Star Wars: The Force Awakens

ChrisM

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Just how big is this going to be? Reviews have been generally glowing and prognosticators are speculating it might blow away Titanic and Avatar. Wow. Hope Han shoots first in this one.
 

Dr Zaius

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After what they did to the last four, I refuse to see it unless everyone in the world tells me it's awesome sauce and completely redeems the whole series.

But judging from the horrible trailers, I see very little chance of that being the case.
 

Vinnie

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After what they did to the last four, I refuse to see it unless everyone in the world tells me it's awesome sauce and completely redeems the whole series.

But judging from the horrible trailers, I see very little chance of that being the case.
I think you are being a little harsh. Return of the Jedi, while not that great was pretty decent!
 

Thunderchief

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I saw the movie twice in the first twelve hours of release here in Australia.

It ROCKS like we want it to.

Old-School Star Wars is BACK and it’s AWESOME.


I have only heard a crowd at the movies cheer twice – once when the snowspeeders attacked the AT-ATs on Hoth during The Empire Strikes Back and today when those two words appeared on the screen and the music started.
If you don’t like Star Wars – get outta my house!
 

Dr Zaius

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Who else has seen it and what did you think about it?

And who is planning to see it? My kids want to go, so I may get dragged into it against my will.
 
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Am planning to go, not sure when. The buzz seems quite promising, so I'm more optimistic than I was a couple of weeks ago. I thought the trailers were good, but were definitely pitched to entice people who enjoyed the original trilogy and thought the prequels were crap.
 

Dr Zaius

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I think you are being a little harsh. Return of the Jedi, while not that great was pretty decent!
It was an abomination.

Let's review. The empire rules nearly the entirety of the known galaxy, spanning tens of thousands of systems. We're talking about trillions upon trillions upon trillions of people, and thousands of species.

To keep this monstrous empire intact, it takes an absolutely gargantuan military presence consisting of an imperial navy, army, special shock troops, etc. Vader's flagship, the Executioner, was miles long and boasted a crew of 100,000 and packed about 1/4 the firepower of a death star. The Executioner would have been a match for the whole of the rebellion alone.

The point is that the empire was supposed to be unassailable from a military perspective. No potential adversary could have hoped to contest that kind of firepower and numbers, as the empire controls the most advanced shipyards in the galaxy in addition to a clone army, very nearly giving it an unlimited supply of manpower and ships.

Secure in the knowledge of its military might, the empire worked tirelessly to maneuver the rebel forces into a situation where they would be forced to stand and fight. But the rebels are smart enough to fear the empire and must be content to merely harass them, as a direct confrontation would almost certainly mean death and the end of the rebellion.

So the rebels fight the good fight guerrilla style, right? No, the emperor's whole plan actually works!

The rebels fall for the bait and their fleet is trapped between the death star and the bulk of the imperial navy. To make matters even worse, to their horror they discover that the death star is operational (which they hadn't counted on) and that the Executioner is leading the assault. And unlike before, Han Solo is tied up with the trap on Endor and Luke Skywalker is captured by Vader, so there's no one who could potentially use the force and help even the odds a bit. The final nail is that the strike team sent to disable the shield walks into a trap when an entire legion of the emperor's most elite forces capture them.

So what happens?

The rebels, equipped with naught but a few converted star freighters and a hodgepodge assortment of ships of every age and class, charge head-on into the massed ranks of the imperial navy. Outgunned more than 10,000 to 1, the rebels proceed to kick the living s*** out the imperial fleet, destroying the Executioner in open battle and crashing it into the death star. The emperor's most elite ground legion is decimated by the muppet show, Vader is soundly beaten in a Jedi duel, and then Luke maneuvers Vader into killing the emperor for him and still manages to make it home in time for cornflakes.

This was an epic disaster of a film where virtually every single plot device was hackneyed and wholly unbelievable. The pacing is bad, the cinematography was lame, and bit by bit the mighty empire is exposed as probably the worst underachievers in the galaxy. They have 10,000 to 1 odds and everything goes according to plan, but they still lose...

What!!!!!!?????!!!!!!!

Talk about deus ex machina. Actually, it's worse than that. Lucas didn't even bother coming up with a deus ex because, well, at that point I guess he was too busy selling lunchboxes and stuff to care whether the movie actually had a plot or not. Instead, the rebels just inexplicably win in one of the most laughable, ridiculous finales in the anals of sci-fi, and that's saying something.

After the generally excellent, The Empire Strikes Back, lame sauce doesn't begin to describe The Return of the Jedi.
 

ChrisM

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Amen, Doc. Preach it. Testify.

I walked out of that movie in 1983 as a disillusioned 14 year old - with the sad knowledge that the dreams of childhood were just fantasies that could be whisked away by the stroke of the pen by venal men.
 

Sand Bar Bill

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Frankly there were so many blatant plot line parallels between this movie and the original... I.e. the new hero is from a desert planet and is blessed with The Force, a droid carrying an important message that must be delivered and a planet destroying death star. And I can name about a half-dozen more.

it was a good movie... but do those plot lines sound familiar?!? I'm not sure I didn't just see Star Wars:The Remake!!!
 
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Dave68124

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Personally I thought it sucked, but admittedly I am not a Star Wars person other than seeing the first one when I was like 8 years old.

However, what Bill said...sure seemed like a flash back to almost 40 years ago other than Princess Leia or General Leia wasn't the same girl she was 40 years ago.
 

Dr Zaius

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I haven't seen it. But even the reviewers who gave it a solid score have more or less admitted The Force Awakens is a soft reboot of the original Star Wars.

My son just got back from seeing it and told me it's like a $200 million dollar fan faction project filmed in a retirement home.

But the media is eating it up and it will probably make $2B or more.

And just to add insult to injury, there was an interview the other day where the studio said they will never, ever make another "failure" like Master and Commander. It attracted only middle-aged guys, had no female characters, no romantic side plot, and barely managed to get the investor's money back. Depressing. Pretty much sums up everything that's wrong with Hollywood and idiot moviegoers in general.
 

Dr Zaius

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Why should the movie industry be above the profit motive?
They shouldn't. But we have 800 channels of crap and all the horrid movies we can possibly stand, and they call Master and Commander a failure.
 

bendizoid

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Master and Commander wasn't a failure, he kicked French butt but then he had to chase them again.
 

Brian W

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They shouldn't. But we have 800 channels of crap and all the horrid movies we can possibly stand, and they call Master and Commander a failure.
It was a failure based on the only rubric that matters: return on investment.
 

ParaMarine

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I thought it was a good movie! My only complaint story-wise was that they did another Death Star and the way they went about it in the story. Building a second one made no sense for lots of reasons - that was, in Tarkin's words, a symbol of fear to prevent an insurgency of ever happening, so building a second was pointless as it didn't really give them any advantage over the Rebels other than what they already had. In this one, they at least had a reason for destroying a planet but they messed up (or pussed out) by not destroying Coruscant. Some of the scenes lack gravity like that, which is ironic because the same director made the destruction of Vulcan seem appropriately important in Star Trek 2009. Even better, destroying Coruscant would have symbolically destroyed George's terrible prequels which spent so much wasted screentime there.

Those are really nit-picks though. Much of the movie was great. Here are some good points.
:skull: The Empire was efficient and fearsome - not the incompetent force they were portrayed as in Jedi. And they really were incompetent only in Jedi, even their pilots who crashed into their own ships three seperate times in the space battle. They even had a full blown Nazi rally in one scene in this one. Rest assured, people who hated Jedi and the preauels: these aren't the comedy stormtroopers of internet meme infamy.
:skull: The new villains are good. This time, the evil Jedi is the boot this time, not Luke. He isn't as good as he thinks and that's an interesting twist on the normal thing with the hero feeling that he isn't strong enough.
:skull: The new stuff they added fits in to the Star Wars universe very well.
:skull: The story is self contained but gives plenty of room for sequels in the right ways.
:skull: The rebels seem pretty competent too and they remind me of the first movie a lot. They are sort of rag tag but still look like they have military discipline. He's a small character, but I like the one fat X Wing pilot because he still looks like someone who could kick somebody's ass in a fistfight.
 

xenovin

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They made it pretty clear that this Death Star was 4x larger than the old Death Star so a totally new movie. BTW - when is James Earl Jones finally going to get a part?! "Boy, I too once worshiped the secret of steel....."
 
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Morbii

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Frankly there were so many blatant plot line parallels between this movie and the original... I.e. the new hero is from a desert planet and is blessed with The Force, a droid carrying an important message that must be delivered and a planet destroying death star. And I can name about a half-dozen more.

it was a good movie... but do those plot lines sound familiar?!? I'm not sure I didn't just see Star Wars:The Remake!!!
Star Wars itself was close to a remake...
 
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