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Spoilers for the film are in this thread, read at your own peril if you have not seen the movie. No more spoiler tags from page 20 |
On January 10 2018 06:34 LegalLord wrote:
Same was true with "I am your father" too though.
They had Ghost Ben to back it up in one of the most hilarious, how did this get by an editor in the script moments. But you might be right. I am sort of cool with Rey just being a hero on her own, without legacy. The force does seem to give characters the ability to sense when a statement is the narrative truth. But that doesn’t explain the shot of the ship flying away from the planet, so my bet is Kylo left some key information out.
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But if you listen to JJ talk he clearly is hinting at something special about Rey's heritage. I'm fine with her being a no-name as well but not after strongly hinting at something else. I guess they could make it so that Kylo turns out to be wrong and Snoke still gets his background but I don't see how they would make it relevant after the fact.
Damnit Rian Johson there was so much potential for epicness here but instead you destroy continuity and undermine all of your scenes by making pretty much every character a clown.
Dare I hope JJ can somehow salvage this?
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Canada11607 Posts
The originals didn't have a straight through line- Lucas didn't know if he'd have a sequel film and really hedged his bets with Splinter of a Mind's Eye, the Force Ghost Ben 'depends on your perspective' is one of the great ret-cons to weld together the characters of Darth and Anakin- something not decided until between Star Wars and Empire Strikes Back. However, Stars Wars does not need a sequel. It began a series, so it gave the minimal amount of information to get into the action (the original opening crawl had way too much background info, irrelevant to the action), but it wasn't trying to connect anything.
It tells the archetypal hero's journey. Luke's parentage was not in question- his father is dead; Vader killed him. Vader escapes, and the Empire still exists, so there's sequel bait, in the same way the end of the Matrix teases a possible future film, but both could have ended there and had no sequel and it would have been perfectly satisfying. (And for the Matrix, probably more satisfying without the sequels.)
Force Awakens by contrast starts way too many plot threads that it never resolves-
#1 it proposes to restart the Empire vs Rebels plot arc, rather than build off a victorious Rebel Alliance/ Republic- that's a giant question mark inherent in a sequel that must be answered to be satisfying, not just made up on the fly and never answered. Prince Caspian is a great example of how to do this properly.
#2 Skywalker is mentioned 40 times (ref Mark Hamill), begins (macguffin map plot- what was the point of that by the way?) and ends the film... and ends on a literal cliff hangar (only to have the whole map business thrown out completely)... and in the end he gains them 2 minutes to escape, after peacing out for years and not cleaning up his Frankenstein problem- very selfish move. That's not a satisfying end to the Jedi Master who brought back the Jedi from the brink of destruction and brought down the Emperor through self-sacrifice. We needed him to be epic- to burn out, rather than to melt away. Too much of a set up and no follow through- he's just lucky that base went from 'definitely only one entrance' to 'Oops, I guess there was another blocked up entrance' otherwise everyone but Rey would've died... which too be honest, I wouldn't be too mad. I'm ready to toss out the whole incompetent lot- all thirteen of them, lol way to help when it's half past late, Luke- and start over.
#3 Lightsaber connection brought back from the dead (Bespin)- tossed into the garbage bin of the other dead plot lines. Don't bring it up in such an obviously important way- with some crazy connection to Rey, if you don't intend to do anything than toss it over your shoulder.
#4 Parent connection- don't make it such a big deal, if nothing will come of it.
#5 Snoke- again- if the Sith are ended, prophecies fulfilled, an explanation is required- sequels that choose to radically alter the mythos, require explanation intrinsically- at the very least, the chain of Sith master to apprentice was broken...so what gives?
In short, Force Awakens deliberately sets up plot lines, unresolved in a way A New Hope never did. Surprise is not good, if your unrealized teases are more interesting than the reality you present- if your surprise is a surprise because you straight up, crumple up the plot and do something else: Frodo's going to throw Ring into Mordor in Fellowship of the Ring. Nope. Gotcha- the Ring is irrelevant. He's going to throw it away in the Two Towers and toddle off to the Lonely Mountain to fight badgers for awhile and Gandalf will come back, only to die from too much smoke inhalation. Surprise!
It feels more like some of the Bantam wars we used to get in the old EU- authors toss away ideas and even mock certain plot ideas from other authors- an incoherent mess when you put it all together.
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On January 10 2018 13:14 Falling wrote:
In short, Force Awakens deliberately sets up plot lines, unresolved in a way A New Hope never did. Surprise is not good, if your unrealized teases are more interesting than the reality you present- if your surprise is a surprise because you straight up, crumple up the plot and do something else: Frodo's going to throw Ring into Mordor in Fellowship of the Ring. Nope. Gotcha- the Ring is irrelevant. He's going to throw it away in the Two Towers and toddle off to the Lonely Mountain to fight badgers for awhile and Gandalf will come back, only to die from too much smoke inhalation. Surprise!
It feels more like some of the Bantam wars we used to get in the old EU- authors toss away ideas and even mock certain plot ideas from other authors- an incoherent mess when you put it all together.
That is the real point. Surprise has to be earned. Checkov's Gun is a concept for a reason.
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Meanwhile Sauron breaks his neck falling out of bed because fuck him and smeagol becomes supreme leader because that's what the new director likes.
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But you didn't expect that, so it would be great!
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United Kingdom10016 Posts
I find it bizarre that people seem to want the story of a film to turn out exactly the way they expect.
Anyway it was a decent movie I thought. It didn't add anything good to the canon but didn't really ruin anything either it was just kind of a meh story with really good action scenes and an inappropriate, badly executed sense of humour.
Rogue one was much better. At least it took its source material seriously and used it to make a point.
7/10
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On January 11 2018 21:43 Jockmcplop wrote:
I find it bizarre that people seem to want the story of a film to turn out exactly the way they expect.
Anyway it was a decent movie I thought. It didn't add anything good to the canon but didn't really ruin anything either it was just kind of a meh story with really good action scenes and an inappropriate, badly executed sense of humour.
Rogue one was much better. At least it took its source material seriously and used it to make a point.
7/10
People don't want it to turn out exactly how they want it to happen. they just don't want endless gotcha moments to replace any type of answers to questions that were given in the last movie.
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Was a fine movie to watch, 7/10. Had a few good laughs and some of scenes were good eye candy.
Some gripes:
+ Show Spoiler +Kylo sure seems to be all over the place. I can get he's divided on what to do but they made that much more acceptable and clear with Darth Vader. What is Kylo even after at this point? Just rage-kill everyone? Also, stating you want the old to burn and then start another order. Right. I felt they could've done a lot more with that and his interaction with Rey.
Isn't the vacuum of space rather deadly? I know it doesn't kill instantly but I really was wondering how they just keep going into space with no ill effect.
If ramming something at light speed (which granted, was an awesome scene) does that much damage, why haven't we seen it before? Throw a ship on autopilot and bam, enemy defeated. Also, why is there no autopilot? At least state that the ship was damaged and that autopilot is offline or something.
Rey being able to duel anyone trained with a lightsaber is still just plain silly. I'd much rather see her struggling to use the Force itself (as telekinesis) but having a serious amount of power with it. That could be explained as a natural thing much more easily than suddenly just having lightsaber skills.
The whole thing with Poe seemed a bit forced and unneeded. It was clear he was popular/liked by many of the rebels and he's headstrong so why exclude him from information like the escape plan that would've prevented him from trying a mutiny? That whole thing just felt weird. I can get that they want to teach the audience that rushing into things is bad but they already achieved that with the loss of the bomber fleet.
Isn't the rebellion pretty much dead if they can all fit on just the Falcon? Sure you got a lot of people out there that prefer you over the bad guys but how are ~50 people going to just overthrow the entire First Order military?
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On January 12 2018 06:14 Sermokala wrote:Show nested quote +On January 11 2018 21:43 Jockmcplop wrote:
I find it bizarre that people seem to want the story of a film to turn out exactly the way they expect.
Anyway it was a decent movie I thought. It didn't add anything good to the canon but didn't really ruin anything either it was just kind of a meh story with really good action scenes and an inappropriate, badly executed sense of humour.
Rogue one was much better. At least it took its source material seriously and used it to make a point.
7/10
People don't want it to turn out exactly how they want it to happen. they just don't want endless gotcha moments to replace any type of answers to questions that were given in the last movie.
i guarantee you, if those questions had been answered in a more expected way, people would've complained about the movie being too predictable.
personally i blame jj abrams way more for trying to set up a whole bunch of bullshit he himself didn't even bother thinking of the answers to, which seems to be a common jj abrams thing, and disney for inexplicably letting these dudes just make up the story on the go without any sort of prior planning. if anything, i think rian johnson did the best he could with what he was given.
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The best = ignoring everything?
Or whar exactly did he do good?
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Johnson made a movie with no consideration of continuity. That’s on him.
If you’re dealt a shitty hand, a good writer can make the best of it and embrace it in a meaningful way. A shitty writer will just do something else.
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United Kingdom10016 Posts
One good thing about this movie was the casting. Laura Dern and Del Toro were both brilliant and added depth to their characters just by acting them really well.
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Hadn't thought of the possibility that JJ also didn't decide yet what the revelations should be. Regardless, the questions were so open (who are Rey and Snoke?) that he could do pretty much anything there. The real shame is how he ruined potential. No background, lame death, and undermining many other characters set up in movie one with stupid jokes or general absence.
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On January 14 2018 01:10 Jockmcplop wrote:
One good thing about this movie was the casting. Laura Dern and Del Toro were both brilliant and added depth to their characters just by acting them really well.
Are you high? Neither of them had anything in the movie for them to act well. Laura Dern was a pink haired nothing of a character that refused to have any real scenes in the movie where she wasn't a pink haried nothing and then was killed off beacuse Rain Johnson had even less planning for her then he did phasma.
Del Toro had as much time in the movie as he did in the first Guardians of the galaxy. Hes basicaly phasma level.
JJ put a bunch of questions to be answered later beacuse thats what you do when you have two more movies to shoot that have to link closely to the movie you're making. It was left to Rain johnson to do whatever he wanted with those questions and Rain johnsons answer was "no". No more kylo ren voice or mask no more justifications for rays mary sueness no snoke no republic or empire no phasma no knights of ren no reason for any space fights Just a whole bag of no. Lets build the entire movie up to a climactic fight scene and a huge twist to change the core of the entire properties history, then just insert a whole bunch more of no lets just go back to where we were at the start of the movie.
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United Kingdom10016 Posts
I was high when I watched it, yeah.
You're welcome to your opinion, obviously you hate the movie, but I'm not really bothered about arguing it with you to be honest.
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Canada11607 Posts
i guarantee you, if those questions had been answered in a more expected way, people would've complained about the movie being too predictable.
I argue that now. It is both a disaster in terms of ripping up plotting, and it is entirely too beholden to recreating the old Empire vs Rebels set up. It's a mess.
The least interesting thing about Force Awakens was recreating the Rebel vs Empire and relaunching yet another Death Star (sorry, Starkiller Base). The better parts of Force Awakens is when it imagined what a galaxy torn apart by civil war would look like- that crashed Star Destroyer was brilliant, not just visually, but also for worldbuilding- visually telling a story of went before. But it seems we mostly got a crappy reboot (or perhaps a choose-your-own adventure, where they run us through the same scenarios, but this time they choose differently? 'This is not going to the way you think', and all that) rather than an interesting continuation. The most interesting parts of this film is Kylo-Rey stuff, which is not borrowed from any of the old films, really.
Plus, nothing about what Force Awakens set-up explains all the Frankenstein cobblings from Empire and Return that dominate this film anyways. The not-Hoth escape at the beginning, the not-Hoth battle at the end (it's salt, see? Thanks, exposition.), the Throne Room with not-Emperor, the Empire chases B-plot escaped from B-plot while Jedi learns (or doesn't learn) from the Jedi Master, these are all unforced (and weak) copies of the V and VI and not at all required by JJ's set-up.
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I saw it for a second time in IMAX, and despite agreeing with a lot of the criticism in this thread, still think it's an 8/10 film.
Basically, everything with Kylo, Rey and Luke was so good that it makes up for the weak spots. Luke's final astral projection scene against Kylo and the Empire* is just perfect, and is still echoing around my head.
Even stuff which doesn't make a lot of sense (lightspeed ramming), led to beautiful scenes. Only flat out weakpoints are the casino (which seemed way shorter second time round), and Leia's weird space experience.
*I know it's the First Order.
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Since the question of "dying in space" keeps coming up, I decided to search it to be sure. Here's a decent explanation: Link
The scene is stupid regardless though.
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On January 14 2018 11:38 LegalLord wrote:Since the question of "dying in space" keeps coming up, I decided to search it to be sure. Here's a decent explanation: LinkThe scene is stupid regardless though.
Good link. Agree that it was stupid regardless - it's just a bit of a weird scene, which is clearly meant to be profound or moving. Also, with her hand outstretched and floating in one pose it just looks unnatural.
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EPT
