It
might seem strange to dress up your baby as Luke Skywalker, may seem silly to
draw C-3PO on your hand and film it walking around, or even downright
disturbing to lounge against a tree with little more than a smallish Jedi
shirt. Or for some hard-core fans, it
might be an experiment in immersion.
When Casey Pugh set out to remake Star
Wars, he created a truly communal experience. Even the title sequence is a collective of
posts from users who “sign on” to comment.
Mixing old and new media as well as utilizing imagery from earlier films
(like the Beatles Yellow Submarine),
or characters (like Homer Simpson), or iconic objects (like Pez dispensers and
action figures), the mass of individuals involved were given a great deal of autonomy
in their participation. This agency and
the goal/assignment of a 15 second portion of the movie, allowed them to
encounter and interact with the text in a new way, as Murray suggests, and exercise their creative faculty.
She notes that: “Because of our
desire to experience immersion, we focus our attention on the developing world
and we use our intelligence to reinforce rather than to question the reality of
the experience. We construct alternate narratives as we go along in life.”
(110) And indeed, that is what each of
the participants did by creating musicals, or using legos and paper bags, or
mock-cnn stories or infomercials.
Radway
suggests that we must go deeper than the theory of mass culture, where the text
is valued over the reader, and give observation and credence to what the
readers do with the text. She promotes a
focus on the reader’s interaction with the media. While Star
Wars Uncut certainly empowers its readers as creators of media, it is most
interesting and telling to look at the way in which they chose to present their
fifteen seconds of fandom glory. While
some of the episodes were centered on one “super fan” playing all the roles,
the majority of the live-action sequences revolved around micro-communities. Parents both staged and interacted with their
children, siblings, friends, co-workers (all groups that exist within a
semi-private space, who were granted the opportunity to make their private
actions not only public – via the vehicle of the internet – but also communal). Together they created this film. In a shot for shot recreation, 473
submissions were selected via vote (thus involving an even larger community)
and edited together with sound overlaid.
Then the film was distributed in an online format, free of charge, for
all viewers forming what might be viewed as a collective.
Jenkins
notes that a “Collective
Intelligence” can be seen as an alternative source of media power – this is
mostly using our collective power of media consumption through our recreational
lives. A clear example of this can be
found in the wide variety of techniques used in retelling this story: Animation
(stop-motion, cut-out, what appeared to be a version of rotoscoping – where it
looked like they drew on top of existing film, etc.), live action using adults,
teenagers, children, babies, cats, etc., even storyboards or collectible cards
moving about. Some used current
technology and others attached cinnamon rolls to their head to become Princess
Lea. Many sequences were
comedic, or obviously low budget. Some
even fit into the low-brow category with their overt sexual tone and play on
characters and relationships, whereas others appeared to be high quality, time-intensive
dedications to a beloved film. While it isn’t likely that many, if
any, of these contributors had the skill and equipment to create a full version
of this film (which would most certainly violate some intellectual property law
and send Sigourney Weaver and Co. after you to turn your video store into
condos…wait, wrong film) their pooled resources and collective intelligence actually
earned them an Emmy.
Casey
Pugh’s experiment of Star Wars Uncut
is a medium that truly pairs the reader with the text. It allows the “actors” to encounter and
identify with the characters and themes in the original film. They assume the role themselves either in an
(attempted) true copy or in a spoof simulacrum.
But no matter their approach, they are empowered to do something with
the text in a participatory culture. Converging old media (the original film,
action figures, even images of Abe Lincoln) and new media (special effects, their
own filming, computer animation and editing, etc.) in an unexpected way, Pugh was
able to allow his viewers to take the media into their own hands, to begin the
process of connecting media. Just look
at how they fused Seal’s “Kissed by a Rose” with scenes from the film and
change the meaning and relationships of the characters or how Harrison Ford was
represented as both Han Solo and Indiana Jones.
Radway
further specifies the need to look at how human beings actively make sense of
their world and culture. While some may scoff and wonder why so many people are drawn
to Star Wars, it is important to focus on the what; to look at how they are
interpreting and constructing the text itself and engaging in the “social event
of viewing and interacting.” (8) There
is an apparent need, given works like this and the likes of Comic-Con, for
audiences to immerse themselves in the digital world. But Star
Wars Uncut manages to do so in a regulated way, allowing time for a short
visit into the fantasy land and clarifying the borders that separate the
participants from a hallucination. This
structure, while the actual viewing was exhausting for an outside viewer,
created a new media experience that is valued and opens the door for others to
come.
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