John Doom

imperialscum said:

Frank your Majesty said:

The problem is not that Anakin isn’t realistically portrayed as a jerk, it’s that he acts like a jerk at all. He’s supposed to be one of the main characters, in the OT he was described as a great man and a good friend, we should be relating to him and care for him

I was about to make a post but I guess I don’t need to.

What I would add is that this kind of fundamental annoying crap is the real deal breaker when it comes to PT. Bad acting or dialogue are mere mild annoyances.

I still think that, had they wrote better dialogues, in the end we would’ve not seen Anakin as a jerk, but more like a young rebel (no SW pun intended!)

Smithers said:

The argument that George Lucas always intended the Jedi to be selfless and emotionless people is not true. Hell, in the first draft of TPM (found here: http://starwarsuniverse2.tripod.com/id7.html) Obi-Wan ends up falling in love with Anakin’s mother!

:\ Those look like fakes. Anyway, I think Qui-gon is the one falling with Miss Skywalker 😄

-Anakin as a mostly unlikable character;
-Anakin and Padmè’s relationship developing so fast, was hardly believable;
-Anakin’s decision to quit his duty to save her mother. I understand what was GL up to with this, but does Anakin actually have to endanger Padmè too?
-Jango Fett as the genetic source for the Clone Army;
-The Arena. Though I admit the first part (before the jedi arrive) was well directed, I just found the whole concept a bit out of place, somehow forced;
-The DS’s plans already completed more than 20 years before its construction;

Objectively, it wasn’t the worst film ever: the plot was overall well designed, directing and compositions were fine too. The real problems were dialogues and acting, and this is really unfortunate (thankfully, foreign dubbings were able to fix this). Then there’s the editing which was… functional, sure, but could’ve used more craft, especially in using the score, so to make the scenes more involving.
As a SW movie, having even more characters somehow related to each other, was unnecessary and, personally, partially ruined my experience. The same can be said on the increasing use of bad CGIs, the addition of more goofy characters (especially for villains), most of which seem out of place in SW even after ROTJ.

Sith just got reels :\

Lord Haseo said:

But what if the sequels have different situations our heroes must go through but still rely on the Star Wars formula (blaster shootouts, space/land battles, lightsaber duels, chases etc.)?

It would be good!

thejediknighthusezni said:

They could have recast Luke Skywalker as a 13 year old Tanzanian girl who happens to be a lesbian.
Wipe out racism, sexism, ageism, and homophobia with one fell blow! 😃

I can somehow see Disney doing this, one day 😄
But really, only few people would stand young protagonists after TPM 😉

Lord Haseo said:

Dek Rollins said:

TFA ripped off Star Wars; the overall plot,

It remixed the plot. In STAR WARS the overall plot was to destroy the Death Star; in TFA the overall plot was to find Luke.

The movie “remixes” most of the plot points from the OT, from another droid on another classified mission, to the destruction of the Nth DS-alike. That’s much more ROTJ dared to do back in the days with DSII.

Though, after all that it borrowed, it still managed to be an original film, because of it’s design.

No, it seems like one because of it’s design when it wasn’t wholly original.

It took a whole lot from older sources, and then built on them.

One can argue TFA does exactly the same things in a lot of regards. Especially when it comes to scenes like Maz’s Castle or the Han and Kylo Ren confrontation.

You can’t give one specific thing that Star Wars was ripping off, because it wasn’t a ripoff.

Did you see the Dam Busters video I posted?

There’s a world of difference between:
-trying to make something unique by building on different sources and putting them in a new context;
-building mainly on itself, especially when recreating the same plot points.

because straying too much from the original films makes it hardly a SW film, but being close makes it feel unoriginal.

That’s a difficult line to walk across. Even if Episodes VIII and IX are mostly original there will be people who will not like it because they think it doesn’t feel enough like Star Wars. But there’s no way to make everyone happy. Not in this day and age anyway and especially not with the fandom in question.

Stopping remixing events from earlier films from the same series would be the first step into the right direction for most of us: I remember asking about this here sometime ago, and people said they don’t want Disney/LF to keep remixing for the next episodes.

P.S.:

DuracellEnergizer said:

Are we still on this discussion?

Bitching about the merits of TFA is sooooo December 2015.

“Nothing is over! Nothing! You just don’t turn it off! It wasn’t my thread! You asked me, I didn’t ask you!”
😄 jk

BillionaireHobo287 said:

Man, this thread got quiet. Think again before criticizing the Force Awakens of its originality!

We already shared our thoughts on this topic. What are we all supposed to do now, go around in circles? 😄

I agree that the OT doesn’t need prequels nor sequels. Like me, you probably see SW from an artistic point of view, but Disney/LF want more, so here we go 😄
In any case, a solution for making better sequels was already found years ago: in a way, TESB was not a SW film (or at least not like the original SW), yet most of us love it. Why? Because it was well crafted, it was able to stay true to the original movie, while expanding it with new concepts: a perfect balance.
So it was possible. I just wish they’d kept trying going into that bold direction for the ST.

When I first heard about it, I think my parents had already bought me a PS2, and boy was I excited to both see the movie and play that videogame! Too bad it was very short, boring and had all those laughable cutscenes :\ I mean, even TPM’s videogame felt more polished and complete 😄

Lord Haseo said:

John Doom said:
I see what you mean. If conflicts are an asset in SW to you

I’m sure it’s an asset to every one. It’s called Star Wars for a reason you know.

😄 that’s true, but let’s not jump to conclusions: I’m not the only one who suggested this idea, and there are also other people who liked it, so there are definitely people who don’t think full intergalactic conflicts in SW are a given.

with different kind of conflicts and enemies

What types of new enemies would you have in mind? I’ve been toying with an idea of having all of the non Force Sensitives hunt down those who use The Force because the galaxy is tired of the wars they bring upon them.

I simply meant changing the empire with stuff typical of the Cold War imaginary (ideologies, spies, information control, rogues).
I like your idea a lot too, which also reminds me a bit of KOTOR2. Imagine the main characters/viewers being initially told the Force Sensitives are the plague which once brought war in the galaxy: it could’ve led to a very interesting and original plot 😉

He did much worse and had even more silly dialogues. In an alternate videogame-like reality :\

Lord Haseo said:

John Doom said:

Expositions on the plot can be as long as in ROTJ’s briefing scene (which didn’t affect its overall pacing), there’s no need for waits and conversations longer than there were in the OT.

If you’re going to have espionage scenes and a lot of exposition spread throughout the film it will effect the pacing.

Not necessarily, there’s no need for more exposition than there’s in ROTJ (again, think of James Bond films, like Goldeneye, which have just the right amount of expositions without feeling slow).

Why do you say it would make more sense in a prequel novel?

Because in real life the Cold War could have resulted in a savage species ending conflict. If war did erupt the Cold War would have been seen as the prelude to it. Also STAR WARS and TFA both start in the thick of it; the only film/s that fixated on what started the war was TPM and most of AOTC.

I see what you mean. If conflicts are an asset in SW to you, the Cold War-like setting, in addition to espionage, would still allow for them: Korea, Vietnam and Afghanistan were all settings of wars the superpowers were heavily involved with.
So, you could start the trilogy with similar wars, but in space. These conflicts then could escalate in a crisis between the superpowers and, in the final movie, bring to a galactic war and its final solution. It’s definitely possible.

wasn’t half of SW’s plot about Leia being a spy and Obi-wan’s mission to bring the stolen data tapes to the Rebellion?

You’re right but there was a full blown war still going on and the movie changes direction after Alderaan explodes. It seems as though you want the film to go even further than that which will detract for the other aspect of Star Wars.

Well, in this regard not really further, just with a Cold War-like context, in order to easily differentiate it from the OT overall plot (with different kind of conflicts and enemies, so more chances to get creative), while staying true to SW original traits (sci-fi, knights and magic, and our history mirrored through the epic).

Expositions on the plot can be as long as in ROTJ’s briefing scene (which didn’t affect its overall pacing), there’s no need for waits and conversations longer than there were in the OT.
Why do you say it would make more sense in a prequel novel? I don’t get it: wasn’t half of SW’s plot about Leia being a spy and Obi-wan’s mission to bring the stolen data tapes to the Rebellion? I’m only suggesting to push this just a little further in the espionage genre with a cold war-like context.

Lord Haseo said:

Because it would call for slower pacing which are fine for books but doesn’t translate as well in terms of film. Still a great idea though.

Pacing only comes down to the director’s taste. You can totally have both espionage and fast pacing in movies (think of every James Bond film).

By the way, some days ago I was thinking about the emperor’s evil laugh in ROTJ, that you hear it often throughout the movie, but can you never see him actually doing it (except for a split second once): it was edited out. Why? Probably because it was cheesy. Fast-forward 20 years, we got the emperor doing his evil laugh right in front of the camera. And it’s cheesy 😄

Why do you think that?

If the OT is “WWII in space”, they could’ve built the new trilogy as the “Cold War in space”, with two factions remnants of the old Republic as the “superpowers”. In staying true to this Cold War setting, we would’ve had less battles between armies, but more espionage and information control, leading to a completely different kind of plot and scenes from the OT.
You still want a fight between light and dark jedi? They could’ve wrote that these factions are unofficially lead/protected by jedi and dark jedi, or have their struggle be the actual cause of this Cold War (but I guess this one would be too similar to the PT, in a way).
Completely new characters, with only very few from the old cast making a return, mostly as cameos.
New concepts: the OT had the Force and the empire, the PT had the clones and the council, so it would’ve been the right time to introduce us to new concepts (like the infamous crystals, or borrowed sci-fi concepts) and build the plot around them.

3PO’s humor was also toned down a bit because of the darker tone of the film. In fact, it always surprises me they tried using him as a comic relief anyway in the carbon freezing scene 😄

I guess it would make things easier in that they don’t have to explain we’re going to see spinoff 1, then ep.VIII, then spinoff 2, then ep.IX, then spinoff 3,… and so on 😄
It may make things confusing to newcomers who don’t know what’s the chronological order, though.

Lord Haseo said:

John Doom said:
I remember him being either serious or playful yet scared to death in that kind of situations throughout the trilogy.
Which scenes are you referring to? I could be wrong, but as I said I don’t feel there’s much consistency with Han’s character in that scene.

Han Solo: Together again, huh?
Luke: Wouldn’t miss it.
Han Solo: How we doin’?
Luke: Same as always.
Han Solo: That bad, huh?

C-3PO: His high exaltedness, the Great Jabba the Hutt, has decreed that you are to be terminated immediately.
Han Solo: Good, I hate long waits.
C-3PO: You will therefore be taken to the Dune Sea, and cast into the pit of Carkoon, the nesting place of the all-powerful Sarlaac.
Han Solo: Doesn’t sound so bad.
C-3PO: In his belly you will find a new definition of pain and suffering as you are slowly digested over a thousand years.
Han Solo: On second thought, let’s pass on that, huh?

I thought you were referring to that scene in ROTJ, but as I said, even though he acts playful and jokes, he does look scared, not fearless (which is always true throughout the OT when Han is facing an immediate danger), while in that TFA’s scene he’s clearly not, which is why I feel his behavior seems off, with him surrounded and yet even mocking his armed speakers, playing dumb with them. It seems too much to me for his character, though I guess it makes for a good laugh.

adywan said:

John Doom said:

By consistent with SW you mean him being a cold-blooded cowboy, and consistent with ROTJ being playful? If so, I say he’s clearly not cold-blooded in TFA

You mean apart from the fact he punched one of the pirates and then threw him directly into the path of one of the Rathtars? I’d say that was a pretty cold blooded killer move to do

With “cold-blooded” I meant his “shoot, ask questions later” attitude when in danger, rather than standing and talking (like he does in TFA, instead): killing pirates after an escalation does not apply to what I meant, it’s more like “badass” 😄

Lord Haseo said:

John Doom said:
I guess they were more for a comedy scene than for character consistency, which is something not everyone liked (including myself), but it’s not a crime either.

I think him trying to worm his way out of a situation like he did in STAR WARS and like he did in Return of The Jedi is consistent with his character. They opted to do both and I think it worked fine.

By consistent with SW you mean him being a cold-blooded cowboy, and consistent with ROTJ being playful? If so, I say he’s clearly not cold-blooded in TFA (though that’s the case for ROTJ too), also I don’t remember him joking in the OT like that when facing a danger: I remember him being either serious or playful yet scared to death in that kind of situations throughout the trilogy.
Which scenes are you referring to? I could be wrong, but as I said I don’t feel there’s much consistency with Han’s character in that scene.

Dek Rollins said:

MalàStrana said:

… in a scene where he’s more a goofy GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY protogonist than the legendary Han Solo…

Prota…gahnist?

Proto-agonist.

Well, had LF wanted to have that kind of “OT Han” I described, they would’ve just written the scene differently: he might’ve been cornered rather than surrounded, with the two factions in front of him or at his sides. Then he could’ve used the right timing to reach for a door behind him and so on.
Again, I’m not saying they should’ve done this, just that, if they wanted to, they could’ve done it. I guess they were more for a comedy scene than for character consistency, which is something not everyone liked (including myself), but it’s not a crime either.

Lord Haseo said:

He seemed like good ol’ Han to me. Trying to talk his way out of certain death, making wise cracks and when one of them sees BB-8 and assumes Rey and Finn are on board he tries to save them by acting as if they didn’t exist. Sounds like Han to me.

I’m not saying one shouldn’t change his behavior in his life, but I myself think in that scene he acts more like some kind of comedian than the cold-blooded cowboy of the OT, the one who shoots first, asks questions later. He should’ve just said “Boring conversation anyway” and blasted his way to the Falcon 😄 , instead it reminds me of his deleted line in ROTJ, that is Han trying to do an Indiana Jones’ impression or something :\

Sorry to be so blunt, but these new screenshots from the blu-ray do highlight I was right all along on TFA’s color grading being like christmas lights, while others said it wasn’t the case: “pictures taken by a phone”, “not final grading”, “a quick and dirty job done just for the trailer”, right right :\
In a way, TFA really is no different from the PT in its terrible use of over-saturated colors (with the exception of TPM’s theatrical grading).

😄 This is what really happened on Dagobah: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZsrmR2xGlW8&feature=youtu.be&t=83