*SPOILER DISCUSSION* Star Wars The Force Awakens *POST HERE AFTER SEEING THE MOVIE*

[Hockey_Ninja]

This guy I follow on Facebook on the whole Rey being a Mary Sue argument. It's long but an interesting take:

Okay... I just want to see if I've got this straight.
Luke's "Training" in a nutshell --

Obi-wan hands Luke his father's lightsaber and Luke somehow knows intuitively how to turn it on.

Luke then witnesses the Jedi Mind Trick in Mos Eisley, but is never really taught by Ben how to use it.

On the Falcon, Luke receives about twenty minutes of training with a flying whiffle ball, gets his ass kicked, but is told to put the blast shield down and trust his feelings, and within SECONDS is able to fend off a number of blasts. Ben then literally tells him, "You've taken your FIRST steps into a larger world."

Training Session Ends.

Luke then somehow makes it through the Death Star.

His teacher DIES during that time.

After barely understanding the concept of hyperdrive earlier in the film -- which Han explains to him -- he ends up gunning a piece of hardware different from a T-16 and takes out 2 TIE Fighters.

He returns to Yaavin, and is handed a million dollar piece of equipment to fly on the Rebellion's greatest mission -- despite not getting the concept of something simple like hyperdrive hours earlier.

He manages to OUTMANEUVER his Ace-Pilot dad with decades of experience -- with BOTH WINGMEN GONE -- turn off his targeting computer, and score the Galaxy saving shot that the head of the squadron -- with YEARS more experience than Luke -- couldn't hit. Like Rey in Force Awakens, piloting skills are MENTIONED, but NEVER SHOWN till dramatically convenient.

On Hoth, Luke is able to retrieve his lightsaber with the Force, even though no one taught him how to do that either.

On Dagobah, Yoda doesn't even want to train him! After failing some key tests, Luke leaves DESPITE his training not being complete. Training time? Depending on who you talk to, either a few days, weeks, or months. But certainly not since a "Youngling" like Jedi are supposed to be.
On Bespin, he fends off an attack from a guy who's been sabering since a child, DOES get his ass kicked, but lives to fight another day after calling Leia (a skill never shown in-film before).
In Jedi, he builds his lightsaber SOMEHOW, uses the mind trick (who did Yoda teach him to practice that on? The swamp frogs?), and defeats a Rancor without even using the Force (why pick a rock up when you can Force chuck it?).

He then goes back to Dagobah and Yoda says HIS TRAINING IS SOMEHOW COMPLETE!
He then goes to Endor and convinces a bunch of Killer Teddy Bears to enlist with the help of his droid.

Then he goes to Death Star II and BESTS his dad with decades of experience, including the CLONE WARS -- all based on a few months of Yoda's training which INITIALLY FAILED in Empire, and with NO ADDITIONAL TRAINING since then.

He then pilots out of the exploding space station in JUST the knick of time.

Conclusion?
Luke is obviously a well rounded character who had nothing come easy to him.
Rey is a Mary Sue.

Don't get me wrong. Claiming Rey is a Mary Sue is NOT the issue here. You could make that argument.

But the second you try to use Luke's journey as some sort of higher standard, your argument completely invalidates itself and falls apart like a shoddy house of cards.

Of COURSE Luke is a Gary Stu. And that's okay. Why?
BECAUSE IT'S A F@#$%ING SPACE FANTASY WITH NEBULOUS SPACE MAGIC AND GODDAM LASER SWORDS.

The only true well rounded character might just be Lando. And how did that work out for Billy Dee Williams? How many fans gave him #### in public because he was the realistic flawed one who made the nasty choice?

Those looking for logic here are just losing themselves down the rabbit hole. Luke is nothing more than an adventurous male fantasy come to life. At best, merely an archetype. (Spoilers from here on out) Rey is the female equivalent: unappreciated genius held back by society gets to use her intuition to fight back alien and male oppressors (Kylo Ren).

Why we're treating this new film like it's supposed to be some gritty Miramax film or great feminist tome is beyond me. Take off the rose colored nostalgia goggles and try applying these same unrealistic standards to New Hope and just see what happens.

There was never anything there -- or here -- but bare bones storytelling going back to the campfires of cavemen spinning mythological yarns. That's the appeal. Joseph Campbell ####. And guess what? A lot of great myths START with heroes and warriors of immense powers -- who rise further or fall in further tales.

But hey, we can't have that in our "realistic" world with a nebulous Force that STILL has yet to be really defined by any true set of rules.

Apologies to those who take Star Wars WAY too seriously, but we never left the realm of mythic fantasy. It's wish fulfillment for the child in all of us. No different from a farmboy going from zero-to-hero in 120 minutes, or a child going from slave-to-hero in the same amount of time.

The only thing that changed is Rey's background is different. Think about that: we've gone from slave, to peasant, to desert warrior. From tutored, to barely tutored, to school of hard knocks. And all of them have approached the Force in their own unique ways. What's with the rigid rules? Yes, the starting points and journeys are slightly different, but that's half the fun.
Take a second and wonder. If this is Rey NOW--? Damn. I can only imagine where they're going from here. If this is Kylo NOT YET FULLY TRAINED?

Who knows?

Maybe we'll see some Force chucking of planets by the time we're through.
After all -- with space magic -- "Size matters not."
To hell with labels and litmus tests.
I think it's exciting.

[underGRADFlame]

Originally Posted by Wormius

I thought this was interesting because wasn't Lucas quite involved in the Clone Wars series, or maybe it was his daughter? They are really quite good and I wonder if they would hold up without the context of the prequels, or if they act as a better prequel than the actual movies did.

George was heavily involved in "The Clone Wars", but he had a smart guy like Dave Filoni riding shotgun on it. I've said it before, "The Clone Wars" series has made me enjoy Episode II and III a lot move, because they explained so much more of what had taken place.

[Regulator75]

Lucas now apologizing for the "white slavers" remark.

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/new...slavers-851661

"I misspoke and used a very inappropriate analogy and for that I apologize," the 71-year-old filmmaker said in a statement. "I have been working with Disney for 40 years and chose them as the custodians of Star Wars because of my great respect for the company and Bob Iger’s leadership."

[CaptainCrunch]

Originally Posted by Wormius

I thought this was interesting because wasn't Lucas quite involved in the Clone Wars series, or maybe it was his daughter? They are really quite good and I wonder if they would hold up without the context of the prequels, or if they act as a better prequel than the actual movies did.

He was involved from mainly like a consulting point of view where they would run story line ideas past him and he'd add his part. Nobody has the vision of the Star Wars story from end to end like Lucas does.

But Filoni was the perfect guy to run the series.

Katie Lucas actually wrote some very strong episodes for the series. The Order 66 kick off to season 6 was her writing and one of the best of the series. She also did a lot of the Savage Opress stuff and some pretty good stand alone episodes.

[GGG]

Isn't the rule of two broken all the time. Luke was going to be converted by Vader and the emperor in empire.

And I think Pelagius in books was alive when Maul was trained

[Locke]

I havent been through the entire thread yet, I jsut saw it and its late and its New Year's Eve, but I thought I'd point this out, not sure if its been mentioned yet but doesnt this:



Remind anyone of this:



?

The First Order's Emblem is an anal sphincter.

[CaptainCrunch]

Originally Posted by GGG

Isn't the rule of two broken all the time. Luke was going to be converted by Vader and the emperor in empire.

And I think Pelagius in books was alive when Maul was trained

Maul was suckered on that, He forbade Plageuis from training him to be anything but an assasin with Dark Side Powers.

That whole book was about how Palpatine basically out maneuvered his master at every turn.

In the last Bane book his apprentice bought along a potential apprentice, but she wasn't going to be trained until after the battle between Bane and Zhanah

Or however you spell her name, I'm kinda hammered so whatever.

[Regulator75]

Originally Posted by Locke

I havent been through the entire thread yet, I jsut saw it and its late and its New Year's Eve, but I thought I'd point this out, not sure if its been mentioned yet but doesnt this:


The First Order's Emblem is an anal sphincter.

No, just no.

[Wormius]

Originally Posted by Locke

I havent been through the entire thread yet, I jsut saw it and its late and its New Year's Eve, but I thought I'd point this out, not sure if its been mentioned yet but doesnt this:






The First Order's Emblem is an anal sphincter.

Looks like an exhaust port; so I guess a Death Star sphincter.

Spoiler!

[CroFlames]

Ew anal sphincters.

TFA = ruined.

Thanks NDP.

[Locke]

Originally Posted by Erick Estrada

If the Hobbit was an example of stretching a story too far into three movies Star Wars the Force Awakens is an example of trying to cram 2 movies into one. The new Death Star is 10x the size of the old one, can suck the energy from a sun, and all it takes to shut down the shields of this state of the art structure is for a drill sergeant to log into a computer in a side room? I can't get over that. My boys really enjoyed it and maybe that's what these movies are for as an adult you kind of have to ignore the flaws and enjoy the action sequences.

Daisy Ridley was fantastic and she stole the movie IMO.

I think at the end of the day we have to take this movie at face value, its the first of what is presumably going to be a long line of future films. Lots of groundwork to cover so the introduction of new characters, orders, structure and conflict was the ultimate goal of this movie.

Originally Posted by Erick Estrada

It was a stupid statement but he's old and probably a little grumpy. Let's give the guy a little credit for the first three movies that were pretty ground breaking for their time and without him this thread doesn't even exist.

Honestly I would be a little ticked myself as everyone loves to crap on his prequels while Disney and Abrams are getting positive reviews for essentially remaking Lucas's first installment and adding very little new to the series. By far the best move in the series (Empire Strikes Back) is still a Lucas movie.

More of a Kirshner movie actually. That is the one film which probably had the least amount of Lucas' input.

[Locke]

Also, I'm going to go ahead and pat myself on the back here, my prediction that the small blades on the guard were designed to be offensive was correct as thats what Kylo stabs Finn in the shoulder with during their standoff.

So I got that going for me, which is nice.

[Ashasx]

If you lock lightsabers with someone else, wouldn't they be just as dangerous against you?

I thought they were confirmed to be exhaust of some sort.

[Locke]

Originally Posted by Ashasx

If you lock lightsabers with someone else, wouldn't they be just as dangerous against you?

I thought they were confirmed to be exhaust of some sort.

Well yeah, if you're a big baby and let the other guy push your own weapon into you like a big baby would.

I've never heard the exhaust theory but I dont think they've been confirmed as anything other than 'totally cool.'

[Tinordi]

I do like how TFA took a dump on a lot of the extended universe mumbo jumbo. Good. Piss those nerds off.

Unrelated remark, why the hell wasn't Captain Phasma the Storm Trooper that battled Finn with the lightsaber instead of some generic guy? That would have tied the story better together.

[getbak]

Originally Posted by Locke

Well yeah, if you're a big baby and let the other guy push your own weapon into you like a big baby would.

I've never heard the exhaust theory but I dont think they've been confirmed as anything other than 'totally cool.'

In the Visual Dictionary, it says they're for exhaust because he used a cracked crystal (my guess is it's from Vader's saber) which creates the unstable blade.

Spoiler!

[CaptainCrunch]

Originally Posted by Tinordi

I do like how TFA took a dump on a lot of the extended universe mumbo jumbo. Good. Piss those nerds off.

Unrelated remark, why the hell wasn't Captain Phasma the Storm Trooper that battled Finn with the lightsaber instead of some generic guy? That would have tied the story better together.

Hey you leave Steve the Riot Trooper alone, he was just trying to do his job.

[Locke]

Originally Posted by CaptainCrunch

Hey you leave Steve the Riot Trooper alone, he was just trying to do his job.

Funny though, after a few days is when you start being more critical of the film.

I mean, Steve the Riot trooper should have just shot him. A lightsaber is fancy and all but buddy isnt deflecting any blaster bolts without any training.

It would have been a carbon copy of the Indiana Jones scene where Indy just shoots the guy with the sword after he does his fancy dance.

Pew-pew! Adios Finn!

I will say this though, the movie truly captured the spirit of Star Wars, it got us invested in the story again. Its been a long time since I could walk out of a theatre and not hate one of the characters.

There is legitimate potential for all the new characters.

After Jar-Jar I never thought I'd love again.

[Caged Great]

Originally Posted by Locke

After Jar-Jar I never thought I'd love again.

Whysa yous gotta be so mean?

[FireGilbert]

^Haha yeah I wondered why they didn't just shoot Finn with a blaster. I guess they assumed he was skilled in the force and could deflect laser blasts but at least give it a try and fire off a couple shots before busting out the riot trooper.