star wars: the force awakens (spoilers)

[Bamyasi]

Sort of like when people posted memes.

It's funny because they don't know it's a marketing trick that took seven years in George Lucas's basement to develop.

Kidnapped children were used as focus groups. I only found out because one of them escaped and told me about it despite being under contract

We have a word for people who do stuff like this but it escapes me.

[Stu4U]

i liked it
the big spoiler of han being kylo ren's dad seemed really weird at first considering it was first told to us in the form of a big cgi alien hologram guy. but i accepted it afterwards during the bridge scene. (rip ;-;)

also glad to see lightsaber fights are actual fights again and not sequenced dancing and twirling like how it was in the prequels.

[Bamyasi]

Jokes aside I'm kind of surprised I'm the only person ITT who didn't like this movie at all. None of the people I saw it with did either.

Like the most common defense seems to be "It was better than the prequels," but I really don't think it was, at least not by much. I'm not trying to ruin anybody's fun but how many people knew exactly how bad the prequels were before the Plinkett reviews? I certainly didn't.

Complaints about the pacing have been brought up ITT, but I thought the main problem was with scope. It was basically a remake of the first movie, but they didn't know how to improve on the 1977 version so they just made everything bigger: bigger Death Star, bigger emperor (I get he was a hologram but my point stands), blowing up six planets instead of one, two Luke Skywalkers, two Han Solos, etc. What they should have done was taken a page out of Miller's book, scaled back and made the movie actually about something.

I also couldn't get invested in the characters' struggle, personally. I was somewhat surprised when they killed off Harrison Ford, but if they follow through with making the origin story they can obviously still merchandise his character (I probably sound really cynical here but this is Disney we're talking about.) The scenes where Mary Sue was in danger didn't thrill me in the slightest, because I knew nothing significantly bad could happen to her, as she didn't just have her own wits, guts, and plot/sequel armor protecting her, but also collective feminist ideology, which in this case is just repackaged sexism. What did her character even want? Did she have any desires whatsoever? At least when Princess Leia was being rescued in every single fucking movie in the original trilogy, there was always a chance someone would die, because the people rescuing her were, ya know, expendable knights i.e. regular dudes. The storm trooper guy was slightly more interesting if only because he kind of wanted the girl or something I dunno. They were both really bad actors. I can deal with camp, but there's no reason a $200,000,000 movie should be campy in any way whatsoever, sorry.

Kizu has brought up most of these points already with more forgiveness because he's not a jaded faggot.

It's so dense, every single frame has so much going on.

I also agree with this but I do not think it is in any way a positive thing. I watched Star Wars (1977) recently, and I thought one of the reasons the first act felt so vast was because it took place in a fucking desert where only about a tenth of every shot was filled with relevant information. Kinda like how a space opera should feel, like you're in space or something, idk.

Anyway I wouldn't really consider myself a Star Wars fan (aside from KOTOR), and I did walk into the theater with very low expectations so there was probably some confirmation bias at play in my assessment. The bar was just soooo loooow (pun intended). Most any surprise would have been a pleasant one, and there really should have been more considering they could have probably gotten anyone to write it. Star Wars (1977) ripped of Dune and Kurosawa. All Star Wars (2015) ripped off was... more Star Wars. I guess it was as good as it needed to be to make billions of dollars, though.

One of my friends said the only way the main character in this could be redeemed would be if she turns out to be a reincarnation of Darth Vader, which I agree with, but there's already been so much Vader fetishism in this franchise, and the new movie did nothing to temper that.

Search your feelings you know it's true etc.

[MealGin]

Everybody already made really good points so me posting a detailed review isn't gonna have anything that wasn't already said.

But I will say that I did quite enjoy the movie, and I hope some of the flaws of the movie get addressed in the sequels. (Kinda nice that Captain Phasma is gonna get a bigger role in the next one apparently) The movie wasn't perfect (no one should not have went into the movie with that mentality), but for what it offered, I was satisfied.

EDIT: Something no one here pointed out that I'm actually really curious about:
[spoiler]How the hell did blowing up Death Star 3.0 awake R2D2 from droid hibernation?[/spoiler]

[rtil]

Like the most common defense seems to be "It was better than the prequels," but I really don't think it was, at least not by much. I'm not trying to ruin anybody's fun but how many people knew exactly how bad the prequels were before the Plinkett reviews? I certainly didn't.

you should probably re-watch the prequels then (if you can stomach it).. because they're really fucking bad - especially AOTC. in anticipation for TFA i rewatched all 6 live action star wars movies so my thoughts on them are fresh. there is practically nothing redeeming about the prequels. the only thing i can think of is maybe Ewan Mcgregor, who seemed to be the only person (besides possibly McDiarmid) who gave a shit about what was going on. even the imaginative worlds Lucas dreamed up look like bad video game graphics now as the CGI from that era has not aged well. it didn't help that the prequel worlds were already very sterile to begin with as they looked unnatural from the start.

when TPM came out i was 12 i think. as a kid, i liked it. when AOTC came out i think i was 15. the only thing i can remember is that i saw it twice and i liked it except the romance stuff. by the time ROTS came out i was 18 and i was not as impressionable. i remember laughing at the Vader reveal scene. laughing at how bad it was, watching it in the theater thinking, oh my god, is this really happening? they left this in the movie and didn't think it was funny? i'm not supposed to be laughing, am i?

the Plinkett reviews were cathartic. it's fun to laugh at how bad they are because actually watching them is a chore and not fun at all - unless maybe you're in a group of people and everyone is drinking. the cgi is dated, the script is terrible, the acting is stale, there are no stakes and you don't care about the characters, especially Anakin because he spends the whole trilogy whining and brooding.

TFA is no Empire.. it's probably not as good as ANH and maybe even ROTJ, if not for the simple fact of the legacy they left behind. but it's most certainly miles better than any of the prequel films. you have to understand how poorly Phantom set up everything for the rest of the prequel trilogy, and how badly they fucked up by killing off the titular villain.  at the very least TFA has salvageable themes and freshly established characters that can be developed.

Complaints about the pacing have been brought up ITT, but I thought the main problem was with scope. It was basically a remake of the first movie, but they didn't know how to improve on the 1977 version so they just made everything bigger: bigger Death Star, bigger emperor (I get he was a hologram but my point stands), blowing up six planets instead of one, two Luke Skywalkers, two Han Solos, etc. What they should have done was taken a page out of Miller's book, scaled back and made the movie actually about something.

has no one talked about this here? because this is probably the most-discussed criticism of TFA - that it was just a reboot of ANH. a valid criticism but not necessarily a bad thing. but i do think JJ leaned too much on the fact that this film is the first installment of a trilogy, because as a standalone film it is missing a lot of things. but i still enjoyed it.

I also couldn't get invested in the characters' struggle, personally. I was somewhat surprised when they killed off Harrison Ford, but if they follow through with making the origin story they can obviously still merchandise his character (I probably sound really cynical here but this is Disney we're talking about.) The scenes where Mary Sue was in danger didn't thrill me in the slightest, because I knew nothing significantly bad could happen to her, as she didn't just have her own wits, guts, and plot/sequel armor protecting her, but also collective feminist ideology, which in this case is just repackaged sexism. What did her character even want? Did she have any desires whatsoever? At least when Princess Leia was being rescued in every single fucking movie in the original trilogy, there was always a chance someone would die, because the people rescuing her were, ya know, expendable knights i.e. regular dudes. The storm trooper guy was slightly more interesting if only because he kind of wanted the girl or something I dunno. They were both really bad actors. I can deal with camp, but there's no reason a $200,000,000 movie should be campy in any way whatsoever, sorry.

Harrison Ford originally wanted Han Solo to die in Empire. he finally got his wish.

Rey wanted to get off that shithole of a planet - and she probably could have a long time ago if not for the fact that she was waiting for her parents/caretakers to come back someday, so she stayed put with the faith that they would. if i'm not mistaken it was Leia who told her it was time to let go of that.

once she realized that the Force was calling her, she didn't want to accept the responsibility. if someone's life was at risk (like Finn's), she doesn't hesistate to try and protect them. but at the end of the film she is very clearly looking at Luke with concern or distress, literally handing the lightsaber back to Luke because she wants him to take the burden of that calling away from her. she even ran away from it twice during the film.

idk, i thought it was pretty obvious. i suppose it could have been more clear with spouts of more expository dialogue or scenes, but it didn't feel necessary.

i disagree that Ridley and Boyega are bad actors. not going to argue about it but i just disagree. i will say though that Star Wars has a history of delightful campiness and i don't see anything wrong with it.

[rtil]

[spoiler]How the hell did blowing up Death Star 3.0 awake R2D2 from droid hibernation?[/spoiler]

there seems to be a ton of confusion about this scene. i was convinced while watching the film that r2 activated by sensing the nearby presence of luke's lightsaber. it's plausible that he would be able to detect its signature, even though his ROTJ lightsaber that he tossed off to luke on Jabba's barge was a new model, lightsabers are rare weapons, and it's possible that r2 can sense their frequency or whatever.

i could be totally wrong about this as it's purely speculation, but that's what immediately came to mind to me while watching the movie. i've heard other theories, though.

[Bamyasi]

Thanks for the response. I more than trust your judgment about the prequels, and I respect your assessment of this one, but I still think its being better than the former is kind of a weak argument for liking TFA. It seems a lot of people were okay with the prequels as kids (I certainly didn't know any better, but I mostly was okay with them (at least the latter two) for things other movies/anime/games I saw/played a bit later did much better, like sci-fi cityscapes and alien worlds and junk), and so felt betrayed looking back on them and realizing they'd been cheated out of quality Star Wars movies at a formative age.

I probably should have read/watched more criticism of TFA before posting. This Washington Post column addresses a lot of my gripes. The RLM review did bring up a few minor things I'd almost forgotten I enjoyed (new Vader having temper tantrums, the possibility that the villain might be 4 feet tall). I definitely didn't mean to imply that TFA being a remake of '77 was inherently a bad thing, but why bother trying to (crudely) improve on something so many people consider next to perfection? Yeah, I know, for a new generation and stuff. A generation who's moms care about gender representation in all the wrong ways.

Which was really my main problem with the movie, or at least the one RLM talked about the least, but I'm guessing has been nitpicked to death on other corners of the internet. The refresher on Rey's motives is much appreciated, but I still think she was a boring character. Effective? Totally, but still utterly uninteresting. This Bloomberg column is the best summation of her flaws (namely, flawlessness). Comparing her to Luke in the original movie, as many people have: at least with Luke we got to feel his longing to explore the galaxy when we saw his home life; Rey was on an adventure from the very start. Luke is a whiny bitch throughout most of the original saga, Rey is only bitchy in the most polite way possible, when she's proving how innately good she is at everything (because of course it matters most if she's impressing a man). Luke was more or less thrust into a story he was superficially unrelated to, but I bought it because of the Campellian structure of his character. Rey is thrust into the story because she's Luke with a vagina. Luke wanted to see the stars and fulfill his destiny and maybe possibly fuck his sister and/or join his father in whipping the cosmos into submission. Rey, as far as we can tell, just wants to be out of frame. That, at the very least, I can sympathize with.

Leia, in my opinion, was much more interesting and made far more decisions of consequence in the original movie. She was kicking Imperial ass from the very first scene, albeit diplomatically, which no one seems to regard as actual ass kicking. I guess everyone was so distracted by the midriff in RotJ they forgot that she basically kickstarted the whole story, even if it was by saying all doe eyed "Save me from the plot, Obi-wan Kenobe," or whatever. I don't care if someone uses their eyes or status or midriff to gain favors, it's still more agency than Rey had.

Given her character will hopefully complicate in Rian Johnson's story, but I think it's very telling that she was left out of Habro's first set. I played with dolls as a kid, and I still wouldn't have any interest staging scenes with Rey. Maybe girls would, but I think Rey's representation is just as unhealthy and unrealistic as, say, Galaxina's. A slight improvement, maybe, but Fury Road also came out this year, and no western blockbuster within memory has even come close to having a heroine like San, Utena, Usagi, Sakura, Madoka, etc.

So yeah, I feel like the stakes criticism of the prequels more or less translates. You're right about the camp, though. I guess it just felt more natural when everything was done practically and we weren't relying on movies to reinforce ideologies that supposedly aren't in favor of the status quo. That's a good rule of thumb. If you're starting to wonder if the movie you're watching might be feminist or revolutionary in some other way, check for the Disney logo.

I suck.

[rtil]

Thanks for the response. I more than trust your judgment about the prequels, and I respect your assessment of this one, but I still think its being better than the former is kind of a weak argument for liking TFA. It seems a lot of people were okay with the prequels as kids (I certainly didn't know any better, but I mostly was okay with them (at least the latter two) for things other movies/anime/games I saw/played a bit later did much better, like sci-fi cityscapes and alien worlds and junk), and so felt betrayed looking back on them and realizing they'd been cheated out of quality Star Wars movies at a formative age.

i'm not saying i liked TFA on the principle that it's a better film than any of the prequels. i liked it for more reasons than that. although my list of qualifications for good was short:
1. feel like a star wars movie
2. don't suck
the latter of which is  entirely subjective, but met my own standards. my favorite film of 2015 is Fury Road but i didn't see very many films this year. i just don't watch many movies in general.

i also was very nervous about seeing TFA, nervous about it sucking really bad. i wasn't blown away but i did like it. i will be seeing it again this coming week and i feel like for my 2nd viewing i'll have been able to properly digest it. watching it the first time was strange for me because i had been waiting so long to see it and it was over so fast.

i do consider myself a star wars fan but i'm not as much into it outside of the films and the series. in fact i've never read a star wars book or owned a star wars toy.. but i have always enjoyed the OT and the Clone Wars spinoffs (minus the original Clone Wars animated film). so i follow it to a larger degree than your average person i guess.

I probably should have read/watched more criticism of TFA before posting. This Washington Post column addresses a lot of my gripes. The RLM review did bring up a few minor things I'd almost forgotten I enjoyed (new Vader having temper tantrums, the possibility that the villain might be 4 feet tall). I definitely didn't mean to imply that TFA being a remake of '77 was inherently a bad thing, but why bother trying to (crudely) improve on something so many people consider next to perfection? Yeah, I know, for a new generation and stuff. A generation who's moms care about gender representation in all the wrong ways.

Which was really my main problem with the movie, or at least the one RLM talked about the least, but I'm guessing has been nitpicked to death on other corners of the internet. The refresher on Rey's motives is much appreciated, but I still think she was a boring character. Effective? Totally, but still utterly uninteresting. This Bloomberg column is the best summation of her flaws (namely, flawlessness). Comparing her to Luke in the original movie, as many people have: at least with Luke we got to feel his longing to explore the galaxy when we saw his home life; Rey was on an adventure from the very start. Luke is a whiny bitch throughout most of the original saga, Rey is only bitchy in the most polite way possible, when she's proving how innately good she is at everything (because of course it matters most if she's impressing a man). Luke was more or less thrust into a story he was superficially unrelated to, but I bought it because of the Campellian structure of his character. Rey is thrust into the story because she's Luke with a vagina. Luke wanted to see the stars and fulfill his destiny and maybe possibly fuck his sister and/or join his father in whipping the cosmos into submission. Rey, as far as we can tell, just wants to be out of frame. That, at the very least, I can sympathize with.

i think star wars fans make a mistake of instantly going back to Luke when people accuse Rey of being written as a Mary Sue because it only reaffirms the truth that Rey is indeed one. Luke was extremely force-sensitive and yes, he went from simple farmboy to rebellion hero by destroying the Death Star after very little training. but he still got his ass saved by his friends sometimes. Rey seems capable of all things. the one time she does fuck up by accidentally releasing the rathtars (the creatures on Han's trading ship), it actually ends up working in their favor and Finn miraculously escapes death. this might be the biggest flaw in TFA's writing for me, but for whatever reason it didn't aggravate me.

she's "heard stories" of the Jedi, so i suppose one can assume she had heard of what the Jedi can do. the problem with the Force is that its mysticism was muddled by the prequels. in the OT, you did not really need a whole lot of training to use it. it was something you could either feel or not. Luke said "the force is strong in my family" - even Leia, who never received any formal training or may have never even heard of the Force, was highly resistant to the mind-probing of the Empire, knew when a loved one was calling to her and in need of help (Luke in Empire & ROTJ, Han in TFA). but in the prequels, all the magic of it was stripped away with midichlorians and the boring stoicism of the practices in the Jedi Temple, where the Force was treated more or less as an academic pursuit. all the makeshift training that Obi-wan and Yoda taught Luke with were now relics from a "golden age" when Jedi were numbered in the hundreds and your lightsaber was as important as your life. the Force wasn't even really all that important in the prequels, it was just used to do stupid things like throw people and shot energy balls. basically everything fun and interesting about it was reduced to something more akin to power levels.

so before all that it wouldn't have been entirely implausible that Rey could tap into a power she hadn't even heard of or known before. still, the fact she can do everything pretty much by herself is where the true fault in her character lies. despite that i did think that she has humanity in her and is relatable in the sense that she did not ask for or wants the burden that the "will" of the Force has given to her, even if it has instilled her with great power and ability to adapt. the weight of that responsibility weighs heavily on her and she clearly doesn't want it.

i do agree that we don't get to spend enough time with each individual character and learn more about them. i do think i said earlier in this thread that i just wanted more of everything, and that includes more of Rey's life on Jakku. but i wouldn't necessarily describe her early scenes on Jakku as an adventure, essentially living life as a wage slave for scraps. but it was short lived.

Leia, in my opinion, was much more interesting and made far more decisions of consequence in the original movie. She was kicking Imperial ass from the very first scene, albeit diplomatically, which no one seems to regard as actual ass kicking. I guess everyone was so distracted by the midriff in RotJ they forgot that she basically kickstarted the whole story, even if it was by saying all doe eyed "Save me from the plot, Obi-wan Kenobe," or whatever. I don't care if someone uses their eyes or status or midriff to gain favors, it's still more agency than Rey had.

Given her character will hopefully complicate in Rian Johnson's story, but I think it's very telling that she was left out of Habro's first set. I played with dolls as a kid, and I still wouldn't have any interest staging scenes with Rey. Maybe girls would, but I think Rey's representation is just as unhealthy and unrealistic as, say, Galaxina's. A slight improvement, maybe, but Fury Road also came out this year, and no western blockbuster within memory has even come close to having a heroine like San, Utena, Usagi, Sakura, Madoka, etc.

So yeah, I feel like the stakes criticism of the prequels more or less translates. You're right about the camp, though. I guess it just felt more natural when everything was done practically and we weren't relying on movies to reinforce ideologies that supposedly aren't in favor of the status quo. That's a good rule of thumb. If you're starting to wonder if the movie you're watching might be feminist or revolutionary in some other way, check for the Disney logo.

i guess there are really no stakes for Rey because she has nothing to lose (except possibly her new friends). she probably still desperately wants to know who her parents were/why they left her on Jakku, but we don't completely know that for sure. Finn's future in the trilogy is uncertain but he is billed for ep 8, and he is still at large as far as the First Order is concerned. Captain Phasma and Kylo Ren have severely damaged egos. i don't really know what the stakes are for the bigger picture because i have no idea what the strength of the First Order and Resistance are after losing 1 laser planet and 5 homeworlds did to their numbers because we never were given any background on the current status of the galaxy, but i can only assume we'll eventually find out?

everything in the prequels just didn't fucking matter because the entire arc was based on the "idiot plot" trope. while JJ could have done a better job framing the Star Wars universe in the scope it deserved, i could see fragments of what he was going for. the scenes on Jakku were probably the most iconic. Rey on her speeder, a speck in the frame crossing the massive wreckage of a Star Destroyer. do we know how it got there or why? no, but it didn't really matter. it was a symbol of an era gone by. the former glory of the Empire being literally picked for scraps. the only problem was we didn't get the complete picture of the First Order and where they came from. if it was deliberately kept from us i'm not sure how to feel about that. i think it might have been a mistake.

but again i will go back and say that unlike the prequels i actually care about the characters and i liked them regardless of their rushed backstories . despite Rey's uncanny ability to tap in to the Force, she had a very real side to her in her intuition and independence. Finn's turn against the First Order was seemingly sudden, but his reluctance to tell the truth and eventual confession brought clarity to his struggle. Kylo Ren was a very convincing Vader wannabe, worshipping his helmet and ashes as a relic of the dead and forgotten Sith. but with no real Sith to train him (except Snoke but i don't know who he is exactly and he hasn't fully trained Kylo yet), he only has whatever knowledge is left of Vader to go off of. everything he has created is a mere imitation of his fantasy of Vader, even his attitude. but unlike Vader, his unable to control his anger, slashing and hacking away at control panels, beating his wounds for strength, yelling and screaming, trying to be a showoff. he is the very culmination of the raw and unhinged power of the Dark Side, and has lots of room for growth in this area. Vader in ANH was already established as a badass. he was Vader from beginning to near end, with only one goal in mind. i feel like Kylo Ren has the potential to evolve a lot with the trilogy and i look forward that.

[Gladius]

I played with dolls as a kid, and I still wouldn't have any interest staging scenes with Rey. Maybe girls would, but I think Rey's representation is just as unhealthy and unrealistic as

[Bamyasi]

Thanks for another thoughtful response. I think I'm finally starting to get the appeal, especially from the concerned fan's perspective. My problem is probably that I always compare every movie to the best I've seen from that year, or franchise, or ever, instead of judging them on their own merits. It's a flawed metric and I really need to work on it, considering I'm much more forgiving of stuff like anime and videogames. I can only speak for myself, but I definitely have gut reactions to things like movies and then rationalize them later, which was definitely the case for me here, and it certainly didn't help that my friends' guts had more or less the same reaction which fed into mine.

But yeah I can see how seeing TFA for the first time would have been a tremendous relief, like dodging the planet killing laser that is Lucas's penchant for poetry. I still think Rey's Mary Sueness could be vindicated if she turned out to be Darth Vader's reincarnation, but that probably won't happen. I was really fixated on her flaws while watching it, which I'm sure means I'm sexist or something, and it would have helped me in this to just let go of all my baggage and appreciate the movie for what it was: not terrible. It's probably also impatience on my part but I get we're coming from a time when the west had so few "positive" action heroines that anybody who isn't Lara fucking Croft is considered a radical leap forward. Hopefully there will soon be marriage between Selene-level ass-kicking and the aspirational relatability that is prerequisite in deciding if a movie is Okay For My Daughter to Watch, but I'm not banking on it being Ghost in the Shell (2017) or Battle Angel Alita.

Your point about her at least being somewhat human compared to prequel Vader is more than fair, and perhaps I rushed to judgment. She's certainly better than the heroine in those Hunger Games movies I didn't see. My criticism could probably be chalked up to a hypersensitivity when I feel a movie tries to force opinions of it's characters, or anything else, onto me, like: "Rey fights for her friends do you like her yet? How about now she's up to snuff with Han Solo? This kid sure has the moxie doesn't she? She can save herself from any situation do you like her yet? Did I mention she's an orphan?" and I'm sure legions of 4chan and GG drones probably had a similar reaction. Friggin nerds.

You're right, it is really funny that Lucas entirely forgot about his chanbara influences for the prequels with the Jedi Academy and minichlorines and everything. I agree with your point about spending more time with the characters. This movie was already leaning so heavily on plot, even only a little bit more human intimacy, like Fury Road had, would have been appreciated. FR proved it could be done without disrupting pace, but it's such a difficult balance that so few contemporary blockbusters manage. Honestly had the film just been about Rey's life and struggles on Jakku, backdropped by some terrifying political space conflict, and ended with her leaving, I might have enjoyed it better. This probably would have been really boring for everyone else though, and sustaining the tease would have been hard.

The "idiot plot" criticism for the prequels is very apt, and it's something we certainly don't see in the new one. Regarding the backstories, maybe there would have been more room for development had they been truncated? Like maybe Finn was a very effective soldier until he has to kill Rey? And he already massacred her adoptive family of Jawas so there's tension from the get-go? Maybe Rey finds Poe (whom Finn's battalion is looking for) shipwrecked in the desert and there's a bounty on his head, which she debates claiming to feed said adoptive family of Jawas? Or maybe she immediately falls in love with him having never seen such a pretty specimen of her own species (I mean it's Oscar fucking Isaac who could blame her?), making her decision to collect the bounty more complicated? And she wants to follow him to the stars like Luke did in a quest to fuck his sister? I'm not saying this would have been better/less contrived, but it could have been the first fifteen minutes of the movie and would have established the characters' desires, instead of Obi-von Sydowbi giving Poe a map to a guy no one cares about (we joked that it might as well have been a map to Jar Jar) and then dying. It just seemed like there was such a rush to get to the irrelevant characters from OT so everyone could fangasm (which they did, audibly, in the theater I was in). And then a 1,000 year old alien lady crawls across a bar table that was weird (I hope it doesn't seem like I'm nitpicking/looking for excuses to hate the movie, these were just the only other things that really stood out to me negatively while watching it).

I definitely agree with Kylo being the most complex character, and looking back he might save the movie for me on the home video rebound. Aside from that, it may seem like my opinion hasn't changed much, but talking to you about TFA has been extremely valuable for me, as I feel I have a much expanded appreciation for this movie, its flaws maybe but also its attributes. I hope you enjoy your second viewing. I'm sure it'll be amazing in 70mm IMAX.

You stop.

Also is your sig from Come and See?

[Gladius]

Also is your sig from Come and See?

yes

[rtil]

But yeah I can see how seeing TFA for the first time would have been a tremendous relief, like dodging the planet killing laser that is Lucas's penchant for poetry. I still think Rey's Mary Sueness could be vindicated if she turned out to be Darth Vader's reincarnation, but that probably won't happen. I was really fixated on her flaws while watching it, which I'm sure means I'm sexist or something, and it would have helped me in this to just let go of all my baggage and appreciate the movie for what it was: not terrible. It's probably also impatience on my part but I get we're coming from a time when the west had so few "positive" action heroines that anybody who isn't Lara fucking Croft is considered a radical leap forward. Hopefully there will soon be marriage between Selene-level ass-kicking and the aspirational relatability that is prerequisite in deciding if a movie is Okay For My Daughter to Watch, but I'm not banking on it being Ghost in the Shell (2017) or Battle Angel Alita.

Your point about her at least being somewhat human compared to prequel Vader is more than fair, and perhaps I rushed to judgment. She's certainly better than the heroine in those Hunger Games movies I didn't see. My criticism could probably be chalked up to a hypersensitivity when I feel a movie tries to force opinions of it's characters, or anything else, onto me, like: "Rey fights for her friends do you like her yet? How about now she's up to snuff with Han Solo? This kid sure has the moxie doesn't she? She can save herself from any situation do you like her yet? Did I mention she's an orphan?" and I'm sure legions of 4chan and GG drones probably had a similar reaction. Friggin nerds.

i don't think you'll get your wish that she will be a direct or indirect descendant of Vader, but i do think she will be faced with a great temptation to turn. obviously it won't be the same way as Luke or Anakin (although Anakin's temptation wasn't really all that appealing, another failing of the prequels.) but even though it's like pottery and it started with Luke, almost every Jedi faces this temptation as it's very easy to give in to the dark side of the force because it's driven by natural human emotions.

most of the discussion around Rey is about the Mary sue thing which blew up after Max Landis made a video about it (as if he was the first to notice). i mean it is an easy way to try and get an audience to like a character, but at least they didn't try to shove it down our throats with narrative or stupid dialogue. i always look back to 2009 Avatar and i'm imagining Rey narrating over the film in past-tense or having a bunch of corny catchphrases and one-liners. i guess what i'm trying to say is the movie could have been a lot dumber. that's not a very good defense of a film but it's just something i am always scared of seeing when i go in to a movie. not that Avatar was the first film to spend its entire running time insulting its audience, but it's my favorite example because i can't stand James Cameron (brave i know).

You're right, it is really funny that Lucas entirely forgot about his chanbara influences for the prequels with the Jedi Academy and minichlorines and everything. I agree with your point about spending more time with the characters. This movie was already leaning so heavily on plot, even only a little bit more human intimacy, like Fury Road had, would have been appreciated. FR proved it could be done without disrupting pace, but it's such a difficult balance that so few contemporary blockbusters manage. Honestly had the film just been about Rey's life and struggles on Jakku, backdropped by some terrifying political space conflict, and ended with her leaving, I might have enjoyed it better. This probably would have been really boring for everyone else though, and sustaining the tease would have been hard.

i'd watch it. it would be very different for a Star Wars film.

i'm curious about what was cut out and if it will be included in a director's cut or extended edition. a lot of it looked like character-focused stuff rather than action. all it really needs is 5-15 more minutes of that in the right places to feel more cohesive imo

The "idiot plot" criticism for the prequels is very apt, and it's something we certainly don't see in the new one. Regarding the backstories, maybe there would have been more room for development had they been truncated? Like maybe Finn was a very effective soldier until he has to kill Rey? And he already massacred her adoptive family of Jawas so there's tension from the get-go? Maybe Rey finds Poe (whom Finn's battalion is looking for) shipwrecked in the desert and there's a bounty on his head, which she debates claiming to feed said adoptive family of Jawas? Or maybe she immediately falls in love with him having never seen such a pretty specimen of her own species (I mean it's Oscar fucking Isaac who could blame her?), making her decision to collect the bounty more complicated? And she wants to follow him to the stars like Luke did in a quest to fuck his sister? I'm not saying this would have been better/less contrived, but it could have been the first fifteen minutes of the movie and would have established the characters' desires, instead of Obi-von Sydowbi giving Poe a map to a guy no one cares about (we joked that it might as well have been a map to Jar Jar) and then dying. It just seemed like there was such a rush to get to the irrelevant characters from OT so everyone could fangasm (which they did, audibly, in the theater I was in). And then a 1,000 year old alien lady crawls across a bar table that was weird (I hope it doesn't seem like I'm nitpicking/looking for excuses to hate the movie, these were just the only other things that really stood out to me negatively while watching it).

my only issue with Finn was that he was supposed to be a brainwashed storm trooper. you grow up your whole life with the name FN-2187 and being trained to take orders, you get in your first battle and you change just like that? what made him so different from his other troopers?  there must have been something else to have his first battle be the tipping point, but we never see it.

whoever Poe was getting that map from i feel like we'll learn more about in the next movie. it sounded like he was supposed to do something with it but failed and trusted Poe enough to continue. why he had the map or how it was created i don't know, my only guess is that the map was originally whole at some point, then the data got scattered and that was the last missing piece. idk none of this matters because we were never told. but it is an important and untreated plot point.

Maz Kanata was a strange character, i think she was supposed to be the "new" Yoda or something. but her voice just did not fit what i would imagine a 1,000-year old alien lady to sound like.

I definitely agree with Kylo being the most complex character, and looking back he might save the movie for me on the home video rebound. Aside from that, it may seem like my opinion hasn't changed much, but talking to you about TFA has been extremely valuable for me, as I feel I have a much expanded appreciation for this movie, its flaws maybe but also its attributes. I hope you enjoy your second viewing. I'm sure it'll be amazing in 70mm IMAX.

i hope i do, too. Star Wars will always be a difficult franchise to discuss without any bias because of how fucking huge it is. it's really rare that someone sees Star Wars for the first time without already knowing a lot of things about it, which is why it's always cool to see videos of children reacting to moments like the Vader reveal in Empire. you can only experience things like that once and it's very easy for them to be ruined by accident.

[Bamyasi]

Yes those videos are adorb.

What gave Finn the impetus to switch sides so soon was him being black and thus morally infallible.

In all seriousness I think our gripes with Finn's sudden treason could have been resolved by making the village attacked at the beginning be Rey's. His transition should have been a slower process, too; like Rey is shielding her Jawa family (and/or Poe, her meal ticket/crush, and the MapGuffin) from Finn and his gun (in slow motion), which gives him a heart boner for her so he can't pull the trigger (impotence), then he wants to protect her from Phasma and Rilo Kiley, and over the course of the movie he is corrupted into a softy, finally removing his helmet at the end and accepting his new name/role. Maybe he felt indebted to Phasma and the New Order for taking him in after his parents were killed by the Republic (just tossing out ideas here). There was no reason to introduce Rey in a later scene considering this all took place on the same planet I think(?)

And yes fuck Lames Camoron. It's funny to me how bad Alien 3 and 4 sucked considering those two directors would go on to become better/were already better than Scott and him.

[BluPhoenix]

i really liked it, and im going to go see it a second time tonight, and i'm sure i'll make some post about things that bug me about it after getting a second look but heres some things i remember
[spoiler]

• rey's progression with the force almost makes her seem overpowered
• i really wanted to see more of poe and phasma
• liked the subtle romantic growth between finn and rey, but the kiss at the end felt a little forced (idk maybe im just looking into it too deep)
• finn's moral dilemma and being called a traitor didn't feel like it had any emotional weight- i've been told that in one of the new books, you get a sense of how much more committed he was to his friends in his troop, but if it ain't in the movie then who cares
• and yeah, i hated the ending shot and how the camera just spun around like 3 times with them being absolutely still with zero dialogue, should've just ended with the shot of rey and chewie taking off to find luke

[/spoiler]

[Bamyasi]

It's almost like Blu just didn't read our textwalls.

Like he just skipped them or something.

[BluPhoenix]

It's almost like Blu just didn't read our textwalls.

Like he just skipped them or something.

not really, i was just saying what first came to mind after i saw it

anyways, after seeing it a second time id like to just

[spoiler]

• rey's progression with the force almost makes her seem overpowered
• i really wanted to see more of poe and phasma
• liked the subtle romantic growth between finn and rey, but the kiss at the end felt a little forced (idk maybe im just looking into it too deep) nevermind
• finn's moral dilemma and being called a traitor didn't feel like it had any emotional weight- i've been told that in one of the new books, you get a sense of how much more committed he was to his friends in his troop, but if it ain't in the movie then who cares
• and yeah, i hated the ending shot and how the camera just spun around like 3 times with them being absolutely still with zero dialogue, should've just ended with the shot of rey and chewie taking off to find luke i didnt mind this as much, this time. its not terrible, just kind of... boring, i guess?
• i still cant get over the fact that kylo ren looks like a holes-era shia labeouf
• why is there snow on the starkiller base? it absorbs the power of the sun and stores it inside of it, it must be hot as fuck there

[/spoiler]

[valiums]

I absolutely hated the "subtle romantic growth".

What are TBA's thoughts on Poe/Finn theories? 

[BluPhoenix]

I hated the "subtle romantic growth" between Finn and Rey and really hope the kiss platonic and just well-wishing for an injured friend, like I thought it was, and not "you were the first person who was nice to me congrats we r married forever now it's permanent you already touched me against my will how romantic!!!!!!!!! ladies love a man who takes charge, even if we don't know it yet  ; ; ; )".
I thought it was cute when the third hand-holding was intiated by her, but if her surrender to the ~~stirrings~~ of ~~romance~~ was what they were intending, I'll vomit in Kylo's helmet.

easy there, killer


sorry i insulted your boytoy

[valiums]

Ah shit you got the unedited version. :/

You didn't even mention Kylo.

[BluPhoenix]

i ctrl+v'd/edited my post from earlier after the fact