Post: #151

(12-18-2015 09:04 PM)LeeEnfield303 Wrote:  My thought is....


If this is 30 years after the "Rebellion" blew up the 2d Death Star......

Isn't the "Rebellion" the government now? Doesn't that make the "First Order" the "resistance?"

I guess it would be like the government using their funding to finance an armed group to fight a shadow war.

But still, it doesn't make any sense. It's not like coming out and publicly opposing the First Order directly would have any negative repercussions, politically or otherwise.

Honestly, I think it's an excuse to have the "Rebels" as an underdog again. It's kind of lazy and a lost opportunity to have an interesting dynamic with the First Order as a kind of insurgent group sowing terror across the galaxy

Post: #152

Spoilers?









Someone else already broke it down further but my main issues were:

1. They made the chick way too powerful to believe. By the time the movie ended she was almost Yoda level with no training whatsoever. I get that they wanted to show her natural talent(grrl power)but come on. It just got ridiculous, she has no room to grow if she is already at beast mode from the first film. I'm thinking she will be revealed as Luke's daughter or something in the next movie.

2. The movie was too much of a rehash of the first star wars film. They played it super safe with pretty much the exact same settings, script, and no explanation of the past 30 years.

The milennium falcon was supposed to be an old piece of shit spacecraft in the original film and your telling me after all the battles it was in and decades of neglect it not only flies but it can outmaneuver much newer aircraft? That would be like fighting in World War II with WW1 era aircraft and coming out on top. They should have just had the balls to come up with a new spaceship.

Post: #153

(12-18-2015 10:20 PM)azulsombra Wrote:  The milennium falcon was supposed to be an old piece of shit spacecraft in the original film and your telling me after all the battles it was in and decades of neglect it not only flies but it can outmaneuver much newer aircraft? That would be like fighting in World War II with WW1 era aircraft and coming out on top. They should have just had the balls to come up with a new spaceship.

They have toys to sell, and it's nearly Christmas. It's common sense for them to milk the fuck out of this cash cow.

The original movies worked because of the story, not because of any science fiction shit. The next 3 movies had no story, loads of sci-fi garbage, and morons ate it up, the saga continues

You could make the same films from the original 3 films, and put them in any historical setting, and they would still be entertaining. The setting/scenario is incidental.

Post: #154

Post: #155

To be honest I really thought that stat killer base was just super lazy writing on JJs part. Oh no another Death Star. Han Solo isn't even impressed with his lines "it's bigger so what" and "there's gotta be a way to blow it up there always is". Overall just too much rehashing and not enough grit to bring something new to the universe.

Post: #156

(12-19-2015 01:49 AM)Razgriz Wrote:  To be honest I really thought that stat killer base was just super lazy writing on JJs part. Oh no another Death Star. Han Solo isn't even impressed with his lines "it's bigger so what" and "there's gotta be a way to blow it up there always is". Overall just too much rehashing and not enough grit to bring something new to the universe.

Well, that's the joys of postmodernism in film: all the hits you know and love reheated in a microwave oven with substandard new flavours added to the mix ... and you have no right to complain about it being so because self-referential narrative is so 21st century, baby, and hey, if Tarantino can make a career out of junk food collage, why can't I?

Post: #157

The progression of her training is ridiculous... but she is the daughter of Luke Skywalker and heir to the Skywalker bloodline. I inferred that Finn and Rey had prior training - Finn from his upbringing as a First Order stormtrooper, and Rey has at least a scrappy and pragmatic knowledge of fighting as established with her fighting with the staff. For her backstory, scavenger from a desert junkyard world, I get it. Whereas Kylo Ren had been hit by Chewbaca's crossbow shot which I buy as nullifying his advantage due to greater familiarity with the lightsaber. I'm assuming he's wearing high-quality armor, since that crossbow had notched several clean kills in fully armored stormtroopers.

The faults in this story are mainly in that you have to take some dubious parameters for the plot at face value. As has been mentioned, the reset of Return of the Jedi's outcome, so that the Empire has revived, and the New Republic is back to being the underdog Rebellion... (actually, the First Order is MORE powerful than the Empire ever was, because it must command as much if not far deeper resources in order to build Starkiller Base, which was shown to be 30x in size of the Death Star). The movie is essentially a reshuffling of various elements of the original trilogy, with the Death Star run, and the escort the droid mission.

There are hints of a more grounding backstory with some Jedi Academy elements alluded to. Setting up Kylo Ren for another Vader arc was pretty poor, but on the other hand he was quite a good villain. There's something in his voice, that shows he's not really robotic. I could feel that this character knew he had cast his lot with the wrong side, but is too afraid to admit it, so doubles down.

Really liked Finn and Poe, their teamup at the beginning was great, though short.

But, we finally have a Star Wars movie that is a real MOVIE. When you see the X-Wing raid, and the camera is at ground level with Finn in the foreground, tilted up, following the X-Wing as it just sweeps the sky clean of six or seven TIE fighters. You know that's Poe in there. That's confident and competent directing and the simplicity of expression just made me smile like a kid watching that.

And there's acting. There's actual acting. In fact, both these characters, Fin and Poe, were quite well-acted. Finn actually carried a majority portion of the Star Wars comedic lightness and did so very well.

Even the girl, I thought Rey was a good character. Her progression through very advanced Jedi learnings was too fast, but her acting was fine. She was just frozen and barely able to move her feet in terror when she was tracked down by Kylo Ren, firing off her blaster. She did get the better of Kylo in the last duel, but he was already injured, and picked up a few more hits when he dealt with Finn. Also, Kylo was trying not to kill her as it seems he has his own agenda in acquiring an apprentice of his own. The writers came up with a few creative ways to demonstrate her quick thinking, like tracking the alien dragging Finn through the Falcon by using the security camera footage to time closing the door as it was passing through. It feels like they earned the portrayal of a quick-witted and resourceful character because the team had to come up with cool ways to show it, instead of describing it in horrific Lucas exposition.

A weakness of the entire Star Wars saga is that in every single one, they fail to give an even cursory development to the geospatial properties of this galaxy. The Star Wars universe is such that they can always arbitrarily create some new star system and planet, ad infinitum. They can put new artefacts and MacGuffins, abandoned Jedi Temples, Sith strongholds, wherever they want with completely free artistic license. We know that Coruscant is at the center, and that there is an Outer Rim. That's it. Even in Empire Strikes Back, we had no idea how far Hoth was from Dagobah and Bespin. Every hyperdrive to light speed is just a mechanic for a scene transition. It looks like this will never change.

Yet at the end of the day... it's Star Wars. They did a great job with it. I think it helped I haven't seen the original trilogy in so long, I didn't rewatch them before going to the theater. The reunion between Han and Leia was moving. The camaraderie and dynamic between Han and Chewie, and the sheer anguish and rage of Chewbaca as he goes berserk at the end. I have to be real, there were quite a few legitimately emotional moments. It didn't meet all my expectations, but this is a special occasion, and without exaggeration one of the most visually sleek films I've ever seen with very successfully acted characters, which alleviates the disappointment of the script somewhat. If nothing else (and there is a little bit of substance and heart here, if we're going to be honest), Disney and Abrams really did an absolutely sensational job harnessing the power of nostalgia and... longing. I'm looking forward to Episode 8.

Post: #158

(12-19-2015 03:28 AM)CactusCat589 Wrote:  The progression of her training is ridiculous... but she is the daughter of Luke Skywalker and heir to the Skywalker bloodline.

I keep seeing this assertion being bandied about, but I don't see positive evidence in favour of it other than "She's a protagonist of a Star Wars movie who can use the Force, which means she must be related in some way to that pain in the ass nine year old who still couldn't get over sand twenty years later." That vision she has does not establish her as having Luke's genes. And indeed the idea that she is Luke's child when there's really no women in these movies other than Luke's sister leaves us looking for a missing cunt or going ... "Oh shit. So those incest-laced scenes in ANH and ESB were on purpose."

That aside, her bloodline still doesn't explain picking up Force powers as if she'd just levelled up and unlocked the "Cell Block 1138" achievement. Anakin Skywalker literally had OVER 9,000 levels of Force ability and his Force abilities untrained still came down to piloting speeders with unnatural timing. Luke didn't start picking up new and random Force powers in the space of about, what, twenty minutes or so.

No criticism - frankly I'm calling her as a new vergence in the Force like Anakin was come Episode 8, but who knows. Maybe they'll find some fiftysomething actress we could believe would tempt Luke to stick his dick in it sometime twenty years earlier. Frankly I thought we'd run into more of Han's bastard children than Luke's in this trilogy, but what the hell.

Quote:I inferred that Finn and Rey had prior training - Finn from his upbringing as a First Order stormtrooper, and Rey has at least a scrappy and pragmatic knowledge of fighting as established with her fighting with the staff. For her backstory, scavenger from a desert junkyard world, I get it. Whereas Kylo Ren had been hit by Chewbaca's crossbow shot which I buy as nullifying his advantage due to greater familiarity with the lightsaber. I'm assuming he's wearing high-quality armor, since that crossbow had notched several clean kills in fully armored stormtroopers.

Yyyyyeah, I get it, they certainly laid on the bodily injuries to convince you that Kylo Ren was injured and therefore not fighting at his best. But still. Still. This guy is implied to have been trained first by Luke, then by Snoke (calling it now, that'll be Darth Plagueis back from the dead, mark my words), then gone on to kill all of Luke's Jedi students ... and even when uninjured he can't bust into a pre-padawan's head and then can't cut her down with a lightsaber either.

Quote:There are hints of a more grounding backstory with some Jedi Academy elements alluded to. Setting up Kylo Ren for another Vader arc was pretty poor, but on the other hand he was quite a good villain. There's something in his voice, that shows he's not really robotic. I could feel that this character knew he had cast his lot with the wrong side, but is too afraid to admit it, so doubles down.

Against my better judgment I've got a feeling this guy might not be more iconic than Vader, but he'll be a little more realistic. Particularly ironic is that his chief hangup seems to be the fear that he's not as strong as Vader was ... which is pretty much exactly the same fear that Anakin Skywalker had before he fell, the fear that without the Dark Side he wasn't strong enough in the Force to save Padme.

Quote:Really liked Finn and Poe, their teamup at the beginning was great, though short.

Seconded; first pairing up of a couple of guys that a Hollywood director manages to portray without it coming off as homoerotic...although don't worry, that shit will come thick and fast between now and Ep 8.

Quote:I am looking forward to Episode 8.

I'd say that's about as much as anyone can hope for. This sucker was never meant to stand alone, it's very clearly act 1 of a three act opera. The problem now being: what can they do with it that's new and hasn't been done before? ESB expanded on ANH in every meaningful way, not least insights on the Force via Yoda. What are they going to do to make Ep 8 as big or better than ESB, since that's now the inevitable comparison to be made?

Post: #159

Yeah good points, all of them. There are inconsistencies with Kylo's portrayal - the beginning establishes as a full-fledged Sith Lord equal in stature to Maul and Vader, because him using the Force to stop the blaster bolt and suspend it in mid-air (ridiculously cool and inventive moment) is completely unprecedented. Then he becomes more of a guy in training. He didn't finish his training with Luke, and Snoke is an unknown quantity. There's not quite enough information.

The parallels between Luke and Rey are too vast. The alien creature at the cantina-esque hideout explicitly told her that Luke left the lightsaber in her possession. (However, this whole scene came out of nowhere and was a Deus Ex Machina... It's sort of handwaved by the lightsaber summoning her to it, but it just isn't quite right, and is by far the biggest failing in the script.)

And there are too many hints. The vision implies Luke left her on the desert planet, Jakku. Han offers to make her the second mate. He and Chewie are loners, so this is a very deliberate signal. He would've known that Luke's daughter was Rey as his brother-in-law, and he wants to make sure he can protect his niece now that they've found her. If she weren't related to Luke, Leia's reaction wouldn't be as warm (the hug, the "May the Force be with you"). She treated Finn as a leader impressed with a heroic soldier joining the ranks, but was more maternal with Rey. It's illogical when you realize from Leia's perspective, both of them served an equal role in getting the droid to her.

There are little nuances that I like. Kylo tries to summon Luke's lightsaber from the snow, but it flies to Rey instead. You can read it like Rey being stronger in the Force and overpowering Kylo. But I thought the film, with the sequence at that hideout stone castle location, and the speech about the lightsaber, tried to make it semi-sentient. So the way I thought of that moment was "The lightsaber chose Rey".

We don't really know how Luke and Anakin would have progressed under pressure. Obi-Wan was extremely vigilant to shelter Luke from facing Vader, but hints of fast progress were shown, like him suddenly deflecting those deflection training droids aboard the Millenium Falcon while blind. I'm not sure one way or the other whether Luke would've progressed similarly. One huge problem with the prequels is that we never saw how Anakin progressed between Phantom Menace and the Clone Wars. I don't actually know whether Rey outstripped Anakin's accomplishments in the same timeframe, because he goes from a 10 year-old to talented and rising Padawan a couple of years into his training already.

The movie does technically cover most of its bases... but the thing is they don't convince you, because it's not natural. Sure, Kylo was injured, but there's a meta thing going on where you as the thinking viewer knew that the script writers engineered it that way to make it justifiable on paper, and it actually feels more wrong, not less. I think the pacing was forward-moving enough so that you don't think about it, but it'll take you out of the film if your mind works at a faster rate than the pacing.

Post: #160

(12-19-2015 05:06 AM)CactusCat589 Wrote:  The parallels between Luke and Rey are too vast. The alien creature at the cantina-esque hideout explicitly told her that Luke left the lightsaber in her possession. (However, this whole scene came out of nowhere and was a Deus Ex Machina... It's sort of handwaved by the lightsaber summoning her to it, but it just isn't quite right, and is by far the biggest failing in the script.)

Nailed. That sequence was just choppy in terms of the narrative. Maybe there's a few minutes of deleted footage that were meant to make it run more smoothly. As it is, on screen it felt like they were trying to mash homages to the ANH cantina scene together with the cave sequence out of ESB. The lightsaber comes out of nowhere, and if I remember right Rey just appears walking down a deserted corridor in the joint for no apparent reason; they don't even tell us that she's gone looking for the bathroom or anything, it just comes out of nowhere. Maybe they were desperate to disguise the homage and overdid it, but in its present form it sort of turns the joint into "Welcome to Bunko's Bargain Basement! Get a drink, sample antiquities that I don't keep terribly well-guarded, and also have spiritual transformative experiences guaranteed to make your midichlorians come online."

Oh ... wait ... I get it! She's walked through a cloud of someone smoking deathsticks and is high!! It all makes sense!

Seriously, she's there vision-ing her brains out, and all I could think was: where the fuck has Han Solo gone? Wasn't he actually trying to negotiate a way to the Resistance or something? He just reappears in time for the First Order assault and the shooting to start.

Post: #161

I've been posting about this on a million other forums and I think I've spent hours writing about it so far... I don't really care to re-hash all that stuff so I'll just copy and paste the review I put up on another forum.

Giving the obligatory white space for spoilers now:































- It was really well done for a 2010s movie and much better than any of the prequels.

- The strongest points are the visuals and the battle/light saber scenes. The final duel between Rey and Kylo may be the best in the ENTIRE series. The fight between Finn and that other stormtrooper is very good too.

- The acting is generally good. The new characters are all really well acted, especially Rey and Kylo. One slight disappointment for me was Han Solo; Harrison Ford just doesn't have the swag he had in the 70s, he honestly comes across a little awkward in this movie. Maybe this was deliberate but I wasn't crazy about it.

- The worst part of the film is the script. It is, no joke, essentially a remake of a New Hope except with the death star renamed something else, R2D2 renamed BB8, Han Solo as the Obi Wan figure who gets killed, etc. There's also a rehash of the "I am your father" scene from empire and Luke/Leia's roles feel like forced cameos.

- You might find Rey a typical 2010s ball-busting alpha female feminist-pandering protagonist, but there's not unanimous agreement on this. I've heard plenty of red-pill types say they didn't mind rey but to me she was pretty blatant feminist pandering. Lots of suspension of narrative consistency for the sake of making her 'strong'; she gets Jedi powers with no training, schools a lifelong force-user in a lightsabre battle the first time she picks one up, etc. She's also kind of a ballbusting 'I'm always right' female character in her relationship with Finn, who in some scenes kinda comes across as the 'clueless male' trope.

Overall I'd give it maybe a 7.5 or 8 out of 10. It's great for a 2010s movie but it's not really in the discussion with the original trilogy. Maybe comparable to Jedi... MAYBE. It has the feeling of a "homage"/nostalgia piece, which does not detract from the film's value as an experience but does detract somewhat from its status in the Star Wars cannon.

Post: #162

Why is this tread in the deep forum?

Post: #163

I had already decided to not watch this as I knew it would suck, but reading these reviews, I could have hardly imagined that it would suck this much. They merely remade the first movie with some added feminism? It's like they're not even trying...

Post: #164

Corny lines, bad acting, worse writing, and a fumbling pace make for a predictable rehash. I'll give it a generous 6/10 for neat visuals and a solid soundtrack.
None of the characters had any depth and their development is typical of a J.J. Abrams film... in that it is virtually non-existent.
Kylo Ren turned out to be a hipster wearing a helmet and I'd be willing to bet that Rey is gonna go Mudshark with Finn at some point.

The movie failed in every conceivable way. If you're determined to pay money for a big screen experience be my guest, but get drunk or high before doing so, it can only help.

Post: #165

(12-19-2015 02:17 PM)Andy_B Wrote:  You might find Rey a typical 2010s ball-busting alpha female feminist-pandering protagonist, but there's not unanimous agreement on this. I've heard plenty of red-pill types say they didn't mind rey but to me she was pretty blatant feminist pandering. Lots of suspension of narrative consistency for the sake of making her 'strong'; she gets Jedi powers with no training, schools a lifelong force-user in a lightsabre battle the first time she picks one up, etc. She's also kind of a ballbusting 'I'm always right' female character in her relationship with Finn, who in some scenes kinda comes across as the 'clueless male' trope.

That's kind of my problem with the character of Rey too. Her growth in using the Force is way too fast, and a bigger point is that she doesn't really have to struggle as much as any of her Force-using predecessors in order to achieve the same results: mastery over the lightsaber and wielding the Force.

The great thing about Luke is that he had to work at it, struggle, screw up, and learn from his mistakes until all that hard work paid off in ROTJ and even then it wasn't all that easy.

Anakin also had to work at it, train, screw up, and try to learn from his mistakes but his downfall was his ego and his fear. Still, he didn't become badass without hard work.

Even then, all Jedi have to work at understanding the Force on a more spiritual and philosophical level as well. Like the Knights Templar, which they draw inspiration from, being a Jedi requires physical, mental, and spiritual effort.

I also think that it's a larger statement about the things a man has to do to hone his skill to achieve his goal: practice with effort and consistency, do, learn from mistakes and successes, and repeat the process until you achieve a level of mastery or competence. Work hard and consistently to get what you want.

Rey's male predecessors had to work to get to the level they were at to beat their adversaries. Rey just kind of puts a little effort into it and she gets it. If she and Kylo had fought each other to a stalemate, that would have been enough.

Is this an oversight by the writers or some type of SJW agenda? I don't know. But made the fights between Luke and Vader in ESB and Anakin and Dooku in AOTC significant is that they got their ass beat; they got their egos checked. With the final fight in TFA, there's no suspense. Rey beat Kylo's ass like the bitch he is and I have no doubt she'll beat his ass again. Maybe next time she'll be kicking him and yelling, "Give up you sexist, misogynistic, cis-gendered, shit lord!" while he's curled in the fetal position crying.

Post: #166

Shes not Lukes daughter, shes Hans.

Post: #167

What makes you think that?

Its more feasible that Luke got her mom pregnant and the mom died in child birth or something.

Post: #168

(12-19-2015 05:05 PM)NomadofEU Wrote:  Corny lines, bad acting, worse writing, and a fumbling pace make for a predictable rehash. I'll give it a generous 6/10 for neat visuals and a solid soundtrack.
None of the characters had any depth and their development is typical of a J.J. Abrams film... in that it is virtually non-existent.
Kylo Ren turned out to be a hipster wearing a helmet and I'd be willing to bet that Rey is gonna go Mudshark with Finn at some point.

The movie failed in every conceivable way. If you're determined to pay money for a big screen experience be my guest, but get drunk or high before doing so, it can only help.

I get this impression from all of Abrams' films. There's something soulless about his films..now I know why. There's not a single original thought in anything he does.

Lucas stole a lot from Kurosawa, eastern religion, serials, and flash gordan but he still brought all those elements together and wrote a mythology. He fucked it up later but the original work still stands.

Abrams is not a creator but an imitator. A person who makes updated copies of classics with retro hip fan fiction ideas thrown in. Hollywood is more of this these days than actual creative content.

Post: #169

I liked the movie. Yes the plot seemed all too familiar, and there was some good actors and bad actors. Rey seemed to learn the Force way too fast, so it felt like they were trying to cram everything into one movie.

One thing that stuck with me is that Luke did not take the lightsaber from Rey's hand. Perhaps he was so broken up about losing Kylo to the dark side that he did not want to use the Force ever again.

Post: #170

(12-19-2015 05:27 PM)Anti-Riot Wrote:  That's kind of my problem with the character of Rey too. Her growth in using the Force is way too fast, and a bigger point is that she doesn't really have to struggle as much as any of her Force-using predecessors in order to achieve the same results: mastery over the lightsaber and wielding the Force.

The great thing about Luke is that he had to work at it, struggle, screw up, and learn from his mistakes until all that hard work paid off in ROTJ and even then it wasn't all that easy.

Anakin also had to work at it, train, screw up, and try to learn from his mistakes but his downfall was his ego and his fear. Still, he didn't become badass without hard work.

On the other hand, and I hope to God it's a theme they pick up in future episodes, consider what Yoda says about the Dark Side:

Luke: Is the Dark Side stronger?
Yoda: No. No. Quicker, easier, more seductive.

If they'd been smart they would've shown Rey getting enraged before she broke into that stormtrooper's mind, rather than calming herself and focusing on her third attempt as it was. Then you would have a plausible explanation for the sudden grant of Force powers: because the Dark Side is quick and seductive, and (if she's a Skywalker) she's suspectible to its temptations. That would also have been an excellent reason for her to go and find Luke - to learn how not to rely on fear or rage to draw on the Force. That's why the sudden grant of Force powers in the movie is wrong - because it's meant to be only the Dark Side that is the quick and easy path to getting the Force into bed.

EDIT: Also had a thought ... what if Rey isn't Luke's bastard -- but rather, a child of Emperor Palpatine?

Post: #171

(12-19-2015 05:35 PM)Raitheon Wrote:  Shes not Lukes daughter, shes Hans.

I was getting that feel from the film myself. However, I'm not a Star Wars fan, the last one I recall watching was the first one in the 80's when Harrison Ford was young faced and Indiana Jones-ish.

I went to watch the film yesterday and it was surprisingly good (again, bear in mind that I'm not a Star Wars fan and I don't have the hypercritical eye that a true fan would on finer details). It reminded me of Avatar (which I enjoyed). I can't recall the mind control from the original or any other parts besides Darth Vader being someone's son (or father) and the light saber battles. They jazzed it up for the 21st century and I didn't feel disappointed. Thumbs up for that film.

Post: #172

(12-18-2015 10:20 PM)azulsombra Wrote:  Spoilers?









Someone else already broke it down further but my main issues were:

1. They made the chick way too powerful to believe. By the time the movie ended she was almost Yoda level with no training whatsoever. I get that they wanted to show her natural talent(grrl power)but come on. It just got ridiculous, she has no room to grow if she is already at beast mode from the first film. I'm thinking she will be revealed as Luke's daughter or something in the next movie.

2. The movie was too much of a rehash of the first star wars film. They played it super safe with pretty much the exact same settings, script, and no explanation of the past 30 years.

The milennium falcon was supposed to be an old piece of shit spacecraft in the original film and your telling me after all the battles it was in and decades of neglect it not only flies but it can outmaneuver much newer aircraft? That would be like fighting in World War II with WW1 era aircraft and coming out on top. They should have just had the balls to come up with a new spaceship.

Also Spoilers my take:
























The Bad: I found the villain of the movie underwhelming. He looks like a dweeb and doesn't seem menacing at all. His lightsaber fighting skills are below par in spite of the fact that he was trained as Luke Skywalker's apprentice and killed everyone of the Jedi Order started by Luke.

And he is a man with Daddy issues that turned to the Dark side because of that.

And I found the chick character obnoxious especially when she was rescued by Fin on her home planet. She had that obnoxious attitude of an empowered grrl power character Who is portrayed as bloody owning all those burly alien males in spite of being a petite female who gets more tolerable later on although all her actions later on seem to be acting like a man with a female suit(With of course grrl power making her ridiculously powerful in the film)

Other than that I found JJ Abrams overused the lens flare effects in the film.


The good

The film sections featuring Finn and Poe as well as the interactions between various X-Wing Fighters were excellent. That and the original cast of Han Solo and the Wookie.

Post: #173

(12-16-2015 09:20 PM)Paracelsus Wrote:  Double post: I've had a chance to think about it, and I'm probably downgrading this film a couple of notches now that the afterglow has faded.

This film was written about 2-3 years ago, when grrrl-power and rape culture propaganda were at their height. It shows, and it had its desired reaction. When I checked on Murdoch's news.com this morning there was a long, gloating feminist article about all the "empowered" things Rey does in this movie -- but a couple of hours later I've checked back and it's disappeared, I'm not sure whether for the ideological bent or because it contains a shitload of spoilers.

Basically, Rey is not only turned into a superhero who don't need no man around, she's made into a hypercompetent superhero as well. It is a glaring addition -- and even the women I spoke to tentatively about this rolled their eyes when I described what the character does.

I've been sipping from the Last Psychiatrist cup a lot recently, so I've been ruminating on this: exactly why would Disney have taken this sort of risk on an IP this big? Saying 'BECAUSE IT'S A FEMINIST PLOT TO CHANGE THE NARRATIVE' is a bit too simplistic: Disney believes in money, not vaginas. They spent four billion on Star Wars. This film would not have gotten anywhere near a silver screen unless that script had been combed over again and again by Disney's marketing consultants and upper management making sure it was in a form they thought people would swallow in vast numbers.

One conclusion I come to is: they took this route because Joseph Campbell's hero cycle is more or less dead as a storytelling device for men in Hollywood. Dear old Christopher Vogler's book The Writer's Journey has finally hit its logical endpoint where it was being used so frequently and so ineptly that Hollywood -- or big films anyway -- have to discard it, parody it, or disguise it because it's too predictable. And because men are turning away from movie theatres in larger and larger numbers, they have to desperately broaden their base.

Had Abrams gone with a more standard male protagonist who slowly learns his secret abilities under a competent teacher as the movie goes on, the movie would have been derided as cliche and derivative. And whether feminists like it or not this film has a primary target audience of young men and teenagers. Even last night, at a midnight screening, it was overwhelmingly young guys who turned up to watch this, not women.

But here's where I get to a very dark and sad pass: making a hypercompetent female protagonist is not an overt attempt to change the narrative in favour of women. I don't doubt that more indie or overt political movies are designed to do precisely that. Rather, I take a contrarian view: the female casting and the story imposed on that female protagonist are troubling commentaries on where our women lie right now.

Let's start with the basic proposition that in order to make a lot of people sit and enjoy your film, you have to give them characters with whom they identify. David Farland makes a merciless (and singular) discussion of this harsh reality in the context of novels: in virtually all bestsellers, the book features escape from ordinary life and features a wide cast of variable ages and of both genders. Harry Potter does this best: the cast ranges from fucking ancient types like Dumbledore down to prepubescent teenagers, and as a result there's a wide audience appeal. The same goes for films.

So. What tranche of audience members was Rey meant to appeal to? I mean, like any other character, she is in there because the writers hope or expect a large number of women will resonate with her; her prominence as a character means her circumstances and basic attitude have to mirror or reflect a large portion of the target female audience.

Rey is a twentysomething female loner sitting on a dead-end planet with no family or kids, low woman on the totem pole and just surviving (and not well) in a brutally capitalist system, with no father or mother identified to us, but who is very good at a tiny subset of tech-related maintenance activities (while being almost delusionally committed to waiting around "for her family", literally marking the time).

The writers then take the female audience viewer through a life-changing journey by proxy, playing to such women's self-aggrandising fantasies that they can master something the moment they touch it, learn Force powers without any prior training, and (eventually) leave the boy who has been risking his life to save her firmly in the friendzone (and ultimately, on another planet entirely).

As TLP says: if you're seeing it, the ad is for you. Movies -- especially ones like Star Wars -- are fundamentally about escapism. They are about fooling a person at an unconscious level that they are the person in the film.

Rey, then, is not a figure of female empowerment. Quite the opposite: she is JJ Abrams' barometer of Western women -- purposeless women living hand-to-mouth lives with no deeper or spiritual purpose to their existence, women so starved of a purpose they have to be fed myths of hypercompetence and instant mastery to get through their days without cutting themselves. This is the lot that feminism has left us.

If someone knew of her beauty. I don't think this woman would be low on the totem pole for long if the actress is any indication.

As a wife of some powerful male she would end up quite high status before long.

But then that would be sexist and misogynist.

Post: #174

Just saw it.

Verdict: just passable, for the flying scenes. Far too derivative. Far too deferential to the feminist narrative. The absence of a strong male character kills it. You can see that Harrison Ford hated every minute of this and was shamed and bribed into doing it. With the exception of some all too brief banter with Chewbacca, he was just distressing to watch, thinking of what he was and what he has become and I am not talking about his ageing. The younger male actors were fucking lame. Even the token slimy-corpulent-desert-dwelling-ripoff-merchant-alien-blob character was a mere shadow of previous renditions of this role.

If they could not have slipped Harrison Ford some methamphetamine before takes they really should have written in an additional role for an actor with the presence of Alec Guiness / Liam Neeson. I cannot help but think that someone like Alan Dale could really have done some of the heavy lifting needed to drag this thing up a few notches.

Even Jar Jar fucking Binks would have been welcome. My god .. what am I saying!!

The fucking nod to grrl power just shows you how wretched society has become in the last 40 years. That line 'stop grabbing my hand I can run by myself'. It must have only been repeated twice, but shit it seemed like 50 times. Jesus Fuck.

At least she wasn't obese and covered from head to foot with tattoos and piercings ... mind you there are two more of these to come so we'll see.

A best picture contender this ain't.

Post: #175

(12-18-2015 10:20 PM)azulsombra Wrote:  The milennium falcon was supposed to be an old piece of shit spacecraft in the original film and your telling me after all the battles it was in and decades of neglect it not only flies but it can outmaneuver much newer aircraft? That would be like fighting in World War II with WW1 era aircraft and coming out on top. They should have just had the balls to come up with a new spaceship.

There's no real scientific and technological progress in the Star Wars universe; because the purpose of the franchise was to tell the spiritual history/future, while portraying God as evil and the kingdom of Satan as good.

The Empire = Kingdom of Heaven.
The Emperor = God the Father
Lord Darth Vader = The eternal Word of God that became incarnate as the Lord Jesus Christ by a virgin birth, the Jedi (Jewish Elders) know He is the Chosen One (Messiah) but reject Him anyway, storms the Temple, appears to be defeated and left for dead by the Jedi (Jewish religious authorities) but is resurrected
The Rebel Alliance (Republic) = Mystery Babylon
Princess Leia = The Whore of Babylon
Han Solo and Luke Skywalker = represent Azazel and Semyaza (Genesis/Enoch) in the past, and prefigure the Antichrist and False Prophet of the future (Revelation).
The ending of the Return of the Jedi = Satan's wish that the Triune God would commit suicide somehow (the Son turning against the Father), leaving Satan and his minions in charge after telling them that they'd been right about God all along.


In fact, they seem to have waited decades for the influence of Christianity to wane to do the Prequels, because the parallels would have been too obvious to earlier generations. Now, however, with the full backstory (occult reveal) of the Lord Jesus as Darth Vader, the original esoteric goals were accomplished and George Lucas could sell out to Disney.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gziIo8mjWlI


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



This is confirmed by the fact that they used the actor (Ewan McGregor) who played Obiwan as is cast as the reporter who discovers the bizarre truth in the Men Who Stare At Goats (about USA government's "Jedi", who seek supernatural power from occult practices, not from unity with the Triune God).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xHFsl2-QtpA

Ewan McGregor (Obiwan): "You are a Jedi warrior? I don't know what that means." (Wink wink, nod nod)


The movie version of the Jedi "Predator" weapon:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sz8QC2Ng3Vs

The real life version as used by US military:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=msVWf1qTNLA

"it is been carried today by the 82nd Airborne in Iraq, it is called the Predator. 'It is friendly to the earth, and all the other things we talk about, <b>but it has a spirit to it</b>' " (video, 1:07 - 1:17))