A year or so ago, after I started getting seriously into Attack of the Clones, I had this idea that I could write episode 3. Think about it — we now have 5 of the 6 pieces of the puzzle. Simple deductive reasoning dictates what must happen between episodes 2 and 4. My idea was to throw everything together into a comical animated short, Naturally, like 75% of the ideas I have, it never got done… and at this point, it’s kind of pointless to try. (The big joke was going to be that my episode 3 would come out a year before George Lucas’s).
I had some decent notes though… here’s what I came up with:
What we know must happen between episodes 2 and 4:
• all the Jedi but two are killed (by Vader and the Emperor)
• the remaining two Jedi go into hiding
• Anakin fights Obi-Wan, falls into a lava pit and emerges as Darth Vader
• Palpatine ascends from Supreme Chancellor to Emperor
• The Republic becomes The Empire, and begins using an assortment of new hardware, including Star Destroyers, TIE fighters, AT-ATs, probe droids and the Death Star.
• Amidala gives birth to twins. One of them is taken to Tatooine, under the care of Owen and Beru. The other is taken to Alderaan, under the care of Jimmy Smits.
• Stormtroopers lose their ability to shoot
• Count Dooku dies (because there can only be two Sith, for some reason)
• R2 & 3PO’s memories are erased
• Owen “doesn’t hold with [Anakin]‘s ideals… he [thinks] he should… stay here and not [get] involved”
• Obi Wan becomes a General and serves Jimmy Smits
• Obi Wan gets ahold of Anakin’s lightsaber and keeps it
• Anakin “brings balance to the Force” (whatever that means — maybe the fact that there are only two Sith and two good guys by the end equals balance?)
• a statue of Palpatine goes up on Coruscant
• Cleig Lars (husband of Shmi, father to Owen) dies or otherwise leaves the Lars homestead. (The line “buying the moisture farm” might be funny in this context.)
• “…when your father left, he didn’t know your mother was pregnant…” (Obi-Wan to Luke, in the novelization of Return of the Jedi.)
What probably will happen as a result of the events in episode 2:
• Anakin’s secret marriage will be discovered and he will be cast out of the Jedi order
• the seperatist movement (the trade federation and their pals) continue fighting the Republic/Empre, eventually becoming a precursor to the Rebel Alliance
What would be nice:
• explanations of various loose ends: who the Sith are, why they hate the Jedi, the midichlorian thing
• explanation of how Qui-Gon didn’t come back as a ghost, but Obi-Wan did. (George Lucas mentions in the annotated screenplays that this is a trick that Yoda taught to Obi-Wan “between the third and fourth movies,” whatever that means.) Also, why Yoda heard Qui-Gon’s voice when Anakin went psycho.
Obligatory continuing motifs:
• “I have a bad feeling about this”
• C3PO being defaced
• losing arms
• opening crawl with pan down to action in space
• foreshadowing
• music from the original trilogy (especially The Imperial March)
Gags:
• Amidala’s costume changes (progressively sillier: Carmen Miranda, Village People, Charlie Brown’s ghost costume)
• Obi-Wan, Beru and Owen’s memories are also erased, by a Jawa carrying a large magnet
• flashbacks to Amidala and Anakin’s creepy courtship
• teenage versions of Lando, Han and Chewie, hanging out at the 50s diner on Coruscant (American Grafiti reference)
• Infant Luke flirting with (trying to hump) infant Leia
• [someone, in reference to infant Luke]: “Boy, this one sure whines a lot.”
[someone else, in response]: “Oh, I’m sure he’ll grow out of that.”
• anything involving Vader as a sort of middle management trainee could be funny
If anyone wants to pick this idea up and run with it, I’m all for it! Just give me some kind of credit. (Hell, I’d even be willing to help… I just don’t have time to make the whole thing happen.)