Titan Network
Community => Comics and Other Media => Topic started by: Golden Girl on December 17, 2015, 12:14:37 AM
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I flew out to Europe with a couple of my brothers to catch it today, and these are my spoiler-free pros and cons:
PROS:
+ It's not a Disney movie, it's a Star Wars movie
+ This is Rey's movie - Daisey Ridley is the star of the show
+ Lots of action - lots and lots and lots of action
+ Better balance between CGI and practical effects than in the last 3 episodes
+ JJ gets generally more consistent performances form his cast than George did in the previous 6 episodes
+ Klyo Ren makes for an interesting and creepy antagonist - Adam Driver really sells the sometimes sudden mood swings from menacing to furious to petulant to vulnerable
+ Plenty of humor
+ Han and Chewie feel like they've never been away
+ BB-8 - no girl should travel the galaxy without one
+ Doesn't feel like a George Lucas movie
CONS:
- Doesn't feel like a George Lucas movie
- Thinnest story out of the 7 episodes
- Lacks some of the mysticism and mythological beats of the previous 6 episodes
- JJ feels like he's trying a bit too hard at some points
- Not as visually inventive as the previous 6 episodes
- JJ doesn't let the world breathe as often as George
- Some pacing problems, especially in the second half
- The score lacks a bit of oomph in places
- JJ lacks the visual storytelling clarity of George
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So umm, did you like it?
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Yes - It as lots of fun - although I'm interested to see how much repeat business it gets outside of the fanbase.
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Having just watched the original trilogy and than this one, I agree with you on the score bit. The music was present, but didn't feel as much part of the movie as it did in the original trilogy.
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I think that the music lacking a bit of a spark was down to JJ lacking the same visual storytelling flair as Lucas - there was loads of action, but not really any stand-out action sequence that could have drawn a striking new piece from the music.
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It's a good punch in the nostalgia feels.
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It's a good punch in the nostalgia feels.
Sounds promising. Any positive feels-punching would be an improvement over episodes 1-3.
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Sounds promising. Any positive feels-punching would be an improvement over episodes 1-3.
Well I'm old, in my 50s and saw the original Star Wars when I was 15. I got a lot of nostalgia that can get punched. Heck, I watched the new Thunderbirds and felt 6 again.
Slightly Star Wars related funny weather report from the UK.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qslJQUMc9yA
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I will say that the part that gave me the most gleeful childish grin on my face was the STAR WARS coming up on the screen.
I flew out to Europe with a couple of my brothers to catch it today
I just reread this, and it makes it sound like you flew to Europe specifically to watch Star Wars.
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Who wouldn't? :P
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Anyone hear about the guy who yelled out a spoiler at the premier of the Force Awakens and 3 people dressed as Darth Vader, Boba Fett and a Storm Trooper beat him up for 5 minutes before the police arrived? The cops let the 3 individuals go saying it was a "justifiable assault."
Can you imagine that conversation? Police officer, "You 3 are going to jail for assault."
Person dressed as Darth Vader waves his hand slowly, "We're not going to jail, it was a justifiable assault."
Cop, "Nah, you're not going to jail, it was a totally justifiable assault. Get out of here and have a good evening!"
Jedi mind trick works!
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Anyone hear about the guy who yelled out a spoiler at the premier of the Force Awakens and 3 people dressed as Darth Vader, Boba Fett and a Storm Trooper beat him up for 5 minutes before the police arrived? The cops let the 3 individuals go saying it was a "justifiable assault."
Can you imagine that conversation? Police officer, "You 3 are going to jail for assault."
Person dressed as Darth Vader waves his hand slowly, "We're not going to jail, it was a justifiable assault."
Cop, "Nah, you're not going to jail, it was a totally justifiable assault. Get out of here and have a good evening!"
Jedi mind trick works!
False. (http://www.snopes.com/false-star-wars-fan-beaten-sharing-spoilers/) Why am I snopesing a Titan post? This isn't Facebook. Research this shit!
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Interesting points of view:
http://www.vulture.com/2015/12/best-star-wars-movie-viewing-order.html
I had always been torn between Release Order or Numerical Order. After reading this, though, I can see the value in Abraham Riesman's comments, especially for people who haven't seen any of the films.
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I'm in the process of showing them to my girlfriend in the 4,5,1,2,3,6 order. She's never seen Star Wars, and never much cared for it, but the further we go, the more she seems to like it and understand it. I'd like to get her to watch Clone Wars, cause Anakin's fall just based on the movies seems so....stupid without the background of certain events in TCW.
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Anyone hear about the guy who yelled out a spoiler at the premier of the Force Awakens and 3 people dressed as Darth Vader, Boba Fett and a Storm Trooper beat him up for 5 minutes before the police arrived? The cops let the 3 individuals go saying it was a "justifiable assault."
Can you imagine that conversation? Police officer, "You 3 are going to jail for assault."
Person dressed as Darth Vader waves his hand slowly, "We're not going to jail, it was a justifiable assault."
Cop, "Nah, you're not going to jail, it was a totally justifiable assault. Get out of here and have a good evening!"
Jedi mind trick works!
I was waiting on line for the midnight premiere of Star Trek II back in the day in Times Square. They had to have a 2nd show because so many people showed up so we had to wait for the 2nd show. The big spoiler was of course whether Spock dies or not at the end.
The first showing let out and some one walking out shouted - "Wow - what an ending who would have thought Vader was Luke's father!" Most of us in the line thought that was really funny. (It was after 1am and we were getting tired)
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Interesting points of view:
http://www.vulture.com/2015/12/best-star-wars-movie-viewing-order.html
I had always been torn between Release Order or Numerical Order. After reading this, though, I can see the value in Abraham Riesman's comments, especially for people who haven't seen any of the films.
If I had started my viewing early enough before VII, I would have done it flashback style. Although some of the comments there make it seem like starting with 1 is good for kids, which makes sense - IV was way slower to develop than I remembered.
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I decided not to see it till I can get it on torrent in decent quality.
I heard there was some political/ideological input into it. Our politics has no place in starwars. sick and tired of it finding it's way into entertainment. Wont pay to see it unless someone can confirm that what I was told is a lie.
So I'm asking here; did it contain any notable and noticeable ideologies?
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No more so than the original movies.
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I decided not to see it till I can get it on torrent in decent quality.
I heard there was some political/ideological input into it. Our politics has no place in starwars. sick and tired of it finding it's way into entertainment. Wont pay to see it unless someone can confirm that what I was told is a lie.
So I'm asking here; did it contain any notable and noticeable ideologies?
It had two new main characters on the good side - one of them is a very capable woman who gets through every situation she ends up in without the need of help from a man, and the other is a black male, who while he has some humorous lines he isn't the comic relief, and handles himself pretty well in battle.
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I decided not to see it till I can get it on torrent in decent quality.
I heard there was some political/ideological input into it. Our politics has no place in starwars. sick and tired of it finding it's way into entertainment. Wont pay to see it unless someone can confirm that what I was told is a lie.
So I'm asking here; did it contain any notable and noticeable ideologies?
Arguably the purpose of telling stories is to educate people on social norms and to give people a reference to which everyone can relate their world views to and "compare notes," as it were. Storytelling was one of the first forms of political education.
Additionally, the original trilogy was hugely political, not just for government politics but also as a reaction against Hollywood politics / trends: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2016/01/06/here-are-three-ways-that-star-wars-is-a-neoconservative-universe/
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I decided not to see it till I can get it on torrent in decent quality.
I heard there was some political/ideological input into it. Our politics has no place in starwars. sick and tired of it finding it's way into entertainment. Wont pay to see it unless someone can confirm that what I was told is a lie.
So I'm asking here; did it contain any notable and noticeable ideologies?
It's impossible to say what you would consider a noticeable ideology, or even an objectionable one without further information.
Did you ever watch Star Trek (before the JJ Abrams reboot)? Those were all morality plays.
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It had two new main characters on the good side - one of them is a very capable woman who gets through every situation she ends up in without the need of help from a man, and the other is a black male, who while he has some humorous lines he isn't the comic relief, and handles himself pretty well in battle.
this is ok, I'm not opposed to this sort of thing, it's a valid plot device. heck I loved Mace Windu, he could have kicked ass if it wasn't for Anakin, he was at Yoda's level and could kick Palpatine's ass solo in a light-saber fight, he was the voice of good and reason, sad thing was this was a mission being played from villain side.
Arguably the purpose of telling stories is to educate people on social norms and to give people a reference to which everyone can relate their world views to and "compare notes," as it were. Storytelling was one of the first forms of political education.
Additionally, the original trilogy was hugely political, not just for government politics but also as a reaction against Hollywood politics / trends: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2016/01/06/here-are-three-ways-that-star-wars-is-a-neoconservative-universe/
Point is it doesn't need to be in every single one, and star wars wasn't one of those purely by setting, it's far far away. it's a fantasy meant to liberate the mind from every day life, rather than be reminded of the things society wants to tell us.
Parallels to events are fine, but to sacrifice any part of the atmosphere in favor of making a parallel is too much. and if society has already seen fit to tell us this same thing in other media then it is no longer required /here/.
Parallels = ok, point is when it becomes a message already available in umpteen billion (exaggerated) other places, it no longer becomes necessary, my question is if they decided to push a topic that society through the media has already decided to push and has pushed in large amounts?
like the movie Pixels, I was like "a new adam sandler comedy!! no way!!" so I go to see it (no spoilers) yeah it was apparently of an alternate reality world with a USA.. wait did that guy just crack an obama support comment?... ruined the atmosphere man, completely unnecessary and not funny.
to me there is a difference between parallels, plot devices, and flat out proclamations of support for real world people or social justice causes, or flat out open ideological support scenes, like;
"hey lets turn all the storm troopers into clowns because they are under-represented and need our help getting acceptance in a coulrophobic society, even though it's an active media topic pushed everywhere else why not do it here too?" (obviously that's not the case, we respect people who are coulrophobic, just making an example.)
or
suddenly a main good character breaks out and says to a sith "you're just like all those people who were against obama's acts as president" (I know they'd never sink that far with starwars, at least I hope they wouldn't),
or make some anti gun rights thing like
"anytime other than when the law enforcement officers (storm troopers) use blasters it only ends in innocent deaths of many innocent bystanders".
or
"hey everyone did you know luke is unicorn for han? han; I'm sorry Luke I just don't feel that way in return. Luke; heart breaker! your just trollophobic and hurt people like me who are vulnerable! people like you should be locked up! what I'm doing is my right, I'm not hurting anyone you're the one hurting me! then chewie growls and B****slaps luke. Luke: Oh! I see how it is!! you're haters! why can't you just accept me for the unicorn I am!"
if Starwars episode 7 is devoid of these things I will pay to see it, maybe even twice.
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Episode 7 is pretty absent of politics, in my opinion. Any politics would have been outside of the movie, as mentioned before - there were some folks annoyed at the casting of a woman and a black guy as the lead. But that's completely outside the realm of the movie.
The thing is, any time you have some sort of rag tag band of freedom fighters fighting a totalitarian regime or something similar, you might be able to find parallels with the real world. Because there have been enough different types of wars or conflicts in the real world that there's a good chance that at least one of them will seem an awful lot like a fictional realm written by someone who perhaps never heard of the real world conflict their story is supposed to be like.
Additionally, I would argue that genres like sci fi and fantasy are the perfect place to put political explorations. Rather than being overt about a particular message, they can examine issues of politics, ethics, morals in ways that can't be explored in the real world. Furthermore, these issues are of fundamental importance to every person, and should be examined, regardless of genre.
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Additionally, I would argue that genres like sci fi and fantasy are the perfect place to put political explorations. Rather than being overt about a particular message, they can examine issues of politics, ethics, morals in ways that can't be explored in the real world. Furthermore, these issues are of fundamental importance to every person, and should be examined, regardless of genre.
Most of the best SciFi ever written was far less about futuristic gadgetry and far more about exploring the human condition.
The court case playing out right now regarding genetic discrimination by a middle school has been played out in just about every possible way by science fiction writers over the last 30 years. Now we'll get to see how close they actually got to predicting the outcome.
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The court case playing out right now regarding genetic discrimination by a middle school...
Say whaaaaaaat? *googles* http://www.wired.com/2016/02/schools-kicked-boy-based-dna/
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Lego Star Wars: The Force Awakens!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i0IJqIzO_YM
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Additionally, I would argue that genres like sci fi and fantasy are the perfect place to put political explorations. Rather than being overt about a particular message, they can examine issues of politics, ethics, morals in ways that can't be explored in the real world. Furthermore, these issues are of fundamental importance to every person, and should be examined, regardless of genre.
as I said, that's ok if it's something that's new (Define new! ok something you have never heard or seen anyone talking about anywhere else in the last 10 years or known history of civilization.), but it's not necessary to explore it in context of some fantasy like star wars IF (and here it comes) it is already presently a topic in society with-in the last 10 years or a known topic to have been pushed in past histories.
what I'm saying is there are people in media who think it's a good idea to spread such ideologies in a massive way, Ex; you turn on the TV to a random channel "did you hear frank likes unicorns?" you switch channel, halfway through another program "are you pony enough? because I'm full unicorn!", court program on another channel "you're discriminating against him because he's Unicorn!", new star trek film "I'm sorry Spock, I just can't do this.... because... I'm unicorn!", news program "today a boy was kicked out of school for proclaiming he is unicorn in class, apparently they are calling this practice 'getting on the pony' a term being used similar to 'get on the horse' and 'coming out of the closet' the school board has expressed that this is improper behavior in a classroom setting, but this rightsactivist protest group is demanding the school allow it in the classroom, saying it's a human rights issue", "today NewYork state has put forward a legislation attempting to ban Unicorn conversion therapy citing that it's better to just let them be unicorn".
enough is enough, we heard you already. some people will be happy, some people will be angry, some people will be 'meh' some people will be 'not sure if want' some people will be 'me gusta!' it's done, it's over, it's no longer necessary to push it, the topic is out, let the public be. enough is enough, it gets depressing when you can't get 'clean' entertainment because everyone follows such a media topic fad. enough is enough, we got it, you killed it, you went overboard now it's not just dead it's mush on cold pavement, you still push it? it's disintegrated. still push it? now it's anti-matter and people get opposed to it.
"but there's still people who hate my little pony!", yeah, duh. haters gonna hate man, and people get tired of S***. All pushing it that much does is force people to pick sides, some will be extreme supporters, the rest who were 'meh' or 'not sure if want' before are going to be annoyed and join the opposition group called haters, by pushing it more and more you will get more people biased against you and then the fad can finally rest in peace.
what happens to people who still want to push it? well to be honest, there's going to be somewhere in the world where there are people who agree with you and like what you like (though everyone else is tired of it), and with the internet you can easily create a community however how small where you can continue your ways, in some cases certain groups may need to meet physically, be warned the moment you leave your community; people in public DO NOT think how you do, people in public WILL NOT accept your behavior in the public space, people in public will get tired of it in public spaces and there will be consequences or uprisings.
buy a plane ticket, save the drama, go where there are enough people like you to hold a physical club. It's not obscene to suggest you take your stuff somewhere else when others don't like it, their dislike of it is just as much a human right as your claim.
it's what us MTG players and D&D geeks have to do. sometimes a plane is not needed and good for you, sometimes it's just down the street.
But what ever you do do, DO NOT attempt at activism, DO NOT try to collectively swarm a place that does not agree with your ways (it's called Troll Flaming and has repercussions), it's like me trying to hold MTG tourneys on fridays, staturdays and sundays at a football stadium during ball season, not gonna happen bo I can stand there with a million people in protest, it's just not compatible with the setting and especially not with the people who 'own' it for /THEIR/ hobby space, and I'd probably leave with a wedgie and two freshly poked eyes. Do not engage politics to support your cause, do not engage the media for support, this is trolling, do not try to get your aim passed through as a human right in the supreme court, don't act or speak in mannerisms from your collective outside of your collective, it just gets funny looks. Don't expect other people to understand, don't try to repress or demonize opposition (that's war bo, you may get some victories but there will always be opponents, and there's always going to be a future where someone undoes what you pushed for and says you can't do it in public anymore, then you're the instigator but act like the victim, that looks real bad).
it's just easier for me to go to gameshub or something. but if there were a nation out there filled with people like me and the rest of the people there are ok with it then, heck that's for me. I never expect any of my desires to become a nationally pushed topic in media in a country that doesn't approve, nor would I want it, it'll just stir up chaos.
so why push common ideologies in star wars? (I'm glad they didn't!)
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I read that, and now I'm wondering if I'm unicorn, or just a little flutter shy.
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I read that, and now I'm wondering if I'm unicorn, or just a little flutter shy.
I read that and understood nary a sentence. I think somebody needs meds.