Lights... Camera... ACTION!!: A Hollywood Quest

Wally's Edit

"Trapped inside an arena where love and escape do not compute."

Marcia Lucas couldn't help but snort and roll her eyes at such a line of narration so cheesy that it was practically chedder, and then watched with blank disinterest as the rest of the trailer then showed a fast paced and choppily edited sequence of Tron's lightcycle sequence which while the graphics were certainly a cool image and revolutionary, were organized in a somewhat sloppy fashion that didn't show anything close to their true beauty like how the Battle of Yavin completely changed the paradigm for science fiction and cinema in general.

Right now Marcia was in her personal editing studio at Skywalker Ranch with her latest project being the official trailer for Tron, the debut film for Pixar and what was currently being planned as Lucasfilms' Christmas blockbuster, and while not being directly involved as even a producer, was sort of a special interest project of George who felt so strongly that Tron would change cinema the way his Star Wars had five years prior.

George felt so strongly about the film after making frequent trips to Pixar throughout the production process that he had used his co-owner authority to place Marcia as the film's editor. Not that Marcia minded at all, watching footage from Tron's filming and then travelling to Pixar and see how it was all aligned with the computers to create the CGI backgrounds and action scenes was a very fascinating process and Marcia had a strong gut feeling that like Star Wars, she was in the midst of a film revolution and future cinematic historians and casual viewers would look back at her marks on such a great piece of history.

Thus for most of 1981, she was primarily focused on Tron, her old job of micromanaging Skywalker Sound thankfully no longer required as her teams had over the past five years become highly skilled and talented artists who could be trusted with crafting a movie without her direct oversight.

It was a shame though that the Tron trailer team had a fair amount of new blood who resorted to the old school style of narrator trailers pre-Star Wars where they just had a single man describe the concept in detail and basically tell you the main synopsis along with a few cool action shots at the end. It worked in the past, but it was not a good format for the new Blockbuster era and it truly did Tron injustice. A few people might be intrigued, but it would go over the heads of most audiences and wouldn't grab anyone the way Star Wars did.

Fortunately, the editing for the film itself was mostly done so all Marcia had to do was deal with the trailer, and then she would have a few weeks of light work load before taking the next great step of her life and becoming a mother once more with her and George's adoption of the soon to be born Amanda Lucas, finally growing their family when for so long they believed that all they would have is Wally.

Speaking of, Marcia turned to the sound of the door opening and smiled brightly as she noticed her son strutting in excitedly with Indy following at his heel, George greeted her with a shy wave, "I'm gonna go see the County now and the little padawan here wanted to work with his Mom for the day." George said, said meeting in particular was negotiations for Skywalker Ranch to get its own fire department.

"How long you gonna be gone?" Marcia asked.

"Eh, probably til around 6-ish. Was thinking of grabbing a pizza on the way home so we can just relax." George offered, neither of them really being enthusiastic cooks like Bruce and til Wally had been born, mostly been content with frozen TV dinners.

"Pizza?! Pepperoni Daddy!" Wally exclaimed happily at the news. Marcia shot her husband a dirty look as now they had to get pizza or else she was the villain for denying it. Oh well, Wally hadn't had any in a while and one pie wasn't bad.

"Don't forget the Breadsticks this time or I'm revoking your restaraunt choosing priviliges." Marcia warned.

George chuckled, "Yes Ma'am. Bye Wally, see you later."

"Bye Daddy!" Wally said, giving his Dad a great hug and kiss.

George then left with Wally setting down his bag of books and toys then trying his best to climb on top of the chair next to Marcia to prove he was a big boy like how Mary was a big girl, but he kept on squirming and failing due to his height. Marcia watched with amusement while Indy curled up by her feet and laid down with a yawn.

With Wally getting frustrated, Marcia stepped in and lifted her son on top of the seat, an endeavor which she found more difficult by the day as Wally's growing size proved he was no longer the little baby she brought home from the hospital.

"Watcha workin Mommy?" Wally asked with interest, swinging his legs excitedly.

When Wally became walking and talking, increaisngly developing a love for all things film, Marcia had become briefly concerned that Wally would only be interested in the flashy side of filmmaking with George's directing and he wouldn't care or dislike her work. Wally did seem to be more of a "Daddy's boy" and while she knew Wally loved her, they didn't have that same father-son bond that belonged to both George Lucas'.

Fortunately, her fears never came to pass as while Wally didn't exactly understand much of the technical stuff, he showed equal fascination and appreciation for Marcia's editing as George's directing and camera work. According to Wally, Marcia fixed messes and made good movies great so she had a cool job to him, which made Marcia smile all the brightly at Wally's enthusiasm. Who knows, maybe she would win the vocation wars one day.

"Well, right now I'm working on a trailer for a movie called Tron." Marcia informed.

"Daddy's computer movie?" Wally asked with interest, then his face suddenly morphed into a grumpy expression, "It a kid movie right?" He asked with crossed arms, a sight that made Marcia laugh, only to make Wally more crossed.

As George Lucas' number one fan, Wally wanted to watch every film his father involved in, but the issue was that currently came down to a very limited pool of three directorial movies and two producer films. THX was certainly out, not something for Wally until he was a pre-teen at least. Star Wars was a must and while Marcia didn't want him to see American Graffiti, George had worn her down with arguments that if it was good enough for Elvis to show his daughter then it was good for Wally, and thankfully most of the mature themes went completely over the toddler's head when he mainly liked the movie for the car stuff.

Now her son had waged a war with her for the last couple weeks over getting to see Indiana Jones, which unlike Star Wars had a pretty high level of grounded violence and most especially concerning was the ending Ark scene which had Marcia put her foot down. This made Wally develop a bit of a bratty phase for a while and while Marcia tried to hold firm, George was a sneaky tag teamer and wore her down until she agreed, if nothing else than to keep Wally happy so there wasn't any bumps before he became a big brother.

"Well, I guess it is." Marcia surmised, with Wally giving a satisfied nod. Tron was perfectly suitable for a PG rating where outside of a few lines of suggestive dialogue between the main trio at the beginning there wasn't anything outright adult and it was a fun adventure movie with the only dangers being maybe a little kid would find Master Control too scary in the same vein Darth Vader scared a few kids upon his debut. Thankfully, Wally had more grit than most kids as he thought the intense Ark opening scene was "Pretty cool".

In fact, maybe Wally could be a perfect test audience to help Marcia find what she was missing. "You want to see the Trailer Wally?"

Wally nodded with anticipation, "Yes please."


View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EtyHX7z8fi8

When the title card dropped, Marcia turned to see her son staring at the screen with a bit of a neutral look, "That Trailer yours Mommy?"

"Nope." Marcia answered. "How did you know."

"It not good like you, you always good." Wally complimented, making Marcia sport a wide smile.

"Thank you very much for the compliment Wally. Why isn't it good like mine?" Marcia asked.

Wally hummed audibly in thought as he adopted a thinking pose whenever Wally wanted to look smart like his best friend Mary, "Mommy trailers make story with movie. This tell me story, then show movie. It boring, too much storyteller talking, thinks I dumb." Wally explained, and if a three year old felt like he was being dumbed down then that most certainly wasn't a good sign.

"Any other criticisms?" Marcia asked, to which Wally gasped.

"Mommy, I no critic! Critics bad people who are mean to good movies." Wally protested.

Marcia raised an eyebrow, "Who told you that?"

"Uncle Bruce." Wally said simply, making Marcia shake her head at the Goose's influence.

"Wally, a critic is just someone who describes how something makes mistakes or is flawed. They explain the good and the bad of the movie, and sometimes they say nothing but good things about a movie. Uncle Bruce gets a little frustrated with them, but that doesn't mean they're bad people or criticism is bad. It's part of my job, I critique other people's work and help them make better movies." Marcia explained.

"Oh." Wally said, receiving a sort of mini epiphany at her education.

"Anything else you don't like about it?" Marcia pressed further, trying to subtly guide her son into problem solving and help further develop his creativity.

Wally thought for a while more than answered, "Trailer not show much of computer world. I wanna see computer world, not normal actor people. Then when computer world, things happen and I no know what going on and why." Wally explained. It sort of put to words what Marcia was feeling, how the premise was thrust upon the viewers with heavy handed exposition, a sudden burst which revealed one of the main gimmicks of the film's central premise too early, and then a whole bunch of nothing with a selection of lower quality clips acting as filler, in essence like shining keys to a baby.

"So what do you wanna see Wally?" Marcia asked.

"See computer world, lots action and cool bikes and ships. Make cool adventure story in trailer like Luke's story, wanna root for hero, be excited." Wally suggested enthusiastically.

While a bit of a childish explanation, Marcia felt it was alluding to the core of what Tron needed to be a good trailer and draw people in. Overall the narrative was admittedly Tron's weakest point as it lacked the grandiose structure and callbacks to classical theater that were filled in Star Wars, it was a simple adventure movie, but the trailer was treating it as a story equal to Star Wars. The main draw of Tron was always going to be the cool and innovative computer imagery, so why not let the world of Tron become the star of the show, draw people in through there and the sequences that previously weren't possible, then let the story play out once they sat their buts in the theater?

"Well, I'm gonna make a better one right now, want to be my helper?" Marcia offered.

"Yes!" Wally said excitedly. Nearby, Indy was wagging his tail excitedly and hopped onto one of the nearby chairs, wanting to be part of the moment.


View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jp2gGqgn3Fw

While she didn't finish by the time George returned with his pizza, with Wally's help, Marcia was pushed into a right direction for a great introductory trailer. Instead of making half the trailer about the human section, it would be left out for now and implied, instead taking the audience straight into the computer world with expansive shots of the digital setting and being intrigued naturally by the Master Control instructing Sark on how to deal with the newcomer Flynn.

There was a great air of mystery and intrigue at what exactly was going on without anything spoiling away. A basic narrative structure was presented by focusing on the gladiatorial aspect, the exposition being delivered not by narrator, but by the dialogue within the film, giving an air of epicness and a weight while telling the viewer all the minimal necessary details they needed to get hook. Add in a highlight reel of a lot of the cool fight scenes and vehicular chases and it was sure to be as enticing as a chunk of peanut butter covered cheese on a mouse trap.

Come Christmas, Tron would be released and change the game of moviemaking forever, or how it was called at Lucasfilms, just another day at the office.

Turn 94 Results (December 1981-January 1982)

-[X]Star Wars Preproduction Extravaganza: George came to you with a big old binder with Dave and Lawrence. "I need your help, Bruce." He said. And that was a big binder. "Oh that, that's just part one.". Then you saw the slave outfit. "GEORGE I'M GOING TO FUCKING KILL YOU!" DC: 0 (Begins a Preproduction Miniturn) Rolled:D100 => 48

You looked at the men who were at the table. And you were surprised that they were not unhappy to see you, because they knew of your legendary temper.

"Bruce, we can explain everything."

The metal table was bending in your hands. "We'll see about that George."

(Continued in Star Wars Preproduction Extravaganza)
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-[X]Tron: You honestly don't want this film to flop, but you planned for it, and by god, you have to hope that it won't die to Napoleon. DC: 50. Rolled:D100 => 79+20=99 (Autopass)

It wasn't going to die against Napoleon.

It was going to kill Napoleon. You think.

(Continued in: TRON)
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-[X]The Mike Eisner Action Plan of 1981: Mike called a war council again, though this time, he practically put his foot down. "Bruce, I have a plan, and it's a goddamn good one. So hear me out." DC: 0 Rolled:D100 => 100

Mike Eisner, was very happy to see everyone here. "Gentlemen, I am prepared to destroy the entire American Entertainment industry with quality products that they cannot compete with. All I am asking is for a moment of your time, and give you all a fuck load of money."

Then you raised an eyebrow. "Well, Bruce and George's money."

(Continued in: The Mike Eisner Action Plan to Destroy Universal)
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-[X]The Christmas Party of 1981: So it seems that everyone, finally, remembered that the Christmas party is supposed to be fun. And look what you know, it is. However, there is one problem. Some people from reputable ad agencies were trying to stalk them, and that would not do. "George, get the Cameras!" DC: 30 Rolled:D100 => 27

You decided to go home early, to spend Christmas with your family.

You did not regret that decision. And George did a good job keeping those scoundrels away.
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Failure.
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-[X]The O'Brian Tradition: You are going to start a new tradition. Best make it a good one. DC:???
--[X] Build a Nativity set in your front yard. Rolled:D100 => 30

It wasn't the best, but hey, the kids enjoyed it. Your thumbs on the other hand did not.
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--[X] Have a Christmas dinner with Sarah's family, and invite Gavin and Susan and your parents if you can. Rolled:D100 => 91

You all sat at the large table and all looked ready to have a wonderful dinner. "You know, it's been along time since we had this, a nice dinner all together, not at the Whale?"

Your father laughed. "Oh don't be like that Bruce, speak your damn mind."

You then raised a glass. "I know we have all been away on our adventures of life. That we have not had a chance as a family to come together in a way that makes us far more together. That we have let our own lives to precedence when the lives of our children and our grandchildren" You traded a glance at mom. "Are happening, and we all want the best. So let's have this day to feast and be happy, and to Thank God the Father, and all of each other, for being here."

You prayed, and then you ate.

Reward: It was a wonderful Christmas evening.
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-[X]All I want for Christmas: Mary is having her first real Christmas, and you want to give her something that she will enjoy.
--[X] Mary keeps non-subtly hinting that she wants books, so get her a personal library. Get her a bookcase for her filled with books, both non-fiction books in her favorite subjects and fiction books of her favorite series and stories, try to get as many as Mary hasn't read along with her favorites. Rolled: D100 => 89
-[X]The Family Time: You need a night out with the family dammit! No more drama, no more work, just you and Carrie and the Kids!
--[X] You've been focusing on Mary a lot lately and don't want Sarah and Joseph to feel left out. Spend some time with the twins and just have some nice Christmas fun. Rolled:D100 => 94

Christmas morning was filled with running and jumping, mostly from…Mary, who was screaming so loudly that everyone was practically awoken by her.

Christmas was always special. And while Rampant consumerism was an unfortunate side effect of it, you had much better ways to capitalize on it.

But after being woken up, coffee was given to you and Carrie by your mom and dad, who had been staying in the guest room for the day, you smiled. "I was hoping for another hour." You said,

"Well, you excited her with the whole Santa story Dad." You said. "You get it in?"

"Yep." He said. "All 200 hundred of them. Can't believe you went all out on the books?"

"It will do so much to help me prepare for whatever she comes up with." You replied. You sighed as she began tearing into the presents.

You then walked over to the crawling to Sarah and Joseph who were, thankfully trying to be calm, and not scared of all the noises that Mary was making in her struggle to get all the books.

"Hey, you two." You scooped them up and held them close. "There are some presents for you, but I am not going to make it all about Mary, she can do all that stuff on her own, but you two get to be my troublemakers for a time, so let's work together." You grabbed the two presents for them and you helped them."

And it was magical to see them work together to get the toys.

Reward: you had a very Merry Christmas.
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-[X]The Sound of fighting: You smile and realize one thing that was rather… uncomfortable. Ginger the cat is fighting one of the neighbors cats again that keeps sneaking into your house. Time to assist her. DC:??? Rolled:D100 => 83

So… you learned something new.

One, Ginger apparently was the battle-hardened badass on the neighborhood cats. And had not a scratch on her despite all the battles she seemed to fight.

And the local cats were pretty much following her to the big pile of food that was out and getting stolen from by her.

Well that was why you were going through catfood so quickly, you thought Ginger and the kittens just ate alot.

But no, you were feeding the whole damn nieghborhood.

Also there was another scottish fold that was around, a feral one that may have been the father to the kittens.

But she learned to kick the crap out of that.

Reward: Um, hail ginger, the queen cat of the neighborhood.
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-[X]Best Friends: So Mary has lots of friends, and she wants them to come over. You need to prepare for that. Carrie, get the cookies.
--[X] Hold a Birthday party for Mary on December 30th where she can invite her friends and have fun. For her birthday, gift her a tricycle. Rolled:D100 => 31

It was a fun birthday party.

Just that.
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-[X]Hanging out with the Friends: It's been far to long since you, John, and Robin hung out, so you will go out for some drinks and have some fun. DC: 45 Rolled:D100 => 44

They sent some wonderful gifts, but they could't make it to the party.


-[X]A Charitable Heart: You want to invest your newfound wealth. Maybe even save some lives while you are at it. (Linetail what you wish to invest in below this action, and the amount of money you want to donate in)
--[X] $200 million, split the money to donate $100 million each to FEAST and the O'Reilly Foundation to make sure many families have a Merry Christmas. Rolled:D100 => 42

WEll… it was a merry christmas.

And you hoped they all had a good year.

Reward: A few things happened but none of them really great.
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-[X]Pray: It had been a long time since you went to Mass. You wish for the Lord to give you strength. DC: ???
--[X] Attend Christmas mass and give thanks for a good year and your family being healthy and safe. Rolled:D100 + 20 => 57

It was too long since you prayed, but you did, and thanked God for your Family, and the health they had.

You only hoped for continued success and continued prosperity.

Reward: THere will be.