Star Wars Episode VIII: The Last Jedi - Discussion Thread

[getbak]

From Star Wars super-nerd, Patton Oswalt...

Patton Oswalt‏ @pattonoswalt

Fun night out at the movies last night. #TheLastJedi is rich, dark, shocking, funny and NON STOP. There’s a deep-pull moment from the canon that will have the die-hards LOSING THEIR ####. (And Luke Skywalker is John Wick.)

[sureLoss]

[getbak]

One of the comments I saw said that the best stuff was not in the trailers, so that's a nice change from a lot of recent movies.

[GGG]

Can we create a spoiler thread for any comments from people who have seen the movie. Payton's comment is a low grade spoiler.

[GGG]

Thanks Captain

[photon]

Wow, someone built a life sized metal model of Kylo Ren's fighter.

Spoiler!

[Matata]

Originally Posted by photon

Yeah seeing lots of extremely positive comments about it, best one since Empire, etc.

And lots of warnings to avoid spoilers, gonna be a tough week.

Revenge of the Jedi, TFA and Rogue One were all hyped as the best one since Empire. Empire was lightning in a bottle and is unanimously considered one of the best films ever made, no other Star Wars movie outside of the original trilogy will ever approach that level.

[blankall]

Originally Posted by Matata

Revenge of the Jedi, TFA and Rogue One were all hyped as the best one since Empire. Empire was lightning in a bottle and is unanimously considered one of the best films ever made, no other Star Wars movie outside of the original trilogy will ever approach that level.

They did say "since Empire", which means that Empire was better. It's really not all that high of a bar to be the best since Empire. RotJ was good, but also flawed in many ways. The prequels were crap. So if it's better than the other two new movies, it has a chance of being the best "since Empire". I just rewatched the Force Awakens, and it's really not all that amazing. Rogue One was great, but far from perfect too. So being the best "since Empire" really isn't all that high of a bar.

Edit: Also assuming you are referring to Revenge of the Sith. That was not better than RotJ.

[Matata]

To imply any of those movies are even comparable to Empire is sacrilegious. (e: ROTJ, flawed as it is, was also much better than any SW that came after it)

A lot of people said Rogue One was as good as Empire, a lot.

[Bunk]

Originally Posted by getbak

One of the comments I saw said that the best stuff was not in the trailers, so that's a nice change from a lot of recent movies.

I suspected that must be the case given how innocuous that content has been. I'm glad they took that approach. Can't wait to see it!

[MrDJZak]

Originally Posted by GGG

Can we create a spoiler thread for any comments from people who have seen the movie. Payton's comment is a low grade spoiler.

Originally Posted by GGG

Thanks Captain

I'm going completely dark, except for CP, starting tonight. Everything.

I got spoiled with Han's death, 2 years ago, from opening the comment section of a post-game Facebook post on the Flames page. Of all places

The first post was an image of Harrison Ford, Lightsaber through him, and the caption "Han dies."

Nowhere is safe until you see it.

[CaptainCrunch]

I would hope that nobody does a deliberate drive by spoiling for you guys. For some reason there are jerks out there that just need to spoil things for everyone.

I mean, its hard to believe that they bought Jar Jar Binks back in this movie as a Force Ghost and he has this amazingly deep conversation with Rey and Ren about the fact that the Midi Chlorians were created by former president Valorian to addict minority races to spice.

[MrDJZak]

Originally Posted by CaptainCrunch

I would hope that nobody does a deliberate drive by spoiling for you guys. For some reason there are jerks out there that just need to spoil things for everyone.

I mean, its hard to believe that they bought Jar Jar Binks back in this movie as a Force Ghost and he has this amazingly deep conversation with Rey and Ren about the fact that the Midi Chlorians were created by former president Valorian to addict minority races to spice.

Spoiler for language.

Spoiler!

[photon]

Originally Posted by Matata

A lot of people said Rogue One was as good as Empire, a lot.

A lot of people need to be beaten.

[CaptainCrunch]

Time to start ramping up for the next movie in the Star Wars universe. We've seen the trailers, some have read the books, but on Thursday at Midnight we get to see if the hype is met.

I've spent the last couple of weeks, watching the Star Wars films, I've also read some of the new EU books, Inferno Squad and Thrawn. So I think I'm ready even though I'm not going on the first night.

As I watched the OT and PT and Rogue One again, I watched it with a bit of a more critical eye for some reason.

The Prequel Trilogy

Should have been called, the Twilight of the Republic. I mean we know this wasn't the first time that the Republic had faltered. In the Old Republic, they probably had a sign in the lobby that read Tuesday - The Republic gets its butt handed to it.

What I liked, I loved the overarching story line of how the Republic was manipulated by the Sith and basically devoured itself, and how as Padme put it saw the fall of the Republic not through War but by thunderous applause.

This story showed us what the Jedi were at during the height of their power, and how they had become a political organization instead of a theological organization that followed the Force.

Palpatine's manipulations cast a huge shadow even when he wasn't in the movie. In fact he had very little to do in AOTC.

Throughout the trilogy there were some strong performances, Ewan and Ian were brilliant in their portrayals of Ben Kenobi and Sidious. Palpatine. The opera house scene was amazing to watch and it took your breath away when Ian talked about the tragedy of Darth Plageous the Wise.

What didn't work - Hayden just physically looked like the Hero with no fear, he was made to be Anakin Skywalker, but he was stunted by what I would consider to be poor dialogue and character choices especially in AOTC. Instead of being a conflicted character being manipulated into a corner he was a spoiled teenager. They did redeem it a bit in ROTS, but frankly more time should have been spent on the fall of Anakin and how he was cornered and used by Palpatine.

Natalie just wasn't very good in this movie again due to clumsy dialogue and the fact that it just looked like she was in it for a pay check. The other problem is no matter what, she was going to be compared to Carrie Fisher, and that's a big job.

TPM - I was mixed by this movie btw, Again Palpatine, the Jedi, Darth Maul, all awesome. But the decision to make Anakin a 10 year old kid was a massive mistake. I get that they were trying to make him a complete innocence, but they were also trapped by the younger audience and it made choices hard. His life as a slave didn't come across as that hard, which is a shame because if they would have made Anakin a little older, a little more mistreated, and a little more rough cut and angry, it would have made things a bit better.

Also the over use of Jar Jar as a cute action figure was a poor one, even though George redeemed himself by making Jar Jar the unintelligent dupe.

Also the over use of CGY, the film looked too cartoony, especially in the final battle with the battle droids, it literally pulled you out of the movie. In a scene where they could have made war what it is, horrible, brutal and gritty, instead they made it too clean and Sterile. Though the battle in the Clone Wars and the battles in ROTS were a whole lot better.

Overall, when I watched the OT I came across as a lot more favorable towards it, maybe because I filtered out the stuff I didn't like and focused on the back story.

OT

What worked - The wonder of it because frankly we'd never seen anything like it before. The space scenes with Tie Fighters buzzing and huge Star Ships was awesome. We were dipped right into the lore of the GFFA. This movie was a blend of Japanese movies, and Westerns and it worked. It also worked because everything had a gritty worn out look to it with very little color.

The Acting was ok, but really wooden in some places. But there were some great performances. Harrison Ford and Carrie Fisher come to mind, they just worked.

What really worked - The faceless face of evil in Darth Vader, the armored villain that was unreadable was brilliant. Grand Moff Tarkin, played by Peter Cushing as cold and reptilian was a great choice even though half the time he was stomping around the bridge wearing bunny slippers.

What didn't work - The think that plagued George Lucas through his career. He has a brilliant eye for detail. His back stories are incredible. But his dialogue is at times awkward and makes the actors wooden.

Clearly the best film in the Trilogy is Empire Strikes back, it was daring in a lot of ways, not just its reveal of Darth Vaders heritage, but because it dared to have the hero's completely and utterly lose in the end.

The problem - Return of the Jedi should have prepared us for the PT, because it was basically George Lucas gone wild.

Bad dialogue and an over reliance on effects were added to by the cute kiddy characters. There was some greatness in ROTJ, the scenes between Palpatine, Vader and Luke were brilliant, the Light Saber battles had some heft to them which at times lacked in the PT because it was too 70's samurai Katana. The effects at the time were awesome, but also over done.

Rogue one - Brilliant I loved this film because they went away from the common themes of the OT and PT. The effects and battle scenes were well done and brilliant, the CGI of Cushing worked because whether it was unintentional, Tarkin came across as more reptilian then Peter Cushing did and more cold. Obviously seeing Vader in action was heart pounding.

The problem was that you just didn't care enough about the characters as you should. I'm not saying that more back story is the answer, or why they're there, but something was missing that would have made you feel both great and bad about their endings.

So what do I want in this new movie?

I guess I want something that will make me go holy mackerel, I'm not even talking about some enormous twist, but just something that makes me go whoah.

Obviously I'm a lore guy, so I'd like to see the lore added to, the exploration of the connections between main characters.

I want to see huge nasty battles, and angry light saber crashes, and I hope the porgues or whatever you call are slowly bbq'd over an open flame, or give emergency powers to Princess Leia.

[getbak]

Reviews are starting to come in on Metacritic. Most are very positive, including some 100%. Best Star Wars film since Empire seems to be a common theme. Although, as already mentioned, that's not a hard bar to clear.

[Buff]

Brian Lowry from CNN hates The Last Jedi:

I don't think there are spoilers in the link, but don't click if you want to be safe:
http://www.cnn.com/2017/12/12/entert...iew/index.html

Paraphrasing what he says:
- it is comparable to Attack of The Clones.
- key moments are a let down
- does nothing to create anticipation for the next movie
- Questions why Rian Johnson was giving the job to do a new trilogy

Without seeing the movie, methinks either his expectations were at an all time high, or he hates all things Star Wars.

Edit:

If Gizmodo says that first impressions are overwhelmingly good:
https://io9.gizmodo.com/the-first-im...are-1821163099

Then how can this criticizer on CNN leave the impression that it is overwhelmingly bad? He did compare it to Episode II, so it isn't hard to suggest he thinks it is that bad.

[nfotiu]

96% on Rotten Tomatoes with 99 reviews counted already.

[CaptainCrunch]

Yeah, the non spoiler reviews are pretty mixed, but the majority are positive. The critics that reviewed it badly really hated the movie, but those were pretty far between.

At the end of the day, this one will all be about the story elements and not the technical execution of the film that define whether its well received or not.

Also no matter what the hardcore Star Wars Community is going to be extremely split ranging every where from I loved it and must watch it again 10 times to, I hate it thanks Rian for killing my love of Star Wars.

[MrDJZak]

Originally Posted by Buff

Brian Lowry from CNN hates The Last Jedi:

I don't think there are spoilers in the link, but don't click if you want to be safe:
http://www.cnn.com/2017/12/12/entert...iew/index.html

Paraphrasing what he says:
- it is comparable to Attack of The Clones.
- key moments are a let down
- does nothing to create anticipation for the next movie
- Questions why Rian Johnson was giving the job to do a new trilogy

Without seeing the movie, methinks either his expectations were at an all time high, or he hates all things Star Wars.

Edit:

If Gizmodo says that first impressions are overwhelmingly good:
https://io9.gizmodo.com/the-first-im...are-1821163099

Then how can this criticizer on CNN leave the impression that it is overwhelmingly bad? He did compare it to Episode II, so it isn't hard to suggest he thinks it is that bad.

2 reasons:
1. CNN
2. click bait