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Anchorhead

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12-Jun-2005
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7-Mar-2024
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Post
#1556088
Topic
<strong>Ahsoka</strong> (live action series) - general discussion thread
Time

I have a bit of time tonight, so some more specific thoughts. They’re a bit scattered as I’m jotting them down as they come to me.

Anakin:
For me as a non-Prequelist, Hayden finally now looked like someone who embodied the mannerisms of Vader and I could definitely see him becoming Vader. I’ve never once, in 25 years, seen or thought of him as Vader. It just did not work at all for me. I most certainly do not see that in any Prequel clips I’ve ever watched. In fact he’s always seemed like a terrible choice. Turns out it was really just more bad writing and directing by Lucas. That all changed in episode 5. To me, Hayden was able to redeem himself as an actor as well as the character. He IS Vader.

Put the characters in the right hands and let actors do what they do best and it can make a VERY big difference. It certainly did for me with Hayden. Like I mentioned to a friend, when he said “you lack conviction” just as he’s trying to kil her - that felt 100% like a Vader moment. Same with his matter-of-fact explanation of things to her. Also his not coddling her is interesting. When she tells him “I don’t understand” , his response is “that’s your problem” and he takes off running without her. He’s no nonsense with her. It’s an interesting dynamic. I particularly liked him saying how it bothered him when soldiers were killed…”of course it does”. His last line to her is perfection, like the visit meant something, but wasn’t as serious as she may have imagined. It really was a lesson disguised as a fight - “there’s hope for you yet”. Man, that is depth of character we’ve never had before.

Hera:
I’m thinking she may be my favorite of the cast. She speaks and behaves like an actual person. I’ve watched episode 2 three times. Hera and Sabine in the hospital is the highlight. Hera speaks to her like friends sometimes do. Her answer to Sabine is painfully honest when Sabine frets over how she , as she puts it, let a mission “go sideways”… “Well, you’re both difficult” and again with her answering Sabine; “She doesn’t want my help”…”yes she does”. That’s how people speak to each other. That felt real.

Same with her extended conversation on the ship after having searched for Sabine all day - she has a sort of defeat in her voice when she says ”Huyang….where are they?” She isn’t so much asking as she’s letting on that she’s worried and losing hope. That defeat in her voice comes up again later when she asks Ahsoka moments after she regains consciousness - “where’s Sabine”.. Outstanding work by Winstead.

Ahsoka:
She’s very stoic through most of the series. I’m fine with that. She’s not the most dynamic by any stretch, but that’s who she is. We’re catching up with her later in life and she’s become very mature. With that in mind, I think her time with Anakin in the World between worlds changed her.
She seemed lighter, less stressed. There are a few scenes after where she’s a bit different.
One where she’s outside the ship and bangs on the window …”hey!…get in there”. She’s showing emotion she has been bottling up prior to that moment.
The second one where they’re in the whale mouth and she says “I have no idea if this is going to work”…”no idea”. When she says the second time “no idea”, she’s smiling for what feels like the first time in the series. She’s lighter, almost happy.

It’s late and I’m exhausted. I’ll address the other characters and scenes later.

Post
#1555813
Topic
<strong>Ahsoka</strong> (live action series) - general discussion thread
Time

I’m traveling so I have limited connectivity and time. I’ll explain this later with examples and clips if I can find them;

For me personally, this is by far the best thing to come out of Disney’s Star Wars. The pacing being one of the best parts. Scenes with normal conversational dialogue and time to breathe. Long shots with architecture and atmosphere. I’ll elaborate in a day or two.

Post
#1547167
Topic
Rank The Indiana Jones Films
Time

I’ll spare you guys my in-depth of Dial Of Destiny for now, but I’ll say this; That’s the most fun I’ve had at an Indy film since Raiders. I really enjoyed it. Lots to chew on but after pondering it for a few days, I liked it even more. Once more in the theater and then a physical copy.

Side note; I think Helena’s Theme may be the most moving and beautiful piece of music John Williams has ever written, Listening to the soundtrack as we speak.
https://youtu.be/hLa3a4tQhag

Post
#1542370
Topic
<strong>The Mandalorian</strong> - a general discussion thread - * <em><strong>SPOILERS</strong></em> *
Time

Anjohan said:

Now that Pedro Pascal confirmed he’s hardly on set anymore and its mainly just voice work, it makes total sense how easy it was to sideline his character in season 3 when the actor doesn’t have to be there/doesn’t care anymore and can’t approve or disapprove of his character’s arc in person.

Interesting that he isn’t always there. I watched a lengthy interview with Katee Sackhoff and she has a totally different process for it. There are occasionally times when it’s not her in the suit but she stays on the set and watches it real-time through monitors. She gives direction to the extra in the suit about how Bo would react, walk, carry her weapon, stand, etc all based on the emotion of the scene. She’s very involved with the character.

Post
#1533893
Topic
<strong>The Mandalorian</strong> - a general discussion thread - * <em><strong>SPOILERS</strong></em> *
Time

StarkillerAG said:

Anchorhead said:

It could have been Andor in space

I thought Andor was already in space? 😉

Turned out it was just people in military govt meetings (every episode), goat farmers using twigs to build little models of military bases (2 episodes), prisoners sitting around talking (3 episodes), a guy eating cereal for breakfast with his mom (several episodes), that same guy sitting in his cubicle at work (2 episodes), people in an antiques store (several episodes), and wealthy people having dinner parties (several episodes).

It all seemed like it would be really interesting at first and as a big fan of Rogue One, I was for sure looking forward to it. One season removed and with time to let it soak in, I’ve only watched the first episode more than once. I tried a few others, but ten minutes in and I realized I just wasn’t interested enough.

There are some very strong moments and some outstanding performances, but they’re few and far between. It just hasn’t had any emotional impact. I sure didn’t think that would be the case, but that’s how it’s landed for me.

Post
#1533854
Topic
<strong>The Mandalorian</strong> - a general discussion thread - * <em><strong>SPOILERS</strong></em> *
Time

I’ll watch the last episode but like the last few, I’ll only be mildly interested.
The show bears no resemblance to season one - “I can bring you in warm or I can bring you in cold”
It’s a BOBF style mess.

So much potential squandered. It could have been Andor in space, but it ended up being a toy advertisement with pop stars who are so well known that they break the fourth wall just by being on screen.

Post
#1533433
Topic
'Rey Skywalker' (Upcoming live action motion picture) - general discussion thread
Time

Why stop at 10 films about the 1977 story when you can have 11? I’ll give the mess that was Solo a pass because it was only thinly connected. I’m speechless at how they absolutely will not move off of 1977\Skywalker\The Saga (genuflect). My prediction - because the best indicator of future behavior is past behavior - we’ll spend time on Tatooine and Coruscant and name-check Vader, Luke, Han, Leia, Ben, Chewie, Yoda et al. They will stretch the 1977 story to ridiculous limits and continue shrinking the franchise down to A Long Time Ago In A Solar System Far Far Away.

Even more insulting, everyone employed by Lucasfilm will continue to tell us that no one is interested in that 1977 film. Why bother restoring and releasing? - we’ve moved on. I found Favreau’s recent comments very disappointing.

Post
#1532067
Topic
<strong>The Bad Batch</strong> (animated series) - a general discussion thread - * <strong>SPOILERS</strong> *
Time

jedi_bendu said:

I have to take a bit of issue with this wording. Animation always seems to get looked down upon as an “inferior” medium, and although it’s totally fair for someone to prefer one over the other, neither animation or live action have any bearing on the quality of a story. They’re simply the vessel that brings that story to the audience.

I have to take a bit of issue with your statement as I’ve compared this to live action a few times. Feel free to point out where I’ve said animation is inferior. To be clear, and I believe I’ve stated this before, I originally became interested in this series because of the animation. For Christ’s sake, I’m watching and enjoying a series that exists in the Prequel world.

You don’t have to be on here for very long to know I’m not familiar with the prequels and don’t know who most of these characters are or what the story is. I just know the Bad Batch characters and I’m enjoying this show. When I say this feels like live action, I mean the depth of characters and the quality writing.

Before you go off half-cocked on that being an animation slight, it’s fair to point out that there is no shortage of animation that’s light on depth. The same can be said of some live action entries; Book Of Boba Fett and The Mandalorian season three being a couple of examples.

I could make this same post on the Visions discussion because it applies there as well. I had little interest in it as advertised (wasn’t an Anime fan) and it ended up being the animation that drew me in and depth of characters that kept me involved.

Post
#1531031
Topic
<strong>The Bad Batch</strong> (animated series) - a general discussion thread - * <strong>SPOILERS</strong> *
Time

If you haven’t seen it yet, no spoilers in my short review.

These two episodes released as a season ender reinforced what I’ve already felt; This show is much more interesting to me than Mando. This had actual weight, tension, and emotion.
It felt very much like a live action film. Sorry it’s over for this season.

Post
#1530808
Topic
What changes would you make to the Sequels?
Time

I’ve yet to see a reason why they were made other than to serve as New Star Wars product. I lost interest before the end of the first, hardly remember the second, didn’t bother seeing the third.

If it were up to me, I’d use the first hour of the first film, minus the Po intro scenes, as a one-hour Star Wars special. Something along the lines of Marvel’s fantastically done Werewolf By Night Halloween special.

Just an hour with a scavenger girl living alone on a remote planet where some long ago Empire battle took place. She meets up with a lost droid, they become companions, and they eventually go off to adventures where we use our imaginations to come up with the pre and post story.

An hour-long Star Wars story that doesn’t have to fit into any long overused narrative of The Saga (genuflect).

Post
#1530795
Topic
<strong>The Mandalorian</strong> - a general discussion thread - * <em><strong>SPOILERS</strong></em> *
Time

It’s pretty clear at this point that Season 1 is the only one for me. In a Star Wars show, we finally started into a story with new characters, new planets, new far far away adventures. Two seasons later were back to Tatooine, Corruscant, and he’s flying around in a Prequel ship. It’s evident the powers that be can’t leave The Solar System Far Far Away.

It doesn’t help that 30 or so Mandalorians practicing combat on a beach looks like bad cosplay LARP. Not to mention, they don’t seem to be the brightest. Everything they do is right next to where a monster lives. ?

In the end, when the baby dinosaurs walked off the ship, that was my ROTJ moment where I realized the show is going in a direction other than one I’m interested in.

Post
#1529383
Topic
<strong>The Mandalorian</strong> - a general discussion thread - * <em><strong>SPOILERS</strong></em> *
Time

StarkillerAG said:

I thought you liked Andor, Anchorhead. Did you change your mind?

I liked a lot of it, but the prison episodes and the amount of time spent with the quest team were way too long. I thought I’d watch it all again, but when it got to rewatching 5 or so of the episodes, I couldn’t do it.

Post
#1529308
Topic
<strong>The Mandalorian</strong> - a general discussion thread - * <em><strong>SPOILERS</strong></em> *
Time

The Andorlorian®
This nearly hour-long episode ended up being 40 minutes of people sitting at a picnic table outside their apartment complex and talking. What started as something that felt very OT-like with the Bo/Mando/TIE chase scene, devolved into an episode of Andor where meaningless characters have meaningless episode-long discussions. It didn’t help that the set looked like an 80s TV show.

So far, this season feels like the directionless mess that was BOBF.

Post
#1527701
Topic
<strong>The Mandalorian</strong> - a general discussion thread - * <em><strong>SPOILERS</strong></em> *
Time

fmalover said:

Reading the latest posts on this thread, I would say that’s my biggest problem with Filoni, his total inabilty to move on from characters and milking them for all their worth. This is best expemplified by his incessant shoehorning of Ahsoka in every last bit of SW media.

I agree 100%. Ahsoka is becoming the character version of Tatooine. Enough already.

Post
#1527700
Topic
<strong>The Mandalorian</strong> - a general discussion thread - * <em><strong>SPOILERS</strong></em> *
Time

screams in the void said:

It probably would have been better if those 2 episodes from BOBF were used to open the season here instead

For sure that was an odd call on their part. Book was a mess and using Mando to hold interest seemed weird (if that’s why they did it). Plus it can be confusing if you don’t follow both shows.

At our weekly lunch time TV\Film discussion at work, there was just that. One of my coworkers had bailed from Book after a few episodes. First question to the table was “Why does Mando have the baby again? I thought he went with Luke”.

Crossover is fine between series and can be fun sometimes. I was really happy to see James Woo show up in WandaVision because he was a great character in Ant-Man and the Wasp a few years earlier (plus I’m a huge Randall Park fan). However, one series shouldn’t be a requirement for the other to make sense. Woo as a character\plot element doesn’t affect one show or the other if you haven’t seen both.

Post
#1518000
Topic
<strong>The Bad Batch</strong> (animated series) - a general discussion thread - * <strong>SPOILERS</strong> *
Time

The first two episodes of season 2 dropped today. Watched them both, enjoyed them both. I found the second episode particularly interesting. It was the usual Bad Batch style of story and pace, but a bit more serious than I expected. As with season 1, very interesting style of animation.

Through the years I’ve never made any secret of my dislike of The Shrunken Universe. It’s one of the main reasons I’ve really enjoyed Andor. I suspect that’s the case for a great many people. Reviews for Andor mention it’s detachment from what’s come before as a big part of its success. That and the incredible acting, writing, and production.

All that said; while watching these two episodes of Bad Batch tonight, I realized that it’s still nice to come home for a little comfort food once in a while. Looking forward to the rest of the series.