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Introduction

Today, I was leafing" through the IMDb page of the 1994 movie The Shadow. I stumbled across the Connections page and found, to my utter surprise, that Star Wars Episode 1: The Phantom Menace, is listed as a connection. According to the page, The Shadow is referenced in The Phantom Menace, but I find that highly doubtful.

Question

What, if any, is the connection between The Shadow (1994) and Star Wars Episode 1: The Phantom Menace?

References

I've linked to the Connections page of The Shadow above, but below is a screenshot for convenience:

Screenshot of The Shadow Connections page on IMDb

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    It should be noted that the Phantom Menace's corresponding 'references' list on IMDb includes many titles other than The Shadow (like Casablanca, Batman and Black Rain) that are left unexplained. It basically means a user thought some scene in TPM was influenced by this movie somehow, but without that user's explanation, it'd be hard to know for certain what they meant.
    – Walt
    Nov 10, 2016 at 12:35
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    My guess is the comparison of Jedi Mind Tricks and the Shadow's ability to Cloud Men's Minds. I'd have to rewatch ep 1 to be sure, and I never will.
    – Longspeak
    Nov 10, 2016 at 18:20
  • @Longspeak See my comment to Mateus' answer. The mind trick was already shown in A New Hope (1977) and was merely repeated in TPM. The Shadow is from 1994.
    – Walt
    Nov 11, 2016 at 14:05
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    @Walt yeah but this was some random users edit on IMdb, with no explanation offered, so we're really only guessing what the heck that person was thinking.
    – Longspeak
    Nov 11, 2016 at 16:08
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    We are literally duplicating IMDB with this trivia... voted to close
    – cde
    Nov 12, 2016 at 3:27

1 Answer 1

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The "Connections" section in IMDB is meant to cover explicit connections between the two movies, such as:

  • characters in the later movie watch or discuss the earlier movie. For example, in The Martian (2015), Mitch Henderson (played by Sean Bean) talks about The Lord Of The Rings (2001), without mentioning that Sean Bean played a major character in it.
  • one movie is a prequel or sequel to the other. For example, Die Hard (1988) was technically a sequel to The Detective (1968).
  • both movies come from the same source material. For example, both Kiss Me, Kate (1953) and 10 Things I Hate About You (1999 ) were based on the 1592 play The Taming of the Shrew.

They are not literary or thematic connections, similar genres, or other subjective judgements like that.

I think what you are seeing in this case is a data error.

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  • Not the 'references' section, though. See the examples here and some of their explanations.
    – Walt
    Nov 11, 2016 at 17:34
  • while i like the detail in this answer, i have a hard time accepting it as the answer since you didn't seem to determine whether there was a connection or not, but rather share what seems to be your opinion.
    – DForck42
    Oct 2, 2018 at 0:24
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    @DForck42 -- the Connections page lists it Phantom as "referencing" The Shadow. Under the usual rules, that would mean that a character in Phantom mentions The Shadow, or has a poster of it or some similar explicit reference. Obviously, that's impossible. Sometimes, the rules are relaxed, and allow for metatexual references (the way the finale in Brazil quotes the famous Odessa Steps sequence in Battleship Potemkin), but that seems unlikely. As I said, a data error.
    – Michael Lorton
    Oct 2, 2018 at 0:42
  • to further support the data error theory, the other options have a description of the reference listed: this one does not.
    – Winston Ewert
    Oct 2, 2018 at 1:45
  • I cannot prove a negative. All the reasons I can think of to assert that there is a link between the two movies are implausible or improbable. If you have another reason, give it; otherwise please comment on someone else's answer.
    – Michael Lorton
    Oct 2, 2018 at 2:26

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