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I'm kind of flabbergasted at people calling The Force Awakens visually unremarkable. Also, lumping all Marvel/superhero movies together as bland, generic tripe. The Force Awakens was always at the very least visually pleasing and engaging, with periodic forays into loving gorgeous.
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Dec 24, 2015 23:34
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Lt. Danger posted:It was pretty funny when Finn freaked out over his first combat deployment, only to later turn around and pewpewpew blast the hell out of his former friends and colleagues on board the Star Destroyer. Subtle difference between gunning down unarmed captive civilians and shooting back at a bunch of guys actively trying to blow you up
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Dec 24, 2015 23:35
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Monglo posted:This probably has been said already, but I felt really iffy about the protagonists slaughtering all those stormtroopers like it was nothing. They aren't his friends. They slaughter a village and then when the other trooper dies next to him he's like "I'm not dying for these assholes" and defects at the first opportunity. (because he's the .01% of troopers whose brainwashing didn't take/the force) Ratios and Tendency fucked around with this message at 23:38 on Dec 24, 2015 |
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Dec 24, 2015 23:36
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Phylodox posted:I'm kind of flabbergasted at people calling The Force Awakens visually unremarkable. Also, lumping all Marvel/superhero movies together as bland, generic tripe. The Force Awakens was always at the very least visually pleasing and engaging, with periodic forays into loving gorgeous. But they don't agree with me that other things i like are good so I'll poo poo on the thing they like. Or valid criticism. But probably the first one
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Dec 24, 2015 23:37
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Pierson posted:I want a name for this Stormtrooper who just throws aside his weapons like he's in Power Rangers and goes up against a lightsaber 100% no fear where's his Wookiepedia article already. http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/tr-8r-the-stormtrooper-tray-tor
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Dec 24, 2015 23:38
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I'm expecting TR-8R to be this generation's Boba Fett.
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Dec 24, 2015 23:39
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TR-8R was already a victim of the crossbow unfortunately, you see the quite large hole in his chest it makes. I mean I guess it could be just a hole in his armor and his undoubtedly glorious chest hair is only lightly singed or something. And he keeps coming back in each episode with an increasingly ridiculous weapon.
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Dec 24, 2015 23:45
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People in my theater cheered at both parts. 
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Dec 24, 2015 23:50
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Phylodox posted:I'm kind of flabbergasted at people calling The Force Awakens visually unremarkable. Also, lumping all Marvel/superhero movies together as bland, generic tripe. The Force Awakens was always at the very least visually pleasing and engaging, with periodic forays into loving gorgeous. But, you see, nerd stuff is mainstream now - everyone loves it - so now nerds must dislike their nerd stuff, in order to maintain their exclusive nerd cred. The village must be burned in order to save it. Purify! Exterminatus!
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Dec 24, 2015 23:59
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I loved every moment of this movie and was completely immersed. And I wasn't someone who bought into the hype beforehand - a month or so ago I didn't know whether or not I was going to watch this; I was pretty ambivalent on the series - seen the OT and never loved it as much as a lot of other people (although, I'd only ever seen the Special Editions - watching the Despecialized now they've finally 'clicked' for me) and saw the PT as a kid and, never having rewatched them as an adult, never hated them as a lot of others either. I was going in roughly the same amount of mild curiousity and skepticism as I did going into The Avengers. And while that turned out to be one of the worst filmgoing experiences in recent memory, this turned out to be one of the best. Rey isn't a Mary Sue - this critique is blatantly gendered. We see her falter at points, and she's an interesting character with several dimensions. None of the characters are "unnecessary". This is a very weak way to critique movies - to expect a Star Wars film to be as economical as possible. The main strength of this film is its heart; Finn, Rey, and Poe Dameron are fun characters and the dialogue between them is great. This is shot a lot better than any Marvel movie. I mean compare even the most chaotic battle scenes in this to the loving horrorshow that is the final NY fight in The Avengers and this is far more crisply, and artfully shot. I don't think it's a valid "complaint" that this is just a reboot of a A New Hope either. Like, the point that it's a soft reboot is arguably true - there are shots which are clearly intended to be exactly the same, and many of the beats are the same, but I rewatched A New Hope back to back with it and it is a different film, with the heart of the new characters making it worthwhile. My only real criticism of it is that it tries too hard to distance itself from the prequels at points. Like, it's quite clear that they've specifically avoided any mention of politics - pretty sure there's a sizeable amount of the audience who would get up and leave if the words "Trade Federation" were mentioned. But this caused an issue in understanding what the actual layout of things was. Like, clearly the First Order are ISIS and the blowing up of the five planets is Paris, but who are the Rebels? What are they rebelling against? Are they Blackwater? What was the layout of the Republic? These details are important in a tale of good and evil.
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Dec 24, 2015 23:59
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Noam Chomsky posted:But, you see, nerd stuff is mainstream now - everyone loves it - so now nerds must dislike their nerd stuff, in order to maintain their exclusive nerd cred. The village must be burned in order to save it. Purify! Exterminatus! Man, I remember back when The Phantom Menace was about to come out and everyone was jazzed about Star Wars again and nerds loving loved it. Finally, something they liked was popular! What happened?
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Dec 25, 2015 00:02
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Jewel Repetition posted:I'm expecting TR-8R to be this generation's Boba Fett. That would be Captain Phasma, actually. Except she actually accomplished less than Boba did. Although I do hear she is signed on for the other movies so maybe she will be vindicated.
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Dec 25, 2015 00:02
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Phylodox posted:Man, I remember back when The Phantom Menace was about to come out and everyone was jazzed about Star Wars again and nerds loving loved it. Finally, something they liked was popular! What happened? Nerd stuff wasn't mainstream then. There weren't a bunch of Marvel and DC movies being made. Game of Thrones wasn't around. Video games were still a niche hobby. The internet was not as widely used, before smart phones. LOTR was just getting started. What has changed is that your average person (and girls, ewww!) engages with traditionally nerdy stuff these days. Nerds are pissed about that. Episode 1 was a long, long time ago. Filthy casuals! Huzanko fucked around with this message at 00:06 on Dec 25, 2015 |
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Dec 25, 2015 00:03
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Phylodox posted:Man, I remember back when The Phantom Menace was about to come out and everyone was jazzed about Star Wars again and nerds loving loved it. Finally, something they liked was popular! What happened? Pretty much the same thing that happened with video games: fans want the prestige of being popular while also keeping it to themselves. Once that stuff actually became popular, there was Chicken Little-ing about how companies wouldn't keep pandering to them, the loyal fans.
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Dec 25, 2015 00:04
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BOAT SHOWBOAT posted:My only real criticism of it is that it tries too hard to distance itself from the prequels at points. Like, it's quite clear that they've specifically avoided any mention of politics - pretty sure there's a sizeable amount of the audience who would get up and leave if the words "Trade Federation" were mentioned. But this caused an issue in understanding what the actual layout of things was. Like, clearly the First Order are ISIS and the blowing up of the five planets is Paris, but who are the Rebels? What are they rebelling against? Are they Blackwater? What was the layout of the Republic? These details are important in a tale of good and evil. "I wont have you question my methods" "they are obviously skilled at high treason, perhaps Supreme Leader Snoke should consider using a clone army." More than enough, they acknowledged their existence. That's all that was needed.
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Dec 25, 2015 00:06
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It's more remix than remake. So what's up with this movie and jackets? Finn ends up with Poe's, and at some point he gives it to Rey. Leia comments on Han's, which she thinks is the same old one but is really new. He wears an overcoat over it, which he leaves at the door of the base and then recovers. Kylo Ren cuts through both jackets while they're being worn, proving them an inferior garment compared to vests. But that's all very preliminary.
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Dec 25, 2015 00:07
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BOAT SHOWBOAT posted:I loved every moment of this movie and was completely immersed. And I wasn't someone who bought into the hype beforehand - a month or so ago I didn't know whether or not I was going to watch this; I was pretty ambivalent on the series - seen the OT and never loved it as much as a lot of other people (although, I'd only ever seen the Special Editions - watching the Despecialized now they've finally 'clicked' for me) and saw the PT as a kid and, never having rewatched them as an adult, never hated them as a lot of others either. My only complaint is that Kylo Ren goes from being a badass to being in tears all the time. I wish he was a more Darth Vader-y character. He's still interesting though.
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Dec 25, 2015 00:08
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I mean personally I think it's awesome that something as geeky as Guardians of the Galaxy was a big blockbuster success and that my 3-year old cousin is gonna grow up loving the superheroes I loved but hey what do I know, I guess I'm just a weirdo who plays video games and occasionally goes outside for maybe a few minutes or so.
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Dec 25, 2015 00:09
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Laurenz posted:My only complaint is that Kylo Ren goes from being a badass to being in tears all the time. I wish he was a more Darth Vader-y character. He's still interesting though. He's more like Vader than he realizes, which is what's great about him.
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Dec 25, 2015 00:09
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Ratios and Tendency posted:They aren't his friends. They slaughter a village and then when the other trooper dies next to him he's like "I'm not dying for these assholes" and defects at the first opportunity. (because he's the .01% of troopers whose brainwashing didn't take/the force) The "traitorrrrrr" parts are great. Because he is a huge traitor. I wish we get just a little bit more on how Finn didn't fit in with the troopers or something, because afaik defecting isn't easy for any soldier, and we never see how disfunctional the first order truly is.
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Dec 25, 2015 00:19
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Viller posted:"I wont have you question my methods" When the super weapon fired I half expected them to blow up Naboo for cheap pops. I was grateful there wasn't anything that seemed to specifically dump on the prequels. They pander to the OT fans a bit much but it's inclusive.
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Dec 25, 2015 00:22
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Wild Horses posted:The "traitorrrrrr" parts are great. Because he is a huge traitor. I wish we get just a little bit more on how Finn didn't fit in with the troopers or something, because afaik defecting isn't easy for any soldier, and we never see how disfunctional the first order truly is. Phasma's one purpose in the story is to kind of maybe give us an idea of the kind of lifestyle stormtroopers have in the First Order: absolute conformity. Finn not firing his blaster and slaughtering innocent people, even among a whole squad of stormtroopers, is noted and slated for disciplinary action. Maxwell Lord posted:I was grateful there wasn't anything that seemed to specifically dump on the prequels. They pander to the OT fans a bit much but it's inclusive. I can't imagine J. J. Abrams doing anything to overtly "dump" on the prequels. There was a story earlier about someone at a meet-and-greet asking Abrams what he thought the Jedi's biggest mistake was, and he flat-out refused to answer the question. It seems to me like the guy knows perfectly well that the popular opinion of the prequels isn't so great, but is terrified of addressing it at all, for fear of offending George Lucas. The one thing you wouldn't want to do as the heir to the Star Wars franchise is piss off the guy who created it all.
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Dec 25, 2015 00:27
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Noam Chomsky posted:But, you see, nerd stuff is mainstream now - everyone loves it - so now nerds must dislike their nerd stuff, in order to maintain their exclusive nerd cred. The village must be burned in order to save it. Purify! Exterminatus! Noam Chomsky posted:Nerd stuff wasn't mainstream then. There weren't a bunch of Marvel and DC movies being made. Game of Thrones wasn't around. Video games were still a niche hobby. The internet was not as widely used, before smart phones. LOTR was just getting started. What has changed is that your average person (and girls, ewww!) engages with traditionally nerdy stuff these days. Nerds are pissed about that. Episode 1 was a long, long time ago. Rofl. Eat a bullet (USER WAS PUT ON PROBATION FOR THIS POST)
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Dec 25, 2015 00:35
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Phylodox posted:That just seems odd. I mean, I can understand not digging, like, a genre or style, but to just like a whole medium? Whoa. Well, it's a couple of my closer friends but yeah. One friend doesn't dislike movies so much as the act of watching a movie. He has ADHD and thinks it's too big a time investment/ difficult for him to focus on a single thing for that long. Every once in a while he'll ask me for a recommendation since we have similar taste, but he doesn't really seek out or watch movies on his own (except Robocop he really likes Robocop). Other friend though just straight dislikes movies, "I have never really liked a movie". I try to get them to watch stuff buuut they're pretty set in their ways. The rest it's like, y'know, they'll see a few big movies in the theatre and maybe watch Shawshank Redemption on TV or something but they don't actively care/I'm not gonna have a chance for conversation.
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Dec 25, 2015 00:48
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Lumpy the Cook posted:Rofl. Eat a bullet more like eat a bowcaster bolt amirite
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Dec 25, 2015 01:11
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BrianWilly posted:I will say that I've watched the film three times and every single time I kinda just blanked through the part where Poe blows up the Starkiller core or whatever. By which I mean, I don't even register that he's successfully crippled the superweapon until after the scene is actually done. ANH was really good about showing the audience the exact parts of the final mission where Luke was failing vs the parts where he was succeeding. TFA needed to be clearer about which times Poe (and his team's) multiple ongoing pew pew explosions were supposed to be ineffective and which times they were supposed to be the money shots. It really wasn't that unclear. They try attacking from outside but they don't succeed in really doing anything, so they resign themselves to just continuing to try even though it probably won't work. Then there is a massive scene which ends with Chewbacca blowing a hole in the side of the Starkiller, then Poe literally says "there's now a hole in the side of the ship, let's go in and blow it up", then he flies in and turns the place into an inferno and whole thing explodes pretty much immediately while Poe flies out whooping and hollering. I'm not sure how much clearer they could have made that whole scene.
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Dec 25, 2015 01:23
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Having seen the movie a second time, I still like it and still think the character arcs all work well, which is certainly what matters most. A far as story, I think all of my complaints could be boiled down to one note: the movie needs to be about the search for Luke, or it needs to be about Starkiller base, it was a mistake for it to try to cram both of those stories into the time allotted. As it is both plotlines come off a bit undercooked, and neither is really all that relevant to the other.
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Dec 25, 2015 01:25
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Maxwell Lord posted:I was grateful there wasn't anything that seemed to specifically dump on the prequels. They pander to the OT fans a bit much but it's inclusive. Counterpoint: ah to be a fly on the wall for the screening and see George Lucas's face when the first line of the movie was 'this will begin to make things right' 
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Dec 25, 2015 01:56
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Noam Chomsky posted:more like eat a bowcaster bolt amirite That reminds me actually, Han Solo and Chewbacca run around the galaxy being shot at by imperials and criminals all the time, for forty plus years, and he never used Chewie's bowcaster one time before TFA? What a shitload of gently caress.
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Dec 25, 2015 02:08
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No Mods No Masters posted:Counterpoint: ah to be a fly on the wall for the screening and see George Lucas's face when the first line of the movie was 'this will begin to make things right' But then he talks about "balance to the Force". That was a nice nod I thought.
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Dec 25, 2015 02:11
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No Mods No Masters posted:Counterpoint: ah to be a fly on the wall for the screening and see George Lucas's face when the first line of the movie was 'this will begin to make things right' Assuming he even cares. Rian Johnson is a fan of the prequels. Who knows what he will put in the the next two movies? Lumpy the Cook posted:That reminds me actually, Han Solo and Chewbacca run around the galaxy being shot at by imperials and criminals all the time, for forty plus years, and he never used Chewie's bowcaster one time before TFA? What a shitload of gently caress. I hope this foreshadows the entire Resistance army using bowcasters by the final movie in the trilogy.
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Dec 25, 2015 02:13
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I'm hype for Rian Johnson and severely unhype for the Jurassic World guy.. what were they thinking?!
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Dec 25, 2015 02:19
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net cafe scandal posted:I'm hype for Rian Johnson and severely unhype for the Jurassic World guy.. what were they thinking?! It's a bit early to get worked up about it. A lot can happen between now and 2019. Josh Trank was supposed to direct a Star Wars movie, too, and look what happened there.
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Dec 25, 2015 02:21
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Phylodox posted:Phasma's one purpose in the story is to kind of maybe give us an idea of the kind of lifestyle stormtroopers have in the First Order: absolute conformity. Finn not firing his blaster and slaughtering innocent people, even among a whole squad of stormtroopers, is noted and slated for disciplinary action. You know what's weird about this is most stormtroopers only have a letter/number combo but Phasma has a name, but she is the conformity enforcer and captain. What's the deal? 
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Dec 25, 2015 02:22
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The MSJ posted:Assuming he even cares. I'm sure he's beyond being mad about it at this point, but I personally imagine an epic eye roll.
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Dec 25, 2015 02:25
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turtlecrunch posted:You know what's weird about this is most stormtroopers only have a letter/number combo but Phasma has a name, but she is the conformity enforcer and captain. What's the deal? You gotta earn your name. EDIT: VV Well, you have to figure that ship designs have gotten better in 30 years. VVV Phylodox fucked around with this message at 02:35 on Dec 25, 2015 |
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Dec 25, 2015 02:26
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Maxwell Lord posted:(Basically the spaceship action needed better choreography and I think some more variation in ship design might have helped.) Apart from the lack of oversight and back and forth, I figured out what was bothering me. It's that ships now turn on a dime, less like airplanes and more video-gamey. Poe's kill streak is the worst example, however cool it may have been. The ships snake around each other, slow as molasses. Ships in Star Wars generally go straight, so seeing Tie Fighters etc doing sharp turns looked strange.
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Dec 25, 2015 02:33
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Daniel Craig's stormtrooper designation was JB-007
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Dec 25, 2015 02:36
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cmndstab posted:It really wasn't that unclear. They try attacking from outside but they don't succeed in really doing anything, so they resign themselves to just continuing to try even though it probably won't work. Then there is a massive scene which ends with Chewbacca blowing a hole in the side of the Starkiller, then Poe literally says "there's now a hole in the side of the ship, let's go in and blow it up", then he flies in and turns the place into an inferno and whole thing explodes pretty much immediately while Poe flies out whooping and hollering. I'm not sure how much clearer they could have made that whole scene. I'm not saying it's impossible to piece out what happened, but it needed to be clearer. It was meant to be a cheer-worthy moment but no one in my three showings -- who cheered at dang near everything from character appearances to minor accomplishments -- understood when exactly the "victory" moment was.
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Dec 25, 2015 02:37
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Lumpy the Cook posted:That reminds me actually, Han Solo and Chewbacca run around the galaxy being shot at by imperials and criminals all the time, for forty plus years, and he never used Chewie's bowcaster one time before TFA? What a shitload of gently caress. Once he meets up with Finn and Rey, he stops just doing the same thing he's always done. He and Leia have a little exchange about how they both drifted back into their respective ruts after Ben did his thing. Those kids are the ones who get him back out of the smuggling game. Naturally it's only after meeting up with them that he even thinks to use a gun other than the gun he always uses.
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Dec 25, 2015 02:37
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