Star Wars: For All Your PT, OT, ST, & AT-AT/ST Needs

[Lord Varys]

1 minute ago, DMC said:

Yeah I was agreeing with you.  And in the process making fun out of the ridiculousness of Finn wanting his dying words to Rey to be that he's force-sensitive.

Not including the revelation what he was trying to say also shows how that movies sucks, by the way. This was a rather interesting plot tidbit.

And while Anakin=Vader and Leia=Luke's sister flows essentially naturally in the OT ... Rey 'Palpatine' comes completely out of the left field and makes about as much sense as Palpatine's return does. Zero.

If they had wanted to do that, then Snoke should have been Palpatine back in TFA, and there should have been more buildup in that direction. Instead, what's in there in the first two ST movies is that Rey is essentially a Skywalker somehow. She is basically a Luke/Anakin 2.0 iconographically and plot-wise.

[Ran]

8 minutes ago, DMC said:

Yeah I was agreeing with you.  And in the process making fun out of the ridiculousness of Finn wanting his dying words to Rey to be that he's force-sensitive.

I had thought it wasn't that he was Force-sensitive, per se, but rather that he had come to believe that the Force had guided him since he saw the massacre take place at the start of TFA, and his admission of this would suggest that he didn't regret what had happened or that they were about to die because it was in a good cause greater than himself, and so on, tying into his initial reticence to care about anything beyond getting himself and Rey out of the whole mess.

Basically what he tells Jannah later in TRoS.

[DMC]

2 minutes ago, Ran said:

I had thought it wasn't that he was Force-sensitive, per se, but rather that he had come to believe that the Force had guided him since he saw the massacre take place at the start of TFA, and his admission of this would suggest that he didn't regret what had happened or that they were about to die because it was in a good cause greater than himself, and so on, tying into his initial reticence to care about anything beyond getting himself and Rey out of the whole mess.

Ah, didn't know that.  That's a lot to get out while you're sinking in quicksand.

[Deadlines? What Deadlines?]

3 minutes ago, Ran said:

I had thought it wasn't that he was Force-sensitive, per se, but rather that he had come to believe that the Force had guided him since he saw the massacre take place at the start of TFA, and his admission of this would suggest that he didn't regret what had happened or that they were about to die because it was in a good cause greater than himself, and so on, tying into his initial reticence to care about anything beyond getting himself and Rey out of the whole mess.

Basically what he tells Jannah later in TRoS.

Holy crap I can't even remember.

There was a lot going on in that movie.

[DaveSumm]

13 hours ago, Heartofice said:

 Like, did something happen to Lucas which made him so completely delusional and out of touch with reality that he really couldn't (and probably still doesn't) understand the disaster he brought forth. Was there a point in his career where he literally became so enamoured with his own greatness that be believed the hype and stopped questioning his own thoughts?

I think Lucas’s primary interest is in experimental film making. In 1978, that meant using the practical effects that have aged rather well. In the late 90’s / early 00’s, that meant pushing how much a film leans on CGI. I honestly think he just doesn’t care that much about whether Anakin and Padme’s romance is believable, it’s just some lines of dialogue to push events to the next action sequence. As the video review I posted points out, all anyone does in the PT is talk about the plot, and what’s happening and where they’re going.

It’s worth remembering that the effects were well received, back when it still wowed an audience to see so much CGI. It’s just that now we’re so used to it, the boundary pushing aspect melts away and we’re left with nothing of substance underneath - because it only existed as a flimsy support for the effects and action sequences. It still amazes me how many years and how many movies we had to trudge through to learn this lesson: remember when we “wouldn’t be able to tell the real Neo from the CG one!” in the Matrix Reloaded? And I think I was impressed at the time, and it looks dogshit now. Pretty much 1997 to very recently, film makers couldn’t help themselves but ‘impress’ us with CGI that rapidly dated. Even Rogue One’s Tarkin and Leia look creepy, and could be done far more justice just these few years later.

[Jaxom 1974]

Why is it never discussed or assumed that Palpatine couldn't have had children or grandchildren on Naboo when he was a Senator...?  Reference that. That might have simply made sense. 

[Ran]

5 minutes ago, Jaxom 1974 said:

Why is it never discussed or assumed that Palpatine couldn't have had children or grandchildren on Naboo when he was a Senator...?  Reference that. That might have simply made sense. 

I think the calculations of when the son might have been born -- based on the actor's age, give or take a few years -- firmly place his birth in the post-RotS era where he is firmly Emperor.

[Werthead]

2 hours ago, Ran said:

Writer, yes. Director, I'm not sure of that. He's serviceable and workmanlike, IMO, when it comes direction, with little to no particular visual flair. Snyder is all visual flair and no substance, OTOH, which is worse. Abrams, IMO, is a better director than Whedon and Snyder, but as a writer ... well, he rarely writes anything alone these days, and is more of an idea factory and guiding hand than a real writer at this point.

A Whedon Star Wars movie would be something I'd be willing to watch, but IMO right now the House of Mouse is on my shit list over that royalties situation with authors and creators. 

Not too sure about that at all. Whedon has some very good framing and shot construction in Serenity, Avengers and even Age of Ultron. The one-shot that opens Serenity is excellent, as is the iconic "hero shot" of Avengers. Even the one that opens Age of Ultron is decent. His directed episodes of Buffy and his other shows are also pretty good, often showing a lot of thought (the shot of Angel killing the smoking prostitute in Innocence to show his transformation back to the dark side and then blowing out her cigarette smoke was impressive, given the limitations of American network TV in 1997).

How he handled the space battle in Serenity was also really good, allowing us to follow clearly the geography of the action without getting bogged down in a confusing morass of beams (the problem several Star Wars films have had; I still find it baffling that since 1983 only Rogue One has given us a space battle to compare to the ones in the OT). That would particularly bode well if he ever did a Star Wars movie.

And yes, Disney need to work this situation out with Alan Dean Foster ASAP. That's a ridiculous situation they got themselves into.

[Ran]

31 minutes ago, Werthead said:

Not too sure about that at all. Whedon has some very good framing and shot construction in Serenity, Avengers and even Age of Ultron. The one-shot that opens Serenity is excellent, as is the iconic "hero shot" of Avengers. Even the one that opens Age of Ultron is decent.

Well, as they say, mileage varies. His Marvel movies are great for their writing and the way he gave room for the chemistry of the actors and deftly handles the ensemble, whereas the visuals always struck me as relatively pedestrian given how much they cost. I remember the quips a lot more than I remember any particular action beat in the Avengers movies (besides Hulk smashing Loki about). 

 

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His directed episodes of Buffy and his other shows are also pretty good, often showing a lot of thought (the shot of Angel killing the smoking prostitute in Innocence to show his transformation back to the dark side and then blowing out her cigarette smoke was impressive, given the limitations of American network TV in 1997).

I do think he can do more with less. Throw a big, VFX-heavy movie budget at him and for me the results are generally not interesting. To me, anyways. He has a decent eye for composition and can find moments. OTOH, he can also direct things that are supposed to look cool that don't quite work because it's beyond his reach, like River's fight scenes in Serenity which are basically undercooked attempts to emulate much better Asian martial arts films. 

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How he handled the space battle in Serenity was also really good, allowing us to follow clearly the geography of the action without getting bogged down in a confusing morass of beams (the problem several Star Wars films have had; I still find it baffling that since 1983 only Rogue One has given us a space battle to compare to the ones in the OT). That would particularly bode well if he ever did a Star Wars movie.

That's a fair point. He does seem to value clarity in a way that Snyder certainly doesn't. Though in Age of Ultron he was getting increasingly more rapid-cut in his fight scenes, and near as I can tell everyone thinks the Justice League movie is a hot mess in that regards (though not really fair, since it's partially Snyder's product).

 

[DMC]

52 minutes ago, Werthead said:

Even the one that opens Age of Ultron is decent.

Yeah I liked that too.  Actually watched it recently and that whole opening sequence is pretty good.  Example - Thor says "it's like they're lining up," Cap responds "well they're excited," then Thor hits the shield to..lightning all of em.

[Jaxom 1974]

1 hour ago, Ran said:

I think the calculations of when the son might have been born -- based on the actor's age, give or take a few years -- firmly place his birth in the post-RotS era where he is firmly Emperor.

Granted. But it doesn't have to be that way specifically. Other than he's obviously a Sith when he represents Naboo in TPM, you'd think his cover would possibly extend to a wife and family.  Frankly, that would make more sense to me if it had been that way...but whatever.  The whole concept was half baked, botched on execution, and ultimately unnecessary to the story as a whole...

[Lord Varys]

1 hour ago, Ran said:

I had thought it wasn't that he was Force-sensitive, per se, but rather that he had come to believe that the Force had guided him since he saw the massacre take place at the start of TFA, and his admission of this would suggest that he didn't regret what had happened or that they were about to die because it was in a good cause greater than himself, and so on, tying into his initial reticence to care about anything beyond getting himself and Rey out of the whole mess.

Basically what he tells Jannah later in TRoS.

The way you recognize bad writing is when you have to piece that together.

Mind you, the idea of Finn being force-sensitive isn't bad at all ... but that's something that should actually be in the movie. But it has nothing to do with the fact that in the first Abrams movie Finn and Rey sort of had a thing going ... which then completely disappeared as a plot point in the third movie. TLJ left it open for who Finn would fall in the end - Finn or Rose - so completely dropping that line would have been if the Han-Leia-Luke triangle hadn't been resolved in ROTJ.

Also, the ST was - especially with its ending - a huge FUCK YOU to ROTJ since if somebody never returned it were the Jedi. If you make a sequel to a film named 'Return of the Jedi', well, then the Jedi actually should have returned in said movie, no?

1 hour ago, Deadlines? What Deadlines? said:

Holy crap I can't even remember.

There was a lot going on in that movie.

You didn't miss anything - this is all conjecture and interpretation based on less important clues than the ham-fisted stuff about

1 hour ago, DaveSumm said:

I think Lucas’s primary interest is in experimental film making. In 1978, that meant using the practical effects that have aged rather well. In the late 90’s / early 00’s, that meant pushing how much a film leans on CGI. I honestly think he just doesn’t care that much about whether Anakin and Padme’s romance is believable, it’s just some lines of dialogue to push events to the next action sequence. As the video review I posted points out, all anyone does in the PT is talk about the plot, and what’s happening and where they’re going.

George Lucas has rather bad taste, all things considered. The PT looks the way it looks because he wanted it so. There are no mistakes there. I mean, basically the entire effects crew tried to dissuade him from making Yoda this jumping frog ... but that's what he wanted.

He is also not really all that interested in punishing technology but rather in doing things faster and more intense the way he wants to them. He very much likes to create a movie in the editing room, and that is basically the reason why he wants to do all digitally, because that allows you to manipulate the image much better than traditional editing. And it seems to me that his production process is a lot smarter than conventional movie-making, especially with them using animated storyboards and the like to previsualize a sequence. If you know everything beforehand you can make all kinds of things easier, including set building and decoration, camera positions, etc.

And to be fair, the digital process was not all about CGI, just as not mostly/all the effects were ditital. They used a lot of models and real world for the PT movies ... the elements were composed digitally, of course, but not everything was created digitally.

And the romance lines are written deliberately the way they are because they are to recreate the feeling of romances from the 1930s - those serials and adventure movies Star Wars is based on. There isn't any deep dialogue there, just as there isn't any deep dialogue in Gone With the Wind.

What makes the PT suck as movies is that there is literally no proper exposition there. The movies are too big ... and the moron who made them chose to focus on pointless action instead of properly setting up the political story he was trying to tell.

If you think about the PT, those are the things the movies should have explained properly:

1. Who the hell are the Sith? What's their beef with the Jedi and what do they want revenge for (you should expect to know what the revenge in Revenge of the Sith is for, right?)? We can't get any answers to this from the movies proper.

Compare it to the OT where it is successfully established that there was an Old Republic protected by the Jedi Knights which was overthrown/replaced by the Empire. It also fails to establish who the hell this Emperor chap is, but you get that he is evil and we get the backstory of Anakin Skywalker/Darth Vader.

2. What the hell does it mean that the Force needs a Chosen One to balance it? We have no idea what the point of Anakin's role even is. This is one of the core question in the movies and there is never even an attempt to explain it.

Apparently, the Force gets out of balance because too many bad Whills feed on the Force produced by the Midi-Chlorians, as Lucas recently revealed. You get references to this kind of thing when Yoda talks about the Dark Side clouding everything ... it is not that Darth Sidious somehow clouds the minds of the Jedi but the Force itself is unbalanced towards the Dark Side, favoring the Sith rather than the Jedi, making it hard or impossible for them to see the future. A similar thing would happen in the other direction when Palpatine fails to see what's going on with his plans in ROTJ and that he will fail.

3. Why the hell can Yoda and Obi-Wan become Force ghosts in ANH/ROTJ but Qui-Gon and the others can't? That's never properly explained in the movies and if you insist on introducing such a mystery in TPM then you have to properly answer it so that people get it what the point of all that was.

4. What the hell is the point of the Separatist movement? If you have complex civil war politics going on then you have to focus on that. The idea that Abe Lincoln and Jefferson Davis are actually working together is great ... but you have to actually show what this is about because it doesn't really fit in the simple 'good vs. evil' iconography you can depict easily enough with costumes and uniforms. This is a tidbit more complex.

And if you fail to properly introduce such concepts then the movie pretty much breaks down.

[DMC]

14 minutes ago, Lord Varys said:

TLJ left it open for who Finn would fall in the end - Finn or Rose

Agreed.  Clearly, Finn ended up choosing Finn.    In all seriousness, seemed like he ended up choosing Poe.

[Deadlines? What Deadlines?]

1 hour ago, Werthead said:

Not too sure about that at all. Whedon has some very good framing and shot construction in Serenity, Avengers and even Age of Ultron. The one-shot that opens Serenity is excellent, as is the iconic "hero shot" of Avengers. Even the one that opens Age of Ultron is decent. His directed episodes of Buffy and his other shows are also pretty good, often showing a lot of thought (the shot of Angel killing the smoking prostitute in Innocence to show his transformation back to the dark side and then blowing out her cigarette smoke was impressive, given the limitations of American network TV in 1997).

How he handled the space battle in Serenity was also really good, allowing us to follow clearly the geography of the action without getting bogged down in a confusing morass of beams (the problem several Star Wars films have had; I still find it baffling that since 1983 only Rogue One has given us a space battle to compare to the ones in the OT). That would particularly bode well if he ever did a Star Wars movie.

And yes, Disney need to work this situation out with Alan Dean Foster ASAP. That's a ridiculous situation they got themselves into.

I'm not familiar with Whedon's TV stuff.  Was never interested enough to check out Buffy.  I heard good things about Firefly but I never got around to it.

I think the first thing I saw from him was Serenity.  I like it a lot but it definitely has a very "televisual" feel to it. Still, a good first effort. Avengers could have easily been the next League of Extraordinary Gentlemen but it wasn't. 

I see no reason why Whedon couldn't do a decent SW film or trilogy of films. But then, I don't think the issue with the ST is the directors.

[Vaughn]

Eh, I don't think Whedon or Snyder would offer anything to the franchise. They've both achieved a lot but they've also been making movies for a long time and are creatively spent. If he wasn't already doing 'Dune', Villeneuve would be a perfect fit or Alex Garland or Lindelof, people currently making interesting stuff. It's also why I'm more excited about the new series from Headland than having some director from 2006 rehash his signature moves in the SWU. I'd love to see a Waititi Star Wars movie but I think with Thor Ragnorak and Love and Thunder I wonder how much he has left in the creative tank for the space spectacular genre.

Edit: The Whedon Avengers movies are far inferior to the Russo MCU movies. Just endless CGI fights with hoary one liners. Russos would also be a better choice based on how they landed the MCU alone.

[Vaughn]

10 minutes ago, Mr Meeseeks said:

Eh, you know Waititi is making Star Wars film, right?

Sure, right after his Akira movie, right? Sounds fun but either are years out.

My main point is that fresh people are needed. Whedon is a weird case. Buffy, FireFly and Angel were very good. He was helpful in establishing the MCU. But in 20 years, what Whedon work is going to have any kind of legacy? I'd bet both Villeneuve and Garland will be viewed as generational talents and Whedon will more like a scifi Darren Star.

[Deadlines? What Deadlines?]

 

51 minutes ago, Vaughn said:

Eh, I don't think Whedon or Snyder would offer anything to the franchise. They've both achieved a lot but they've also been making movies for a long time and are creatively spent. If he wasn't already doing 'Dune', Villeneuve would be a perfect fit or Alex Garland or Lindelof, people currently making interesting stuff. It's also why I'm more excited about the new series from Headland than having some director from 2006 rehash his signature moves in the SWU. I'd love to see a Waititi Star Wars movie but I think with Thor Ragnorak and Love and Thunder I wonder how much he has left in the creative tank for the space spectacular genre.

Edit: The Whedon Avengers movies are far inferior to the Russo MCU movies. Just endless CGI fights with hoary one liners. Russos would also be a better choice based on how they landed the MCU alone.

Strongly disagree.

Wait, Whedon's Avengers films are "just endless CGI fights with hoary one liners"?

10 minutes ago, Vaughn said:

Sure, right after his Akira movie, right? Sounds fun but either are years out.

Which is after Thor 4, which has probably been delayed due to Covid.

Even money says Waititi's Akira doesn't happen. Same for his Star Wars film.

[Jaxom 1974]

1 hour ago, Mr Meeseeks said:

Well, per the new EU(gag) the son was a failed clone of Palps that escaped around Ep 6.

Well that's just dumb. Thus par for the course with all of this.  Far too much of the sequel trilogy relies on tie ins, novels, and other supporting materials to make it work...

[Deadlines? What Deadlines?]

2 minutes ago, Mr Meeseeks said:

Yeah like I’ve said I love ep 7 and 8, but 9 can just die in a fire. 
 

Not sure if the clone thing was planned or a retcon but if they had actually explored it in the film ever a little it would have helped. 

When I saw Poe Dameron alive in in the second half of TFA the first thing that popped into my head was "Oh, he's a clone!" which might have made for an interesting wrinkle.  I mean, cloning technology is a feature of this universe, so why wouldn't the resistance' best fighter pilot allow himself to be cloned to fight the might of the First Order? The organic against the technological in a way that sort of resonates with the Clone War.

That might have been an interesting concept to explore. But nope. He got off the planet somehow. Throw away line.

[Vaughn]

24 minutes ago, Mr Meeseeks said:

Uh, Waititi’s Star Wars film is going to be his next after Thor 4, which is filming now, and I believe already has a release date. Like, it’s green lit and official and everything.

Things change all the time - remember the Weiss Beinhoff Star Wars trilogy? Hope you're right though.

The OG Avengers was ok but the battle of New York is just tedious on rewatch. Ultron is easily the worst ensemble MCU movie.

Buffy's fine. There are no great Whedon movies that will be regarded as classics like Alien or Terminator or ET, etc... He's a very serviceable creative talent who will not have a lasting legacy and, to bring this back around the topic, has nothing to offer worth blowing hundreds of millions of dollars making a new Star Wars movie on, let alone the opportunity cost vs. rolling the dice on someone less known but perhaps better.