[Lord Aquaman]

First of all, let me just say thank you to HK 47 for showing me the screen cap of Aquaman from "Justice League" (I like that show, but I hardly ever get to see it). I personally prefer the classic Aquaman with the orange shirt and both hands (playfully nicknamed "the Rutger Hauer Aquaman"), but I do agree that the bearded Aquaman is more lordly looking (playfully nicknamed "the Viking Aquaman"). I'll work on getting that avatar later (I'm not very good with this avatar stuff... I'm very inept)

I may be the only person who feels this way, but I've always felt that one of the biggest flaws with these prequels, well specifically Episode 1 - aside from too much Jar Jar Binks - is that there wasn't enough Obi-Wan Kenobi in Episode 1. Obi-Wan Kenobi & Anakin Skywalker/Darth Vader are the only ones (aside from the droids) to appear in both this trilogy and the original trilogy; I was 15 when TPM came out, and I assumed that Obi-Wan would more or less be the lead character, with little Anakin right beside him. I foolishly believed that the movie would revolve around Obi-Wan meeting & befriending Anakin, and the beginning of their friendship (I imagined they'd have a big brother/little brother dynamic), which is crucial to the plot and to Anakin's downfall. Instead, Obi-Wan Kenobi was reduced to a secondary character/2nd banana lurking in the background while Qui-Gon Jinn, played by Liam Neeson, stepped up to the plate to get Anakin into the Jedi Order, and upon his death, he gets Obi-Wan to promise him he'll train the boy since "He... is the Chosen One."

Now before I go any further, let me just say this is not an anti-Liam Neeson thread/rant. I like Liam Neeson; he's a damn fine actor and he was very good in films like "Darkman", "Rob Roy", and "Michael Collins" and, despite the overall wooden feeling of "Menace", I thought Neeson brought a quiet dignity to Qui-Gon Jinn (that sounds like the name of a beer; imagine going into the cantina and saying "I'd like a qui-gon jinn please, with an obi-wan to go."). On his own, Qui-Gon probably could have been a very interesting character, but there's just one problem - he's a continuity error.

Look back to the original "Star Wars" and to "Return of the Jedi" for a moment, long considered the weakest of the old trilogy but still lightyears ahead of the prequels (they may be silly, but I dig those crazy Ewoks). In the first movie, Obi-Wan seems to emphasize this idea of Anakin as "a good friend", a line he repeats in ROTJ. In ROTJ, the ghost of Obi-Wan Kenobi says to Luke "When I first knew him, your father was already a great pilot, but I was amazed at how strongly the Force was with him. I took it upon myself to train him as a Jedi. I thought I could instruct him just as well as Yoda. I was wrong."

In Episode 1, we see none of this. Obi-Wan & Anakin have like 2 to 3 exchanges of dialogue while Anakin follows Qui-Gon around. As Chefelf pointed out on the 78 reasons to hate episode 1 page, Qui-Gon was basically a carbon copy of the old version of Obi-Wan from the first movie; albeit Qui-Gon couldn't make up his mind over being a maverick and being the wise, mysterious, aloof old master. Having said that, the idea of Qui-Gon was to serve as the grandfatherly "wizard" archetype that you see in so many mythological hero quests and, at the same time, to be the "liberal" Jedi Knight (as a friend of mine once put it) and for Obi-Wan and all the other Jedi we see in #1 to be "conservative" Jedi Knights. This all greatly contradicts Obi-Wan's speech from ROTJ about his first impression of Anakin; throughout the film, Obi-Wan & Anakin barely interact, which hurts Episode 2 where their relationship is supposed to be strained and in turmoil because we never saw them having much of a friendship to begin with. This is due to the mis-use of Qui-Gon.

I'm not saying Qui-Gon couldn't have a role in the prequels; I'm just saying that I feel that Qui-Gon Jinn should have been used differently. Qui-Gon should have been one of the more "conservative" Jedi who think it a bad idea to take in the devil child that is Anakin, and Obi-Wan should have been the "liberal" Jedi putting his ass on the line for Anakin; and upon his death, Qui-Gon relents and encourages Obi-Wan to follow his heart, even though he disagrees with the Anakin thing. I know the "conservative older man VS the liberal younger man" is cliche, but for the sake of continuity and keeping in step with Obi-Wan's ROTJ speech, this is how it should have been. Of course, I have other ideas on how the prequels should have been handled, but I'll save those for another thread.

Then the fact that Qui-Gon, as the apparent mentor of Obi-Wan, clashes with "The Empire Strikes Back" where the ghost of Obi-Wan says that Yoda instructed him. I keep waiting for a line explaining that Obi-Wan was initially trained by Yoda and later given to Qui-Gon but it never materializes.

[J m HofMarN]

Qui Gon's part was like many things in the prequels: Big, unecessary, and easily getting in the way of plot and relationships between characters.

[jariten]

ive got a post just waiting to be posted but i dont have time to post the post so the post will have to wait BUT he was important for a few reasons as well as being one of the best things in SW as well as being easily the best thing in the worst SW film ever.

[Despondent]

being one of the best things in SW as well as being easily the best thing in the worst SW film ever.

Jariten, I can't believe it! I agree with you wholeheartedly!

well, mostly. I saw Attack of the Clones.

but I hear you, man.

[Helena]

It's not just in this sense that Qui-Gon is a continuity error. It is specifically stated in The Empire Strikes Back that it was Yoda who trained Obi-Wan, not Qui-Gon. I agree that he's not a bad character, but he simply shouldn't have been in the movie in the first place.

[Chefelf]

It does say a lot for Liam Neeson's portrayal of Qui-Gon. I always really liked the character EVEN THOUGH it does represent one of the worst continuity problems in the PT. The two should have been Jedi friends, not this silly Master/Apprentice business.

[J m HofMarN]

I certainly wasnt defaming Liam Neeson or his character. I do like Qui Gon but I dont like the part he played in the films. He could have just been another Mace Windu like figure, or maybe replaced Mace and it would have been cool. Even as a mian character (the character of Jariten is pretty much a Qui Gon in my PT) he could have worked fine if he hadn't had to wedge himself into the plot. What Lucas was trying to do was inject Qui Gonn into the SW timeline and link him to Anakin and Obi Wan and stuff like that. The problem is that he'd have worked fine as a friend, a brother, a homosexual lover, any number of things EXCEPT a master and ontop of that a guy who pushes Obi Wan into a decision he should have made on his own. That's the problem I have with Qui Gonn. That and they tried to make him an overly important and meaningful character when they should have been busy explaining things about the people we already had in the story./

[Hannibal]

Can anybody see yet that Quigon is not a continuity error, but a deliberate ploy to refit Obiwan as Lord Aquaman puts it, into a "conservative" Jedi? Contrary to delierious opinion that the new Obiwan is a 'spitting image' of Jesus Christ, Lucas modeled Obiwan Kenobi after Wagner's Parsifal(Persival), who you might feel queasy to know was the "Christ-figure" of the S.S. and Knights Templar which the Jedi were based upon. The idea of replacing our favorite hero/father figure with the 'liberal' or maverick Quigon is an obvious choice on the part of Lucas to remain faithful to the Parsifal mythos. We can't have our Wagnerian Christ Figure turn out to be a heretic to the faith, Obiwan must remain among the knights and his clan as a mere pawn, in a misguided plot between Quigon and Christopher Lee(Saruman). So therefore, in our fascist heart of hearts, Obiwan is still endowed with Parsifal's purity and can still be adored and Quigon spat upon as the foolish victim of the evil dark side conspiracy(or Jewish Conspiracy if you buy into that one yet). After all, Quigon doesn't get to go to Jedi-heaven, for we know he is not standing there along side the dead holy Jedis, including the redeemed butcher-saint named Darth Anakin Skywalker Vader. Obiwan Kenobi must remain the Parsifal Wizard-Knight Christ Figure, otherwise the entire fascist fantasy might collapse because as the idealogy demands, all wanna-be knights who follow the tale must understand that the idols of the saga must be in their proper places, and the scapegoats in theirs, and once your mind has tuned to the proper plot and placement, and thus you can be influenced.

[littlejerryseinfeld]

hannibal: your post hurts my brain.

This post has been edited by littlejerryseinfeld: 24 November 2004 - 03:39 PM

[Hannibal]

or...simply put, Quigon in place of Kenobi as Anakin's Master is...well...just gay.

[J m HofMarN]

I wish the dark side would cloud my vision enough that I could ignore those two posts...

[njamilla]

I liked Qui-Gon. A lot more interesting that McGregor's Obi-Wan portrayal of a person who WAS one of the most interesting characters in the OT. I mean, doesn't McGregor simply strike you as simply another fanboy instead of an actor protraying the great Alec Guiness?

[J m HofMarN]

Oh noone's debating the character. Undeniably Qui Gon was cool, he had great lines and was one of the most likeable portrayals in an otherwise wooden movie. What I think the general consensus is is that his character was doing things he shouldn't have been doing. It was not a mistake by Neeson, but one that Lucas made.