DrDre

DominicCobb said:

StarkillerAG said:

DominicCobb said:

StarkillerAG said:

DominicCobb said:

How important is it really to this story? The First Order is trying to take over the galaxy, the Resistance is trying to stop it. Is a lot more information than that really important to the stories of these new characters? The logistics of the New Republic are no more important to Rey’s story than they are to the Mandalorian’s.

When one of the main characters of the story is the ruler of the galaxy, you should expect to have at least some explanation of how the system works. It’s fine to not explain anything for a small-scale TV show like The Mandalorian, but the sequels have events that happen on a galactic scale, so the movies should at least give us some broad idea as to the political situation.

I mean, Snoke is neither a main character nor the ruler of the galaxy, so I’m not sure that’s the most salient point.

I was referring to Kylo.

I thought we were talking about TFA. I feel like the political situation is pretty unconfusing in both TLJ and TROS.

Yes, but in some ways it is actually worse, since the message is, that even when the Resistance blows up the First Order’s big gun, a major victory in ANH, and the start of the Galactic Civil War, the rest of the galaxy is conveniently too scared, or too lazy to take on what is left of the First Order. Then in TROS these scared or lazy systems, which in TLJ apparently didn’t have the means to resist, or worse didn’t want to, just conveniently come crawling out of the woodworks at the end of the movie in a massive show of force. In other words these systems could have kicked the First Order, which was a lot smaller than the Final Order apparently, out of the galaxy any time they wanted to, but they didn’t because it wasn’t convenient for the story at that time. It’s really quite appalling the way the bigger picture was handled throughout the entire trilogy in my view.

DominicCobb said:

DrDre said:

DominicCobb said:

Probably worth mentioning as well that even if you’re not a fan of the ST, the last two movies got 93% and 91%. So even if you weren’t personally expecting it to be good, it wasn’t unreasonable that most would suspect it’d be in the same ballpark as the last two.

It wasn’t unreasonable, but at least to some of us, the critics ratings didn’t tell the whole story.

My point is that regardless of how you think you’ll feel about it and how you think non-critics will receive it, it wasn’t unreasonable to suspect that it would get a high RT score, because the last two films did.

DrDre said:

Broom Kid said:

DrDre said:
Additionally, not everyone’s expectations for this film’s quality, or its reception were very high.

Again, I’m not saying expectations for quality needed to be “very high.” High 70’s/low 80’s isn’t “very high.” But there’s a big gulf between even low 70s and where it is (53)

That gulf is a big reason why it’s earnings are where they are. Expectations didn’t need to be “very high” for the reality to be jarring, and for that jarring reality to negatively affect the box-office somewhat significantly.

I didn’t expect it to get into the high 70s, low 80s. I expected it to be in the low to mid 60s. While it came out a bit worse than that, I would not have expected the film to have done much better, if it had a 65% RT score.

To my point, unless you predicted the film would be significantly worse than TFA and TLJ, I’m not sure why you would think it would score that much lower than those two, which you already don’t think are good.

Because I felt there was a danger, JJ and Disney in general would want to please everyone. Like they say, if you try to please everyone, you end up pleasing no one. After Palpatine was introduced as the big bad, I also expected the film to be rather heavy on fan service, and Star Wars tropes, and to thus be more in line with TFA, backtracking somewhat from the direction TLJ took the story, which I felt would not go over well with many critics.

Broom Kid said:

DrDre said:
Additionally, not everyone’s expectations for this film’s quality, or its reception were very high.

Again, I’m not saying expectations for quality needed to be “very high.” High 70’s/low 80’s isn’t “very high.” But there’s a big gulf between even low 70s and where it is (53)

That gulf is a big reason why it’s earnings are where they are. Expectations didn’t need to be “very high” for the reality to be jarring, and for that jarring reality to negatively affect the box-office somewhat significantly.

I didn’t expect it to get into the high 70s, low 80s. I expected it to be in the low to mid 60s. While it came out a bit worse than that, I would not have expected the film to have done much better, if it had a 65% RT score.

DominicCobb said:

Probably worth mentioning as well that even if you’re not a fan of the ST, the last two movies got 93% and 91%. So even if you weren’t personally expecting it to be good, it wasn’t unreasonable that most would suspect it’d be in the same ballpark as the last two.

It wasn’t unreasonable, but at least to some of us, the critics ratings didn’t tell the whole story.

Broom Kid said:

I don’t know how you can disagree that people feel it’s bad. People obviously feel that it’s bad. Bad movies still make money (Michael Bay’s very existence is proof of this phenomenon) - but that’s a different argument than the one I’m making, which is that this movie would have made MORE money had it not been bad. TFA was well-regarded! But it was well-regarded because of it’s safeness. That reputation came immediately, and further, was considered a very smart move. The studio CEO basically admitted as much in his recent biography. Had this movie been “safe” along the same lines, it likely would have gotten a better reception and avoided the word of mouth that is obviously hurting it at the box-office. Movies with good word of mouth don’t have the Friday-to-Saturday drops this film had early in its run. Movies with good word of mouth don’t get those drops AT ALL, really.

The general audience can like it more than the critical reception and the movie can still be overall poorly recieved if the critical reception is low enough. Batman v. Superman (or similarly, Suicide Squad) is the example I keep coming back to here, and I think it’s very much applicable.

Again, this isn’t to say that had the movie been good that the predictions around 700mil DOM and 1.5bil WW would have won out. Its ceiling probably would have been +/- 20mil of The Last Jedi’s numbers. But I don’t think the numbers we’re seeing now could have happened without the film coming in THIS far under anyone’s expectations, quality-wise.

Because it has mixed reviews, meaning a slight majority of critics liked the film. Bad movies get RT scores of <40%, implying that a vast majority of critics dislike the film. Additionally, not everyone’s expectations for this film’s quality, or its reception were very high. Mine weren’t. I didn’t expect it to be the worst movie ever, nor do I think it is a truly bad movie. I think it has a weak story, and a weak script, but I also believe JJ has a talent to make even the worst screenplay come to life. So, as pure popcorn entertainment, I think the movie works. However, like I said, I feel the numbers indicated interest in the franchise was waning, and TLJ didn’t really leave TROS with story threads to get people pumped for this film, and so I didn’t think it was likely, it would come close to TLJ’s total BO.

DominicCobb said:

I’m not sure how anyone could be saying it might not break a billion. They’d have to pull it from theaters to accomplish that.

DrDre said:
but given the recent history, and Abrams’ reputation, I don’t think many people expected a masterpiece. Hence, this outcome was not all that suprising to some of us.

If you look at the Tomatoemeter (i.e. the only “review” that matters for the vast majority of the audience), TROS has 53%, which is a massive drop off from the next lowest rated Abrams film (Mission: Impossible III, which also disappointed). Regardless of your personal feelings on TFA, that film was a mostly unanimous success, with a 93% rating. That’s a very significant difference from TROS. Even the flop Solo had a 70%.

There’s a difference between not getting overwhelmingly positive reviews and getting bad reviews. 53% is far outside the realm of what people have come to expect from things like Star Wars and Marvel.

Like I said, I think the film was better recieved by fans, and the general audience, than critics, many of whom viewed it as a capitulation to TLJ’s critics. In any case, I expected mixed reviews from critics, though perhaps a bit more positive than they were in the end. I didn’t believe anything other than it being a truly great film could push it beyond TLJ’s numbers. When they announced Palpatine’s return, there was an air of desperation in the way they approached this film in my view. This coupled with waning interest in the brand led to my own predictions for this film.

Broom Kid said:

DrDre said:
but given the recent history, and Abrams’ reputation, I don’t think many people expected a masterpiece. Hence, this outcome was not all that suprising to some of us.

The quality of the film being this poor was pretty surprising to a large number, which is why the word of mouth hit the film’s legs as hard as it did. There’s a pretty big gulf between masterpiece and The Rise of Skywalker, and it wasn’t an either/or proposition - Masterpiece vs. Stinker, record-breaker vs giant disappointment, etc. I’m not saying people were expecting a masterpiece - just that pretty much nobody expected it to be THIS bad. And being this bad is obviously, absolutely having a big effect on its box-office. Which is why I’m saying I don’t think those early projections would look accurate now had the film not done its damndest to turn off the general audience, which was a factor I don’t think anyone making those projections was accounting for.

If it were a masterpiece obviously its box-office would be better. But even if it was barely as well-regarded a film as The Force Awakens (i.e. safely serviceable), the numbers wouldn’t be where they are now.

I disagree, that people feel it is that bad. It had mixed reviews, and pretty much any audience measure (RM, imdb, etc) indicate most fans, and the general audience like it better than the critics. I would argue most would say, it is a flawed, but entertaining film. I also disagree with your assessment of TFA, which was very well recieved by critics, fans, and general audience alike. It was only over time, that its reputation began to suffer, and its weaker elements, that at first were seen as not detrimental to the film, began to soil its reputation.

Broom Kid said:

DrDre said:
Good reviews might have boosted the numbers somewhat, but even the opening weekend indicated a final BO of around the 1 billion mark. Also, let’s not forget TPM’s inflation adjusted BO is $1.8 billion, the third most financially successful film in the franchise, so evidently the financial success of a Star Wars film is not strongly correlated with its reviews.

Good reviews would have definitely boosted the numbers, as the interest in the film began declining markedly as the early word began coming in that the film was not only possibly the worst of the sequel trilogy, but maybe the worst film since Phantom Menace, whose repuatation has only declined since its 1999 premiere. The film’s opening weekend was definitely stunted by its word of mouth, which points to how big a factor it’s quality was in damaging its own box-office. Essentially - post-premiere, the film’s legs started shrinking IMMEDIATELY. It was a Batman v. Superman situation more than anything.

TPM was also the first Star Wars film since 1983, which is good to keep in mind. Word of mouth during that summer was better than Rise of Skywalker’s word of mouth is this winter. I don’t think anyone early-estimating the numbers it wound up at was doing so under the assumption the movie was going to be what it ended up being.

(anecdotally: I remember much discussion on the early internets about how Titanic’s record WOULD have been broken in 1999 had The Phantom Menace actually been good. Not to say such analysis had merit - hell not to say mine does either, obviously! But there were definitely conversations as to how Phantom Menace’s quality did hinder it at the box-office somewhat)

Well, I for one didn’t have high expectations for this film before it was released. TLJ was a highly divisive film, and no matter how anyone felt about it, it didn’t leave many story threads unresolved, and didn’t end on a cliffhanger. So, TROS was fighting an uphill battle from the beginning. Add to this, that the anticipation for this film seemed very tepid for most of the time leading up to its release, which prompted me to look into some sentiment analysis, leading to the prediction it would not do record breaking numbers at the box office. Had the film been the second coming, perhaps word of mouth would have carried it a lot further, but given the recent history, and Abrams’ reputation, I don’t think many people expected a masterpiece. Hence, this outcome was not all that suprising to some of us.

Broom Kid said:

It wasn’t the waning interest that led to these totals though. It was the quality of the film. Again, I don’t think any of those predictions were being made under the assumption the film in question would be the most poorly reviewed Star Wars since The Phantom Menace. Had the film been at the quality level of even Solo, those numbers wouldn’t have borne out.

All the numbers showed interest in the brand was waning well before TROS release, hence my prediction at the time. Good reviews might have boosted the numbers somewhat, but even the opening weekend indicated a final BO of around the 1 billion mark. Also, let’s not forget TPM’s inflation adjusted BO is $1.8 billion, the third most financially successful film in the franchise, so evidently the financial success of a Star Wars film is not strongly correlated with its reviews.

DuracellEnergizer said:

Sorry, but Leia kissing Luke isn’t upsetting at all.

If you watch the films in chronological order it is 😉.

DominicCobb said:

My interpretation of the Final Order was that this was something Palpatine wasn’t able to start developing until he had the resources of the Empire at his disposal (at least that was what I took the Star Destroyer design to imply). I don’t know what the visual dictionary says so I can’t comment on that. Really the main thing that bothers me is it just feels redundant. Wasn’t the First Order the same idea - a mysterious resurrected Imperial force that had been building power in the unknown regions as part of Palpatine’s contingency?

They didn’t seem to have a solid grasp on the interplay of the two forces, and they could have done something interesting with some friction between them if perhaps Palpatine claimed some ownership of the First Order’s existing fleet and they weren’t necessarily on board. They could have at least made it seem like they were part of the same plan. The First Order comes in to destabilize the galaxy, the Final Order finishes the job (but Kylo becoming Supreme Leader complicated matters).

I think it would have been interesting, if the Resistance, and First Order were forced to work together to defeat the Final Order. The arrival of the good guy fleet felt just a little too convenient for me. I think it would have been far more interesting, if rather than being a one note bad guy, general Pryde actually cares about his troops, and the fate of the galaxy, and has the FO come to the aid of the Resistance in their hour of greatest need.

Valheru_84 said:

Hi Dre, sorry if this has already been answered or indicated before but will you be releasing your own colour corrected versions of the 4k projects once you’ve completed your changes or just LUTs to be applied to the base uncorrected versions already available now (which I currently have no idea how to do but I’m sure I could learn)?

Thank you in advance and also for your amazing work, the images look absolutely beautiful! 😃

Yes, the regrade will be a separate release. 😃

Broom Kid said:

Hiding reasonable, justified criticisms behind something called “two-hour-rage” is ridiculously counterproductive. Why would anyone want to watch a “two-hour-rage” directed at anything?

If the criticisms are reasonable and justified what’s the benefit in presenting them as two hours of concentrated rage?

These sort of videos have been popular ever since the days of good ol’ Plinkett.

Here’s an updated figure of the domestic BO up till Jan 7:

It’s looking far less likely TROS will beat the final BO of RO. Here’s an estimate on the future trajectory based on the trajectory of RO:

The current estimated total world wide BO is $1.046 billion.

Shopping Maul said:

The planet-killing Star Destroyers were one of many reasons I see TROS as ROTJ done better. Not that it’s necessarily the greatest idea on earth, but more because it was a cool way to retain that ‘super weapon/final showdown’ idea without the blatant retread of the Death Star.

I don’t agree, because while the idea of planet-killing Star Destroyers might seem more original, and interesting on paper, it is used in the lamest way possible in the film. Essentially, they show one of these Destroyers blow up a planet, in an attempt to artificially raise the stakes, to then never use the lasers again for the rest of the movie. At least in ROTJ the Death Star was used in an interesting way, to lure the rebels to it, and then as a twist, have it be be operational. It was also actively used in the space battle to increase tension, forcing the rebels to engage the Star Destroyers at point blank range. Lastly, the part where the rebels fly through the Death Star super structure, has turned out to be so iconic, that thusfar each of the ST entries have rehashed it in some way:

Tobar said:

Rumors are starting to circulate about an extended cut being released to theaters toward the end of the month:
THE 192 MINUTE J.J. ABRAMS RISE OF SKYWALKER CUT IS COMING SOONER THAN YOU THINK

It breaks down to this:

• An extended version of The Rise of Skywalker will be announced in the coming week, releasing near the end of January, and including 3-5 additional sequences fit into the narrative. This should bring the cut up from 142 minutes to about 165 minutes.
• Rumored sequences to be included in this cut involve an extended Endor sequence that occurs before the final shot in the current film, Lobot and Lando in a sequence that predates the chase in the desert, and a slew of ghost Jedis returning alongside Luke and Leia and participating in the final sequence to unseat the Emperor.
• This new cut will be simply treated as an Extended Cut, and will include a post-credits sequence highlighting additional sequences that will be released with the official Blu Ray release of The Rise of Skywalker which will have a special J.J. Abrams Director’s Cut version of the film at 185 minutes.
• When The Rise of Skywalker enters the streaming window exclusively on Disney Plus it will include an additional 7 minutes of extra footage that didn’t get finished in post production as a part of its exclusive run on the streaming upstart.

Interesting! Considering that most criticisms were leveled at the fast pacing, and lack of moments of reflection, the extended/director’s cut should make for a better movie.

Here is a figure with the domestic numbers for TROS, compared to RO and TLJ up till Jan 31:

The biggest uncertainty is, whether it will overtake the BO of RO in the end, as it is just below RO at this point, but its BO decline is faster for TROS than for RO, so there’s a good chance, it won’t. However, ever since Christmas TROS has been following the trajectory of RO extremely closely, so if it beats RO, it will almost certainly do so by a very small margin. Taking into account the budget, and marketing cost, TROS will likely be the least profitable of all the films except for Solo.

yotsuya said:

I think it is going to pass the 1 billion mark. My guess is next Sunday or sometime during the following week. And it is still playing on a lot of screens and hasn’t hit the second run theaters yet. So there is potential for it climb a couple of notches higher for the 2019 worldwide box office.

That’s not what the data indicates. All films have shown the same very consistent pattern in January, namely a half time of about a week, meaning each week will bring in about half the BO of last week. If it hits 1 billion, it will likely do so in about two weeks at the earliest, more likely near the end of its run, although the scenario, that it just misses the 1 billion mark is also still on the table. Jan 6 and the days thereafter will very likely show a dramatic drop in BO revenue, since it is the end of the holiday period for most people around the globe with kids going back to school. It will then likely pick up a bit for the weekend, but like I said, it is unlikely it will do much more than half of last weekend.

rocknroll41 said:

$919 million now. So I’m guessing the movie will close in on a billion within the next few days.

I estimate it will do $40-$50 million in the next week, which would bring it to $960-$970 million, and another $20-$25 million in the week thereafter, which would bring it to $980-$995 million. The final weeks of its run should bring in another $20-$25 million, which would bring the final BO to $1,000-$1,020 million, so likely just over $1,000,000,000.

Cthulhunicron said:

DrDre said:

Cthulhunicron said:

Wanderer_ said:

DuracellEnergizer said:

“Sheev” is Palpatine’s first name. That detail was one of Lucas’ last contributions to the lore, IIRC.

I just find weird that we call him palpatine at all. He is darth sidious.

It’s not wise to call him Darth Sidious on this forum.

Why? This site is called originaltrilogy.com, not prequelhaters.com, or sequelhaters.com. As for any forum, there will be those, that like the PT, and/or ST, and those that don’t, but let’s not even begin to push the idea, that some opinions on the films are more valid than others, or that we should censor ourselves to pacify some vocal hard line segment of the membership on this forum.

I was only joking.

I have no sense of humor. 😉

oojason said:

DrDre said:

Cthulhunicron said:

Wanderer_ said:

DuracellEnergizer said:

“Sheev” is Palpatine’s first name. That detail was one of Lucas’ last contributions to the lore, IIRC.

I just find weird that we call him palpatine at all. He is darth sidious.

It’s not wise to call him Darth Sidious on this forum.

Why? This site is called originaltrilogy.com, not prequelhaters.com, or sequelhaters.com. As for any forum, there will be those, that like the PT, and/or ST, and those that don’t, but let’s not even begin to push the idea, that some opinions on the films are more valid than others, or that we should censor ourselves to pacify some vocal hard line segment of the membership on this forum.

I read it as more a joke / humour - and was awaiting a follow up post ‘He IS the Senate’ etc

(or maybe now a follow-up of ‘He is ALL of the Senate’)

Cthulhunicron said:

Wanderer_ said:

DuracellEnergizer said:

“Sheev” is Palpatine’s first name. That detail was one of Lucas’ last contributions to the lore, IIRC.

I just find weird that we call him palpatine at all. He is darth sidious.

It’s not wise to call him Darth Sidious on this forum.

Why? This site is called originaltrilogy.com, not prequelhaters.com, or sequelhaters.com. As for any forum, there will be those, that like the PT, and/or ST, and those that don’t, but let’s not even begin to push the idea, that some opinions on the films are more valid than others, or that we should censor ourselves to pacify some vocal hard line segment of the membership on this forum.

yotsuya said:

Broom Kid said:

People don’t overcome their shortcomings and then never ever make them ever again for the rest of their life, though.

His mistake in this example is “seeing that his nephew will commit genocide on a scale his father never dreamed of and instinctually flicking on a lightsaber” - before immediately feeling a flood of total shame at himself in response. It’s actually a lesser mistake, considering the first time he tried to save one of his genocidal relatives he kicked the hell out of him and then cut his hand off before just barely managing to stop himself from delivering the killing blow.

Nobody solves a problem in their life once and then it stays solved forever. Even real life heroes struggle with those sorts of things. That he made that mistake (among others, including subtly succumbing to hubris and vanity) doesn’t erase his maturation as a character (especially considering the rest of the film’s characterization of Luke, and Hamill’s amazing work in bringing it depth and meaning). It complicates it, but by the end of the film’s arc, it’s enriched. Luke does something no Jedi’s ever done, not even Yoda. He only unlocks the potential and ability within himself to do that because he learns - finally - from the failures he kept incurring (as we all do) when his life continued past “happily ever after.”

His stand at the end of ROTJ was great, but that is a moment. I really feel the rest of ROTJ and the two previous films is more true to his character and insisting that he must live up to that high point of heroism at the end of ROTJ is lifting him above being human and putting him on a pedestal.

This is a really odd statement for me. How can you point to the end of a well established character arc over the course of three films, and within this film, and say: “Nah, that is just an isolated moment, that doesn’t really count? Just look at the flawed guy in TESB, that is the real Luke, who never learned from his mistakes, and will forever be the reckless boy looking to the horizon, rather than the responsible man he appeared to be at the end of ROTJ.” The isolated moment, that stands out is the Luke in Ben’s hutt, who for no apparent reason regresses back to the reckless boy looking to the horizon. It is a moment, that required context, and development, that we simply never got, and so we are left wondering why Luke, who saw the good in and hope for his father, didn’t extend the same courtesy to the son of his sister and best friend, who by then was just a young boy asleep in his bed struggling with dark thoughts? I like Luke’s arc in TLJ, but I feel the setup was rather poorly handled. It’s perfectly fine for a character to make a mistake, but as viewers we should understand the reasons for that mistake. It shouldn’t be, because the plot requires it, and we should not have to ignore the last part of a character arc to make it work. I also think, that if the premise had been well written, and developed, the vast majority of fans would have accepted it. Conversly, when a large segment of the fanbase rejects a certain premise, it is a good indication, it wasn’t handled very well.

Broom Kid said:

Apologies for stepping on any toes. I’ll forgo adding any statistical updates to the thread.

No toes have been stepped on my friend. 😉 It’s all just speculation…

Edit:

I also misinterpreted your post, so sorry about that. No offense meant.