A month, a year, has come and gone since The Force Awakens was released. Opening night I wanted to start a discussion, but with how the Blog works, I was afraid of spoilers just showing up. So I've waited, I've used the patience those Jedi keep talking about.
So let's talk Star Wars: The Force Awakens.
What did you think of it? The plot. The characters. Where the story is going.
I've got some theories of my own that I'm dying to talk about
A lot of things are badly done in this movie due to rushing.
The afro dude switches sides just like that, there is no buildup. After which, the rebels accept him just like that, there is no suspicion.
The lass learns force tricks out of the blue, just like that, without any teachings. Then she picks up a lightsaber for the first time and wins the fight. Again, rushed.
The "new Death Star" planet appears just like that in the middle of the movie, no announcements, no build up. Then it blows up some planets noone cares about, noone even knows. Then the rebels gather and for just under 2 minutes devise a plan to destroy it. And succeed. Also, some of it is too cheap - if the Millenium Falcon can fly through shields in hyperspace, why didn't they use it in RotJ, would have saved them the whole Endor saga.
Kylo Ren gets lots of hate, but for me he was one of the better things in the film. I've seen my fair share of seemingly invincible Star Wars villains who were only done in by their own arrogance and overconfidence - Vader, Maul, Dooku, Palpatine. Here is a villain in the process of making, he starts the movie as a badass, then slowly his flaws and weaknesses are shown. Also here we have a dark side character who is tempted by the light (as we've also seen our fair share of the opposite).
So the one time they tried to do something original in this film, they did it right. Which is sad, as it shows this movei could have been much, much more.
Dismember? He only gets a cut on the face from what I've seen.
A lot of things in the prequels too were criticized and then got "interesting interpretations", some by Lucas himself. If somethings needs an after-the-movie interpretation to explain it, then it's poorly done in the movie itself, I think we can agree on that
Actually, Kylo Ren was my second favourite character of that movie. This one was my favourite:
But seriously now, this guy shows what was wrong with the movie. Finn gets a lightsaber and Disney was like: "Oh, we gave him lightsaber, now it would be cool to see him fight with it. But he can´t deflect blaster lasers, we have to come up with something." BAM! Regular Stormtrooper with plasma police baton appears out of blue and kicks Finn´s ass.
Don´t get me wrong, it was cool to see non-jedi with lightsaber, but this would have worked much better if that Stormtrooper was one of Ren´s "Black guard" in my opinion. I mean, everyone shoots all around with blasters, but one Stormtrooper is camping with police baton, waiting for his opportunity? Come on!
People keep saying this. There's a difference between borrowing heavily from A New Hope when it comes to plot and it being a remake of A New Hope. Yes, I agree it borrows too heavily from A New Hope, but those elements aren't the point of the movie.
Empire going after Secret Plans and Death Star being destroyed aren't the point. The first is only there to kick off the story and the later takes place in the background. The story is about the characters, not Starkiller base and the map.
The afro dude switches sides just like that, there is no buildup. After which, the rebels accept him just like that, there is no suspicion.
I saw the whole point is it being a rash decision on Fin's part. We get enough of his backstory later in the film to make it a reasonable reaction. Fin was taken as an infant by the First Order, given a serial number and treated like the clones; disposable workforce and army. He's assigned to handle sanitation and is suddenly thrown into combat. He has never been exposed to the grim reality of combat and it clearly traumatizes him in that opening scene.
His actions after this are all him thinking on his feet, trying to get away from this until he gets attached to Rey.
He also had the endorsement of Han Solo and Poe Dameron, finished Poe's mission, and fought against the First Order. There's no reason to think he's a double agent or saboteur.
The lass learns force tricks out of the blue, just like that, without any teachings. Then she picks up a lightsaber for the first time and wins the fight. Again, rushed.
I really think this complaint is too early. There's definitely a backstory to Rey we haven't been told yet, and it's wrapped up in the Force or Jedi. I'm quite annoyed with the saber fight complaints as well. It wasn't some acrobatic nonsense from the prequels. It was two people just bashing each other with light sabers. The combat was just like what we had in the original trilogy.
The "new Death Star" planet appears just like that in the middle of the movie, no announcements, no build up. Then it blows up some planets noone cares about, noone even knows. Then the rebels gather and for just under 2 minutes devise a plan to destroy it. And succeed. Also, some of it is too cheap - if the Millenium Falcon can fly through shields in hyperspace, why didn't they use it in RotJ, would have saved them the whole Endor saga.
I agree with most of this. Putting aside the physics of Star Killer base and how it drains stars (just fucking stupid unless it can move to other stars), I don't hate this thing existing. My biggest issue with it is destroying it in the first movie. I really think it should have just been critically disabled and it can feature in later movies for something or another.
The planets they blew up were apparently in the same system as Maz Kinata's little planet. I thought that was stupid. Might as well blow up Coruscant. We know that's where the Senate is, and General Ham ranted about destroying the Republic's Senate. A few planets in Republic space we've never heard of and conveniently close enough to our protagonists felt like the director thought the audience was too stupid to piece anything else together.
Shield thing flies with me. There are different types of shielding in Star Wars. Point is you'd have to bee an idiot to attempt that maneuver.
Kylo Ren gets lots of hate, but for me he was one of the better things in the film. I've seen my fair share of seemingly invincible Star Wars villains who were only done in by their own arrogance and overconfidence - Vader, Maul, Dooku, Palpatine. Here is a villain in the process of making, he starts the movie as a badass, then slowly his flaws and weaknesses are shown. Also here we have a dark side character who is tempted by the light (as we've also seen our fair share of the opposite).
Absolutely. Kyle Ren was my favorite character in this movie.
Tom, I'm sure there are explanations for all of the above. The issue is, however, as already discussed above, that if something needs an explanation after the movie, then it was not done well in the movie in the first place. There is a thing in storytelling called "buildup" - you feel the tension rising and then it resolves somehow. There is no buildup in the develompment of the Ray and Finn characters, they just jump from one state to another at a given point with no transition period. For example - if someone was taken as a child and brainwashed into an FO crone, there is no way a single act of Order violence would remove years of brainwashing and suddenly cause him do desire defection; his change of heart would be a process, not a snap.
As for the systems, you're incorrect: Maz's castle is on Takodana (http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Takodana) a planet in the Mid Rim, Western Reaches, while the destroyed system was the Hosnian System (http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Hosnian_system) which is in the Core Worlds. That causes another problem - how the fEck would that beam be visible hundreds of lightyears away in realtime and, most importantly, how would the exploding planets be visible hundreds of lightyears away in realtime; then again Star Wars was never big on General Relativity
I don't like Rey and TR-8R should have been Captain Phasma. It actually makes no sense that it wasn't.
I like Kylo Ren and people saying he is a whiney emo clearly don't understand real characteristics or how the force works. I like Fin but they could done better at showing him breaking out of his First Order indoctrination, or at least tried at all.
The movie is entertaining but I'm not sure it's a "good" movie. If people weren't so starved for a good Star Wars movie or riled up by Disney hype then I don't thin people would be giving it so much of a pass.
I'm looking forward to Rogue One more.
The Star Forge was powered by a star, granted, its surely a lot more mobile than a gutted planet. Also, as TvTropes has pointed out, they compared the dueling to fencing. When the Jedi grew complacent, as their were fewer out and out Sith to fight, they grew used to fighting non Lightsaber users, and became more ¨flashy¨ and acrobatic by the end of the Old Republic, with the lightsaber wielders in the original trilogy reverting to a more pragmatic fighting style.
Though you have to afmit, there were a couple prequel fights that rocked