Broom Kid

According to this poster at blu-ray.com, Target’s already got individual 4K titles in their system already, and they’re dated for release simultaneous with the box-set (March 31st), which appears to still be a Best Buy exclusive.

https://forum.blu-ray.com/showpost.php?p=17314051&postcount=2453

According to another poster, the individual 4K titles are 3-discs each (4K/Blu/Bonus), at least in Germany and Australia. That might hold true for every other region too, although people are still worrying/“hearing” that individual titles in NA won’t have the bonus discs, and the only way to get them would be through the box-set.

https://forum.blu-ray.com/showpost.php?p=17315086&postcount=2476

it’s appearing as if the only upside to getting the box-set is cosmetic, as none of the on-disc content will be exclusive to it, so if you don’t care about the box, the letter, and the special book/artwork, you’re probably okay simply buying the movies you want individually. I believe this is the first time in quite awhile that Lucasfilm is allowing you to essentially part out a brand new set at retail. In 2004 you couldn’t just buy individual DVD titles in the OT, you had to get the full set or nothing. Same with the 2011 BD set (although I believe shortly afterwards they let you buy either trilogy in a separate set, sans bonus discs). But for 4K, it looks like they’re saying “you don’t HAVE to buy a box to get all the goodies. Just pick the movies you want.”

I gotta imagine if random reylo-user 583 on twitter’s got the pages, the full script isn’t too far from leaking in its entirety very, very soon.

The question is how long before someone either makes a fan-comic out of it, or tries to actually animate everything using Battlefront II or Fallen Order or something like that.

Absolutely. I appreciate that there was a Coruscant uprising in Trevorrow’s script, but even if that had been cut, the presence in the script of the ONE scene where Finn essentially helps free a First Order trooper both physically AND mentally (“Get yourself a name. That’s the first step.”) makes it something I really wish we’d gotten to see.

yotsuya said:

I totally agree that the stormtrooper rebellion is a great idea, but it isn’t one that works very well in the context of a typical Star Wars film.

1. I think “typical” Star Wars films shouldn’t be the only Star Wars films we get anymore, and adhering solely to what’s “typical” in a Star Wars movie is probably a bad call.
2. I don’t agree with the idea that it wouldn’t work very well since we’ve never seen one before to know whether it would or wouldn’t.

instead they are having the time of their lives gunning down their former comrades.

No they aren’t. There really isn’t any use or purpose to hyperbolically reinventing what they’re doing in the film (and how they’re doing it) for the sake of criticism. You can criticize the direction and the writing and the execution without having to use inaccurate descriptors like “mindlessly” or “Having the time of their lives” as if they’re ecstatic and joyful about killing stormtroopers. It’s not played that way. They’re ecstatic that they’re going to prevent Palpatines victory, and they’re happy they’re still ALIVE despite being directly in the line of enemy fire - that’s different than being ecstatic about killing people.

I don’t think they “mindlessly” did anything. They were trying to save the galaxy from Palpatine’s New Order. That’s pretty mindful. There’s only so far you can go in the middle of a war to save as many people as you can from the opposite side during the fighting. That’s part of why war is such an inherently tragic setting. And there are ways to amplify that feeling, or mute it. Star Wars has mostly always chosen to mute it, save for very specific instances, which don’t happen very frequently in the movies themselves (they happen a little more frequently in the Clone Wars show).

My problem isn’t with the characters so much as with the conceptualizing of their behavior and the situations they’re dropped in by the writers. Abrams set up a scenario where Finn defected from the First Order because he’s a good man, and then he just… never followed up on it. Johnson DID follow up on it, and then cut it out of The Last Jedi for the sake of time (I think the minute or two he saved by doing that was ultimately not worth it, and he should have left those beats in). Had he left it in, maybe it would have been so clearly described in the minds of the general audience that Abrams felt he would have HAD to address Finn’s status as a symbol to other troopers that they don’t HAVE to keep working for Kylo and Hux.

Instead he invented Jannah and her team of defectors and… didn’t do anything with them, really. And even then, Jannah’s defection is more character shading than anything else, because the purpose of her was primarily to connect to Lando more than anything else. And even THAT got cut.

Trevorrow’s script (and his ensuing direction) probably would have had their own set of very big and dumb problems, but I think people are reacting as positively as they are not only because it’s forever a hypothetical and the grass stays greener on that side, but because he was actively engaging with those sorts of ideas. Finn’s major purpose isn’t to help Rey find a thing which leads to a thing and then he has to help shut off a thing. Finn’s major purpose is to inspire a rebellion within the First Order. I wish I’d gotten to see that.

I think the Stormtrooper rebellion should have been a huge part of the 3rd film. The primary B-plot, really. If the A-plot is Rey vs. Kylo/Palpatine (Religion) then the B-plot should have been Poe/Finn vs. Hux/First Order (military) and the best possible way to have pulled that off would be through the Stormtrooper rebellion.

The First Order should have been seen as untenable considering how rabid and power-hungry it’s two leaders were. That power structure eating itself alive and the Resistance using that opportunity to turn its numbers to their side to help bring the First Order down could (and should) have been a major plot point, especially considering Finn’s status as an ex-trooper.

Honestly, the fact nothing ultimately ever came of Finn’s defection is sort of like the giant missed opportunity in the Prequel trilogy where slavery is introduced as a concept and then the Jedi and the Republic literally never bring it up again, much less attempt to do anything about it. Especially in a story as inherently moralistic as Star Wars is.

Broom Kid said:

I think the majority of normal people don’t have a side at all, and aren’t really engaged in this conversation, because they honestly don’t think about it to that extent once they’re done watching it. And there’s absolutely nothing wrong with that either. They watch the thing, they like parts of it, dislike others, and either they’re happy with their experience or they’re not. The majority of normal people just move onto the next thing at that point. They never join a side.

OutboundFlight said:

I disagree. Most people see a movie and then either had a good time or a bad time. Yes, they’ll probably stop thinking about it once they get to their cars unless they really liked it, but they still had an opinion. You don’t have to argue online to have an opinion about something.

I’m confused with what you’re disagreeing with, then. I never said they didn’t have an opinion. I specifically said they’re going to form opinions as they watch it, and then… not care enough about sharing those opinions with strangers on the internet to be part of the conversation. They’re not picking a side. That’s most people.

Most people having the conversation on the internet though, aren’t the majority of people who watched the movie. And of the people who ARE making sure to turn their feelings on the movie into long, extended conversations (or even content, which then spurs its own content-focused conversations nested within) the idea that argumentative loudmouths are a small minority doesn’t hold weight, in my experience. Maybe they’re not the majority, but it’s a lot closer to 50/50, and again, more often than not the loudmouth brigade being the “minority” doesn’t matter because they’re the ones steering the conversation anyway.

Tack said:
I think a prime Eastman mono print would have been the way I personally would love to see it. The mono mix is so much more sonically alive to me than the Dolby and 70mm versions, and the more washed-out look of an Eastman print might have complimented the visuals more than I think some realize.

There aren’t a lot of “holy grails” left when it comes to various preservations… A great scan/restoration of Empire on 35mm, of course. THX-1138, too. But increasingly, I’m finding that what you just described is probably the last version of Star Wars I’d need. Even if it was just a brand-new restoration/recording of that original mono track married to whatever iteration of 4k77 is the most “up-to-date” at that point.

I think a warm, full, well-recorded/restored version of that mono track is one of those last grails, for me.

To answer the question, as many others have: It’s probably either Definitive Edition Laserdisc or Executor Set. One of those two. It wasn’t just extras or picture quality for the time, it was just that those sets had real weight to them. Not just literally, as in “these are heavy” but it felt like you owned an actual piece of Star Wars, and that piece was worth a lot, and you could feel that worth when you picked it up.

OutboundFlight said:

We need to recognize both sides have a small group of outspoken idiots and a majority of normal people who just have different tastes.

I think the majority of normal people don’t have a side at all, and aren’t really engaged in this conversation, because they honestly don’t think about it to that extent once they’re done watching it. And there’s absolutely nothing wrong with that either. They watch the thing, they like parts of it, dislike others, and either they’re happy with their experience or they’re not. The majority of normal people just move onto the next thing at that point. They never join a side.

I understand the inclination to minimize the more unsavory aspects of online film discussion but in my experience, continually characterizing the sort of fighting, bad-faith arguing, and proxy/stand-in projection that occurs as being somehow anomalous or not representative is… inaccurate.

The “outspoken idiots” aren’t really a small group. Maybe they’re not the majority, but the margin is pretty slim, and more often than not they’re steering the ship.

Audience scores on any entertainment website are pretty sketchy in terms of reliably ascertaining what “The general public” thought of a film - not just because gaming of those scores is so easy, but because absent any ulterior motive for gaming the scores, the self-selecting sample is hardly representative of your normal movie-goer anyway. Normal movie-goers typically don’t rate movies online at imdb OR rotten tomatoes after watching a film. The kind of person who does that isn’t just a tiny percentage of the possible general audience, but they’re a skewed tiny percentage at that, because you have to be a certain type of movie-goer to care enough about your opinion being registered online to even THINK of heading there after watching the film.

It’s part of why the scores are so easy to game - people don’t think of the scores at all, so when presented with the score, they just accept the number out of hand. People who game those scores know this. They can fake the number, and then fake the authority that number holds. Audience scores have basically become not much more than a stat to be used to win online arguments. They were pretty much always that, because more often than not the only people contributing were people inclined to get in those arguments in the first place.

I AM THE SENATE

I don’t think we’re really arguing at all though! Just a thorough discussion. I apologize if it seemed otherwise!

I get what you’re saying, but this applies to pretty much all directors, showrunners, writers, etc.

i don’t think that’s necessarily true, But even if I agreed with that - why would the fact it applies to all directors/showrunners/writers (those three things are three very different things, btw) be any sort of rebuttal to the points I’m making? If it applies to them, it applies to him. So what’s wrong with the criticisms I’m making - which are aimed more at people who are willing to carry his water for the sake of minimizing his shortcomings than they are at him and his actual shortcomings as a storyteller?

A big part of what I’m criticizing here is the inclination for people to essentially transform collaborative art into singular authorship for the sake of championing a “visionary” for negligible reasons. It was wrong when they did it for Lucas’ benefit, and it’s still wrong now. I’m not so much trying to downplay his contributions as I am fighting against the idea his contributions are as essential to Star Wars’ continued success as they are often claimed to be.

I also think, while I’m at it, that he benefits not JUST from the proximity to Lucas (pay attention to how often his praise is essentially backhanded, as if he’s a vessel for Lucas’ genius instead of a creative in his own right - even Freddie Prinze essentially framed him as such when he went viral on twitter sticking up for him) but also from the fact he’s got a bit of a handicap because he works in children’s animation. Because so many people honestly believe that’s a “lesser” medium, and that stories “don’t count” as much in that medium as they do in live action, his successes end up being appreciated to a somewhat unfair extent - they read it as his being so good he transcends the medium, when what’s happened is they’ve opened themselves up to what that medium can do in a way they don’t normally do for other practitioners of that medium. If they did, they’d likely discover there are a lot of people who are just as good, if not better in many ways, at what Filoni does as a showrunner.

Favreau is the showrunner on Mandalorian, anyway. Filoni is a supporting player to that end. I don’t think he’s an equal there. He’s a key element, but it’s Favreau’s show.

I think people are more or less substituting all the same things they used to say about George Lucas (before he inevitably disappointed them in one way or another because they were too busy buying into every last myth about his creative process) onto Filoni now. He’s not really a visionary - a huge percentage of his Clone Wars successes are essentially “which really old movie these kids haven’t seen shall we loosely adapt this month.” It’s not so much “clever homage” as it is strip-mining classic film. Which - again, you can argue “that’s what Lucas did” because we all know the story about The Hidden Fortress, etc… but that plays into my larger point that Filoni gets a lot of rope simply because he “does things” the way Lucas “did things” as if the mere fact that Lucas did them makes them good.

The fact he gets credited for all of “The Clone Wars” despite the fact he had a ton of help in the form of other directors, writers, contributors, animators, voice actors, etc… it’s the same mistakes everyone made with Lucas, just mapped onto a different “visionary.”

It’s not that I dislike him. Like I said, he’s probably better just being “The Story Group” than he is being a hands-on creative. But I don’t think he’s as necessary as people tend to make him out to be, and I think he’s got big problems as a storyteller that get papered over because of that Lucas connection, and the familiarity and habitual nature of just repurposing old forum arguments ABOUT Lucas, and just copy/replacing with Filoni’s name.

The lowest parts of the Mandalorian are all his. And to be fair - many of the lowest parts of The Clone Wars are ALSO all his. I don’t think the “leap” to live-action has very much to do with it at all, because those low points have a lot in common across both mediums. And the things he’s been good at are things other people are also good at, and some people (Favreau, Waititi, Chow, Famuyiwa) are already better at. He’s not as necessary to Lucasfilm’s success as people like to frame it. He’s been part of very good things. I don’t think he’s the answer. He’s PART of AN answer. But I think Star Wars’ future is best served not by consistently asking “What would George Do” and looking to Filoni for not much more reason than “he’s the next best thing to George.”

I’d personally be fine with all future SW shows, both live action and animated, being Filoni-esque.

I wouldn’t. This show’s lowest points are the ones Filoni directed and wrote. The highest points are the ones he has the least involvement with.

“Filoni-esque” doesn’t really mean much, either, since the only real identifiable hallmarks of Filoni’s storytelling are, as stated by his biggest fans:

George Lucas talked to him a lot.
He likes Princess Mononoke.

Filoni’s status seems to be less earned than it is an easy substitution exercise: All the ways fans used to unfairly deify Lucas as a storyteller supreme are just being mapped onto Filoni now because George Lucas handpicked him.

The thing Filoni has most in common with Lucas is that his storytelling instincts are sound but his execution is lacking and he’s probably better off being “The Story Group” than he is actually involving himself in directing or writing.

StarkillerAG said:

That’s my main problem with the movie. JJ didn’t want to make a meaningful movie, he didn’t even want to make a good movie, he just wanted a big dumb blockbuster that lots of people would enjoy without really thinking about it.

I don’t think it’s even this purposeful, honestly. I don’t think there’s really much to why this movie is a mess beyond two (possibly three) simple factors.

1. Time.

2. JJ Abrams isn’t good at ending stories, or understanding why good endings work.

2.5) Chris Terrio has only ever written one good story, and it was based on real life.

I think JJ probably did want to make a meaningful movie. I think he absolutely wanted it to be great and amazing and to touch people the way The Force Awakens touched a lot of people. I think he simply doesn’t know how to do that. It’s not that he doesn’t want to. It’s just beyond him. And he’s gone out of his way to make sure that he doesn’t have to be in that position most of the time, and that’s benefitted him greatly in his career. His strength is in beginnings, and then stopping when the actual STORYTELLING parts begin to take on more and more importance. And I think maybe he thought with Star Wars he could finally disprove the idea that he doesn’t get why this stuff works, and that he could find substance in a story beyond mimicking what worked before.

The last movie in the Skywalker Saga is one hell of a way to have it irrefutably, irrevocably confirmed that he can’t, though.

For me, suggesting that he didn’t want to make something meaningful is letting him off the hook, because it suggests he COULD if he really tried. And at this point - I just don’t think he has it in him. I really don’t. It’s not a thing he’s built for. He can feint TOWARDS meaning and depth, and hopefully other collaborators can (and will) pick up the baton and take it where he’s pointing. But when you ask him to follow through himself… he can’t do it.

I really think that’s the big lesson here. It’s not a story about corporate interference, or meddling bosses.

It’s the story of a couple guys, under the gun and on the clock, delivering sub-par work because their instincts are inherently bad. That’s it.

Oh wow. How many times have I seen that movie and never EVER noticed that. That’s great.

I agree, there’s a ton of potential for this show and I’m excited to see how they build from what they did in season one.

Make a small-scale TV show that respects the canon

I don’t think “respecting the canon” has a whole lot to do with why it’s liked though. Not to any real degree. Nor should it be, honestly. Canon isn’t that important, ultimately. It’s just as malleable as any other story element. What’s important is whether or not you put some thought into why you’re breaking - or adhering - to it, and execute that thought well.

The Mandalorian comparison might also be alluding to how Mandalorian very obviously plays like a movie that got rewritten, split into parts, and had 3 bottle episodes shoved into the middle of it, and maybe they don’t want that to happen here, too.

But they could release it as a movie on Disney+ if they wanted, as well. It doesn’t have to be a “TV Show” - but I get why they’d rather have four weeks of subscription retention as opposed to one.

And… it’s delayed indefinitely. They’re worried the story Amini came up with is going to seem too similar to the Mandalorian’s, and they want to reduce the episode count from 6 to 4. Which makes me wonder why they even bothered turning it into a TV show. That’s basically movie length if they’re using Mandalorian-sized episodes.

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/heat-vision/obi-wan-kenobi-series-hold-as-calls-goes-new-scripts-1272499

I don’t think Carrie’s passing had much to do with it at all. I think Trevorrow couldn’t come up with a version of the story where he could redeem Kylo, and that’s what caused the split. None of his drafts have it, and the Jack Thorne draft that does have it… he probably didn’t want his name on that once he read it, because shortly after it came in, he was gone. Most of the other aspects of the two approaches share similarities (which is probably why Trevorrow got the credit he got, even if Abrams and Terrio really did page one rewrite it) but the only really big difference is Kylo.

I do believe the wedge issue was Lucasfilm execs believed this story needed to have the redemption of its bad guy, and the writer/director they initially hired to deliver that ending didn’t feel the same way. The guy they got to replace Trevorrow not only would do it, but he’d resurrect Carrie Fisher in order to get it done. Oh, and he ALSO directed the biggest domestic earner of all time, whereas the other guy just made Book of Henry.

That probably seemed like a pretty brilliant move in September 2017.

DominicCobb said:

I’ve heard the 50 completed scripts thing too. If it’s true, it’s crazy it never got made, though I guess that’s how Lucas rolled. You almost have to think it’s a shame too? Unless it sucked of course. I wonder if they’d ever consider reviving the concept for D+, but I doubt it.

My bet is that they’ve basically been parting it out for whatever they need.

But yeah, if they ever need a quick hit of content for their streaming network, it’s got to be very tempting to know the development process on a full 5 season series is already finished. Literally all you have to do is start shooting it.

IIRC, Underworld had a Palpatine Origin Story episode that essentially made the case Palpatine only really sought out the Sith because he couldn’t handle getting done wrong by his girlfriend.

Ronald D. Moore talked about it some after everything got sold, and I think that interview he gave is where we found out the whole show had something like 50-plus completely finished scripts? Also that Moore and Lucas would get in full-on FIGHTS over the story direction. Not gentle disagreements, but very heated arguments about what “Star Wars” can be.

Which I thought was awesome. Make that dude fight for his story, not just sit there and dole it out. Make him do the work of justifying the ideas that fly into his head, as opposed to just handing them down to people like they’re historical documents.

I really wish that Coruscant uprising stuff had somehow made it through the development process. It looks so good.