Star Wars Thread - Spoilers, yo.

[ColinBollocks]

19 hours ago, HarmonicGenerator said:

Did they do a good job building Snoke as a villain though? We don’t really see him do all that much that’s villainous. He’s in charge of the First Order, and they’re evil, and he had some part in turning Ben (though Luke’s failure could have been just as much of an influence) but other than that? He issued instructions as a hologram and there’s some vague dark sidey stuff but not all that much. I’d argue most of his build was fan theorising between films. 

I think the fact a lot of people were interested in his story suggests as much. They painted him as this shadowy figure, a new unknown super evil, which created intrigue, After all he was the master training Kylo to be new Vader - it suggests a powerful villain.

Edited December 28, 2017 by ColinBollocks

[PunkStep]

To be fair a lot of the fans that were upset by that were also upset that they killed off Admiral Ackbar- who in the grand scheme of things is a very minor character. So I'm not so sure the reaction is a testament to him being built up as this almighty force. I don't think he was built up much at all and was essentially fodder to help build Kylo Ren even more. And to be honest I'm glad- he came across as a Palpatine reboot.

[Carbomb]

The other criticism I've read about Snoke and the First Order is that they don't really show how they're evil. They shouldn't really need to do all that much, they're the Empire under a new name; we know they're evil, we don't need to see lots of atrocities. However, stealing babies for their military, and destroying star systems using Starkiller should be reminder cromulent enough, and a satisfactory intro for first-time SW viewers. Sure, Snoke isn’t personally doing it, but the fact he's very much in charge of this organisation should be sufficient, surely?                        

[Arch Stanton]

Ackbar was a cult fan favourite, it was a bit crap how they killed him off. I feel they missed an opportunity to get some proper heat on the bad guys by killing him on screen, or give him a more heroic death of some description.

[Carbomb]

42 minutes ago, Arch Stanton said:

Ackbar was a cult fan favourite, it was a bit crap how they killed him off. I feel they missed an opportunity to get some proper heat on the bad guys by killing him on screen, or give him a more heroic death of some description.

IT'S A CRAP

[Arch Stanton]

[PunkStep]

I don't think Maxwell is going to send you his trophy in the post Carbomb, if that's what you're aiming for!

[Carbomb]

Just a last-gasp attempt in the vinegar strokes of the year.

[Surf Digby]

On ‎15‎/‎12‎/‎2017 at 9:35 AM, ColinBollocks said:

 

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My issue with them killing Snoke was mainly because it added to the feeling you were clearly watching two different visions, with JJ setting up a lot of questions, which you assumed tied in with the mythology (after all, a big part of the appeal of the franchise), but Rian Johnson seemed to be dead against it.

 

This is how I felt about it. It was like they decided between the films that they didn't need him and so just offed him without him doing much.

I like the idea of Ren killing him, not because he's defecting the rebels, but just because he's insane with power, however I think it came too early.

On ‎27‎/‎12‎/‎2017 at 12:34 PM, johnnyboy said:

I think it's already been said in this thread, but how much did we know of the Emperor from film appearances pre-prequels?  I'm hitching up to the not everyone needs a massive backstory train.

There's an implied/inferred back story to the Emperor though. Firstly, he's the Emperor of what we know is an established galactic empire, he hasn't just appeared out of nowhere. Secondly, we know from TESB that Vader is subservient to him and addresses him as his master. Everything else we learn as we go along.

With Snoke, we start the film knowing that there's no longer an Emperor, but there's a new fella that Kylo Ren is answerable to. Why? Who is he, and how did he come to take charge of the New Republic? Surely to have such a following so soon, he would have to be well established with some serious credentials.

As he facilitated Ren and Rey's pan-galactic telepathy conversation, he's powerful with The Force and yet missed the lightsaber pointing at his kidneys?

 

12 hours ago, johnnyboy said:

Much loved minor cult character.

He's also an Admiral. He didn't get that rank from having a minor role in the battles.

Overall, I felt this was a mixed bag. There were some dodgy moments, but also some absolutely killer ones.

Leia Poppins. Yeah, I wasn't thrilled on that either. If it wasn't for the reunion with Luke (*sniff, there's something in my eye*), I would have argued that she should have been killed off there as everything she did after that could have been done by another character. Similar to how they killed off Obi-Wan in EpIV to avoid him just standing around for the rest of the movie.

Casino planet. Just like the 50s diner in the prequel (I forget which one), it was too much like an Earthy one for my liking. That whole scene was a bit shit. Couldn't they have just sacrificed some more Bothans to get the code for the shields?

The visuals were great. The speeders skimming over the salt, the opening battle.

Kylo Ren was just wonderful. He's powerful and completely unhinged.

Captain Phasma. What a waste. Absent for most of the movie, then shows up and gets a nice little fight, only to get bumped off by Finn's cheapshot. The New Republic is lacking in standout characters (Kylo Ren aside). I'm hoping she's not dead and turns up in the next one, kills Poe and then has a proper battle with Finn.

The worst thing though?

No 20th Century Fox ident at the beginning. It just seems wrong for it to be absent.

This made up for it though during the intermission:

 

Edited December 29, 2017 by Nostalgia Nonce
Pressing shift and enter publishes the post. Who knew?

[HarmonicGenerator]

Snoke being dead certainly doesn’t mean we won’t get any answers to his backstory or motives, or that we’ve seen the last of him either. He could end up being a Force ghost - not usually a Dark Side trick but it wasn’t a Light Side trick til Qui-Gon figured it out either. Last Jedi has shown that Star Wars can use flashbacks now - nothing to stop them using that to flesh out Kylo’s story more in IX, especially if Snoke’s major function was to serve Kylo’s character.

Or... or! They could be very sneakily setting things up so that in 15 years’ time we’ll get a prequel trilogy showing how young innocent Ben Solo grew up and was turned from the Light by Snoke, which answers all the questions and people realise that the answers weren’t what they wanted after all. Look for this to happen if they do some special editions of the current trilogy that change their numbers to X, XI and XII.

[Nick Soapdish]

I watched it opening morning in Imax 3d with my wife. She came out loving it, I left feeling really confused. I liked some bits and hated others. I was almost relieved to see similar opinions as I thought maybe I had gone mad. However, when I saw it again a few days after, without the expectations of what I was going to see, I really enjoyed the film for what it was. It was not like the template Star Wars film, though I think there are a few parallels to ESB then most people admit to. I know why people have been divided on it, but I think it is a film which over time will be better regarded then it is now. 

What I do find amazing is that in just 16 days it dethroned Beauty and The Beast as biggest domestic release of 2016 in America. That is a feat and a half

[Van Dammer]

Add me to the 'meh' crowd. It was a decent enough movie, I just think it was closer to the prequels as far as substance and style than it was to the originals. Saying that, it wasnt anywhere near as bad as them, id say it was three quarters of the way to TFA than the prequels, but still too close for my liking. I get that Star Wars is about dodgy creatures and what not, but between the porgs, the crystal dogs, the mother Teresa frogs and the camel horse racers, I just thought fuck off and tone it down a bit. My biggest bug bare was probably the humour, and this is a criticism of modern movie humour rather than just this film. Its a new trend to make fun of yourselves so nobody can make fun of you and it was around in small doses in TFA but there was buckets of it here. From Luke throwing the saber over his shoulder, to Luke admitting hed never read the Jedi books he beloved so much. Even the prank call at the start with General Hux and Rey chuckle brothering the housemaid frogs on the island, it was just slapped on a little too thick at times. I also didnt like the needless 'new stuff' i.e upteen different trooper costumes, battle vehicles etc but again, its minor and I can see the reason Disney-wise.

There were aspects I thought were great, Rey and Kylo are legit characters who I want to see more and more of, anything with them two was tremendous and I enjoyed Lukes input for the most part. Yoda I enjoyed, although im tempted to say they went a bit far with the jedi afterlife stuff. Normally it was only ever a quick glance or moment, this was a full on chat from beyond the grave, but I think they did the best with it that they could.

[Devon Malcolm]

I thought it was a brilliant film. I'm not going to go over all the reasons why because I just spent an hour doing a review of it on Letterboxd, but I feel like a lot of the criticisms that have been made of it are minor issues, really. But that's always been the way with Star Wars and that will never change.

What I will say is that the choice of directors for the series has been perfect. I'm not Abrams fan but his brand of safety-first filmmaking was perfect for bringing the series back and then someone like Johnson, who has made a name for himself with genre films that take risks, was the ideal choice for the chances that they wanted to take with the narrative here.

Also, the acting has never been finer in this series. Aside from Domhnall Gleeson's scenery chewing, everyone is ridiculously good, especially Adam Driver who is one of the best on the planet right now. That guy is something special.

[LaGoosh]

I saw it a second time because while I loved it the first time, some of the story choices niggled me and I needed to see it again to digest it properly. On the second viewing, a lot of the criticisms fell massively flat to me. If you cut out the casino planet (which drags the film down massively in the middle) it would be perfectly paced and everything else works. The Rey/Ren story in particular features the best acting and complex character work out of all the films. Adam Driver is a sensation and just incredibly brilliant. His performance is evil, sad, lonely, furious, pathetic and seductive all at once. The relationship between the two is fascinating. All the performances in it are great but Driver is doing the true heavy lifting to give the film the weight it has. The bit where he goes "You come from nothing. You're nothing. But not to me." is so masterful if Rey decided to turn to the dark side right then and there I think everyone would have understood it. I would suggest everyone go for a second viewing.

Out of the 3 new SW movies I'm incredibly happy with all of them. None are perfect, but outside of Empire Strikes Back, none of them are. 

[Carbomb]

Glad to see more positivity for the film in this thread, as I continue to see more negative reviews for it on social.

Ultimately, for me the only criticism I can really give it that could reach anywhere near significance would be that Finn & Rose's part of the film could've been removed and not much would've been lost - but I won't, because whilst dispensable it was still enjoyable. It's a good film, and more of the same quality is fine by me.