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

[Kalbear]

Just now, Deadlines? What Deadlines? said:

In TFA, they are able to penetrate the shields on Starkiller base by flying through in hyperspace.

Cool! So have another reason then, because it's not that hard. Hell, have it that the ship's hyperspace tracking also allows Holdo to target it accurately in hyperspace. That would kind of make sense too, right - that she can hit it because it has an active link to hyperspatial tracking running constantly. 

Really, though, it's just not that hard to come up with shit. It's stupid that the SSD crashed into the Death Star, but it's also not that hard to explain or fanwank away. The question is - why is one something you're willing to explain away, and the other not? 

[Vaughn]

One smaller ship took out 2 or 3 Star Destroyers in 'Rogue One', an X-wing blew up a moon sized space station in 'ANH'. I don't get the angst about how easy it is destroy big space spaceships in this franchise. It's fun and necessary.

[Derfel Cadarn]

26 minutes ago, Slurktan said:

Vader tortures Han for no reason other than to torture him.  He doesn't even ask questions.  That's in service of the Empire?

It was for a reason; he knew Luke would sense it and come to rescue his friends. That was the whole reason he had a super star destroyer plus a fleet of star destroyers (some of which were damaged/destroyed by asteroids) chase a single freighter.

 

[Jace, Extat]

Or Vader tortured Han for no reason other than he's a villain and that's the kind of thing villains do. Stop trying to read so much into it.

[Deadlines? What Deadlines?]

17 minutes ago, Kalbear Total Landscaping said:

Cool! So have another reason then, because it's not that hard. Hell, have it that the ship's hyperspace tracking also allows Holdo to target it accurately in hyperspace. That would kind of make sense too, right - that she can hit it because it has an active link to hyperspatial tracking running constantly. 

Really, though, it's just not that hard to come up with shit. It's stupid that the SSD crashed into the Death Star, but it's also not that hard to explain or fanwank away. The question is - why is one something you're willing to explain away, and the other not? 

Regarding the SSD and the second death star, why is this stupid again? That station would produce a substantial gravity well. Or you could assume it produces a substantial gravity well. No Problem. Whether it's "fanwank" or not, it doesn't invalidate the concept of space battles established in this universe with "fuck it, just plow a ship into it."

Droid Control ship orbiting Naboo? Fuck off! Just plow a ship into it.

Battle of Coruscant? Fuck off! Just plow a ship into it.

Two metre exhaust port? Fuck off! Just plow a ship into it.

Rebel Base on Hoth? Fuck off! Just plow a ship into it.

Zoom Zoom space chase to the reactor core on the second death star? Fuck off! Just plow a ship into it.

Thermal oscillator on Starkiller Base? Fuck off! Just plow a ship into it.

etc. etc.  

13 minutes ago, Derfel Cadarn said:

It was for a reason; he knew Luke would sense it and come to rescue his friends. That was the whole reason he had a super star destroyer plus a fleet of star destroyers (some of which were damaged/destroyed by asteroids) chase a single freighter.

 

Yeah this. don't those scenes even follow in succession in the film? I can't remember.

[Kalbear]

2 minutes ago, Deadlines? What Deadlines? said:

Regarding the SSD and the second death star, why is this stupid again? That station would produce a substantial gravity well. Or you could assume it produces a substantial gravity well. No Problem. Whether it's "fanwank" or not, it doesn't invalidate the concept of space battles established in this universe with "fuck it, just plow a ship into it."

Because in general destroying a bridge on a ship doesn't cause the ship to 'sink' or lose the ability to escape a gravity well. It can make it not particularly useful, but actually causing it to crash? 

(not to mention the Executor was no where near the actual Death Star and was set up at the start literally on the other side of the Rebel fleet)

2 minutes ago, Deadlines? What Deadlines? said:

Droid Control ship orbiting Naboo? Fuck off! Just plow a ship into it.

Battle of Coruscant? Fuck off! Just plow a ship into it.

Two metre exhaust port? Fuck off! Just plow a ship into it.

Rebel Base on Hoth? Fuck off! Just plow a ship into it.

Zoom Zoom space chase to the reactor core on the second death star? Fuck off! Just plow a ship into it.

Thermal oscillator on Starkiller Base? Fuck off! Just plow a ship into it.

Kinda sure that most of those didn't actually happen? But that's sort of the point - all of those could have worked perfectly fine with the A-wing plowing into it. 

 

[Derfel Cadarn]

I’ve no problem woth Holdo manoeuvre; if she’d acted too quick, the cruiser eould have jumped into hyperspace; too late, and it would have crashed against the hull at normal speed (we see this in Rogue One whenVader’s fleet appears as the rebels try to escape).

Would be funny if Holdo had reallynjust decided thr fleet was lost, and was tryinf to get to Canto Bight to sell the cruiser and spend a few years in the casino, but fucked up the jump.

What is a valid criticism of TLJ (that I’ve not seen) is, space has no ‘atmosphere’ so there’s nothing to slow the ships. So the rebels and the 1st Order are constantly accelerating. But the distance between both appears more or less constant, which seems an unlikely occurrence; ships of completely different size have the same thruster acceleration?

[Veltigar]

12 hours ago, Deadlines? What Deadlines? said:

A New Hope received an Oscar nomination for best original screenplay. Empire was pretty good too. So yes.

I'm usually the first to dismiss attention at the Oscar's as an evidence of quality, but they aren't always wrong it seems

10 hours ago, Heartofice said:

While I think that is true, I think the opposite is also the case for some. People tend to look back at he OT, and judge it by todays standards, or out of context of it's time or what it was trying to achieve.

ANH has some clunky, melodramatic dialogue that made Alec Guinness put his head in his hands, but it was also very effective. It evoked those old flash gordon serials and it also somehow managed to inspire generations of fans who loved every line. I'd suggest the dialogue and script are in part stylistically a bit silly, on purpose. We now live in a time where it feels like every movie should invoke Joss Whedon and be a contest of who can make the wittiest jibe about coffee. The OT is a lot more straightforward, but at the same time has some magical lines and moments. I always think the back and forth between Leia and Han is some of the best rom com stuff I've seen in a movie for instance.

And it's not just about dialogue, those movies, well ANH and ESB, are well structured great examples of how to make a blockbuster movie. There is real skill in a lot of the writing that they told those stories as well as they did

Agree with everything, but definitely the bolded. There is a reason why those films became a phenomenon and still inspire so much ardor from fans. Parts of it are certainly somewhate dated (less so in ESB, but ANH definitely) but they wrote the playbook for so much which came afterwards. It's amazing what an achievement that is really.

10 hours ago, Rippounet said:

It's very clear that people who hate on almost everything (the PT, the ST, or The Mandalorian) (hello @Veltigar), but somehow don't see just how many plotholes, unresolved questions, or ridiculous moments the OT had, have some weird-ass rose-tinted glasses at home.

I'm loving the hate I'm inspiring here XD It's okay Rip, we don't all have to love things in the same way (or even love the same things). I'm glad that my opinion means so much for you, but sometimes you just got to state your case and if that doesn't change perspectives than that is an outcome we should be able to live with. Perhaps not the one you hoped for, but still an outcome.

For honesties' sake, I also think you are misrepresenting the arguments I made. I definitely hate the TROS (and most of the ST, although a lot of that is also due to TROS destroying a lot of the interesting bits of TLJ), but I have remarked several times already that I'm quite fond of the prequels despite the many misgivings I have with them. Heck, my mate and I rewatched the duel between Anakin and Count Dooku from AOTC after the last episode of the Mandalorian. There are few things that make me laugh that much 

I'm also still very fond of the Mandalorian. Otherwise I would definitely not be watching it. The fact that I enjoy a lot of this, doesn't mean that I can't be disappointed with it for not being better. Enjoying a thing does not necessarily meant that said thing must be completely wholesome or good. I think @Kalbear Total Landscaping made the best analogy up thread by comparing The Mandalorian to junk food. It might not be the greatest, but who doesn't love a good helping of McDonald/Burger King/fill in your favorite junk food chain from time to time? Sure, I'd prefer to have a diner with 10 courses from a 3 star Michelin place all the time, but I'm grown up enough to understand that the resources of the universe are unfortunately not limitless. 

8 hours ago, DaveSumm said:

The first two were, by any metric you wish to pick, phenomenally successful. Back to the Future is regularly referred to as one of the greatest films of all time, and has one of the best scripts, but does it make 100% sense? Is it airtight? Is Biff a realistic villain? Nope, but the movie is entirely comfortable being what it is. A movie doesn’t have to be high art to be great.

Yeah, great points!

4 hours ago, Relic said:

I mean you can think whatever you want, for sure. But speaking for myself I don't think it's fair to say that and just leave it there. 

43 minutes ago, Rippounet said:

Just a bit of perspective. Given the fandom, if the OT was released today, even in modernized form, it would be torn to pieces. The reason it gets a pass is because it started it all and because (let's be honest) we were kids when we first saw it.

You must realize that is a very silly argument to make? Not everyone on the board is old enough to have seen the OT as a kid, but not the prequels. I'm guessing a fair number of us are young enough to have seen both the prequels and the OT at an impressionable age. 

Some of those people might agree with you, but I'd bet good money that many others would also see the gap in quality between the OT and the prequels. 

48 minutes ago, Rippounet said:

I'm the first one to have harsh words for works of fiction after watching them, but after some time one can just let it go. There's really no reason to hate on movies that were released years or decades ago. Otherwise, the OT doesn't get a pass either. It's that simple.

With time, I'm more inclined to give even the ST a shot, at least the first two movies. And I love pretty much everything else I've every seen or read in the SW universe.

This really is the strangest argument I have seen in this thread. The passage of time does not automatically turn a bad film into a good one (or the reverse, although that is more likely to happen). If I see a bad movie today and someone asks me about it twenty years later, I'll probably still recommend that person to steer clear (If I still remember having seen it of course).

Obviously, for most bad films you won't have any reasons left to hate on it actively after 20 years (Like what loony future person is going to ask me a question about Wrath of the Titans?), but in a big fandom like SW with its huge popcultural impact and continual flow of cross-referencing IP's that's just par for the course.  

This whole thread is a pretty good demonstration of that. Fifteen pages in about a week. That just shows you how vital this franchise still is and in such a maelstrom of opinions and comparisons between this and that property, you're bound to have broadranging arguments.

 

[Deadlines? What Deadlines?]

10 minutes ago, Kalbear Total Landscaping said:

Because in general destroying a bridge on a ship doesn't cause the ship to 'sink' or lose the ability to escape a gravity well. It can make it not particularly useful, but actually causing it to crash? 

 

42 minutes ago, Ran said:

(A quick Google tells me that the EU basically made this stuff explicit, apparently: the primary bridge destruction left controls veering the ship towards the station, and that the crew on the secondary bridge were not able to transfer control and stop the plunge at the Death Star before it was too late. Which all tracks, because, well, that's a kind of scenario you could see in naval ships.)

Facts!

11 minutes ago, Kalbear Total Landscaping said:

Kinda sure that most of those didn't actually happen? But that's sort of the point - all of those could have worked perfectly fine with the A-wing plowing into it. 

Kinds Sure?

[Kalbear]

4 minutes ago, Deadlines? What Deadlines? said:

Facts!

So...if a noncanon source that most people haven't read gives an in-universe explanation for it, that's totes cool, but if that doesn't exist it's bad?

So until what, 1998 that scene really pissed you off, but then you were fine?

4 minutes ago, Deadlines? What Deadlines? said:

Kinds Sure?

Well, yeah. I'm honestly not sure if you're complaining that they should have crashed more shit into shit or that you're saying it's implausible. 

[Deadlines? What Deadlines?]

5 minutes ago, Veltigar said:

This really is the strangest argument I have seen in this thread. The passage of time does not automatically turn a bad film into a good one (or the reverse, although that is more likely to happen). If I see a bad movie today and someone asks me about it twenty years later, I'll probably still recommend that person to steer clear (If I still remember having seen it of course).

This is tricky. A truly bad film won't become good but a misunderstood film or film that came along at the wrong time can be reappraised given time.

Blade Runner was a critical and commercial failure when it hit theaters.

Friedkin's Sorcerer was shredded by critics and was a massive box office flop.

The Shining earned Kubrick a Razzie nomination for worst director... Kubrick... for the Shining...

[RumHam]

1 hour ago, Deadlines? What Deadlines? said:

Droid Control ship orbiting Naboo? Fuck off! Just plow a ship into it.

They only had one ship, and they were on it. Then later they didn't have any big ships, just those starfighters. 

1 hour ago, Deadlines? What Deadlines? said:

Battle of Coruscant? Fuck off! Just plow a ship into it.

Plow a ship into the ship holding palpatine? Granted this would have solved a lot of problems, but they didn't know that. 

1 hour ago, Deadlines? What Deadlines? said:

Two metre exhaust port? Fuck off! Just plow a ship into it.

They needed to hit the "power core" in the middle to start some kinda chain reaction. Plowing a ship into it may have just left it in the shape of the second death star. Plus I'm not sure they had any capital ships on Yavin, if they did they may have been trying to evacuate people. 

1 hour ago, Deadlines? What Deadlines? said:

Rebel Base on Hoth? Fuck off! Just plow a ship into it.

and kill Luke? I guess they could have flown a ship into the shield generator. But when you're the empire and have a massive military advantage and the rebels only survive by hiding it just doesn't make sense to waste one of your ships when AT-ATs will do the job. 

1 hour ago, Deadlines? What Deadlines? said:

Zoom Zoom space chase to the reactor core on the second death star? Fuck off! Just plow a ship into it.

That one would have worked with a big enough ship, as we saw with the super star destroyer. But they thought the thing was offline and didn't expect the ambush. Yes, Akbar or someone else could have had a maneuver named after them. But I'd argue it's a dick move to pull that when you're not the only person on the ship. 

The main argument against Holdoing everything is that ships are expensive and the rebels really need the few they have. 

[DaveSumm]

1 hour ago, Rippounet said:

Just a bit of perspective. Given the fandom, if the OT was released today, even in modernized form, it would be torn to pieces. The reason it gets a pass is because it started it all and because (let's be honest) we were kids when we first saw it.

Is it not possible that they’re just better movies? Given the widespread critical and fan acclaim for IV and V, if not VI? Including fans who didn’t watch until the hype came back around with the prequels (myself included) and then again with the sequels? IV and V only started ‘it all’ because they were great movies. The prequels were poorly received because they were poorly made. The sequels were poorly received because they were poorly planned.

[Deadlines? What Deadlines?]

2 minutes ago, RumHam said:

The main argument against Holdoing everything is that ships are expensive and the rebels really the few they have. 

One ship to destroy an entire fleet is cheap.

[Veltigar]

1 minute ago, Deadlines? What Deadlines? said:

This is tricky. A truly bad film won't become good but a misunderstood film or film that came along at the wrong time can be reappraised given time.

Blade Runner was a critical and commercial failure when it hit theaters.

Friedkin's Sorcerer was shredded by critics and was a massive box office flop.

The Shining earned Kubrick a Razzie nomination for worst director... Kubrick... for the Shining...

The key word in my post is bolded thistime around 

12 minutes ago, Veltigar said:

This really is the strangest argument I have seen in this thread. The passage of time does not automatically turn a bad film into a good one (or the reverse, although that is more likely to happen). If I see a bad movie today and someone asks me about it twenty years later, I'll probably still recommend that person to steer clear (If I still remember having seen it of course).

 

[Ran]

5 minutes ago, Kalbear Total Landscaping said:

So...if a noncanon source that most people haven't read gives an in-universe explanation for it, that's totes cool, but if that doesn't exist it's bad?

If you can find a reasonable explanation for something, then that's cool, is my view. But two Holdo maneuvers in two movies against First Order ships are a real problem which you yourself already acknowledged as something that needs some sort of explanation beyond "it's one in a million". Except they can't explain it reasonably, short of, I don't know, "Oh, yeah, we've developed new shields that are totally proof against masses moving at light speed [don't ask us why they don't work as well against lasers!]", so what they'll do if they ever go post-ST is memory hole it and wave it away as "one in a million, ignore the second one happening right after you were told this."

I remain baffled as to why JJ decided to have it, other than he liked the image of a Star Destroyer cut in half.

[Kalbear]

10 minutes ago, Deadlines? What Deadlines? said:

This is tricky. A truly bad film won't become good but a misunderstood film or film that came along at the wrong time can be reappraised given time.

Blade Runner was a critical and commercial failure when it hit theaters.

Friedkin's Sorcerer was shredded by critics and was a massive box office flop.

The Shining earned Kubrick a Razzie nomination for worst director... Kubrick... for the Shining...

The Thing (by John Carpenter) may be the best horror movie ever created, and it got both box office and critical slams at the time.

TESB was considered the weakest by far at the time it came out and not remotely a worthy sequel by many. 

[Kalbear]

6 minutes ago, Ran said:

If you can find a reasonable explanation for something, then that's cool, is my view. But two Holdo maneuvers in two movies against First Order ships are a real problem which you yourself already acknowledged as something that needs some sort of explanation beyond "it's one in a million". Except they can't explain it reasonably, short of, I don't know, "Oh, yeah, we've developed new shields that are totally proof against masses moving at light speed [don't ask us why they don't work as well against lasers!]", so what they'll do if they ever go post-ST is memory hole it and wave it away as "one in a million, ignore the second one happening right after you were told this."

I remain baffled as to why JJ decided to have it, other than he liked the image of a Star Destroyer cut in half.

Again, not going to get into the various stupidities of TRoS. If you're that upset about the Holdo maneuver you've got to be completely and utterly angry at hyperspace skipping and going into atmo in hyperspace, given that those were definitely NOT one in a million shots and not only could the Falcon do it, so could a bunch of shitty TIEs. 

I guess I really don't see the problem with Holdo's thing or why it can't be explained in some way later that makes it clear why it's unlikely to be used over and over again. I gave a few examples upthread that are just as reasonable as 'the only controls to the entire ship got borked AND we moved it closer to the death star for no good reason AND it just so happened to plow into the Death Star instead of going literally any other direction'. Really, that's my main issue - the amount of fanwank done by literal mountains of EU and other stories that people accept as fine explanations for clear issues that they didn't have problems with before, but now mysteriously they do when it comes to the newer movies.

[Ran]

4 minutes ago, Mr Meeseeks said:

Hot take: Kubricks The Shining sucks balls.

 

Is that you, Mr. King?

[Deadlines? What Deadlines?]

8 minutes ago, Veltigar said:

The key word in my post is bolded thistime around 

 

Pft. Technicalities.

Although, I think the post you were replying to only suggested a willingness to revisit the material later. Maybe I'm just being generous.

2 minutes ago, Mr Meeseeks said:

Oh, heh, yeah. The initial reception to Empire is definitely not what it is now.

Also I know someone people who say the prequels in the theaters as wee kids who would be aghast at some of the stuff in this thread. :p

If you were a kid who saw ANH in a theater, Empire would be kind of a punch in the gut. My only memory of Empire in the theater was that it was so crowded we had to sit in the aisle.