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Review: "Revenge"
Oct. 17th, 2007 09:48 pmRevenge: The Real Life Story of Star Wars Episode III Revenge of the Sith
by Jonathan L. Bowen
Two years ago, Jonathan L. Bowen unleashed Anticipation: The Real Life Story of Star Wars Episode I The Phantom Menace, a book that chronicled TPM's journey from the writing of the film through its debut on DVD in 2001. Anticipation is a pretty good source for fans or anyone else looking for facts about the film. It also does a terrific job knocking out a lot of misconceptions and inaccuracies that have surrounded the film since then.
Bowen more or less does the same with Revenge, although the tack he takes with this book is that ROTS vindicates George Lucas, fans who have stood by the PT, and the SW phenomenon as a whole. He doesn't go into as much detail with ROTS's pre-production as he did with TPM, but given that it's the last hurrah for a pre-assembled team and not a start-from-scratch film like TPM was, that's to be expected.
Bowen also covers AOTC's pre-release hype, if you can call it that, its run at the box office, in IMAX format, and on DVD. Bowen acknowledges, as I've been saying for years, that AOTC was underpromoted and that had an effect on its box office.
The way Bowen frames it, ROTS had to prove itself to naysayers and show everyone SW still had it. And it succeeded.
As with Anticipation, the best parts of Revenge is when it lets the facts tell the story. This is especially true when it comes to tracking ROTS's box office numbers, its merchandise sales, and its DVD sales. When it comes to the business/economic side of movies, this book excels. All of it is presented in a way anyone can understand and it's not dry or dull. Bowen did extensive research in a shorter time frame than the six years it took for him to write Anticipation. He tries to make his citations clearer this time. Not perfect, but definitely an improvement over the previous book.
Even though just two years have passed since ROTS graced theaters, Revenge brings back things you may have forgotten in that short period of time. Remember the people busted for pirating ROTS? (There's a chapter in the book about piracy of the film, though there's no mention of good ol' "Backstroke of the West.") Or parents allegedly getting up in arms over the PG-13 rating? How about Wal-Mart's 48 Hours of the Force promotion in April 2005?
He also has on record, in case anyone suffers amnesia, several critics who gave ROTS glowing reviews. ROTS may actually be the best-reviewed SW film since ANH. He bases his percentages of positive reviews on RottenTomatoes.com, though I think you'd have to do more in-depth research through means such as microfilm and databases like Lexis/Nexus (rarely used outside of legal/legislative circles) to really get the full picture of reviews from the OT era. Still, he's probably right.
Then there are the tidbits I didn't know about, such as how ROTS's merchandise earnings outdid its predecessors when everyone expected the numbers to fall in between TPM's and AOTC's. Not all of it is quite as sunny. Bowen discusses how for some reason, the Italians just aren't into SW. None of the six films performed all of that impressively in the land of pasta. Mamma Mia! Bowen also notes the few attempts by the international media to downplay or even distort ROTS's box office success. One columnist in Australia prematurely declared ROTS a flop in the land Down Under, which it was most certainly not. Crikey!
One problem with Anticipation that is carried over to this book is the lack of a really good editor. Bowen needed somebody to keep him focused and avoid going off on tangents. The chapter on LucasArts is interesting but it felt like a chapter from another book. It's not important to the story of ROTS and its success to go through the entire history of the company over several pages. As a fan, Bowen wants to pack in as much as possible, leaving nothing unmentioned, but as a writer you can't do that.
T'Bone at T'Bone's SW Universe noted in his review that if he had any criticism at all of the book, it was that Bowen injects too much of his opinion. Don't worry, he is generally favorable to the PT, but at times even I felt from a writer's perspective the editorializing was distracting. The facts in the book speak for themselves.
There's a chapter on the political controversy the movie generated but while the chapter implicitly denies the movie was meant as a commentary on the Iraq war or the Bush administration, in the next chapter "Understanding Revenge" he tries to argue that "only a Sith deals in absolutes" is a commentary on the Iraq war and the Bush administration.
What's this about SW being a guy thing again? It's stated more than once in the book ("especially young boys") even though Bowen gets statements from female fans as well as the dudes.
And to be really nitpicky, the events at Comic Con 2004 didn't exactly transpire the way he described it. The title wasn't announced by having Steve Sansweet whip off his baseball jersey to reveal his ROTS t-shirt. There was a specially-made video shown right before that which actually revealed the title. It's probably archived somewhere on starwars.com.
Overall Revenge is a fascinating and eye-opening read. Fans can get a lot out of Bowen's history of the final SW film and so can anyone who's interested in the business/economic side of the movies.
by Jonathan L. Bowen
Two years ago, Jonathan L. Bowen unleashed Anticipation: The Real Life Story of Star Wars Episode I The Phantom Menace, a book that chronicled TPM's journey from the writing of the film through its debut on DVD in 2001. Anticipation is a pretty good source for fans or anyone else looking for facts about the film. It also does a terrific job knocking out a lot of misconceptions and inaccuracies that have surrounded the film since then.
Bowen more or less does the same with Revenge, although the tack he takes with this book is that ROTS vindicates George Lucas, fans who have stood by the PT, and the SW phenomenon as a whole. He doesn't go into as much detail with ROTS's pre-production as he did with TPM, but given that it's the last hurrah for a pre-assembled team and not a start-from-scratch film like TPM was, that's to be expected.
Bowen also covers AOTC's pre-release hype, if you can call it that, its run at the box office, in IMAX format, and on DVD. Bowen acknowledges, as I've been saying for years, that AOTC was underpromoted and that had an effect on its box office.
The way Bowen frames it, ROTS had to prove itself to naysayers and show everyone SW still had it. And it succeeded.
As with Anticipation, the best parts of Revenge is when it lets the facts tell the story. This is especially true when it comes to tracking ROTS's box office numbers, its merchandise sales, and its DVD sales. When it comes to the business/economic side of movies, this book excels. All of it is presented in a way anyone can understand and it's not dry or dull. Bowen did extensive research in a shorter time frame than the six years it took for him to write Anticipation. He tries to make his citations clearer this time. Not perfect, but definitely an improvement over the previous book.
Even though just two years have passed since ROTS graced theaters, Revenge brings back things you may have forgotten in that short period of time. Remember the people busted for pirating ROTS? (There's a chapter in the book about piracy of the film, though there's no mention of good ol' "Backstroke of the West.") Or parents allegedly getting up in arms over the PG-13 rating? How about Wal-Mart's 48 Hours of the Force promotion in April 2005?
He also has on record, in case anyone suffers amnesia, several critics who gave ROTS glowing reviews. ROTS may actually be the best-reviewed SW film since ANH. He bases his percentages of positive reviews on RottenTomatoes.com, though I think you'd have to do more in-depth research through means such as microfilm and databases like Lexis/Nexus (rarely used outside of legal/legislative circles) to really get the full picture of reviews from the OT era. Still, he's probably right.
Then there are the tidbits I didn't know about, such as how ROTS's merchandise earnings outdid its predecessors when everyone expected the numbers to fall in between TPM's and AOTC's. Not all of it is quite as sunny. Bowen discusses how for some reason, the Italians just aren't into SW. None of the six films performed all of that impressively in the land of pasta. Mamma Mia! Bowen also notes the few attempts by the international media to downplay or even distort ROTS's box office success. One columnist in Australia prematurely declared ROTS a flop in the land Down Under, which it was most certainly not. Crikey!
One problem with Anticipation that is carried over to this book is the lack of a really good editor. Bowen needed somebody to keep him focused and avoid going off on tangents. The chapter on LucasArts is interesting but it felt like a chapter from another book. It's not important to the story of ROTS and its success to go through the entire history of the company over several pages. As a fan, Bowen wants to pack in as much as possible, leaving nothing unmentioned, but as a writer you can't do that.
T'Bone at T'Bone's SW Universe noted in his review that if he had any criticism at all of the book, it was that Bowen injects too much of his opinion. Don't worry, he is generally favorable to the PT, but at times even I felt from a writer's perspective the editorializing was distracting. The facts in the book speak for themselves.
There's a chapter on the political controversy the movie generated but while the chapter implicitly denies the movie was meant as a commentary on the Iraq war or the Bush administration, in the next chapter "Understanding Revenge" he tries to argue that "only a Sith deals in absolutes" is a commentary on the Iraq war and the Bush administration.
What's this about SW being a guy thing again? It's stated more than once in the book ("especially young boys") even though Bowen gets statements from female fans as well as the dudes.
And to be really nitpicky, the events at Comic Con 2004 didn't exactly transpire the way he described it. The title wasn't announced by having Steve Sansweet whip off his baseball jersey to reveal his ROTS t-shirt. There was a specially-made video shown right before that which actually revealed the title. It's probably archived somewhere on starwars.com.
Overall Revenge is a fascinating and eye-opening read. Fans can get a lot out of Bowen's history of the final SW film and so can anyone who's interested in the business/economic side of the movies.
