Jabba The Hutt !!!!!

[Zopwx2]

on the topic of star wars rippoffs:

http://www.jitterbug.com/origins/dune.html

What about Jabba The Hutt! He resembles the description of the God Emperor of Dune Leto II quite alot!!!

[Vanguard3000]

Interesting, but CHOAM is not the Spacing Guild. E for effort; F for failure. ;)

Seriosuly though, I think this guy has too much time on his hands. He makes way too many farfetched theories. Case in point:

C-3PO is a gold, male version of the robot Maria from Fritz Lang's highly influential 1927 scifi masterpiece, Metropolis. The whirring sound of C-3PO's joints was probably inspired by the clanking joints of the Tin Woodsman in The Wizard of Oz.

The author assumes Lucas has no immagination of his own. I agree that stuff inspired him, whether he knows it or not (i.e. subconciously), but I like to think at least some of it was his own.

[Zopwx2]

"Are you accusing George Lucas of plagiarism, or saying that Star Wars is unoriginal?

Exactly the opposite! The surface elements of a story are the most visible, but when you start explore how story works you quickly realize that surface elements are really the least-significant parts of a story. For instance, Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings borrows the idea of "orcs" from Beowulf. Tolkien seemed to think of orcs as the same creatures he called "goblins" in The Hobbit. He probably became unhappy with the word "goblin" because it derives from the French (gobelin), and he wanted to create a myth that was English. Does that mean that Tolkien ripped off Beowulf? On the other hand, if Tolkien had called his orcs "goblins," would that have changed his story in any really important way? The power of a story lies mostly how the underlying archetypes relate, not what form those archetypes take.

So why borrow from inspirations at all? Star Wars is an epic myth, which is kind of a "summing up" of all the best stories and perspectives of a culture into a single story. Lucas tied together some of the best ideas from world cinema, science fiction, comic books, fantasy, westerns, fairy tales and other myths. If this sounds easy, check out any of the films and television programs which try to repeat the "Star Wars success formula." Why are they so awful? Because they imitate only the surface, and the surface is almost irrelevant. The film which best repeats the inner lessons of Star Wars is The Matrix, which very carefully avoids any superficial resemblance.

A myth-maker's originality lies in the way they combine mostly pre-existing ideas as seamlessly and appeallingly as possible. George Lucas has pulled off an honest-to-goodness myth, which takes a real affection for people, a staggering amount of work, and a kind of genius. As Joseph Campbell has often said, myth is an essential tool for living. By modernizing the Universal Myth in a way people all over the world can easily connect with, George Lucas has enriched the world." - From the Site's FAQ

[Acriku]

One thing great about Star Wars is that it re-invented sci-fi. Look at 2001 Space Odyssey, with the one ship throughout the movie. Then look at Star Wars with the thousands of ships going around all at once.

[thomas]

yea SW was great but lucas did rip off alot of ideas from dune, and hte stars geek at my school says "stop , stop talking!" I dont like him, I tried to convert him to dune but he already has card board cutouts of princess leia from all three movies ::) :P

[Emperor Harkonnen]

so the conclusion is that star wars is a dune rippoff??

I am not really into sw, but is it copied from dune?

[Gunseng_Harkonnen]

I always thought that this sand guy that Jabba tried to feed with Luke was like shai hulud one but I rether trying find dune stuff in this. But now I think star wars have some things that can be compered with dune.

[Egeides]

I found a very interesting article on the subject at http://archive.salon.com/ent/movies/feature/2002/04/10/lucas/index.html

There's a lot there about Star Wars being inspired (at which point, up to you to see) by many other authors, Herbert included (Tatooine, force...). There's also this article we have on FED2k that talks about it and is quite a good reading.

[Acriku]

Actually the force was from a different person, who had the idea first. I forget who, anybody know?

[Zopwx2]

the force is a pretty general idea, i dont think any one guy thought it up. Also i could have sworn i came up for the basic idea of the matrix way before the movie came out. It goes to show you that somtimes different people can come up with similar things. But starwars was mostlikely influenced by dune and other things.

[Acriku]

In early drafts Lucas called The Force "The Force of Others," which may have been inspired by the episode called The Force of Life.

[number6]

In early drafts Lucas called The Force "The Force of Others," which may have been inspired by the episode called The Force of Life.

To what episode is that quote referring?

[Acriku]

http://www.space1999.net/catacombs/main/epguide/t09fol.html Looks cool - but it probably is cheesy.

[slaphapy]

I don't know why you would think Lucas stole all his ideas from dune.

all epic stories are incredibly similar.. you have a hero trying to fight for something.. usually piece or something like that

you have some opposing force

in pretty much every story (can't think of any that don't) the hero has some special ability that seperates him from others.

think of the oddysey for instance, you have Odysseus as the hero, his special ability or power is that he can string his bow, which no other man can do. His fight type of thing, is him trying to get home, also he has to fight all of the gods and mythical creatures along the way to home, and he has to beat the suiters when he gets home in order to get them out of the way... there are many other examples you could find if you had the time that the other guy did ;)

[Acriku]

Sure the gist of it is similar to others, but the specifics are obviously similar to parts of Dune and other works.

[number6]

http://www.space1999.net/catacombs/main/epguide/t09fol.html Looks cool - but it probably is cheesy.

Well I read the synopsis of the story and I doubt this episode of Space 1999 influenced Lucas about the "Force". It sounds like a twist on vampire stories where this guy can drain the life force or any energy for that matter by touch instead of drinking blood.

[Acriku]

Well, remember that Lucas called it "The Force of Life" in the early drafts, and probably built off of that.

[TMA_1]

This reminds me of how rap artists "sample" from different songs and recreate a new one out of it. George Lucas did not reinvent science fiction, only broke ground with making the first bigtime sci fi movie that used the special effects techniques he did. The story itself is completely typical and could have been made in an hour by a junior high student. Still though, he isnt a bad writer. You can see this in some of his other movies like THX 1139, american graffiti, and others. Also remember, he is a director. And looking at it that way, though there are some cheezy cliche's in the movie, he did a damn freaking good job at directing it. It deserved to be as popular as it was. It really did save mainstream science fiction.

[Chani]

i dont star wars is a rip off of dune.

i think star wars has elements of dune in it.. but not that it ripped it off. it's a completely different story..

i love dune very dearly, and i also love star wars very dearly, though not because they are the same..

[Emperor Harkonnen]

but you got to admit that there are similarities which are so similar that they had to be copied

[Chani]

i do admit there are similarities... but i just dont think star wars is a rip off of dune, just aspects are similar.

[Acriku]

Star-Wars ripped off Dune in many ways, but the entire series is not a complete rip-off, although it leaves little to be desired.

[Emperor Harkonnen]

but I do think that there should be credit to the dune books in the star wars movies