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Star Wars IX The Rise of Skywalker (JJ Abrams 2019)


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17 minutes ago, TheAvengerButton said:

It always bothers me when people say that The Last Jedi didn't follow through on the set-ups of The Force Awakens, or that The Rise of Skywalker didn't follow through on the themes of The Last Jedi and so on and so forth. Of all the things you could very easily critique about the Sequel Trilogy, that aint it.

 

Like, I would love to be convinced that that was actually the case, but it seems to me that the set ups and the themes and what have you flow extremely well from film-to-film, and that despite the haphazard way these films are coddled together. It actually comes together pretty well in the end.

 

I think people who really, REALLY don't like these films try to make it an all or nothing deal. It's either all bad or it's the greatest thing ever made. That's never true with anything. Like other films, the Sequel trilogy has stuff that they do that isn't done very well and stuff that they pull off very nicely. The characters are all fun. The effects feel closer to those of the original trilogy than the somewhat artificiality of the Prequels (despite still having absolutely copious amounts of CG). I even like the narrative undercurrent of the new generation having to fill the shoes of their heroes and carry on their legacy on their own terms. When it comes to the bad, some of the locations could use a better identity. When I think back to the planets of the Original Trilogy there's usually a central pillar or object which continuously gives presence to each planet. There's the Cloud City on Bespin, the Shield Generator on Endor, the temples on Yavin. They are all shown to jut out and hang over everything or fill the screen with their awe inspiring beauty. The planets of the Sequel Trilogy don't really have that (with the exception, IMO, of the Shield Door on Crait). The overall exposition used throughout the film could use a bit more slow down. I remember leaving TFA wondering why the hell they didn't fill us in more on the gap of time between ROTJ and TFA. Then there's the 98mph dumps in TROS to contend with as well. There was also an unnecessary cloud of mystery behind Rey, and while a little bit of mystery goes a long way I still can't figure out what J.J. OR Rian were going for between Rey and her parental dynamic (does she actually KNOW her parents are dead? Did she know the whole time? Is she just supressing her own memories? Does Kylo already know who Rey is before they meet in TFA?) Way too confusing to try to piece together.

 

So people try to throw everything they can possibly critique at these films and try to make everything stick and it just doesn't work. If you think the movies ignore each other or are extremely inconsistent with major details you really need to force yourself to watch these movies again just to get a refresher.

 

Hi, my name is TheAvengerButton (not my real name) and this is my TEDTalk on Star Wars.

Agreed on lots of point with you.

I will just add that in TFA Jakku has the cruiser junkyard as a central pillar and that IMO the real weakness of the sequel is the lack of background stories which result in some poor plot like Rey's parents

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Yeah Abrams and even Johnson are really in the idea to give a lot of rhythm to their movies forgetting to settle properly sets and location. It's sadly a thing more and more common in modern action flicks, it remembers me a bit Infinity War where everything move too fast making the action a bit harder to follow

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3 hours ago, TheAvengerButton said:

I guess now that I think about it, every movie in ST does have at least something of what I've described. The Force Awakens has the Star Destroyers on Jakku, The Last Jedi has the shield gate on Crait, and The Rise of Skywalker has the Sith Temple on Exogol. But you don't really get to linger on them as much as you did in the original trilogy, because the direction is so fast paced. That's something the new films are missing completely, is just the chance to take everything in.


Like in the original trilogy? ALL of the original trilogy?! Because I don’t remember a lot of shots in the original film that emphasize scale: there's the shot of the Falcon entering the Death Star and the shot of the "gang" overlooking Mos Eisley, and that's basically it. That kind of perspective work didn’t really sip into the cinematic style of Star Wars until The Empire Strikes Back.

 

I think all the sequel films have enough scale, visually.

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That was the whole point of the original Star Wars was NOT to have any time to take anything in, Lucas's whole theory was to treat every amazing new location like any other random house, bar, military complex. He wanted it to be paced like "Yeah, okay there's the Death Star, we've all seen a Death Star, moving on" and that is part of what blew people away and kept them coming back to take it all in, and part of the risk he took pouring all this money into things that wouldn't get the sort of screentime epics usually gave their production values.

 

Now movies have become even more frenetic than that, plus we do now culturally recognize all those locations like everyday places, so Star Wars feels like a normal movie but at the time people found it such a rush. 

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23 minutes ago, mrbellamy said:

That was the whole point of the original Star Wars was NOT to have any time to take anything in, Lucas's whole theory was to treat every amazing new location like any other random house, bar, military complex. He wanted it to be paced like "Yeah, okay there's the Death Star, we've all seen a Death Star, moving on" and that is part of what blew people away and kept them coming back to take it all in, and part of the risk he took pouring all this money into things that wouldn't get the sort of screentime epics usually gave their production values.

 

I never bought Lucas' claims here. Sure, he didn't want to do a 2001, where the shots really linger: he wanted to do a fast-paced action film in the style of Bullitt. That isn't the same as what latter-day Lucas is saying: he makes it sound like some grand cinema verite artistic statement which it really isn't.

 

Its a case of looking at what he does rather than listening to what he says he's done. For instance, the introduction to the Cantina is entirely not in keeping with this supposed philosophy: we cut from our main characters stepping towards it, into a flurry of (quite a large number of) shots that do nothing except show off all the wierd alien patrons of this establishment. The Falcon getting pulled into the Death Star is also not that short a sequence, if the goal was for the camera to treat the Death Star "casually", so to speak.

 

And, when opportunity came to revisit the films, what was the very first thing Lucas did? He added more shots of Mos Eisley, precisely and expressedly (and for no reason other than) to show it off; he changed the shot of the Sandcrawler and the view of Ben's hut to look more impressive.

 

I've even heard Lucas estimate the length of his special effects shots as "32 frames or so", which is (1) untrue of any of the shots in his film and (2) ludicrous, since shots of that length border on the subliminal.

 

Lucas has this habit of aggrandizing his own work: all the talk about the in medias res opening (which was mostly the result of happenstance) and all the Joseph Campbell nonesense is also the same kind of rhetoric.

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21 hours ago, Chen G. said:


Like in the original trilogy? ALL of the original trilogy?! Because I don’t remember a lot of shots in the original film that emphasize scale: there's the shot of the Falcon entering the Death Star and the shot of the "gang" overlooking Mos Eisley, and that's basically it. That kind of perspective work didn’t really sip into the cinematic style of Star Wars until The Empire Strikes Back.

 

I think all the sequel films have enough scale, visually.

 

I think Star Wars has plenty of scale outside of the very specific thing I'm referring to. Hell, we begin the movie with the best example of scale, which is the great shot of the Star Destroyer absolutely enveloping the screen as it chases the tinier corvette. Then there's the aforementioned shot of the Millenium Falcon entering the Death Star but one of my favorite things that is done in the OT as far as providing scale is showing ships we thought were absolutely massive against objects or ships that are even larger. There's a shot of the Imperial Cruiser we saw chasing the corvette speeding towards the Death Star in Star Wars, and then in the next movie we get a similar juxtaposition with an Imperial Cruiser up against Darth Vader's Star Destroyer, which is massive.

 

But as far as the "central pillar" thing I'm talking about you're right in that Star Wars is the odd man out there, unless we count the Death Star shots themselves.

 

TPM has the Jedi Temple.

Attack of the Clones has the Arena.

Revenge of the Sith the trees on Kashyyyk.

Star Wars has lots of scale shots, but nothing outside of the Death Star to induce that "central pillar" feel.

The Empire Strikes Back has Cloud City.

Return of the Jedi has the Shield Generator on Endor.

The Force Awakens has the ruined Star Destroyers on Jakku.

The Last Jedi has the shield gate on Crait.

The Rise of Skywalker has the Sith Obelisk on Exogol.

 

Note that this isn't something that any of the many Star Wars filmmakers have done on purpose and every Star Wars film has to have this in order to be considered legitimate, it's just an association game I myself play with this series so I can remember the interesting visual elements that pop out from each movie.

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On 6/1/2021 at 3:25 PM, Bofur01 said:

The lightning in the emperor/Rey scenes is definitely on-set lighting, anyway, which implies the whole look of the planet was known

 

Hmm, is that based behind-the-scenes footage? I don't recall seeing any for these scenes. It's also possible they made the decision prior to reshoots, which apparently included most (all?) of the final Rey/emperor confrontation.

 

I can't imagine all the lightning wouldn't have affected passages with a very light touch, like 3:10 here:

 

 

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That's a great eerie version of the Anthem of Evil. Love how it crescendos a little bit in brass at around 3:33 before turning into the Emperor's theme.

 

Anthem of Evil was one of the highlights for me in the new scores if you don't understand my enthusiasm in this post.

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1 hour ago, TheAvengerButton said:

That's a great eerie version of the Anthem of Evil. Love how it crescendos a little bit in brass at around 3:33 before turning into the Emperor's theme.

 

Anthem of Evil was one of the highlights for me in the new scores if you don't understand my enthusiasm in this post.

I think that AoE was written for what amounted to a different movie, but Williams refused to drop it even when the movie had changed to something different.  It is a cool theme, though not in the league of the Emperor's theme. 

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I think the running theory, which I subscribe to, is that Palpatine being behind it all was supposed to be a climax or 11th hour reveal instead of using it to promote the film first thing so prequel memers go to the theater. AoE was going to be like a mystery theme of the movie, when they'd talk about "Who's this dark force behind all this? What's going on?" 

 

I really love the march version in the credits. I think the concert version of it would have been served better as a march. It's much more performable for one, but it's also much more listenable. The concert version on the CD I usually can't get through without losing focus. Love the melody itself though.

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9 minutes ago, SilverTrumpet said:

I think the running theory, which I subscribe to, is that Palpatine being behind it all was supposed to be a climax or 11th hour reveal instead of using it to promote the film first thing so prequel memers go to the theater. AoE was going to be like a mystery theme of the movie, when they'd talk about "Who's this dark force behind all this? What's going on?" 

 

Wow that actually makes a lot of sense!

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12 minutes ago, SilverTrumpet said:

I think the running theory, which I subscribe to, is that Palpatine being behind it all was supposed to be a climax or 11th hour reveal instead of using it to promote the film first thing so prequel memers go to the theater. AoE was going to be like a mystery theme of the movie, when they'd talk about "Who's this dark force behind all this? What's going on?" 

 

Yes, I believe early leaks had Kylo Ren meeting an unidentifiable, decrepit old man in the opening scene, being tended to by medical workers. It would only later be revealed as Palpatine.

 

From a filmmaking perspective, the dead giveaway is that Adam Driver doesn't share a single shot with Ian McDiarmid in that opening sequence. The entire sequence consists of singles, meaning the two were never on set together. Utterly bizarre for such a crucial first meeting.

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26 minutes ago, SilverTrumpet said:

AoE was going to be like a mystery theme of the movie, when they'd talk about "Who's this dark force behind all this? What's going on?" 

 

Williams loves writing new themes for such mysteries, so that seems like a really solid theory. It would also explain why he'd bother writing a new evil theme when the evil characters in the film already have plenty of themes associated with them.

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Rewatching the prologue, it's hilariously obvious the entire sequence was constructed in post production. Kylo Ren has one onscreen line of dialogue after Palpatine is revealed: "Who is she?"

 

The funniest thing is how one of his key lines to Palpatine is conveniently obscured by his arm, and it's ridiculously obvious his mouth isn't even moving when he speaks:

vlcsnap-2021-06-05-01h18m31s131.png

 

Meanwhile, Palpy has a grand total of three on-screen lines in the entire opening sequence.

  • "Everything."
  • "Kill the girl."
  • "...all the galaxy as the new Emperor. But beware, she is not who you think she is."

Everything else is a voiceover, meaning it was added in post

 

You don't have to look beneath the surface to see how this mess of a movie is barely held together with sticky tape.

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9 hours ago, crumbs said:

 

 

From a filmmaking perspective, the dead giveaway is that Adam Driver doesn't share a single shot with Ian McDiarmid in that opening sequence. The entire sequence consists of singles, meaning the two were never on set together. Utterly bizarre for such a crucial first meeting.

 

20210605_102224.jpg

Seems to me that they were both present for the scene, but the way it was shot was either intentionally separating the two, or was edited heavily to fit new script changes.

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2 hours ago, Arpy said:

 

20210605_102224.jpg

Seems to me that they were both present for the scene, but the way it was shot was either intentionally separating the two, or was edited heavily to fit new script changes.

 

Just makes it even more bizarre.

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Hard to believe but who knows. It seems lots material was shot and in & out of the cut at various stages of post.

 

Interestingly, the music for Rey/Ben's kiss appears to be an insert on the OST. Make of that what you will...

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Looks like another last minute decision..

Quote

 

When Rey (Daisy Ridley) and Kylo (Adam Driver) snogged, it was the kiss heard around this galaxy and those far, far away. The moment made Reylo fans shout for joy and detractors just shout. According to Brandon, there was a lot of back-and-forth about whether the scene would happen at all. She cut a lot of different versions of “should they/shouldn’t they,” she said.

“I always said, ‘The movie will tell us whether they should kiss or not. We will know by the time we get to the end of our process, if it should happen.’ And I felt it should, and [director J.J. Abrams] agreed with me, and other people who saw the film agreed.”

Brandon praised the performances in the scene, especially the moment Kylo Ren smiles, the first time the character has smiled in three movies.

“I know it’s not for everybody,” she said of the kiss. “I know there will be people who wish they hadn’t, but this is a film that was never going to please everyone, and I think that the reviews are kind of reflective of that. The things that certain people love, other people hated. And that’s the phenomenon of ‘Star Wars.’”

 

https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/star-wars-rise-of-skywalker_n_5e011966e4b05b08bab96b07?ri18n&guccounter=1

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The Kylo/Rey scene where he dies was at least 4 minutes longer with more dialogue. Ben was always supposed to die. Source also added that if he wasn’t, then that might’ve been in an earlier draft which they haven’t read. The first draft they read included Lando (the first few didn’t). The Reylo kiss and Ben’s death was not part of the reshoots. It was a part of the re-editing. Even the cut that JJ thought was coming out earlier this month had a longer version of that scene than what was shown in the theatrical cut.

JJ was against the Reylo kiss (or Reylo in general). This was Disney's attempt to please both sides of the fandom.

 

https://www.reddit.com/r/saltierthancrait/comments/eisnd8/heres_what_ive_been_told_from_a_source_that/

 

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11 hours ago, greenturnedblue said:

https://www.reddit.com/r/saltierthancrait/

 

I wouldn't put too much stock in anything that comes from that place, lol.

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@toothlessI really enjoyed the French YouTuber’s TFA critique videos, thanks for the recommendation!

 

I really want to watch his TLJ ones but it doesn’t seem like there’s any English subtitles so I don’t know what I can do there

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14 hours ago, greenturnedblue said:

 

All of this was pretty much debunked long ago. That sub-Reddit is known for its bullshit posts.

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2 hours ago, Manakin Skywalker said:

 

All of this was pretty much debunked long ago. That sub-Reddit is known for its bullshit posts.

Do you have a source for any of that? I was aware these rumours have been around for a while but I didn’t see anything that was able to disprove the claims

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17 hours ago, DarthDementous said:

@toothlessI really enjoyed the French YouTuber’s TFA critique videos, thanks for the recommendation!

 

I really want to watch his TLJ ones but it doesn’t seem like there’s any English subtitles so I don’t know what I can do there


when you play it from here, for whatever reason you can enable auto translation by Google 🙂.

 

BTW thank you so much for watching this. Not because you found it good but because you actually watched it before judging 💯

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2 hours ago, toothless said:


when you play it from here, for whatever reason you can enable auto translation by Google 🙂.

 

BTW thank you so much for watching this. Not because you found it good but because you actually watched it before judging 💯

Unfortunately the first part of TLJ doesn't have auto translation available, so I'll have to jump to part 2. Hopefully things aren't too confusing

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