Eh it was fine, I'm past caring that much I think. Missed a good portion of the bridge dialogue because Ade popped up and I couldn't stop giggling.

FIRE ON THAT SHIP!

righty dokey skip

The resistance deserve to be wiped out. They aren't very smart. Didn't anyone think of sacrifising the capital ship earlier on? That way they still would have had their support ships to rely on. Move everyone onto the supports, turn around and lightspeed into snoke's ship.

They could have done a kamikaze run with a bomber at the dreadnought at start of movie as well. Therefore save your bomber fleet.

Poorly thought out.

Dinostar77 wrote:

@legal the speech about the spark that lights the fire is nicked from the Old Republic cgi mini movie for the games. In that the speech is implemented really well.

No it's not, it's an ancient metaphor that has been used since time immemorial. For example, Russian socialists émigrés named their rag Iskra, the spark, Trotsky wrote for it. The rag would be the spark that lights the fire of socialist revolution.

I was going to query the golden dice by saying that Han won the Millennium Falcon from Lando in a game of sabacc, which is played with cards, but I've now found out that there is a variant of sabacc which is played with two golden dice. Nerds.

Back from seeing it with the kids.  I seem to be in the minority in that I liked it.  (As did they.)

There are issues, obviously - Hux is too comedically incompetent, the cute orphans were cheesy and the casino planet, whilst necessary, went on too long.  Phasma felt pointless, adding new Force powers this late on feels like cheating etc etc etc.  I get all that.  (Though I'd argue most Star Wars movies have similar mis-steps if not worse)

I still liked it - mainly for not being what was expected, and for being a film that subtly (and not so subtly) readjusts the Star Wars narrative.  It felt less a revolution than an over-due coarse correction.  Namely - this is a film about not being a gung-ho twat who wades in thinking you know best.  It has a recurring message about the need for collective resistance over individual arrogance.  Leia is revealed to be every bit the powerful Jedi it has long been implied she is capable of being, but that she uses it almost exclusively passively.  Equally, when Luke finally utilises his insane power, it's again pretty much passive.  (If a little vague in the specifics of how the fuck it works - though crucially well established within the film itself, if not previously in the franchise - particularly with Ren and Rey's conversations and eventual physical contact.  It doesn't come from nowhere, it's established throughout the movie.)  

It's also a film in which Poe has to fuck up twice before learning the same lesson.  He kills all the bomber pilots taking out the destroyer, and then he kills half the resistance by sending Finn off on a mission that ultimately results in betrayal.  Had he done nothing they all would have escaped safely.  His desire to be the hero is consistently a fucking disaster, and I liked that twist - by the final act, he's learned, they resist throwing everyone headlong into oblivion, and instead look for another way - setting him up as a potentially decent leader for the future.  (And Finn also gets an object lesson in not committing pointless suicide - the film's pretty clear that had Rose not intervened he'd be toast, and nothing would have been gained.)  The idea that maverick heroes are dangerous idiots is pretty bloody subversive these days.

So, yeah, it felt much more an exploration of what "light" and "dark" sides of the force actually constituted - rather than simply being "you're on the light side if you only kill baddies".  I liked the movement away from the suggestion that the Force is a Skywalker (or even "Jedi") specific phenomenon, and the notion that the Resistance might be a movement in its own right, rather than a bunch of people in a control room debating how best to blow shit up.

Having said all that, I'm fairly sure that it will quickly revert to the standard template once Abrams is back in control - particularly given the amount of teeth gnashing that this iteration's created.

Basic film making tip: If you have a setting for your film do not include anachronistic elements, it stops the suspension of disbelief and instantly reminds the viewer they are watching a film. 

It's not even hard to avoid. It's like a basic part of writing a script. Except for when you don't bother because fuck it for some reason you only had $250m in the budget, clearly corners have to be cut somewhere, now get on the phone to Indonesia, your $4/hr CGI monkeys are waaaaaay behind on the 45 minute long big space battle VFX extravaganza.

It's shit. 

Unless you love Star Wars so much that you are going to try and say that it's acceptable that a film that has one of the largest budgets of any film coming out this year that you gotta pay like £15 and sit through for 2.5 hours contains scenes that don't need to be in it, story elements that are handled poorly and characters that act in totally stupid ways in totally redundant plot threads.

Roujin wrote:

totally redundant plot threads.

I disagree whole-heartedly with the notion that, just because a plan doesn’t succeed, a plot thread is redundant. It goes together with the, “if they’d just done this, that would/wouldn’t have happened,” school of nonsense. Every story is, by its nature, a sequence of events that would have gone differently if different things happened*. History is full of failed missions, tactical errors in battle, and ill-judged strategies. So you felt frustrated that they tried something you wouldn’t? Good, you’re supposed to. Fuck, if everything had gone the way some of you wanted, it’d be a fucking dull film which would pose the question; if the Resistance are so fucking good at this fighting malarkey, how the fuck did they end up against the ropes like this?




* Except, maybe, Raiders of the Lost Ark.

For example...

I forgot Leia flying through space. Complete nonsense.

ChopperByrne wrote:

I forgot Leia flying through space. Complete nonsense.

One of the many wtf moments that I thought they might explain or at least hint at.. How did she and only she survive?

The Force? The ship force field? Luke? Magic beans???

Saw this yesterday.  Was mostly very enjoyable, with a couple of excellent bits and a few iffy bits.  7/10, roughly on par with the also pretty good TFA.  There are plenty of decent characters in there, helping to carry the occasional not-quite-awesome set-piece.  

Casino section - the mounted escape in particular - was a bit too Episode I-III, but that scene didn't drag, it was just a breakneck swing and a miss.  I've heard people claiming it's the worst one, crikey - they must've had a vastly different experience with the prequels to me.

Its piss poor. Looks great sure but everything else is shite. Its no Empire as some reviews have touted.

Snoke, wtf was the point? Build him up in TFA, then despatch him like he is nothing with no explanation whatsoever.

The whole projection thing with Luke, well thats new. Same with Rey and Ren, the water on Rens hand, wtaf.

Lukes death, Chewie wasted, topless Kylo - its either cringeworthy or makes no frikking sense. Maz? What was that about? Phasma? Pointless.

As one review pointed out, the end of Rogue One when Vadar was badass was better than this entire film.

The film was a retcon of not just the TFA, but all of star wars. That's obvious. It knew it and didn't hide it. Kill the past etc. I wouldn't mind so much if it replaced it with something better. But it replaced it with something even dumber. Daft lines, inexplicable character arcs, ridiculous plot devices and weak characters.

Felt like a waste.  Gleeson on hold was like something out of that Family Guy spoof and the Marvel-esque quips were nails on a blackboard.  Though I did lol at "they've got a battering ram cannon!".  Clangers dropping left and right.

Saving grace is that Fisher is given plenty of screen time.  The farewell scene with Mark Hamill was pretty tough and probably the highlight.

Could it be, as I initially thought, that Island Luke was a second projection?  Would like to see more of him becoming like water and presumably there's now a big nostalgic hole in the next film where Carrie Fisher used to be.

edit:  oh wait he can just be a ghost, never mind.