because they didn’t “allow” him to become powerful enough to prevent his mother from dying. Or at least he wants to you think that’s his noble reason. The real reason is because he was too hot and bothered over Padme to keep his vow of celibacy. Padme is a politician; you don’t need a movie to explains why she has no morals.
There are two requirements for any story – conflict and change – and Episode Two does have both of those, but the whole thing could have been summarized in a single line of dialogue.
I guess my attitude about Star Wars is sour grapes. Jealousy. I write a paragraph of back-story and my agent tells me to take it out. Doesn’t she see the potential? How many editors are slapping their foreheads and staring into their trashcans at all the money they’ve trashed over the years! If only they’d known they could have sold all those chapters of back-story as individual books! Just think of all the extra toys that could have been made and sold for characters that have no bearing on core events.
If I were a famous writer like George Lucas, I could leave back-story in, and no one would complain. But I’m not a famous writer. In fact, you probably don’t know who I am at all. So, if you’ll just settle into your chair there and pay admission, I’ll tell you all about myself, just a little back-story to entertain you….
