Author Topic: [SPOILERS] Star Wars Episode 7: Ticking All The Wrong Boxes [SPOILERS]  (Read 43980 times)

genesis063

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Re: Star Wars Episode 7: Ticking All The Wrong Boxes
« Reply #75 on: 2015-12-23 05:17:37 »
I guess people don't understand how Sith train their apprentices.  He learns the bare bones basic to fulfill the main guys agenda at the time.  This is evident by him only showing a few force abilities.  As for flashy combat I totally disagree the prequels where far more flashy and put it to shame.  Plus the most ludicrous insult I ever saw in this thread is the beef with the woman being all super bull crap.  Did you guys see the same movie I did?  She was salvaging parts ever since she has been on that rock and your telling me in all the years alone she didn't learn anything about what she was digging up or taking apart?  Also Obi Wan didn't teach Luke much of anything and he used the force to bring the lightsaber to him to cut himself down on Hoth.  There have been several instances of the force acting through people.  Finally did you guys forget this was a Disney film?  None of this is new they have female protagonist and different racial backgrounds in a bunch of movies.  I except that not everyone will like this movie and it got its share of problems but at least do your homework and give better criticism over stuff that hasn't been explained through the countless source books out there.

Tekkie.X

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Re: Star Wars Episode 7: Ticking All The Wrong Boxes
« Reply #76 on: 2015-12-23 13:44:56 »
I liked that the saber fights were simple like in the original trilogy and not spiny flippy retardedness like the prequels.

gjoerulv

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Re: Star Wars Episode 7: Ticking All The Wrong Boxes
« Reply #77 on: 2015-12-29 07:03:36 »
Yup, saw it yesterday. I went in as blind as I could (only saw trailers; tried to avoid opinions about it, though that was pretty impossible).
SPOILER AHEAD! probably...

My notes:

Pacing... It moved, at times, too fast forward, not giving me enough time to digest the scenes. There was generally little room to breathe. This kind of movie making (or writing in general) isn't inherently bad, but is often used to "a-muse" the audience. As in avoid them from thinking too much, or rather, do the thinking for them. As there were plenty of filler material in the movie they should, imo, remove those parts and add some "slow-the-hell-down" scenes in.

Too much action and "ohmygodwesurvived" moments. Kinda related to the point above as much action = fast pace. The action was good. However, in my case, it got exponentially harder to buy that these guys could survive it all. The latter point is, in some sense, true for the original Star Wars as well, but the original didn't have all these "amazing" action scenes to make them even less believable. The above being said, the action was pretty solid, imo. You truly felt the blasters. If sci-fi action is all you need (which I know plenty of people are content with), then you can't go wrong by this movie.

Plot holes, bad writing and such. Probably the movies biggest sin. SPOILER: For example. R2D2's conveniently recovering at the end just to serve the plot. I could buy it if there was any explanation at all, but there was none. "Oh time to find Luke, R2D2 activate!". And how did Poe (was that his name?) escape from Jakku again? Luckily the movie has plenty of characters, action and setting to salvage (at least some) the bad writing etc, for many people. But if you're like me, a consistent story without plot-holes should be the framework to fit the other parts in. Bad writing isn't automatically forgiven by the beforementioned. This point, however, is more or less true for all Star Wars movies.

Characters. To be honest I was pleasantly surprised by the characters. Most of them felt like Star Wars characters. I see many people digging Finn, and i can see why, but imo, it was really hard to read this guy. SPOILERS As i see it, he was supposed to be the face of doubt as a storm-trooper, however, all his actions and motivations felt kinda forced. Probably because he had no back-story. Maybe that was the point? Beeing an infant-minded grown-man, confused and scarred?
The part i feared the most was that SPOILERS Kylo Ren would be a Darth Vader clone. Luckily he wasn't. May be debatable, but to me he turned out very different than DV. But that silver cloaked storm-trooper captain was a waste of space.

The nostalgia catering. Ok, it's fine to pull on the nostalgia string, but, my God, did they have to copy the original? I wouldn't mind a few scenes, but when they blatantly, in-your-face, not hiding it at all, copy the overall structure, to me, that is very cheap. I don't know what else to say. Sure they did it on purpose, and obviously sold it that way. Still, it's cheap.

Despite all the crap I've said, I'm glad I saw it. Not being a huge Star Wars fan, I don't really care that much if there are inconsistencies with the other movies, the expanded universe, etc. I've always viewed Star Wars as simple, sci-fi action flicks with some deeper elements to them. As such, episode 7 was good fun (unlike episode 1 and 2). My favorite moment in the movie was the SPOILER final light-saber fight. It felt real and personal. Too bad they conveniently got split up by the planet splitting haha!

TMTDNR:
I'm not in fan of numeric ratings as pretty much everyone scales differently, but if it helps as a visual representation of my opinion: on a bad day: 4/10. On a good day: 7/10. On an average day 6/10. But I've only seen it once, so, yeah, shrug.

DLPB_

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Re: Star Wars Episode 7: Ticking All The Wrong Boxes
« Reply #78 on: 2015-12-29 19:02:26 »
Thanks for that :)  Yeah, it's safe to say I'd hate it.  I can't sit through a film littered with plot holes, and I really dislike fast paced films that are doing it as compensation for story / character development (like the Nolan Batman films which I also dislike).  But at least you got some entertainment value out of it, which is more than I would.

StickySock

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Re: Star Wars Episode 7: Ticking All The Wrong Boxes
« Reply #79 on: 2015-12-30 00:40:50 »
I didn't really read through the thread but I recently saw the film and thought I'd share my opinion. (EDIT: this was on purpose to see if after posting anyone shared my opinion).


SPOILERS AHEAD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!





The movie had some good moments, but was ultimately squandered potential.

Spoiler: show
Pros -

Finn & Poe were likable, relatable, and funny.
Han Solo & Chewy had respectably large roles in the movie are were excellent.
The opening sequence was pretty cool.
There were a lot of actual costumes and not a complete reliance on CGI.

Cons -

Blatant feminist girl-power strawberries where they waste several lines of dialogue beating you over the head that Rey is a girl but doesn't need help or saving.

They repeat that strawberries multiple times throughout the movie, all the way up until the "rescue" team is again not "allowed" to rescue the girl, because she got out of it on her own.

Rey randomly learns advanced Jedi powers without any guidance just days after finding out that Jedi's were actually real from Han Solo, while it took Luke Skywalker a trilogy of movies to be on that level.

Rey is overall a generic Mary Sue character who has little difficulty overcoming any hardships that come her way, making her struggle very little if at all during the events of the movie. (She randomly decides to try the Jedi mind-trick and succeeds while captive. She is apparently an amazing pilot, and rarely ever misses with a blaster despite the fact she has little or no training with one. She even chastises Han Solo for offering one to her, stating yet again that she doesn't need it because she's such a badass chick. She bests a sith-in-training who has trained his entire life to one day rival the strength of Darth Vader by remembering that the force is real halfway through the fight, giving her extraordinary lightsaber fighting prowess that overwhelms Kylo Ren.)

Finn, although funny, is made out to be a bumbling idiot way too often. Han Solo and Luke Skywalker both had their strengths and weaknesses, making them and interesting pair. In this movie they are so focused on making you think Rey is a badass that they make Finn basically completely useless. I'm pretty sure Rey is better with a blaster than Finn, although it was what Finn was raised to do his entire life.

Kylo Ren himself was a wasted opportunity. Instead of making a character who is truly torn between his family and his grandfather's legacy, and showing what lead him to believe his grandfather was truly special (they could have shown Snook lying to Kylo to convince him that Luke and Leia somehow betrayed Vader because they were afraid of his power or something), they made Kylo Ren out to be some angsty teen who can't decide if one minute he's super evil or the next if he's gonna go cry and cut himself.

Han Solo's death was wasted, and offered no character development for Kylo Ren. It could have been the moment where he finally stopped being a pansy and became a cold, calculated killer, but that obviously didn't happen. Instead Han died because Harrison Ford didn't want to do any more movies, and Kylo Ren was the same person after killing him that he was before.

The movie in general had a structure ripped straight from episode IV, but done worse in almost every way.

A lot of scenes which could have been more impactful had extra effects, explosions, or artificial tension for no reason. The most remarkable being when Finn thought Poe died by seeing the wrecked tie-fighter, and instead of seeing its burning wreckage and solemnly mourning the loss, the fighter had to sink with CGI effects, and if that weren't enough, it had to explode after, as if to fill an explosion per minute screen time quota.

The movie was too fast-paced, where nearly every scene where people are talking is immediately followed by action. And every task they have to do is a very bombastic, life or death situation, with impossible odds and outcomes, stealing some of the thunder from the climax of the film because they had already been pulling stunts like that every five minutes of the movie.

I applauded them for using real costumes for some of the alien races, but the CGI aliens that were there were awful, especially the alien that gave rations out to Rey in exchange for junk. It looked absolutely awful, and even the worst costume you could find would have worked better.

Did I mention the movie gives you no reason to care about Rey? No details about her family or how she grew up on her planet other than she was a "scavenger" of old parts. She was shown being abandoned as a child, but at that young of age it is hard to believe she grew up independent in a "scavenger" environment. Even the horrid episode I at least made Anakin a slave child and gave you some back story, even if the movie itself was a joke.

I also found the actress portraying Rey, was probably the least impressive actress/actor in the movie (even though the movie was generally well-acted). I couldn't tell any of her expressions apart for the majority of the movie, and the reaction she had after she ran away from the lightsaber legitimately looked as though she was constipated. Before she ran away you had no idea what she was thinking, whether she was happy, sad, confused, sick, dying, had to use the restroom, etc.

Last but not least: "Supreme Emperor" Snook looked like a massive Gollum/Smeagol from The Hobbit/LOTR films with a couple gashes on his head. I'm not even kidding. People say he will look less ridiculous because his size was just a hologram, but I'm not concerned with his size. He just looks utterly ridiculous.

There are more complaints but I'm tired and writing sloppy enough as it is.

Overall, I'd rank this movie even with episode III in terms of quality. The movie is pretty crappy and not very well done, although it did have some cool moments and ideas that could have had potential. But it never capitalized on any of its own ideas or potential, and was too busy reminding you that CGI danger was present, but that Rey was such a badass that you shouldn't worry about her JUST BECAUSE SHE'S A GIRL!!!!!!!!!!!




« Last Edit: 2015-12-30 15:40:11 by Covarr »

gjoerulv

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Re: Star Wars Episode 7: Ticking All The Wrong Boxes
« Reply #80 on: 2015-12-30 07:39:17 »
Spoiler warning (if you care)

Forgot to mention Rey... How could I...

...
Blatant feminist girl-power strawberries where they waste several lines of dialogue beating you over the head that Rey is a girl but doesn't need help or saving.

They repeat that strawberries multiple times throughout the movie, all the way up until the "rescue" team is again not "allowed" to rescue the girl, because she got out of it on her own.
...

I remember the specific part you mention here, but other than that I didn't find the movie blatantly feminist friendly. Sure, Rey was kind of a mary sue character, but I didn't get the "I'm-strong-because-I'm-female-and-don't-need-any-help" vibe from the movie. I think you specifically have to look for it to see it. But, hey, maybe I'll see it too if I see it again with my googles adjusted accordingly lol. I did find it annoying how she just knew how to do everything, but her being a female had nothing to do with it in my case.

In the start of the movie I had no problem with her. Sure, I'll buy that she survives as a scavenger, and is good at it, no problem. Ok, she knows how to fight with that stick, that's cool. After that it just got in your face more and more. Sigh, ok, she knows how to handle the falcon, that's borderline acceptable, but then she knows how to fix it too?? Come on!! And, off course, she's a natural blaster expert after a minimal amount of time. Why isn't she the president of space again?!?

Maybe her backstory will explain why she is such a wonder woman. Until then I have the right to call bullstrawberries on her "perfection".

EQ2Alyza

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I have edited the topic with SPOILER tags since we've gotten to that level of discussion now. Please continue marking your posts with SPOILER warnings as well.

I agree, we need spoiler tags on these forums. The best I've seen is highlighting your text in the color white.

Covarr

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I agree, we need spoiler tags on these forums.
Spoiler: show
I agree too. ~Covarr

Vgr

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Spoiler: show
I agree too. ~Covarr


Someone's been messing with some modules :D

EQ2Alyza

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Relf

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I enjoyed it, I felt the parallels to the original weren't too distracting. Outside of how consuming enough media all plots will seem rehashed to some extent the movie felt largely like a prelude. "Here are new characters in a familiar setting with a familiar plot line. The Empire is still building doomsday devices, the Rebels are still fighting back in their X-Wings, the Jedi are still in hiding."

After the backlash the prequels got, perhaps it's not surprising they took a safer route. I imagine the future movies will deviate much more greatly and perhaps it's best to remember the stories are part of a greater whole. As an introduction to new characters and the dispatching of old ones, I felt like it did its job though it's by no means a stand-alone movie.

Funny to still see so many old faces hanging around this forum, almost a decade later.

EDIT: Can you believe it? My Avater finally expired off Mirex's trashbin.
« Last Edit: 2015-12-31 05:40:16 by Relf »

obesebear

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Managed to avoid all spoilers and saw it earlier tonight.

Really fun movie. I thoroughly enjoyed all the nods to the original trilogy. Easily better than the prequels. You can tell Abrams wanted to make it more like the original movies, but it's just not as good. The wow factor and feeling of being involved in an epic story are almost there, just not quite. That being said, I would see it in theaters again and am very excited to see what the next movie has in store

nfitc1

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You can tell Abrams wanted to make it more like the original movies, but it's just not as good.

This, but it's trying too hard to ultimately be as good. There was something threatening about the Death Star because there wasn't anything like that in cinema before. This....thing that they make into the next super weapon is just strange. The concept makes no sense and the rules of its operation change mid-movie.

There's a HUGE list of what I liked and disliked about the movie overall. I'll eventually finish typing it and post it here. I keep starting it and getting interrupted because it takes so long to write up. :P

KnifeTheSky77

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The wow factor and feeling of being involved in an epic story are almost there, just not quite.

I kind of agree here. I think all of the previous star wars movies were around 3 hours long, but this new one felt a lot shorter to me for some reason. This film definitely provided a lot of setup for the next one.

obesebear

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This, but it's trying too hard to ultimately be as good. There was something threatening about the Death Star because there wasn't anything like that in cinema before. This....thing that they make into the next super weapon is just strange. The concept makes no sense and the rules of its operation change mid-movie.

There's a HUGE list of what I liked and disliked about the movie overall. I'll eventually finish typing it and post it here. I keep starting it and getting interrupted because it takes so long to write up. :P
Exactly.  To be fair, I think I read that the process of absorbing a sun as a weapon is actually used in the Extended Universe, so it could have been a nod to that
I kind of agree here. I think all of the previous star wars movies were around 3 hours long, but this new one felt a lot shorter to me for some reason. This film definitely provided a lot of setup for the next one.
I actually looked it up right after watching it because I thought it felt shorter, too.  Turns out A New Hope, Phantom Menace, and Force Awakens are all 2h 16m.  I think it's because Force Awakens seems to have more action in it than the others, so it goes by faster.

DLPB_

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That kind of thing is precisely why I don't like films like this. The very idea of "absorbing the sun" is completely impossible and totally lame brained.  It destroys all suspension of disbelief for a cheap gimmick.  And it's also not remotely clever or good sci-fi.  If someone wanted to destroy life on a planet, all they'd need to do is use a mass driver (like in Babylon 5) to catapult large rocks.  That's a practical weapon that may even one day be possible. 

Absorbing the sun isn't - even remotely.  It's just ridiculous, and a symptom of a rather VERY thick writer.

The original death star didn't go into the hows and whys of the science behind the super weapon.  It didn't need to because that wasn't important.  And it wasn't so ridiculous that I sat there thinking "lol".  You can believe that they had some form of fusion power to generate the enormous energy (although, that's also v unlikely), but the second you go too far, or start giving absurd reasoning, you lose the audience.  Or, at least, you lose me and many others.

I appreciate that not everyone thinks that way, but a good number of people do - but they aren't catered for. The people catered for massively are people who think "Biggerer Death Star = betterer Death Star"
« Last Edit: 2016-01-03 05:01:10 by DLPB »

obesebear

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People using telekinesis and wielding swords made of solid light also requires suspension of disbelief. A weapon that harnesses the sun's nuclear power doesn't seem that outside the realm of possibility.

I have a much bigger gripe about a highly trained force user being bested by a force user who only started discovering her power an hour or two prior to their duel

DLPB_

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Well the latter is another symptom of poor writing, but to me it's not in the same league has absorbing a whole star.  It's still piss poor, though.

KnifeTheSky77

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From a scifi, pseudo science perspective, a sun is basically the most energy dense object in its solar system. It isn't completely unreasonable to assume that a space faring civilization would want to do something with the free energy. It's also star wars, it's never NOT been kind of outlandish. I don't know what you were expecting lol

DLPB_

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From a scifi, pseudo science perspective, a sun is basically the most energy dense object in its solar system. It isn't completely unreasonable to assume that a space faring civilization would want to do something with the free energy. It's also star wars, it's never NOT been kind of outlandish. I don't know what you were expecting lol

You've completely missed the point of my argument and are also trying to annoy me with "lol" childish comments.

I wasn't expecting anything that I would call decent or to my tastes, and indeed that proved to be the case.  Have you even read my first post here - or the title of this thread?

Furthermore, this isn't about harnessing the sun's power.  We do that all the time here on Earth...  Ever heard of solar power?  This is about absorbing an entire sun and completely severing the audience (many who will be sci-fi fans) from the fiction - all for a cheap gimmick.  Internal logic is important for a fiction.  Evidently, not for you - which is why you run away penning 10/10 reviews everywhere. Once your writing has degraded to the point that anything can happen for any reason, it is no longer real writing. It's sloppy, basic, brainless, and cheap. The exception to this is comedy, of course - like cartoons. But even that depends on the setting.  I wouldn't bat an eye lid at a sun being absorbed in a Looney Toons cartoon. But in a science fiction set mostly within the confines of our own physics- I expect, you know, some actual logic and science.

You are right that Star Wars has never been totally pure "sci-fi", but the original trilogy was a mostly solid piece of fiction. This is not. In fact, one of the major criticisms that the Prequels received is that they were way too cartoonish and wrecked tension in scenes. This film has the exact same problem in places, but seems to be getting a free pass compared.
« Last Edit: 2016-01-05 08:15:31 by DLPB »

Vgr

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[...] and are also trying to annoy me with "lol" childish comments.

I don't think so, no. To me, this look just like a way to relax the discussion and not make it feel like you're in a political debate. From my perspective, he was simply trying to ease the tone of his argument, not annoy or attack anyone.

DLPB_

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I don't think so, no. To me, this look just like a way to relax the discussion and not make it feel like you're in a political debate. From my perspective, he was simply trying to ease the tone of his argument, not annoy or attack anyone.

Haha. Bollocks.
« Last Edit: 2016-01-05 13:12:02 by DLPB »

Vgr

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Bollocks. That whole post he made was lacking substance and clearly just trying to annoy.  But from now on I will respond to him with "lol". We'll see how long it is before I'm taking to task over it. Ok?

Go back to my warning at the end of the previous page; I specifically say that anything that has previously happened is irrelevant from this point onwards. I gave everyone a second chance, it would be a bad idea to waste it.

To be clear, I am not taking any side. I'm being as objective as I can, but I'm still human. My interpretation and your interpretation are going to differ - of course they're going to differ. I could be wrong, but keep in mind that you could be, too. Please don't fall into provocation or arrogance :)

DLPB_

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« Last Edit: 2016-01-06 05:40:19 by DLPB »

Bosola

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Star Wars: Episode VII was quite an achievement! Specifically, what it achieved was to make George Lucas retrospectively appear a competent and inventive steward of the series. It was not a sequel, it was a reboot in exactly the same manner as all the other franchise reboots from the last five years: a vampiric pastiche of everyone's treasured memories from the original series, leaping from scene to scene hell for leather, relying on the fans' memory of Ep. IV/V to give those scenes meaning and plot significance when the film itself can't be bothered to.

It is quite a cynical and lifeless film, and I'm left wondering if Star Wars is really a franchise trapped by its reputation, too expensive and too big to innovate further. What once seemed like intransigence on Lucas' part now seems quite wise - he never let fan expectation box in his vision, even if that meant taking a few missteps now and then. His films always tried to expand the universe and the franchise, and whilst aiming his films at kids alienated many fans, at least Lucas tried to grow the franchise, in that sense, not just sit on top of it like Disney and collect its annual Star Wars tithe. I think we will never see another truly exciting Star Wars film again.
« Last Edit: 2016-01-13 20:09:38 by Bosola »