

Did George Lucas Read Vogue? - esalazar
http://www.dynamist.com/2444/did-george-lucas-read-vogue

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simonh
I used to watch the old black and white Flash Gordon and Buck Rogers TV
serials from the 30s when I was a kid in the 70s. The black and white, the
scrolling plot summary, the dinky bullet shaped spaceships and firework rocket
engines, flying around saving space princesses were a bit naff, but we lapped
it up anyway.

That opening scroll, but in full colour on a 'modern' cinema screen, with the
latest sound systems of the day was stunning. I immediately got the reference,
it was obvious to anyone of the time. But the way it was used with full colour
and up to date projection technology, having the text recede into the distance
yet still remain readable due to the high resolution film stock, the opening
scene of the staggering huge battle cruiser seemingly taking forever to fill
the screen was just awe inspiring.

George Lucas was speaking directly into your subconcious saying "You know
those old TV shows you love? I love them too. So I made this".

My children love Star Wars, but not the way I do, and they can never have
quite the same relationship to it. You just had to be there at that time and
have those formative experiences to prepare you for it.

The one thing I made absolutely sure of - I made certain my girls didn't know
Vader was Luke's father and let them see it on the screen. That was really
important to me.

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S_A_P
Umm... Spoiler Alert!

In all seriousness, I dont think my kids will get the significance of Star
Wars, either.

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swombat
Spoiler alert? About Vader being Luke's father? Almost 40 years on?

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S_A_P
I guess my sense of humor doesnt transcend hackers everywhere

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swombat
Ah... it was a joke!... Sorry, didn't get it :-P

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kapowaz
He may not have been inspired by this particular magazine, but it's likely he
_was_ inspired by similar opening crawls that existed in cinema as early as
the 30s, such as Flash Gordon: <http://i.imgur.com/XNzi7.jpg>. There are a
whole bunch of things that Star Wars can be reasonably said to have copied and
reused, and if you're at all interested in this you should definitely check
out Kirby Ferguson's excellent ‘Everything is a Remix’ series, which looks at
Star Wars in more detail here: <http://vimeo.com/19447662>

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crayola
The phrase "A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away..." is suspiciously
similar to the one in the ad, though. But maybe that, also, was borrowed by
the ad from previous material?

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bediger4000
And more to the point, is that previous Intellectual Property still under
copyright? It seems that the most diligent respecter of Intellectual Property,
Disney, may have bought a pig in a poke - someone else may legitimately be
entitled to some compensation for the unauthorized use of their property.

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ef4
To elaborate on kapowaz comment: Star Wars was directly inspired by an earlier
era of space opera. Most likely, so was this ad in Vogue.

Even the idea of starting at "Episode 4" makes Star Wars feel like one of the
older serials -- they were presented as shorts, split into multiple episodes.

Another similar homage that went way over my head as a kid is Indiana Jones.
The whole concept is a deliberate remix of adventure serials of the 30s and
40s.

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pablosanchez
Exactly. In fact, Spielberg and Lucas tell where they got their inspiration
for Indiana Jones character on the Extras of the IJ Trilogy collection: old
adventure movies and comic books from the 30s and the 40s.

