STAR WARS : Episode VIII December 15, 2017 4 4

[Knightsofold]

 I find it surprising that everyone is so mad at this movie.  I didn't like Force Awakens that much, but I was very happy they accomplished the main mission of getting people to love and care about Star Wars again.  

So maybe it's from having lowish expectations that I think the movie was fine.  

What were you people expecting?  And what possibly gave you those expectations?

I can't believe I'm hearing how this ruined Star Wars etc....

This movie is a NOT EVEN CLOSE to the destruction unleashed in Phantom Menace and II and III.

1. Medichlorians are the force..

2. Anakin was born via immaculate conception..

3. Darth Vader built C3-PO???

4. Taking place on Tatooine.

Now that's a movie that could've ruined Star Wars. 

 

Anyways there are some really dumb parts to the Last Jedi, but by all means if you even remotely enjoyed Force Awakens then see this!  It was still fun.  If you're looking for something ground breaking, inspirational, life changing, or thought provoking you're not going to find it in a Disney family fun movie like this.

 

[kdoginohio]

11 minutes ago, NewWorldOrder said:

OMG I 110% agree with you.  

  Reveal hidden contents

However if Luke had some powerful ending I think I would have been okay with him dying in this film.  I would have loved to see him use the force to take down the AST walkers and then an epic duel with Kylo.  I like how powerful he was in the end, but it just seemed lame he was just a hologram of himself.

 

Yes, lame it was.

[NewWorldOrder]

I really believe the fan reactions are going to make Disney re-think their decision on Rian Johnson for the next trilogy. 

[Rip]

2 hours ago, Bosco685 said:

You would think it is people playing around with ratings. But go to Rotten Tomatoes and read what general viewers are posting. I think it is really about Old School vs. New School.

IMDB has the ratings segmented. You can see the older the person, the lower the rating. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2527336/ratings?ref_=tt_ov_rt 

I suspect then RT must have a much older audience than IMDB.

Here are the closest Star Wars ratings on IMDB

Force Awakens 8.1

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2488496/ratings?ref_=tt_ov_rt 

Rogue One 7.8

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt3748528/ratings?ref_=tt_ov_rt

ROTJ 8.4 

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0086190/ratings?ref_=tt_ov_rt 

 

Edit, very Strange because RT has the fan score of TFA at 88% Hmm. completely bucks the trend.

Its likely organized somewhere or spammed. For example on TFA it has 700K (IMDB) vs 223K on (RT) yet right now TLJ on RT already has over 65K in votes vs 57K on IMDB.

Also PostTrak audience score is 82% which almost matched IMDB perfectly

http://deadline.com/2017/12/the-last-jedi-star-wars-box-office-thursday-night-preview-record-1202227654/

Edited December 16, 2017 by Rip

[jsilverjanet]

Wait did the Mouse something up?

but I thought they did the right thing with the characters, look at the marvel movies 

 

[NewWorldOrder]

#fireKathleenKennedy

[Chip Cataldo]

I saw it this morning and loved it. That being said, there were a few parts I thought were lame and others that could have been outright eliminated. Definitely better than the first two prequels.

[Azkaban]

It wouldn't take much to be better than the prequels. Went with a group last night and waited in line for 2 hours and couldn't wait to see it. After about two hours couldn't wait for it to be over very disappointing for me. But that's just my 

[Artboy99]

3 hours ago, Antpark said:

I saw it this afternoon and liked it. There were some parts I didn't care for -- the ending, in particular, had more cheese than the state of Wisconsin -- but my overall experience was positive. 

After the trauma that was the prequel trilogy, I came to a realization -- There will never be another Star Wars movie (for me) that will equal or capture the same feelings and magic as ANH & ESB. Never. Period. Stop trying to compare them and becoming disappointed when they don't measure up.

I find I'm able to enjoy them more now that way. 

(Except Phantom Menace. That one's still awful).

So frustrating. It is definitely what I have been doing: hoping for that familiar magic and never getting it. Instead I get flat emotionless characters and lots of flying ships.

[newshane]

Just saw it.

Haven't had that much fun at the movies in a very, very long time.

 

[DiamondCityComics]

Metacritic user score is pretty bad too.  I'm a lot less excited to see this tomorrow .  

[1Cool]

Did I just get punked?  Star Wars couldn’t have been that bad for real.  Jar Jar Binks bad.  Felt like 4 directors decided to play spin the bottle to decide who would get each 15 minutes of the movie.  Terrible acting across the board.  Can’t expresses how disappointed I am with that flick.  I’ll give it a D just because I love Star Wars.

[drotto]

I liked it, and the theater I was in was clapping and cheering on at least four separate occasions.  But I do understand the points the people seem to hate and a few of the themes that are brought out by it.

 

Here is what I think ticked people off.  Tell me if I am correct.  These are BIG spoilers do not read if you have not seen it.

Spoiler

1. Snoke was a red herring you learned nothing about him, or how he came to power now he is dead.

2. Luke dies, and with the untimely death of Carrie Fisher nobody from the original cast is left.

3. Luke's death was alone and far away.  You never got the true Luke and Leia reunion, and he did not go down in a blaze of glory. We never get that reunion of the big three.

4. It signals the likely end of the Skywalker story.  Unless Kylo has an unknown kid or turns back to the light side, the bloodline will end. For those who think that Star Wars and Skywalker are inseparable this is a big problem.

5. Reys parents being nobody seems like a letdown. 

6. The symbolic turning over of the franchise to the next generation with the rebellion shown restating with children.  Us middle agers have been told that Star Wars is not ours anymore.

7. We really learn nothing about the First Order other than they are Nazi knock offs.  They have no back story.

 

 

[darkstar]

5 hours ago, Hudson said:

 

If you watch this movie and want to compare it to the original 1977 Star Wars, then you may be disappointed. 

 

But you see that is kind of the point. Disney had the opportunity to create a follow up to the original trilogy with the Force Awakens and make everyone forget about the prequels. And they completely pissed the opportunity away.

They had all of the original characters that audiences loved from the original trilogy at their disposal (outside of Vader, who got his "return" in Rogue One anyway), plus all the original actors were on board (some more than others). As bad as the Force Awakens was it actually looked like Star Wars (the same can't be said for the prequels). Insert the original characters and you're golden.

Knowing that why did the people in charge sign off on starting their new trilogy with a focus entirely on the new characters that the audience does not care about?

Obviously you have the time gap that you have to write into the story and account for the actors aging. You don't want geriatrics headlining a billion dollar movie, but those characters need major screen time. The last time the audience saw the original characters the Rebellion was on top and everyone was on good terms. So why start the new trilogy with the Rebellion somehow having fallen apart, with all the main characters pissed at each other, separated, and getting barely any screen time? The audience doesn't want to see that and worst of all they are never going to see how that happened anyway, so they are left filling in the gaps through expository dialogue. 

Here's an idea. Start the Force Awakens with the Rebellion still in control having maintained peace since the end of Jedi. The main cast is still together. Luke is featured training an apprentice - one of the new trilogy's heroes, it could even be a girl, who cares! Leia is in charge diplomatically of the Rebellion with Han who is doing his military thing, training pilots, whatever. Obviously Ford desperately wants out, so Han dies protecting Leia from an assassin in the first movie. Leia and Han go out on good terms, instead of whatever the f that was in the Force Awakens. Chewbacca, along with Han and Leia's son, goes off to hunt down Han's killer. Chewie eventually gets his revenge only to die allowing Han's son the opportunity to escape. Han's son has to make his way back to the Rebellion doing typical underhanded smuggler things and warns the Rebellion of the incoming threat. Meanwhile the Empire is off rebuilding itself quietly, with a new sith lord and apprentice being introduced. There is no gigantic world ending super weapon that makes the stakes impossible to top in the second movie. Really, this isn't that hard to figure out.

[newshane]

To those who hated the film, I'm not sure what you expected.

It's space-pop. A movie for kids. That's the way the franchise has always been.

It's not serious science fiction. It's not serious at all. So why take it that way?

To hear people talk about "flat acting" and plot holes and is funny. You've had that from the very beginning. This isn't Shakespeare folks. It's a popcorn movie, just as stupid as 90% of the other movies we enjoy from time to time.

Reminds me of a guy who complained about the opening space battle in the Sith movie. "Why the _____ would they have the spaceships broadside one another like a bunch of space pirates?"

Ummm...maybe because it looked really cool?

You're never going to recapture the magic you felt as a child. If you can accept that axiom, which applies to many experiences (it's nearly always the best the FIRST time), then you have a shot at enjoying the movie.

All I know is that I loved it. Much better than anything else released produced by the franchise since the 80s.

 

[drotto]

2 minutes ago, newshane said:

To those who hated the film, I'm not sure what you expected.

It's space-pop. A movie for kids. That's the way the franchise has always been.

It's not serious science fiction. It's not serious at all. So why take it that way?

To hear people talk about "flat acting" and plot holes and is funny. You've had that from the very beginning. This isn't Shakespeare folks. It's a popcorn movie, just as stupid as 90% of the other movies we enjoy from time to time.

Reminds me of a guy who complained about the opening space battle in the Sith movie. "Why the _____ would they have the spaceships broadside one another like a bunch of space pirates?"

Ummm...maybe because it looked really cool?

You're never going to recapture the magic you felt as a child. If you can accept that axiom, which applies to many experiences (it's nearly always the best the FIRST time), then you have a shot at enjoying the movie.

All I know is that I loved it. Much better than anything else released produced by the franchise since the 80s.

 

Pointing out bad acting in Star Wars from any of the movies is easy.  Other than Harrison Ford the cast has always been marginal at best.  Luke whining to Uncle Ben in the first movie. The awful Luke and Leia scene in ROTJ when he tells her they are siblings. The way Luke acts during the Vader is you father reveal in ESB is bad. There are so many points that are corny, have bad dialog, and acting that is poorly delivered, that I could point out many more,  I love Star Wars anyway. 

 

We have put the original movies on a pedestal (I do not deny I helped build the pedestal).  But if you pick them apart, they also have a lot of problems. So many fans have built up in their minds what they want and expect from these movies.  They have certain expectations and a need for wish fulfillment.  Then you get a movie like TLJ which seems to either change or abandon things that seemed to be set up earlier and people get pissed.

 

I get it.  Just not sure way it has made some people so angry. 

[drotto]

Sorry for yet another post but I had a question, and want to know if people think there was a middle ground.  Many people complained that TFA was just a rehash of ANH, and they were hoping that TLJ would be more original, and they were angry and let down of that movie because of the lack of originality and large reliance on nostalgia.  There were so many people praying that TLJ would not just be a rehash of ESB.  So assume that the studio did listen to those complaints to an extent when making the next film.  So now we get TLJ which arguably takes the franchise in a new direction, and takes some turns which people did not see coming, and are larger risks. The story in TLJ is more "original" or at least unexpected as compared to TFA.  And again fans get upset.

 

Was there a path that could have been taken?  Was there a middle ground? Are we just asking or expecting to much? Are movie makers just money grabbing evil people? Are fans just desperate to be pissed off whiners when they do not get their way?

 

 

[Rip]

1 hour ago, drotto said:

I liked it, and the theater I was in was clapping and cheering on at least four separate occasions.  But I do understand the points the people seem to hate and a few of the themes that are brought out by it.

 

Here is what I think ticked people off.  Tell me if I am correct.  These are BIG spoilers do not read if you have not seen it.

  Hide contents

 

1. Snoke was a red herring you learned nothing about him, or how he came to power now he is dead.

2. Luke dies, and with the untimely death of Carrie Fisher nobody from the original cast is left.

3. Luke's death was alone and far away.  You never got the true Luke and Leia reunion, and he did not go down in a blaze of glory. We never get that reunion of the big three.

4. It signals the likely end of the Skywalker story.  Unless Kylo has an unknown kid or turns back to the light side, the bloodline will end. For those who think that Star Wars and Skywalker are inseparable this is a big problem.

5. Reys parents being nobody seems like a letdown. 

6. The symbolic turning over of the franchise to the next generation with the rebellion shown restating with children.  Us middle agers have been told that Star Wars is not ours anymore.

7. We really learn nothing about the First Order other than they are Nazi knock offs.  They have no back story.

 

 

2 is the wammy.

[Guardian Comics]

I haven't posted here since all my comics were stolen from my home and then my shop four days later in late September, but after seeing this disaster this evening, this is the first place I came running.

Like many here, SW was my childhood and the prequels did not live up to 16 years of expectations but at least I can look at them fondly.  Palme was a memorable character, Qui Gonn and Darth Maul were memorable characters.  The movies still had a little bit of heart, and were still Star Wars, there was no mistaking that.  Whatever I just finished watching was not that.  I know Luke and Leia like my brother and sister, but these were not my family.  The story was slooowww, and not very good at all.  There is no heart left at all.

And for those people who say that no movies can ever live up to what you hold so dear from ones childhood, I beg to differ.  To me the OT trilogy was everything, but when Winter Soldier, Avengers 2 And Civil War came out, they became my adulthood holy trilogy that if someone asked me which three movies I’m taking on a deserted island, I’m still not sure which I would choose.

There is only one Cinematic War that matters anymore...and it’s of the Infinity not the Star.

It is with heavy heart that I write that last sentence.

 

Jim

[SkOw]

10 minutes ago, Guardian Comics said:

I haven't posted here since all my comics were stolen from my home and then my shop four days later in late September, but after seeing this disaster this evening, this is the first place I came running.

Like many here, SW was my childhood and the prequels did not live up to 16 years of expectations but at least I can look at them fondly.  Palme was a memorable character, Qui Gonn and Darth Maul were memorable characters.  The movies still had a little bit of heart, and were still Star Wars, there was no mistaking that.  Whatever I just finished watching was not that.  I know Luke and Leia like my brother and sister, but these were not my family.  The story was slooowww, and not very good at all.  There is no heart left at all.

And for those people who say that no movies can ever live up to what you hold so dear from ones childhood, I beg to differ.  To me the OT trilogy was everything, but when Winter Soldier, Avengers 2 And Civil War came out, they became my adulthood holy trilogy that if someone asked me which three movies I’m taking on a deserted island, I’m still not sure which I would choose.

There is only one Cinematic War that matters anymore...and it’s of the Infinity not the Star.

It is with heavy heart that I write that last sentence.

 

Jim

Jim, so sorry about your books.  I recently had my own experience with stolen books.  Were you able to get any back?

Also I understand the way you felt about the movie.  I was a little more mixed but I get the very fair criticism.