Hey, remember Star Wars? It's a film series about film wizards who fight each other with swords made of energy in space. They don't literally fight in space. The main villain, Darth Vader, was supposed to be able to jump from spaceship to spaceship in the original concept, but then that never made it to the production cut of Star Wars, which mysteriously started on Episode 4.
The Episode 8 mixtape dropped last week, and I'm going to give some raw, unstable thoughts on the matter. To start with, I am a huge Star Wars fan. I think I was born with a toy lightsaber in my hand. What makes that even weirder is that my mother was a wolf, but I somehow came out as a human. But that's a different story for a different time. I want to tell you about something that is bugging me. It... it's Disney. I think Kathleen Kennedy is riding a bull that she can't control, and it's called Star Wars, and why the fuck did they give the series to Rian Johnson?
I guess I'm going to spoil some stuff. So just go away if you don't want to be spoilered.
I kind of liked The Force Awakens. I was one of the people who didn't bitch about it that much. I have one issue with it, which is that it introduces the Star Killer Base, and then destroys it like 10 minutes later. A New Hope also had a super weapon, but the whole movie revolved around it, and the climax of the movie was built-up to throughout the story. I almost felt like JJ Abrams wrote the script and then someone said "It needs a Death Star. Episode 4 had a Death Star." and he was like "Oh, hold on." and penned in a few edits and said "There, now the script has a Death Star in it. It gets blowed up at the end."
As far as the other shit goes, I'm fine with Rey being overpowered, except for that one scene where she goes "I bypassed the thing!" and holds up a ship part. I'm like "Get out of here with that shit." But it's established that she knows how to fix spaceships and how to fight early in the film. So when people cry about her beating Kylo Ren's ass on not-Hoth, keep in mind that he got fucking shot by Chewbacca, and is barely trained in how to actually fight another person with a lightsaber. The point is: while the film had weaknesses, I have excuses for explaining that away so I can live in my fantasy land where Star Wars is still lit af.
Until now. I think the decision to hand the story from one person to the next is a terrible way to create a larger narrative. I feel like JJ Abrams was going in a certain direction with the series, but then they gave it to Rian Johnson, who had different ideas. Why on Earth would they do this? Episode 8 doesn't seem like the logical follow-up to Episode 7 at all. I'm not saying Episode 8 is bad, but when Episode 7 ended, I wanted to see another Star Wars. I was like "Well, done. You did it, Disney. You made a film that didn't suck." and was excited to see what would happen next. Now I'm just kind of like "Meh. I don't care."
I thought a good arc would've been for Rey to be seduced by the dark side and then redeemed in part 3. Or something like that. The ultimate villain is not supposed to die in the middle of a story. Part 2 is supposed to set something up for Part 3. Instead, Part 2 just took all the stuff in Part 1 and threw it in the garbage. Like, Luke Skywalker could reject the force and the jedi, but then in Part 3, he could have an 'arc'. That's a thing characters have. Jesus Christ. It's just a giant pile of shit now designed to sell toys and have a bag of marshmallows with Finn on the package.
WHY WOULD YOU DO THIS TO US, DISNEY!? DO YOU JUST NOT CARE!?
On December 23 2017 12:31 Cricketer12 wrote: Yea it's a weird movie. Not horrible, but man is it weird for JJ to fix this
I don't think it's fixable. JJ Abrams just did a bunch of re-hashing of older films in the Star Trek films, and then with TFA. How is he going to rehash RotJ if there's no Empire Strikes Back?
Well with the new movie they are literal space wizards that don't have to care about the vacuum of space and can just move around at will. They also don't have to worry about stretches of time or space as ships can travel around instantly and you can learn complex sword fighting and high level force techniques in less then a week. Prequels were so bad they had to spend decades teaching kids to turn them into warrior monks when the new trilogy can churn out world beaters in a long weekend.
It's fascinating how differently people perceive this film. I would write a paper about it if only I understood it well enough to say something credible. I legitimately have no clue what it is exactly that makes people LOVE this movie. It's easy enough to poke holes in the logic and continuity of the story but somehow a significant portion of viewers is not bothered by that. Is it really the disparity between people that like to be surprised and the people that don't that make up the divide in this movie?
On December 23 2017 18:38 Saechiis wrote: It's fascinating how differently people perceive this film. I would write a paper about it if only I understood it well enough to say something credible. I legitimately have no clue what it is exactly that makes people LOVE this movie. It's easy enough to poke holes in the logic and continuity of the story but somehow a significant portion of viewers is not bothered by that. Is it really the disparity between people that like to be surprised and the people that don't that make up the divide in this movie?
Here's the weird thing -- I wanted to like this movie. But even before it came out, I was wondering how it would work out having different writer/directors work on each movie of a continuous story. I wish I knew the thought process behind all of this. And I know it's possible for people to write stories that are Star Wars, and that the fans love. While I personally have mixed feelings about the Expanded Universe series (I think some of it is shite) a lot of people really love those. Therefore, it is possible to write new Star Wars stories that are good, but this is not a good example, and I don't even want to see the damn Han Solo movie.
The ultimate villain is not supposed to die in the middle of a story.
It's almost like the guy who has all the characterisation and development's the actual ultimate villain, not some conjoined-twin fetus head in a bathrobe.
I do agree that having two vastly different creative forces at work here has created problems, they'd have done much better having just one screenplay/director/editing team and keeping with it throughout the years. Unfortunately nobody was around to explain this to Disney, I guess they figured it would function liked the Marvel stuff does but that's a different sort of beast.
For what it's worth I rather liked The Last Jedi and do look forward to seeing Rian Johnson doing more Star Wars films (though I would appreciate it if he would allow someone to help him with the script. He's good with character work but struggles with internal logic and verisimilitude. I'm pretty good with those things generally but goddammit man you're pushing me here)
I rather like that movie personally, probably my favourite movie since Empire and A New Hope, it's way to long, but if you cut the casino part, a good part of Fin-Purple hair and the toys characters, I fell you have a very solid movie.
And I don't really care about Snoke dying, he probably should never have been in the movie to begin with, like the Emperor in the original trilogy, they are just useless super villain who look like they eat baby for breakfast and have no background (well they gave the Emperor a background but after the fact). I am more exited now to see the follow up then I was after TFA, since the story is not just a copy of the OT, but an actual new story with an interesting duo of main characters.
As for the Han Solo movie, I was never exited about it to begin with, I never found him particularly interesting.
If you still fell angry at the movie, go watch one of the Hobbit movie and tell yourself it could have been much much worst
I think Luke had his arc within this movie. And I actually liked it. But yeah, the tone was very different to the direct predecessor and it has it's share of problems. I still liked the movie and will probably see it again, but it's definitely a different beast than pretty much all the other star wars. Although I kinda like the generally darker atmosphere.
I also think a lot about it boils down to how much you like character driven vs goal driven storywriting. I thought the plot was fine as a character driven story and I don't mind that + Show Spoiler +
the Rival kills off the BBE to advance his character development
, I found most actions of characters within the movie coherent (disregarding the entire "Luke is too different to RotJ"/"Luke is okay" discussion) and I don't mind too much that there are some asspull power ups, most of the powers were abbreviations of formerly known powers and nothing was more wtf to me than mind trick of an untrained.
Not saying there aren't glaring issues here, the pacing and joke timing was messy at best and J.J.A. has to start pretty much at zero again.
Disney is even more evil than neo-Blizzard. No franchise is safe from their rape. In fact they will probably team up for Starcraft: The Movie, featuring the cast: Shia Labouf as Raynor, Scarlett Johansen as Kerrigan, and Kevin Hart as Zeratul. At the end they will put in shout out to Korean e-sports, starring Ken Jeong as Boxer.
On December 23 2017 18:38 Saechiis wrote: It's fascinating how differently people perceive this film. I would write a paper about it if only I understood it well enough to say something credible. I legitimately have no clue what it is exactly that makes people LOVE this movie. It's easy enough to poke holes in the logic and continuity of the story but somehow a significant portion of viewers is not bothered by that. Is it really the disparity between people that like to be surprised and the people that don't that make up the divide in this movie?
I'm just not that interested in figuring out fleet logistics. The film is ambitious and is chock-full of subtext, and Rian Johnson has a lot to say with the different characters. Delving into that is interesting. Seeing how he handles the tonal swaps is inherently more interesting for me than trying to track down alleged plot holes. I reckon I'm not the only one.
It's just a different way to approach cinema, one of several, and none of them is inherently better than another.
e: Obviously this feels like a misstep for certain viewers, and I'm wondering if Kennedy will opt for more traditional storytelling methods in the next film.
i think the last jedi might be the worst movie that i have ever seen without being hyperbolic at all. the plot holes in the movie can't even be called plot holes because they throw the entire lore and rationale of the universe out the window from the word go. even outside of the literally laughably bad scenes like the leia superman scene and the hyperdrive attack, you still have absurd questions like why didn't the empire move to intercept the fleet instead of sitting behind them for an entire day? how did finn and rose live even after they crashed in front of the ATATs? why didn't snape notice the lightsaber turning next to him? it's not even a question of suspension of disbelief, the movie and writing was just utter trash through and through, all the way from respecting the established lore to character development to "comedy" to love interests.
the casino planet's "moral stories" (if you want to call them that) were so absurdly heavy handed that i don't think a writer could make it more obvious if she tried. THEN, they had the code breaker just be like "you might hate these guys, but they have helped the rebellion too.." at which point the narrative is like WHOOPS, can't have anything morally grey, make that guy evil immediately! it's like there were 20 different writers... like why even include that part at all if you're not going to actually go into the subject matter?
I liked the Rey/Kylo/Luke (I don't care he isn't a perfect Jedi in the movie tbh) enough that I enjoyed the movie, BUT: I think Star Wars is now in full Marvel mode as in, sure, the movies can be fun in their own way, but their goal is to now be a giant cash cow and for that you need something passable, not great. Obviously Lucasfilm has been milking the franchse for decades, but with Disney we are honestly at a whole other level.
On December 23 2017 18:38 Saechiis wrote: It's fascinating how differently people perceive this film. I would write a paper about it if only I understood it well enough to say something credible. I legitimately have no clue what it is exactly that makes people LOVE this movie. It's easy enough to poke holes in the logic and continuity of the story but somehow a significant portion of viewers is not bothered by that. Is it really the disparity between people that like to be surprised and the people that don't that make up the divide in this movie?
I'm just not that interested in figuring out fleet logistics. The film is ambitious and is chock-full of subtext, and Rian Johnson has a lot to say with the different characters. Delving into that is interesting. Seeing how he handles the tonal swaps is inherently more interesting for me than trying to track down alleged plot holes. I reckon I'm not the only one.
It's just a different way to approach cinema, one of several, and none of them is inherently better than another.
e: Obviously this feels like a misstep for certain viewers, and I'm wondering if Kennedy will opt for more traditional storytelling methods in the next film.
double edit: case in point \/\/\/\/\/\/
Drinking the ocean is also ambitious. The question is whether the audience really needed Star Wars 8 to subvert Star Wars.
On December 23 2017 18:38 Saechiis wrote: It's fascinating how differently people perceive this film. I would write a paper about it if only I understood it well enough to say something credible. I legitimately have no clue what it is exactly that makes people LOVE this movie. It's easy enough to poke holes in the logic and continuity of the story but somehow a significant portion of viewers is not bothered by that. Is it really the disparity between people that like to be surprised and the people that don't that make up the divide in this movie?
I'm just not that interested in figuring out fleet logistics. The film is ambitious and is chock-full of subtext, and Rian Johnson has a lot to say with the different characters. Delving into that is interesting. Seeing how he handles the tonal swaps is inherently more interesting for me than trying to track down alleged plot holes. I reckon I'm not the only one.
It's just a different way to approach cinema, one of several, and none of them is inherently better than another.
e: Obviously this feels like a misstep for certain viewers, and I'm wondering if Kennedy will opt for more traditional storytelling methods in the next film.
double edit: case in point \/\/\/\/\/\/
Drinking the ocean is also ambitious.
You're thinking of Thor, not Star Wars
Thor then challenged anyone in the castle to a drinking contest, something at which he had no little skill. Utgarda-Loki had one of his servants fetch the kind of drinking horn from which Utgarda-Loki’s men were said to drink. When it was placed before Thor, Utgarda-Loki informed him that whoever could finish the horn in one drink was considered a great drinker, whoever could do it in two was considered fair, but no one in his retinue was such a poor drinker as to be unable to finish it in three.
Thor drank mightily, but by the time he had to pause for a breath, the level of liquor in the horn had barely lowered. So he gave it a second try, straining to gulp and gulp until his breath failed him. This time, the level had gone down appreciably, but the better part of the horn still remained. His third drink was even more formidable than the previous two, but in the end, much was still left. By that point, however, Thor could drink could no more, and gave up.
"The far end of the horn from which you drank was connected to the sea, and we were actually greatly afraid that you were going to drink it all. When you cross over the sea again, you will see how much you have lowered its level."
We've also had 8 movies, not a bad time for subversion.
I think the two movies have opposite problems. In TF, the plot was ok, but the acting direction and writing were terrible. Too many lame jokes and poor reactions. In TLJ, the acting and writing was much better but the plot was all over the place. It is just terribly disjointed.
I feel the overall character development fell flat, though. Kylo is no longer that interesting now that he's not turning good. Rey is no longer interesting now that she never really was ever slightly tempted to turn evil. Finn started to do repeat the same character arc he had in the first movie, but then he does a complete 180 immediately. Are we supposed to care about Poe Dameron now? At least he had a reasonable albeit short character arc. The stuff about the "balance" in the force being something other than the Jedi winning just fell by the wayside.
On December 24 2017 08:23 hexhaven wrote: I'm just not that interested in figuring out fleet logistics. The film is ambitious and is chock-full of subtext, and Rian Johnson has a lot to say with the different characters. Delving into that is interesting. Seeing how he handles the tonal swaps is inherently more interesting for me than trying to track down alleged plot holes. I reckon I'm not the only one.
The problem is Star Wars is a franchise film, not an independent movie, and Rian Johnson isn't Tarkovsky or Bunuel. Deconstruction and subversion are neutral as approaches to crafting a film, and a director doesn't deserve inherent credit for embracing them. Furthermore TLJ is a movie ultimately about Star Wars and its legacy, not a movie about the supposed story shown on screen. This results in multiple point holes, egregious misunderstandings of individual and group dynamics, and plain impossible stuff that nevertheless occurs for the sake of drama.
As much as your interests skew towards the meta-aspects of TLJ, basic storytelling 101 demands internal consistency within the world being portrayed. This is especially important for sci-fi, which demands a hefty suspension of belief when it alters the basic limitations of physics. The new limitations, and how the people in the story address them, form the parameters of what types of drama can be taken seriously. Star Wars isn't a hard sci-fi movie by any stretch of the imagination (it's a pastiche of Eastern mysticism + Western fetishization of technology mixed with 40's-50's pulp stories), but its dramatic possibilities are still dictated by the physics of the universe. In short, the entire main plot of TLJ is dependent on the First Order being morons (on a bureaucratic + technical level but leadership is also denigrated from a moral perspective, which sucks the tension out of the FO being a dramatic threat) and the Resistance also being morons (but shielded from criticism because of their symbolic importance).
The tonal swaps are terrible. Bob Ducsay failed in his editing on a fundamental level (although to his credit, TLJ had too many subplots that required too much contrivance to pack into one movie). This even extends to the cinematography, which is often at odds with the tone Johnson is trying to portray at any particular point.
On December 24 2017 16:41 Endymion wrote: i think the last jedi might be the worst movie that i have ever seen without being hyperbolic at all.
As much as your interests skew towards the meta-aspects of TLJ, basic storytelling 101 demands internal consistency within the world being portrayed.
Yeah, I got kicked out of the Secondary World in a mega way. There certainly worse films that I have watched, but because I'm pretty picky with which films I see in theatre, this is the only film where I was actively hating what I was seeing and getting really antsy because I didn't want to hate it, but I was.
Not only does the story rely upon the First Order being dumb, but it relied upon the Republic being Lawful Stupid. How is it that they completely collapse after the Capital is destroyed? Sure they lost their fleet because they were dumb about disarming (not even movie knowledge because these film makers are terrible at world building), but that sort of massacre would normally rally the people, not cow them... because the base was destroyed. That's what sky rocketed the Rebel Alliance in the first film- Alderaan was destroyed, but they blew up the Death Star and people were like, oh hey there's some hope that we can fight back... a new hope.
Or maybe what's going on behind the scenes is a giant propaganda war and the Republic/ Resistance is freaking sucks at PR. So they didn't even bother to tell anyone they killed the StarKiller Base and in the meantime the First Order is faking footage that the StarKiller Base still a thing. Or maybe the Republic leaders suck as much as the Resistance commanders and so the galaxy let out a collective cheer when they died. I'm almost Team Evil at this point Just need Rey join the Dark Side, kill Hux and we're good.
One of the anti-criticisms is that the naysayers were just wanting a repeat of the OG Trilogy. Um, no. That's the very thing that's frustrating me... that these film makers are so desperate to recreate the Empire/ Rebel scenario that they break the internal consistency of the world building to get there. It's a forced fit that does not work at just a cursory glance without undermining the gains made by the Return of the Jedi.
i think Poe is the most interesting character in the new movies because he's the only character that actually fails and has to make decisions. for example, continuing the bomber assault on the mega SSD or whatever it was called while getting a lot of other pilots killed, committing mutiny against the (perceived) incompetent rebellion admirality to save lives, standing up to the vice admiral, etc. the more i think about it, the more Poe feels like the center piece of the movie despite not having an important role in the grand scheme of things. Finn is the same character, Rey didn't feel like she developed at all, and Kylo didn't really develop at all either.
with regard to your points Falling, I think that they left the politics of the galaxy purposely vague because some people complained about all of the senate discussion/economic negotiations in the prequels. i personally don't agree with the choice though because when you leave out political exposition you get the exact situation that we're in now, where people defending the movie are saying "well we don't knoww exactly what happened" or "go read the new expanded universe." i thought that one of the great strengths of the prequels was the exposition that set up such a colorful universe, allowing stories like the clone wars tv series to thrive.
even from episode 2 to episode 3 when there was a massive exposition gap between the movies as far as the disposition of forces and political influences, the title crawl of episode 3 somewhat filled the audience in on what was going down and why there was a large naval battle over coruscant . in episode 7 and 8, the title crawl hand waves the exposition
Can I just point out how simple and better it would have been for them to simply portray the enemy as Empire holdouts rather than a whole new thing (that just happens to use all the same equipment/ships). There's also no depiction of the scope of the First Order? Is this their whole army fleet? Is this their whole army?
On December 25 2017 07:12 Jerubaal wrote: Can I just point out how simple and better it would have been for them to simply portray the enemy as Empire holdouts rather than a whole new thing (that just happens to use all the same equipment/ships). There's also no depiction of the scope of the First Order? Is this their whole army fleet? Is this their whole army?
I assumed that the FO is a leftover of the empire that got hijacked by a Sith from the outer rim (or Plageius, which would make more sense, but is less likely), but I didn't read anything since they killed the EU. As to how large the FO actually is, I have no idea. I was under the impression that the reason only the rebels are fighting them is that they control the majority of the universe (which is why Leia seeks allies in the outer rim) or are at least by far the largest power remaining, but those are only assumptions.
And yes, I would have liked to get some politics and background here and there, but I actually enjoyed the basic plot of the prequels and like lots of worldbuilding. Disney played it safe though and went with the OT-way of saying basically nothing about wtf is actually happening in the background.
On December 25 2017 07:12 Jerubaal wrote: Can I just point out how simple and better it would have been for them to simply portray the enemy as Empire holdouts rather than a whole new thing (that just happens to use all the same equipment/ships). There's also no depiction of the scope of the First Order? Is this their whole army fleet? Is this their whole army?
I assumed that the FO is a leftover of the empire that got hijacked by a Sith from the outer rim (or Plageius, which would make more sense, but is less likely), but I didn't read anything since they killed the EU. As to how large the FO actually is, I have no idea. I was under the impression that the reason only the rebels are fighting them is that they control the majority of the universe (which is why Leia seeks allies in the outer rim) or are at least by far the largest power remaining, but those are only assumptions.
And yes, I would have liked to get some politics and background here and there, but I actually enjoyed the basic plot of the prequels and like lots of worldbuilding. Disney played it safe though and went with the OT-way of saying basically nothing about wtf is actually happening in the background.
The Phantom Menace was actually pretty ambiguous about a lot of things, like how powerful the Trade Federation actually was, and how powerful the Republic was. The only thing that is made clear is that the Trade Federation is way more powerful than Naboo, and is illegally using their private military to bully Naboo. The actual dispute is never touched on, and it is never said what the trade dispute encompassed. The extent to which the Republic can actually punish the Trade Federation is also never really touched on. Obviously, the Trade Federation has little to fear from the Republic militarily, and is more concerned with their business being hampered by sanctions. Additionally, it's also shown that there are certain planets that are not part of the Republic, like Tatooine.
The next film focuses primarily on Count Dooku, even though Nute Gunray is actively trying to assassinate Padme, and shows that he is part of a separatist movement. The other leaders are never mentioned by name, and even in Revenge of The Sith, Palpatine says "Wipe out Viceroy Gunray and the others" to Anakin. Who is the leader of the flying bug people? What's his gripe with the Republic? We'll never ever know. Unless we read "the books". I've always thought of the books as ways of explaining away plotholes and loose ends in the movies. "Have a problem? You probably didn't read the books." It's silly.
'In April 2014, Lucasfilm rebranded the Expanded Universe material as Star Wars Legends and declared it non-canon to the franchise.'
Thus ending any interest in anything other than the books I still haven't finished reading with regards to new Star Wars. I have only read 60 of the 300 or however many novels there are and there is still tones of Star Wars out there for me to discover. I will probably never finish reading them all as it's obviously not the only thing I read. 'I made the mistake of watching the Force awakens and vowed to never watch another (we need a new name because it's just not Star Wars any more) movie. So much has happened and they have created so many loveable characters in the real (legacy books) Star Wars galaxy. This was a process that took decades and came from the minds of some of the best science fiction writers in the world all largely cooperating to make something beautiful.
To just turn around and say ‘yeah none of that happened. Here are some special effects and explosions and absolutely no discernible story what’s so ever. This is the real Star Wars’. Frankly makes me want to punch someone. But instead I will just happily read some more novels and smile and say ‘me too’ whenever one of my Chinese kids says he loves Star Wars.
while they don't specifically say how powerful the confederacy/trade federation is, the first 2 prequels spend a bunch of time talking (or hinting, i haven't watched them in a while) about how woefully unprepared the republic is for a full blown war. that's why the clones were so instrumental, if there weren't clone armies then the republic wouldn't have been able to fight let alone win the war against the confederacy. the interesting dynamic in episode 2 and 3 is that the republic always has the upper hand, the war never even feels like they're close to losing, which makes sense given the context that the emperor is manipulating everything so that eventually the republic becomes the galactic empire.
the writers also didn't feel the need to go fully into the disputes for the sake of the audience, they omitted things that weren't central to the story partially for the audience's sake and partially for the sake of brevity. it worked, however, because there was never really a glaring plot hole that demanded explanation, everything presumably happened before the events in episode 1 to set off the trade disputes/precursor to the war. in episode 7, however, we have facts that completely and utterly conflict with episode 6. the galactic empire lost a massive engagement (presumably, there were still a ton of star destroyers so who knows what actually happened) where they lost their 2 defacto commanders and the second deathstar. then episode 7 comes along, jumps ahead a few years, and doesn't really explain who or what the new order is, or where the empire is, or any of these important facts that need to be told for the space opera's drama to make any sense. like the first half of episode 7 all you really see is the FO's one star destroyer and it's like "okay, cool, it's just one ship i guess.." then they suddenly have a MULTISHOT DEATHSTAR that puts the empire to shame. like what?? who are these people, where is the republic... there needs to be some kind of exposition instead of just hand waving.. like if you existed in the star wars universe, you would know "oh right, the empire retreated to the outer rim, the republic is disarming because they're complacent pacifists who forgot the clone/civil wars, and there empire is coming back under the first order." just imagine how much news small scale modern wars drive, then imagine a galactic civil war.. it's literally everything anyone would be talking about because it would impact everything from credit inflation to trade routes to hyperspace lanes. yet as an observer to the universe, we know nothing. that's the job of the writer, they have to creatively weave in the context of the situation without putting us in a 3 hour galactic senate meeting.
think about episode 1 on Tatooine. when they're first crash landing on the planet, quigon and the security officer argue about how dangerous the planet is because it's not under the republican dominion, but rather it is under Hutt control (an important clarification for audiences because in episode 4 it's under imperial control, showing that the republic is less expansive). because of this, the party is unlikely to find allies and they have to be careful. furthermore, for some reason republic credits aren't accepted on the planet (and i think they mention that naboo's currency isn't good either), so both the queen's treasury and the jedi treasury is of no use. as a result, they have to go on the adventure to find a way to pay to fix their ship, causing them to run into anakin in a somewhat natural way. compare the whole Tatooine encounter to the casino planet, where we know literally nothing about who the people are, why they do what they do, or what they value (other than money). is it some neutral third party? are they imperial bankers? republic bankers? the code breaker's comment makes it seem like they're neutral, but then why did finn and rose have to be so sneaky? why couldn't they just pay their way, they were there on leia's pocketbook (if it the plan worked), they should have just walked right in.. the whole scene just makes no sense given the world building
On December 24 2017 06:35 Starlightsun wrote: Disney is even more evil than neo-Blizzard. No franchise is safe from their rape. In fact they will probably team up for Starcraft: The Movie, featuring the cast: Shia Labouf as Raynor, Scarlett Johansen as Kerrigan, and Kevin Hart as Zeratul. At the end they will put in shout out to Korean e-sports, starring Ken Jeong as Boxer.
Ken Jeong as a Larva/FBH type progamer is something I'd oddly be interested in watching.
On December 25 2017 07:12 Jerubaal wrote: Can I just point out how simple and better it would have been for them to simply portray the enemy as Empire holdouts rather than a whole new thing (that just happens to use all the same equipment/ships). There's also no depiction of the scope of the First Order? Is this their whole army fleet? Is this their whole army?
I assumed that the FO is a leftover of the empire that got hijacked by a Sith from the outer rim (or Plageius, which would make more sense, but is less likely), but I didn't read anything since they killed the EU. As to how large the FO actually is, I have no idea. I was under the impression that the reason only the rebels are fighting them is that they control the majority of the universe (which is why Leia seeks allies in the outer rim) or are at least by far the largest power remaining, but those are only assumptions.
And yes, I would have liked to get some politics and background here and there, but I actually enjoyed the basic plot of the prequels and like lots of worldbuilding. Disney played it safe though and went with the OT-way of saying basically nothing about wtf is actually happening in the background.
The Phantom Menace was actually pretty ambiguous about a lot of things, like how powerful the Trade Federation actually was, and how powerful the Republic was. The only thing that is made clear is that the Trade Federation is way more powerful than Naboo, and is illegally using their private military to bully Naboo. The actual dispute is never touched on, and it is never said what the trade dispute encompassed. The extent to which the Republic can actually punish the Trade Federation is also never really touched on. Obviously, the Trade Federation has little to fear from the Republic militarily, and is more concerned with their business being hampered by sanctions. Additionally, it's also shown that there are certain planets that are not part of the Republic, like Tatooine.
The next film focuses primarily on Count Dooku, even though Nute Gunray is actively trying to assassinate Padme, and shows that he is part of a separatist movement. The other leaders are never mentioned by name, and even in Revenge of The Sith, Palpatine says "Wipe out Viceroy Gunray and the others" to Anakin. Who is the leader of the flying bug people? What's his gripe with the Republic? We'll never ever know. Unless we read "the books". I've always thought of the books as ways of explaining away plotholes and loose ends in the movies. "Have a problem? You probably didn't read the books." It's silly.
Yeah not saying the prequels were super explicit, but at least I got who was fighting whom, I understood that there were a huge numbers of planets involved and that they both had standing armies of equal enough size to make the war close. There was a lot dropped on the political system going on, we learned that the Republic doesn't draft, (some?) planets within the republic send senators to participate in a parliament, there's a chancelor who gets voted by the parliament and who acts as the governing body and supreme military leader. The parliament is huge, which makes it reasonable to assume that the member-systems of the republic lie in the dozens or in the hundreds. I've been shown 3 planets in PM, 1 mostly wild planet which is probably agricultural and part of the republic, Corouscant as the beating heart of the republic and Tatooine as a neutral planet controlled by criminals. In CW they introduce a production world that IIRC separates itself as part of a larger mining corporation and allies themselves with a trading corporation and there's a neutral but this time High-tech world that specializes in cloning and will serve as the Republic's main army provider after their main production planets as part of the mining corp probably rebel. In RotS we get to see Corouscant being part of the war (which means that the war is undecided), a mining world of some sort (Charr) and that random planet Grievous is on. We get also shown a lot of planets including Kashyyk when order 66 is executed, showing that the war has spread over a large area.
In the OT Bespin and Tatoine are the only inhabited planets that are part of the conflict, Bespin is some kind of mining world and Tatoine is an agricultural planet partly inhabited by tribes that attack normal people on sight. The empire seems to be some fascist dictatorship or absolute monarchy. I learn IIRC that the emperor abolishes a senate, so there was some kind of power grab going on.
So I can basically say zero about the actual size of the conflict in the OT. I know the empire can field ~10 star destroyer and a super star destroyer, as well as produce 2 death stars. The rebel fleet consists of ~10-20 larger than fighter ships in RotJ. The empire I assume is superior in space because we get to know that the Empire is winning the space battle in episode 6 and the rebels ditch their base twice when the empire finds them. Which is roughly the amount of information I get from the new series about the conflict going on there.
Then you aren't remembering. There are some pretty key information drops in the first film.
"Holding her is dangerous. If word of this gets out, it could generate sympathy for the Rebellion in the senate." Commander
"Leave that to me. Send a distress signal and then inform the senate that all aboard were killed." Vader
There's a lot to infer just from that alone.
Then we have a conference room that efficiently gives us some sense of the political rivalries, strength assessments, and power shifts.
Tagge: "Until this battle station is fully operational we are vulnerable. The Rebel Alliance is too well equipped. They're more dangerous than you realize." Motti: "Dangerous to your starfleet, Commander, not to this battle station!" Tagge: "The Rebellion will continue to gain support in the Imperial Senate as long as..."
Tarkin: "The Imperial Senate will no longer be of any concern to us. I've just received word that the Emperor has dissolved the council permanently. The last remnants of the Old Republic have been swept away.
Tagge: "That's impossible! How will the Emperor maintain control without the bureaucracy?" Tarkin: "The regional governors now have direct control over the territories. Fear will keep the local systems in line. Fear of this battle station."
And so on.
Those little scenes flesh out what we need to know about the politics beyond what we've been given in the opening crawl, the battle between Rebels and Vader. But here's the thing, it's also apples and oranges. A New Hope is the first movie in a series. It's the Entry Point. So it needs to give us enough information to understand the action. But it doesn't need to connect to old information. We just need enough for the action to be sensible- everything else is bonus to flesh out the world to make is seem believable.
Force Awakens and Last Jedi are not stand alone films, nor are they the first films of a brand new franchise. One of their jobs is to give a sensible connection from the old material to the new- to a give a plausible scenario of what could happen in the intervening years. That's a taller order. You absolutely can jump ahead in time.
CS Lewis did it with Prince Caspian. He radically changed the landscape and politics and almost everything about Narnia from his first book. Terry Brooks did it from his original trilogy to his quadrology. What was the center of civilization in the first had become the border town of the later centuries. The warring cities in the south became the powerhouse. The elves disappeared, etc. There's a huge change and for awhile, that remains a mystery. It's part of what draws the reader in- what happened in the intervening years? That's a question inherent in a sequel that jumps ahead in time like that- something that's not true of a story that starts a series. And right now both films are adamantly refusing to deal with the past. The scenario they are projecting makes no sense using Return of the Jedi as a starting point. This would make more sense if Return of the Jedi did not exist, but Darth Vader and the Emperor died of old age.
That's the only way a government that blew up two Death Stars and two Sith has absolutely zero support anywhere in the galaxy. Han somehow escaped Boba Fett before getting to Jabba and has bumming around the galaxy. Luke could never face Vader and goes crazy like Yoda. Leia has fought the endless defeat for the last several decades and is ready to curl up and die.
A proper projection of Return of the Jedi would give us a proper Civil War with maybe half the galaxy unaligned or broken into their own rival factions. The victories of the Old Trilogy need to mean something. The New Republic control a quarter of the known galaxy, the Empire loyalists another quarter (or more). Coruscant has maybe remained out of reach and so the Republic has never gained legitimacy- or perhaps it's been won and lost multiple times. But these writers and directors are too cautious and played it too safe, and had to give another repeat of the Empire vs Rebels.
Just watched this today, and in a few words, I'd describe The Last Jedi as less of a Star Wars film and more of a Star Wars spoof; it was weird but entertaining. With that said, I actually really enjoyed the movie, especially after letting go of my feelings about TFA and beyond. I just knew at some point while watching the film that Star Wars (under Darth Mickey) has taken a new direction (that and the lore is basically screwed)
My only major gripes are a) Kylo Ren is such a weak villain character-wise (and pretty much every New Order character) and that hopelessness->speech about hope->miracle happens cycle repeated like 5 times in the movie lol
On December 29 2017 02:23 c3rberUs wrote: My only major gripes are a) Kylo Ren is such a weak villain character-wise (and pretty much every New Order character) and that hopelessness->speech about hope->miracle happens cycle repeated like 5 times in the movie lol
This is the spark that lights the fire to lead the rebellioN!!!!!!!!!!!
On December 29 2017 02:23 c3rberUs wrote: Just watched this today, and in a few words, I'd describe The Last Jedi as less of a Star Wars film and more of a Star Wars spoof; it was weird but entertaining. With that said, I actually really enjoyed the movie, especially after letting go of my feelings about TFA and beyond. I just knew at some point while watching the film that Star Wars (under Darth Mickey) has taken a new direction (that and the lore is basically screwed)
My only major gripes are a) Kylo Ren is such a weak villain character-wise (and pretty much every New Order character) and that hopelessness->speech about hope->miracle happens cycle repeated like 5 times in the movie lol
What are you on about? Tarkin aint got shit on Hux
I'm a huge Star Wars fan, it was probably one of the first movies I was introduced to as a little kid, largely thanks to my parents.
I'm not gonna lie now, I absolutely hate with a passion what they did in The Last Jedi, how they butchered the story, the old heroes and spat on all their accomplishments.
I'm sad that I feel this way, its wrong to have so much hate in one's heart but at the moment the only thing that will bring me happiness is seeing SW out of Disney and Rian's claws, preferably in a manner which sees Disney suffer severely to the point they never recover.
I probably will write my own blog with my opinions on this at some point.
EU apologists boggle my mind. scifi is already a genre notorious for terrible writing quality and somehow every single EU novel manages to lower the bar. the power creep towards the end of the sword of jedi series is ridiculous, luke is basically superman, and there's literally force satan and force god.
tlj had some really silly parts and i took a pissbreak during the casino sequence, but i thought it was pretty enjoyable. anyone who expected the new trilogy to just be han/luke/leia adventures part 2... like what, you want to watch a bunch of 70 year olds try and be believable action heroes? if they didn't recast those 3 there was no way it would have worked and if they had recast them people would lose their shit
as someone who isn't at all a hardcore star wars fan and gives very few fucks about the overall canon, the old EU, etc., I really enjoyed the movie's themes and "meta" commentary about the franchise. a few logical inconsistencies, sure, but that's a given, star wars is very soft sci-fi and has always required a high suspension of disbelief. however, i do think there were problems with the pacing (casino part) and some of the attempted humor.
On December 27 2017 00:15 iFU.pauline wrote: Hope someone manages to learn about gravity and space for star wars 9.
this is the series where spaceships have always, explicitly behaved like they're fighting world war 2 naval/air battles. it's just how it is...
It comes down to this: They should have left it alone. But that doesn't make money. So as terrible as the new films have been they were never going to be good or please anyone. I'll just pretend they don't exist and they can take the cash.
I feel like Cranstons contrast between the mindset of an artist versus a businessman aligns well with the difference in people's perception of TLJ. It might interest people in this thread.
Jennifer Aniston actually gives a really great talk to a group of Rutger's college students on how to make it as an artist, and it's really inspiring, but a bit long. Long, but worth watching.
I agree that the story arc just seems to have abruptly ended. Its not really possible to end a trilogy easily when general organa (I think that's princess leia) says we have enough to start the revolution, and that revolution basically has to win in a single, final movie.
Unless of course, its just a lead up to yet another trilogy? At least then it might still be possible to have a good narrative arc.
I think the main problem for me is that Kylo Ren just isn't a very scary or evil villain. He's just a conflicted boy, not as scary as the other sith lords who could shoot lighting from their hands or levitate people in mid-air.
I think I can accept most of the rest that happened. Even princess leia floating back to the cruiser made sense. If you can grab lightsabers from a distance, then in space where there is no friction or gravity, it ought to be easy to pull yourself towards things. And scientifically speaking the body can actually survive in space for a minute or two before you just lose consciousness, so I don't think the scene was actually as bad as people make it out to be (the same goes for many other issues most audiences had).
The movie was action packed. The bomber scene was cool, and there were some genuinely funny scenes with Luke slapping Rey's hand with a blade of grass and pretending it was the force lol. So I had fun
In general the TLJ universe seems to have lost some gravity, it kind of reminds me of Lego Star Wars. I'm rewatching the original trilogy tonight, I tried watching the Phantom menace yesterday and I couldn't make it past Jar Jar Binks, I might have become an angry person.
On January 01 2018 22:28 Saechiis wrote: In general the TLJ universe seems to have lost some gravity, it kind of reminds me of Lego Star Wars. I'm rewatching the original trilogy tonight, I tried watching the Phantom menace yesterday and I couldn't make it past Jar Jar Binks, I might have become an angry person.
I don't think I will be able to get myself to see this horrible movie ever again. I watched the Phantom menace a few days ago and enjoyed it far more than I did TLJ. Sure Jar Jar binks is awful and there are problems with it, but nothing compared to TLJ.
The movie felt like people who didn't know much about star wars. Out of place jokes, Luke's character and how the force works. I could go on a long rant about what I disliked about TLJ, but I won't .
On January 06 2018 01:29 Qikz wrote: I actually feel this is my second favourite star wars to Empire. I could explain everything I liked about it if you wanted.
I might be the wrong person to explain stuff to. My favorite Star Wars was Return of The Jedi. :D