Just finished that this week:Lord Akiyama wrote:If any one hasn't seen it, I highly recommend watching the documentary The People vs. George Lucas, which is currently available on Netflix last I saw. It's a great examination on the whole Star Wars fan culture from all sides.
Although it does straw-man the "Fan entitlement" argument ("He can't do that to OUR Star Wars!")--complete with excerpting the Misery-parody fan-film--they make a good point by the end that Between-Trilogies George (or "Willow-era", as I like to refer to it) became such an insecure control-freak of his own empire, he forgot the one thing that made the first movie, and "American Graffiti", good movies in the first place. Namely, the director's ability to hire good people and trust their work. Instead, he insisted on making the Prequel Trilogy "his" movies, and took over jobs he was clearly unqualified for, like screenwriting.
(Which Ep. VII solved by trying to get Lawrence Kasdan back, although I don't think we'll ever truly have Kasdan "back" after Grand Canyon.)
The one YouTube fan who provided his own alternate solution to RotS's "Nooo!" emphasizes the point that when the director can't make a better film than the audience can, neither side's innocent.