USA Today wants to know: What do you think about 'The Two Towers'?. The comparison they are using is the Star Wars films. (I see blood in the water. Can you say: "chum-fest"?) They'll publish the answers. Come on, all you geeks. What are you waiting for? (I'm waiting to wake up.)
Update: My answers to the questions are up:
1. Do the The Lord of the Rings movies show signs of having enough of a cultural impact and popularity to become the Star Wars for this generation?
"This generation" is a meaningless term, because both movies have a certain amount of cross-generational appeal. However, that is where the comparison ends. For example: The Lord of the Rings films have nothing in them aimed at very young children the way the Star Wars films do (even the first one had cute, barrel-shaped Cee-threepio, its burbles and squeals sounding very like a baby in a cradle). This does not mean that children aren't "sophisticated" enough to like The Lord of the Rings films, it means only that there is no blatant attempt to appeal to their "baser" toy-collecting nature. (I do not count the spinoff merchandising of both sets of films -- the dolls and accessories and video games and so forth -- in this assessment of the actual amount of child-appeal in the actual films. In Lord of the Rings the only creatures that come close to being even halfway child's-toy-like are the Ents, but they are far outclassed in the cuteness department by the Ewoks.)
2. Is Peter Jackson, the director and effects wizard behind the Rings movies, the new George Lucas?
I certainly hope not. Lucas, after a promising start, has become a hopeless windbag with delusions of grandeur, and no sense of story or characterization.
3. Are you one of the original Star Wars fans who have been disappointed by the recent episodes The Phantom Menace and Attack of the Clones in the series?
Oh god, yes. I haven't even bothered to go see Clones. I saw The Phantom Menace on video. I wasn't impressed.
Has The Lord of the Rings replaced Star Wars as your film series of choice? If so, why?
Well, quite a few movies had already replaced Star Wars as my movie of choice. One reason was the increasing sophistication of movie-making technology, which makes the early Star Wars films look lame. Dazzling special effects are no longer sufficient to hide a weak storyline from the audience. The storyline in Lord of the Rings exposes the Star Wars "mythos" as a randomly pasted-up pastiche of old fifties sci-fi, Saturday matinee serials, rescue-the-princess fairy tales, and badly-digested kung-fu-movie pseudo-mysticism.
4. If you are age 25 and under, do you find that the Rings movies mean more to you than the Star Wars films. And why?
I don't qualify for this question.
5. Which film are you looking forward to the most Star Wars: Episode III (due in 2005) or The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, due this Christmas?
Return of the King, hands down. I doubt I'll even bother to go see this nth episode of Star Wars: The Movie That Wouldn't Leave, in the theater.
I went ahead and emailed them to the USAToday folks. This should get me universally hated...
Posted by Andrea Harris at January 10, 2003 09:05 AMIt's like you never left high school -- but then a lot of aspects of modern life seem to be like that.
Posted by: Andrea Harris at January 10, 2003 at 09:48 AMI've made sure my life is NOTHING like it was at high school.
Two Towers was so good I went to see it again. And I might go a third time.
Posted by: Scott Wickstein at January 10, 2003 at 10:15 AMMy answers are up. And e-mailed to them, of course.
Posted by: *** Dave at January 10, 2003 at 10:51 AMToo funny! At dinner last night when I was telling my brother about the LotR Oscar party, I said, "Peter Jackson, the George Lucas of the 21st century."
Posted by: Ith at January 10, 2003 at 11:34 AMWhat the person doing the poll dimly gets is that Star Wars and The Lord of the Rings both tap into the same fundamental myths. But Tolkein's saga is champagne, while Lucas's original stories are 'jungle juice', giving Peter Jackson a thoroughly unfair advanatage when it comes to making them into movies.
So I'll go see the next Star Wars flick, but I'm eager for The Return of the King.
Posted by: Stephen M. St. Onge at January 11, 2003 at 05:37 AMR2-D2! Not C3-PO.
If you must bash my childhood, bash it correctly.
Posted by: Enrak at January 13, 2003 at 01:01 PMGroan! I know. I didn't notice my mistake until about a week later. Encroaching senility.
Posted by: Andrea Harris at January 23, 2003 at 02:01 PM