SW - Episode 7: Mary Sue wakes up but there's no coffee. RAGE.

[calapine]

The Red Letter Media Plinket Review is out.

1 hour 45 minutes!  

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=miVRaoR_8xQ#t=4.216878

Edit: Now that I am 45 mins in, this one is more a general "State of the Star Wars Franchise" assessment.

[eldaec]

I really wish he'd drop the gimmick.

[Khaldun]

Gimmick has definitely way, way outworn its welcome. This installment is pretty boring.

[Rishathra]

To be fair, he mostly has dropped the gimmick.  RLM fans have just been pestering him for years about when the next Plinkett review will come out.  I bet he only does it to get them to shut up for a little while.

[HaemishM]

The Plinkett joke stuff has gotten extremely tired.

[satael]

Best of the Worst has probably been the best stuff RLM has released in the last few years since the movies etc they cover in those haven't been done by countless others for the most part. The "prequel Plinketts" were something original back when they came out but the new one while containing much of the same fails to make an impact (kind of like SW7 was compared to the original trilogy in my opinion).

[eldaec]

I'd have been happiest if he dropped the gimmick about 10 minutes in to the first one.

[HaemishM]

I'm now 45 minutes into this one and goddamn if he has yet to actually start talking about the movie he's reviewing. He's spending a fuckload of time talking about Disney's purchase of the franchise and criticizing/deconstructing idiotic Internet blogs who are apologizing for the prequels.

[eldaec]

Plinkett stuff aside, I was interested enough to sit through his comments on Disney's overall approach. But the whole "someone is wrong on the internet" bit I could have lived without.

[HaemishM]

That video should have been about 20 minutes - which is about how much time he spent talking about the Force Awakens, and most of the review could be summed up by "good, not great, a fan service-filled safe reboot that I enjoyed but could have been better." That's it. That's the whole goddamn take. The dissertation on the Disney approach was interesting but should have been a separate video. The whole "Stupid Internet Theories" section was just self-indulgent and silly.

[pxib]

The whole thing came across, to me, as a LEAVE ME ALONE ABOUT PLINKETT REVIEWS fuck you to the audience. Trolling and spraying diarrhea rather than actually saying much of anything that hadn't been said before. It all seemed like one big suggestion to go read about uninspiring movies somewhere else.

[Samprimary]

man we waited so long for this but it has definitely fallen far short of the quality of the original trilogy

wait

[Soln]

I could've done without the pizza scene and the final explosion, but otherwise it was good enough to sit through (while doing something else).

Ed: spelling

[Abagadro]

His proposed plot for a better Ep VII was pretty damn good. He actually captured a couple things that I intuited but couldn't really pin down re: how lifeless it was in many respects.   I like how he has almost cast his philosophical lot with Lucas at this point over Disney.

[MahrinSkel]

No. Lucas is as free to have opinions about Star Wars as any other geek (who royally fucked  the franchise), and they count for exactly as much as any other random asshole with opinions.

Seriously, fuck Lucas. Phantom Menace used up all his geek cred, the next two put him him in a karmic hole he couldn't dig out of even if he hired someone to follow him around the rest of his life, spouting random Jar-Jar quotes.

--Dave

[eldaec]

Tbe point that "at least the prequels were new films" is a fair one that I hadn't really considered. Obviously I'd still rather have vacuous explosions than the preqiels.

I'm hoping the 'a star wars story' films are a way to do something a little different. But again his point about marvel is valid and not overly hopeful.

[HaemishM]

Tbe point that "at least the prequels were new films" is a fair one that I hadn't really considered.

Sure, but they were really bad bad bad fucking films on almost every level, including the levels that Lucas should have crushed - things like special effects that look real instead of Roger Rabbit levels of disconnect. For tentpole, franchise level adventure movies, I'll take "fan service" over "being different" every day of the week. It wasn't like Lucas suddenly turned the franchise into THX 1138 art films - he repeated themes and stylistic touches from the first trilogy constantly.

Rogue One, for all of it being an unnecessary story told, looks like it will be more of a "different" type of movie than the prequels were. It looks like Dirty Dozen war movie in Star Wars, as opposed to what the fuck ever the prequels were supposed to be.

[eldaec]

I hope so. And it does have a really cool trailer. But equally I'm nervous that Disney's other big cinematic universe doesn't achieve that kind of variation. Plus Disney not having sufficient confidence to leave out either Darth Vader or Han Solo isn't filling me with confidence.

I think Star Wars needs the variety more than the MCU because SW can't distract you with 90 minutes introducing how a guy can shrink to the size of an ant - there will always be jedi and laser guns. They have to do something new with them.

[Khaldun]

I would actually find it peculiar for them to leave Darth Vader out of this story, considering what it is.

[Cyrrex]

- there will always be jedi and laser guns. They have to do something new with them.

No they don't.  They need to have a cool space battle or two.  They need a few extremely cool lightsaber battles.  A couple of well-done blaster battles.  Add in a swash buckling male lead (or two) with some funny lines and an extremely hot female character.  Bonus points for a cool bad guy.  Avoid CGI whenever possible.  Done.  They wouldn't even need a story at all and I'd still watch it 5 times.

[Sky]

Here's the thing with nerds. Stick to your pretentious Star Trek for your pseudoscientific nonsense and hackneyed social commentary.

This is Star Wars:

[Teleku]

Ok, but like, you can still do something different.  In the context of, NOT COMPLETELY REMAKING THE FIRST MOVIE OVER AGAIN.  I enjoyed the latest film, they seem to have a lot of the feeling down, and understand what made the originals great (unlike Lucas).  However, it did feel bland in that most of it felt like a forced remake of the first movie with forced nostalgia references.  My main hope is that they got it all out of their system with the first film, and we can move on for the next two.

So yes, laser sword fights, WW2 in space, and pew pew.  Great, full speed ahead.  Lets just like, try a more original story that hasn't been done in that context yet.  KotoR did it, I'm sure billions of dollars in Disney bucks can find a writer who can do it here as well.

[TheWalrus]

Hire the guys that did Rebels or Clone Wars. Lot of good stories in there.

[HaemishM]

So yes, laser sword fights, WW2 in space, and pew pew. 

The prequels did all that with "better" effects. Still sucked. 

I do continually get gobsmacked by movies/franchises that take a simple premise or set of checkboxes and manage to fuck it up so royally. Matthew Broderick Godzilla, the prequels. I mean, I think writing is hard but writing a good Star Wars movie should not be fucking hard.

[Sir T]

This conversation is creating very polar opinions.

[lamaros]

Tbe point that "at least the prequels were new films" is a fair one that I hadn't really considered. Obviously I'd still rather have vacuous explosions than the preqiels.

I'm hoping the 'a star wars story' films are a way to do something a little different. But again his point about marvel is valid and not overly hopeful.

Didn't we argue about this for like 30 pages earlier?

I'd rather they they have the ambition to try, I'd risk 30 prequel movies even if only a couple worked out before I'd sign up for more empty jjabrams crap. They're entirely vacuous.

[Velorath]

I'd rather watch 30 good non-SW movies than 30 prequel-quality SW movies in the hopes of getting a couple good ones.

The original Star Wars came out almost 40 years ago. It's time to move on with your lives instead of worrying about what Disney is going to do with the franchise that just made them $2 billion in theaters alone.

[Reg]

Damn Velorath now you're giving me Margalis flashbacks. 

[Velorath]

He didn't even like the original movies. I enjoy them but I'm fully aware that they were the product of a certain set of circumstances that aren't going to be recaptured four decades later unless Disney is able to develop a time machine with their billions of dollars. In the meantime as someone who watches a ton of movies a year I find it hard to obsess about one franchise to the extent that I need to watch a movie length youtube video of someone picking apart the latest SW movie and SW fan theories.

[TheWalrus]

https://youtu.be/N9j9pGi-l4c

[eldaec]

I would actually find it peculiar for them to leave Darth Vader out of this story, considering what it is.

Darth Vader called in at the end to hunt down the stolen plans or a so quick you'd miss it Solo cameo in some cantina seem reasonable but not really necessary. Both strike me as overkill.

Vader seems detached from the Death Star project in ANH so having him involved except under sufferance feels odd. Even for the Tantive IV boarding I always saw Vader feeling this entire excercise is beneath him and he regards it as a few days of his life which he will not get back and so wants this shit over with as quickly as possible. Cooincidentally one of few aspects if his character that the prequels managed to deliver on.

[Merusk]

Vader was dispatched by the Emperor to recover the plans in old lore. This appears to be the root of the Rogue One story they are going with, including the battle on the beach planet, now called

http://fandom.wikia.com/articles/road-star-wars-rogue-one-stealing-death-star-plans

Since the Rebellion is still nascent and has had no victories, Vader would indeed see this beneath him. It's a task they would have used the Inquisitors for. We'll see in Rebels why there aren't any replacements for the ones Maul killed I suppose.

However, they appear to be expanding Vaders role. Hopefully so he hunts down and kill the spies, the last of whom transmits them to Leia moments before being killed.

Rumor is it's more like Vader is in early on to set up the conflict of why  Director Krennic has his own little cache of forces.

[Khaldun]

I've gotten the impression from both older EU stuff and the newer comics and books that Vader may have begun seriously plotting against the Emperor even before ANH and being aware he had a son, so it might be that the Death Star is as much the Emperor's counterplay against Vader as it is anything else. E.g., it gives him something that lets him act directly to control the galaxy, so that he doesn't have to rely on his Sith apprentice as his consigliere. Which could add an interesting element to the movie if they play that out--Vader sent to retrieve the plans, Vader allowing the plans to slip through his fingers...

[jgsugden]

I've gotten the impression from both older EU stuff and the newer comics and books that Vader may have begun seriously plotting against the Emperor even before ANH and being aware he had a son, so it might be that the Death Star is as much the Emperor's counterplay against Vader as it is anything else. E.g., it gives him something that lets him act directly to control the galaxy, so that he doesn't have to rely on his Sith apprentice as his consigliere. Which could add an interesting element to the movie if they play that out--Vader sent to retrieve the plans, Vader allowing the plans to slip through his fingers...

That would change everything that folly from ANH on. People do not embrace this type of ' Iknow you thought he was X based upon everything you see, but he was really Y... see how I changed everythin!' move. It'd go over bad. Very bad.

[Khaldun]

Really? You mean as if they'd done something like, "You think Vader is just a bad guy who killed the Jedi but actually he's Luke Skywalker's father?" That kind of thing that people do not embrace? The sort of later revelation that changes what you thought you knew about a character? Yeah, I see your point. That does go over bad, very bad.