Star Wars

This is the place where you can conflab about all the other stuff besides videogames
User avatar
ratsoalbion
Admin
Posts: 7918
Joined: August 28th, 2012, 9:41 am
Location: Brighton, England
Contact:

Re: Star Wars: The Force Awakens

Post by ratsoalbion »

Spoiler two above has been confirmed in fact.
User avatar
Combine Hunter
Moderator
Posts: 892
Joined: August 27th, 2012, 4:40 pm

Re: Star Wars: The Force Awakens

Post by Combine Hunter »

I thought it was a good film, not a great film. Definitely 100 times better than those AWFUL prequel films, but I think I prefer the likes of Serenity and Guardians of the Galaxy as far as modern space operas go.
User avatar
KissMammal
Member
Posts: 523
Joined: August 22nd, 2014, 5:52 pm

Re: Star Wars: The Force Awakens

Post by KissMammal »

its really hard to judge TWA since its clearly not finished
If I were being facetious, I'd say that I agree that it's not finished, in that the script is 'not finished' because from my perspective it could have done with a lot more polish and tightening up. I believe that a film should be self-contained and satisfying even if it's part of a series, and I have very little time for the common defence of 'it will be explained in the sequel' - leaving a lot of question marks hanging over things is not the same as leaving things on a cliffhanger ending.

I found quite a lot of fundamental things in the film didn't really make any sense - a lot of narrative leaps of logic, inconsistencies and whopping coincidences we're asked to swallow. Some bugged me on first watch, and yet more started to bother me the more I thought about the film afterwards. Even the characters - the films undoubted strong point - sometimes feel not particularly well thought out. Take Rey - a character who is
Spoiler: show
a capable star pilot, despite the film explicitly telling us she has spent her entire life since childhood confined to the one planet....
Looking at it with a very critical eye, you could argue that across the board the filmmakers kind of rely on casting great, charismatic actors to paper over the cracks of some rather underwritten characters.

I'd be very curious to see the original Michael Arndt script (before it was rewritten by Abrams), because I have a few theories about why certain things are the way they are in the final film. For example I know that in the original script the Macguffin everyone is chasing is simply
Spoiler: show
Luke's lightsaber and not this very Abrams-esque 'map' doodad, which is a bit nebulous and problematic, and raises some very awkward questions that remain unanswered. Who made the map? And why?
Of course, how much things like plot holes and contrivances bother you depends on the individual. Personally I can overlook a few things, but when there are so many nagging things that don't add up it can't help but sour my enjoyment a bit.
this was the first time watching a Star Wars movie that I felt I needed to read a book or a primer before watching I mean I dont wanna a Kojima monologue to explain all that's happening but c'mon 10 minutes to really estabilish the world wouldnt hurt either.
I think this is spot on. The original movies managed to convey the setup and the stakes of the conflict literally within the first five minutes of the first film, despite opening 'in media res' with very little exposition. We instantly understood the relation the Rebellion had to the Empire, whereas in TFA I think 99% of viewers are still scratching their heads regarding the First Order, the Republic and the Resistance. Who's fighting who? Who is the establishment and who is the insurgent? Who has the upper hand? The film presents this all in a really frustratingly muddy way. I'd actually point to the bit where
Spoiler: show
all those planets start getting blown up
as the exact moment the plot went a bit off the rails. A moment like that should be a big dramatic shock, not so rushed as to leave the audience confused. I would have preferred the whole
Spoiler: show
Death Star
plot be cut entirely and just have the ending be a straight rescue. The film worked best when the scale was kept small - while Abrams is great with characters, I always think he has a problem conveying a sense of grand scale in his movies. In both his Trek and Wars films the big wide galaxy seems about the size of a small English county to me.

I'm seeing a lot of people calling TFA 'the best Star Wars film ever', and while everyone is entitled to their opinion, I think that may be getting a little carried away in the euphoria of the first decent Star Wars movie in over thirty years. As entertaining and fun as The Force Awakens is, purely from a creative, writing and cinematic storytelling perspective - the building blocks of the film - personally I just don't think there's any comparison. The originals are truly timeless classics.
User avatar
ratsoalbion
Admin
Posts: 7918
Joined: August 28th, 2012, 9:41 am
Location: Brighton, England
Contact:

Re: Star Wars: The Force Awakens

Post by ratsoalbion »

What I would say is that, love them as I do, the original trilogy is absolutely full to the brim of plot-holes, contrivances, inconsistencies and outrageous coincidences too.
User avatar
DomsBeard
Member
Posts: 3689
Joined: September 2nd, 2012, 5:03 pm
Location: Doms Chin

Re: Star Wars: The Force Awakens

Post by DomsBeard »

Ok if we're finding "issues"
Spoiler: show
Given Finn doesn't have anything to do with the force, how could he fight Ren one on one at the end?. Force choke job done.
Also
Spoiler: show
How did they know Kylo Ren had taken Rey to the Starkiller?
And
Spoiler: show
How did Poe get off Jakku?, why does he have a black X Wing?
And
Spoiler: show
Why would Han and Leia call their Son Ben?
Plus
Spoiler: show
who are the Knights of Ren?, how could Luke be bested by a load of amateurs?
;)
User avatar
DomsBeard
Member
Posts: 3689
Joined: September 2nd, 2012, 5:03 pm
Location: Doms Chin

Re: Star Wars: The Force Awakens

Post by DomsBeard »

Oh also
Spoiler: show
If they were bombing something, why not Y Wings?
User avatar
ratsoalbion
Admin
Posts: 7918
Joined: August 28th, 2012, 9:41 am
Location: Brighton, England
Contact:

Re: Star Wars: The Force Awakens

Post by ratsoalbion »

4 suggestion:
Spoiler: show
Because without the other guy with the same (adopted) name they never would have met?
User avatar
ratsoalbion
Admin
Posts: 7918
Joined: August 28th, 2012, 9:41 am
Location: Brighton, England
Contact:

Re: Star Wars: The Force Awakens

Post by ratsoalbion »

DomsBeard wrote:Oh also
Spoiler: show
If they were bombing something, why not Y Wings?
It looked to me as though the 30 years later model of the fighter used had been adapted to be more of an all-rounder maybe?
User avatar
DomsBeard
Member
Posts: 3689
Joined: September 2nd, 2012, 5:03 pm
Location: Doms Chin

Re: Star Wars: The Force Awakens

Post by DomsBeard »

Can we all agree how amazing it was to see:
Spoiler: show
Admiral Ackbar
User avatar
macstat
Member
Posts: 372
Joined: November 24th, 2015, 1:12 pm
Location: Wrocław, Poland
Contact:

Re: Star Wars: The Force Awakens

Post by macstat »

Don't answer that people.
Spoiler: show
Its a trap !
Todinho

Re: Star Wars: The Force Awakens

Post by Todinho »

Yeah of course the original trilogy is also full of plot-holes but it estabilished the world very well and kept things simple so It never bothered me,Im not complaning that whoever designed the Death Star with a fatal flaw was an idiot that's not important, Im complaning that I dont even know who is even fighting who in this new movie,and all of that could have been solved with few lines of dialogue that's the worst part,I get it you dont want to bore the audience but hey after those opening scenes I dont think anybody would complain if a character talked about what happened in the 30 years betewen episode VI and VII.This strkes me as JJ Abrams sindrome, ever since LOST the dude thinks he cant give straight anwsers to the audience.
Spoiler: show
For example who was that old guy in the beginning of the movie who had the map?Welp i guess we will never know unless we read a book or something,is it important not at all it`s not even a complaint of mine but all the movie needed to do to give us a straight anwser was once Kylo Ren got there he would just have to adress him by name,simple like "Hello colonel Antilles"bam done(that old man is totally Wedge)
User avatar
Beck
Member
Posts: 653
Joined: September 4th, 2012, 3:50 pm

Re: Star Wars: The Force Awakens

Post by Beck »

It's a bit too soon to be labelling unanswered characters and arks as plot holes. This was a trilogy from the get go, how do you know those questions won't be answered in the next two films? It sounds like you went into this with too high of expectations.
User avatar
ratsoalbion
Admin
Posts: 7918
Joined: August 28th, 2012, 9:41 am
Location: Brighton, England
Contact:

Re: Star Wars: The Force Awakens

Post by ratsoalbion »

I'm all in favour of the movies leaving so much unsaid. It was the references and allusions to things like 'Jabba the Hutt', 'Kessel' and so on that fired off my imagination as a kid.

It's nice to not be spoonfed as per the prequels, even if the secrecy is partly (of course) to promote interest in the subsequent films and extra materials.

In Episode VI a woman turns up. Turns out that she's the leader of the Rebel Alliance. Rather a major player then, yet she is never mentioned before or after her one brief scene. That was awesome I thought.
User avatar
KissMammal
Member
Posts: 523
Joined: August 22nd, 2014, 5:52 pm

Re: Star Wars: The Force Awakens

Post by KissMammal »

I'm all in favour of the movies leaving so much unsaid. It was the references and allusions to things like 'Jabba the Hutt', 'Kessel' and so on that fired off my imagination as a kid.
I'm in complete agreement with you there - one of the great things about the original movies is that they (intentionally) begin as if you are catching part of a serial partway through, and one of the main problems with the prequels is they explained far too much and completely de-mystified everything in the process. I'm also frankly relived that Disney has jettisoned the entire Expanded Universe of SW novels, comics, games etc as they filled in too many details and formalised everything to the point where it became boring and stifled. A world like Star Wars, with its anachronistic blend of space wizards and chunky tech, is best kept vague. Ditto the Force.

My feeling with TFA is that they were very aware of the shortcomings of the prequels (which had far too much exposition and dry political discourse) so they wanted to keep this new film lean and mean. It's essentially a chase movie as each of the originals were. And I totally respect that and think that was the right call, and I appreciate that it's a deceptively tricky thing to get the right balance. However, I think they went perhaps a little too far in cutting things to the bone - as Todinho says, all it would have taken was one or two short scenes here and there to let the pace slow down and give us a little more context and character development.

Apologies if I'm coming across as too negative. I'm fascinated by all this stuff and love a good debate about storytelling. Most of my gripes are plot-related, and I'm aware this kind of thing bothers some more than others. I honestly did really enjoy the film, but I just had a few too many issues with it to really love it. I'll list some positives for a change:

The cast are uniformly excellent. The good guys are all instantly lovable, and they have great chemistry together. It's easy to forget that getting this stuff right and harnessing this charm and charisma in a movie is so hard to do - so many films try it and fail. Kudos to all the actors and the casting director. I was worried about Harrison Ford, but he turns in his most spirited performance in what must be over 20 years.
Spoiler: show
I have to say, in the three-way duel at the end I was honestly hoping that no one would die cos I wanted all these guys back in the next film.
BB-8.

It's far and away the funniest of all the Star Wars films. Big thumbs up there.

The lightsaber fights were great - so glad that they've abandoned the overdone, highly choreographed fighting style of the prequels.

The tactile feel of everything - eg the sets, the Stormtroopers being thrown back 15 feet from Chewie's laser blasts etc.

The music. I was worried we'd get a lazy medley of all the familiar themes, but it felt quite restrained on that front. Loved 'Rey's Theme' especially.

Great character design - loved Rey's new costume at the end.

I'm aware that he's proving quite divisive, but I personally thought they did a great job with Kylo Ren - he's a fantastic villain - something really different - and is probably my favourite single thing in the film.
Spoiler: show
Han Solo's death scene
could have been really ruinous if handled badly, but I thought they nailed it.
Spoiler: show
It was ultimately the right decision as far as I'm concerned - one last hurrah, then leave the stage before you outstay your welcome.
Loads of lovely little touches in this film - almost too many to count. Abrams talked a lot about their main concern when making the film was to 'make it delightful' and I think they succeeded.
Spoiler: show
Rey sliding down that sand dune - a perfect little moment.
Lego Solo

Re: Star Wars: The Force Awakens

Post by Lego Solo »

Just seen it for a second time and loved it all over again. This film is a love letter to the older fans and a film that Lucas didn't want to make again. I honestly feel that's one of the reasons he let it go to a new generation of filmmakers.

It's got it's problems but all films do when you look at them closely. It asks more questions than it answers, but I'm sure they will be answered in the remaining two, if not then some of the problems people have with it now are understandable, but for now we all knew it was part of a trilogy and they were never going to tell you everything in the first one.

For me, sitting there I felt like a kid again going off on a grand adventure and for that I'm thankful and it was worth the wait.
Todinho

Re: Star Wars: The Force Awakens

Post by Todinho »

Spoiler: show
I dont think it's unresonable to want to know who is fighting who,just by comparing this movie to a New Hope and just by those standards you can see the problems:

Start of Star wars: This is the Empire and these are the rebels,they are the galatic empire and they have this super weapon that we gotta destroy,there were jedis that used these cool laser swords and were kinda mystic but they were all destroyed there's this darth vader guy he betrayed them and was Obi-wan aprentice.There was a feel other elements thrown in there but this is the gist and it`s perfectly understandable.
Now in this movie we have the First Order,ok I thought the empire had fallen at 6 so these are remnants of it? Are they just the Empire by another name?They must have at least the same strenght if they built this super weapon that`s way better then the Death Star right?Speaking of which you`d think the good guys would`ve paid more attention to that but sure maybe security got better,by the way who are the good guys?There`s the republic and a senate but they are also called the resistance at many points,are they different entities or the First Order just calls them the resistance to spite them? You dont have to give a monologue to explain things you just have to have a few lines to help the audience understand exactly what`s happening,like they did in a New Hope were they were able to explain this stuff and not drag things out,dont leave it a "mystery" to be "explained" in future movies or in books,those are for you to expand what you build here not to explain what's going on now c'mon,the things I wanted explained here are things vital to the plot of this film,I dont care that I dont know what the "knights of Ren" are because they dont factor here I dont need to know what they are other then that Kylo is a part of them and that they are probably bad guys and that's fine,but I do need to know who are the two main factions of the film.
User avatar
DomsBeard
Member
Posts: 3689
Joined: September 2nd, 2012, 5:03 pm
Location: Doms Chin

Re: Star Wars: The Force Awakens

Post by DomsBeard »

I'm mostly shocked
Spoiler: show
someone hasn't swapped Lukes head for Jar Jars in the final scene yet
User avatar
KissMammal
Member
Posts: 523
Joined: August 22nd, 2014, 5:52 pm

Re: Star Wars: The Force Awakens

Post by KissMammal »

Todinho wrote:
Spoiler: show
I dont think it's unresonable to want to know who is fighting who,just by comparing this movie to a New Hope and just by those standards you can see the problems:

Start of Star wars: This is the Empire and these are the rebels,they are the galatic empire and they have this super weapon that we gotta destroy,there were jedis that used these cool laser swords and were kinda mystic but they were all destroyed there's this darth vader guy he betrayed them and was Obi-wan aprentice.There was a feel other elements thrown in there but this is the gist and it`s perfectly understandable.
Now in this movie we have the First Order,ok I thought the empire had fallen at 6 so these are remnants of it? Are they just the Empire by another name?They must have at least the same strenght if they built this super weapon that`s way better then the Death Star right?Speaking of which you`d think the good guys would`ve paid more attention to that but sure maybe security got better,by the way who are the good guys?There`s the republic and a senate but they are also called the resistance at many points,are they different entities or the First Order just calls them the resistance to spite them? You dont have to give a monologue to explain things you just have to have a few lines to help the audience understand exactly what`s happening,like they did in a New Hope were they were able to explain this stuff and not drag things out,dont leave it a "mystery" to be "explained" in future movies or in books,those are for you to expand what you build here not to explain what's going on now c'mon,the things I wanted explained here are things vital to the plot of this film,I dont care that I dont know what the "knights of Ren" are because they dont factor here I dont need to know what they are other then that Kylo is a part of them and that they are probably bad guys and that's fine,but I do need to know who are the two main factions of the film.
I was literally just reading up on this. While, as I said, I appreciate not having things over-explained, there definitely seemed to be some scenes missing here, and it turns out that there were.

Apparently, the original script featured more screentime for Leia, who
Spoiler: show
dispatches an agent to warn the Republic about the First Order (and presumably the Starkiller), and this is the girl we see on the balcony who dies on the city planet when it explodes. It is established that Leia has a fractious relationship to the Republic, who covertly support but publicly denounce The Resistance, who we learn are Leia's paramilitary organisation, set up to challenge the threat of the First Order, an extreme off-shoot of the old Empire that is rising to power on the far reaches of the galaxy.

It's a shame that this was cut as it really helps clarify what is going on with all the various factions. My guess is that they cut it due to pacing/timing issues, but if they hadn't, and built up more of introduction to the Starkiller, that, for me, would fix a lot of the problems with the second act of the movie. I still think the film didn't need another Death Star superweapon but at least that way it wouldn't just appear out of nowhere.
I'm actually holding out hope some kind of director's cut with some of this vital plot information reinstated, as wrong as it seems for there to be a director's cut of a Star Wars movie.
User avatar
DomsBeard
Member
Posts: 3689
Joined: September 2nd, 2012, 5:03 pm
Location: Doms Chin

Re: Star Wars: The Force Awakens

Post by DomsBeard »

I think JJ must've noticed
Spoiler: show
How terrible Carrie Fisher is, she was great in the originals but wooden in tfa
User avatar
KissMammal
Member
Posts: 523
Joined: August 22nd, 2014, 5:52 pm

Re: Star Wars: The Force Awakens

Post by KissMammal »

I admire Carrie Fisher a lot, but she has famously been through a lot and comes across as a little... eccentric in interviews and chat show appearances. She also seemingly hasn't acted in a long time so I was worried how she be in the movie, but I actually thought she was surprisingly fine, all things considered.
Post Reply