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We can start discussing the next movie now I guess, even though we don't have a title....or do we?

http://comicbook.com/starwars/2016/05/20/star-wars-episode-viii-title-possibly-revealed/

Not sure how I feel about that, though it would fit as the second in this trilogy after the way the Empire Strikes Back was 127 minutes of the good guys almost exclusively getting the crap kicked out of them.

Mark Hamill in 2012:


Mark Hamill in 2016:


This guy deserves major props for getting back in Jedi shape. I just hope I look this good when I'm in my mid-sixties.

I liked The Force Awakens a lot, but one of my biggest gripes was that we didn't get to see Luke in action again. We saw him as an apprentice Jedi in Episodes IV and V, and we saw him attain the rank of Jedi Knight in Episode VI. Now I want to see Jedi MASTER Luke unleash Anakin/Yoda/Sidious levels of hurt on the Knights of Ren. Luke inherited Anakin's Force potential, but we never saw it max out in the Original Trilogy. He needs to be the OG Jedi Master of the Sequel Trilogy. I also hope he still has his green lightsaber from Return of the Jedi.

That is amazing

And yes totally in regards to Luke kicking some ass.

I think we'll get that. I've read a rumour from a reliable source, and

it involves Kylo Ren, and the Knights of Ren stalking Luke and Rey. Rey fights Kylo again, and Luke battles and kills all the Knight of Ren in an amazing display of force powers and yes, also the green lighsabre from ROTJ. Kylo runs off and Luke rescues Rey. Luke wears an all black costume like in ROTJ apparently.

The way they handled Luke in TFA was perfect, in my opinion. He's still the crux of the story - everyone is looking for him. And he's made into a mythic person. The look he gives Rey leads me to believe he knows it's war again in the galaxy, and he's needed. Even if he's not exactly happy about that.

I agree with Dark Knight about the way Luke was handled in TFA being achieved perfectly, and yeah, Luke displaying just how much of a Jedi Master he's become at this stage is going to be something I might even cry to upon seeing. It's going to be absolutely fabulous!

Quote from: The Joker on Tue, 31 May  2016, 07:17
Luke displaying just how much of a Jedi Master he's become at this stage is going to be something I might even cry to upon seeing.

I will cry. There's no might about it. The final shot of the trailer should be Luke igniting his green RotJ lightsaber. Just imagine the response from fans. It would be as if millions of voices suddenly cried out in pleasure, and were suddenly silenced (their nerdgasms ending).

Quote from: Silver Nemesis on Tue, 31 May  2016, 14:23
I will cry. There's no might about it. The final shot of the trailer should be Luke igniting his green RotJ lightsaber. Just imagine the response from fans. It would be as if millions of voices suddenly cried out in pleasure, and were suddenly silenced (their nerdgasms ending).

Silver Nemesis friend: "Are you crying?"

Silver Nemesis: "Luke's slaying the Knights of Ren like a boss, and you're looking at me? WATCH THE MOVIE FOR CHRIST'S SAKES!!!!"

Me watching Luke hack someone's head off with a lightsaber:

(https://www.batman-online.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fimages4.hiboox.com%2Fimages%2F0417%2F6d0f4e799688f25c0c4927c1701f9e22.jpg&hash=594468a412a9d22002bc86030bf658f71635c46f)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=5&v=t9EaZtgDftc


Personally, I think calling it "The Last Jedi" is partially meant to make us speculate/assume Luke is going to die (especially after another OT character's death in TFA), indicating to me he's going to be just fine.


(https://pbs.twimg.com/media/C29VMTgUUAAw4O0.jpg)

I don't get why people think Luke is going to die.

It's literally just Luke's title as of right now.

The opening crawl of TFA refers to Luke as such: "Luke Skywalker has vanished. In his absence, the sinister FIRST ORDER has risen from the ashes of the Empire and will not rest until Skywalker, the last Jedi, has been destroyed."

Snoke also gives him this title: "The droid will soon be delivered to the Resistance, leading them to the last Jedi. If Skywalker returns, the new Jedi will rise."

It's like calling Superman the last son of Krypton. It's rather mythic.

I like the title because TFA was all about locating Luke. That's where the film ended. With Luke standing alone overlooking the ocean. I predict IX will be called something like The New Jedi, completing Snoke's quote and ultimate fear. With the sequel trilogy becoming 'The' trilogy.

Witnessing the true rebirth of the Jedi on screen is better than just hearing about it via a piece of dialogue. I prefer this way. He tried once, but it failed. Kylo killed everyone. But Luke tries a second time and succeeds. It adds depth to Luke's character too. He feels the burden and sense of failure - but through Rey, he overcomes his pain.

I think it will include a reformation of the Jedi order, such as policy regarding attachment.

All in all, I'm happy with how it's all shaping up.

Although I am completely A OK with Luke getting back in the saddle, so to speak, and ascending with a new class of Jedi, it's worth stating that the Jedi Order has failed twice in the last hundred years. Once during Order 66 and the purge, and also (apparently) when Luke tried a new Jedi academy that got murdered by the Knights of Ren, which we'll likely see in the next movie.

So clearly, while Force traditions can (and presumably still do) exist in the galaxy, the Jedi as an actual institution can be viewed as finished. Leaving something new needs to arise to keep balance to the Force, and the Light will always be with the Dark.

One of the things I noticed about TFA, was that the characters seemed to use the term "light" metaphorically. "I feel it again. The pull to the light." , "There's still light in him, I know it."

Going that route would be different than what most folks would naturally expect, however, I sincerely doubt Disney and LucasFilm will ever phase out the Jedi even if an attempt was made. They're too much of a signature feature of the setting, and judging from TFA, I don't see Disney straying too far from the episodic formula for very long anyways.

Those terms are used, in my opinion, because the Sith WERE destroyed. Palpatine and Vader were the last two Sith Lords and they are both dead. Kylo Ren, and Snoke, are dark side users but they are not Sith Lords. A Sith Lord is a very specific individual. There's only one Jedi left, and one Jedi does not make an order. So to the wider galaxy, for all intents and purposes, the Jedi are all but extinct too. So for that reason it makes sense the terms light and dark are now a lot more commonplace. The religious aspects have eroded.

Personally, I'm over the saga's treatment of the Jedi as cannonfodder for dark side users. Being hunted down like dogs. I'm hoping The Last Jedi represents a change in their fortunes, with Luke at least establishing a new Jedi academy of some sort by the end of IX. Because as the title says, we are now down to the last Jedi. They either grow from here or they are extinct. But on the positive side, even a small bunch of 10, 15 or 20 Jedi means the Jedi live on, and they still manage to outlast the Sith.

Quote from: The Dark Knight on Wed, 25 Jan  2017, 04:53
I don't get why people think Luke is going to die.

It's literally just Luke's title as of right now.

The opening crawl of TFA refers to Luke as such: "Luke Skywalker has vanished. In his absence, the sinister FIRST ORDER has risen from the ashes of the Empire and will not rest until Skywalker, the last Jedi, has been destroyed."

Snoke also gives him this title: "The droid will soon be delivered to the Resistance, leading them to the last Jedi. If Skywalker returns, the new Jedi will rise."

It's like calling Superman the last son of Krypton. It's rather mythic.

I like the title because TFA was all about locating Luke. That's where the film ended. With Luke standing alone overlooking the ocean. I predict IX will be called something like The New Jedi, completing Snoke's quote and ultimate fear. With the sequel trilogy becoming 'The' trilogy.

Witnessing the true rebirth of the Jedi on screen is better than just hearing about it via a piece of dialogue. I prefer this way. He tried once, but it failed. Kylo killed everyone. But Luke tries a second time and succeeds. It adds depth to Luke's character too. He feels the burden and sense of failure - but through Rey, he overcomes his pain.

I think it will include a reformation of the Jedi order, such as policy regarding attachment.

All in all, I'm happy with how it's all shaping up.

I think fans are predicting that Luke's fate will mirror Yoda's; the teacher passes away as his student - and the galaxy's last hope - is ready to stop the Empire. If that does happen, I'd expect claims that the new films recycling ideas from the original trilogy to increase ten fold. But whether that's seen as a good thing or a bad thing depends on the viewer.

Keep in mind now that Han Solo is gone for good, and Princess Leia's fate will have to be addressed because of Carrie Fisher's unexpected death, fans are preparing themselves if Luke becomes the next iconic character to retire from the series. We'll wait and see.

I'm pretty sure Disney has poised "The Last Jedi", or atleast hopes to, at least meet the same box office as "The Force Awakens," but does anyone think that with the unfortunate passing of Carrie Fisher, particularly with her having completed her role in the film which is reportedly larger than her role in Episode 7 (which, and let's be honest here... isn't saying much)... is going to galvanize audiences into making Episode 8 an even bigger hit than it was already going to be in a Heath Ledger manner?

I hear what yall are saying, but this is still totally me rn.

(https://pbs.twimg.com/media/C230fBkUcAADmNz.jpg)

Quote from: The Joker on Wed, 25 Jan  2017, 20:04


I'm pretty sure Disney has poised "The Last Jedi", or atleast hopes to, at least meet the same box office as "The Force Awakens," but does anyone think that with the unfortunate passing of Carrie Fisher, particularly with her having completed her role in the film which is reportedly larger than her role in Episode 7 (which, and let's be honest here... isn't saying much)... is going to galvanize audiences into making Episode 8 an even bigger hit than it was already going to be in a Heath Ledger manner?

Honestly, I don't think it will influence the box office that much. I was expecting comparable box office numbers to TFA before Carrie died.

TFA had the advantage of being a new SW movie in 10 years that continued the story beyond that of ROJ. That was 'big league'! With TLJ, even though third SW movie released by Disney being set apart by 3 years, I'm sure Carrie's death will get people who wouldn't have watched it to check it out, but ultimately I agree that it's probably not going to make a huge difference in the amount of people who will check it out simply because it's a new SW movie. I'm sure the trailers will end up being very engaging and Luke actually being present will probably get people more excited than before.

I have opinions on Carrie, and Mark, but I'm not sure how they'd go down with other people, so I'll refrain from making them. But I like these 'characters' first and foremost. I think Luke whipping out his big green one for the first time in 30 years and simply having a large amount of screen time will bring in big dollars. That's what the fans want to see. TFA belonged to Han, and Harrison did a bang up job. But now it's Luke's turn.

Not much, but something new.

(https://i0.wp.com/media2.slashfilm.com/slashfilm/wp/wp-content/images/starwars-lastjedi-forcefriday2-boxart-slice-700x467.jpg)

Nice tribute to Carrie/Leia.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sE99le5FBrY

First teaser trailer!!!


EDIT: And here's the poster:

The line Luke says. "I only know one truth... It's time for the Jedi... to end." is intriguing.

I've theorized over in the Force Awakens thread that Luke may very well be literally the last of the Jedi Order, with Rey being trained and becoming what is essentially the 1st of something new. Luke may have seen notable flaws within the Jedi Order's history with battles with the Sith during his time away, and thus his mission will be to focus on training Rey to help him take down Snoke and Kylo and finally be done with it.

I'm going to do the unthinkable and speak in Hayden Christensen's defence. First of all, can I just say I hated this guy when Attack of the Clones came out. Every girl I knew, including my own girlfriend at the time, had a crush on him. And I thought he was far too wimpy to play Vader. Not to mention the fact his performance was awful.

But I've seen Hayden in other things where his acting was much better. Back when he did the prequels, he was a young and inexperienced performer whose background was mostly in television, theatre and small indie movies. Suddenly he's thrust into a massive blockbuster film with a director who – let's be honest – is terrible at directing actors. He's handed some of the cringiest dialogue ever written, dumped in the middle of a vast green void and told to emote. He's not given anything real to react to and the only direction Lucas offers is "faster and more intense".


Is it any wonder his performance sucked? I'm probably in the minority, but I thought his acting was acceptable in Revenge of the Sith. He still had some awkward lines of dialogue, but there was a massive improvement there over Attack of the Clones. And I'd like to see Hayden given a chance to revisit the character with a better director and script. I'd love to see some well written scenes between Luke and Anakin's Force ghost. Just the two of them talking, with no action or overbearing effects to distract from the drama. Seeing Anakin confide in his son about his many regrets would make for a powerful scene, and it would give Hayden a chance to redeem himself in the eyes of the fans and show them what he's really capable of.

The Last Jedi is by far my most hyped film of 2017. However, after watching this teaser a few more times, I have to say I'm not that impressed by it. I think it's a little too similar to The Force Awakens teaser. It starts with a sudden jump moment (Finn's head popping into view on Jakku/Rey's hand landing on the rock). Then we get a soft medley of iconic character themes accompanied by a cryptic voiceover from Luke. We get a shot of a familiar character with their face obscured from view. We get some shots of lightsabers, but no combat. We get a fan service money shot of the Falcon in action. We get a shot of Captain Phasma walking towards the camera. We even get a shot of what appears to be the same scene from the Episode VII teaser:


The only really intriguing element in this teaser is Luke's line about the Jedi ending. Other than that, it looks like they're using nostalgia and familiarity to market Episode VIII like they did with The Force Awakens. I think Lucasfilm has overplayed that hand. Fans are craving something new, not a remake of The Empire Strikes Back. Speaking of which, is anyone else a bit concerned by this shot?


Low-altitude speeders skimming across the white surface of salt flats towards what appear to be walkers. It looks worrying similar to the Battle of Hoth. It might not be. We don't yet know what the context is behind this scene. But if it turns out those are Resistance speeders racing to battle First Order walkers, I'll be very disappointed.

Like I say, this is my most hyped film of the year. And I'll definitely be there to see it opening weekend. I just don't think this teaser was that great. I'm glad it didn't give away any spoilers and I'm sure there are lots of exciting new characters and planets they haven't shown us yet. But for a first trailer, it's underwhelming. I'd rank it below the Episode VII and Rogue One teasers.

Quote from: The Joker on Fri, 14 Apr  2017, 21:18
The line Luke says. "I only know one truth... It's time for the Jedi... to end." is intriguing.

I've theorized over in the Force Awakens thread that Luke may very well be literally the last of the Jedi Order, with Rey being trained and becoming what is essentially the 1st of something new. Luke may have seen notable flaws within the Jedi Order's history with battles with the Sith during his time away, and thus his mission will be to focus on training Rey to help him take down Snoke and Kylo and finally be done with it.

Here's the theory from me, TDOAK (The Darkest Of All Knights).

I think Luke found out a dark secret about the Jedi which shook him to his core - that they strayed from their original path. I'm taking a leap of faith and guessing the book we see in the trailer is the Journal of the Whills, located at the first Jedi temple. This revelation also could have led to Ben Solo turning to the dark side, given he was also disillusioned and also susceptible to Snoke's manipulations. And as we know, Ben went on to massacre Luke's students, which adds to Luke's torment.

I think the Jedi will eventually be reformed by Luke, but only after he's inspired again by Rey.

Quote from: Silver Nemesis on Fri, 14 Apr  2017, 22:54I'm going to do the unthinkable and speak in Hayden Christensen's defence. First of all, can I just say I hated this guy when Attack of the Clones came out. Every girl I knew, including my own girlfriend at the time, had a crush on him. And I thought he was far too wimpy to play Vader. Not to mention the fact his performance was awful.

I'd like to think I understand the rationale behind his portrayal in AOTC. Lucas wanted to bridge the gap between the character's portrayal in TPM (a basically sweet and wholesome kid) and Star Wars '77 (where he chokes people who piss him off). He also wanted to explore the character's vulnerabilities and show the audience that his thought process is pretty relatable, really, and most of what he does comes from his own frailties rather than his own inherent darkness.

In actual execution though... well, it's up for grabs how well done those issues all are.

Still, I can speak to a fringe benefit of casting Christensen as Anakin. Jake Lloyd was a typical American kid from the midwest and his accent was that of a typical American kid from the midwest. Christensen's accent is not midwest. He pronounces some of his R's in a fairly clipped manner. "I programmed Arrrr-2 to wawn us if thewe is an intrudah." The result is a bit of a linguistic filling-of-the-gap between Jake Lloyd's accent and James Earl Jones's accent.

It gives the impression that Anakin moved into the Jedi Temple and gradually began absorbing the accents that a lot of people seem to use on Coruscant. So he still has a few of Lloyd's R-pronunciations and a few Obi-Wan's R-pronunciations. I kind of like that.

Quote from: Silver Nemesis on Fri, 14 Apr  2017, 22:54But I've seen Hayden in other things where his acting was much better. Back when he did the prequels, he was a young and inexperienced performer whose background was mostly in television, theatre and small indie movies. Suddenly he's thrust into a massive blockbuster film with a director who – let's be honest – is terrible at directing actors. He's handed some of the cringiest dialogue ever written, dumped in the middle of a vast green void and told to emote. He's not given anything real to react to and the only direction Lucas offers is "faster and more intense".

Other actors in the prequels seemed to handle their assignments pretty well. Ewan McGregor, Ian McDiarmid and Samuel L. Jackson, for example.

It seems that the more devoted a given actor is to Method-style acting, the more he seems to struggle with Star Wars performances. Not always, obviously, but in a lot of cases. Meanwhile, actors from a more classical background don't seem to find Star Wars any more challenging than anything else they've ever done. Again, exceptions do exist but it's true in a lot of cases.

Christensen's style has always seemed very Methody to me. I'm no expert on him but that's the impression I've gotten. If my little theory about Method acting holds true, it stands to reason that he would struggle with Star Wars because he has nothing in his personal life to draw upon to immerse himself in that kind of world.

Then again, I could be pulling all this out of my... hat.

Quote from: thecolorsblend on Tue, 18 Apr  2017, 19:54Still, I can speak to a fringe benefit of casting Christensen as Anakin. Jake Lloyd was a typical American kid from the midwest and his accent was that of a typical American kid from the midwest. Christensen's accent is not midwest. He pronounces some of his R's in a fairly clipped manner. "I programmed Arrrr-2 to wawn us if thewe is an intrudah." The result is a bit of a linguistic filling-of-the-gap between Jake Lloyd's accent and James Earl Jones's accent.

I assumed he was trying to affect a transatlantic accent as a way of foreshadowing Sebastian Shaw's English accent in Return of the Jedi. Regardless, his deeper more measured manner of speaking in ROTS was a nice setup for James Earl Jones' Vader voice.

Quote from: thecolorsblend on Tue, 18 Apr  2017, 19:54It gives the impression that Anakin moved into the Jedi Temple and gradually began absorbing the accents that a lot of people seem to use on Coruscant. So he still has a few of Lloyd's R-pronunciations and a few Obi-Wan's R-pronunciations. I kind of like that.

That's a good in-universe explanation. The English accent is meant to be the Core Worlds accent, which in turn is supposed to be emblematic of the wealthier elite class of Star Wars characters. Hence why Palpatine, Tarkin and most of the Imperial officers sound British. It would make sense for Anakin to pick up such an accent after spending years on Coruscant.

Quote from: thecolorsblend on Tue, 18 Apr  2017, 19:54Other actors in the prequels seemed to handle their assignments pretty well. Ewan McGregor, Ian McDiarmid and Samuel L. Jackson, for example.

Hmm. The only two actors that I'd say were good in the PT – and by 'good' I mean they managed to make their character's actions and dialogue seem natural while investing some emotional honesty into their role – were Pernilla August and Ian McDiarmid. Liam Neeson, Terrence Stamp, Christopher Lee and Jimmy Smits did ok with what they had to work with. Samuel L. Jackson was acceptable, though I felt he was playing the exact same role he's played in most of his other films. Practically everyone else ranged from poor to terrible. Even Natalie Portman, who is ordinarily dependable, was emotionless and wooden in the majority of her scenes ("I ask you to help us. No, I beg you to help us," being one of the worst line deliveries in the entire saga).

I've heard a lot of people praise McGregor's performance, but I've always thought he was one of the actors most visibly struggling with the material. I love the character of Obi-Wan, but McGregor seemed more preoccupied with impersonating Alec Guinness than breathing life into his own interpretation of the character. He was particularly awkward whenever he had to interact with a digital character. He had this habit of overselling the effect by staring too intently at the empty space where the other person was meant to be. He wasn't terrible in the role by any means, but I definitely think he struggled under Lucas' direction.

I read somewhere that Lucas solicited the help of an acting coach on the set of Revenge of the Sith. He knew he couldn't direct the actors effectively on his own, so he got someone else to do it for him. I think there is a noticeable improvement in the overall standard of acting in Revenge of the Sith, Hayden included. But maybe that's just my bias talking because I like that movie more than the other two.

Quote from: thecolorsblend on Tue, 18 Apr  2017, 19:54Christensen's style has always seemed very Methody to me. I'm no expert on him but that's the impression I've gotten. If my little theory about Method acting holds true, it stands to reason that he would struggle with Star Wars because he has nothing in his personal life to draw upon to immerse himself in that kind of world.

You're probably right. I'm no expert on acting, but as I understand it the basic concept behind the Method approach is to place oneself in the same emotional state as the character and then react in a way that is spontaneous and organic, as opposed to the classical approach of mimicking the external symptoms of an emotion using carefully premeditated gestures. But how can anyone produce an authentic emotional reaction without authentic stimuli to fuel it? When you're standing in front of a green screen, conversing with a digital character who isn't really present, then it must be practically impossible to make proper use of the Method. It's times like that you need a director who's good with actors. Someone who can give context to their emotional state. For all his talents, Lucas simply isn't an actor's director. And it shows in the PT.

Quote from: Silver Nemesis on Wed, 30 Aug  2017, 22:30

(https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DIedxhCUQAMjL-u.jpg:large)

Freaking epic

I agree.

Honestly, I think Luke is a great character given his character growth, going from from farm boy to Jedi Knight. He wasn't the chosen one. He was just a teenager minding his own business shooting womb rats and longing for something more with his life. One day everything changes and he's saving a princess and blowing up a space station. We learn along with Luke. Yes, he's whiny at times. But that's the reality of human existence. We grow.

I think TLJ is going to make him an even more interesting character in my opinion - building upon what already existed. I'm a fan of emotionally scarred heroes who walk a fine line between light and dark. And that's Luke. In ROTJ he force choked the Gamorrean guards and wore a black cloak. He asked Jabba to surrender, and when he didn't, he killed his goons and blew up the barge. That sounds fair to me. He also tapped into the dark side to defeat Vader, but realized he went too far. Thus he surrendered to the Emperor's lightning because he'd rather die than repeat his father's mistakes. Same thing when Vader revealed he was his father. He'd rather drop down into oblivion than join the forces of darkness.

Luke had to come to terms with who his father was. Just as Vader had to come to terms with the fact Palpatine tricked him, and he now has to live the rest of his life as a slave....just as he grew up on Tatooine. His mother is dead. Padme is dead. He betrayed all his friends....and so on.

Luke knows darkness is in his blood, but he manages to control it. So when Ben Solo burns down his Jedi Temple and probably massacres all of his padawans...he's going to be hurt. He's going to feel anger and the need to take revenge. But what does he do? Well, it's safe to say he goes into seclusion on Ahch-To. He'd rather remove himself from the situation than succumb to the darkness. Brooding and reflecting on his failures during this time.

As said, I like three dimensional characters with trauma to overcome. Rey finding Luke doesn't automatically mean the universe is saved. That would be boring. Re-energizing Luke gives the man another character arc and most importantly, allows us to see the true rebirth of the Jedi on screen.

That image of Luke really connects him visually to the badass Return of the Jedi Luke.

Only he looks a hundred times more dangerous.

He has a look there that's like;

"You think you know the Force? Let me show you the Force..."

He looks like he's ready to annihilate some Gungans. With extreme prejudice.

Quote from: Silver Nemesis on Thu, 31 Aug  2017, 19:43
He looks like he's ready to annihilate some Gungans. With extreme prejudice.

Meesa no lookey! Meesa love Jar Jar!

On a serious note I wonder how Luke will interact with Chewie and R2. They went with Rey to Achoo didn't they? I know Chewie did as co-pilot. I hope, weary as he is, that Luke would at least have a little warmth to them. I couldn't take him being rude to R2. I don't think R2 could take it. He would probably short circuit permanently. :(

Okay, I own this mistake.

Quote from: The Dark Knight on Thu, 31 Aug  2017, 02:32
from from

But this?

Quote from: The Dark Knight on Thu, 31 Aug  2017, 02:32
womb rats

Autocorrect socks and it can go straight to he'll.

The poster is okay. I prefer TFA's design, though.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8DHwYao2QTs

I'm all about that redemption arc, bro. I need Luke to be down in the dumps, scared and insecure in the first few acts of the film. And then at the end he stomps back to shut everything down. I need savage Luke.

Hmmmmm. The trailer does hint a little too much of what's going to happen, for my liking. Looks fairly gloomy compared to TFA, but I'm still open to seeing it.

To go off-topic a bit, I noticed some detractors of the Disney Star Wars franchise are complaining that the focus on women as the main leading characters reeks of SJW propaganda. This is where I think all the SJW stuff can be blurry. Just Star Wars happens to have female characters taking the spotlight, it doesn't mean it's agenda-driven. If these Disney films promoted misandry, then these complaints are justified, but that's not what's going on here.

I can understand the criticism for TFA relying too much on nostalgia, and it may be the same case for TLJ. But I repeat, women as the main characters is not a problem.

The SJW thing... maybe it's true, maybe it isn't. But either way, it's kind of a testament to how politicized entertainment (hell, everything) has become that people can reasonably make this accusation.

I suppose it's a good sign that the accusation is sticking now. Three years ago, the people making the claim would be ridiculed, harassed and mocked. Improvement?

The trailer. Those of you planning to see this movie, I hope you enjoyed this trailer and love the movie.

Quote from: thecolorsblend on Tue, 10 Oct  2017, 22:06
The SJW thing... maybe it's true, maybe it isn't. But either way, it's kind of a testament to how politicized entertainment (hell, everything) has become that people can reasonably make this accusation.

We're at the height of the SJW agenda with gender/race quotas in businesses, talk about 'white privilege', stunt casting in media such as Doctor Who and elsewhere....but the diversity in Star Wars? Nah, that's all just a coincidence. C'mon. They talk about the best person for the job, but that's a lie. They gotta fill those gender and race quotas to show they're progressive and inclusive. There's absolutely an agenda.

Fun little trailer, even with all the misdirection's.

Quote from: The Dark Knight on Wed, 11 Oct  2017, 00:51We're at the height of the SJW agenda with gender/race quotas in businesses

Keep in mind that the movies coming out now were still in production at various levels two'ish years ago. But I think we're past peak SJW now. It'll take time for Hollyweird to catch up but the man on the street has had to contend with kneeling during America's national anthem in NFL games, never-ending far-left viewpoints in their movies and shows, more women in video games because Equality Or Else and that type of stuff.

It's been nearly a year since the SJW's discovered they don't rule the roost anymore. It'll take time for Hollywood to catch up. Thing is though, I don't think it'll be that easy for them in the future. Lines have been drawn and We The People haven't been in an especially forgiving mood lately.

As to the coincidence thing... look, Abrams said upfront that he shaped the story into being what it is. So the "representation" we have seen, are seeing and will see is not an accident. Everybody may want to deny it now but I remember him saying on several occasions that not for nothing is the First Order mostly White and mostly male while the Rebels are mostly not-White or mostly not-male. He stacked the deck the way he did on purpose.

In the end, I don't think it'll matter. At this point, Star Wars is just another adventure movie franchise in a sea of adventure movie franchises. Sooner or later, reality will come crashing down on Disney. And it's totally possible that Star Wars will be destroyed, possibly forever. If you look at the pathetic toy sales from TFA, it's easy to think that the day of reckoning is coming. And may soon be at hand.

I honestly think Hollyweird is going the way of the NFL. Hollyweird just happens to be a bigger beast, but the end result will be the same. Box office returns aren't what they used to be. People are voting with their wallets, just as the Emmys recently had their lowest viewership in history. People are trying to find all kinds of excuses for the drop off in box office, but educated people know what's going on. It's all connected and it's not a coincidence - pissing off half of your viewership is dumb business. Hollyweird were already struggling and had limited influence, and then Harvey Weinstein was exposed as the grub he has always been. Everybody knew, but they said nothing. It's a place full of fake, hypocritical people. This is called instant karma. The more Hollyweird and the NFL double down on their unpopular practices, the bigger they fail.

Quote from: The Dark Knight on Thu, 12 Oct  2017, 08:59Hollyweird were already struggling and had limited influence, and then Harvey Weinstein was exposed as the grub he has always been. Everybody knew, but they said nothing. It's a place full of fake, hypocritical people. This is called instant karma. The more Hollyweird and the NFL double down on their unpopular practices, the bigger they fail.

Weinstein is an interesting story. But let's be realistic. All he did was proposition beautiful women in exchange for certain roles or opportunities. Is that fair or right? Obviously not. You know me, my condemnation should go without saying.

But be sure of this: Weinstein is probably the most normal guy in Hollywood.

Give me a tinfoil hat if you want but I think Weinstein's fall from grace is purely tactical. He's a pressure release valve. I think it was him or someone bigger and more important in the industry. So they chose him as the sacrificial lamb.

But if you look only at the stuff Weinstein has admitted to (much less what he's been accused of), he's nowhere near the level of, say, Bryan Singer. All Weinstein did was abuse his position to pressure adult women into, ahem, intimate encounters. Meanwhile, Bryan Singer molests children, which is objectively worse than anything we've heard about Weinstein.

If LAPD was worth a crap, they would've cracked down on this decades ago. As it stands, my fondest hope is that President Trump sics the FBI on Hollywood to arrest the executives, directors, actors and even the entirety of LAPD to put a stop to this once and for all. No deals, no pleas, no apologies, no excuses, no regrets.

Just arrest every last one of them and let the judges sort it out.

Colors, my good friend, think about this for a moment.

Spirit cooking with children exposed during election via Wikileaks. Trump takes office. Trump's DoJ targets human trafficking. Hundreds of arrests made in Hollyweird since. Weinstein scandal breaks. We're supposed to believe this is all coincidental?

The house of cards is falling in Hollyweird, and Harvey could just be the start.

The Amazon studio chief has now been accused of sexual misconduct, and has now been suspended.
Hollyweird actors have been exposed as complicit in their silence of Weinstein.
Wikileaks documents show top executives knew about Harvey's behavior...even though they pretend to be surprised.
Actors like Affleck are now getting targeted by other actors as they turn on themselves.

This stuff isn't just talk. It's action. They're doing everything they accuse others of doing, but x100 times worse. Emma Thompson said what we already knew, that Weinstein is just the tip of the iceberg. It could snowball.

Let the process play out. Vampire your enemies. Give them the brightest spot on the stage and it destroys them.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iyRECFEfz7g

Somebody who works for the website Digital Spy has seen The Last Jedi and has this to say:

Quote
Early thoughts on #TheLastJedi is I saw a lot of smiles as I left. Reviews coming tomorrow but it's undoubtedly the funniest Star Wars. Like, Marvel funny. Gag central

The tweets reacting to this feedback are overwhelmingly negative.

Source: https://twitter.com/gethill/status/940341219535851520

We shall see how "funny" it is then.

I've got a feeling this movie is going to make us go through the entire spectrum of emotions like 15 times between the Lucasfilm logo and "Directed By Rian Johnson." Idk if I'm ready for it.

Quote from: Catwoman on Wed, 25 Jan  2017, 20:35
I hear what yall are saying, but this is still totally me rn.

(https://pbs.twimg.com/media/C230fBkUcAADmNz.jpg)

Still me. The rest of the whole damn galaxy can go (sadly we know Leia will have to either in this one or between this one and Ep 9 :'( ) but I couldn't handle Luke dying. Han was bad even though we all knew it would happen, but Luke? Dear sweet Mark Hamill? I couldn't handle it! I mean yes he could Force ghost it and chill with Pops n' Ben n' Yoda, but ug. lol.

Son of a motherf***ing goddamnit this f***ing just got f***ing spoiled for me by some pecker necked piece of sh*t hiding behind a mother f***ing computer screen. I swear to f***ing god in heaven I would throttle the life out of that piece of sh*t if i could f***ing find him.

Attention catwoman and other users, I'm talking spoilers down below, so only read this until AFTER you've seen the film.

Again, here's the spoiler warning:

(https://media1.tenor.com/images/d2bad82cbb11f86c53eba7e340f94ae7/tenor.gif?itemid=5493205)

Okay....

I absolutely love what they did with an icon like Luke Skywalker. It was brave and bold. They had real guts. I'm sure other fans aren't going to like it, but I really appreciate it. It's not something happy. But it's deep, thoughtful and affects my soul. Which is so much better. Let me break it down.

Luke Skywalker became a myth. In his younger days he blew up the Death Star and redeemed Darth Vader. He was a galactic hero. But like most icons, they do most of their work as young people. That's their creative peak. Rey encountered Luke full of expectation. Instead of finding a legend she found a man. A flawed man. Rey found a man at the end of his rope because he had been burned too many times. The Resistance saw Luke as their great hope - someone who would end the war by himself. Luke didn't see himself that way. Big difference. I liked how he mocked their expectations. The idea one person could take down the First Order all on their own is silly. It's folklore.

Finding Luke wasn't going to solve all of their problems even if he co-operated.

People are freaking out about the flashback of Luke attempting to kill Ben Solo. But his mindset made complete and utter sense to me. In the film he spoke about how the Jedi were failures for allowing Sidious and Vader to rise under their noses and take over the galaxy. He witnessed firsthand what happened because of their inaction. He wasn't going to let that happen again without at least trying something. He had second thoughts after he ignited his blade, but by the time Ben woke up, it was too late. It's meant to be a product of shame for Luke as well. It's the reason why he detached himself from the galaxy and brooded alone. As Yoda said, failure is the biggest teacher.

The ending of the film is what really works for me. He literally projected himself as a God-like figure at the end (projecting his image via the Force), even though the reality is Luke is a flawed and broken man. People all saw Luke Skywalker withstand a barrage of AT-AT blaster fire. That was an impossible feat and would've only grown his legend. We know how he did it, but they don't. It's really poignant when you think about it.

I prefer that Luke projected his image and didn't actually fight Ben in person. Luke made a vow not to leave Ahch-To and he kept that vow. Luke was adamant he would die on the island and he did. But he still managed to help the Resistance by stalling Kylo Ren. He was okay with dying, but more so after knowing Rey would take his title as the last Jedi. Therefore his death is something of a release. He's moving on, but more just reaching his final form.

Deep down the character is a simple person. He grew up on Tattooine. Back then he had the spirit of adventure.....a sense of longing. But 30 years after Return of the Jedi, he lost that spirit of adventure. He no longer wanted to run off like he did in A New Hope or The Empire Strikes Back. He had done it all before and was content to stay where he was.

Again, I think they were really brave for going down this path and I'm proud of them for doing so.

I hope we see Luke again as a Force ghost in IX. There's no reason why we shouldn't.

You might wanna do our tried and true white font lol. Don't think your button is going to do much good unless you add a ton of space above and below the spoiler.

With that being the topic that was spoiled for me I went ahead and read that. PMing for clarification.

Quote from: Catwoman on Thu, 14 Dec  2017, 11:40
You might wanna do our tried and true white font lol. Don't think your button is going to do much good unless you add a ton of space above and below the spoiler.

With that being the topic that was spoiled for me I went ahead and read that. PMing for clarification.

PM sent, and I made the text white just in case.  ;)

Ok, so I got back from seeing this a few hours ago, having spent the past week avoiding any reviews or online reactions. I'm planning to see it again with my brother over Christmas, so my opinion might change on my second viewing. But based on my initial viewing, I think this is the weakest Star Wars movie since Attack of the Clones. It's not a bad film. It shares most of the same technical merits as The Force Awakens. But it also exacerbates the same problems that movie had and fails to course correct the disappointing trajectory of the trilogy as a whole. Advanced warning – this is more of a very long rant than a proper review. Highlight to read SPOILERS.

Firstly, the things I liked. I mostly liked the depiction of Luke, at least up until the ending, and I though Hamill gave a good performance. I liked that Yoda was a puppet again and not CG. I liked that they showed Leia using Force powers, even though the space vacuum scene was rather absurd and cheesily executed. I like that Rey turned out not to be a Skywalker. I like that they cut back on the fan service references. I admired the aforementioned technical strengths (35mm photography, practical effects, strong cinematography) and generally decent performances. That's about it.

What didn't I like? Practically everything else. Snoke, who was one of the worst aspects of The Force Awakens, is not redeemed in the sequel. He has the silliest and most abrupt death scene since Boba Fett, and we still don't have a satisfying payoff to explain who he was or what his long-term objectives were. He's just a hollow red herring used to reintroduce the threat of the Dark Side without any care or foresight, and he's a poor substitute for a great character like Palpatine. J J Abrams admitted they didn't plan out this trilogy when they wrote Episode VII, and that lack of forethought is painfully apparent in Episode VIII. I didn't find Poe or the Laura Dern character even vaguely compelling, and I resented the amount of screen time they were given as it distracted from the more interesting storyline with Luke. You can tell that whole subplot about the mutiny was added during the six month rewrite period that followed the release of The Force Awakens. Again, the lack of forward planning is obvious.

On the subject of Dern's character, there were too many scenes of heroes sacrificing themselves for their allies. Finn tries to do it, Rose tries to, Luke does it. But why did Dern's character do it? Couldn't they have left a droid to operate the ship? Maybe this was explained and I missed it. But her sacrifice felt like a cheap way of attaching emotional weight to her character and getting her out of the picture. Again, this seems to suggest her inclusion was a product of the post-TFA rewrites. She didn't fit in with the rest of the story, so they had to kill her off.

There were far too many cutesy scenes for my taste. And I say that as someone who liked the Ewoks! The BB-8 comedy was overplayed, and his invincibility level surpassed even that of R2 in the prequel trilogy. Every time the Porgs were on screen I felt as though I was watching a toy commercial. A lot of people say that about the Ewoks in the OT, but at least the Ewoks served an important function in the plot of Return of the Jedi. The Porgs don't. Why were they even there during the finale? The commercially-motivated reasoning behind their inclusion is far too blatant. And as if the Porgs weren't enough, we also get those doe eyed equine creatures on the casino planet (which was probably the most unimaginative alien world in the history of the franchise) and the crystal wolf beasts at the end of the movie.  We get it, Disney – you want the audience to go 'Awwwwww' and rush out to buy the toys. At least be subtle about it.

As a general point, I don't find any of the new characters in this trilogy compelling. I know a lot of people love Daisy Ridley. I don't. I think she's bland and I don't find Rey to be an interesting character. She's not as much of a Mary Sue this time around, but they didn't explain her apparent mastery of certain Jedi skills in the previous movie. Not innate Jedi traits (fast reflexes, intuition, prescience), but learnable Jedi skills (lightsaber swordsmanship, Force persuasion, telekinesis). Episode VIII needed to account for how she learned to do those things in Episode VII, but the movie completely fails to address this issue. Ultimately Rey strikes me as a forgettable gender-swapped Luke/Anakin clone rather than a worthwhile original creation that can stand on her own strengths. George Lucas patterned Luke and Anakin's stories after the classical hero's journey outlined by Joseph Campbell. There is an analogous female hero's journey too. If the writers of the new trilogy had studied that and used it as the structural basis for Rey's character arc they might have delivered something fresh and interesting. Instead they took the lazy approach and gave us a rehash of what we've seen before, only with less personality this time around.

I'm also disappointed with the way Finn has developed. Or rather the way he hasn't developed. His character arc in Episode VII was essentially the same as Han Solo's character arc in Episode IV: the Imperial defector motivated by self-interest (see Han's back story in the EU) who gets embroiled in a mission to smuggle a droid containing secret plans to the good guys, cuts loose the first chance he gets, then returns to help rescue his friend after heeding a higher calling. Han moved on from that characterisation in Episode V, and I was hoping Finn would progress in an equally interesting direction. But instead The Last Jedi largely recycles his arc from the previous film: he tries to run off again, gets embroiled with a female character, learns the value of loyalty and friendship (again), and ends up right back where he started. Admittedly it's not exactly the same as his character arc in Episode VII, but it's sufficiently similar for me to derive frustration. And that final scene between him and Rose, where she reveals her love and kisses him, came out of nowhere. Still, it's better than the Anakin/Padme romance from the Prequel Trilogy.

I need to re-watch it to make sure, but I don't remember there being a single duel between two lightsaber users in The Last Jedi. We see characters using lightsabers to fight mooks armed with other weapons, but no proper sabre vs. sabre combat. The closest we get is the flashback of Luke and Ben locking sabres, but that's hardly a duel. That makes this the first Star Wars movie ever not to contain a single proper lightsaber duel (not counting Rogue One)! We're teased with one right at the end, and the epic build-up makes us think we're about to get the long-awaited Jedi Master Luke sequence we've all been craving. Aaaaand... it doesn't happen. But I was ok with that because I figured they were saving the awesome Luke sequence for Episode IX. But then, in the very next scene, he drops dead; a development which adds a note of sentimentality to an otherwise emotionally thin climax. "It worked when Han died, right? So let's kill off another beloved character and that'll get the fans' juices flowing." If they were determined to kill him, they should have saved his death for Episode IX. This felt way too soon to me. Especially after the build-up in Episode VII.

One of the biggest problems with Episode VII was its structural dependency on Episode IV. Of all the criticisms that film received, I felt sure this was one Episode VIII would avoid repeating. But I was wrong. Structurally, The Last Jedi is every bit as much a rehash of the Original Trilogy as its predecessor. The film begins with the villains launching a retaliatory strike on the good guys' base as the heroes evacuate. The bad guy fleet then pursues the heroes through space for most of the movie, while a small band of characters split off from the good guy fleet to pursue their own adventure. Eventually they are betrayed to the bad guys by a scoundrel they'd earlier made the mistake of trusting. Elsewhere, a wannabe Jedi petitions a reluctant hermit to train them on a remote watery planet. At one point the aspiring Jedi climbs down into a mysterious cave and experiences a vision in which their own likeness is reflected back at them. They then ignore their master's advice and race off to confront the main villain. But after learning the truth of their parentage, the apprentice Jedi is overwhelmed by the villains' superior power. Sound familiar?

And it's not just Episode V this rips off. What about the sequence where the hero surrenders themself to the villain in an attempt to bring them back to the Light Side of the Force, only to be taken to the throne room of the head honcho, who is then betrayed and killed by his servant in order to protect the hero?  Or the scene where the old Jedi master confronts his former apprentice, delivers his "If you strike me down" line and relinquishes his life so that his allies can make good their escape? Or what about the climactic threat being a slowly-charging super weapon that is about to fire on the rebel base and annihilate them all? It may not be a space station, but it's still basically a terrestrial Death Star cannon. Will we ever get another Star Wars film where the final threat isn't a slowly-charging Death Star cannon? And I loved that line at the beginning of the final battle, where the Resistance soldier explains the ground is covered in salt. It was as if the director was saying, "See? It's salt, not snow. We're not ripping off the Battle of Hoth." Sure.

Another problem I have with the storytelling mechanics in this trilogy is the reliance on nonlinear disclosure of key events. Far too many important things happened off-screen between Episodes VI and VII. The Empire collapsed, the New Republic was formed, a new Jedi order was formed, Leia and Han had a son, Luke tried training him, the First Order rose, Snoke appeared and corrupted Ben, the Knights of Ren emerged (we still don't know who they are or what happened to the other Knights we glimpsed during Rey's vision in Episode VII), Ben turned to the Dark Side, the New Republic splintered and gave rise to the Resistance, the new Jedi order was wiped out, Luke went into hiding, etc.

There's more plot there than in Episodes VII and VIII combined. These events should have been depicted in Episode VII, The Force Awakens should have been Episode VIII, and The Last Jedi should have been Episode IX and should have concluded with Luke killing Kylo Ren. Instead we have to fill in the gaps with flashbacks and visions; plot devices which are inconsistent with the storytelling methodology established in the earlier Star Wars films. These movies are numbered for a reason. They're a linear narrative. Sure, Lucas released them in a nonlinear way by producing Episodes IV-VI first. But the events depicted within the films are presented in a straightforward numerical structure. The new trilogy's deviated from that tradition.

I've got a million more things to say about this film, but I'll leave it there for now. This is already way beyond TL:DR. Hopefully when I've have time to process my initial disappointment, I might find more to like in it. But right now, I feel very unenthusiastic about this whole trilogy. They've killed off all the great characters now except Leia, and we know she won't be returning in Episode IX due to Carrie Fisher's death. I don't care about Rey, Finn and Poe, so I don't feel any excitement about seeing what happens to them in Episode IX.  The nostalgia card has been well and truly played, and the final film in this trilogy will have to stand on its own (but don't be surprised if they drag out Lando or a few Force ghosts for emergency fan service). What baffles me is that they've already announced another trilogy to follow this one. If they can't even think of enough original ideas for Episodes VII and VIII – and evidently they can't – then how do they hope to make another four films after that?

I remember when the critics raved about Star Trek Into Darkness, but the fans hated it. I'm predicting a similar outcome for The Last Jedi. I see it has a high Rotten Tomatoes score, but I bet you anything the audience ratings will be considerably lower.

I saw it a few nights ago.

I told to several of my co-workers that after watching The Last Jedi, I think I'm going to give the prequels another chance. They loved my comment so much that they wrote down what I said on a sticky note and pinned it up on a wall.

I know that sounds such a harsh thing to say, but the truth is I didn't hate it. I just thought it was mediocre. I enjoyed The Force Awakens more than this, but so far, only Rogue One is the most impressive and creative out of all these Disney SW films to date.

Man, I would love to discuss why I think Luke's arc is contradictory from what we saw in the original trilogy, but apparently, charterer arcs and contradictions mean two separate things, and they can't tie into one another. So therefore, my opinion must be wrong. #OhWell

Agreed with many sentiments expressed above, especially SN's review.

The Last Jedi was... "fun" I guess, entertaining while eating popcorn, great visuals and music, it was Mark Hammill's return to the franchise with some awesome Luke moments, but the more you think about it, the worse it seems. I don't have any inclination to rewatch it any time soon. After my first viewing of Revenge of the Sith, I couldn't wait to revisit it. With this one, I prefer watching Mark Hammill's interviews.

I liked Luke and Leia's reunion, accompanied by the subtle use of music themes from Empire and Jedi, this one was a good, nostalgic, emotional moment.

The prequels slowly, but steadily, gain appreciation for the things they did right (they are still fairly "recent", the last one released a little more than 10 years before the first sequel by JJ and Disney was in theaters). The legacy of Disney's Star Wars will be decided many years from now and, judging by what we have seen, Time will not be very kind.

Quote from: Travesty on Sun, 17 Dec  2017, 06:55
Man, I would love to discuss why I think Luke's arc is contradictory from what we saw in the original trilogy, but apparently, charterer arcs and contradictions mean two separate things, and they can't tie into one another. So therefore, my opinion must be wrong. #OhWell

I'm very mixed about Luke in The Last Jedi (Spoilers below in white):

I wasn't totally convinced by Luke's backstory with Kylo Ren. On one hand, it's kinda interesting that he's traumatised by how the Dark Side corrupts, and that's why he contemplated killing Kylo Ren. But then again, this is the same man who rightly believed Darth Vader, his own diabolical father, could be redeemed! It is one of the many things about TLJ that doesn't sit well with me.

Another thing I don't like about the film is that Laura Dern character, and her sacrifice felt forced for somebody who we have never seen before, as was the hint she was good friends with Leia. I think it would've been better if Admiral Ackbar sacrificed himself to buy Leia and co some time to escape. Instead, he dies off-screen.

Apparently TLJ was the last straw for a lot of people. The movie may be a critical darling and it might be raking in the cash. But it looks this is becoming the Star Wars movie that finally broke the camel's back for a lot of people.

I ain't even mad. I'm glad about it, actually. There are three good movies in this series: Star Wars '77, Empire and Jedi; everything else is a sub-standard footnote.

Yes, even Rogue One. Especially Rogue One.

I haven't seen the movie and I doubt I ever will. But for those of you who hated it, welcome to my world.

Finally saw this this afternoon. Good, not great, which by default is so disappointing. I loved the humor and I don't mind it being similar to ESB or being fan service-y (this franchise has been fan service since 1983) but I disagree with how they portrayed Luke which is a huge, HUGE letdown and Finn was basically wasted on what felt a throw in side mission to get him and the new girl in the game which sucked since he basically grew none from the end of TFA to the end of this one. And who the hell/what was the point of Admiral Purple Hair Lady except to make me want to dye my hair purple ASAP? And is Snoke the biggest waste of a big baddy ever or what? I feel like they should put him in some of those anti smoking ads to get some worthwhile use out of him cause thats what he looks like. On the flip side I totally freaking love Poe. All I can say to him is "Hell yes."

Mixed emotions with Rey and the "answers" we got in this movie. The scene in the cave was interesting but when she reveals she knew her parents were nobody it's like "Ooooook what was the f***ing point of the cave scene other than to draw this out as far as possible?" I enjoyed her otherwise, I know some people hate the idea of a girl being the galaxy's new savior but, eh, I'm ok with it....

I will have to see Episode IX to judge how I feel about Kylo Ren in this movie. I think I liked his portrayal but we need to see where he goes.

I guess it's fate (or, if you prefer, *super gravelly voice* MY DESTINYYYYY) that I saw this on the one year anniversary of Carrie's passing. Made certain scenes with her all too real and difficult to bear. But I loved her performance. And if anyone on this site was going to ugly cry at the tribute in the credits it was going to be me, and guess what? I totally did.

To sum up how I feel about the movie, I have to invoke a spoiler. Know how Yoda *pause for fangirl squeal over the return of Yoda* says about the Jedi texts "Page turners, they are not?" You could say about Star Wars movies "Popcorn Flicks, they are not."  But this turned into one. Like I said, I loved the humor, that wasn't the problem. Without it I would have liked the movie less. It was characterizations, throwaway scenes, etc. that are the problem. These movies are held to a higher standard and it just didn't deliver. I can only rate it a 6 out of 10. Wish I had used my ticket to see Justice League instead.

REVIEW

Here's the thing about this movie. It has little to no interest in following up on any of the questions introduced by Abrams in TFA. Who's Snoke? Doesn't matter. Who's Rey's parents? Nobody. How did Maz get Luke's lightsabre? Why did R2D2 magically reawaken? Why did Luke hide a map inside R2 if he didn't want to be found? Who knows and who cares. The films mantra seems to be "let the past die", which numerous characters state throughout the entire movie. Problem is, each time the film presents an opportunity to do so, it undercuts itself and reverts right back to status quo of Episode IV. TFA had the possibility that maybe there was different relationships between the intergalactic factions within the SW universe and such, but nope.

One of the reasons why I found TFA enjoyable despite the story line not being my PREFERRED route to take, at least introduced a shroud of mystery that left many speculating about the future direction of the story. What was Rey's lightsaber vision all about? What's up with Luke going into hiding? Who are Rey's parents? Who's Snoke? How did the First Order come into power?

TLJ could care less about any and all of these set ups and questions. Rather, the humor is incredibly amped up, in a Disney-owned Marvel kinda way, and literally opens up with a prank call and a your mom joke...

Needless to say, the humour didn't hit very often for me, and I thought it was badly incorporated into the script. It's like the writer was contractually obliged to continue the MCU formula and include a joke every five minutes, on the minute. With many of them being poorly timed, mostly falling flat, but also often undercutting the weight of scenes. There are big moments that should feel weighty and tense, but the script keeps letting the air out with site-gags and misplaced observational humour; not to mention the ultra-cheesy attempts at fist-pumping one-liners that are one step away from "that's gotta' hurt".

Obviously, I think the script was pretty abysmal. The plot felt like one of those corpse exercises, where someone writes a chunk and then passes it onto someone else. I don't mean that the script was re-written, I mean that things that happened earlier in the script didn't seem to have much bearing on things that happen later, sometimes even immediately afterwards.

The worst sin the film commits, in direct contradiction of it's message, is it basically ends up in more or less the same place it began. Sure, Luke and Snoke are gone, but they had little screen time and significance in the start of the sequel trilogy (TFA) to begin with. Rey is still on the light side, Ben is still conflicted and on the dark side, Rey & Finn's relationship didn't move an inch, we still don't know jack about who Snoke was, The First Order still has the upper hand like in the beginning of TFA, and Luke never even left the island.

And please correct me if I'm wrong, but I can't think of a single character in this movie who really achieves their actual intended goal. Kylo wants to turn Rey, Rey wants to turn Kylo, neither succeed. Poe wants to stage a mutiny, fails. Finn and Rose want to find the master codebreaker, fails. (I'm not going to get into plot holes, leaps of logic, and how pointless and uninteresting Finn and Rose's side quest was.) Then they want to sabotage the ships tracking device, fail at that as well. Then they want destroy the battering ram machine, fail at that. Snoke wants to kill Rey, but gets himself killed. Phasma wants to kill Finn, dies (again) trying. Leia wants to save the Resistance, but by the end there's so few left they can all fit on the Falcon, so, yeah, I wouldn't call that a big win. Hux wants to wipe out the last of the Resistance, they get away. I guess Luke's goal to delay the First Order works, so that's something ... right? But this whole trilogy beginning is essentially boiled down to a result of Luke uncharacteristically wanting to kill his sister's son.

Regarding the last shot of the movie... The movie insists the events on Crait will somehow have a ripple effect across the universe. Luke even says "The Rebellion is reborn today." Poe also has a line about being the spark that will light the fire which will bring the First Order down. Can someone clarify how anything that happened was supposed to inspire hope? I mean, should that not have happened at the end of TFA when the First Order's mega weapon was destroyed? How is having the Resistance dwindled down to under 100 people after all their allies refused to show up supposed to inspire hope?

To the characters:

LUKE: What we see with Luke in The Last Jedi is a complete regression of his character back to, again, the status quo of Episode IV ANH. Complete with milk. This is not merely being jaded, he's gone to simply not caring about anything or anyone, and being determined to wanting to eradicate the Jedi Order itself from existence...

I mean, the sort of behavior you're seeing from Luke is the sort of behavior you'd expect out of a petulant kid. And in particular petulance without purpose.

When Yoda deceived Luke about his identity, it wasn't out of genuine distrust or not actually wanting to teach him, it was for the purpose of testing him. The stereotypical grumpy "master" who won't teach the student is a stereotype for a reason: it works. Training just anyone how to use the force isn't a smart notion to take, and it's another way to find out if that person will actually commit to it. Yoda does have a moment of despair when Luke proves impatient, but on balance, and given the galaxy's immense need, he agrees to train Luke - and does so in earnest.

Compare that with Luke's approach in TLJ: he agrees to teach Rey three lessons only for the purpose of convincing her NOT to be a Jedi.

But as said, this irrational fear of the stereotype caused Disney to wipe out Luke's character development. The criticism Yoda had of Luke was: "All his life has he looked away, to the future, to the horizon, never his mind on where he was, what he was doing!" This character flaw was exactly what Luke overcame in ROTJ: when confronted with the vision of ruling the galaxy by the Emperor's side and killing his hated father, Luke sees that part of him in his (mechanical) right hand, throws his lightsaber away, and says he will never turn to the Dark Side. That was effectively the climax of the film, the end of his character arc, what made him a mature hero and why he could see Obi-Wan, Yoda, and his father at the end of the film: because he was seeing the world the same way they did.

Consider the other lesson Yoda had him internalize: "Try not. Do or do not. There is no try."

What we have at the end of ROTJ is a character whose character flaws have been burned away by fire, whose fear is extinguished, who will see the Jedi way through no matter the personal cost. This growth was further expanded upon in the now non-canon EU of Star Wars lore.

Half the point of the training with the Force is implied as the spiritual growth it enables. The first exercise Luke throws at Rey is to ask her to sense the inherent balance in all things. These are calmative forces: discernment of the Light Side from the Dark is found when one is calm, at peace, passive, per Yoda himself.

In yet another "twist" this film hollowly incorporates in abundance, Luke suddenly regresses to the point of absurdedy: presumptuous about his right to end the Jedi Order, doesn't give a damn about stuff happening in the wider galaxy, distrustful of people who want to learn, (supposedly) never reading any of the texts his order handed down to him over a thousand years.

I get what they were trying to do with the character, that Luke is broken,  despite that the galaxy continues to view him as a legend and basically a galactic John Wayne who will come in and save the day. In theory I can be down for that, but I think the execution isn't done particularly well. At all.

Luke. as a character, was the guy who saw good and conflict in his mass murdering father, Darth Vader, of all people... NOW we're fed the notion that he thought about killing his nephew because he simply saw a growing darkness in him? Without Ben (presumably) having done anything terrible yet? Essentially, having absolutely zero faith in his nephew, and effectively bringing about the destruction of his Jedi academy. And then, instead of trying to make a course correction, he cuts himself off from the Force and hides, not caring about what happens to his sister or best friends (all of whom were the most important thing for him during the Original Trilogy) .....

Sorry, that doesn't jive with the Luke we know .

Luke is better than this.

I've read some comments on the internets of people comparing Luke in TLJ and Obi Wan in ANH, but ultimately such comparisons make Luke even worse by how he's written in TLJ.

In Episode IV, Obi-Wan was a character that witnessed the near total annihilation of his fellow Jedi Knights, even younglings, the failure of himself to steer his Padawan from the Dark Side (who then ends up murdering and/or being complicit in untold thousands of people), a Sith Lord taking control of the Republic and the whole galaxy being turned upside down around him. With Episode VIII, we get the story that Luke has been dealing with the destruction of his Jedi school and his failure to steer Kylo from the Dark Side. Hell, he didn't even know about Han yet. Yet it goes like this:

Episode IV...

Leia: "Help me, Obi-Wan Kenobi, you're our only hope!"

Obi-Wan: "OK, cool. Let's go."

Episode VIII...

Rey: "Help me, Luke, you're our only hope!"

Luke: "NO! And I'm NEVER LEAVING this island!"

To me, Obi-Wan should have been in a lower place than Luke, yet he was ready to rush into the fray without question. Thanks Disney. It's no wonder Hamill stated that he thought of this guy as "Jake" Skywalker rather than Luke.

In the end, Mark Hamill was great in this movie in spite of what Rian Johnson gave him. A nobel attempt to make chicken salad out of chicken sh*t.


REY: The incredible lack of any explanation about this character is absolutely stunning. If she truly turns out to be just a "nobody", then that's a blatant middle finger to TFA and all her displays of proficiency with the force. There had to be something else going on there, there had to.

If TFA had had her super painfully pick up that lightsaber, then getting her ass handed to her by Kylo, then her parents being nobodies would work fine. We can have a nice arc with her learning the Force and how to be a Jedi Knight. Unfortunately, all the set up from TFA was set up in such a way that there had to be more to her than just "random person, random parents," unless everything we've known about Star Wars is out the window. Which, evidently, seems to be the case now with Disney's Star Wars, as the force is essentially now just a x-gene superpower that random people can do. See the kid at the end with the broomstick. I literally thought I was seeing things when that happened. It's like a brand new universe where nothing is learned or actually taught. The force is super power mutant x gene. It's easy. You don't have to earn it.

Even putting aside the prequels and everything that taught us about "You need to start your training when you're like 5 or you're not gonna be sh**!" and all, Luke in ESB had way more trouble than Rey in drawing that same lightsaber to him, and that was even AFTER some lessons by a Jedi Master. Let alone winning lightsaber fights by people with zero training off the bat. It's stuff like this that really begged the question on just who she is? A Skywalker? A Kenobi? A Palpatine? A female clone of any of the aforementioned? Is she essentially X-Men's Rogue in Star Wars? Drawing the force from other powerful force users? Which would explain a few things and atleast attempt to be kinda different. Nope. None of the above. She's just Supergirl and doesn't need anything cause, well ... she's perfect?

At one point, I was hopeful that there was going to be a worthwhile twist with actual substance. That twist being Rey and Ben teaming up to form a new order separate from the Resistance and First Order? Bold choice! I'm on boar-oh, wait... Rey's back with the Resistance and Kylo's commanding the First Order.

Awesome.


KYLO REN: Kylo resists killing off Leia only to have his storm troopers deliver the killing blow instead, forever haunting him if he could have done something? Bold choice! I'm on boar-oh, wait... Nope, there she goes, Mary Poppinsing her way to safety. Yay. I can only imagine all the comedy that's going to transpire within the First Order with Kylo at the helm now. Considering his scenes with Hux and all the temper tantrums, it's just too enticing for Disney not to rack up on silliness in the next one.


LEIA: Considering the real life death of Carrie Fisher, did anyone else feel that Leia should have been the one to stay on the ship to lightspeed kamikaze the First Order? It even felt perfectly set up for it when she says "I can't take another loss." Then moving forward you can have Vice Admiral Holdo in place trying to live up to Leia's legacy. This would also line up with the "let the past die" mantra the film so very much wants us to embrace. What we get instead is Leia gliding thru space that very much feels like a "jumping the shark" kinda moment. I suppose the ideal payoff for such a scene was Leia's expanded role in Episode 9, where I would imagine she would display even more force abilities, but obviously that's no longer going to be the case. Atleast this checked the "Leia gets to demonstrate a force power" box, so .. yay?


SNOKE: We heard Supreme Leader, Supreme Leader, Supreme Leader all through TFA and even Han warns Kylo/Ben how Snoke will kill him soon. Snoke's a badass neo-Imperial revolutionary who deviously orchestrates the destruction of an entire system of planets and the Republic government and Senate, the result of years of rebuilding the shattered Empire in the shadows. As the mastermind of this revival, Snoke was taking the First Order well beyond the complacency and gluttonous mass of its predecessor....

Well, so much for intrigue.

At least the death of Palpatine was believable. This crap in the TLJ was not.

Horrendous waste of what was meant to be an awesome, formidable character. Snoke deserved a lot better, given the mystery of the character, and well .. basically being the evil mastermind in the shadows that got this Disney sequel trilogy in motion.


FINN: Finn should have died. Flat out. That actually would have been amazing if Rian pulled the trigger like that. Unfortunately, he didn't have the balls. What we have instead is Rose, being an absolute idiot, crashing into Finn's ship, calling him an idiot (despite Holdo doing the SAME EXTACT THING with the light speed jump and being heraled as a hero) and parroting off some of the most cringe worthy SJW nonsense that literally had me rolling me eyes. "We don't kill the one's we hate, we save the one's we love!" ... Are you f'n kidding me with this crap? Who in their right mind would say that in a actual WAR?!? This is still Star WARS, correct? God almighty! Luckily for her, Luke shows up to distract, and Rey in her unexplained omnipotence, can lift heavy bolder rocks, cause otherwise, her goofiness would have assuredly sealed the fate or the rebels right then and there. SAD!

Another thing that annoyed me about Finn and Rose (a character that's introduced as a mechanic, but ends up a pilot because.... reasons) was basically they didn't do ANYTHING USEFUL AT ALL. it was just filler for 40 minutes. Killing off Finn would have been a bold choice. I'm on boar-oh, wait... Nope, Rose took that choice away from him. Everyone survives. Yay.


YODA: Yoda burns down the remains of the Jedi temple, cementing the end of the Jedi and ushering in a new age? Bold choice! I'm on boar-oh, wait... Rey took the books with her. Coach Yoda's burning f***ing trees and saying that failure is an important teacher. Problem being that it skips the other half of the formula: a mindset of constant improvement and dedication to being a lifelong learner, and a mindset of pushing one's limits harder and harder. *sigh*

I really wish I could have enjoyed Yoda's appearance more than I did, since I was really anticipating him showing up at some point, but the fact that he came across more like the comical Yoda that Luke initially meets on Dagobah, and not the wise Jedi Yoda that he later reveals himself to be, was a unfortunate mistake I think. I was honestly hoping for Yoda's scene to have more gravitas in how it played out. Not MCU Yoda.

In closing, TLJ is the film that detractors have been waiting for ever since George decided to sell to Disney some years back. The devisivness wasn't there right out of the gate for TFA, and damn sure wasn't there for Rogue One (still the best to come out of the Disney controlled material, and this includes the Rebels tv show), but it's now here and I'm sure we'll hear crying about childhoods being ruined, just as we did during the prequel trilogy over 15 years ago. Has it ever stopped? I'm happy for those who got something out of this, and would be curious as to how it holds up for those who do upon repeated viewings, but it just wasn't for me. At this stage, spin off stories like Rogue One or Kenobi (jury is still out on Solo) are holding my interest alot more than Episode 9. Oh, and the SW expanded universe/legends stuff. I suddenly feel the need to catch up on alot of that.

* On a side note, I am finding the debate about Rotton Tomatoes' scoring to be mildly entertaining. Only due to the discrepancy in scores between critics and the audience for this movie in relation to DCEU movies is fascinating to me. It's almost like these aren't even real people giving out scores.

Great review Joker!

(https://i.imgur.com/0mKXcg1.gif)

Of course nobody read mine *pout*

But yes that was very good Joker. I had to giggle when you were talking about Snoke cause it reminded me of two years ago when I PM'd you a couple weeks after the movie had been out asking if you could make some GIFs for me for someone who shall remain nameless. You said sure, then something like "What is thy bidding, Supreme Leader Kitty Snoke?" And I went OFF, threatened something like giving you a colonoscopy with Kylo Ren's lightsaber if you ever compared me to that ugly creepy dude again. The name was cute (adding Kitty to anything has that effect) but ughhhhh. lol

Quote from: The Laughing Fish on Sun, 24 Dec  2017, 01:46
I wasn't totally convinced by Luke's backstory with Kylo Ren. On one hand, it's kinda interesting that he's traumatised by how the Dark Side corrupts, and that's why he contemplated killing Kylo Ren. But then again, this is the same man who rightly believed Darth Vader, his own diabolical father, could be redeemed! It is one of the many things about TLJ that doesn't sit well with me.

Bingo. It makes absolutely no sense to me. The entire Original Trilogy tells us that Luke will bend over backwards to not kill Sith, as that would bring him closer to the Dark Side. He goes out of his way to not kill his father, cause he sees a glimmer of good in him. Darth Vader is supposed to be evil. So lets say he's 99% evil, and Luke sees that 1% good. That's supposed to be enough for Luke to be able do as much as he can to bring him back to the light side. Now fast forward to TLJ, and it's the complete opposite. When it comes to Ben Solo, he sees 1% darkness, and he somehow has impulses to kill him immediately. lolwut? That goes completely contrary to what we saw before.

I saw this again with my brother yesterday (he didn't like it), and I've now had several weeks to weigh its strengths and weaknesses. I think I enjoyed it slightly more on second viewing because I knew what was coming, but I still have a lot of issues with it. I want to like it, but it just has too many flaws. I've read the other reviews in this thread and mostly agree with the points being made. Now I'd like to add some more thoughts on the subject. I won't bother marking SPOILERS in white because I think everyone's seen it by now. But in case you haven't, SPOILERS ahead.

I hate the egalitarian re-conceptualisation of the Force in this trilogy. Now anyone can be a Jedi. No one has to train. No discipline is required. There's no good, there's no evil; it's all relative. The morality play element from the older films has now gone out the window. Burn the sacred texts. Forget the heroes of the past; there's nothing special about them, so let them die (but we'll still market these new movies based on nostalgia, because that's all they've got going for them). It seems Force powers now work differently as well. If Force ghosts can conjure lightning, why didn't Qui-Gon, Ben or Yoda do this to knock out Vader's life support systems during the two decades when he was terrorising the galaxy? If Luke can astral project not only himself, but also tangible objects – as evidenced by the dice he gave Leia – then why not simply project himself behind Kylo Ren and manifest a weapon to kill him with?

The Last Jedi has also more or less rendered the political occurrences of Episodes V-VII obsolete. The repetitive/cyclical nature of the storytelling in this new trilogy has brought us right back to where we were at the beginning of Episode IV: Leia is leading a small band of rebels as they are pursued by the evil Empire, which is led by a dark Jedi bred of the Skywalker bloodline. Did the destruction of either Death Star in the OT have any significant impact on the present? Did the destruction of Starkiller Base have any meaningful consequences? If so, why weren't those consequences shown in The Last Jedi? Did Anakin bringing balance to the Force have any long-lasting impact? If so, why are there still Sith/dark Jedi like Snoke around? Is Anakin's role as the Chosen One now obsolete? What's happening in the rest of the galaxy while these two diminishing factions are chasing each other? What's at stake here? Does the First Order want to rule the galaxy? If so, why aren't they trying to establish a new government following the destruction of the Republic capital? Why are they wasting time and committing all of their resources to chasing a small group of rebels through space? Neither of these factions made any attempt to establish a new system of government in The Last Jedi. Neither of them seems to have an objective beyond destroying the other. They exist solely to fight. It's been over thirty years since the events of Episode VI, and yet the Galactic Civil War is still chugging along exactly as it was in A New Hope. The only difference between then and now is that a lot of people have died and some planets been destroyed during the interim. And for what?

Isaac Asimov's Foundation series provides the perfect template for a science fiction epic set in a post-Imperial galaxy. The plot of those books begins with a psychohistorian analysing various social, political and economic factors in the present in order to extrapolate future events with prescient accuracy. He predicts the Galactic Empire will collapse in the next three centuries, and that following its demise will be thirty thousand years of barbaric feudalism before the second great Galactic Empire eventually rises. In anticipation of this, he establishes the Foundation – a group based on the peripheral world of Terminus, charged with preserving and advancing scientific knowledge in order to guide humanity through the anarchy of post-Imperial chaos and precipitate the rise of the second Galactic Empire.

This is exactly what the Star Wars Sequel Trilogy should have been. The Empire collapses and the galaxy degenerates into feudalism. The tyranny of the Emperor vanishes, but with it go all the benefits of Imperial rule. Trade, science and law. The pax imperialis (relatively speaking). Trade routes become compromised. The galactic common market crumbles. Lawlessness spreads, beginning on the Outer Rim planets and gradually spreading to the Core worlds. Soon various warlords emerge to claim control over different parts of the galaxy. Feudalism reigns. The new Jedi order established by Luke should have played the same role the Foundation did in Asimov's books: a faction committed to steering the various planetary civilisations towards peaceful coexistence, while at the same time combating those feudal lords who'd oppose such an ideal.

Say what you will about the Prequel Trilogy, but at least Lucas gave us a different conflict with the Clone Wars. He effectively inverted the dynamic from the OT by having the villains represent anti-establishmentarianism and the heroes fighting to maintain the bureaucratic officialdom. In the PT we have the Clone Wars, with the corrupt Galactic Republic battling the Confederacy of Independent Systems. In the OT we have the Galactic Civil War, with the Galactic Empire battling the Rebel Alliance. In the ST we should have had the Galactic Feudal War, with five or six main factions vying for dominance while the Jedi fight to maintain order. Instead we got a rehash/continuation of the Galactic Civil War. What a waste of an opportunity.

These new films also don't feel as epic in scale to me as the earlier entries in the saga. The OT took place across a span of around 4 years. The PT took place over around 13 years. So far the events depicted in the new trilogy have spanned, what, two or three weeks? The world building aspect is also falling flat for me, as none of the new worlds they've introduced have been as interesting or well developed as Tatooine, Endor, Coruscant or Naboo.

I particularly disliked the casino planet in The Last Jedi. Visually it felt too closely patterned on Monte Carlo and the clothing of the denizens was just Tellurian eveningwear with the collars removed. The CG gnome creatures looked like rejects from Gringotts Bank, and the evil-capitalists-vs.-downtrodden-orphans dynamic was straight out of a Sergei Eisenstein Soviet propaganda film. The special effects in the horse riding sequence verged on Prequel Trilogy bad, and I didn't think there was any substantial suspense or drama during that entire section of the film. The subplot about the horses, along with the scene of Chewbacca refusing to eat the Porg, seemed to be advancing some sort of animal rights/PETA agenda that felt very out of place in a Star Wars movie. I wish the whole excursion to that planet had been omitted. But I suspect it was included as a plug for Johnson's upcoming trilogy. Though in light of The Last Jedi's mixed fan reception, the reality of that trilogy may now be in question.

The jaunt to the casino planet, like the equally pointless mutiny subplot, are both superfluous to the central narrative. And both subplots could have been avoided entirely, if Laura Dern's character had simply answered Poe's question when he asked her what the plan was. Why did she withhold that important information? There's this weird trend in the recent Star Wars movies where every time a prominent male character meets a prominent female character for the first time, the latter has to emasculate the former in order to establish her dominance (e.g. Rey beating up Finn in Episode VII, Rose tasering Finn in Episode VIII, Dern humiliating Poe in front of the bridge crew). If they'd only subverted this trend in The Last Jedi, we might have been spared some truly awful subplots.

Regarding the characterisation of Luke, I had mixed feelings after my first viewing. After my second viewing, I've shifted my position into the negative camp. I initially defended the flashback scenes by reasoning that Luke reflexively ignited his sabre due to the shock of sensing the Dark Side. But after seeing the film again, he clearly contemplates murdering his sleeping nephew and holds onto that thought for several seconds. Even if the impulse was fleeting, it's enough to contradict the established characterisation of Luke – the galaxy's 'hope' – as an optimist who was willing to stand there and let the Emperor kill him rather than take Vader's life. Luke may be the only Jedi in the Star Wars saga who got less wise and more selfish with age. It now seems like he peaked in Return of the Jedi. I've seen some people cite Obi-Wan and Yoda in the OT to justify Luke's behaviour, but I don't find the two scenarios comparable. In Revenge of the Sith Yoda clearly says, "Until the time is right, disappear, we will." He always intended to resume the battle. And Obi-Wan spent his seclusion watching over Luke. Luke, on the other hand, just gave up. He went into hiding so he could die, and when given the opportunity to put things right, he chose not to.

I can't help comparing the situation to The Dark Knight Returns. I could have accepted Luke turning into a dick if it was some kind of midlife crisis and if he'd then readopted his classic characterisation later on. But instead he just astral projects for a few minutes and dies from exhaustion. That would be like if Bruce Wayne spent the whole of TDKR hiding in the Batcave, ignored Gordon's appeals for help, then sent the Batmobile out by remote control to tease a final confrontation with the Joker, only to die from exhaustion the instant the Joker realised the car is empty. It's a pathetic send-off for one of the most beloved characters in modern cinema, and all for the sake of subverting audience expectations.

Oh well. At least Christopher Blair is still a badass.

Regardless of any attempts at subversion, the film remains a rehash of the OT. The throne room scene is almost identical to the throne room sequence in Episode VI. You've got the villain sitting in his chair taunting the hero as he/she watches the rebel fleet being destroyed outside, then the hero summoning their lightsaber with the Force, the fight scene, and the villain being betrayed and killed by his apprentice. The things that were bold and different in The Last Jedi (the characterisation of Luke, the conceptualisation of the Force) should have been more consistent with established canon, and the things that were recycled (the plot, set pieces and character dynamics) should have been bold and different. Johnson did a decent job directing, but his script was horribly ill judged IMO.

William Goldman once wrote of the filmmaking process: "If you had gotten the script to work and cast it properly, then you had a chance for something of quality. But if you had not, it didn't matter how skilful the rest of the process was; you were dead in the water [...] Remember this: shooting is just the factory putting together the car." Needless to say he's right. You get the script as close to perfect as humanly possible, then you proceed with filming. There are rare instances of poorly conceived movies being salvaged in postproduction, but as a rule filmmakers shouldn't place themselves in a position where they have to do that. They should resolve any issues of plot, structure, pacing and characterisation during the scripting phase. That way they don't have to second guess themselves halfway through production as Rian Johnson and J J Abrams are currently having to do with this trilogy.

Trilogies are tricky things. On the one hand you have something like Kieslowski's Three Colours trilogy, which is not a narrative trilogy in the conventional sense. Besides a few cameos, the connective tissue linking Blue, White and Red is largely thematic. So there was no need to write all three stories before producing the first of them. That's not the case when you're making a narrative trilogy such as The Lord of the Rings series. Then you need some kind of idea of the direction in which things are heading. You can't just write the opening act, fill it with unanswered questions (a la Abrams' patented 'magic box' strategy), and then make the rest up as you go along. But that's precisely what they've done with this new Star Wars trilogy. It's such an elementary mistake in their approach, I'm astonished they made it.

There are actually quite a few things I like about The Last Jedi, but I really don't feel like discussing them. Sadly it's the negatives that preoccupy my mind. I've tried getting on board with the new Disney canon. I've read several of the new novels, I've collected numerous volumes of the comics (the Shattered Empire, Luke Skywalker and Darth Vader series), and I've got the first two seasons of Rebels on DVD. But overall, I'm just not digging the creatively bankrupt direction the franchise is heading in. I weathered the PT era, and I'll always love the OT. But right now, I feel like maybe I'm done with Star Wars. The sad thing is that I was really looking forward to The Last Jedi. So was my brother. So were a lot of the people who've posted disappointing reviews in this thread. Are we all outgrowing Star Wars, or is Star Wars burning itself out?

Where the hell do I start?

I've been hammering everyone around me for the past month about TLJ. There's so much to discuss and honestly, I can't really be bothered discussing it all over again, this time on BO. There's so much I shake my head at with how people interpret things. This is a fantastic movie and the 'fans' are ignorant buffoons who simply don't get it. Period. They speak through an overly emotional lens which disconnects them from reason. This is a film up there with Dawn of Justice, but this time, the critics actually see the greatness. I have ammunition ready to fire but right now I can't be bothered.

Give me a week or two and you'll see something in depth.

Quote from: The Dark Knight on Tue,  9 Jan  2018, 19:00
This is a film up there with Dawn of Justice, but this time, the critics actually see the greatness.

Let's get real about one thing though: critics are full of sh*t. Especially nowadays, when people associated in the entertainment industry love to make everything heavily politicised. That, and they're nothing but a bunch of holier-than-thou, know-it-all douchebags. I've heard of some critics giving Last Jedi a pass because they feature women in prominent roles. FFS, why do these people need to make a cheap political point? Who cares if the character is a man, woman, Asian, white, Pomeranian dog or whatever, are they good characters and serve the story or not? I've ignored the naysayers' accusations of Disney Star Wars using SJW feminist propaganda, but I think they might have a point in Last Jedi.

Quote from: Catwoman on Wed, 27 Dec  2017, 23:02
Mixed emotions with Rey and the "answers" we got in this movie. The scene in the cave was interesting but when she reveals she knew her parents were nobody it's like "Ooooook what was the f***ing point of the cave scene other than to draw this out as far as possible?" I enjoyed her otherwise, I know some people hate the idea of a girl being the galaxy's new savior but, eh, I'm ok with it....

As I just mentioned, I was never that bothered about Rey's introduction in TFA. Sure, I can understand that she was a bit too powerful, but I always found her abilities a little raw. And let's face it, it's not like Luke was a little bit unstoppable either. I watched A New Hope for the first time in years, and I was taken aback a bit by how great of a fighter pilot he is despite little to no training. Yes, the film established that he had some skills in aviation, but there's a difference between flying a simple ship to pick errands to flying in space in a fighter jet to fight the Empire. Just a little food for thought.

But Rey in this movie, just like most of the characters in TLJ, felt as if they were going through the motions. I think the only character who made any progress was Kylo Ren.

Quote from: The Laughing Fish on Thu, 28 Dec  2017, 03:29
Great review Joker!

Thanks!  8)

Quote from: Catwoman on Thu, 28 Dec  2017, 13:06
Of course nobody read mine *pout*

But yes that was very good Joker. I had to giggle when you were talking about Snoke cause it reminded me of two years ago when I PM'd you a couple weeks after the movie had been out asking if you could make some GIFs for me for someone who shall remain nameless. You said sure, then something like "What is thy bidding, Supreme Leader Kitty Snoke?" And I went OFF, threatened something like giving you a colonoscopy with Kylo Ren's lightsaber if you ever compared me to that ugly creepy dude again. The name was cute (adding Kitty to anything has that effect) but ughhhhh. lol

Ha! Yeah, I remember that. The sadomasochistic threat was enough for me to leave you alone. I didn't want to start having nightmares of you (or what my mental image of you is) with a grill on your teeth, and telling me, "This is going to hurt, really, really bad!", while eerily coming towards me in the dark of night with a huge pair of scissors (or Kylo Ren's lightsaber) like a scene from The Big Lebowski.

Quote from: The Joker on Fri, 12 Jan  2018, 05:29

Quote from: Catwoman on Thu, 28 Dec  2017, 13:06
Of course nobody read mine *pout*

But yes that was very good Joker. I had to giggle when you were talking about Snoke cause it reminded me of two years ago when I PM'd you a couple weeks after the movie had been out asking if you could make some GIFs for me for someone who shall remain nameless. You said sure, then something like "What is thy bidding, Supreme Leader Kitty Snoke?" And I went OFF, threatened something like giving you a colonoscopy with Kylo Ren's lightsaber if you ever compared me to that ugly creepy dude again. The name was cute (adding Kitty to anything has that effect) but ughhhhh. lol

Ha! Yeah, I remember that. The sadomasochistic threat was enough for me to leave you alone. I didn't want to start having nightmares of you (or what my mental image of you is) with a grill on your teeth, and telling me, "This is going to hurt, really, really bad!", while eerily coming towards me in the dark of night with a huge pair of scissors (or Kylo Ren's lightsaber) like a scene from The Big Lebowski.

I'm afraid to know what your mental image of me is. Actually, after reading that, I'm just afraid in general.

Quote from: The Dark Knight on Tue,  9 Jan  2018, 19:00
Where the hell do I start?

This is a fantastic movie and the 'fans' are ignorant buffoons who simply don't get it. Period.

Bull.

sh*t.

Quote from: Catwoman on Sat, 13 Jan  2018, 21:57Bull.

sh*t.

Pretty much. Hamill seems pretty horrified by the movie, full-stop. Which I find very telling. Apart from this page, I'm accustomed to being the only one in the room who sees the brilliance of something. Being in the majority is a refreshing change of pace.

Quote from: Catwoman on Sat, 13 Jan  2018, 21:57

Quote from: The Dark Knight on Tue,  9 Jan  2018, 19:00
Where the hell do I start?

This is a fantastic movie and the 'fans' are ignorant buffoons who simply don't get it. Period.

Bull.

sh*t.

You described yourself and not the film.  ;)

Quote from: thecolorsblend on Mon, 15 Jan  2018, 03:12

Quote from: Catwoman on Sat, 13 Jan  2018, 21:57Bull.

sh*t.

Pretty much. Hamill seems pretty horrified by the movie, full-stop. Which I find very telling. Apart from this page, I'm accustomed to being the only one in the room who sees the brilliance of something. Being in the majority is a refreshing change of pace.

I'm away from a desktop computer, so I'm waiting to get back to one before launching into my LJ analysis. Typing on an iPad for essays isn't really my thing. So give me a couple more days. But you'll see my side of things explained in greater detail. I'll just say the sheep flock together and the lion walks alone! As for Mark, I don't care for him or his opinions as a human being. But the character he's playing? That's another matter.

Quote from: The Dark Knight on Mon, 15 Jan  2018, 15:03

Quote from: Catwoman on Sat, 13 Jan  2018, 21:57

Quote from: The Dark Knight on Tue,  9 Jan  2018, 19:00
Where the hell do I start?

This is a fantastic movie and the 'fans' are ignorant buffoons who simply don't get it. Period.

Bull.

sh*t.

You described yourself and not the film.  ;)

Remarkable comeback. Suddenly I feel like I'm in first grade again.

And actually I described your opinion. Sheep may flock together but if you think this movie is a worthy followup to what the previous seven had built, you're insane. As a standalone, sure, it's alright, but as part of the Star Wars universe it was a glorified fan film that decided to try and tear everything we knew or thought apart purely for the sake of tearing it apart, with no rhyme or reason whatsoever. The opening crawl could have just said "Ignore everything you have seen before, because there was no f***ing point." Which isn't how a movie franchise like this works.

Quote from: Catwoman on Mon, 15 Jan  2018, 19:25Sheep may flock together but if you think this movie is a worthy followup to what the previous seven had built, you're insane.

The older I get, the more I have to accept that the franchise has two amazing films (Star Wars '77 and Empire), one really good film (Jedi) and the rest is fluff, totally forgettable.

Sad.

Quote from: Catwoman on Mon, 15 Jan  2018, 19:25

Quote from: The Dark Knight on Mon, 15 Jan  2018, 15:03

Quote from: Catwoman on Sat, 13 Jan  2018, 21:57

Quote from: The Dark Knight on Tue,  9 Jan  2018, 19:00
Where the hell do I start?

This is a fantastic movie and the 'fans' are ignorant buffoons who simply don't get it. Period.

Bull.

sh*t.

You described yourself and not the film.  ;)

Remarkable comeback. Suddenly I feel like I'm in first grade again.

And actually I described your opinion. Sheep may flock together but if you think this movie is a worthy followup to what the previous seven had built, you're insane. As a standalone, sure, it's alright, but as part of the Star Wars universe it was a glorified fan film that decided to try and tear everything we knew or thought apart purely for the sake of tearing it apart, with no rhyme or reason whatsoever. The opening crawl could have just said "Ignore everything you have seen before, because there was no f***ing point." Which isn't how a movie franchise like this works.

I don't agree, but that's cool. I still love some of you here like brothers.  ;D

But here's what I'm going to do. I have some key points dotted down, and when I return to a Word document I'll get them elaborated upon for an analysis/feature. It'll present my viewpoint in a clear way to show where I'm coming from. My tone here isn't purely personal, but based on a passion that Justice League just didn't provide me with afterwards. I really love this film and what it went with and that will come out in my notes. Look out for it and have an open mind. I'll argue the case for the film, and why it works well as a middle chapter and why it is faithful to the characters and the universe.

Considering I'm the sister of the crowd I know where I stand. And fair enough.

Quote from: Catwoman on Mon, 15 Jan  2018, 21:04
Considering I'm the sister of the crowd I know where I stand. And fair enough.

We've had battles before, but there's no real malice here. Only playful jabbing (I made sure to use the winking emoticon) and other generaliations not aimed at any specific user but rather the internet community as a whole. We're cool.

Here's a collection of clips featuring Mark Hamill, expressing how much he disagreed with Rian Johnson's treatment of luke in TLJ. This includes his humourous, yet honest analysis about how box office isn't an indicator of good quality while talking about TFA.

https://youtu.be/ZzO3DCW4LXw

Quote from: The Dark Knight on Mon, 15 Jan  2018, 15:03
As for Mark, I don't care for him or his opinions as a human being. But the character he's playing? That's another matter.

Interesting. Just curious, is there something ugly about Hamill that people aren't aware about?

Quote from: The Laughing Fish on Thu, 18 Jan  2018, 12:00

Quote from: The Dark Knight on Mon, 15 Jan  2018, 15:03
As for Mark, I don't care for him or his opinions as a human being. But the character he's playing? That's another matter.

Interesting. Just curious, is there something ugly about Hamill that people aren't aware about?

If you're a fan of the nasty petulant childish oompa loompa sitting in the Oval Office, then yes. Otherwise, he's universally adored.

Quote from: Catwoman on Thu, 18 Jan  2018, 17:21

Quote from: The Laughing Fish on Thu, 18 Jan  2018, 12:00

Quote from: The Dark Knight on Mon, 15 Jan  2018, 15:03
As for Mark, I don't care for him or his opinions as a human being. But the character he's playing? That's another matter.

Interesting. Just curious, is there something ugly about Hamill that people aren't aware about?

If you're a fan of the nasty petulant childish oompa loompa sitting in the Oval Office, then yes. Otherwise, he's universally adored.

You always rattle on about politics being on this forum, and Lo and behold, look at what you typed above. I wasn't going to elaborate on my original generic comment in detail, and I'm still not going to. I don't have to explain the various reasons why I think Hamill is a dumb prick because it would derail the thread. In short, I don't care one inch what the actor has to say about box office or his own personal taste regarding Luke or anything else. I enjoy this film independent of all that.

Nice try, but my post wasn't political. It was personal. Mentioning a skunk's current residence has nothing to do with his politics.

Thanks for playing, though.

Quote from: Catwoman on Fri, 19 Jan  2018, 17:11
Nice try, but my post wasn't political.

Mentions the POTUS in a post...but then claims the post wasn't political and has NOTHING to do with politics. Hmm, okay. So can I post in length about the Clintons looting Haiti, and pass that off as personal and not political? That's the standard you've established. But we're not playing anything here. You're just 'one sick kitty' who continues to do 'crazy and stupid things.' My original point was about not caring about Hamill's personal opinions because I like TLJ independent of all that. That's where my statement begins and ends. But you couldn't help yourself.

Be a doll and get bent, sweetie.

And I don't care what you say about those crooked f***ers. And twist it all you like but I didn't make one political comment. I was talking about the man in the position, not the position itself or any of his political views. Just him being a rotten excuse for a human being. Would you rather I refer to him as the ex-host of Celebrity Apprentice instead?

Regardless, TLF wasn't privy to why anyone could hate on Mark Hamill, so all I did was explain why they would. :)

The only one twisting here is you, sweetie. I'm deliberately not progressing this political debate here (but hey, because you mentioned the Apprentice, the previous POTUS was a community organiser who didn't even run a hotdog stand) but instead calling you out. Again....I don't care what the dumb prick Mark Hamill thinks of box office, characterization or whatever else - but the character of Luke Skywalker is another matter. Be a doll and get bent.

I love how you keep throwing out references to certain political figures to try to piss me off. Keep digging, you might find one I actually care about. I'll give you a hint since you clearly need it, none of them served in office in the last three decades or so. :)

I've twisted nothing. Our dear TLF asked an honest question and I gave him the honest answer (too honest? perhaps). You're the one who made it political by crying that what I said was political, which it wasn't. That bozo barely counts as "political" to start with.

And wow, resorting to my own request to throw back at me. How disappointing. You used to be better at this. In any case we're arguing in a circle, there's a lot better things I can be doing with my time. Toodleloo.

You brought up a political figure and then claimed you weren't being political. You then pushed forward with more references to said political figure. And you keep doing so with your bozo comment. You're nothing but a hypocrite and a thread derailer.

Nope. I brought up an assclown masquerading as a political figure, and my posts are only referencing the assclown part. Not political. :)

Quote from: Catwoman on Fri, 19 Jan  2018, 21:38
Nope. I brought up an assclown masquerading as a political figure, and my posts are only referencing the assclown part. Not political. :)

Thanks for continuing to prove my point.

You started the whole thing with your reference to Mark Hamill, in a Star Wars thread no less. You can't be stupid enough to think nobody - at least among those of us who are familiar with you and your views - was going to pick up on that. You had to either be expecting exactly what happened (where you could turn around and act like you and your idiot idol are victims) or for people to just let it go and not take the bait. You're no better than johnnygobbs was. You're the mirror image. My mistake was taking the bait so you could play your little game. Congratulations, you won, you can stick the medal next to your Special Olympics Five Yard Dash Participation Ribbon.

To everybody else, I apologize for my hand in the thread going off subject. Like I said, Mark Hamill is just about universally adored, one of the few people in Hollywood you can point to and tell your children "Hey, taking after him a little bit isn't so bad." The only imaginable reason people can find to take issue with him (aside from him just being too damn nice and decent) would be his politics (particularly our resident Trumpkin and the other thin-skinned disciples of that fool), but even as someone who's own politics are a little bit right of center I don't have any issue with that. I just don't care about someone's politics. I don't care about that idiot Trump's politics. That's why I didn't make one reference to any view he has. I just talked about him being a poor excuse for a human being. Which he is.

I should have just let it go and said nothing, with it being about Mark I felt compelled to speak up. Lesson learned.

In your apology you just keep going. I mean...just get a load of this.

Quote from: Catwoman on Fri, 19 Jan  2018, 21:55
where you could turn around and act like you and your idiot idol are victims

Quote from: Catwoman on Fri, 19 Jan  2018, 21:55
(particularly our resident Trumpkin and the other thin-skinned disciples of that fool)

Quote from: Catwoman on Fri, 19 Jan  2018, 21:55
I don't care about that idiot Trump's politics.

Quote from: Catwoman on Fri, 19 Jan  2018, 21:55
I just talked about him being a poor excuse for a human being. Which he is.

I'm not taking your bait. I just rightly pointed out you can't stop talking about him...in the Last Jedi thread. I made a comment about Mark Hamill and you exploded. "I was triggered and behaved badly, blame TDK". Nope.

Behaving like this is on you, not me.

Mark Hamill didn't initially agree with Luke's portrayal in TLJ. So?
Mark Hamill says box office isn't an indicator of quality? Wow, what a genius. But again....so?

I don't like the actor but I like the film and the character. That's it.
That's all I'm saying here through all of your constant POTUS references.

FFS, I'm sorry I even asked. :-[

The jousting contest between TDK and IceCatPrincessWoman is more interesting to me than anything I've heard about TLJ.

Heh, you two. Get a room or something, yeesh...

Quote from: thecolorsblend on Sat, 20 Jan  2018, 02:48
The jousting contest between TDK and IceCatPrincessWoman is more interesting to me than anything I've heard about TLJ.

Heh, you two. Get a room or something, yeesh...

Hey, IceCatPrincessWoman keeps trying to make reservations. And I keep saying no.

In other news, I've started my review/analysis of some movie called Jed's Last Eye. Ardent followers of the my gospel can rest assured it's going to be a good read - I have about 1687 words at the moment. Keep your eye out for it.

I find the explanations for the negativity concerning TLJ to be quite amusing thus far.

The backlash is being framed as being the result of anything from muh Russia to even the alt-right. Which is hilariously desperate, but hey, keep swinging for the fences, Disney.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mdm8rpv045U

Did anybody catch the news that TLJ got pulled from nearly all of Chinese theatres after it opened for only a couple of weeks? It bombed at the box office over there, despite its financial success worldwide.

Quote
After its hugely disappointing debut last weekend, China's movie exhibitors have taken the big, and possibly unprecedented decision to drop the Hollywood studio film Star Wars: The Last Jedi's showtimes by 92 percent, from its 34.5% percent share of the territory's total screenings last Friday to just 2.6 percent this Friday.

Source: https://www.forbes.com/sites/robcain/2018/01/11/7-days-into-its-release-chinese-theaters-abandon-the-last-jedi-dumping-92-of-its-screenings/#2016ef0c5cc0

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bHskNv5uVe4

Sour grapes? The guy walks through the numbers and they're not very pretty. The issue here is that the larger franchise's health is questionable. TLJ might've done okay but it doesn't exist in a vacuum. The big picture for Star Wars as a brand just isn't promising. The trajectory is downward.

The more things go on, the better Lucas looks. Disney isn't doing anything Lucas couldn't have done himself. But arguably he made a smart play by devoting his attention to TV projects and not oversaturating the marketplace with huge feature films. Even Star Wars under latter day Lucas leadership had a narrative focus: The Clone Wars.

Today, there is no narrative focus. We've got a sequel trilogy coming out and unrelated standalone films featuring non-sequel characters with stories that zigzag all over the timeline.

Frankly, I would've expected Disney of all companies to better understand how to exploit a franchise but it seems like their approach is throwing every possible thing out there and that's obviously not working so well for them.

I think you're right, colors. There's a real risk of burnout. The rapid fire release schedule can be a double edged sword. I liked TLJ but it's a fact a lot of people didn't. There isn't a lot of goodwill towards the franchise right now. I had a review for TLJ which is still sitting on my desktop, and I can't be bothered going back to it right now. Generally speaking, I feel like cinema has lost its magic. The content and the experience in general seems to have lost something and it's become too commercial. It's a business and not necessarily a passion. They have a release schedule and they pump them out - reboots, sequels, prequels, etc. It's a shame, but that's how the world feels to me right now. It's generic and unexciting. We're all awake to it.

I realize this next comparison is a bit unfair. But I compare the way Disney is going balls to the wall with Star Wars to how Tolkien's Legendarium is unfolding and it really is a world of difference.

There was a decent interval between the LOTR films and The Hobbit trilogy. Putting aside the value of The Hobbit, there wasn't a gigantic rush to make it happen. Now there's an Amazon show coming. But it's an LOTR prequel show of some kind. Nothing else is really on the horizon right now. And there may not be anything new for a while.

Now that the Tolkien estate has new management, it would be all too tempting to do rush jobs on Beren & Luthien, Quenta Silmarillion and all that rest. But it's not happening and there's no real indication that stuff is coming any time soon. I'm fuzzy about the need of even doing an LOTR prequel show, tbh. But that's the only thing on the horizon.

Star Wars was once a very special thing. It was THE franchise. The prequels diminished that but at this point I'm prepared to say that Disney has harmed Star Wars far more than Jar Jar ever did even on his worst day.

Quote from: The Dark Knight on Sun, 25 Mar  2018, 23:09
Generally speaking, I feel like cinema has lost its magic.

I feel the same. Nowadays, I find film is becoming such a chore, whether it's watching on the big screen or at home.

Quote from: The Dark Knight on Sun, 25 Mar  2018, 23:09
The content and the experience in general seems to have lost something and it's become too commercial. It's a business and not necessarily a passion. They have a release schedule and they pump them out - reboots, sequels, prequels, etc. It's a shame, but that's how the world feels to me right now. It's generic and unexciting. We're all awake to it.

Yes, this is exactly the problem. All of these studios have lined up blockbuster after blockbuster to the point it's over-saturating the market. One of my criticisms of the MCU recently is releasing three films per year is overkill. It becomes less of an event and more a Happy Meal. And worse of all, films in general are becoming less creative and more formulaic. Do we really need a Han Solo movie? He's fine as he is in the original trilogy, I don't need to see his backstory and how met Chewie, Lando Calrissian and how he got the Millennium Falcon. Leave it alone.

Sometimes it's better to reduce the output before risking stagnation.

I agree. Harveywood is on its knees in more ways than one, and honestly, I don't care. I think they've just had their worst March on record, which shows this downward trend isn't abating.

I do like going to the movies but there's been nothing that's interested me in recent times, and most of the actors are losers. It's the likes of Jimmy Kimmel who can't help themselves and keep perpetuating this self-inflicted hurricane. However I do feel for the cinema chains around me who are struggling and reducing ticket prices these days, instead of raising them. They're the decent people who are caught in the crossfire. They've been let down by forces outside of their control. So I genuinely have sympathy for them.

It's probably not by intent, but the long breaks with the Bond franchise (three and four year gaps) will probably end up being a positive and not a negative, even though it frustrates the fan base. Same goes for Mission Impossible, I guess. It at least keeps people hungry, and the special aura is maintained. That aura had certainly been lost for me in terms of endless comic book films and reboots/remakes, CGI fests. After a while you become numb to it.

Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom is an example. Back in the day I'd be jumping out of my skin at the thought of another JP film. But now? I can't muster the same level of enthusiasm, and I don't think it's because I'm now older. If something clicks with me I'm still the biggest geek in the room.

The trailer for the new JP film speaks for itself. An abundance of CGI and no sense of threat. The original film's dinosaurs still look better and the atmosphere is still better. They're just satisfying the need for a new sequel, and eventual trilogy, not that they genuinely have an interesting and bold new story to tell.

I agree 100% with the sentiments being expressed here.

I sometimes wonder if we're witnessed the beginning of the end of Hollywood as the centre of the US film industry. If we are, it won't happen overnight. It'll be a long, painful drawn-out process. But the signs are there that things are taking a downward turn for the big studios. Box office is continuing to drop. Theatres are losing more and more ground to online streaming services. China is poised to overtake the US as the largest global film market and Hong Kong studios have already begun poaching US talent to leave Hollywood for Asia. The entertainment industry's ideological insularity and increased emphasis on partisan politics are alienating large portions of their target audiences. Meanwhile the big studios are still riding on the coattails of the New Hollywood generation and rehashing every movie concept from the seventies and eighties instead of coming up with fresh ideas for the 21st century.

Movie stars are no longer the box office draw they once were and haven't been for over a decade now. The studios know this and have tried desperately to push certain young actors as the next generation of big stars. But star bankability isn't a reliable factor anymore. Put Robert Downey Jr. in an Iron Man film and it'll rake in the dough, but put him in something like The Judge (2014) and no one goes to see it. It's not the star that sells tickets anymore – it's the character and the universe they inhabit. I believe that's why studios are shifting their emphasis away from individual talent and towards cinematic brands. It's recognisable IPs that count, not original ideas. Hence the recent profusion of cinematic shared universes. Instead of promoting quality cuisine, studios are opting for a fast food business model: stick to a reliable formula and churn out the product as quickly as possible. If we're not careful, we're going to end up like the society depicted in Demolition Man. Only instead of Taco Bell owning all the restaurants, it'll be Disney owning all the film studios.


Sadly Star Wars is becoming a victim of this trend. I remember the good old days when we had to wait three years between Star Wars movies and at least a decade between each trilogy. If the latest Disney SW films are Big Macs, then Lucas' were home cooked meals. Admittedly he didn't always get the ingredients right (when the recipe said add half a teaspoon of Jar Jar, Lucas poured in the entire bottle), but they were his meals to ruin. I've reached the point now where I regard Star Wars as George Lucas' 6-film saga of Anakin Skywalker. Anything else is fan fiction.

Quote from: thecolorsblend on Mon, 26 Mar  2018, 00:45There was a decent interval between the LOTR films and The Hobbit trilogy. Putting aside the value of The Hobbit, there wasn't a gigantic rush to make it happen. Now there's an Amazon show coming. But it's an LOTR prequel show of some kind. Nothing else is really on the horizon right now. And there may not be anything new for a while.

Now that the Tolkien estate has new management, it would be all too tempting to do rush jobs on Beren & Luthien, Quenta Silmarillion and all that rest. But it's not happening and there's no real indication that stuff is coming any time soon. I'm fuzzy about the need of even doing an LOTR prequel show, tbh. But that's the only thing on the horizon.

An important ingredient to any saga – and perhaps the most difficult part to execute – is the ending. Stories need closure. It's easy to begin a narrative, but it's much harder to conclude one satisfactorily. Tolkien understood this. Obviously he wrote a wealth of material set within his fictional universe, but he never protracted the timeline beyond its organic lifespan. At one point he started work on a story set during the Fourth Age, but quickly abandoned the concept when he realised it was cynical and unnecessary. He knew the story should end with the conclusion of the Third Age. It's for this reason I respect Bob Gale and Robert Zemeckis for the way they handled the Back to the Future series. They toyed with the idea of a fourth film, but ultimately decided against it. They then entangled the rights to the property to make sure no one else could remake or reboot the films without their permission.

Sometimes it is justifiable to revisit old properties. Rocky Balboa (2006) is a good example of this. Sly screwed up Rocky V, so he went back to correct his mistakes and give the series the proper ending it deserved (or so we thought). It was a film worth making. Likewise the recent revival of Twin Peaks felt necessary, since the original show ended on an unresolved cliff-hanger. And of course I'm stoked about the new Cobra Kai series. But these are exceptions to the rule. Most film and TV franchises should be allowed to die once they've run their course. Just look at The Terminator franchise to see what happens when a studio continues milking an IP's cadaver long after its natural death has occurred.

I fear Star Wars is heading for a similar fate. In the next few years we're getting Solo, Abrams' Episode IX, rumoured Obi-Wan and Boba Fett spin offs, Rian Johnson's new trilogy, another series of films from David Benioff and D.B. Weiss, and Jon Favreau's live action TV series. With this in mind, I find myself recalling a comment I saw in December regarding the cynical turn the Star Wars franchise is taking:

"This is what happens when you continue a fairy tale beyond 'And they lived happily ever after...'"

Quote from: The Dark Knight on Tue, 27 Mar  2018, 04:21The trailer for the new JP film speaks for itself. An abundance of CGI and no sense of threat. The original film's dinosaurs still look better and the atmosphere is still better. They're just satisfying the need for a new sequel, and eventual trilogy, not that they genuinely have an interesting and bold new story to tell.

Tyrannosaurus rex in 1993:


Tyrannosaurus rex in 2018:


You'd think special effects would improve over a quarter of a century, but somehow they've gotten worse. And you're right about the lack of a new story. Nothing about the trailer indicates a sense of mystery, intrigue or an original plot worth telling. It just looks like more of what we've already seen. Which begs the question, what's the point?

Bravo, Silver. You've explained the situation perfectly. And that GIF is hilarious.

Quote from: Silver Nemesis on Tue, 27 Mar  2018, 16:46I sometimes wonder if we're witnessed the beginning of the end of Hollywood as the centre of the US film industry.

Hollywood's implosion could be a boon. It's strange to consider now but there was a point when Hollywood didn't have a practical regional monopoly on cinema. The rise of Hollywood eliminated other would-be filmmaking communities. Perhaps we'll see challengers rise up?

Lucas himself tried that very thing back in the 80's with his Star Wars bucks. Hollywood was able to shut him out. But I have to wonder what, say, a Chris Nolan or a Robert Rodriguez could achieve if they tried.

Hollywood won't change their ways. Hollywood will always insert certain things into movies and China wants nothing to do with that stuff. You're smart, you know what I'm talking around here. Hollywood will destroy themselves before they change their ways. Maybe some domestic filmmakers can give them a push over the edge?

Quote from: Silver Nemesis on Tue, 27 Mar  2018, 16:46I've reached the point now where I regard Star Wars as George Lucas' 6-film saga of Anakin Skywalker. Anything else is fan fiction.

I'm past that, myself. "Star Wars" to me means Star Wars '77, Empire and Jedi (as they were seen and heard originally in theaters). If I'm feeling charitable, I might allow both Episode I trailers as well. But that's really it for me.

I read a lot of fan conjecture after Revenge Of The Sith that maybe, just maybe, we don't really need Empire and Jedi. That maybe Star Wars '77 is enough by itself and who needs sequels? I'm not to that point yet. And probably never will be. But I see more people express that view today than ever before.

Fandom shouldn't be an act of self-flagellation. But that's where more and more Star Wars fans are finding themselves these days.

Ready Player One's trailer gave me the same kind of feeling. I see all these CGI cars zooming around and crashing...and I think to myself, from the days of Raiders of the Lost Ark to this. The film dredges up past glories with tons of cameos and doesn't seem like it has much to offer for the future. It can't help but feel like a huge regression to me, even though the technology they're using in new. It all feels hollow to me, and that's what I find sad. But...SCREW EM.

Here are a couple of videos defending Last Jedi. The first talking about the supposed desires of the characters and what they need to do, and the second is, quite frankly, a cop out by using subjectivity as an argument to defend the flaws of the film. I thought I'd share these anyway just in case somebody wants to express their opinion why this analysis has some merit.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CE7SkcoyVAI

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XJhOpY7bh6s&t

He was already losing me when he was trying to justify the pointless Canto Bight subplot. Honestly, Finn's need to become a Rebel already happened in TFA, and here it's just a repetition. And honestly, I can't take anybody seriously if they admire a critic who uses a pseudonym by the name of Film Crit Hulk, who intentionally writes in broken English and cap locks.

Quote from: The Laughing Fish on Sun,  9 Sep  2018, 11:09
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XJhOpY7bh6s&t

I found this response video dismissing the points made in Just Write's lazy defense over interpreting TLJ. Contains some foul language.

https://youtu.be/xAiwFvxzChM

Tim Rose, who played Admiral Ackbar, spoke in an interview about his career in the entire Star Wars saga. Not only did he express his disappointment when he discovered his character would be immediately killed off without much fuss, he revealed he was in tears when he was invited to come back to the set for a cheap joke. Suffice to say, he felt very disrespected.

https://youtu.be/arvfiN_OgiY?t=474

Anyway, I saw this video paying "tribute" to this disappointment of a movie on its one year anniversary.

https://twitter.com/Dataracer117/status/1073871293110312961

Some days, I wake up and think to myself "This is it. I can't possibly hate Disney Star Wars any more than I possibly do."

Then Fish goes and posts a video of Ackbar recounting the time he was humiliated and insulted on the set of that farce of a movie.

More and more, Rian Johnson's "vision" for Star Wars seems less like an actual movie and more like glorified edgelord fan fiction.

This 17 second clip of Luke coming to terms with Han's death should've been in the final cut. If I only had one choice to replace any of Luke's scenes in the movie with that deleted scene, I'd remove that pointless breast feeding milk moment.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CLwzzSS1bCk

No, it wouldn't have made TLJ any better. But it would've completed the scene where Luke meets Chewbacca and asks "Where's Han?", instead of abruptly cutting off to the next scene.

Adam Driver revealed Kylo Ren's arc was supposed to be the opposite of Darth Vader's, in the sense that he was supposed to be progressively evil instead of redeeming himself at the end of the trilogy.

https://au.lifestyle.yahoo.com/star-wars-adam-driver-says-010159765.html

I don't understand why JJ Abrams bothered to direct The Rise of Skywalker if his overall story arc was drastically changed by Rian Johnson.

Speaking of Rian Johnson, I read this post from a disgruntled Star Wars fan saying TLJ was conceived because of a niche group of bloggers influencing Hollywood, and Johnson is connected with these people:

QuoteIf there's one lesson I hope Disney and Lucasfilm learned from this...

It's "Don't hire Twitter trolls to make Star Wars movies."

One of the things that baffles so many of us Star Wars fans is Rian Johnson's open contempt for supporters of George Lucas' vision. How could a guy responsible for directing one of the biggest event films in the last 20 years be such a petty, thin-skinned, permaTweeting bully?

He got it from his best friend.

Before Rian DELETED EVERYTHING, Johnson was part of a very strange, insular, and deeply cruel subculture that called itself Film Twitter. Led by Devin Faraci, formerly of the Alamo Drafthouse and a blog called BirthMoviesDeath, Film Twitter was an army of drinking buddies who would get wasted together and scream at people online all day who disagreed with their hot movie takes. Film Twitter was filled with guys like Devin, Rian, Drew McWeeny, Meredith Borders, Priscilla Page, Jordan Hoffman, Kumail Nanjiani, and Jen Yamato, among many others. They were INSANELY cruel to strangers that they deemed not "woke" enough or had "bad" opinions on movies. Name calling and threats were par for the course, and in fact, they got off not just on harassing fans, but also entertainers whose work they did not enjoy, like the cast of a dumb party movie from 2012 called Project X and the indie filmmaker Joe Swanberg. They really hurt many young artists' careers, and they got off on inflicting pain onto those they saw as enemies or worse, inferior moviemakers.

I personally went to a couple of their meetups. Imagine 20 Comic Book Guys getting hammered, singing Karaoke, and passing around their phones to brag about the strangers they were totally schooling. Just irredeemable and vile sh*t from a sweaty legion of dork alcoholics. Their usual excuses for harassing people would be some nonsensical and completely irrelevant rhetoric about gender or race. Didn't like Force Awakens? Misogyny. Thought one of their buddy's new indie film sucked? Bigotry. These guys spread so much hate, but would immediately retreat into "I'M BEING BULLIED! HARASSMENT!" when their victims dished it back. This is called "crybullying."

Rian Johnson eventually had to delete all of his Twitter references to Devin Faraci after he admitted to sexually assaulting a woman. They are still, however, very close friends. So for all of his posturing, he's a total fraud who hangs out regularly with a creepy criminal. The online toxicity of the TLJ fanbase is a direct reflection of it's director and his social circle.

There are so many talented filmmakers who don't have an active presence on Twitter, and Disney and Lucasfilm are entirely to blame for prioritizing social media zeitgeists over their actual customers and fans.

https://www.reddit.com/r/saltierthancrait/comments/dheqw9/if_theres_one_lesson_i_hope_disney_and_lucasfilm/

That last sentence easily applies to WB and the DCEU too.

I'm very familiar with Devin Faraci, as he was allegedly the one started this baseless "Zack Snyder is an objectivist" bullsh*t, as well as his exposure to being a sexual deviant. I'll never forget the time when he was called out by a woman who accused him of sexually assaulting her and boasted about it to his friends, and he begged her for forgiveness despite saying he didn't remember. And he had the gall to call himself a feminist. What a degenerate.

If it's true that Johnson is friends with Faraci then that makes my distaste for him increase tenfold.

I am surprised to read that Kumail Nanjiani is one of these people. If that's true then that might explain why he gets roles in the MCU and Star Wars.

That would seem to legitimize Luke's rationale in trying to kill Kylo. I don't think Luke would actually do that. But the thought would cross his mind.