The Rise Of Skywalker - Abrams' Vision or Executive Meddling? — Page 2

JadedSkywalker said:

I read he had ten months to make Rise of Skywalker. Its my opinion that its a very good film to be made in such a short amount of time.

Idk…I think Jurassic Park III is a great film, and they were literally writing the script during filming. Not that’s ever a good idea, but my point is can be done well.

Ten months sounds about right, though, as Abrams was revealed as director in September 2017, and principal photography began in August 2018. Apparently Lucas was brought onboard for story meetings around that time. I can only imagine his reaction went something like this:

It’s Disney’s fault for having such a tight deadline. When Carrie passed, they should have pushed it back a year. No one external forced the release date.

100%. Regardless whose vision the final film was, it sucked because they weren’t given the time to make something better.

None of the bad decisions he made were time-based though. He would have had an extra 6-10 months to try finessing his mountain of bad ideas, but they still would have been fundamentally bad. If anything, looking at how that movie was made, it just would have been packed full of even more - and newer - bad ideas than what we got on his deadline.

Fair enough. I suppose no matter how much time you gave him, Abrams would’ve still made an Abrams film. Which is why they should’ve picked someone other than Abrams. When has Abrams ever stuck a landing on anything? Really, though, the issue isn’t his directing, it’s his writing. So long as you keep him out of the writers’ room, there shouldn’t be any problem. Kinda makes you wonder what the Prequels would’ve been like with the same script but Abrams as director.

Point is, the most fundamental issue was the script, as with just about any bad film, and the way to solve that is to rewrite or get somehow else who can. Personally, I’d have gotten a rewrite of Duel of the Fates, but that’s just me. Oh wait, no, actually, that’s probably a lot of people’s take.

Duel of fates was 2 rewrites away from serving as a great epilogue to the skywalker saga

The structural issues is that Rey and Kylo’s duel has nothing to do with what is happening on coruscant, this needs fixing

There are a lot more issues with it than just that, but yes, it did come pretty close to being a perfect ending.

Hoop28 said:

Abrams and Terrio are both competent writers, they were just poor choices for Episode IX. They tried to please everyone, make a crowd-pleasing movie that made everyone feel warm and fuzzy inside, but that’s not how it works. Attempting to please all factors involved and injecting your movie with fanservice is never a good idea. It only worked on TFA because of competent character writing from Arndt and Kasdan.

I would argue that TFA didn’t work

People never liked TFA…people tolerated TFA

People were genuinely hoping that future installments would improve the more questionable aspects of TFA

The reason TLJ fell at the box office so quickly and it’s backlash became so violent that TROS barely grossed a billion was because of pent up rage against TFA

People never liked the first order, loathed the resistance, and hoped that the new republic was still alive till TLJ confirmed that it wasn’t and that the resistance and the first order were the main factions

Than the shit storm hit

There is a reason why the final order completely overshadows the first order in episode 9

People really liked TFA. Nothing makes 900mil+ domestically out of a sense of “tolerance.”

It’s kinda silly to look at the unprecedented success (and critical reception) TFA got and say people only “tolerated” it. They obviously really, really liked it. Liking a movie and hoping the sequel does the stuff you liked EVEN BETTER aren’t mutually exclusive ideas. TLJ didn’t make as much as TFA for multiple reasons, hashed out in multiple discusssions over the last five years, but I don’t think in any way that “pent up rage” from the audience had any real effect on that box-office dip.

I still think it’s more than fair to say many opinions on TFA soured over time

Ok, but that’s not really what’s being argued. Opinions didn’t really sour that much between 2015 and 2017, and certainly not to the point where mass outbreaks of “pent up rage” affected the box-office of TLJ to a measurable degree. Even to the extent that some opinions on the film did sour in the two years (more like 1 1/2 considering its popularity) it certainly didn’t sour to the point where anyone could claim its “tolerated” popularity was only kept afloat due to the power of hope that sequels would “fix” it.

This suggested POV seems to be reflecting a small and extremely online subsect of the film’s (exponentially) larger audience.

Also: earlier in the thread, someone suggested Arndt’s character work is what contributed to TFA’s success, but I don’t believe anything about Arndt’s script save for the general structure survived the process. IIRC, the whole reason Kasdan was there was to effectively page-one rewrite everything with Abrams.

“The community” is a very small percentage of the larger audience though. Fandom isn’t as important as it thinks it is, nor does it have the numbers it thinks it does. “Fandom,” and “The Community” don’t represent a lot of power compared to the general audience. Is there some venn diagramming of the “Silent Majority” as you put it and the vocal side of a much, much smaller segment of that audience that self-identifies as “the fandom?” Definitely. Is that venn diagramming all that important to anyone but the people in that self-identified fandom? Not really.

I’m also not sure what it is you’re trying to argue in this context? That if things were different, they’d be different? TFA was liked. A lot. It wasn’t merely “Tolerated” to the level of success it enjoyed.

It’s popularity doesn’t negate or invalidate people’s feelings about the movie though. I’m not saying “Well, it was popular, so your criticisms don’t count” I have problems with TFA as a movie, too. What I’m saying is that trying to reframe its obvious and observable success both financially and critically as a mass exercise in tolerance doesn’t make any sense to me if you’re trying to reflect reality at all, nor does trying to frame TLJ’s reception (which was remarkably good if not AS remarkable as TFA’s) as a result of the general audience’s collective pent-up rage being unleashed.

“The community” is a very small percentage of the larger audience though. Fandom isn’t as important as it thinks it is, nor does it have the numbers it thinks it does. “Fandom,” and “The Community” don’t represent a lot of power compared to the general audience. Is there some venn diagramming of the “Silent Majority” as you put it and the vocal side of a much, much smaller segment of that audience that self-identifies as “the fandom?” Definitely. Is that venn diagramming all that important to anyone but the people in that self-identified fandom? Not really.

You must be right. Clearly, the fandom can’t be that big since pretty much every corner of it hated TRoS and yet audience scores are pretty positive. Then again, I think they’re taken from right after the premiere, so…

act on instinct said:

I’m with you through most of this, but this absolutely is important to the studio, they want a four quadrant blockbuster.

The four quadrants don’t include “hardcore online fandom” though. The four quadrants are men, women, young, and old. Again, do small slivers of each quadrant coincide with self-described members of fandom? Absolutely. But the utility of fandom to a studio isn’t ticket sales. It’s free marketing. And even in that instance, free marketing is just cherries on top of an expensive pie they’ve baked to do most of the real work.

I get your point about feeling dismissive, and wanting to combat that dismissiveness - but that’s partially why I responded in the first place, because the initial response I was countering was legitimately dismissive based on basically nothing but a small, skewed, extremely online perspective that sought to reframe reality itself in order to make an argument seem more sound. And that’s also why I made sure to point out I’m not suggesting people’s personal opinions about the movies are invalidated by general audience reception, nor should they be. The Force Awakens made 930mil domestic and made more than a few top 10 of the year lists - and I feel like it’s still borderline incoherent in the editing at points and comes very close to fumbling the third act completely, for example. The argument I’m making here isn’t that “the movie was successful and has a Rotten Tomatoes rating of X, therefore you can’t ever complain about the movie.” That’s not my stance. My stance is “You can’t extrapolate from your own personal opinons, attribute them to millions and millions of other people on a whim, and then act as if that extrapolation is now observable, inarguable reality,” especially when what you’re claiming as reality is that a generally accepted, liked, and inarguably successful movie was merely “tolerated” all the way to the bank.

it’s when you say those feelings are only with the fandom you also are making an assumption of reality

It’s not so much an assumption as it is an accumulation of experience. It’s not dismissing fandom to say it’s a small, much less-important voice compared to the general audience’s, it’s observable fact. Fandom isn’t as important as it likes to think it is, and has proven as such over, and over, and over again.

I’ve never said feelings within the fandom are exclusive to the fandom, and have repeatedly admitted there are members of the general audience whose opinion will (and do) overlap with members of the fandom’s. But that doesn’t validate or elevate the fandom’s status beyond their place as a loud and passionate minority of the much larger general audience.

The initial claim was honestly pretty ridiculous and that’s why I spoke up. I don’t understand what’s wrong with that. YouTube comment rhetoric isn’t the same as a cogent argument with legitimate support.

Your tone is different but it feels like the same hand waving lumping together the general audience opinion based on assumptions of their consensus, then when it swings the other way circumstances

So what about the post I initially responded to sounded like the whistlings of a canary in a coal mine, or “undeniable echoes” as such?

Are you devil’s advocating in general, or do you honestly believe there’s some merit in the unrealistic assertion that people “tolerated” TFA to the astronomical success it enjoyed, and that “pent-up rage” is responsible for TLJ’s lesser box-office success? And did you honestly believe one of the four quadrants in a studio’s four-quadrant audience targeting was “online fandom?” I guess I’m not sure what hypothetical outcome you’re protecting for here, and that you think I’m unfairly dismissing out of hand.

“The deeper conversation” is better and more worthwhile when (observably false) appeals to authority are lessened, not allowed (and made room) for. If you (I’m using the royal “you” here, to clarify) have to gin up mistaken realities to support your personal feelings about a work of art, your personal feelings could probably do with more reflection, investigation, and examination before sharing them.

I think it’s also nice to point out that fandoms in general are at an all time high, actually. TROS was an answer to many fan complaints from the previous two movies, the Snyder Cut of Justice League is being released…

Those are bad things, though.

Anakin Starkiller said:
Clearly, the fandom can’t be that big since pretty much every corner of it hated TRoS…

I do not believe this is true. I think those who didn’t like it are disproportionately more vocal than those who did. I see many different people proclaiming they enjoyed it, but often see the same few people more frequently repeating they didn’t. Of course, all I have is my own anecdotal experience like everyone else.

We all have this tendency of confirmation bias. Information that supports our conclusion sticks out to us. Also, we often manufacture a false dichotomy where we reduce the results to “the worst ever and everyone hated it” versus “absolutely amazing and fans loved it.” We forget the most likely larger segment of some good aspects along with some bad and people having opinions somewhere in the middle.

That said, I loved it. I spotted flaws and things I would have done differently, but the more I watch it, the more I enjoy it. The flaws matter less and the parts I enjoy matter much more. I feel the same about every Star Wars movie.