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On April 12 2018 04:45 LegalLord wrote: Marvel has the luxury that their "fun" approach that kind of spits in the face of continuity or good storytelling somehow works with the iteration of the characters as imagined at present. People expect little more than a dumb popcorn movie, so it's easy enough to make that work. Star Wars fans are much more unforgiving. It dilutes the brand, yes, but it makes great money and to be fair there are a few genuine gems here and there.
I disagree. People who compare fanbases are never as smart as they think they are. The mistake George Lucas made with episodes 1-3 is catering too much to the fans who built up so much head canon that they would be disappointed with anything but a faithful adaptation to their head canon. The fanservice is the biggest thing getting in the way of good storytelling.
The Marvel approach works because they craft good movies without worrying about giving a big middle finger to the people who don't like their approach. They don't have the baggage of trying to please every fan of the earlier films. Each series targets a slightly different audience who may or may not like the other series they have. It doesn't matter as long as each film has a big enough target audience of its own.
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United Kingdom13774 Posts
The reason for the failure of the prequels is and promises to continue to be widely debated for years to come. Although I can’t say I agree with the idea that “head canon compliance” is my idea of why it went wrong. I have heard plenty of slightly better premises for the movies that would have led to better results while being even more compliant with existing canon. My personal most significant gripe was simply how poorly the characters built into the universe were actually represented and executed. The world-building and “Star Wars feel” of all three were actually very good.
Regarding the “Marvel approach” it works because they can make throwaway movies and no one will give a dang because people see them as one-off popcorn movies. Out of the many movies they have actually made, the only ones I’d ever even consider watching more than once are Avengers 1 and Captain America Winter Soldier. The rest were very throwaway, great for a movie you see once and never again.
I can say from my end that “fuck previous movie canon, I’m doing my own shit” is definitely not a strength of the movies. I know some people don’t care and watch them anyways, and that’s kind of what I’m getting at in that they can be pretty bad movies in the grand scheme of things but still work because they’re so throwaway. You can’t really do that with Star Wars main trilogies.
These spin-offs are quite more akin to Marvel-style throwaways. You know ahead of time which characters you have seen before and which ones are guaranteed not to matter. It’s a movie that gets to be whatever it wants to be, knowing nothing that happens will be of too much consequence for the larger story. I’m not too enthusiastic about that approach, though.
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On April 12 2018 07:16 andrewlt wrote:Show nested quote +On April 12 2018 04:45 LegalLord wrote: Marvel has the luxury that their "fun" approach that kind of spits in the face of continuity or good storytelling somehow works with the iteration of the characters as imagined at present. People expect little more than a dumb popcorn movie, so it's easy enough to make that work. Star Wars fans are much more unforgiving. It dilutes the brand, yes, but it makes great money and to be fair there are a few genuine gems here and there. I disagree. People who compare fanbases are never as smart as they think they are. The mistake George Lucas made with episodes 1-3 is catering too much to the fans who built up so much head canon that they would be disappointed with anything but a faithful adaptation to their head canon. The fanservice is the biggest thing getting in the way of good storytelling. The Marvel approach works because they craft good movies without worrying about giving a big middle finger to the people who don't like their approach. They don't have the baggage of trying to please every fan of the earlier films. Each series targets a slightly different audience who may or may not like the other series they have. It doesn't matter as long as each film has a big enough target audience of its own. I wouldn’t say that Marvel has that going for them. The big thing with Marvel is that fans of comics have long suffered through terrible adaptations of those super heroes, so there was a lot of forgiveness early on. And when Marvel wanted to do weird things, they tapped into the weirdest shit in their roster, like Guardians of the Galaxy. Star Wars has not gone full Rocket Raccoon level of risk yet, but they should as soon as possible. Because that was the power of comics, that they had a broad slate of titles with different tones. Anyone who had read Thor knows that comic not serious at all.
The DreamTM: is to have a catalog of movies and stories so large that people can take or leave what they want. They could make a movie about a noir style detective on Coruscant that is just about a murder. Or a group of young force users trying to defend a tiny colony from slavers. Or one about a family Mandalorian monster hunters. They could just make wild shit and people wouldn’t feel like their identity is caught up in it. So we need to get the Empire/Rebel conflict so some point of stability where it is present, but does not dominate the entire galaxy. Once that happens, we can have unlimited fun Star Wars stories that are not caught up with the next Death Star/Starkiller/System Cracker narrative.
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Those costume designer sure like game of thrones.
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United Kingdom13774 Posts
Hey, has anyone gone in and seen this movie yet? After Ep 8 I'm really loathe to watch another Star Wars movie blindly and the reviews I've seen suggest that this movie leaves much to be desired. Anyone have their own two cents on it?
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It turned out to be a surprisingly solid 8/10 for me, especially considering how unwanted this movie was and the production troubles it had. The pacing did slow awkwardly in places, Alden's acting isn't phenomenal but it does eventually become serviceable, and some of the more interesting characters become kinda throwaway, but the action sequences were excitingly fun, especially the starship chase through you-know-what.
They did go overboard stuffing all those origin stories in one film, but I still loved the reference to the more obscure parts of the canon, be it seemingly throwaway lines from the films to even nods from old obscure books and games. There's also a big cameo that is very rewarding for anyone who followed The Clone Wars and Rebels cartoons, though it'll leave the casual movie-goer very confused. I loved these references and the gratuitous world-building, and it brought the movie up to the 8/10 from what could be a 7/10.
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Giving this movie an 8 must be a joke.i rarely leave the cinema and this movie made me do it after 1hour into it.
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I was anticipating mediocrity, but you actually left?!
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Eh, you missed out on the better parts of the movie if you left during the first half.
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It was a pretty big Meh for me. Donald glover wasn't given the freedom to carry the movie and the guy who played solo wasn't a leading man caliber actor. He wasn't bad but he doesn't have the voice or the ruggedness to play a rouge.
Not enough forshadowing or building up the twist at the end leads to a pretty meandering ending without much suspense or tension.
+ Show Spoiler +Darth mall turning into a crime boss with his robot legs from the clone wars cartoon. That was a great idea but wasn't executed well. the ending would have been better if it was a seige type battle with the wookies were everyone dies while the survivors get away with the rebellion getting started with the ship fuel. Intrigue thats predictable is really lame.
Solo getting his name from not having a family almost made me walk out. If it was any further in I would have. Jesus what a fucking shit fest of a story decision.
Finally what a god damm disgrace that they stick l3 into the falcon and Lando is willing to bet with it again. Makes the whole sub plot about them caring for each other a shitty joke.
As with the last jedi star wars has the greatest movie makers in the business yet gets let down constantly by shit teir writing.
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For me, better than expected 7/10
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On May 26 2018 09:10 Sermokala wrote:It was a pretty big Meh for me. Donald glover wasn't given the freedom to carry the movie and the guy who played solo wasn't a leading man caliber actor. He wasn't bad but he doesn't have the voice or the ruggedness to play a rouge. Not enough forshadowing or building up the twist at the end leads to a pretty meandering ending without much suspense or tension. + Show Spoiler +Darth mall turning into a crime boss with his robot legs from the clone wars cartoon. That was a great idea but wasn't executed well. the ending would have been better if it was a seige type battle with the wookies were everyone dies while the survivors get away with the rebellion getting started with the ship fuel. Intrigue thats predictable is really lame.
Solo getting his name from not having a family almost made me walk out. If it was any further in I would have. Jesus what a fucking shit fest of a story decision.
Finally what a god damm disgrace that they stick l3 into the falcon and Lando is willing to bet with it again. Makes the whole sub plot about them caring for each other a shitty joke. As with the last jedi star wars has the greatest movie makers in the business yet gets let down constantly by shit teir writing.
The script is weak, but the overall arc of the story felt coherent (unlike TFA and TLJ).
Solid 7 or 7.5 out of 10 for me. Strong disagree on Solo/his actor. Han is not a seasoned veteran in this film. He's a naive street rat trying to break free. He doesn't need to carry the film as a lead because it's an ensemble. Donald/Lando did ok and I was glad to see that their relationship was much more tenuous than we are led to believe by episode 5/6. The script lets Lando and L3 down a bit. L3 veers into Jar Jar levels of being laughed at rather than being laughed with.
A seige battle with wookies? No thanks. Totally does not fit the more small scale of the movie. The ending was probably the best part - the heist scenes take some extra layers of suspension of disbelief
My only complaint about the origin of the name Solo was that someone else came up with it...should have been Han to say it.
The Last Jedi was like... 2/10. This is no where near that.
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On May 27 2018 16:05 Bigtony wrote:Show nested quote +On May 26 2018 09:10 Sermokala wrote:It was a pretty big Meh for me. Donald glover wasn't given the freedom to carry the movie and the guy who played solo wasn't a leading man caliber actor. He wasn't bad but he doesn't have the voice or the ruggedness to play a rouge. Not enough forshadowing or building up the twist at the end leads to a pretty meandering ending without much suspense or tension. + Show Spoiler +Darth mall turning into a crime boss with his robot legs from the clone wars cartoon. That was a great idea but wasn't executed well. the ending would have been better if it was a seige type battle with the wookies were everyone dies while the survivors get away with the rebellion getting started with the ship fuel. Intrigue thats predictable is really lame.
Solo getting his name from not having a family almost made me walk out. If it was any further in I would have. Jesus what a fucking shit fest of a story decision.
Finally what a god damm disgrace that they stick l3 into the falcon and Lando is willing to bet with it again. Makes the whole sub plot about them caring for each other a shitty joke. As with the last jedi star wars has the greatest movie makers in the business yet gets let down constantly by shit teir writing. The script is weak, but the overall arc of the story felt coherent (unlike TFA and TLJ). Solid 7 or 7.5 out of 10 for me. Strong disagree on Solo/his actor. Han is not a seasoned veteran in this film. He's a naive street rat trying to break free. He doesn't need to carry the film as a lead because it's an ensemble. Donald/Lando did ok and I was glad to see that their relationship was much more tenuous than we are led to believe by episode 5/6. The script lets Lando and L3 down a bit. L3 veers into Jar Jar levels of being laughed at rather than being laughed with. A seige battle with wookies? No thanks. Totally does not fit the more small scale of the movie. The ending was probably the best part - the heist scenes take some extra layers of suspension of disbelief My only complaint about the origin of the name Solo was that someone else came up with it...should have been Han to say it. The Last Jedi was like... 2/10. This is no where near that.
How can TLJ be 2/10?
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United Kingdom13774 Posts
It was very bad. I tried really hard to like it but after the uniqueness factor wears off it’s easily the worst Star Wars main episode to date.
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I mean we have the prequels to judge it against truely henious movies. I don't think TLJ is worse then them but its very clearly right behind them.
Basic things about the movie are rotten. Editing is probably only surpassed by Kingdom of heaven in truely terrible decisions. Its really long and yet lacks content as a movie. It spits on established cannon (even within the "hard cannon") with such distaste you suspect that Rain johnson just hates star wars as a whole. Turning Luke into a coward who refuses to take responsibility for his actions was shocking but everything to do with the island neither builds up to anything nor really delivers on anything. The basic premise of "what happened to luke training kylo" was solved in a short montage in TFA yet now we need to waste the end of lukes story rehasing and re explaining what we learned in TFA. Nothing important happens on the island basically that couldn't have been done just as well in 5 minutes. The casino plot is basically 30 more minutes of filler that leads no where and doesn't add anything to a movie that really shows its length.
But I mean even after everything the ending scenes are at least acceptable. the "salt" scene was embarrassing, the lack of a real fight between kylo and luke is a bizarre decision and rays final Ascension to mary sue god hood was bad but its at least acceptable for a movie unlike what we ever got in the prequels.
My problem with Solo is that there never really is a big moment in the movie. The "heist" scenes never tell the audience what the plan is really ahead of time so we can never get Oceans style twists, rather we get predictable "oh that person betrayed the other person just like the movie told me they would eariler" moments. I say a final siege would be good because it would add something exciting for the movie to do instead of constant talking parts being the only source of story development.
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United Kingdom13774 Posts
TLJ is worse than all three prequels. For all their problems the ones in TLJ are so much more severe that I can't really forgive the direction they took with it or the collective stupidity of all the bad decisions they made. There are more stupid moments, the "cool" scenes are outdone by their Ep 1/2/3 equivalents, the character assassination is unprecedented, and the plot is much worse (in that this was actually a strength of the prequels but a weakness of TLJ).
I know it's common to say "worse than prequels" as a form of exaggeration as to how disappointing something was, but I think it's absolutely justified here.
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On May 28 2018 03:16 LegalLord wrote: TLJ is worse than all three prequels. For all their problems the ones in TLJ are so much more severe that I can't really forgive the direction they took with it or the collective stupidity of all the bad decisions they made. There are more stupid moments, the "cool" scenes are outdone by their Ep 1/2/3 equivalents, the character assassination is unprecedented, and the plot is much worse (in that this was actually a strength of the prequels but a weakness of TLJ).
I know it's common to say "worse than prequels" as a form of exaggeration as to how disappointing something was, but I think it's absolutely justified here. I got to disagree. The prequels were worse by a factor that the first broke the force fundamentally and got worse from there. The Mary popins scene and the force projection scenes may have been unforgivable gotcha moments but they weren't mitoclorians giving the star wars universe an vaguely Aryan race type aspect to it. The only good part in the first one was the fight scene where no one talked. the rest of the prequels was a dirge of shot reverse shot of people sitting and talking, walking and talking, or standing and talking. Either that or painfully obvious green screen scenes. None of the characters has a real backstory to them. TLJ for its character assassination had mark hamil in it and kylo ren was at the least intriguing. The throne room fight scene ,while horribly damaging to the rest of the movie, was worlds better then the weirdly constant of light sabers in the prequels. Del toro is given no time but is at least a good character that no one in the prequels is.
The plots of the prequels is not a strength. The first fundamentally makes no sense (trade federation blockading trade and invading a planet?) the second has more red flags then a bull fight and the third, from the where did they actually land the thing on a planet city to a third act that would make a marvel movie executive say "gee isn't that a little predictable?"
I mean that whole last fight scene between anikin and obi wan leaves such a black mark on all of cinema. All that manpower all those hours spent by true professionals and what do you get? A forgettable sequence that you really don't care about. Three movies and 5 years have been spent leading to this and you don't care about it. Its truely the worst thing to happen to cinema.
Well until justice league but thats a whole nother can of worms.
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United States15275 Posts
Midiclorians were a rather short-sighted, silly attempt to render a mystical force as a scientific phenomenon. Besides violating the unspoken fact that Star Wars' appeal is rooted in fantasy tropes and archetypes, it was just an unappealing explanation that didn't address any questions. However, it didn't effect the movies in any meaningful way besides explaining why Luke possessed such potency with the Force. The Jedi certainly didn't use it to circumvent their embrace of celibacy, and nothing about it was mentioned on the Sith side.
Also it's a bit hypocritical bemoaning midiclorians when TLJ made space warfare null and void with that hyperspace sequence.
On May 28 2018 09:47 Sermokala wrote: The first fundamentally makes no sense (trade federation blockading trade and invading a planet?) the second has more red flags then a bull fight and the third, from the where did they actually land the thing on a planet city to a third act that would make a marvel movie executive say "gee isn't that a little predictable?"
Merchant organizations leveraging their wealth into military power is a common theme in history. The East India Company exercised control over large parts of India with their private armies, not to mention ran unofficial wars against competition. Perhaps it's a misplaced plot in Star Wars, given the original trilogy was all heroic fantasy, but the notion is hardly inexplicable.
I don't know how one can reasonably argue Episodes 1-3 had a worse plot, considering they actually had an overarching plot that was botched in execution. TLJ is a loose collection of skits with vague themes connecting them, and these only make sense via reference to the older movies. It had far better overall acting (Lucas' direction tended to lead to stiff acting, and any success could be accredited to the actors themselves) but that's not equivalent to more interesting characters. In abstract Palpatine, Dooku, Jango Fett, and a half dozen other characters are all more interesting in how they could have been developed. Shit Grevious had more potential and he's basically a robot ninja.
The prequels are earnest to the point of schmaltz and incompetence doomed whatever potential existed in them. But at least they had potential and a vision of its universe as a legitimate universe, full of history and alien races and weird things befitting the central conceit. TLJ is a slickly directed movie with poor editing, nonsensical plot points, bad spats of humor, dissonant tone issues and a fundamental lack of interest in its source material. Lots of moments in the prequel trilogy are more embarrassing in retrospect (especially the lurid space opera crap), but at least you could tell Lucas had ambition to tell a story.
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But what I mean is that Midiclorians effectively means that there are people who are genetically superior to being force users and those that are genetically inferior to being force users. I can understand that it was intended as a slight explanation to why skywalkers are op at the force but it has DEEPLY disturbing connotations to the properties core. This is on top of the cloning facilities also promoting the same ideology of having a singular genetic line being declared superior for the role of a foot solider.
Not to mention the prequels make jedi into General/preists leading to the subconscious image of genetically chosen generals leading genetically chosen soldiers being the good guys.
I get the East indian company example but its a bizzare escalation that no one doesn't just call their bluff. This is a universe that has decided that military might and wars are a thing to be banned and not to be pursued. Suddenly the trade interests protesting taxation decide to create a military from scratch and no one has any idea what to do about it for the time between one and two. Its a jarring concept that creates a core of political talky bits that the prequels continue on and on. Why doesn't Padmea, the one coming from the planet who got invaded and could really use a federation defense force, see the obvious and shown reason to support the federation defense force?
In TLJ the actors are better but the sets are better as they're more often then not real sets with people and not much CGI in them. Grevious had potential but that potential will go nowhere if hes strictly a CGI creation that other actors have to imagine him being instead of interacting with in any way.
I will admit that the prequels do show that Lucas had the ambition and love for the content that is critical for a quality movie that TLJ severely lacks. I'll give TFA a break every day of the week for being the movie it needed to be but TLJ was the most golden opportunity Disney will ever have and they've ruined it.
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On May 28 2018 03:16 LegalLord wrote: TLJ is worse than all three prequels. For all their problems the ones in TLJ are so much more severe that I can't really forgive the direction they took with it or the collective stupidity of all the bad decisions they made. There are more stupid moments, the "cool" scenes are outdone by their Ep 1/2/3 equivalents, the character assassination is unprecedented, and the plot is much worse (in that this was actually a strength of the prequels but a weakness of TLJ).
I know it's common to say "worse than prequels" as a form of exaggeration as to how disappointing something was, but I think it's absolutely justified here. Atleast TLJ didnt have Hayden Christensen
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