LEXX vs Star Wars
I agree that there are many parallels between I Worship His Shadow and Star Wars. My personal glib description of IWHS (though not Lexx generally) is Star Wars if it were reimagined by Terry Gilliam. But, DT, most of the things that you list were established conventions in pulp space opera a very long time before Star Wars. Ever heard of E.E. “Doc” Smith? How about Edmond Hamilton? Maybe his wife, Leigh Brackett… yes, she died working on the script of my favorite of the Star Wars films, The Empire Strikes Back, long after writing such books as The Sword of Rhiannon and such films as The Big Sleep.
And the second thing you’re failing to take into account is that Lexx is satire. The first scene of IWHS seems to me a dark inversion of the end of Star Wars (eep! they killed Luke Skywalker in the first five minutes!). His Divine Shadow in all his megalomaniacal glory is a parody of all those Evil Overlords who are too stupid to follow the sound advise of Peter Anspach. (link here for those unfamiliar…[url=http://www.eviloverlord.com/lists/overlord.html]Evil Overlord List[/url]) The obvious continuity errors, the counsel of talking (and all too often whining) evil brains… Lexx exposes the conventions of space opera in order to demolish them (and at the same time, somehow manages to be gripping and moving in between the laughs). Star Wars simply revels in those conventions, and there’s nothing wrong with that, but how you can claim it’s ground breaking in any way except for the special effects is beyond me.
Lexx is also an incredibly flexible television series, able to go in virtually any direction it’s creators wish. Star Wars is a film series that, it seems to me, is stagnating under the weight of its own popularity. I’ve already mentioned the ewoks. When the original films were remastered and rereleased we were treated to such travesties as the altered confrontation between Greedo and Han. And The Phantom Menace did not inspire me with confidence for a trilogy that, by it’s subject matter, should be much darker than the original one.
Maybe my tastes are dark and jaded, but even when Lexx is not one hundred per cent successful, it is more interesting and challenging than Star Wars is, even at its best.
[ 05-11-2001: Message edited by: uberfrosch ]