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[SPOILERS] Star Wars: Rise of Skywalker


Lord Varys

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49 minutes ago, sifth said:

So basically you're a Joffrey fan I take it? You love it when your villains are basically unstable babies, who are only still alive because the plot demands them to be? I much rather prefer strong, competent villains, such as Tywin. To each their own I suppose.

Wow, that was a jerk and dismissive response.

Plot Armor?  There are plenty of incompetent and petulant people who are like in positions of power right now in our actual lives.  And they do that without super powers.

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1 hour ago, sifth said:

So basically you're a Joffrey fan I take it? You love it when your villains are basically unstable babies, who are only still alive because the plot demands them to be? I much rather prefer strong, competent villains, such as Tywin. To each their own I suppose.

Is that an insinuation that Joffery survived 2.75 books out of plot convenience? Because that's the stupidest thing I've ever heard. And there are people here defending Rise of Skywalker.

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42 minutes ago, Guy Kilmore said:

Wow, that was a jerk and dismissive response.

Plot Armor?  There are plenty of incompetent and petulant people who are like in positions of power right now in our actual lives.  And they do that without super powers.

Thanks Guy - better response than I was going to give. "A fan" is very different to "is legitimately scared by them". I think Ren is an accurate depiction of the kind of man who is driven to violence and is the type of person much more likely to harm me in some way than some mastermind plotter like Sidious.

He also comes from socially powerful parents which certainly gives a leg up too. 

And Joffrey is a shit that I think does do a good job of making people hate him, so you probably think I'm a fan of him too.

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9 hours ago, Werthead said:

The fact that the Death Star exploded into a trillion pieces in RotJ but it appears pretty large sections of it landed intact on Endor without obliterating the moon shows that perhaps Abrams wasn't paying attention to any of this.

There's also the bit where Rey is inside the Death Star wreckage and the curvature of the station is visible, which would not be the case if it was really the canonical size of 160km (the canon reset dropping the ludicrous old 900km figure down a reactor shaft is a relief) in diameter. Abrams really is just that shit at working out distances or the laws of physics.

Would it surprise you to know that the moon the Death Star wreckage is on isn't the Forest Moon?  Despite the Death Star being shown and spoke of as being in close orbit to that Forest Moon in RotJ?  Your points would be interesting but you are forgetting the key fact that the director and story creator of this movie is literally a COMPLETE AND UTTER MORON when it comes to space, time, and distance.

 

EDIT:  As a side note I find it incredibly hilarious (and obviously beyond stupid) that it is now canon that Starkiller base was created while the first Death Star was being made. 

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On 12/23/2019 at 4:13 AM, Ran said:

It's part why I hold Rogue One in such high regard, because that's a film about the main characters, every one of them, sacrificing themselves for a cause and managing to win out against all hope. Every moment of that film and its plot is informed by this.

But there is no catharsis in the PT, in my experience. None, at any time.

Agreed entirely.  Feel like Rogue One gets short shrift on the internets.  It was what the new age of Star Wars should be, IMO.

On 12/23/2019 at 6:37 AM, Lord Varys said:

Luke could have stayed on Tatooine since he and his dad didn't even defeat the Emperor.

This is just facile, overly dismissive, and logically inaccurate.  To be clear, I think Palps coming back is pretty stupid.  But even so, it doesn't necessarily negate what they did from a pragmatic viewpoint.  At the worst, they waylaid him for 30 some years before he was "finally" defeated...until they need him for another trilogy.

On 12/23/2019 at 6:37 AM, Lord Varys said:

What are you trying to say here? This is commentary thread, right? I point out why I find the movies go wrong? Surely that's the place to do that, right?

Of course you're entitled to your opinion.  What I was trying to sarcastically - and drunkenly, sorry - express there is your idea of what should happen is not the only way things should actually happen.  In other words, your opinion is indeed one among many in a commentary thread.  You have a habit of presenting your arguments as authoritative, as if that is the way things should be.  And that was undoubtedly the case with your post I was reacting to.  So I responded in kind.  Don't like the taste of your own medicine, huh?

On 12/23/2019 at 6:37 AM, Lord Varys said:

I don't understand what you mean here.

My point there is it's difficult to do so while simultaneously respecting the accomplishments of the OT and reintegrating the OT characters.  The former is inherently going to cheapen the latter, and vice versa.  If you want something that won't do either, you're asking for a sequel that truly does take place "long, long.." in the future - or past.

On 12/23/2019 at 6:37 AM, Lord Varys said:

Yeah. I mean, what did they do but to execute the orders of the Chancellor and the Senate? They were mid-level executive branch of the government, not decision-makers. Sure, in the end they sort of tried to rebel - but that went nowhere, didn't it?

Um, didn't they run the clone wars?  They clearly had a long-held relationship with the Galactic Senate as their protectors.  They would have been the equivalent of a - in a modern American context - Department of Defense - as well as the intelligence agencies.  If you want to equate them to earlier governments, they were the military wing until the revelation of the clone army. 

It's preposterous to think such an entity did not play a permanently integral political role in the foundation and execution of the Republic's politics.  Let alone the fact military coups are incredibly common throughout history, and the Jedi clearly could have executed as much for, apparently, centuries.  Particularly in terms of the PT, the argument the Jedi did not have a role in the politics of the Republic is patently ludicrous, frankly should not be entertained.

On 12/23/2019 at 6:37 AM, Lord Varys said:

I'm not sure you understand what I meant by fascism - fascism historically came to power with a considerable popular power base. They had goon squads, paramilitary organiziations, political parties, that kind of thing - but Palpatine rises to power with essentially consensus of the entire Senate, He buries democracy as a democrat, not as a man who started with the publicly avowed intention of overthrowing the Republic (like Hitler, say), nor is there any indication in the PT that Palpatine's dictatorship came with the oppression/eradication of certain groups of people (or in the Star Wars context species).

You're right, I'm not sure what you mean by fascism, because it's not any rational definition of fascism.  First, yes, fascists regimes came to power with paramilitary forces.  As did the Empire.  Which is why they're called stormtroopers, a terminology Lucas literally cribbed from Nazi Germany (as if that needed to be clarified).  Second, yes, fascists had political parties, as is depicted in the PT through the fact Palpatine has to secure certain support for his extension of powers in AOTC.

The entire PT is Lucas' depiction of how a fascist dictator rises to power, mirroring Hitler.  The iconography of fascism is almost overly blatant throughout the OT, let alone the PT, and the new trilogy with the First Order is even more explicitly based on Nazi symbolism - pretty sure one of TFA's writer's got in trouble for admitting so.  

Moreover, Palpatine does not "essentially [bury] democracy as a democrat."  That's another incredibly stupid statement.  He buries democracy after killing off dissenters and having the remainder of the "democratic" Senate approve his dictatorship via fear.  This is literally how almost all fascist regimes take power.  The fact you don't know that is fine.  That fact you're trying to claim this is not fascist is why neo-fascist movements are re-emerging.

Finally, Palpatine's dictatorship did indeed come with oppression and eradication of certain groups/species.  There are clear supremacist sentiments expressed throughout the films, let alone the obvious genocidal analogies the Death Star and all its progenies represent.  In conclusion, if you're an avid fan of Star Wars and don't think the Empire and subsequent First Order represent fascism, you're either gravely uneducated on the history of fascism, an alt-right contrarian, or just a nihilist who likes fucking with people.

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I mean, the Emperor had ten thousand fold the First Order's ships. For those of you who are bad at math, that means at least ten thousand because we know Kylo has at least one ship. And each one of the Emperor's Star Destroyers is also a Death Star...

And the reason he didn't reconquer the galaxy with them the moment he had like a dozen is reasons.

That's not even a nitpick. It's the most basic structural inconsistency invalidating the triumphs of the original series I could possibly imagine, and it appears sixty seconds into the film.

I won't get into the endless problems, I just won't. But this entire concept is starting off the conclusion film with a bullet to the brain.

You can bring back the Emperor. I thought it was stupid and lazy, and absolutely uninspired. But I didn't think it would be fucking brain dead. This movie is fascinating to me all of a sudden. Like Crimes of Grindlewald, or Batman v Superman. There's just so much wrong with it, and it starts right away. The movies are incorrect on a conceptual level, and it shows in every frame. And they're all terrible in their own unique ways. Batman v Superman is obviously the epitome of all horribleness, but Crimes of JK Rowling and Rise of JJ Abrams take different approaches to destroying their franchise.

Grindlewald was like nine movies stuffed into one. With retcons, and too many characters, and way overpowered characters.

Which on the surface is similar to Skywalker. But Grindlewald never feels like an active refutation of its source material, while also trying to try something new. There's contempt in Rise of Skywalker. Contempt for The Last Jedi, contempt for Rose Tico and the people who liked the direction certain characters in this franchise were going. It was clumsy to the point of being offensive. Not to be an 'I have black friends' person, but I have a lot of black friends. The jokes about "we gotta make sure Finn stays with his own" and "I guess Lando knows that girl, 'cause that's how we do"... Like what the fuck. There's so much wrong with this movie, and it's the most basic shit. Who the fuck thought this was okay? Oh, right. Disney, because they knew people would defend it because it has a fucking logo attached.

And you people who try to defend this pile of cerebral hemorrhage by tearing down the original trilogy are either fucking idiots or in denial. Of course there's inconsistencies in those films. Do you think you're special for noticing that the rebels could have left Yavin 4 at any time? Get the fuck over yourself. They're a series of movies that have, in totality, a reasonably coherent universe full of vibrant characters and fantastic settings. They weren't planned out minutely, they have plot holes like a lot of movie series tend to.

The fact that the Star Wars Trilogy isn't as tightly plotted as The Lord of the Rings does not mean that any successor installments are automatically free from criticism. It's the stupidest kind of false equivocating. Imagine if people were defending the prequels by saying that Palpatine just tricking the universe into forming an Empire is less stupid than them never finding the dude named Skywalker on Anakin's home planet? As if that was some kind of flaw in the original trilogy. You'd stove their head in with a fucking brick, and a jury of your peers would rightfully that the deceased's family owed you money for pain and suffering. 

If you enjoyed the movie, whatever. I'm glad you got your money's worth. But if you're acting like it's anything other than a jumbled mess then you're wrong from a basic film making perspective.

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38 minutes ago, Jace, Basilissa said:

Contempt for The Last Jedi, contempt for Rose Tico and the people who liked the direction certain characters in this franchise were going. It was clumsy to the point of being offensive.

Other thing you didn't mention was Abrams going out of his way to denigrate the Holdo maneuver, as if his bullshit was any better.

But overall Jace, chill.  Merry Fucking Christmas.

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Anywho, finally saw it yesterday.  Is it weird that my reaction to all three of the new ones is "meh"?  Got big issues with how this was presented overall, but thinking about it, they all were pretty much average movies on their own.  6-7 out of 10.

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25 minutes ago, DMC said:

Other thing you didn't mention was Abrams going out of his way to denigrate the Holdo maneuver, as if his bullshit was any better.

But overall Jace, chill.  Merry Fucking Christmas.

A FUCKING HOBBIT

Swear to god, actual hand to the deity I don't believe in, the only time I cheered in this movie was when Charlie Pace showed up. I let out a genuine "Yahhh!" like a goddamn anime character. There are witnesses.

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1 minute ago, Jace, Basilissa said:

A FUCKING HOBBIT

Swear to god, actual hand to the deity I don't believe in, the only time I cheered in this movie was when Charlie Pace showed up. I let out a genuine "Yahhh!" like a goddamn anime character. There are witnesses.

Yeah he looked looked more like Charlie than Merry.  Not Penny's Boat!

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36 minutes ago, DMC said:

Other thing you didn't mention was Abrams going out of his way to denigrate the Holdo maneuver, as if his bullshit was any better.

As noted earlier, there's a Holdo maneuver in the film. The "one-in-a-million" business is there to try and provide some sort of minimization of its reliability so as to not have to change the makeup of space warfare in Star Wars for future films.

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26 minutes ago, Ran said:

The "one-in-a-million" business is there to try and provide some sort of minimization of its reliability so as to not have to change the makeup of space warfare in Star Wars for future films.

Only seen it once, but stood out as blatant animus to me.  Considering the totality of what Abrams changed in the film, I have a hard time buying he was concerned about correcting how space warfare should be conducted in future films.

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2 minutes ago, DMC said:

Only seen it once, but stood out as blatant animus to me.  Considering the totality of what Abrams changed in the film, I have a hard time buying he was concerned about correcting how space warfare should be conducted in future films.

For me, animus would be not mentioning it at all as if it never happened. Acknowledging that it exists but saying it was a freak event for *insert reasons* seems like a way to patch it up in the continuity without removing it. Having an actual Holdo maneuver happen in that same movie seems like it's muddying the waters, though, but in the opposite direction.

I don't know what he changed in this movie that fundamentally changes the rules of the Star Wars universe. If Abrams is anything, he's a corporate steward or caretaker who you can let play with your toys safe in the knowledge that he won't break them. 

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4 hours ago, sifth said:

So basically you're a Joffrey fan I take it? You love it when your villains are basically unstable babies, who are only still alive because the plot demands them to be? I much rather prefer strong, competent villains, such as Tywin. To each their own I suppose.


We can have villains of more than one kind. Joffrey is a great villain. Kylo could have been just as good and with the added depth of at some level being aware of and struggling with his own evil and unstabeleness. A film in which he had to deal with all that while leading the First Order for his own ends and fighting over it against the more scientific and more rabid fanaticism of Hux could have been really good. 

3 minutes ago, Ran said:

If Abrams is anything, he's a corporate steward or caretaker who you can let play with your toys safe in the knowledge that he won't break them.  

Into Darkness absolutely ruined Star Trek's universe, Beyond had to ignore it out of pure necessity because a world where death is a thing of the past thanks to Tribbles, and where unrestricted teleportation over vast interstellar distances makes ships obsolete, would have been impossible to make a Star Trek film in.

I don't think he's done as irreversible damage to the SW mythos but I don't think he's taken good care of it either.

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I agree with the Pole. Abrams is a safe studio choice to broadly recreate your iconic property, he will absolutely strain then break it though. 

The man's imagination is literally too small to handle the scope of a Star Wars or a Star Trek. The REAL big picture stuff, to actually mind the rules. The fact that space travel is a short loading screen is a pretty perfect example. 

He understand pretty lights and emotional high points. And twice managed to recreate the work of better men and women to general approval while failing to really capture the essence of what made the original special. In hindsight, it's clear that he didn't ignore the rules of said universes, he didn't even seem to know there were rules. Or that the movies are supposed to work independently and in concert.

I mean maybe it was hard though...

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10 minutes ago, polishgenius said:


We can have villains of more than one kind. Joffrey is a great villain. Kylo could have been just as good and with the added depth of at some level being aware of and struggling with his own evil and unstabeleness. A film in which he had to deal with all that while leading the First Order for his own ends and fighting over it against the more scientific and more rabid fanaticism of Hux could have been really good. 

If Snoke had been killed early in TLJ, and while the heroes woo-hooed and thought they could relax Kylo ended up winning a power struggle in the First Order and came back in the vengeance, I could see this working as a setup for the 3rd film. But you really need that setup to make that side of things have any weight at all, IMO. As it is Kylo's control over the First Order feels a bit weightless in TRoS, but this in part has to do with Hux having been the main FO figure in the first two films and being presented (especially in TLJ) as relatively useless. Someone like Pryde should have been around from the start, to be honest.

10 minutes ago, polishgenius said:

Into Darkness absolutely ruined Star Trek's universe,

Not really, since they end up covering their tracks.

10 minutes ago, polishgenius said:

Beyond had to ignore it out of pure necessity because a world where death is a thing of the past thanks to Tribbles,

You mean magical Khan blood, which the Federation has the only access to, and which can as easily decide to destroy and never use it for ethical reasons. It was dumb, I agree, but so long as knowledge and material is restricted to the point of being entirely hidden, it's basically tidied away and changes nothing.

10 minutes ago, polishgenius said:

and where unrestricted teleportation over vast interstellar distances makes ships obsolete,

They already did this in the prior film, and in both of them the basic idea that Starfleet knows it's a Pandora's box and so buries the info. It's like that warehouse at the end of Raiders of the Lost Ark, yeah the good guys have it now and could use it, but they won't, ergo it doesn't matter. And yes, someone else could in theory have the same idea ... but then again, maybe they won't. 

Neither of these are elegant and in fact pretty stupid, but the end state of the Star Trek universe after both of the Abrams films was basically still the recognizable Star Trek universe.

 

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Was it Abrams who did that tidying away (yeah my mad it was magical Khan blood) though? I don't remember that being covered in STiD. And I'm not sure it helps coz there are bound to be situations where that stuff would come in insanely useful without being let out of Federation hands but isn't used, because you can't.

13 minutes ago, Jace, Basilissa said:

He understand pretty lights and emotional high points.


Given the destruction of Vulcan and the Starkiller Base firing, I don't think he understands lights either.

That said, I think the first Star Trek does hold up pretty well taken on its own (and unlike TFA it isn't reliant on later answers for a full payoff). It's not like Abrams is incapable of making a good spectacle film (see also MI:III), but he's got no consistency.

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Ran my man. You're wrong about that Kahn blood. That shit is so stupid and universe breaking that I haven't seen Beyond and I don't care what justification they may or may not use to wave it away. Or what people like you can conjure up to stretch believability. 

They found a cure for death. Not for almost death.  Not for near death. For after you are dead, you can be alive again. 

That is universe shattering. Not just cinematically, imagine if that happened tomorrow. It changes literally everything about how we perceive ourselves and our reality. Bruh, the Ark of the Covenant kills you if you open it. It don't make you invincible. Yeah, I didn't say immortal. I said fucking invincible. That shit regenerated every cell in Chris Pines body that had been destroyed by radiation. No limits was shown to the capabilities of this stuff. It's MORE POWERFUL THAN UNICORN BLOOD.

And in Star Wars you can just be alive after an iconic death, because. You literally ain't even got to give a real reason why anymore. 

That is... bad for a universe. Where death is fucking irrelevant. You can bring people back, look at Gandalf, but there's a right way and a wrong way. J.J. knows that when a character is alive again that's really surprising or dramatic. But he... I'm just gonna say it. He's a stupid person. He is stupid and a cheap hack. He doesn't know how to bring a character back from death and make it believable. And he doesn't care, he's so fucking stupid he thinks it's sick as fuck when he does it anyway. 

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6 hours ago, Jace, Basilissa said:

Is that an insinuation that Joffery survived 2.75 books out of plot convenience? Because that's the stupidest thing I've ever heard. And there are people here defending Rise of Skywalker.

Well GRRM’s original plan was for Joff to get hurt by Rob in combat and killed by Jamie at the end of the first book, because he was too stupid to be king. So yea, Joff got rather lucky GRRM chose to rewrite that part of his story, lol

Kylo Ren is basically Joffrey, only he knows how to fight.

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