STAR WARS : Episode IX December 20, 2019 6 6

[fantastic_four]

21 hours ago, Chuck Gower said:

On 12/21/2019 at 4:54 PM, fantastic_four said:

Been hearing this same mess for 20 years now ever since Phantom Menace.

Exactly. As if George Lucas didn't have a generic formula he consistently repeated and co-ordinated it with toy sales. It's been a money grab since they started offering it with the success of the original.

You could come up with a list of 100 things to hate about Empire OR Return of the Jedi.  Billy Dee as the token black guy, or Yoda merging the Muppets into Star Wars, or Ewoks and Endor replacing Wookies and Kashyyyk just because Chewbacca toys weren't selling as well as teddy bears would have.  I could keep going, but what we lacked at the time was twofold--the Internet to create an echo chamber of hate, and a generation of kids too young to see the weaknesses of the original trilogy who were old enough to see those problems by 1999 once the Phantom Menace and every subsequent film came out.

[fantastic_four]

15 hours ago, Buzzetta said:

I will never understand why people need to stare when they hear the 'pss-ch' sound when they hear a beer being opened up during a movie theater. 

I can't wait until the first time someone sitting right next to me does that...my immediate instinctual reaction will be to ask them to hold my beer so I can go to the bathroom.  

[csaag]

Catching a 9:45 morning matinee.  One of their bigger theaters.  Bought ticket last second and only about 20 seats were already taken.

[jcjames]

2 hours ago, fantastic_four said:

You could come up with a list of 100 things to hate about Empire OR Return of the Jedi.  Billy Dee as the token black guy, or Yoda merging the Muppets into Star Wars, or Ewoks and Endor replacing Wookies and Kashyyyk just because Chewbacca toys weren't selling as well as teddy bears would have.  I could keep going, but what we lacked at the time was twofold--the Internet to create an echo chamber of hate, and a generation of kids too young to see the weaknesses of the original trilogy who were old enough to see those problems by 1999 once the Phantom Menace and every subsequent film came out.

Exactly.

Case in point: There is NO reason any Jedi (or Sith for that matter) ever has to be "hanging on for their life" or falling to their apparent death because...they can levitate! Even back to the original trilogy this was a dramatic flaw whenever a Jedi was in danger.

Anyways.... like you said, there are myriad of flaws and plot holes in even the best Star Wars movies.

Rian Johnson gave a giant middle finger to the Star Wars canon, and so this movie had to do a lot of work to snap that finger off just to start with, and so maybe it went a bit overboard in returning to the roots/characters of the original trilogy. Sure, there were a lot of chase scenes and action, but it didn't rise to the fatigue level of a John Woo film. Daisy's "origin" was the weakest plotline, that "connection" wasn't necessary for her to be the one who had to ultimately face down Palpatine.

[WolverineX]

On 12/22/2019 at 10:21 AM, paperheart said:

$179MM, a TLJ multiple of 2.8x gets it to $500MM; who would have bet Joker would outgross Star Wars WW?

me.

[Bosco685]

Quote

J.J. Abrams’ Star Wars: The Rise Of Skywalker Failed By Repeating The Mistakes Of Spider-Man 3, Spectre, Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald And Dark Phoenix.

 

With today beginning the unofficial two-week “kids are out of school and many adults are off work for the holidays” break period, Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker will have plenty of time to pull a Phantom Menace and make fools of those of us concerned about the $175.5 million domestic and $373.5 million opening weekend. The problem is less the raw number and more everything else. Beyond mixed-negative reviews, the film had a noticeably lower weekend multiplier (1.95 x a $90 million Friday) than the last three Christmas Star Wars flicks and a B+ Cinemascore grade, the lowest such grade from the opening night polling service for any live-action Star Wars movie. Even if you argue that the lower opening is indeed related to so-called Star Wars fatigue or backlash over The Last Jedi, the audience polling is entirely about The Rise of Skywalker.

 

I don’t pretend to know how the film was made, in terms of potential push-pull between J.J. Abrams, Disney and/or Lucasfilm. But beyond a frantic pace that left little time for character interaction, generic action sequences and oodles of “We’ve got to find that file!” Saturday morning cartoon-level dialogue are two core problems. First, the film spends a large majority of its running time retconning plot beats and character threads from The Last Jedi, in a way that, intentional or not, feels like kowtowing to the very sort of anti-Last Jedi folks who have kept John Boyega on the defensive since 2014 and chased Daisy Ridley and Kelly Marie Tran off social media. Moreover, it seemed dead set on ripping off plot twists and plot turns from some of the most divisive franchise finales and/or franchise sequels from the last 15 years.  

 

J.J. Abrams probably had concrete answers to the questions he posed in The Force Awakens but was willing to let Rian Johnson continue and (at the time) Colin Trevorrow finish the story he began. Whether you like or agree with the answers Johnson came up with (Luke has given up, Rey’s parents were nobodies, Poe is a cocky narcissist and Snoke is just a step to Kylo Ren’s path to ultimate power), they were no more or less valid with the information The Force Awakens gave us than anything fans might have speculated. What’s doubly frustrating about the retcons, specifically the reveal that Snoke was a clone created by Sheev Palpatine (Ian McDiarmid) and that Rey was actually Palpatine’s granddaughter and that her parents were actually heroes who hid her from grandpa and gave their lives to keep her safe, is that it both painfully patronizing and entirely unnecessary.

 

[@therealsilvermane]

Anyone who doesn’t like Ewoks doesn’t understand what Star Wars is truly about.

[zhamlau]

3 hours ago, bentbryan said:

Agree 99.9% with this. I would only say JJ does have a deep love and respect for Star Wars. Clearly a lifelong fan even tho he was behind the wheel for 2 out of 3 of this jumbled mess.  RJ on the other hand has no clue about SW.  I have absolutely no doubt that before he signed on for this, he probably had only seen the original movies a handful of times, if that.   I’ve seen several interviews with him and he always needs to insert “that he’s a fan”. You don’t get that from JJ or Favreau. 

Fair enough. I sometimes wonder after the Solo firing debacle if really the issue is KK and the consistently bad decisions that seem to be made on her watch. Really other than Rogue One what’s gone smoothly under her watch at Disney? These should be autopilot victory movies, just minimum effort and a little marketing and you will make billions on name brand alone. Disney has squandered so much potential in terms of revenue and fan support with this endless flow of crappy decisions.

Just look at Mandalorian. When you really think about it, just being quality is enough to send the fans into a frenzy of love and support. It’s fawned over for just being fully competent and generally good. Even the one actually bad episode was enjoyable and quickly forgotten. It proves how much Star Wars fans will get behind and support the brand if they would just give us the chance. We want this to like this stuff. The bar has been set so low, just not cr- - ping the bed is good enough to launch a millions memes and positive tweets. We are signing up in droves for their services just on the sheer hope there is something not toxic or stupid coming from Lucasfilm in the near future.

Just quit kicking fans in the junk, show the property and history a little respect, and give us something that does all that while being passably entertaining and we flock to you.

We buy even your garbage products as this new trilogy as shown, now imagine what you could get from us with consistent competent quality?!?

[Bosco685]

Quote

When it came to closing out the STAR WARS sequel trilogy, J.J. Abrams had a tough road to hoe. It wasn't just about bringing a nine film saga that's over four decades old to a satisfying conclusion. Abrams also faced the daunting task of reuniting a splintered fan base after Rian Johnson's THE LAST JEDI polarized audiences. STAR WARS fans everywhere finally got a chance to see THE RISE OF SKYWALKER this past weekend and while critics were mixed, people showed up in droves as the film had the third largest December opening in history. THE RISE OF SKYWALKER is undoubtedly on its way to a $1 billion bonanza on the big screen.

 

Despite the film's unquestionable financial success, THE RISE OF SKYWALKER has garnered a fair share of criticism. Many have derided the film's plot holes, poor pacing, focus on spectacle rather than story, and perceived retconning of THE LAST JEDI. Following a screening of the film at the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences at Hollywood, Abrams responded to the criticism in a Q & A session. When asked whether fans aren't getting something from the final film in the franchise, rather than get defensive, Abrams agreed saying:

 

“No, I would say that they’re right. The people who love it more than anything are also right. We knew starting this that any decision we made — a design decision, a musical decision, a narrative decision — would please someone and infuriate someone else. And they’re all right.”

 

Abrams also put to bed that there's any rancor between him and director Rian Johnson stating:

 

“It would be a much more interesting answer if there were conflict. The truth is when I was getting [The Force Awakens] up and running, I was nothing but grateful that a director and writer I admire as much as Rian was coming in to do [the next one.] Not expecting to come back to this, it was just fun to watch what was happening and get to respond to it."

 

Regardless of your feelings about THE RISE OF SKYWALKER (I personally liked it) there's a lot of truth to Abrams' words. Pleasing every STAR WARS fan is impossible. People get so wrapped up in their own head canon that if it doesn't match up with what's on the screen they are going to be disappointed. That's not to say that THE RISE OF SKYWALKER isn't deserving of criticism - it is. The final film proves that none of these new movies were talking to each other and that a singular overriding creative voice was sorely missing from this new trilogy. If Disney wants to learn from their mistakes and improve, that needs to change for the next trilogy, whatever and whenever that may be.

 

[Mr Sneeze]

32 minutes ago, zhamlau said:

Fair enough. I sometimes wonder after the Solo firing debacle if really the issue is KK and the consistently bad decisions that seem to be made on her watch. Really other than Rogue One what’s gone smoothly under her watch at Disney? These should be autopilot victory movies, just minimum effort and a little marketing and you will make billions on name brand alone. Disney has squandered so much potential in terms of revenue and fan support with this endless flow of crappy decisions.

Just look at Mandalorian. When you really think about it, just being quality is enough to send the fans into a frenzy of love and support. It’s fawned over for just being fully competent and generally good. Even the one actually bad episode was enjoyable and quickly forgotten. It proves how much Star Wars fans will get behind and support the brand if they would just give us the chance. We want this to like this stuff. The bar has been set so low, just not cr- - ping the bed is good enough to launch a millions memes and positive tweets. We are signing up in droves for their services just on the sheer hope there is something not toxic or stupid coming from Lucasfilm in the near future.

Just quit kicking fans in the junk, show the property and history a little respect, and give us something that does all that while being passably entertaining and we flock to you.

We buy even your garbage products as this new trilogy as shown, now imagine what you could get from us with consistent competent quality?!?

I know we disagree on the last two movies, but I certainly agree with your sentiment here.

[Xenosmilus]

44 minutes ago, @therealsilvermane said:

Anyone who doesn’t like Ewoks doesn’t understand what Star Wars is truly about.

I loved ewoks as a kid. I remember going to see ROTJ with my grandpa. He absolutely hated it.  Reflexing back now I can understand why he hated ROTJ and ewoks. They are geared towards kids which is fine I guess.  You just have to go into the movie understanding that.  With the exception to the first 2 movies I think the movies were geared more towards kids to sell merchandise.

[fantastic_four]

7 minutes ago, Xenosmilus said:

I loved ewoks as a kid. I remember going to see ROTJ with my grandpa. He absolutely hated it.  Reflexing back now I can understand why he hated ROTJ and ewoks. They are geared towards kids which is fine I guess.  You just have to go into the movie understanding that.  With the exception to the first 2 movies I think the movies were geared more towards kids to sell merchandise.

Lucas has another reason he said he used Ewoks instead of Wookies--he wanted the race on the planet to be primitive, but by the time we got to the third film Chewie wasn't being looked at as just a big walking dog anymore since he was shown both flying and fixing the Millenium Falcon in Empire, so he substituted in another similar race instead.  But that doesn't rule out the cute factor of Ewok teddy bears as being primarily being chosen to appeal to kids.

I was 12 when Jedi was released, so I rolled my eyes at the teddy bears.  By the time 1999 came around I just looked at Jar Jar as another version of the Ewoks and ignored my instinctive reaction to not think much of it.  As a 12-year old you're trying not to be a kid anymore, but by the time I was 28 I was fine with Lucas injecting elements geared towards kids.

Edited December 23, 2019 by fantastic_four

[N e r V]

I wonder if the new Jumanji movie will get the same bump as the last time it was paired off against Star Wars? Seems word of mouth is even worse on the third go round for Star Wars...

If it does I expect all future Jumanji movies will continue to open against all future Star Wars movies...

Edited December 23, 2019 by N e r V

[Xenosmilus]

6 minutes ago, N e r V said:

I wonder if the new Jumanji movie will get the same bump as the last time it was paired off against Star Wars? Seems word of mouth is even worse on the third go round for Star Wars...

If it does I expect all future Jumanji movies will continue to open against all future Star Wars movies...

I was pleasantly surprised with the first Jumanji (reboot).  My  is that there are no formulations to big pay offs at the movie theaters other than a good well written story and production!!!  I remember when no one though there could be a block buster movie in early March and then come Frank Miller's 300 which was awesome! Produce a good movie and they will come (ripe off quote from Field of Dreams LOL) anytime of the year. 

[@therealsilvermane]

23 minutes ago, fantastic_four said:

30 minutes ago, Xenosmilus said:

I loved ewoks as a kid. I remember going to see ROTJ with my grandpa. He absolutely hated it.  Reflexing back now I can understand why he hated ROTJ and ewoks. They are geared towards kids which is fine I guess.  You just have to go into the movie understanding that.  With the exception to the first 2 movies I think the movies were geared more towards kids to sell merchandise.

Lucas has another reason he said he used Ewoks instead of Wookies--he wanted the race on the planet to be primitive, but by the time we got to the third film Chewie wasn't being looked at as just a big walking dog anymore since he was shown both flying and fixing the Millenium Falcon in Empire, so he substituted in another similar race instead.  But that doesn't rule out the cute factor of Ewok teddy bears as being primarily being chosen to appeal to kids.

I was 12 when Jedi was released, so I rolled my eyes at the teddy bears.  By the time 1999 came around I just looked at Jar Jar as another version of the Ewoks and ignored my instinctive reaction to not think much of it.  As a 12-year old you're trying not to be a kid anymore, but by the time I was 28 I was fine with Lucas injecting elements geared towards kids.

I'm talking about the theme of Star Wars, not merchandising. Ewoks epitomize Yoda's saying, "size matters not." Yet most of Star Wars fandom has absolutely judged the Ewoks by their size and cuteness, thus missing the point. Size matters not. Metaphorically, it dates back to original inspiration of Star Wars, Kurosawa's "Hidden Fortress" where the two greedy cowardly peasants save the day. It even dates back to the Bible, in David vs Goliath or even the story of Jesus.

Ewoks in ROTJ represent what Luke should have been in ANH, a simple farm boy, before we learn he's really a Jedi prince. Instead, it's Han & Chewie and C3P0 & R2D2 who take those roles of "lowly" beings who make the difference. The Ewoks represent what Yoda did in ESB, someone initially judged by his size and cuteness by Luke. 

In ROTJ, the Ewoks are overlooked by everyone, especially the Empire, as simple woodland beasts. Yet, they make the difference. Their spears and logs and ropes overcome the technological might of an Empire. Nature and the Force were with the Ewoks. Size mattered not.

The Ewoks epitomize the meaning of Star Wars.

[fantastic_four]

3 minutes ago, @therealsilvermane said:

Ewoks in ROTJ represent what Luke should have been in ANH, a simple farm boy, before we learn he's really a Jedi prince. Instead, it's Han & Chewie and C3P0 & R2D2 who take those roles of "lowly" beings who make the difference. The Ewoks represent what Yoda did in ESB, someone initially judged by his size and cuteness by Luke. 

In ROTJ, the Ewoks are overlooked by everyone, especially the Empire, as simple woodland beasts. Yet, they make the difference. Their spears and logs and ropes overcome the technological might of an Empire. Nature and the Force were with the Ewoks. Size mattered not.

The Ewoks epitomize the meaning of Star Wars.

it was more the way that Richard Marquand had them behave.  If they had been little bad-asses who happened to look like teddy bears, then yea, I would have gotten the message you're describing, but instead they hobbled around and were zany as heck.  Leia meets her first one, talks to him like he's a child, and he comes up looking for a cookie.  Listen to their munchkin songs!  Look at that wacky glider!  That one spun his sling around and bonked himself in the nose!  Look, they're hitting dudes in plate armor with sticks and they seem to stand no chance--oh well, let's go with it!  AT-STs may LOOK powerful, but they're no match for rolling logs!  They didn't just LOOK like children, they acted like them and the rules of engagement seemed more akin to a Tom and Jerry cartoon than Star Wars.

Yoda, on the other hand, was entirely different.  I lost my sheet when he opened up a can of whoop-arse on Dooku.  THAT was bad-arse...Ewoks weren't.

[@therealsilvermane]

4 minutes ago, fantastic_four said:

it was more the way that Richard Marquand had them behave.  If they had been little bad-asses who happened to look like teddy bears, then yea, I would have gotten the message you're describing, but instead they hobbled around and were zany as heck.

Yes, Wicket was cute. But he was also basically a kid. When the adult Ewoks initially emerge from the woods, their spears pointed at our netted heroes, I always thought they were a little scary. Bears are also cute until you meet one alone in the middle of the woods (I have). But that they were cute or not doesn't matter. The point still stands. The Ewoks epitomized the meaning of Star Wars. Not everything has to be cool and bada_s.

[drotto]

7 minutes ago, fantastic_four said:

it was more the way that Richard Marquand had them behave.  If they had been little bad-asses who happened to look like teddy bears, then yea, I would have gotten the message you're describing, but instead they hobbled around and were zany as heck.  Leia meets her first one, talks to him like he's a child, and he comes up looking for a cookie.  Listen to their munchkin songs!  Look at that wacky glider!  That one spun his sling around and bonked himself in the nose!  Look, they're hitting dudes in plate armor with sticks and they seem to stand no chance--oh well, let's go with it!  AT-STs may LOOK powerful, but they're no match for rolling logs!  They didn't just LOOK like children, they acted like them and the rules of engagement seemed more akin to a Tom and Jerry cartoon than Star Wars.

Yoda, on the other hand, was entirely different.  I lost my sheet when he opened up a can of whoop-arse on Dooku.  THAT was bad-arse...Ewoks weren't.

Unfortunately, Ewoks were a symptom of what would later become a problem in the PT.  A relatively good idea that Lucas took to far, and by ROTJ he had fewer people holding him back and more yes men on his staff then the previous movies.  In both ANH and Empire it was well documented that other writers and high level creatives would rework his ideas, and keep him in check.  By ROTJ many of those people were no longer around.

[@therealsilvermane]

20 minutes ago, fantastic_four said:

Listen to their munchkin songs!  Look at that wacky glider!  That one spun his sling around and bonked himself in the nose!  Look, they're hitting dudes in plate armor with sticks and they seem to stand no chance--oh well, let's go with it!  AT-STs may LOOK powerful, but they're no match for rolling logs!  They didn't just LOOK like children, they acted like them and the rules of engagement seemed more akin to a Tom and Jerry cartoon than Star Wars.

Sure, the Ewoks also provided a little comic relief. Han Solo & Chewie, the droids, Lando Calrissian, and even Yoda, in his little play act to Luke, have provided comic relief and zany antics to lighten the mood, too. But in the end, they all got the job done. The Ewoks got the job done in ROTJ despite their few scenes of zany antics.

Edited December 23, 2019 by @therealsilvermane

[mattn792]

2 hours ago, Bosco685 said:

 

I read Spider-Man 3 plot twist and confirmation of one of those spoilers I previously saw...even with low expectations already established, I'm getting that Ark of the Covenant feeling again.