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Yeah, Phantom Menace Anakin is fine. Sort of. Him and Attack of the Clones Anakin are completely different characters.
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Dec 22, 2015 20:41
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Bongo Bill posted:A character saying a clunky thing is not necessarily a flaw in the script. It reveals an aspect of their character. It means they're the kind of person who would say that kind of thing. Yeah Phantom and Clones are both too complex for the... uh... "limited" dialog to keep up with. Let's face it, the dialog was just bad. In A New Hope that kind of dialog could fly but I and II have far too many moving parts for the viewer to keep up with all the misdirection and characters' mistakes.
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Dec 22, 2015 20:41
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Augus posted:You can talk all you want about how Anakin is supposed to be emotionally retarded, but that doesn't change the fact that we have no reason to care. The movie wants us to feel bad for him when he turns evil, but the tragedy doesn't work because he's completely unlikable. How is it a "fact" that we have no reason to care? Maybe you don't, some others do. I mean I hate to beat the "film is subjective" drum over and over but a lot of the prequel criticism seems to take it as read that nobody really likes this poo poo, at least not on any level beyond "the CGI was pretty", so there's a lot of "Of course we have no reason to care about this" / "This would be a nice scene but there's no emotional investment", etc. There's a sort of insistence here, a desire to not just say "there are many valid reasons to dislike the prequels" but also "there are no valid reasons to like them." Caring/not caring is a symptom, not a cause. I feel like Anakin is worthy of at least some sympathy because he wasn't this screwed up starting out- in Phantom Menace he's all "let's help these strangers, ma!", he's a good kid, but clearly the Jedi have not raised him right. They don't understand his emotional needs because they've been shut off all these years and most of them are basically trained from before they were old enough to form connections to their biological parents.
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Dec 22, 2015 20:41
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thrawn527 posted:If you don't find it brilliant that the villain in the new Star Wars movie was filled with self doubt about how he'll never be as good as Darth Vader, when the entire audience going in was thinking the same thing, then I don't even know what to say. I don't
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Dec 22, 2015 20:43
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Arglebargle III posted:Yeah Phantom and Clones are both too complex for the... uh... "limited" dialog to keep up with. Let's face it, the dialog was just bad. Again the desire to have everyone "just face it" and stop pretending that they see things you don't. You ever think that maybe this is not the best way to discuss movies? That maybe we all have something to offer? From a certain point of view?
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Dec 22, 2015 20:43
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Bongo Bill posted:Anakin is a nice person who starts off caring about other people than himself and risking his life for them. Actually, Anakin cares about the people around him way, way too much. Shmi and Padme are emotional anchors who drag him down to new depths of fear and despair. Obi-Wan's guidance is so personal to him it hurts and he resents it. His problem is never not caring about his friends and family.
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Dec 22, 2015 20:43
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CelticPredator posted:Yeah, Phantom Menace Anakin is fine. Sort of. Him and Attack of the Clones Anakin are completely different characters. Zoran posted:AOTC Anakin is essentially the polar opposite of Han Solo. Anakin wears his emotions right on his sleeve, without the least bit of subtlety. He's brutally honest at all times. He's also wildly insecure, though he covers it up with the occasional show of reckless bravado. Anakin has zero cynicism and possesses no regard for his own safety, a trait that's related to his lack of self-esteem. Everything here is true of TPM Anakin as well, though the flaws are more muted.
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Dec 22, 2015 20:43
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CelticPredator posted:Yeah, Phantom Menace Anakin is fine. Sort of. Him and Attack of the Clones Anakin are completely different characters. He's repressed and horny in Attack of the Clones, but he's still the same kid. A daredevil, disarmingly honest, a deep-seated core of rage that's only revealed when he's made to dwell on his powerlessness. Check out the line in The Phantom Menace where he's describing what will happen to him if he tries to run away. Specifically, look at Jake Lloyd's face.
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Dec 22, 2015 20:44
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Arglebargle III posted:Actually, Anakin cares about the people around him way, way too much. Shmi and Padme are emotional anchors who drag him down to new depths of fear and despair. Obi-Wan's guidance is so personal to him it hurts and he resents it. His problem is never not caring about his friends and family. He basically has a follower personality. When he's confessing to Padme he says "What will I do? I will do whatever you ask." When he becomes Vader he tells the Emperor "I will do whatever you ask." He's always looking for someone to guide him.
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Dec 22, 2015 20:45
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Fair I guess. But I still hate that character. So I'll let the discussion continue.
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Dec 22, 2015 20:45
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Maxwell Lord posted:Again the desire to have everyone "just face it" and stop pretending that they see things you don't. I'm on your side, actually. Whatever the intent behind the dialog, it's hard to support it as well-crafted. "Functional at best" is a charitable description, I think, and I appreciate the prequels. I think Lucas struggles to articulate through dialog why Anakin and Padme's romance is such a bad idea, for example, even if there are good reasons and even though I believe that the romance reads as "bad" to many because that was always the intention.
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Dec 22, 2015 20:46
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It'll be interesting to see what screwed up Kylo Ren so much. Obviously his birth parents had their troubles (though it kinda reads like they split up because he went all Dark Side- similar to real parents losing a child), and Luke it seems made some mistake training him, but hopefully in the next movie he might fess up to what went wrong.
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Dec 22, 2015 20:49
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George Lucas is too skilled a visual storyteller to fail to convey the story to the audience, but because he is not similarly skilled as a screenwriter, he failed to provide the expected cues that the story they're seeing is actually the story they're "supposed" to hear. This is why you see people noticing that e.g. the Jedi are fools and hypocrites, but thinking that it's a problem with the movie instead of the point of it. Disney and JJ Abrams, regardless of any artistic shortcomings they might bring to the table, are much more committed to communicating the film's premise to the audience, which will mean less misunderstanding.
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Dec 22, 2015 20:51
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CelticPredator posted:Luke is a nice person who comes to really care about other people besides than himself. He starts off a little whiny and wanting more, but he eventually risks his life for his new friends. That makes him a hero. I ask this question because Anakin quite clearly cares about people.
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Dec 22, 2015 20:54
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Bongo Bill posted:George Lucas is too skilled a visual storyteller to fail to convey the story to the audience, but because he is not similarly skilled as a screenwriter, he failed to provide the expected cues that the story they're seeing is actually the story they're "supposed" to hear. This is why you see people noticing that e.g. the Jedi are fools and hypocrites, but thinking that it's a problem with the movie instead of the point of it. Part of it may also be simply that the story the prequels tell is inherently a tricky one- you want to set up these great powerful people and institutions and have them all fail miserably. The story of the OT is "underdogs prevail against an overwhelming force" which is way simpler. And even then, I'm not sure how long it took me to pick up on some of the finer points of the OT- that Yoda and Kenobi are ultimately wrong about Vader and that Vader and the Emperor are working at slight cross-purposes because evil always defeats itself, etc.
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Dec 22, 2015 20:55
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It's very telling that the most interesting parts of the prequel Star Wars movies were (to me) the political intrigue and manipulation of a functional and "good" interplanetary democratic government, and the least interesting were the caste of lasersword bushido monks.
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Dec 22, 2015 20:58
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Bongo Bill posted:George Lucas is too skilled a visual storyteller to fail to convey the story to the audience, but because he is not similarly skilled as a screenwriter, he failed to provide the expected cues that the story they're seeing is actually the story they're "supposed" to hear. This is why you see people noticing that e.g. the Jedi are fools and hypocrites, but thinking that it's a problem with the movie instead of the point of it. This also comes up with Qui-Gon in TPM. He's terrifically funny, but only if you pick up on the split-second smug grin he gives when Padmé reveals herself to the Gungans. You're meant to understand that he was messing with handmaiden-Padmé every time he spoke to her, but it's easy to miss, and if you miss it then Qui-Gon just seems stoic and boring.
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Dec 22, 2015 21:11
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Yeah. Qui-Gon is really great. There's that one time Padme's like 'the queen would be upset if she knew we were doing this' and he says 'the queen doesn't know!' and grins at her. He knows. He's seen this poo poo before. He has a 10 in perception
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Dec 22, 2015 21:13
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CelticPredator posted:Luke is a nice person who comes to really care about other people besides than himself. He rescues Leia because he wants to bone her.
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Dec 22, 2015 21:24
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Bongo Bill posted:Anakin is a nice person who starts off caring about other people than himself and risking his life for them. Anakin in TPM doesn't even matter in regards to this whole discussion. He is a little kid and you could argue that kids aren't real personalities (there is precedent in many human cultures for this view). In the end TPM doesn't give Anakin more than a few character traits you were expecting anyways as well as some history but that doesn't really factor into the person Anakin becomes as far as the audience goes. This is also not helped by the fact that we talk about totally different actors. It was a huge jump from kid Anakin to grown up Anakin and we haven't got a clue what happened in the meantime or who this older Anakin is. That's why I keep arguing that it was a bad idea to waste a whole movie about kid Anakin. All of that could have been done in 15-20 Minutes in the first movie to get across what happened to him as kid and then use the next movies to show who Anakin is and why the audience should care or empathise about him. This also goes beyond doing heroic/"good" stuff and why even villains can be more likeable than goody good characters though it doesn't surprise me that goons still don't get why Anakin wasn't liked (and again "like" doesn't mean people have to consider him as "good" guy). TFA is at least very effective in creating a connection between characters like Rey, Ren, Finn and the audience and that was always the biggest shortcoming of the prequels. Kylo Ren's and Han's scene had for example more gravitas than the duel between Obi-Wan and Anakin in ROTS and that pretty much says it all about the prequels and how "well" they got feelings across.
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Dec 22, 2015 21:25
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Augus posted:The movie wants us to feel bad for him when he turns evil, but the tragedy doesn't work because he's completely unlikable. The movie does not want you to feel bad for him. The movie doesn't want anything.
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Dec 22, 2015 21:28
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SuperMechagodzilla posted:The movie does not want you to feel bad for him. Except make Lucas richer. Finally something people can agree on.
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Dec 22, 2015 21:32
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Yeah you're saying "I want to feel bad for him when he turns evil, but the tragedy doesn't work because I don't like him." That's a pretty reasonable way to feel about the guy.
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Dec 22, 2015 21:32
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LinkesAuge posted:He is a little kid and you could argue that kids aren't real personalities (there is precedent in many human cultures for this view). —The Jedi Council, probably
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Dec 22, 2015 21:33
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Hbomberguy posted:I ask this question because Anakin quite clearly cares about people. He has a lot of feelings for people, especially the younglings. quote:The movie doesn't want anything. I bet the artists do though.
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Dec 22, 2015 21:44
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RBA Starblade posted:I bet the artists do though.
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Dec 22, 2015 21:51
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The prequels already had a tough job just in concept: they had to make the tragic transformation of a dumb little kid into the coolest villain of all time (but notably, still a villain and a murderer and stuff) into a rollicking family adventure, and the audience already knows the ending the entire time. Why even bother making it? I think the answer is money.
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Dec 22, 2015 21:58
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Augus posted:If something intentional comes across clunky, like it was a result of bad direction rather than author intent, then it probably isn't a good scene. Writing is essentially communication, and bad writing is a failure to communicate your ideas effectively, regardless of how good the ideas might've been. The Force Awakens does this brilliantly with Kylo Ren. In particular the scene towards the end: "Han Solo. I've waited a long time for this." On paper, it's a clichéd action movie line, but Adam Driver delivers it with such forced pomp and gravitas that the line falls completely flat, but it's obvious that it's supposed to. Ren the character, not Adam Driver the actor, is reciting dialogue. He's acting out his Darth Vader fantasy, and Han immediately rebuffs it. I really loved that exchange.
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Dec 22, 2015 21:59
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thrawn527 posted:If you don't find it brilliant that the villain in the new Star Wars movie was filled with self doubt about how he'll never be as good as Darth Vader, when the entire audience going in was thinking the same thing, then I don't even know what to say. If your audience has doubts on a bad guy being as good as Darth Vader, the worst thing to do is confirm those doubts every time the bad guy is on stream.
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Dec 22, 2015 22:02
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turtlecrunch posted:The prequels already had a tough job just in concept: they had to make the tragic transformation of a dumb little kid into the coolest villain of all time (but notably, still a villain and a murderer and stuff) into a rollicking family adventure, and the audience already knows the ending the entire time. Why even bother making it? I think the answer is money. Money is the reason they got made (i.e., they wouldn't have gotten made if they didn't make money), but probably not the reason Lucas wanted them to get made. If he was only in it for the cash, he would've made something that called back to the OT excessively and was incredibly safe (like, you know, The Force Awakens). For better or worse, the PT we got was definitely his vision which disregarded the critical reception.
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Dec 22, 2015 22:05
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On a side topic, what I think I love about Poe is that he's Buck Rogers. He's an ace pilot and action hero who does lots of cool poo poo and survives impossible odds, but we don't see that much of him because it's just not his story. He's like Lord Flashheart or Ace Rimmer but played straight. It's a wonder nobody thought to put Oscar Isaac in a dashing action role before. He's seriously too good at it.
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Dec 22, 2015 22:06
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teagone posted:So you're saying Rey would only slightly be a Mary Sue if she manifested her powers a little later in the second film? What difference would that make? Either way, you're way off base. The film clearly has been showing us that Rey has a unique connection to the Force and that her ability to attune it was progressively getting stronger. She was able to best Kylo Ren, not just because of that unique connection, but also because Ren took a bowcaster shot to the gut and was bleeding out, and had just killed his father (think about his already fragile state of mind). Oh and Finn managed to get a solid couple hits on Ren as well, maiming him even further. He was pretty messed up. Zodack posted:Woah buddy, comparing Luke versus Vader to Rey versus Kylo Ren is not even a contest. It's made painfully obvious through dialogue and through actions that Kylo Ren is relatively untrained, unfocused, and not in control of his powers. Your right him getting shot with the bowcaster and such made it at least reasonable Finn and Rey could hold their own I actually really liked that bit. I just didn't like that Reyy despite never using a lightsaber before was able to defeat him. I liked the fight against Finn because it showed him clearly outmatched by Ren even though Ren was wounded, it felt like he was toying with him until he got decently cut by Finn then finished Finn pretty quickly like Vader v. Luke or Dooku v. Anakin in the Clone Wars. I understand why Rey did well in the fight I guess I just felt surprised she overpowered Ren in the fight by the end. It just felt surprising she would beat Ren in the first film rather than build into it with some training from Luke. I guess that was mostly an initial shock reaction at this overall thinking back the scene works well, if you consider he was hurt and was trying to do the whole JOIN ME that darksiders have a bad habit of doing. In regards to the piloting, I understand why she is gifted most force sensitives seem to be naturally good pilots, however at least with Luke he actually had flown before the death star attack in his skyhopper stuff on Tatooine, with his friend Biggs who went off and got official training and still admitted Luke was a solid pilot. Whereas Reyy never had until piloting the Falcon and was doing crazy poo poo in it compared to anything Luke did. Her knowing how to fix poo poo on it made perfect sense though since she was a Scavenger and the Falcon is mostly scaved parts. Luke sneaking on the death star is a bit on the wait what side back then and it makes sense Reyy would do a better job sneaking around starkiller base. I guess my only issue is her piloting skills which seem to come out of nowhere, also the special connection to the force feels a bit Mary Sueish, but if its needed and explained more in the later movies I would be fine with it. Jack2142 fucked around with this message at 22:11 on Dec 22, 2015 |
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Dec 22, 2015 22:06
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If I suddenly discovered the Force was real, you bet your rear end the first thing I would try to do is try stuff I've heard in stories just to see if it would stick, training be damned
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Dec 22, 2015 22:13
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turtlecrunch posted:The prequels already had a tough job just in concept: they had to make the tragic transformation of a dumb little kid into the coolest villain of all time (but notably, still a villain and a murderer and stuff) into a rollicking family adventure, and the audience already knows the ending the entire time. Why even bother making it? I think the answer is money.
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Dec 22, 2015 22:18
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Maxwell Lord posted:It's a wonder nobody thought to put Oscar Isaac in a dashing action role before. He's seriously too good at it. He was also a pretty good shot in Show Me a Hero too. i'm sorry
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Dec 22, 2015 22:27
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Hbomberguy posted:What makes you like Luke? Is it the shot of him looking wistfully at the sun that one time? Or maybe the one line about him wanting to be a Jedi, or the way he squeals happily when he scores a hit? It's probably his friendly nature, the natural charm Hamill brings to the character, the goodwill he shows utter strangers, and the sympathetic events that occur and his reaction to them; his only family dies, his mentor dies, he finds out his father is the bodyguard to Mega Hitler, he loses his hand, he loses his friends, gets beat down in a swamp by a puppet, and he ends up fighting his father. All actions out of his control, all things he bounces back from. The only time you see him being a horrible person was when he starts beating down a defeated Vader, and he ends up having the same reaction of horror to this as the audience. Compassion and mercy define the character. Now look at Anakin, who's arc in the PT is a slight incline before declining into the ground; He's a slave kid, he builds a pod racer, he wins a pod race, he tries spinning (which is a good trick) and then....He becomes a petulant poo poo who talks crap about his only friend behind his back, he acts like an awkward dork (which would be fine if the character was likable in the first place) to an extent that he makes a Space Venice date uncomfortable, he has delusions of grandeur as what is essentially a Jedi High School Student, he murders an entire tribe (including the women, and the CHILDREN) because he had a space vision of his mother getting killed (who he apparently didnt care about saving from tattooine with his spinning laser sword kung-fu at any point before), he is involved in the rescue of Padme (along with a hundres jedi) which ends in losing his hand, then he saves one clone (gently caress the others) and murders another guy while a mysteriously evil guy goads him on and tries to get him to abandon the friend he hates. Then he murders another guy for fighting the weird evil guy because he suggested that maybe Space Hitler was right and also that they could totally save his GF (he assumes she needs saving because of a future space dream, later dies anyways), then he commits an entire theocratic cleansing of the jedi (in the process murdering more kids), then he says Jedi are evil, then he fights his friend after trying to choke his pregnant GF, then he gets put in a suit. So, a pod race, existing during a rescue attempt, and saving a clone trooper. Versus all of that. On top of having no charisma and being responsible for almost all of his bad fortune. Even if you yell out "he's intentionally unlikable and terrible!" that doesn't make him not unlikable and terrible.
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Dec 22, 2015 22:39
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Can someone explain to me the following argument? It goes something like this: "JJ Abrams had to retread the OT and do a soft reboot because so many people were disappointed in the prequels. The next movies can be more original / creative." Why is this the case? What if TFA hadn't done any of that stuff, but _still had been_ a sequel to ROTJ that prequel detractors considered to have good acting, good dialogue, good visuals even without making frequent callbacks to the OT? Would that have been a franchise-ending disappointment? "Well, I liked the new characters and the fights were good, but it didn't have a Death Star and none of the BB-8 plot reminded me of ANH. gently caress JJ, gently caress Disney!"
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Dec 22, 2015 22:46
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Hbomberguy posted:So you agree. Yes in the sense that nobody's going to say "the director, producer, writers, artists, technicians, and army of interns who created this movie" instead of "the movie". My mistake was not noticing who wrote that because the ignore list doesn't work when writing a reply. RBA Starblade fucked around with this message at 22:50 on Dec 22, 2015 |
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Dec 22, 2015 22:47
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Icon-Cat posted:Can someone explain to me the following argument? It goes something like this: "JJ Abrams had to retread the OT and do a soft reboot because so many people were disappointed in the prequels. The next movies can be more original / creative." It makes frequent callbacks to ROTJ because it is a direct sequel to ROTJ in a setting where the characters of ROTJ are unavoidable. It also expands on direct OT moments, reflects on them, and makes use of characters from ROTJ (which is old enough that, for plenty of kids, Han Solo means "this old guy in a black vest"). Here's my own question: why does the existence of some superfluous fanservice to the original trilogy enrage certain viewers? My only conclusion is that some CineD star wars fans just dont like star wars. Neurolimal fucked around with this message at 22:52 on Dec 22, 2015 |
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Dec 22, 2015 22:50
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Neurolimal posted:It makes frequent callbacks to ROTJ because it is a direct sequel to ROTJ in a setting where the characters of ROTJ are unavoidable. It also expands on direct OT moments, reflects on them, and makes use of characters from ROTJ (which is old enough that, for plenty of kids, Han Solo means "this old guy in a black vest"). He has a jacket now!
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Dec 22, 2015 22:51
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