Star Wars: The Force Awakens - Spoilertastic Thread

[Parker_Hylton]

Well, I'd give it a solid 2.5 out of 4.  3 and 1/4 out of 5.  I might give it more or less but I waited 2.5 hours in a theater that only turned out to be half full, so I am trying hard not to work that in to the rating..  I'm also trying to be reasonable with the rating because a whole lot of folks I went to the theater with went "OMG, 4 stars, NOSTALGIA!!!"

The Good:  The acting was good to great.  No one made me go "OMG get that person off the screen."  Kylo Ren really had some good surprises.

The Bad:  The writing was terrible.  The dialog literally made me cringe at times. 

The...well...not going to say it.  But theater actually started to cheer when a certain female character appeared and then changed to gasps.  Seriously.  I went "well hey, she's older, that's understandable."  But then she spoke.  It sounded like a PSA where someone goes "Kids, I ate a bucket of cigarette butts and they tore out my larynx.  Now I breath through a tube.  Don't eat cigarette butts."

Now...it was NOT "A New Hope."  I would still call it a "fun" movie.  Definitely better than average.  And hey, we don't have to bring politics into Star Wars anymore... them thar Storm Troopers is Illinois Nazis!  Everyone hates Illinois Nazis!   I suppose that breaks things for the "I love the bad guys" crowd, but hey, keeps things civil.   

[SJP]

I was at RottenTomatoes earlier and the AFI called it the top movie of 2015.  That I definitely don't agree with.  It was good, but THAT good after only one day of release?  It will most likely be the highest earning movie of the year (possibly all-time, if ticket sales are to be believed), but doing that almost seems like they're trolling Lucas a little bit.

And yeah, Carrie Fisher is pretty smoked out.  But considering how much she has been through in her life, I thought she handled the part as dignified as she could.  I even heard she had to lose weight before they would let her be in it.  I'll give her credit for putting up with crap like that.

But that's something that I noticed that I thought a little off...30 some odd years later, and she's still a Princess, according to C-3P0?  Promote her already!  She's earned it!

[Quantum Vagina]

Not completely.  It's certainly got a lot of notes that it hit, but Star Wars is kind of supposed to be like that anyway.  The whole prequel trilogy was supposed to be a mirror of the original trilogy, so seeing it done like this, too, is no surprise, nor does it ruin anything.  But I do agree with RD that the movie is played very safe.  For all the spoiler-hiding, the movie wastes no time in explaining almost everything people were asking about.  I mean, all the "Is Luke Kylo Ren?" speculation goes out the window in the opening crawl, for Pete's sake.  I get the sense Abrams is so in awe and reverential of Star Wars that he didn't want to upset the apple cart.  He certainly didn't, but he didn't do much to make it stand on its own.  It's a fun watch, but it has yet to make a leap into radically new and exciting territory.

Hey, cool, Abrams actually managed to make the twist not guessable? That's like K-Stew gaining a facial expression every movie! Even if he DID make it the worst possible cop out. I'm reminded of the Cloverfield is about Voltron scenario...

[Kete]

But that's something that I noticed that I thought a little off...30 some odd years later, and she's still a Princess, according to C-3P0?  Promote her already!  She's earned it!

Or demote her. Princess of what? Her people are all dead.

[Quantum Vagina]

I thought her title was General

[Parker_Hylton]

I thought her title was General

Yeah, I seem to recall Finn calling her General Organa several times.

Oh, and you'll be happy to know that Jar Jar Abrams kept the lens-flares to a minimum.  I noticed one really obvious one through the whole movie.  Much better than blinding you with Enterprise bridge console lighting...

[Quantum Vagina]

I don't know. At this point I'm more inclined to believe the critical reviews you guys are giving out vs the fan praise. I just keep remembering that everyone REALLY liked Phantom Menace when it came out... I'll reserve judgement until I see it, sometime this weekend, I hope.

[Kete]

Regarding all the familiar references in the new movie...
I think it was necessary to right the course of the franchise.  We are back on track.  It's proven that we can get a movie that is on par with the originals.  Now we are free to explore new territory.  JJ is safe, yes.  He's the safest bet you could make when it comes to directors.  One of his greatest abilities is to emulate other directors, and he emulated what we hoped Lucas had been.  Now the torch is going to someone different and interesting in Rian Johnson.  I am even more excited now for Episode 8.

[Relaxing Dragon]

But that's something that I noticed that I thought a little off...30 some odd years later, and she's still a Princess, according to C-3P0?  Promote her already!  She's earned it!

If My Little Pony has taught me nothing else, it's that the rank of Princess is generally the pinnacle with regards to rulers who actually want to get things done.

Some other little thoughts:

-The more I think about it, the more I find the score to be my biggest disappointment of the new movie. The original trilogy delivered sounds that have entered the perpetual pop culture consciousness, whether it's the truly iconic stuff like the opening number or the Imperial March, or the smaller stuff (that's also my favorite) like the battle music on Hoth and Endor. Apart from clips of the classic stuff, the new music seemed wholly unremarkable. Which seems to be a modern blockbuster problem in general, I find.

-The humor mostly worked really well, but as others have pointed out, it was occasionally right on the line of being a bit too snarky/cutesy. That's another modern blockbuster sensibility leaking in, though, as that style of humor is pretty par for the course these days (I want to blame the Marvel movies for it. Not their fault that it works for them, but everyone always takes success and tries to blanket apply it).

-All the dialogue callbacks they make, and they *don't* do a "Red One checking in, Red Two checking in..." bit? Ridiculous. That's hardly even a callback at this point, it's just what the series does. And I love those moments!

-Really don't understand how the Galactic government is set up here. We've got the Republic, the New Order, and also the Resistance? Wouldn't it just be the first two? Presumably the Resistance is working in league with the Republic, and also that the Republic is the one in charge, so how is the Resistance a resistance at all? I feel like the movie made things a bit needlessly complicated there.

-Having literally just made my above complaint, I also enjoyed one aspect of the movie's slavish Episode 4 devotion, in that we were just tossed into the wider world of the plot. Major characters and events happen, history is hinted at (love love love those crashed Star Destroyers), and the plot keeps moving through it. Not too heavy on any backstory that isn't directly character related, which is great. Just what we need to really bring out that spark of imagination that Star Wars is so good at bringing out.

-They gotta do a lot of work on Snoke to make him work in the next movies. Because right now he just feels like a cheap Palpatine knock-off. Which is especially discouraging, because nearly every other new character actually has their own identity that isn't just an older character with new paint (well, alright, BB-8 is a new R2, albeit not nearly as stubborn).

-Also really gotta improve the massive space battles. The Falcon chase on the planet was great, but there was hardly anything going on with the X-Wings with regards to their attack on the Death Planet (which actually gets its energy from real stars, so, funnily enough, calling it a Death Star is probably more accurate). The best space battle this series has ever done is still back in Jedi over the forest moon of Endor, and I want something to match that. With new ship designs, too! Or at least don't be afraid to bring back medium frigates, A-Wings, B-Wings, and Y-Wings!

-I liked how Han went out. Having him go out swinging like SJP said might've felt more "right", but I think that makes the actual death all the more tragic (especially since I really can't see Han losing a real fight that badly). This series is really big on the whole father/son betrayal, and given the chaotic internal mess they've got going on with Kylo Ren, I loved that it was a final loss of a son that killed the father. A good reversal of what came before, and very affecting (not the least of which because I just new it was coming moments before, and then my body suddenly realized it was a case of "I'm about to watch Han Solo die", which nobody really wants in life but here we are).

-Modern movies are always casting so young. Makes the big bad New Order general look like a SS Youth Recruiter. Actors exist over the age of 35, Hollywood! And you can give them roles that require more than 5 minutes of screentime!

That's all for now. Seeing the movie again tonight (at a Drafthouse no less! Very exciting), so I'll be able to better take in all there is to see.

[SJP]

But that's something that I noticed that I thought a little off...30 some odd years later, and she's still a Princess, according to C-3P0?  Promote her already!  She's earned it!

Or demote her. Princess of what? Her people are all dead.

True.  But I meant according to when C-3P0 shrugs and says "Princesses," with the unspoken "Am I right?" I know everyone else calls her General, but I thought that one line was a little odd.

I had written a bunch of stuff that got erased because of an unexpected signout, but I'll try to get it back down again without getting too wordy...
J.J. seems to be big on character and dialogue, but light on the showing of epic action, and I think that's what I noticed the most about this one.  Looking back on Super 8, I loved the kids and their Goonies-esque antics, but when the alien shows up and the army attacks it, you see very little of the actual fighting, with most of it hidden behind houses and in darkness.  Star Trek, there's only a little bit of ship-to-ship combat (and even a lot of that was Spock flying around in the little single-person ship), but plenty of hand-to-hand fisticuffs (I didn't see Into Darkness, so can't comment on that).  On Star Wars, you expect a lot of starships whizzing around and blowing stuff up, or battlefields filled with all sort of aliens and stormtroopers and robots going at it, and not getting lost in the shuffle.  Abrams doesn't do that.  He plays to his strengths, but it is easy to notice a big difference in scale when the two biggest action sequences involve three spaceships and a lightsaber duel.

It does make me more excited for the other two films, though.  I haven't seen Looper or Brick, but know OF them, and think that edgier, more cerebral thing will work for a middle segment, even if Rian Johnson is similar in a small-scale style.  But Colin will make the third one a popcorn show, and if it's written well, that'll be a...uh, that'll be a thing to see.

-The more I think about it, the more I find the score to be my biggest disappointment of the new movie. The original trilogy delivered sounds that have entered the perpetual pop culture consciousness, whether it's the truly iconic stuff like the opening number or the Imperial March, or the smaller stuff (that's also my favorite) like the battle music on Hoth and Endor. Apart from clips of the classic stuff, the new music seemed wholly unremarkable. Which seems to be a modern blockbuster problem in general, I find.

This, too.  I can't recall or hum any piece of music from it that wasn't from the other movies.

[Parker_Hylton]

This, too.  I can't recall or hum any piece of music from it that wasn't from the other movies.

I could.  Let me es-plain.  In the scene on the attack on (Jakka?) right at the beginning when Kylo Ren's ship landed they had a whole new score that sounded slightly similar to the Darth Vader theme but was still completely different and new.  I thought "Awesome, now I'll have to learn a whole bunch of new 'scores' for the characters!" and I was fairly impressed with the new KR theme...

I didn't hear that song again the ENTIRE movie...If they had REPLAYED it a few times like they should have...people would probably have remembered it.

[Relaxing Dragon]

This, too.  I can't recall or hum any piece of music from it that wasn't from the other movies.

I could.  Let me es-plain.  In the scene on the attack on (Jakka?) right at the beginning when Kylo Ren's ship landed they had a whole new score that sounded slightly similar to the Darth Vader theme but was still completely different and new.  I thought "Awesome, now I'll have to learn a whole bunch of new 'scores' for the characters!" and I was fairly impressed with the new KR theme...

I didn't hear that song again the ENTIRE movie...If they had REPLAYED it a few times like they should have...people would probably have remembered it.

I'll keep an ear out for that when I watch it again tonight. I'm always hunting for a good new sound, and I'll admit, I tend to not notice the score as much on my first viewing of a movie (my mind's too occupied with everything else that's happening onscreen). Really, really wish there was a moment where the score forced itself front and center. Like I said before, even The Phantom Menace managed to do that one thing extraordinarily well. Movies shouldn't be too afraid to let us hear them.

[Kete]

As Im mentioned in the other thread, this is almost 100% spot on:
http://makingstarwars.net/2015/05/a-compiled-synopsis-of-star-wars-the-force-awakens/

I just hope that Rey is not related.  Also, I really hope that Fin is truly just a stormtrooper.

[soguru]

Just one thing... I still think it's important to have spoilers even in this thread, mostly because if somebody clicks the "show posts" links under your username on your profile, it will show ALL your posts, and that has the potential for seeing spoilers.

[SJP]

OK.  Went back and edited the 'big stuff.'  I think what's left out to see is nothing that should offend anyone who casually looks through.