Smoking Lizard said:
Considering the subject of this thread, I am going to assume I can post what I do not like about TFA without being accused of being a “troll.” I just caved and saw the movie yesterday. Here’s what I did not like:
- Von Sydow’s character required someone to travel IN PERSON to Jakku to receive the map, rather than just transmit it encrypted to Leia.
Bringing Luke, the droids, Han, Chewie, Leia, and Vader together required someone to travel IN PERSON to Alderaan, rather than just transmit it encrypted. Also, if you trust encryption that much, please send me your credit card info “encrypted.”
- Instead of covertly sending an intelligence officer under deep cover to retrieve the map, Leia sends a pilot. In uniform. In an X-Wing.
A pilot is needed to fly there. And he’s not in uniform, he’s in a jacket / shirt / pants.
- On Jakku, Kylo Ren and the rest of the First Order round up the villagers. Instead of saying to Poe, “Tell us where the map is or we’ll kill these villagers,” Ren orders Poe onto his ship and then orders the villagers murdered for the sport of it.
Yes, for sport of it. He’s a villain, and a bloodthirsty one.
- The blaster bolt suspended midflight and hanging in the air until Ren “coolly” released it.
I’ll let my wife handle this one - “Shut up. This was so cool. He stops a shot in mid-air, then interrogates Poe while still holding the shot up. Shows some good force use, and dammit it looks cool. What do you want, endless discussion of politics?”
- Kylo Ren and the First Order round up the innocent villagers and are setting the village on fire. When Kylo comes to question Poe, Poe deems it appropriate to crack jokes at Ren. No, Poe, don’t, you know, maybe BEG for mercy for the villagers and insist that they’re innocent. Nah. Crack jokes instead.
It’s a movie, and Poe knows he ain’t talking Ren out of anything. And his character is being set-up. It’s character development.
- So Kylo Ren is Anakin Skywalker/Darth Vader’s grandson? Kylo Ren, in private, “prays” to his grandfather to “show him the way” to resist the pull of the light side of the Force. Um, hello? Anakin Skywalker is probably the WORST person to ask for advice on how to resist the light side?
Why does Ren know this? There’s no way the Empire / First Order acknowledges the end of Darth Vader. And you think Snoke is telling him this?
- Anakin Skywalker is Kylo Ren’s grandfather, yes? So Anakin, a redeemed Jedi, couldn’t appear as a Force ghost to Ren years earlier as Ren was turning to the dark side and, you know, maybe try to talk him out of it? You know, appear to Ren as a ghost the way Obi Wan did multiple times to Luke?
How do we know this didn’t happen? We don’t the backstory, we don’t know what he’s been told, or what he wants to believe.
- If you’re saying right now, “Well, maybe he did and Ren resisted him!” Why, then, is Ren asking Vader for advice on how to resist the light?
Answered in the last two responses above.
- So Finn helps Poe escape. Finn, by the way, is a janitor (yes…JANITOR!) stormtrooper who was abducted as an infant by the First Order and raised to be a stormtrooper. Because raising soldiers for your evil cause from infancy is easier than just using recruits. I mean, yeah, recruits worked for the Nazis, the Khmer Rouge, imperial Japan, Al Qaeda, Stalin, and ISIS but they would NEVER work for the First Order. Abducting babies is much easier.
This is going to come up a lot, but this is a movie. They’re evil. They do evil things. Abducting babies is evil. Also, maybe they recruit as well. Maybe they’re having trouble recruiting because the Empire failed. We don’t know.
- OK, so we escape. Suddenly the new and improved First Order TIE fighters are two seaters.
Yes. So what? Technology doesn’t change? Did you complain when we saw new ships in ESB? Do you know for a fact there aren’t single and two-seat TIEs?
- The TIE fighter gets shot and then crash lands on Jakku. CONVENIENTLY close to Rey’s settlement.
It’s a movie. We have to meet her somehow. And did you complain in ANH when Luke just happened to live on the same planet as Obi-Wan Kenobi, and Leia ship ended up there under attach en-route to Alderaan, and the droids with the plans for the Death Star just happened to come into Luke’s possession?
- The TIE fighter CONVENIENTLY gets eaten up by the desert. Because, yeah, the desert eats stuff all the time.
- But there’s other crashed junk all over the place that hasn’t been swallowed up by the desert.
Already discussed, pointless to discuss further.
- Finn runs to the settlement, where he conveniently bumps into Rey who conveniently has found BB-8.
See previous response. Characters have to meet in movies for a story to progress.
- So BB-8 tells Rey that that random dude is wearing my master’s jacket – or, well, a jacket that looks just like my master’s jacket. So Rey runs over and smashes him in the face with a blunt weapon.
First off, I thought Poe was wearing a uniform? Oh wait, now it’s a jacket. Regardless, do you own a jacket that a family member would recognize. Bet you do.
Rey and Finn? She’s interested that he’s in the Resistence, BB-8 seems to buy Finn’s story, Finn is NICE to her, and the First Order shows up so they have to run. What’s the problem?
- Oh no! The First Order is on to us! They’re chasing us!
They know the TIE crashed there! We see them on the ship saying that! This is how movies work!
- Let’s run for that “Quad Jumper”! But we need a pilot? Don’t worry! I can PILOT ANYTHING! Including the Millenium Falcon!
Luke could pilot anything too, did that bother you? Or does it bother you because she doesn’t have a dick?
And she doesn’t exactly fly it perfect straight away. Did we see Luke have any trouble with an X-wing at first? Hell no! Ace pilot, having never flew a Rebellion ship, but no problem.
Do we have to see in a five minute flying montage with “You’re the Best” playing in the background to understand that she can fly?
- How did you learn to fly the Millenium Falcon? I found a flight simulator! And the flight simulator taught me how to fly that type of craft!
Was this in the movie? I don’t remember that.
- Oh, no! The Quad Jumper was blown up by the First Order! Don’t worry! The Millenium Falcon is right over there! Yes, in this entire wide galaxy, how entirely fortunate that Kylo Ren’s father’s ship just happens to be right here!
It has to be somewhere. What does this have to do with anything? AND maybe it provides a clue to Ren’s backstory.
Were you nitpicking ANH to this level before you saw ESB? After? Some stuff is explained, some is not, it’s a continuing story.
Why does Han Solo have a training remote on the Falcon?
- And the door is open! Gee, I wonder why the pawn broker had enough sense to throw a tarp over the MF but not bother to close the door?
Ever been to a junkyard?
- Ah, well! Let’s run inside! Won’t the First Order blow this ship up, too? Nah.
Good point! Let’s just stand outside and die, and the movie is over, and you can go home. Yah.
- OK, I just started up the Millenium Falcon! Wait! Doesn’t it have some kind of security on the starter? After all, even my 1977 Ford Pinto required a KEY TO START! Nah! I just started it up!
My wife can’t stop saying “junkyard!” and “no keys in space!” Has anyone ever used a key in Star Wars to start a ship? Also, no one thought it could fly. It just sits there.
- Damn! Look at me! I can fly the MF at least as well as Han Solo…even though I never had before. IT’S THE FORCE! Yes, every other Jedi alive – including Anakin – had to be TRAINED to use the Force, but NOT REY! SHE’S SPECIAL!
She did not fly it as well as Solo, she crashed it around. She didn’t use the force. If you want to go there with Anakin, Qui-Gon pointed out that he seemed to have such fast reflexes because he’s good with the force…but he had zero training. And he was a fucking baby, by the way (age-wise, not crying-wise). And Luke was not trained in the Force. Or flying, for that matter. He was a fucking farm boy (my wife’s words) who taught himself to fly.
Rey is not special, unless you think a woman can’t do what a man can do. Oh and she is special, because she’s the star of the movie. Just like Luke! Stars of the movies!
- OK, we’re in space now! We ditched the First Order somehow…but oh no! We’re captured…by Han Solo!
This happened literally two minutes later! What’s the problem?
- Who just so happened to be in the neighborhood, actively looking for the Millenium Falcon…at the age of 70 something years old. Sure he was a general once who led the Rebellion to maybe the greatest victory in the history of the galaxy, but now, at the age of 70, he’s back to being a smuggler.
So what? Maybe he likes it? He says later he went back to what he knows how to do when everything fell apart. What do you plan to do at 70?
And, common theme, it’s a movie and he’s a hero. What should he do, watch football at the old-folks home?
- OK, now Han is going to take Rey to his Force-sensitive mentor. But Han! Back in the 1977 movie, you insisted you didn’t believe in the Force! Um, oh yeah. Forgot about that.
Old friend, not mentor. Stop making shit up.
Also, holy shit. People change thirty years later. People have new experiences. They see things in action. They fucking marry a force-sensitive woman and have a fucking jedi for a brother-in-law and have a son who fucking uses the force. If he didn’t believe in the Force now, THAT would be bullshit. And he says as much on the Falcon to Rey.
- Gotta love the trite, “I can see who you are by looking into your eyes,” bullsh*t. I mean, because that’s SOOOOOOO original.
My wife’s response - “Is this guy fourteen?” I think no further comment is neede.
- Also gotta love that crawling across the table and switching the lenses in the goggles to amp up the magnification or whatever. Yeah, that wasn’t contrived.
Contrived? Contrived to what end. My wife just asked if “contrived” is on your word-a-day calendar.
- Oh, hey! By the way, I’m Maz and I somehow have Luke Skywalker’s lighsaber in a wooden box downstairs in my dungeon! How did I get it, you ask? Oh, that’s a story for another time (TRANSLATION: The writers don’t know yet, either).
Do we need to stop the story to go into that? The First Order is attacking. And gee, maybe will find out backstory in one of the next movies!
- Somehow Rey just stumbles on the box with the lightsaber. I know, I know – the Force. Uh huh.
It’s a Star Wars movie. It’s space magic in all of the movies. All of them. Were you ok with the Darth Vader cave on Dagobah? SPACE MAGIC!
- So now Finn has the lightsaber and Rey is randomly running around the woods because she’s upset or something.
Nice misogyny. “Randomly.” “Upset or something.” I hope you never get abducted as a child and then it’s shown to you in a force dream. You might need a walk too.
- Oh, hey! Look at that! We can see the blast rays from the Starkiller base, which is light years away!
I agree with this. I don’t understand it either.
- The Starkiller base is able to blow up planets many light years away because, wait for it, its blasts travel through hyperspace to arrive at their targets! Not making this up.
So ships can do it but lasers can’t. Because you can show me how it works with ships. Got it.
On that subject, since you are nitpick this movie to absolute death, how does traveling through hyperspace work anyway. It’s not explained in the original movies, so it must be bullshit, right?
- Oh no! The First Order found us here on Maz’s planet! Oh no! Rey is captured and Ren doesn’t give a rat’s butt about BB-8 and the ACTUAL MAP anymore because he can torture the map out of Rey’s brain. Because, yeah, her cursory look at the map somehow enabled it to be perfectly imprinted on her brain.
Oh no! First of all, he didn’t have BB-8, he had Rey. And they pulled out because the Resistance was winning and they would need more troops. And he can use the Force to get info - he does it with Poe. How does he know it won’t work with Rey? And Hux fucking calls him out on it later. He fucked up. He’s not a perfect villain. How uninteresting!
- Oh, yeah! What about Poe Dameron? Why did he just leave Jakku without finding BB-8 first? It was a critical mission AND HE JUST LEFT?! When he got back to the Resistance planet did Leia come up and say, “Well?” and he said, “Well, what?” and she said, “Did you get the message I sent you to retrieve?” and he said, “Oh, snap!”?!
I’m pretty sure at this point you weren’t paying any attention. There is a resistance droid on Maz’s planet that notifies the resistance that BB-8 was on the planet. Why would Poe NOT go there?
- So Rey is captured. She hasn’t figured out that she can already use the Force yet. Give it about 10 minutes and she’ll have it figured out.
Kylo uses the force to get in her mind, and she pushes back. That’s how she figures it out.
- So Ren’s secret darkest fear is that he will never be as powerful as Darth Vader? Puh-lease.
Um, yeah. Why is this a problem? He obviously idolizes his Grandfather. He dresses like him. And he is afraid of being found out that he’s not as powerful, and he overcompensates. See his “temper tantrums” as others have mockingly said. He’s a fucking complex person, not a one-dimensional bad guy.
- Han and Leia repeatedly refer to Ren stiltedly as “our son” and not simply his name.
It’s a fucking movie. It’s more powerful when you hear it near the end of the movie. And maybe they don’t want to call him Ben. Maybe it makes them cry. And they certainly ain’t calling him Ren.
- Leia’s stilted dialog: “It was Snoke who seduced our son to the Dark Side of the Force.” Ugh.
Is this a complaint about Carrie Fisher or the dialogue. The dialogue makes sense, and if you are criticizing Carrie Fisher…well, whatever.
- Oh, yeah…and Snoke is a laughably bad CGI character. One that looks a hell of a lot like the trite old “big head alien” from alien abduction movies.
I don’t disagree with this…although we’ll see what he looks like in the next movie.
- Yeah. Snoke is a bad CGI character. And he’s, like, one of the two main villains. Read that again. A main villain is a CGI character. Jar Jar, anyone?
Jar Jar is not a villain. Snoke is a hologram, let’s see what he looks like in the next movie. And if you want to go there, the Emperor was one of two main villains in ESB and is essentially a CGI character. You’d be better comparing Snoke to the Emperor than Jar Jar, which makes no fucking sense.
- And the command center of the First Order doesn’t look very military. Looked more like a Comcast customer care call center. In TESB, Lucas hired very experienced British stage actors to play the roles of the key imperials – Ozzel, Piett, Needa, and Veers – and they delivered a very “professional military” performance. These guys? Not so scary.
Disagree 100%. They are emulating the Empire. This complaint is honestly puzzling to me.
- Temper tantrums make someone a bad guy! Get bad news? Tear sht up with your stupid lightsaber! A key prisoner escaped? Tear sht up with your stupid lightsaber!
You’re not a deep thinker, are you? It’s a character trait…and he turns off almost as fast as he turns it on, which is even more chilling
- Why the hell is Ren wearing a mask, anyway? Because it’s cool? Does he sleep with it, too?
Because he’s emulating the grandfather he idolizes, and he’s more scary looking that way, and it’s a fucking movie. We don’t need to see him sleep, and no he doesn’t sleep with it on. My wife would like to know if you would like this movie better if we saw him take off the mask, eat some soup, put on his jammies, and go to bed.
- So the galaxy has gone to hell in a hand basket…and Luke has gone into hiding? Never mind, you know, maybe helping the Resistance, you know, RESIST?
Still not a deep thinker, are you. Explained in the movie, and that’s enough said.
- So in 30 years Luke trained ZERO new Jedis? Ren somehow killed them ALL?!
Which is it? Which would have satisfied you? What do you want to happen.
In the movie, it’s explained he started the Academy, and Ren turned on him and killed everyone else. Did you miss that?
Did it bother you when Vader failed to kill Luke in ESB? And he’s Luke Skywalker. Would you want him to be killed? Or would you bitch about that even more?
Could he have killed Luke? How do we know he could have? It’s interesting how you seem to have information that no one else has.
- Hey, we have to blow up the Starkiller base! No problem. We’ll just land on the planet and blow up the shields! But how will we get through the shields to begin with? We’ll just come out of hyperspace inside the shields? Why hadn’t we ever done that before? Um…because!
Agreed, that was kind of weak.
- How many times is the MF going to scrape along the ground, scrape across rocks, and fly through trees without, you know, blowing up?
It’s a movie. How many times did it get shot in the original trilogy. Isn’t that part of the charm, it’s a piece of junk and a bucket of bolts but it always gets through? It’s a character!
- Oh, hey, now we’re going to crash. No, not really. We’ll just skid along the snowy surface. And…wait for it…wait for it! Yep! Here comes a cliff! And wait for it…wait for it…errrt! We stopped just at the edge of the cliff! Never saw that before!
Thank god it didn’t “teeter” on the edge of the cliff, you might have had an aneurysm.
Where would it be ok to stop? I can’t imagine a single place that would have satisfied you.
- We have X-Wing pilots who don’t look like military pilots. The female pilot especially…not because she’s female, but because she carries herself as a college student enjoying a theme park ride.
Sorry, you can say it’s not because she’s female, but that doesn’t make your comment any less misogynistic.
Did Porkins look like a military pilot?
- Rey kills Han. Thank God. Not because it was a good story element, but because at least it spares us from having to see an 80 year old Han Solo in the future.
First off, nice ageism. Second, killing Han IS a good story element. But I don’t think this can be explained to you.
Also, Ren killed Han, not Rey, but that’s an easy mistake for you to make considering you’re clearly not paying much attention as you watch this.
- We have C3PO literally calling play-by-play during the battle!
Don’t disagree, but he did this in every movie.
- Hurray! We blew up the Starkiller base! How? Who cares?! An oscillator or something. Who cares?! It’s blown up! Yay!
Again, not paying much attention to the movie, are you? Even if you don’t like the Starkiller part of the movie, you can’t claim it’s not explained…unless you aren’t paying attention.
- And even better! Somehow all the main characters somehow manage to escape the planet blowing up! Sure is a good thing the First Order was somehow able to pick up Ren from the surface and get him off the planet before the planet blew up! How wonderfully convenient!
I’ve run out of ways to say “it’s a movie.” Did it bother you that Darth Vader wasn’t on the Death Star? How about that during the trench run, his ship doesn’t blow up but magically flies off into space? How did Luke somehow catch the conveniently placed weathervane on Cloud City?
Or would you prefer we blow everyone up? All new characters in the next movie.
Or even better - let’s stop the momentum of the movie for a 10 minute montage explaining how everyone got off the planet.
- Oh, by the way, Ren got his butt kicked by Rey…who just suddenly, out of nowhere, learned how to use the Force and a lightsaber. How convenient!
I think you can read my earlier responses to know the answer to this. And she’s in full retreat, not fighting very well, until she calms herself and focuses on the Force…and Ren is out of control emotionally (he’s just killed his father) and he’s very wounded to boot.
- Oh! And why didn’t Rey just kill him?! Because a rift in the planet formed just at the right second! Phew! That was CLOSE! We almost lost our super “cool” villain!
NO…you aren’t watching the same movie. She CHOOSES not to do it. And THEN the planet starts to blow up. But make shit up if it helps you make your points.
- Hey look at that! R2-D2 just woke up somehow. Maybe Luke woke him up or something. Because “Now is the right time. The time was not right before now…” Since when did Luke become so melodramatic?
I just can’t even. You make something up (which still might end up being at least partly right) but you don’t know and then you deride it as if it was actually in the movie.
Hell yes. Thank god it was a good movie.
