OutboundFlight

The Eleven Star Wars Films
by Outbound

1. A New Hope / Star Wars: I rewatched the OT and ST in preparation for TROS this month, and I found myself enjoying this more than Empire. Although it’s production value isn’t ideal, I find this story best captures the essence of Star Wars… despite being the shortest in the franchise. 10/10.

2. Empire Strikes Back: Standing next to ANH on a pinnacle, Empire is rightfully praised for its shocking story, high production, and darker themes. 10/10.

3. The Rise of Skywalker: I’m nicknaming this one Fuck It! A Star Wars Story. This is the only ST movie confident in itself, and it has so much fun doing it. It’s sorta a Fast and Furious movie, but with the emotion of the best Star Wars when it needs it. Only problem is it’s too rushed, a direct result of splitting the trilogy to two directors. 9/10.

4. The Force Awakens: Rewatching this movie I had forgotten how much fun the the little moments are. Rey and Finn talking in the Falcon, Kylo being immature. And TROS makes it even better in retrospect. Only real issues I have is first, Starkiller Base, and second, the intense nostalgia you’d expect from the passing of the torch. It’s a great setup for the sequel trilogy. 8.5/10

5. Return of the Jedi: This movie has perhaps the best scene in Star Wars - the throne room. Everything else is meh. The plot is broken up and everyone seems to just be there to finish the trilogy up. 7.5/10

6. Solo: A very basic movie that was unfortunately filled with controversy. Really it’s a solid movie. It’s a bit clunky, but still a fun adventure I can get behind. 7/10.

7. Rogue One: Everyone talks about the end to this movie, and I agree it’s awesome. But the first half is too boring, imo. It’s a solid Star Wars adventure, but not one we really needed to make into a movie. But Vader’s in it so I guess it’s great? 6.5/10.

8. The Last Jedi: This is hard for me because I am in a perpetual love/hate relationship with this movie. I really liked everything related to the Jedi, and got really annoyed by the Resistance. It wants to lecture to the audience when we just want to have fun. I still side with Poe on the Holdo debate, and Rose was an unneeded character when Finn was setup in TFA to love Rey. But after all that, we have Luke’s standoff against the First Order: one of the best scenes in the franchise. 6.5/10.

9. Revenge of the Sith: For the longest time I put this one higher for the memes alone. But as a movie, it’s basically a bunch of people walk and talk until the main character turns evil. Add some random fights to keep people awake, and you got yourself this movie. 5/10.

10. The Phantom Menace: The most boring of the Star Wars movies. 4.5/10.

11. Attack of the Clones: I have never understood this movie. The plot is baffling. The characters cringe worthy. The locations aged CGI. Sorry, but this feels less like it’s one movie and more like the bridge between Episodes I and III. 3/10.

I LOVE this movie. The entirety of TFA and TLJ felt like they were holding on so much. Like they couldn’t cross a line. And then this movie says fuck it!

I went into this movie hoping for the best and prepared for the worst. I hadn’t seen the leaks but knew of the lackluster RT score. But how bad could it be, I said?

After literally 30 minutes of trailers (I checked with my phone - the last trailer got booed) those iconic words Star Wars appear on the screen… followed by…

“It is a period of civil war”?

“Luke Skywalker has vanished”?

“Turmoil has engulfed the galactic republic the taxation of trade routes is under dispute”?

No. Instead we have the dead speak!

And my friends and I start laughing, surrounded by all these Star Wars fans trying to salvage the wreckage of a crawl and get prepared for what must be their perfect movie.

And that’s when I realized this movie was going to be pure entertainment. It’s not here to lecture you like The Last Jedi or speak in mysteries like The Force Awakens. Just fuck it. Have fun.

Poe, Finn, and Rey have so much chemistry! I had liked them in TFA but grown bored of everyone in TLJ. This made me love them. The first half was just a crazy adventure. And then the second half became a genuinely emotional conclusion. Rey isn’t a Mary Sue anymore and Ben getting his redemption early subverted my expectations in a positive way.

The plot was massive but streamlined. It’s a simple stop Palpatine story. It doesn’t give you a moment to consider Palpatine’s return… he’s just back and we gotta deal with it. The action was imaginative. A fleet of Death Stars? Why not!

Now, it wasn’t perfect - this movie in many ways feels as if it should have been two. It was too rushed, but if it means telling this crazy story than sure. Thanks to this, I like the Sequel Trilogy.

8.5/10 my third favorite Star Wars movie.

So I guess this happened?

Maaga said:

Broom Kid said:

The Rotten Tomatoes number has become its own narrative. That’s… not good news.

It’s time to inform the Senate that our ability to clear $200 million opening weekend has diminished.

I sincerely doubt this movie won’t make at least $200m opening weekend. I mean, there’s barely any competition.

NOOOO! EVERYBODY GOTTA WATCH CATS NOW!!! 🐈

/s

NeverarGreat said:

Slight problem, Vader wasn’t buried on the Death Star and Kylo would probably have already found Vader’s remains on Endor to get the mask.

Yeah, I’m banking on the assumption Kylo doesn’t know all that went down.

In new canon wasn’t Luke/Leia’s heritage some major scandal? So stuff like Vader’s redemption may not be known.

I know I said I’d be gone yesterday but I have one more thread to tie up.

With TROS just around the corner, I thought I’d make a last-ditch “prediction” of what is to come. This is just a fun little game to see if I can guess Disney and JJ correctly. It is not a wishlist of what I want.

I have not read any of the leaks. I have only watched the three trailers and a few of the promos. You won’t be spoiled by this post. Maybe I got it right, but there’s no way of nothing that. Most likely I got it wrong… for those who have seen the leaks, please don’t respond with hot/cold my guess is.

I predict the crawl will explain ever since the sacrifice of Luke, the Resistance has seen a surge in hope. They have rebuilt and are now threatening Kylo’s First Order. In desperation, Kylo learns of a secret macguffin that can bring back the dead. Kylo decides he will bring Darth Vader back to life. Only he can destroy the Resistance for good.

Meanwhile the Resistance has gathered on a jungle planet. Leia tutors Poe in leadership and Rey in the force. They learn of Kylo’s plan and move to the desert planet to stop them.

Despite their best efforts, the large desert battle fails, with Kylo acquiring the artifact and going to the Death Star ruins to reawaken Vader’s corpse. Meanwhile Leia either dies or is decommissioned, forcing Rey and Poe to step up as leaders respectively.

But plot twist, Kylo can’t reawaken Vader because Vader was redeemed. We learn it was really Palpatine’s spirit guiding him here, and now Sheev is back. He uses Kylo as a pawn while reawakening his secret fleet to kill the last jedi.

Rey and Kylo fight, and Rey convinces Kylo to join the light side and kill Palpatine. The two then team up and have an intense force duel before Palpatine is defeated for good.

In the aftermath, Rey and Ben overlook a new order of Jedi who will protect the galaxy in a reorganized republic.

Next week I’ll critique how I did!

I think Adywan pulled it off so well because so many could hop aboard the project… everyone wants to improve the OT’s graphics. They are great movies and to improve their look is something we all agree on.

But the PT? Can we decide what to do? How radical do we go, and how much would we like to keep? Would people work with a graphics update for a movie who’s story / cast aren’t really that good (at least compared to the OT)?

Despite my concerns, I would do my best to support such a daring project.

Can’t believe we’re just 10 days now. I still remember the hype after we all learned Disney would be making a sequel trilogy. It’s crazy to think it will all be over soon. I don’t want to be spoiled, so I’ll be leaving the forums till next Friday.

FreezingTNT2 said:

I have an idea for a future PT edit: we will not see the birth of Luke and Leia. In fact, when Obi-Wan returns to the ship after his duel with Anakin, we don’t see a living Padmé at all. The last time we see a living Padmé will be when Anakin Force-chokes her, and we can assume she died after Anakin and Obi-Wan begin their duel. During Anakin’s transformation into Vader, we will not see the childbirth.

We should assume that Padmé died on Mustafar, and that Luke and Leia are just babies whose parents were killed during Order 66. Also, in a future edit for A New Hope, everytime Obi-Wan, Beru, and Owen bring up Luke’s father, they’ll be referring to a different Jedi and not Anakin Skywalker. Also, Luke wouldn’t mention “Skywalker” when he arrives at Leia’s prisoner cell in the Death Star. That way, we can preserve “I am your father” in The Empire Strikes Back without having to make it seem like Anakin and Vader are separate characters.

What do you think? 😃

That might just work! Honestly the biggest flaw in preserving the twist is the OT giving Luke’s name. If you could cut Luke’s line in ANH and redo the Empire crawl to remove his last name, it would actually be a twist.

Even better, cut Padme revealing her pregnancy at all. Maybe the children are conceived a few days before the purge, and Padme survives nine months to give birth? It doesn’t have to be fully explained.

TavorX said:

Touching. I’ll definitely be seeing it in theaters, despite my lack of true excitement I’d normally have for a SW film. However, it does help to see that there’s more character interactions that we lost in TLJ.

But MAN are they really being on the nose for any of those people that dearly wanted Finn and Poe to be a romantic pairing, amusing to say the least. The marketing team knows what they’re doing.

Yeah, that’s got to be out of the running now with Finn + Rose, but they’ll still want to market for it.

I wonder if Reylo will go official?

Just noticed I never added an opening guess. Let’s set it 240 mill.

Honestly it seems like a waste of time. If it’s the only change your making, it’s not really a fanedit as much as a subtle tweak, not really worth rendering and downloading. If it’s one of many changes, why isolate a significant part of the audience by changing the episode number?

DominicCobb said:

I never liked the idea of a gray Jedi, or at least the kind of gray Jedi that’s an anti-hero who uses all the powers because he’s too cool to follow the rules. But the idea of a “gray” Jedi who does have a strong sense of right and wrong, that’s an attractive idea. The PT sets up a dogma that’s doomed to fail - anger, hate, and fear are all natural human emotions and suppressing them can be dangerous and unhealthy. You can see how this is (poorly communicated) subtext in the PT, in regards to how Anakin’s story unfolds.

I always thought that a potential sequel trilogy would confront these ideas that were floated in the prequels but never fully considered. So far, the two films (well, really TLJ) have actually picked up the thread on this to some extent - the fallibility of the Jedi, the danger/complacency of Jedi pride, the monopoly the Jedi strive to have on the Force. The pieces are in place to come to some sort of resolution for it all in TROS, if they are so inclined. Since ROTJ dropped the ball on Luke’s perspective in regards to Ben and Yoda’s actions, it became fair game to simply have Luke revive the Jedi order as it was. But now Rey is building an explicitly new order. We’ve seen Rey use what could potentially be considered anger in her fights without any condemnation or repercussions. So that could either be integrated into the storyline, or simply ignored as a quirk of choreography/acting. But on the flip, what they’re doing with Kylo’s eternally conflicted persona (never fully light or dark), and his being essentially the other side of Rey’s coin, it would ultimately be kind of surprising if they didn’t explore this idea to some extent.

When I hear “Gray Jedi” I think of someone like Cassian Andor (if he had the force). They’re doing the right thing, but aren’t afraid to flirt with evil in doing so. From that angle I can’t see Rey going towards darkness.

I don’t think Gray Jedi is the solution. You can’t say the side that destroyed planets, purged races, and slaughtered children are half the good guys now, and the people doing everything to stop them were partially in the wrong. Instead I think it’s about reevaluating the light side’s rules. Yoda says Jedi cannot have emotions, but in ROTJ, Luke proves him wrong by using Vader’s fatherly love to turn him over. Therefore, the Jedi should have positive emotions.

ANH and TESB’s morals on becoming a Jedi feel like learning anything. For example the piano. When you start you hear the piano playing a really good song, and you excitedly start learning the keys. But then when you try to play all the good songs you aren’t good, and you become frustrated. Now the teacher must stress the importance of patience and hard work.

I actually agree. I would have liked to see Luke contradict Yoda and the Old Order more directly in ROTJ, proving that emotions can be used for good.

ATMachine said:

Interesting how that version of a “somebody is spaced and uses the Force to pull themselves back inside a ship” scene is much better staged than the one in TLJ.

Yeah, I think the real problem with that scene was the shot. Had it been executed differently it would have been fine.

TavorX said:

So hold up, is Rey leaping from a hanger, across space, to the Falcon?!

No, they are in the planet’s atmosphere.

DuracellEnergizer said:

regularjoe said:

If you want more and new Star Wars you’re going to have to make your peace with new characters, new story lines, new actors, new stories.

No “if” about it; I don’t. In fact, I wish it were possible to retroactively make less Star Wars crap.

How is it that by making the ST, or the PT, or heck even Empire Strikes Back has Lucasfilm “ruined” Star Wars 1977?

The way I see it, every piece of Star Wars media is an opportunity. Either you like it or you don’t. If you don’t, you can forget about it’s existence, and go back to what you like.

Well I suppose due to my name I’m legally required to post my thoughts. I prefer Outbound Flight, it’s was one of my favorites in the old EU. Not my actual favorite which might be counterintuitive, but hey, the name “OutboundFlight” is much slicker than “HeirToTheEmpire”.

I’ve also found Thrawn one of SW’s most interesting characters, despite him never appearing in any movies (yet). There really aren’t many “smart” SW characters besides him. He’s the opposite of the Jedi - the Jedi have wisdom and the force, Thrawn has intelligence and battleplans. His death is perfect, dying at the hands of the one people he underestimated - largely due to their connection with a force user.

Honestly, I think the simplest order for children is probably:

1. The OT uninterrupted
2. The PT uninterrupted
3. Solo? The Clone Wars?
4. The ST uninterrupted

This is for children who have remained oblivious to the Vader twist, and are likely too young to handle R1. For adults just do it chronologically. I don’t think adding tons of backstories is a good idea because it may become confusing for first-timers. Although it would make an interesting marathon watch.

I don’t understand how George Lucas is getting all the breaks now for his “originality” while Rian Johnson is hated for doing exactly what haters of TFA asked.

This is what RJ possibly “ruined” about Star Wars:

• Luke’s ultimate fate is sit around moaning about his failure before he returns to form and sacrifices himself.
• You can now hyperspace attack.
• Animal cruelty exists in Star Wars.

Compared to the PT:

• Anakin wasn’t a brave warrior, he was a creep.
• The Jedi were idiots.
• Padmé died of a broken heart.
• Stormtroopers are clones of Boba Fett’s father.
• There’s a ton of weird names.
• It’s potentially racist (likely accidental).
• The Jedi Purge happened in a day.
• Anakin built C-3PO and knew R2.
• Anakin knew about Uncle Owen but never checked up on him.

Yes, TLJ is way worse than the PT! /s I can see the argument TFA is the worst one, although I beg to differ, but I don’t understand how RJ gets SW worse than GL.

Your_friendly_Imperial said:

The First Order never rules the galaxy, they don’t own a galaxy weapon with which they blow up Republic space, they don’t own star destroyers. They are the underdogs who try to stay under the radar of the New Republic. Their tactics are subterfuge and terrorizing civilians. Essentially make them the Taliban of the galaxy.

I like this a lot. I’ve been thinking about ways to make it happen.

We cannot show the audience the First Order’s weakness. But we can tell them about it. As long as we remove any references to the “might” of the First Order, we could make that everyone involved in the FO (including overconfident Ren and Hux) know they’re trash, and have to be constantly a step ahead of the Republic.

For example. Let’s alter the wording of the crawl.

Luke Skywalker has vanished.
In his absence, a ragtag
terrorist group, the
FIRST ORDER, has risen
and will not rest until
Skywalker, the last Jedi,
has been destroyed.

We have now established the lie. We can strengthen it by adding bits and pieces of dialogue. For instance, the scene where Captain Phasma asks Kylo about what to do with the villagers. I suggest dubbing a nearby Stormtrooper to provide his opinion:

If we let them live, they’ll tell the Republic. We can’t afford a straight fight.
This, in turn, leads Kylo to order killing them all, making the First Order less cartoonish and more calculated.

Another possible example. At some point on the First Order Star Destroyer, add in a ship loudspeaker, announcing:
Jakku scavengers have picked up on our presence, and a First Responders group is on its way. This is a battle we cannot afford. Troopers, prepare to leave in t minus 30 minutes.

For Starkiller, you could cut out the planet-destroying entirely, though it will require some intense VFXs to cover the big hole. Instead the planet could just be a FO base that is attacked at the end of the movie to get the remaining map to Skywalker.

Finally, in TLJ the reason the FO is so intent on hunting the Resistance is that the Resistance is the only people with proof of their threat.Again, we could add a fake Stormtrooper conversation to establish this:
What’s with all the effort on one ship?
The Resistance knows about us.
Ah.

The footage isn’t a problem, we just need someone that could do a reasonable impression that can later be audio edited to fit the movie.

To review properly you should give it a season. Most shows nowadays don’t explain the overarching plot until the final episode (and often there’s a twist in the final scene!).

I’ve never been a fan of the star destroyers escaping shot. The sudden switch in tone between shots would come off bad in editing.

I think calling for “worst ideas” is just asking for arguments. But the second part sounds interesting.

I’d say most of Lucas’s PT sounds interesting in theory but falls apart because of the lack of character drama. I think if Lucas was better at directing characters we would have some solid Star Wars movies. A better directed Anakin could have been likable from the start, so we feel for him when he fails to gain Padme’s attention or feels constrained by Obi-Wan. Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan’s interactions with the Trade Federation could have been funny. And the one time they actually show great emotion - the High Ground scene - we would feel far more for these characters.

I also wonder if had Lucas written these as books, not screenplays, we would have liked, maybe even praised the storytelling.

DominicCobb said:

FreezingTNT2 said:

How would you feel if they remade the original trilogy films in a couple of decades from now? Personally, I’d be okay with it, especially in the form of a TV series which retells the whole saga.

Honestly, I probably wouldn’t mind all that much. Star Wars is a modern myth, and myths are meant to be told and retold. I’d only hope that if they were to do it again, they’d make it it’s own thing, and not try to merely replicate what made everyone enjoy the OT (like, for instance, how the Disney live action remakes often do).

If it sucks, who cares. I still have the OT (well, maybe not, but that’s what this site is for).

They’re already doing this with the ST. They try to make it its own thing, but the big reason for making it is to capitalize on these classic stories. And I’m perfectly fine with that. But if they want to do it again, just make a Sequel-Sequel Trilogy. Remaking the OT is too on the nose… although it’d probably still make a ton.