Star Wars: The Book of Boba Fett (Disney+)

[Khaldun]

The Space Vespa Cyborgs Chase Bureaucrat in Landspeeder Through Mos Espa scene was maybe the worst thing in any SW since...I dunno, anything in a long time, and that's saying something. Like up there with I hate sand, if in a different register.

[01101010]

The Space Vespa Cyborgs Chase Bureaucrat in Landspeeder Through Mos Espa scene was maybe the worst thing in any SW since...I dunno, anything in a long time, and that's saying something. Like up there with I hate sand, if in a different register.

OK good... not just me then. I gave it a 4 Jar Jar's out of 5 for terribleness.

[HaemishM]

The Mods were just the most obviously jarring thing in the whole show. They stood out visually so goddamn bad - in a city/world full of browns and sand and dirty ass people covered in sand, here are these spotless cunts in primary colors faffing about on the shiniest bikes(?) ever with droid parts sticking out of their whatevers. They stuck out like sore thumbs in every single scene they were in. One of my RL buddies who just fucking hates Kathleen Kennedy blamed her, saying there were reports that she came on set and made them change/add a bunch of stuff. I don't know if I believe it - I'm sure there's plenty of blame to go around for this mess.

[Samwise]

Think how good those things would look parked outside Dexter Jettster's American Graffiti diner on Coruscant.

[Khaldun]

It's not only that they looked bad but there was something profoundly stupid about them claiming they couldn't afford the waterseller's high prices when come the fuck on, they look like the closest thing Tatooine has to trust-fund kids. The Space Mods can afford ridiculous imported Space Vespas that no one else on Tatooine has and they can afford expensive cyborg alterations of their own bodies, but they're sitting around fucking with a waterseller (is there only one in Mos Espa?) because he charges too much?

I can believe *somebody* stepped in on the whole thing precisely because it feels like such a muddle. I honestly wonder if it was Star Wars Sopranos when the first story conference happened and then when they started filming it they started getting a lot of directives to make it family-friendly so it became Boba Fett and His Swell Pals.

[Setanta]

I can believe *somebody* stepped in on the whole thing precisely because it feels like such a muddle. I honestly wonder if it was Star Wars Sopranos when the first story conference happened and then when they started filming it they started getting a lot of directives to make it family-friendly so it became Boba Fett and His Swell Pals.

I think you pretty much nailed it. I want to think that it was a totally different direction to the Mandalorian, because it's Boba - then he fucking disappears, the bloody Mandalorian, trust fund spy  kids, and the Jedi get dragged in, and it just goes to shit.

[Sky]

I really don't like that they tied the stupid scooter kids to one of the most badass characters in the current Star Wars era. I swear to god if they spin those kids into a show and tie that anchor around the wookiee's ankle....

Anyway, other than those kids I enjoyed the show. A bit too far in one direction or another as it went, but that's to be expected since it's a pretty wide audience.

[Khaldun]

Look, the genius thing about Marvel since Iron Man has been that they've fairly consciously tried to spread out the genre referents and to some extent have also encouraged some range of directorial style. That hasn't been totally consistent and some of the genre mapping they've done hasn't worked all that well. The first Thor, for example, was pseudo-Shakespearean done by a Shakespearean director and it was pretty wooden as a result.

Star Wars is really struggling to do anything that coherent. Everybody loved Rogue One because it didn't hesitate to go all in on the genre template and ended up being a pretty dark war movie as a result. Everybody's enjoying The Mandalorian because while it's doing pastiche (Lone Wolf and Cub most notably) it's doing it with some gusto and there's some tough stuff here and there (way back in Episode 1, Mando uses a door to cut someone in half, remember?)

This was a big test of "can Star Wars do underworld/gangster stuff" and wow, the answer is "not under the current management" in a big way. That might have been fine if that felt really planned--like the first episode opens and they go "hey you though Boba Fett was gonna go gangsta? actually no, he's had two life-changing experiences from being in a Sarlacc gut and living with Tuskens and he's actually here to be the new sheriff in town", e.g., if they decoyed us to think "Sopranos" when what they were really doing was "High Noon". But instead it feels more like the sequel trilogy: nobody has a plan, everybody's working at cross-purposes, and mostly the ostensible main character just seems like being in a Sarlacc and working with Tuskens caused him to become mentally disabled.

[HaemishM]

I agree. As goofy as it would have been to go full Last Samurai/Dances with Tuskens on the whole series, as least it would have been a story with some cohesion. By the time Boba finds out the Pykes killed the Tuskens, it's been like 4 episodes since we would have even cared, and everything in between has been an entirely other story that had only the most tenuous connection to the character, and even less to the main plot. I'm still trying to figure out who had the bright idea to do what was mostly 2 episodes of The Mandolorian inside this series. Rodriguez and Favreau cannot have had that idea from the get go. They have their moments of garbage, but not that bad.

[MahrinSkel]

Some serious studio fuckery happened. Favreau has more respect for the Canon, Rodriguez isn't this bad at story.

--Dave

[eldaec]

There is nothing wrong with the story. The problem is execution.

[Khaldun]

I was thinking some about this and realizing that the Grogu/Luke stuff made me feel more sour and irritated even than the Boba Fett thing.

We know that the reborn Jedi Order is going to fail, so first off, if they're going to tell that story on-screen, they've got to find a way to fill it with some pathos, to recognize that they're telling us the story of a tragedy. They've locked themselves into that. But also I'm just stunned that Ahsoka is hanging around so passively and complacently. She's lived with the whole history of the Jedi's fall and the Empire's rise, as well as the Rebellion's entire history, so for her to have no opinion whatsoever about what the Jedi should be, and to let Luke just toodle around making beehives and re-enacting his time on Dagobah with Baby Yoda feels really wrong. She knows how the Order failed. We don't know if Luke is regularly chatting with the Force Ghosts or if he's gone off and researched the Jedi or what but he certainly knows less than she does.

The whole thing just felt wrong-footed in every way, like they were losing their sense of how to develop *both* shows.

[Velorath]

I mean, I have a hard time in general believing that the original plan was to send Grogu off as the emotional finale of Season 2, and basically the culmination of the main story arc of the first two seasons, only to undo it in two episodes of a spin-off show.

[Threash]

I can absolutely believe that was the original plan, they were clearly setting up mando to go on a reclamation of Mandalore arc and end up as the eventual king or whatever. Then the fans let them know that no, fucking Grogu is the main draw of the show and you better bring his little ass back right this fucking minute and Disney very much agreed with the billions of dollars of Grogu merchandise money they were getting.

[Khaldun]

It did seem to me they're setting up Mando himself to take off the helmet and mostly keep it off unless he's in a fight, which is fine and kind of where I thought this would be going eventually. But I really wish we hadn't seen anything about what Luke is actually doing with Grogu--I would rather Mando made him a teeny-weeny chainmail shirt of +2 beskar and sent it via intergalactic Amazon.com and we never really saw Undead Luke and Totally Passive Ahsoka until they're ready to tell that story. Fine if Grogu just comes back in and saves Mando's bacon in Season 3 and then in his usual fashion doesn't really explain anything to Mando except that he's decided not to go Jedi.

I know Luke's going to fail, I just want him to fail while at least trying to do it better than the old-style Jedi did. Like, I would totally love him talking with Force Ghost Anakin about what the Jedi did wrong and having Force Yoda and Force Obi-Wan going "well, ok, actually, he's kind of right, you gotta try something different". Maybe whatever he does actually works until Leia and Han call him up about his nephew who has been caught doing spice and murdering sandpeople on his spring school trip and ask him to take Ben in and shape him up and he reluctantly agrees. But in that episode, Luke seems fucking hopeless as a teacher--he's like "hey all I know is running around a jungle and lifting rocks and having a little globe thing shoot at you so that's what we're doing".

[Samwise]

But in that episode, Luke seems fucking hopeless as a teacher--he's like "hey all I know is running around a jungle and lifting rocks and having a little globe thing shoot at you so that's what we're doing".

It's very in keeping with Jedi tradition to only do things that were introduced in the original trilogy. 

I mean, when we saw the youngling Jedi in the prequels, they were doing that exact same "shooty globe while blindfolded" exercise.  If there was literally anything else in the Jedi curriculum I'm sure we'd have seen that instead.

[Khaldun]

I know, but Filoni at least seems to grok the idea that maybe the Jedi tradition was part of the reason the Jedi fell, though he's had to be somewhat subtle about how he let that float up as an idea. And of course The Last Jedi says it aggressively, which is maybe why the people in charge are so scared of that now. But I think they are misunderstanding why everybody thought Luke coming in and plowing through a bunch of Dark Troopers was so cool. It wasn't because they wanted more traditional Jedi stuff about attachment and younglings and padawans, it was because they finally got to see Luke as an ultra-powerful Jedi Master cutting loose, which is kind of what everybody always wanted him to get a chance to be.

[Speedy Cerviche]

The final episode was really poorly directed. What a terrible battle scene, really disjointed, stretched out, riddled with logical inconsistency. Even in the opening moments they are fighting all kinds of gunmen positioned on the roof, so they jetpack out and land in a killing field on the ground instead of taking high ground then staying mobile?? Even if they spent all their budget on CGI for the big animals and droids it doesn't excuse that kind of stupid script and direction.

[MediumHigh]

I know, but Filoni at least seems to grok the idea that maybe the Jedi tradition was part of the reason the Jedi fell, though he's had to be somewhat subtle about how he let that float up as an idea. And of course The Last Jedi says it aggressively, which is maybe why the people in charge are so scared of that now. But I think they are misunderstanding why everybody thought Luke coming in and plowing through a bunch of Dark Troopers was so cool. It wasn't because they wanted more traditional Jedi stuff about attachment and younglings and padawans, it was because they finally got to see Luke as an ultra-powerful Jedi Master cutting loose, which is kind of what everybody always wanted him to get a chance to be.

This right here is the major contention within the fanbase. Because the general camps are "Star Wars is a sandbox where I get to roleplay like its dnd and my jedi can use force lightning" or "no this is straight good vs evil, the jedi and sith codes are core to the series actually working". Jedi aren't "supposed" to be related average joes who went to the force academy for a few months and did whatever they wanted on the weekends. Which has been a core issue the fanbase had since 70s and its been actively fought against at the expense of well good star wars stories. Our brains trying to add a "both sides" narrative doesn't add anything people actually care about no matter how much we try to shoehorn it in.

[Threash]

Ahsoka was only there to make sure Luke wasn't like his daddy, not because she gave any shits about the Jedi or how they ran their school.

[Phildo]

The final episode was really poorly directed. What a terrible battle scene, really disjointed, stretched out, riddled with logical inconsistency. Even in the opening moments they are fighting all kinds of gunmen positioned on the roof, so they jetpack out and land in a killing field on the ground instead of taking high ground then staying mobile?? Even if they spent all their budget on CGI for the big animals and droids it doesn't excuse that kind of stupid script and direction.

I walked away from this episode feeling similarly.  All the reinforcements coming in and they all huddle behind the same cover rather than trying any sort of flanking?  And the huge droids missing everybody, all of them time?  Not a lot of tension there.

[Khaldun]

Droid armies generally seem pretty fucking shit which is kind of hard to explain considering that droid AI otherwise seems pretty sophisticated. It's enough to make you wonder if someone long-ago designer did something like was done with the Death Star design and embedded something in all droid AI that would make them crappy soldiers.

[Samwise]

Wonder if IG-88 was jailbroken and that's why he was allowed to be able to shoot worth a damn.

[MediumHigh]

Once the giant battle droid couldn't shut over a 4 foot mud wall I was like 

[HaemishM]

Ahsoka was only there to make sure Luke wasn't like his daddy, not because she gave any shits about the Jedi or how they ran their school.

No, she was just in there to remind everyone she has a show coming out. 

[Sir T]

Droid armies generally seem pretty fucking shit which is kind of hard to explain considering that droid AI otherwise seems pretty sophisticated. It's enough to make you wonder if someone long-ago designer did something like was done with the Death Star design and embedded something in all droid AI that would make them crappy soldiers.

That goes right back to Lucas. He deliberately wanted the Droid army in the Fandom Penance Phantom Menace to be shit, just becasue. I saw some of the "Making of" thingies and Lucas was there staring at a mock up of the Battle Droid and commenting about how they are utterly crap.

[eldaec]

To be fair, he was referring to the cheap mass produced battle droids, I took his meaning to be 'these get used against helpless civilians'.

The same film showed there were also other droids that jedi were unable to stand their ground against.

[Speedy Cerviche]

The final episode was really poorly directed. What a terrible battle scene, really disjointed, stretched out, riddled with logical inconsistency. Even in the opening moments they are fighting all kinds of gunmen positioned on the roof, so they jetpack out and land in a killing field on the ground instead of taking high ground then staying mobile?? Even if they spent all their budget on CGI for the big animals and droids it doesn't excuse that kind of stupid script and direction.

I walked away from this episode feeling similarly.  All the reinforcements coming in and they all huddle behind the same cover rather than trying any sort of flanking?  And the huge droids missing everybody, all of them time?  Not a lot of tension there.

Haha yeah I was just thinking of all the "stormtroopers can't aim" jokes when they have these war droids not being able to hit anyone in a closely packed group of people under little to no cover, with heavy weapons, from 50 foot range, during 20 minutes of continuous shooting.

[Khaldun]

Now this is true. I wonder if the Force is actually an energy field that causes permanent astigmatism in all sapients, including droids.

[Sir T]

To be fair, he was referring to the cheap mass produced battle droids, I took his meaning to be 'these get used against helpless civilians'.

The same film showed there were also other droids that jedi were unable to stand their ground against.

These were the same droids that a character said "Our Volunteer militias are no match for their battle hardened droids." or words to that effect. "... battle Hardened" does not equal "crap."

But hey, this is Lucas. By that stage he was operating Lucasarts like the infallible leader of a cult, and he never had a decent plot related thought in his life.

[Cyrrex]

Semi binged this over the last week.  Takeaways...

-Somebody else, probably Kathleen Fucking Kennedy, absolutely meddled in this from start to finish.  No question at all.
-What the fuck is up with the Kitchenaid Appliance gang?
-At every turn, it felt like someone was asking the question 'now, what would a toddler enjoy?' and then added that to the scene
-Mos Espa is not that goddamn fancy, stop it.  People don't fucking live on this planet.
-Jennifer Beals has been scorching hot spanning five decades now.
-Temuera Morrison doesn't really pull it off in this.  Soft grampa.
-Pedro absolutely does
-A whole episode about pimping a Nabooian starfighter?  Okay....
-Everything instantly improves the moment Mando comes into the scene.
-They have almost managed to cross the uncanny valley with Luke.  The voiceover was odd, but visually, goddamn.
-Despite all the absurdities, I still fucking love Grogu.  
-Audio/Visual is outstanding.  Pretty amazed on that front.
-Don't do this again, no need.

[01101010]

-Don't do this again, no need.

Oh they will... you know damn well they will.

CGI Luke was interesting and a little unsettling.

Hated that stupid ending with Luke making Grogu choose... fuck off. If the jedi had beskar chainmail most of them would still be alive.

[Cyrrex]

I was mildly annoyed by the choice given to Grogu, but honestly...it fits well with what Luke understood at the time.  We all know he was wrong, but he hadn't learned that lesson yet.

And by "don't do this again" I just mean the Boba Fett angle, Mando and Grogu are great.  Also, yeet Kathleen Kennedy into the sun and get her fingers off this shit.

[Surlyboi]

Luke fucking up just lended credence to his fail in TLJ and a greater fuckup of the jedi writ large.

[Khaldun]

It makes his bitterness in TLJ feel way more real, for sure. I mean, he must be looking back and thinking "I thought I could train a whole new Jedi Order on my own, more or less? And I knew so fucking little that all I could manage was to re-enact my own pathetically limited training? And Ahsoka, who was actually trained BY the Jedi just sat there and watched me?" Considering how we know it ends with Ben Solo's group of bad guys and Snoke etc. killing everybody, that must feel especially humiliating to think back on. Only as an old man does he realize that he needed to rethink the whole damn thing from the ground up and only then does he realize that Ben and Yoda were of no fucking use whatsoever as ghost mentors at that point, precisely when they might have done something.