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Author Topic: Star Wars VIII: The Last Jedi  (Read 248041 times)
Threash
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Reply #245 on: December 19, 2017, 07:06:04 AM

It wasn't just the execution, it was that it really didn't really fit with the whole space chase with no way to escape thing they were doing. Apparently it was just that simple to come and go at will?

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Lakov_Sanite
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Reply #246 on: December 19, 2017, 07:40:00 AM

Well I think that is more of a problem with the ticking clock conflict they set up.  They are surrounded by the strongest ships in the enemy fleet that just kinda sits around plinking away at their shields, doesn't seem to care about any escape pods and just wants to wait them out?  It would have made a LOT of sense if there was a line or two about how they wanted Leia alive to stand mock trial or some shit but no they just wanted the rebels dead so that whole a standoff scenario was just dumb.

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Reply #247 on: December 19, 2017, 08:34:38 AM

They explained everything and when they didn't you can reasonably explain it yourself.


The Empire tracked them through hyperspace. This is the new super weapon for the trilogy.


Why didn't the first order notice rose and Finn leaving? Because the rebels had the tech to make their smaller ships harder to see in the presence of their larger ships. They reliably used this fact to escape to the planet.. the plan only failed because those 2 came back with an amoralist who outed them.

Why could rose and Finn go back and forth? Well you have to wrap your head around what hyper drives and faster than light communications mean for warfare. The rebels were confident their allies could reach them in a timely fashion and save them from the "outer" sectors. Their tech allows for this level of fast response.


The more important questions really are.

Why doesn't the first order jump ahead to quicken their task?

Doesn't this mean the death star is a big waste of money if any one could hyper drive ram into it?


I've thought about the second question and there is no specific answer to how powerful such a suicidal attack is. You can argue their shields are strong enough.

The first question though is harder to dismiss. Yes it would waste fuel but this was an important battle for the first order. Huxley was already rebuked by Snoke publicly so he would have incentive to being more aggressive. The early movies established jumping is complicated and computers have to do a ton of calculations to prevent the passengers from dying but there isn't any reason to believe they couldn't do a short jump.

OP is assuming its somewhat of a design-goal of eve to make players happy.
this is however not the case.
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Reply #248 on: December 19, 2017, 08:51:55 AM

The casino was right out of a Bond film, or maybe a Star Trek holodeck.  It wasn't quite as bad as the diner in Ep 2 that was lifted from American Graffiti, but it did not feel Star Wars-y.

Hyperdrive suicide ramming was kinda dumb, but I'm figuring that it only works if you're willing to sacrifice a ship that's comparable in mass to the target.  Otherwise, duh, hyperdrive missiles.

That aside I thought the movie was pretty good.  As others have said, it's great that it gave such a big middle finger to the dumbest parts of previous Star Wars movies.

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Reply #249 on: December 19, 2017, 09:01:27 AM

Arg, so gave up on tags.  Good to know.

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Khaldun
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Reply #250 on: December 19, 2017, 09:11:04 AM

I suppose on the "why not jump ahead of the Resistance fleet" question is that we've never seen capital ships or light fighters do that kind of precision hyperjumping to improve their battle position within a very small volume of space. Otherwise I think you'd see X-Wings hyperjumping constantly in order to appear behind a Tie Fighter and so on. Hyperjumps seem to always involve movement that is at least 1 AU or so.

I suppose another possibility is that the hyperspace tracking requires keeping constant sensor contact on your target. E.g., the First Order fleet is not tracking all hyperspace movement of all ships everywhere in the galaxy, only the hyperspace movement of the ships that were previously seen and plotted in regular space that were in proximity to the First Order ships. So if the First Order fleet itself goes into hyperspace, that might give the Resistance an opportunity to go into hyperspace itself and escape from being tracked.
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Reply #251 on: December 19, 2017, 09:46:49 AM

It felt to me that they invented tech reasons for story beats they'd already decided had to happen and just handwaved it away with "NEW TECH." Which is a very Star Trek thing to do and isn't really good storytelling.

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Reply #252 on: December 19, 2017, 09:59:25 AM

I can't even describe how silly, nonsensical and fan-fiction-y this film is.  Every time I start to respond to someone's excuses for this film, I find myself spiraling down a series of ridiculousness...

While the method of her idiocy is very different, the intensity of Rose's idiocy rivals the mighty Jar-Jar.  Someone needs to write a bad country music song about how she treats the guy she's crushing on.  
And we've seen short jumps into combat in the animated (cannon) series.  Also, you don't need precision jumping or for your entire fleet to jump.  And the idea behind how they're doing the tracking.... so dumb. 
So ... disappointed.

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Reply #253 on: December 19, 2017, 10:09:19 AM

I was waiting for Half in the Bag's review since I'm not that big of a Star Wars fan and it seems I'm going to wait until the blu-ray comes out to see this.
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Reply #254 on: December 19, 2017, 10:14:29 AM

About 3 minutes into that review and yep, I agree with what they said about this which is rare.

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Reply #255 on: December 19, 2017, 10:20:58 AM

Ok, so on the concept of inept evil.  At a base level, sure, many of histories monsters have not been Machiavelli masters.  But even Hitler, crazy and stupid as he was, was very adept in his recruitment, tactics, and administration.  Most of the nazi leadership, while crazy, was very effective and competent.  Stalin was very competent (and crazy).  Most of the effective dictatorships in history have very much been Tywin Lannister.  You get incompetent evil like Caligula in power randomly, but they always end up dead like him in short order.  The First Order as the alt-right seems ok if you look at it as Snoke dying and putting the two fuck nuts in power the same as Trump getting elected through are archaic and retarded election system.  Unfortunately, that means the opening scrawl of the next Star Wars movie must look like this if what you say is true:

Episode IX

The galaxy is in flames
The first order has collapsed and no longer exists
Kylo Ren, now supreme leader, attempted to conqure the galaxy
However, every time he ordered a new campaign, it was so badly managed, everybody died without firing a shot at the enemy.
When confronted by his commanders, he fired them for not being loyal, and complained about it on Space Twitter.
Eventually everybody turned on themselves and the entire organization went up in flames.
The new Resistance took credit for the defeat, even though they did not fire a single shot in the war.
Instead, they argued about ethics in game journalism and making the resistance more inclusive.
Engulfed in the flames of social justice war, they also were destroyed.
There is nobody actually running things anymore.

Trump and Bannon are not compelling villains, and neither is Kylo Ren.  Cool calculating evil has always existed and is far more scary than the Chaotic Evil characters that eventually eat themselves and do very little of long term consequence.

Now, to slightly backtrack, this film gave a lot more character and reason to Kylo Ren's actions.  After killing Snoke, revelations about how everybody sucks and its best to just be your own person make some sense.  But its still vague and half assed.  I STILL have no idea why the fuck he is the way he is.  Luke vaguly discovered that Snoke had somehow so thoroughly turned him dark side he was a black pit of evil even before he started murdering people?  Why?  There is some reason why people embrace the dark side, and I still haven't been given any reason at all why he did so.  I've seen lots of motivations for him trying to reach that total dark side and cut all previous cords, but it has no context than him wanting to live up to Vader now that he is Dark Side.  But there is no reason as to why he even wanted to go Dark Side other than 'A wizard Snoke did it.'  They really needed to develop Snoke more.  He is way more compelling of a character than anybody else on that side.


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Reply #256 on: December 19, 2017, 11:28:07 AM

I think this movie is about one thing: Failure. Absolutely everyone in this movie tried to do something and FAILED at it even when they succeeded.


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Reply #257 on: December 19, 2017, 11:34:39 AM

They explained everything and when they didn't you can reasonably explain it yourself.


The Empire tracked them through hyperspace. This is the new super weapon for the trilogy.


Why didn't the first order notice rose and Finn leaving? Because the rebels had the tech to make their smaller ships harder to see in the presence of their larger ships. They reliably used this fact to escape to the planet.. the plan only failed because those 2 came back with an amoralist who outed them.

Why could rose and Finn go back and forth? Well you have to wrap your head around what hyper drives and faster than light communications mean for warfare. The rebels were confident their allies could reach them in a timely fashion and save them from the "outer" sectors. Their tech allows for this level of fast response.


The more important questions really are.

Why doesn't the first order jump ahead to quicken their task?

Doesn't this mean the death star is a big waste of money if any one could hyper drive ram into it?


I've thought about the second question and there is no specific answer to how powerful such a suicidal attack is. You can argue their shields are strong enough.

The first question though is harder to dismiss. Yes it would waste fuel but this was an important battle for the first order. Huxley was already rebuked by Snoke publicly so he would have incentive to being more aggressive. The early movies established jumping is complicated and computers have to do a ton of calculations to prevent the passengers from dying but there isn't any reason to believe they couldn't do a short jump.

1) It’s hard to hyperjump short distances. You could go ahead but hen you would be so far away as to not be useful.

2) hyperjumping isn’t that precise. So you would have to get close to reliably suicide attack The only reason the cruiser was able to get in position was because the first order was shooting the transports and was ignoring the cruiser. There is a line specifically about this “Sir the cruiser is maneuvering” “ignore it, it’s empty”. Had they shot it instead it would not have succeeded is the implication

Also fuck the haters this movie was amazing

are: failure

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Reply #258 on: December 19, 2017, 11:54:36 AM

On the competency of evil leadership, to say thinking that Hitler or other Nazis were competent administrators is simply factually incorrect--it is mistaking their propaganda for their reality. Hitler was good at two things: treachery and theatrical speech-making. The military leadership were largely competent but that's a different kind of thing--and they were defeated largely because the Nazi leadership in general was as blundering and arrogant and as prone to in-fighting as it was.

The Roman Empire had perhaps six or seven truly competent emperors in 150 years. All but two of them were NOT Tywin Lannister types--every single one of them was a person who had some degree of scruples or at least some partial benevolence: Claudius, Marcus Aurelius, Constantine, Trajan. The Tywin Lannisters were Augustus and Domitian, both of whom were simultaneously ruthless and skilled in wielding authority to build a more secure ruling structure.

The idea that competent underlings will always remove an incompetent figurehead is simply 100% unsupportable in human history. First, because incompetent figureheads don't often have competent underlings, and second because competent underlings often just let the incompetent do his thing as long as he doesn't fuck with the really important stuff. Third because when competent underlings do try to do something, they just as often end up dead, tortured, imprisoned or at best fired rather than pushing aside the leader.

If Star Wars wants to tell a story about the self-defeating character of evil--while also perhaps noting that "good" doesn't know how to stick the landing even when it has the upper hand--it would be telling a story with plenty of deep resonance with the history of humanity.

EDIT: Just to add this: if you want a story about competent lawful evil villains, you want a story where the good guys almost inevitably lose. Every single real human ruler that I can think of who was highly skilled and ruthless is a story of someone who stayed in power for a long time and built lasting systems and structures that weren't just about his own gratification. Augustus is a great example: he was unspeakably evil in his treatment of his enemies prior to his establishing a firm hold as the founder of the Roman Empire--utterly unrestrained, deeply cruel, etc. But he was rarely in it to gratify his own random or sinister impulses; he wasn't a sadist for the hell of it. And as a result, he swept the field of his enemies, both highly principled idealists and rivals for power.

A Star Wars story where that's really how the Empire or First Order runs is a story where they win. Which is kind of Luke Skywalker's apprehension when he makes fun of Rey's request that he come back and help them win.
« Last Edit: December 19, 2017, 12:00:14 PM by Khaldun »
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Reply #259 on: December 19, 2017, 12:17:42 PM

Of course it's about failure. Yoda gives a giant speech about it.  Another undercutting of all the rending of garments major characters have done about failing each other throughout the series.

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Reply #260 on: December 19, 2017, 01:21:25 PM


Now, to slightly backtrack, this film gave a lot more character and reason to Kylo Ren's actions.  After killing Snoke, revelations about how everybody sucks and its best to just be your own person make some sense.  But its still vague and half assed.  I STILL have no idea why the fuck he is the way he is.  Luke vaguly discovered that Snoke had somehow so thoroughly turned him dark side he was a black pit of evil even before he started murdering people?  Why?  There is some reason why people embrace the dark side, and I still haven't been given any reason at all why he did so.  I've seen lots of motivations for him trying to reach that total dark side and cut all previous cords, but it has no context than him wanting to live up to Vader now that he is Dark Side.  But there is no reason as to why he even wanted to go Dark Side other than 'A wizard Snoke did it.'  They really needed to develop Snoke more.  He is way more compelling of a character than anybody else on that side.



Reminder that Anakin turning to the dark side basically went:

Anakin: The Jedi are assholes.
Palpatine: Sith get to have girlfriends.
Anakin: Really?
Palpatine: Sure, now go and murder a bunch of children for me.
Anakin: On it!

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Reply #261 on: December 19, 2017, 01:45:04 PM

Re not understanding Kylos turn:

Kylo is conflicted because the dark side brings power. In the same way you’re tempted to do shitty things to get ahead in life.

Luke feels it because that is how this game works, and in a moment of weakness tries to kill Kylo (or gets close to looking like it)

Kylo feeling that the “light side” as represented by Luke, it’s primary disciple, has betrayed him says “fuck this shit I guess I am going to be evil now, you fucking hypocrites” which is a reasonable interpersonal response.

They also really do not need to develop snoke.
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Reply #262 on: December 19, 2017, 01:56:25 PM


Now, to slightly backtrack, this film gave a lot more character and reason to Kylo Ren's actions.  After killing Snoke, revelations about how everybody sucks and its best to just be your own person make some sense.  But its still vague and half assed.  I STILL have no idea why the fuck he is the way he is.  Luke vaguly discovered that Snoke had somehow so thoroughly turned him dark side he was a black pit of evil even before he started murdering people?  Why?  There is some reason why people embrace the dark side, and I still haven't been given any reason at all why he did so.  I've seen lots of motivations for him trying to reach that total dark side and cut all previous cords, but it has no context than him wanting to live up to Vader now that he is Dark Side.  But there is no reason as to why he even wanted to go Dark Side other than 'A wizard Snoke did it.'  They really needed to develop Snoke more.  He is way more compelling of a character than anybody else on that side.



Reminder that Anakin turning to the dark side basically went:

Anakin: The Jedi are assholes.
Palpatine: Sith get to have girlfriends.
Anakin: Really?
Palpatine: Sure, now go and murder a bunch of children for me.
Anakin: On it!

Considering he has dreams of his wife dying, a wife he has to keep secret or lose his job he spent training for since he was 8 years old. Oh and the guy your trusting is like "oh btw you may have the power to keep her from dying, I only have to teach you." Oh and his mom died while he is busy being a jedi, something he hasn't gotten over and strongly believes he could have changed. Thoughts that he knows is against the jedi code, a code he is losing faith in as he is unable to let go of his non-jedi attachments.

Meanwhile Ben
Snoke "you can be just like vader"
Ben " oh that sounds fun"
Luke the same luke who choose to go on a suicide mission to redeem vadar and refused to kill him because he is family suddenly "acts out of instinct" and goes "killing little Hitler isn't so bad, oh wait that's wrong, oops too bad i didn't have this moral conflict OUTSIDE THE TENT"
BEn "waaah my uncle tried to kill me, I time to go on a killing spree! DARKSIDE WOOOT"

One series of events is set up between 2 movies, doesn't require any outside source material to understand, and generally makes sense (though acting, directing, and the basics of movie keeps anyone of that from having the impact it needed)

Another series of events... Ben is evil. Reason? Rey gotta fight someone in the first movie.
« Last Edit: December 19, 2017, 02:04:15 PM by MediumHigh »
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Reply #263 on: December 19, 2017, 02:08:17 PM

We do not see 99.9% of Kylo's turn.  What happens in the tent happens *after* the core of the turn - it is the coda of the turn.  We do not see how Snoke seduces Ben to the dark side.  We don't know much about it at all - just that Ben, while in Luke's training, was tempted to the dark side so completely that Luke, in a moment of self doubt, thought he was inescapably lost and considered going all 'Anakin on Padwan' on him. 

I don't want to see a repeat of Anakin and Palpatine.  But, I do want to see that story.

Of course, I'm starting to think that the next animated series (following Rebels) might very well be Jedi babies - the tale of Kylo as a Padwan in the dumpter fire jedi temple Luke set up.  We know that Hamil is up to do a voice for an animated series...


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Khaldun
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Reply #264 on: December 19, 2017, 02:35:55 PM

You may get to see that story someday. But it's not necessary to tell this one. I was surprised that they did as much as they did to get into the backstory of Ben and Luke--and that they did as much to make it seem morally ambiguous as they did.
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Reply #265 on: December 19, 2017, 03:06:03 PM

I think it might be time to take a step back and re-evaluate life choices once your vitriol for space fantasy movies reaches such critical mass.

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Reply #266 on: December 19, 2017, 03:07:42 PM

You may get to see that story someday. But it's not necessary to tell this one. I was surprised that they did as much as they did to get into the backstory of Ben and Luke--and that they did as much to make it seem morally ambiguous as they did.
What?  You were surprised to see them spend as much as a few brief moments telling us the motivation of two central figures in the movie, motivations that they'd majorly foreshadowed in the prior film?  The foreshadowing in the prior film is a big part of what makes this so vexing.  Chekhov's Gun.  If you foreshadow something so centrally in part of a story, you dang well better pay it off and make the foreshadowing relevant later on in the story.  They only add a flicker more to the foreshadowing in TLJ - they do not pay it off.  They need to pay it off.  

Maybe if the told us how Han and Leia's son, who was under the controlled tutelage of Luke Skywalker (a Jedi that had the Universe's most powerful reminder that a Jedi can be corrupted and result in disaster), could turn into such a whiny, tantrum throwing, hot mess we might be able to care about him as much as we should about Luke and Leia's kid.

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Reply #267 on: December 19, 2017, 04:48:21 PM

Wait, did MediumHigh just hold up the prequels as an example of good character development?  Because that's what I thought I just read and now I can't find my monocle.

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Reply #268 on: December 19, 2017, 05:09:31 PM

Wait, did MediumHigh just hold up the prequels as an example of good character development?  Because that's what I thought I just read and now I can't find my monocle.

I also pointed out that everything about that setup was done wrong so...keep looking for it.
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Reply #269 on: December 19, 2017, 10:10:43 PM

Loved every minute of it. Great show. Sorry you lot can't enjoy things, I sure don't envy you.

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Reply #270 on: December 19, 2017, 11:58:49 PM

Loved every minute of it. Great show. Sorry you lot can't enjoy things, I sure don't envy you.

Fuck off with that. I haven't even watched this yet but don't act like it's somebody else's problem that they don't like what you like.
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Reply #271 on: December 20, 2017, 12:21:55 AM

Or that accepting things uncritically is somehow better than acknowledging flaws and problems even in things that we do like. I enjoyed the film but it was not a good movie.

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Reply #272 on: December 20, 2017, 01:22:09 AM

It had flaws* but it was most definitely a “good” movie. A really really good movie.

*most notably the character arcs for the non-Jedi were thin.
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Reply #273 on: December 20, 2017, 01:25:07 AM

Loved every minute of it. Great show. Sorry you lot can't enjoy things, I sure don't envy you.

Fuck off with that. I haven't even watched this yet but don't act like it's somebody else's problem that they don't like what you like.

You wouldn't like it. You shouldn't waste your money.

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Reply #274 on: December 20, 2017, 01:36:39 AM

I'll admit I may be tilting at windmills a little harder here because so many people are playing off the criticisms of people as just not understanding this amazing master piece.  I fully accept we all have different opinions here, and don't mean to judge people for liking what they like.  Plenty of movies I like are hated here, and vice versa.

But I thought top to bottom the entire plot was just badly written (worst, lazy.  Instead of taking the time to come up with a logical flow for good story telling, shit just happened simply 'because') and I genuinely didn't like anything they did with the characters.  I also think people are projecting way to many of their own interpretations on to what I feel was basically a very shallow movie with none of the subtilties mentioned intentional.  There may have been good intentions in what they were doing, but just like how the prequels were destroyed by bad execution, so was this one equally.

It had its points, but just felt emotionally dead to me.  Beyond laughing at a few of the jokes, nobodies death or anything else caused any stirring of motion in me other than bordom.  It was a badly made movie, if perhaps entertaining.  I'm glad Abrams is coming back.


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Goumindong
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Reply #275 on: December 20, 2017, 02:56:01 AM

Maybe? I mean I just don’t understand the criticisms you’ve put out. The plot is simple but not lazy. The main plot, like in many second acts, is a vehicle for the character progression. It neither needs to nor can be complicated; all it has to be is internallly consistent and sufficient to provide character interaction and growth.  And it is. The rebels are in crisis and everyone takes their own reaction in response to it. If it’s more complicated than that it gets in the way of the character growth through tribulation that is necessary for the payoff in the third act.


I do not understand what you mean of “shit just happened because” because everything had pretty clear purpose both in plot and in theme.

For instance it would be a valid criticism to say  “Taking Finn and Rose off of the cruiser separates the main cast in too many portions, giving some of them little to do and forcing “telephone” type conversations which are difficult to structure visually. Rather than amplify how they’re all in this together it separates them; which, while it works for the theme of the movie in that they fail when they do not act together it is not necessary and distances the audience from the drama. The movie wants us to follow three main threads, the Jedi, Finn and Rose, and Poe and the cruiser but the main characters in one of these are either incapacitated or in a perpetual waiting state making the purpose of those scenes solely to raise the stakes on the other two. Either Finn and Rose should have stayed on the cruiser and found their hacker their or there should have been radio silence once Finn and Rose left, with no information about what was happening on the cruiser except the shots from the bridge of Snokes ship as they pick off the stragglers running out of fuel. This would amply the tension and prevent dead weight on the run time.

But it’s not a valid criticism to say that the movie is lacking in “therefore” and is all “and then”. It has plenty of “therefore” and little “and then”. I am reading your criticisms and wondering if this is a clue situation. Emotionally dead?! Did they send a different cut to your theater?
« Last Edit: December 20, 2017, 02:58:21 AM by Goumindong »
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Reply #276 on: December 20, 2017, 03:39:15 AM

What I mean on lazy writing, and 'just because': 

A single damn cruiser can withstand all the firepower of an entire fleet of death stars and a new super star destroyer, just because.  It's hand waved away so they can have this made up slow speed chase that in not internally consistent at all.  Lazy.

Leia gets blasted into the vaccume of space for many minutes, which should have killed her dead, then just wakes up and forces herself back over just because, instead of a more believable scenario.  Lazy.

The entire mutinies against commander dumbass purple hair because she, for no reason what's so ever, tells them she is going to send them to their deaths without a plan, instead of revealing the plan.  Lazy.

Luke doesn't tell anybody he is stalling for time leading, again, to unearned tension.  Lazy.

Kylo Ren became evil and Luke tried to kill him just because.  Lazy.

Luke dies at the end, literally just because, for no reason.  Lazy.

Etc, ect, ect.  Like, this is really easy to fix shit, and its insulting they didn't bother.  The entire plot structure of the movie could have been rewritten to something else, and still kept in all the (Bad) story beats you guys love, while being a way better narrative.

I guess I could have been ok with the total half assed plot if it was just a vehical for "character progression".  But (and I think we are just going to have to agree to disagree on this) I felt the character progression has been pretty terrible.  I still sort of like Finn, but if they are going to make him fall in love with complete dumb ass "I must kill all of humanity to save my crush" Rose, he's a lost cause also.  I want everybody to lose now.  Maybe in Episode 9 the Trade Federation can come back and kill both sides to take control?

 

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Reply #277 on: December 20, 2017, 03:57:12 AM

The problem with the casino plot is twofold: 1 it's quite a jarring separation from the main plot (both visually and thematically) and 2 it is still tied into the main plot in a manner that doesn't make a lot of sense and kind of undercuts that main plot.

Abandoning spoilers now obviously: The Rebels are in, essentially, a high speed chase. Having people able to pop in and off ships during a high speed chase seems very artificial. As someone else suggested, if they'd run the casino thing with Finn and Rose already off from the fleet and find out about it (and the countdown starts) it wouldn't have been such an issue. Instead they went for some tech speak hand waving to justify them being able to leave the fleet during said chase and return to it later without getting into why the hell the FO can't do the same thing.

Ben could work, competence isn't necessary in an evil ruler but projecting power and control most definitely are. The FO needed a few more 'wins' achieved through competence to help establish them. Kylo Ren and Hux both needed to be able to portray some level of competent or inspiring leadership. Being a whiny baby in private is fine but they need to establish why people would be willing to follow both of them or at least why they were willing to follow Snoke (actually Ren's relationship with the military doesn't seem a million miles off from Vader's).

Finn's 'sacrifice' I think makes sense if it was obvious he wasn't going to make it in time, Rose just stopped him from dying in a doomed attempt. That fits with the lesson Po got after the bombing run and tracker sabotage: Taking huge risks and sacrifices still leaves you with the sacrifice and may or may not get you the desired result. Had that bomber chick not been able to kick that control unit and catch it in time to open the doors Po would have sacrificed all those pilots and bombers for no gain whatsoever. His high risk sacrifice with the tracker loses them Finn and Rose and compromises the thought through plan. If they had made it really obvious Finn was just on the verge of getting vaporised for no reason, Rose's move would have made more sense (plot wise, obviously it still doesn't make sense she was somehow able to overtake him when he was going full speed in a straight line).

Also Khaldun I take issue with your run down of Roman Emperors: No Aurelian or Diocletian in there? Also Constantine was not someone with a super strong moral core, he was at least as treacherous and conniving as Augustus in his rise to the top. Caracalla would have been a much better example of crazy evil than Caligula also, he managed to rule the Empire for 6 years despite murdering whole cities for making fun of him, having random senators executed and starting a war with Parthia for literally no reason by offering a marriage treaty and then attempting (and failing) to Red Wedding the Parthian royal family. Even then he only went down because he eventually failed enough that his pissed off army turned on him. Sorry, /historynerd

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Teleku
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Reply #278 on: December 20, 2017, 04:21:29 AM

Oh yeah, forgot about that post.  I don’t consider most Roman Emperors evil or an example of it.  I picked Caligula off the top of my head because he was a crazy evil bastard.

Edit:  You also left out Vespasian and Titus from your list (though I guess the latter didn’t last long enough to make an impact).  No Hadrian?
« Last Edit: December 20, 2017, 04:30:49 AM by Teleku »

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Khaldun
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Reply #279 on: December 20, 2017, 05:12:00 AM

See, I also don't get this series of complaints, because they seem like lazy criticism, e.g., it's just rattling off epithets to describe imprecisely and generically a sensation of disliking the film. I get not liking that they didn't do with the characters what you wanted done, I get not liking the structure of the plot, but it's anything but lazy. It's essentially the opposite of lazy: it does unusual and provocative things with the characters. Lazy would have been, "Luke Skywalker does the grumpy Yoda thing, trains Rey to be an awesome Jedi in a quick montage, they fight Kylo Ren and then Snoke at the end and win; Poe Dameron has a brilliant desperate plan that against all the odds works and the Resistance escapes intact to save the day and Vice-Admiral Holdo admits Poe is a genius and also that she is falling in love with him". That's lazy writing.

What's also lazy criticism is applying complaints to one film that would essentially indict every single one of them.

Does Obi-Wan tell Luke a whole bunch of things that he ought to tell him in ANH? Nope. "Unearned tension".
Does it make any sense at all that this particular group of barely-competent fugitives should be able to sneak around the Death Star successfully (before Vader and Tarkin decide to put a tracker on the Falcon?) Not remotely.
Does a trash compactor as shown make any sense? Does the interior design of the Death Star make any sense?
Does the fact that the Death Star seems to only have about four to eight Tie Fighters total make any sense?
Why does the Empire not care about all the small fighters sneaking away from Hoth after the main transports have gotten away? Why not swarm the entire sector with Tie Fighters?
Does Yoda not telling Luke about his father prior to his father telling him make any sense? Why not get out in front of it? Unearned tension!
Does Yoda's method of oblique training in general make any sense?
Does a space worm make any sense? What's it eat, anyway? Why wouldn't Han know about such things?
How on earth does the implied time frame of Luke's time on Dagobah square with what's going on with the Falcon?

etc. None of these movies--and maybe no science-fantasy or science-fiction movie ever--really stands up if you're going to come at it with this kind of determination.


Sure, add Hadrian and Antonius Pius too. Vespasian was mostly just a guy who made a bridge to the Roman Empire as something other than the private property of the Julio-Claudians. I suppose you could add him to the Tywin Lannister list in that he was pretty ruthless. The point still stands: ruthlessly lawful evil dictators who are also great administrators who are appreciated by their subordinates are really rare in history; chaotic evil monarchs and dictators who indulge their own cruel and petty whims and eventually self-destruct or open up their rule to outside attack are regrettably common. If you want an evil Empire and a Supreme Leader, Kylo Ren is way closer to the mark, and a major reason why evil Empires can actually be fought and defeated by alliances of "good" nations and people.
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