Star Wars Spoilers Thread [Spoilers]

ccs · Dec 18, 2015

Hmm. I guess my overall rating for this Episode would be: Entertaining.
About a C+. (It loses major points for being Episode IV, Redux.)
Seriously, if I hadn't seen the original? This would've been pretty good. Alas....

The good:
* Practical effects
* I liked Rey, Finn, & Po. And BB8 to an extent.
* Harrison Ford.

The bad:
* I've been watching Episode 4 & versions of it for almost 40 years already.
* Kyle Ren - Well, for the moment he's better than Anikin. But he's still in the catagory of Who-Cares, Kill him off & bring in an interesting villain.
* Third act is completely pointless. The good guys know where the target is. Know how to bypass the shields. And instead of hitting the capacitor with entire droid crewed ships popping out of warp just above it (just crash into it at near LS)? Opt to send in just 3 people with charges, followed by an x-wing strike - that is 100% reliant upon that shield coming down & virtually gauanteed to cost apparently scarce resources (pilots/ships). And this plan is devised/aurhorized by the vets who've done this all before. ???
At the very least send in more ground commandos aboard the Falcon! (They did it in Jedi!)
* Alot of time could be saved if they'd just rebooted R2....
* A scattered map leading to Luke? Why?? Well, I guess that could be the thread for episodes 8 & 9. Go here, go there, encounter bad guys, etc. But they wrap that up right before the credits roll with a simple jump to lightspeed.
* The good guys are the "resistance" & seem to have limited resources. WHY? As in why isn't the Republic itself fighting against the 1st order?
Yes, I realize some of that would make for a dull movie.

delericho · Dec 18, 2015

horacethegrey said:
- Luke's absence. I mean WTF? Why is the last remaining Jedi AWOL during the New Republic's darkest hour? I mean it's what sets off the plot of the film, but Luke is the last person you'd expect to leave his friends and family in dire straights and go hopping around the galaxy. There'd better be a good reason for why he's rarely been seen in upcoming sequels.

Ah, well, Han and Leia went through this, though they didn't realise they were talking about Luke too - when the kid went bad, they each went back to the thing that they're best at. Han went back to smuggling, Leia went back to running a revolt against tyrants.

As for Luke, he's a Jedi. And when a Jedi's student goes bad, they proceed to go into a self-imposed exile until such time as the next generation of chosen one comes of age. At which point, R2-D2 will lead the kid to the master to be half-trained in the Jedi arts.

Morrus · Dec 18, 2015

Interesting casting notes -- movie stars who just wanted to be in a Star Wards film, I guess1

Apparently the stormtrooper who threatened to tighten Rey's restraints before she mind-tricked him was Daniel Craig.

One of the aliens on Jakku who Rey deals with - the one handing out the food rations - was Simon Pegg.

horacethegrey · Dec 18, 2015

delericho said:
Ah, well, Han and Leia went through this, though they didn't realise they were talking about Luke too - when the kid went bad, they each went back to the thing that they're best at. Han went back to smuggling, Leia went back to running a revolt against tyrants.

As for Luke, he's a Jedi. And when a Jedi's student goes bad, they proceed to go into a self-imposed exile until such time as the next generation of chosen one comes of age. At which point, R2-D2 will lead the kid to the master to be half-trained in the Jedi arts.

Yeah. I suddenly realized that Luke would feel doubly bad about the situation with Kylo Ren, seeing as he was the one who trained him. And Ren did kill the rest of Luke's apprentices so I imagine that failure weighs heavily upon his shoulders. I'm guessing in Episode VIII he'll be in the same position as Yoda was in The Empire Strikes Back and be a reluctant mentor to Rey.

Morrus said:
Interesting casting notes -- movie stars who just wanted to be in a Star Wards film, I guess1

Apparently the stormtrooper who threatened to tighten Rey's restraints before she mind-tricked him was Daniel Craig.

One of the aliens on Jakku who Rey deals with - the one handing out the food rations - was Simon Pegg.

I knew about Pegg as I saw him in the Comic-Con footage, but Craig was a complete surprise for me. Heh. Not many people know he's a geek.

Orlax · Dec 18, 2015

This movie was frickin awesome. I love what was done with it, and how's it was done. The imagery, and symbolism, and thematic ties to previous films in the series were just excellent. There's a whole bunch to dissect in this movie, but some of those discussions might get a little heated so for now I'm just going to enjoy a day of the afterglow, and get back into some detailed dissection later this weekend (possibly after I see it again there's some details I need to get a second time because I missed then the first time).

billd91 · Dec 18, 2015

Morrus said:
I have a question about the scene on the bridge with Kylo Ren and han.

So, Kylo gives the little speech to Han about how he has all this pain inside him and will Han help him, and Han says "yes, anything".

So I was kinda with the scene up until that moment. Kylo seemed to be struggling with the dark/light side, Han was trying to appeal to his better instincts, all that stuff.

And then Han and Kylo hang on to Kylo's lightsaber and gaze into each others' eyes for a bit before the big event happens. I don't quite understand what happened in that scene. What was the subtext?

I don't know about subtext between Han and Kylo, but that's when the starkiller finished draining the sun's energy and the light faded from the sky. So I think it's more of a mood setting device for the filmmaking process - this is where the dark side rises in ascendancy after a period of teetering on the balance point to build suspense - both in the starkiller readying to fire and in Kylo resisting the lighter side still within him.

Curmudjinn · Dec 18, 2015

horacethegrey said:
And Ren did kill the rest of Luke's apprentices so I imagine that failure weighs heavily upon his shoulders.

They said Ren destroyed it all, but I took that as him destroying the new Jedi academy itself. I believe the Knights of Ren might be the other students that Ren was able to turn from Luke's tutelage.

Curmudjinn · Dec 18, 2015

Also, was that Coruscant that was destroyed? It left it kind of ambiguous. I want to know a lot more about the New Republic, it's fleets(and their lack of combating the First Order.), and if the Republic is back to using clones.

Hux mentioned hand-picked recruits being better than clones, leading me to believe some other military is using them.

The comedy was great. I thought Poe's comedic parts were excellent and if he plays a prominent role in the next two installments, he could fill the hole left by Han.

Morrus · Dec 18, 2015

Curmudjinn said:
They said Ren destroyed it all, but I took that as him destroying the new Jedi academy itself. I believe the Knights of Ren might be the other students that Ren was able to turn from Luke's tutelage.

Ren's a title (like Darth); his name changed from Ben Solo to Kylo Ren when he joined the Knights of Ren. At least that's what I took from it.

Morrus · Dec 18, 2015

Curmudjinn said:
Also, was that Coruscant that was destroyed?

It was 5 planets, all of which were visible from whatever planet it was Han was on. So in the same system, presumably. That's about all it said, though, and no mention was made of it again!