Andy 4,242 Posted August 7, 2022 Share Posted August 7, 2022 2 hours ago, HunterTech said: Is there even anyone who fully enjoyed TRoS unironically? I love TRoS. I was completely entertained. I’m not sure I’m a metric for popular opinion though, because I’m cold on Rogue One, and there’s been a steady decline in my enjoyment of the television offerings. (In other words I don’t eat everything they feed me. ) Giftheck 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
publicist 4,643 Posted August 7, 2022 Share Posted August 7, 2022 1 hour ago, HunterTech said: With TRoS, I've been used to people either merely enjoying the production work put into the film, or finding it so silly it makes it rather entertaining for them. Otherwise, it tends to be a resounding meh at best from a lot of people who has seen it. Me and some schoolmates had this pact that we would finish the saga together in a cinema, come what may. I remember it was a rather cold December night and all of us assembled in a Berlin multiplex being completely in agreement before the movie started that our engagement level was as low as the temperature. The movie was pretty bad, yes, but also weightlessly inoffensive and it rushed by in a breeze. I remember that i was weighing the thought that Disney found a secret tech formula by which they could feed all the silly lore, actor avatars and Williams' music sheets into a computer system, pressed a key and out came The Rise of Skywalker. Then i asked myself what would happen if they shuffled the elements around a little, or changed a certain variable - could they just press the key again and again? Then i watched three episodes of 'Obi Wan' and found my theory validated. DarthDementous 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
enderdrag64 633 Posted August 7, 2022 Share Posted August 7, 2022 1 hour ago, HunterTech said: given the reports of key projects being targeted for mass downvotes If they aren't bots why does it matter if they're en masse or not? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tallguy 3,486 Posted August 7, 2022 Share Posted August 7, 2022 Hm. This has taken some interesting turns. I have no idea if this is complete garbage or not. I'm only posting it because I ran across it and it seems like total wish fulfillment for me. If it turns out to be true then so much the better! https://bespinbulletin.com/2022/08/first-reaction-to-andors-first-four-episodes-appears-online-grounded-complex-expect-division/ "I’ve seen the first four and it’s the most serious, grounded thing Star Wars has ever done. It feels more like an English-made espionage thriller than Star Wars. It is totally unconcerned with giving you fan service moments, and instead wants to delve into what it’s like for the bit players in this universe to wake up every morning and go about their day. This is not space opera. It’s more space drama. It’s slow, deliberate, complex (for Star Wars) and asks the viewer to do some work. It actually humanizes roles that are traditionally cartoon evil in the SW universe. It’s attempting to tell a grown up story, and I think a lot of fans are going to haaaate it. Both Gilroy’s presence is all over this thing. It’s got that cinema verite vibe that the core Bourne movies had going for them. Puts you in the world like never before. Whether the world can hold up to that level of scrutiny is up for debate, but it is fascinating.” That sounds like a logical progression from Rogue One. Like I said, it's totally what I want to hear so if it's totally made up, I'm primed to fall for it. If it IS totally made up then I want someone to make something like this next! 1 hour ago, Andy said: (In other words I don’t eat everything they feed me. ) Hmmm. I wonder if I do? I found Book of Boba to be an entertaining but ultimately unfulfilling journey. But I don't hate the scooter gang. I hate that Boba never gets to be Boba. That episode of Mando that introduced him? Do that. Mando has been very very good. Obi-Wan had some spectacular moments, and almost all of them start with "Leia". I ADORE THE BAD BATCH. Rebels is the best that Star Wars has been since 1980. The last season of the Clone Wars tricked me into watching Revenge of the Sith again. I want to visit the alternate world where Fliloni was Lucas' wing-man when he made the prequels. The Sequel trilogy is an entertaining mess. The Force Awakens is annoyingly watchable. It's a great cast. But none of them are done justice. (Psst. Meryl Streep should have played Leia in The Rise of Skywalker.) Am I eating everything they feed me? enderdrag64 and Yavar Moradi 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andy 4,242 Posted August 7, 2022 Share Posted August 7, 2022 Na you just like what you like. You’re enjoying them yet critiquing flaws. From your description you posted, Andor wasn’t made for me. If I wanted that granular level of espionage, I’d read one of the hundreds of Star Wars novels out there. Gil Roy should’ve just written one of those, because this sounds dreadfully boring. And of course I’ll watch it, but I am really missing the days of expensive budget Star Wars in the cinema. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mstrox 6,661 Posted August 7, 2022 Share Posted August 7, 2022 8 hours ago, enderdrag64 said: If they aren't bots why does it matter if they're en masse or not? You can consider a RottenTomatoes audience rating (or similar on IMDB, etc) as a canvassing of all types of moviegoers (which is true in some regards, but statistically dubious because you’re already limiting yourself to the types of people who rate movies on the Internet). An organized downvoting skews that data to a completely unusable level. HunterTech 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JohnTheBaptist 57 Posted August 8, 2022 Share Posted August 8, 2022 On 07/08/2022 at 1:49 AM, Tallguy said: That sounds like a logical progression from Rogue One. Rogue One was nothing but fan-service moments, so it would actually be a significant break from RO and everything Star Wars since 1999. But I'm not holding my breath. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
crumbs 14,367 Posted August 8, 2022 Share Posted August 8, 2022 I'm surprised we haven't seen Palpatine "dissolving" the senate yet, per the line in ANH. I guess that can't happen in this series either, based on the established timeline. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post Nick1Ø66 4,838 Posted August 8, 2022 Popular Post Share Posted August 8, 2022 I preferred ROTS to TLJ. Maybe TLJ is a better movie, I don't know. But I do know that ROTS is a better Star Wars movie. I know Rian Johnson was trying to shake up the Star Wars formula, be subversive, etc. And I remember thinking at the time, that's fine in theory, but the penultimate chapter in a nine-chapter saga probably isn't the best time to do it. And that such a shake up would be better suited for one of the spin-off films or a TV series. But now that I've read these early, glowing reviews of the Andor series, I'm not even sure about that. The thing is, at what point do you mess with the Star Wars formula so much that it's no longer Star Wars? What are the first five things that come to mind that define Star Wars, and how many can you take away and it still be Star Wars? Or James Bond. I mean, you could make a "realistic" James Bond movie about what the life of a spy is really all about....endless hours of tedium, developing sources, sitting in dingy safe houses, driving a computer instead of a Lamborghini, etc...but who would want to see that in a Bond flick? If you take away the gadgets, the women, the larger than life villains, the exotic locales, luxury cars, the Vodka Martinis, and the seemingly limitless budget for a civil servant, is it really still James Bond? The series has certainly swung the pendulum between the farcical (i.e some of the Moore & Brosnan outings) and the more "gritty" (the Craig & Dalton films) and everything in between (Connery). But never have we seen a "realistic" James Bond. You can only mess with what makes 007 Bond so much or he's no longer Bond. You could still have a great film, but I don't think it would be a great Bond film. So what's a Star Wars movie without Jedi, and lightsabres, JW's music (or music like it), and the Force and all the other trappings of Star Wars? Is it still really Star Wars? If Disney wants a realistic, gritty TV show about what being in a rebellion is like, populated with morally "grey" Rebels, why not make that show? Of course, it's because they have to put Star Wars name on it to get people to watch, and they have to fill x number of hours of Star Wars content on Disney+ to retain and bring in new subscribers. The IP must be exploited and Disney must justify the cost they paid for it. But at what point do we lose what makes Star Wars special? Answer: we've already lost it. I get it. They're doing the same thing with Marvel. You can only follow the same formula so many times before the story just becomes diluted and, well...formulaic. So they shake it up. Only then, you lose what made it the escapist fantasy people wanted to watch in the first place. It's Catch-22. To me, the only winning move here is not to play...i.e. give Star Wars a rest for a while, and when you do have a story to tell, tell it in the cinema where you can make it a special event. Of course, those are days gone by, and there's no going back to that, and we all know why. So I'm sure Andor will be a fine TV series, maybe the best so far. But will really be Star Wars? Tom Guernsey, Andy and Pellaeon 2 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post Yavar Moradi 2,640 Posted August 8, 2022 Popular Post Share Posted August 8, 2022 4 hours ago, Nick1Ø66 said: I preferred ROTS to TLJ. Maybe TLJ is a better movie, I don't know. But I do know that ROTS is a better Star Wars movie. Of course, this is all a matter of opinion and you're welcome to yours... but I think that's nonsense. To me all of the prequel films are far more unrecognizable (than the sequel trilogy) as "Star Wars" compared to the original trilogy. In fact, I don't see how they followed at all, from the bits Alec Guinness relayed about the Clone Wars in the original Star Wars. It felt like a completely different universe, to me, and I didn't like it at all. It's funny because, to me, most of the problems with the sequel trilogy actually came from them (really the two Abrams films) trying to be TOO MUCH like the original trilogy, rather than something new (my eyes rolling at the even bigger Death Star in TFA, but also of course the return of Palpatine in TROS). Which is why TLJ is easily, EASILY my favorite of those three. Because it did try to do something new, while still having a lot of the familiar. 4 hours ago, Nick1Ø66 said: I know Rian Johnson was trying to shake up the Star Wars formula, be subversive, etc. And I remember thinking at the time, that's fine in theory, but the penultimate chapter in a nine-chapter saga probably isn't the best time to do it. And that such a shake up would be better suited for one of the spin-off films or a TV series. I don't follow your reasoning on this at all. It was a new trilogy. Each of the three trilogies is pretty independent from the others, IMO, in large part stemming from how they are separated by so much time (both in-story and when they were made). It made sense for the *first* film of the sequel trilogy to be an homage to the original trilogy (though again I think they took it too far). So much time had passed and audiences needed to know "Star Wars is back!" The bad taste of the miserable prequel films needed to be washed away, by a return to the familiar. But the second film of a trilogy is ABSOLUTELY the best, maybe the ONLY time, to do a "shake up" film! (It's not as if it would make sense for the very last film, right?) In fact that's what the original Star Wars trilogy did to great success, with The Empire Strikes Back! If it was going to happen AT ALL, this was the only time it made sense to "kill the past" to some degree. I don't agree that it should have been relegated to a spinoff or TV series; that would have entirely defeated the point and made no sense. 4 hours ago, Nick1Ø66 said: But now that I've read these early, glowing reviews of the Andor series, I'm not even sure about that. The thing is, at what point do you mess with the Star Wars formula so much that it's no longer Star Wars? What are the first five things that come to mind that define Star Wars, and how many can you take away and it still be Star Wars? Happy to do this exercise with you if you like, but believe me based on MY Star Wars criteria, The Last Jedi wins out and the horrible prequels (and I include Revenge of the Sith in that assessment, absolutely) do not. One of my criteria is having likeable characters I give a damn about. Got that in the sequel trilogy, don't in the prequels... not even for a moment. 4 hours ago, Nick1Ø66 said: Or James Bond. I mean, you could make a "realistic" James Bond movie about what the life of a spy is really all about....endless hours of tedium, developing sources, sitting in dingy safe houses, driving a computer instead of a Lamborghini, etc...but who would want to see that in a Bond flick? If you take away the gadgets, the women, the larger than life villains, the exotic locales, luxury cars, the Vodka Martinis, and the seemingly limitless budget for a civil servant, is it really still James Bond? The series has certainly swung the pendulum between the farcical (i.e some of the Moore & Brosnan outings) and the more "gritty" (the Craig & Dalton films) and everything in between (Connery). But never have we seen a "realistic" James Bond. You can only mess with what makes 007 Bond so much or he's no longer Bond. Actually, taking away the gadgets, women, larger than life villains, martinis, luxury whatever, and seemingly limitless budget... and it can still be fuckin' awesome. Allow me to introduce you to... YMMV, but for me more consistently strong than the Bond series in every way. Most of your list I'd consider liabilities in my enjoying Bond, rather than features. But for the record my favorite Bond film is easily Casino Royale (2006) and before that my favorite was The Living Daylights (1987) so I assume we are coming at this from very different tastes. 4 hours ago, Nick1Ø66 said: So what's a Star Wars movie without Jedi, and lightsabres, JW's music (or music like it), and the Force and all the other trappings of Star Wars? Is it still really Star Wars? If Disney wants a realistic, gritty TV show about what being in a rebellion is like, populated with morally "grey" Rebels, why not make that show? Of course, it's because they have to put Star Wars name on it to get people to watch, and they have to fill x number of hours of Star Wars content on Disney+ to retain and bring in new subscribers. The IP must be exploited and Disney must justify the cost they paid for it. But at what point do we lose what makes Star Wars special? Answer: we've already lost it. Your need for the Star Wars universe to be so limited is what would inevitably doom it. Look at the MCU, continually managing to avoid superhero fatigue by giving us *different* approaches with each new project, and making some attempt to keep it fresh (even when it misfires). Jedi/lightsabers were but a small part of the *original* titular Star Wars. Luke didn't even fight with a lightsaber until the very end of the sequel film (and that was just Vader toying with him after he'd had only a little bit of training!) One lightsaber duel per movie is not a war. The original trilogy opening crawls were never about lightsaber duels, but the larger war and political situation in the galaxy! That IS a central part of Star Wars you cannot deny! In the original film Luke was just a decent pilot, who in the very end was able to "let go" and use the force, yes, but he didn't blow up the Death Star with a lightsaber; he used a ship, in an attack run with a bunch of other fighters! That and the earlier key sequence of TIE fighters attacking the Millennium Falcon were obviously inspired by 20th century world war footage. There are *multiple* different components of the universe of Star Wars, and that's great! It doesn't always have to be Jedi and lightsabers; and refusing to explore other nooks and crannies of this cool universe is incredibly short-sighted and would doom the franchise. So yeah, even if the execution isn't always great I'm glad to have something like Andor being introduced to this world... as happy as I was to get an expansion on the world of bounty hunters on the fringe in The Mandalorian (clearly the most successful and widely-beloved piece of live action Disney Star Wars... and the beloved first season didn't have a single Jedi). 4 hours ago, Nick1Ø66 said: I get it. They're doing the same thing with Marvel. You can only follow the same formula so many times before the story just becomes diluted and, well...formulaic. So they shake it up. Only then, you lose what made it the escapist fantasy people wanted to watch in the first place. It's Catch-22. To me, the only winning move here is not to play...i.e. give Star Wars a rest for a while, and when you do have a story to tell, tell it in the cinema where you can make it a special event. Of course, those are days gone by, and there's no going back to that, and we all know why. So I'm sure Andor will be a fine TV series, maybe the best so far. But will really be Star Wars? Maybe it won't be for you, but it will be for many of us. For me it looks like what the horrible prequel films SHOULD have been, if they were going to go for the political intrigue angle (which they tried and failed at miserably). Maybe I'll hate it but I'm going to be cautiously optimistic for now. It certainly LOOKS and FEELS like Star Wars, to me. Yavar j39m, Holko and Tallguy 1 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post Nick1Ø66 4,838 Posted August 8, 2022 Popular Post Share Posted August 8, 2022 21 minutes ago, Yavar Moradi said: Of course, this is all a matter of opinion and you're welcome to yours. Well, like you, everything I wrote is opinion, of course. De gustibus non est disputandum & all that. I disagree with most of what you said...we look at what makes Star Wars special (and what we want to get from it) from fundamentally different perspectives...but I very much appreciate the thoughtful response, Yavar! Yavar Moradi, j39m and DarthDementous 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tallguy 3,486 Posted August 8, 2022 Share Posted August 8, 2022 15 minutes ago, Yavar Moradi said: Actually, taking away the gadgets, women, larger than life villains, martinis, luxury whatever, and seemingly limitless budget... and it can still be fuckin' awesome. Allow me to introduce you to... YMMV, but for me more consistently strong than the Bond series in every way. Most of your list I'd consider liabilities in my enjoying Bond, rather than features. But for the record my favorite Bond film is easily Casino Royale (2006) and before that my favorite was The Living Daylights (1987) so I assume we are coming at this from very different tastes. You sound like you like the books. 5 hours ago, JohnTheBaptist said: Rogue One was nothing but fan-service moments, so it would actually be a significant break from RO and everything Star Wars since 1999. But I'm not holding my breath. I think that's just not true that RO is nothing but fan service. It certainly has it. There are certainly a lot of callbacks just because it's set in the few days before Star Wars. Yet it manages to be very much it's own thing while still being 100% Star Wars. Yavar Moradi 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Yavar Moradi 2,640 Posted August 8, 2022 Share Posted August 8, 2022 41 minutes ago, Nick1Ø66 said: Well, like you, everything I wrote is opinion, of course. De gustibus non est disputandum & all that. I disagree with most of what you said...we look at what makes Star Wars special (and what we want to get from it) from fundamentally different perspectives...but I very much appreciate the thoughtful response, Yavar! I mean, I love lightsabers and Jedi too! I just don't need *all* Star Wars stories to feature lightsabers and Jedi. There are *many different things* which make Star Wars wonderful! Han Solo is many people's favorite character from the original films. Not a Jedi at any point; he's essentially a space cowboy smuggler. (There's also the buddy dynamic with him and Chewbacca.) Of the three main original trilogy characters, only one is (well, becomes) a Jedi. Leia is introduced as a freedom fighter from the beginning and yes we eventually find out she has the Force too (not originally planned, of course), but that's not a defining element of her character as it is for Luke. In many ways Andor seems to be taking up the Leia-in-Episode 4 side of things, with all of the politics included in that too. ("The Imperial Senate will not sit still for this!") I think it's very interesting if some Star Wars stuff is Jedi-free (after all, weren't they supposed to be rare, if not merely legends, at this point?) Maybe this comes from devouring a bunch of extended universe Star Wars books back when I was a teen, but I just loved further explorations into this universe, whether it be Force-related, WAR-related, bounty hunter/smuggler/crime underbelly-related, or what have you. Yavar Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JohnTheBaptist 57 Posted August 8, 2022 Share Posted August 8, 2022 52 minutes ago, Tallguy said: I think that's just not true that RO is nothing but fan service. It certainly has it. There are certainly a lot of callbacks just because it's set in the few days before Star Wars. Yet it manages to be very much it's own thing while still being 100% Star Wars. The fact that you're a fan and you like it doesn't make it not fan service. It just means you're the target audience for the nostalgia baiting. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tallguy 3,486 Posted August 8, 2022 Share Posted August 8, 2022 46 minutes ago, JohnTheBaptist said: The fact that you're a fan and you like it doesn't make it not fan service. It just means you're the target audience for the nostalgia baiting. I think there is some nuance that you're not getting and I'm not up to communicating. (Yavar?) Which leads me to: 1 hour ago, Yavar Moradi said: In many ways Andor seems to be taking up the Leia-in-Episode 4 side of things, with all of the politics included in that too. ("The Imperial Senate will not sit still for this!") I'm suddenly annoyed that Leia featured so prominently in Obi-Wan, if it means that she can't show up somewhere in Andor. I don't need them to meet or anything. But if Mon Mothma is going to be prominent in showing the the seeds of the Rebellion in the Imperial Senate then I would think that the Organa family should be in there somewhere. (I'm also just eager to see the original three leads recast - WITHOUT any CG) at any opportunity. Then it becomes a legendary character rather than just a legendary performance.) Maybe that's the distinction between "fan service" and just "this is the story". If the Enterprise shows up in a Star Trek movie about the crew of the Enterprise then it isn't fan service. If Random Admiral Giving Exposition is LADIES AND GENTLEMEN IT'S Admiral Janeway! then that's fan service. Darth Vader, GM Tarkin, and Leia show up in a movie that is the prelude to Star Wars? That's what we signed up for. The two schmoes from the Mos Eisley cantina? That's fan service. Rogue One was a Dirty Dozen style war movie. Andor seems to be a political espionage thriller (in SPACE). Oh please let it work! Yavar Moradi and DarthDementous 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Yavar Moradi 2,640 Posted August 8, 2022 Share Posted August 8, 2022 4 minutes ago, Tallguy said: I'm suddenly annoyed that Leia featured so prominently in Obi-Wan, if it means that she can't show up somewhere in Andor. I don't know why that would be (she'd be at very different ages and played by different actresses, for one thing). But I agree her presence would make much more sense (and not be fan service) in Andor. Yavar Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andy 4,242 Posted August 9, 2022 Share Posted August 9, 2022 It doesn’t need lightsabers. It doesn’t need intrigue and espionage. It doesn’t need gritty realism. It doesn’t need politics. It needs to be fun. Obi-Wan was many things, but it wasn’t a fun adventure. Andor looks to be filled with more of the all too serious tone. Remember Luke and Leia swinging across the Death Star bridge? That was Star Wars. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pellaeon 593 Posted August 9, 2022 Share Posted August 9, 2022 Solo was at least trying to be fun. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GerateWohl 4,461 Posted August 9, 2022 Share Posted August 9, 2022 6 hours ago, Pellaeon said: Solo was at least trying to be fun. The Lord and Miller version would probably have been even much funnier. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tallguy 3,486 Posted August 9, 2022 Share Posted August 9, 2022 10 hours ago, Andy said: Remember Luke and Leia swinging across the Death Star bridge? I tried explaining to my kids why THAT scene was one of the signature scenes in Star Wars. To the point where they did an encore in Return of the Jedi. Luke and Leia (after much build up) swing from here. To there. I finally settled on "But the music is amazing!" Andy and Tom Guernsey 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andy 4,242 Posted August 9, 2022 Share Posted August 9, 2022 Wasn't "The Swashbucklers" the first Star Wars music ever recorded? That should set the tone for all to follow. enderdrag64 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SilverTrumpet 638 Posted August 9, 2022 Share Posted August 9, 2022 Toldja Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jay 37,479 Posted August 9, 2022 Share Posted August 9, 2022 9 minutes ago, Andy said: Wasn't "The Swashbucklers" the first Star Wars music ever recorded? That should set the tone for all to follow. Yup! Takes 1-7, and they used takes 5 and 7 for the final performance edit. Tallguy and Andy 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tom Guernsey 2,316 Posted August 9, 2022 Share Posted August 9, 2022 1 hour ago, Andy said: Wasn't "The Swashbucklers" the first Star Wars music ever recorded? That should set the tone for all to follow. It’s the bit that sounds most like it could have come from a classic korngold score. Lovely, unashamedly romantically whimsical moment of the sort that the later films sorely miss, especially the sequels. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post Manakin Skywalker 4,907 Posted August 9, 2022 Popular Post Share Posted August 9, 2022 I always find is so bizarre how "obscure" that cue is. When I think of music from the first film, that cue always pops up, but I pretty much never see anyone else mention it when talking about their favorite pieces. It's one of the greatest pieces of action music, one of the greatest arrangements of the main theme, AND the original Imperial motif; I always thought it deserved it's own concert performance of some kind! Not to mention it underscores one of the most iconic scenes in all of Star Wars... enderdrag64, Tallguy, Smaug The Iron and 3 others 3 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post Tallguy 3,486 Posted August 9, 2022 Popular Post Share Posted August 9, 2022 It's also a pretty snazzy burst of the 'B' theme! I'm sure part of it is because it's "the one that got away" and partly because I get to be nerdy and know something obscure, but I LOVE the Star Wars Imperial theme. I loved it when it showed up in Rogue One, when it showed up in Solo, I just love it! enderdrag64, Yavar Moradi, Manakin Skywalker and 2 others 3 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DarthDementous 1,060 Posted August 10, 2022 Share Posted August 10, 2022 On 9/8/2022 at 1:39 PM, Andy said: It doesn’t need lightsabers. It doesn’t need intrigue and espionage. It doesn’t need gritty realism. It doesn’t need politics. It needs to be fun. Obi-Wan was many things, but it wasn’t a fun adventure. Andor looks to be filled with more of the all too serious tone. Remember Luke and Leia swinging across the Death Star bridge? That was Star Wars. I don’t think ‘fun’ really covers it I think Star Wars needs humanity, there needs to be light to both balance and more harshly contrast the darkness. It can’t be torture porn and it can’t be light and breezy When I look at the Bane trilogy from the EU, that is undeniably Star Wars to me but there’s not really a single moment it tries to be fun. It’s a very dark and tragic tale about what it means to both be and succeed as Sith, however it’s not indulgent. The darkness is presented very matter-of-factly, almost non-chalantly, as if it’s saying this is what it means to follow the dark path, the darkness is expected, and is not just the work reveling or drawing attention to how miserable it is - things just are, and the characters have to deal with it Yet it’s still a series that has humanity, these are deep and nuanced characters interacting with a complex and layered world where you understand every decision that resulted in the person they are now I think the mistake a lot of people make is to see something ‘dark’ and ‘serious’ as lacking ‘fun’ because the work feels like that’s an accolade to wear, and as such it feels forced, indulgent, and one-dimensional. If Andor is matter-of-fact and succeeds in creating human characters and a world with a balance of light and dark, it will feel like Star Wars. If not, then it’s not the approach that’s the problem - it’s the execution Basically… it needs to not be Rogue One Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andy 4,242 Posted August 10, 2022 Share Posted August 10, 2022 I miss Threepio and Artoo. They've been taken for granted for too long. EDIT with merged response... 15 hours ago, Manakin Skywalker said: I always find is so bizarre how "obscure" that cue is. When I think of music from the first film, that cue always pops up, but I pretty much never see anyone else mention it when talking about their favorite pieces. It's one of the greatest pieces of action music, one of the greatest arrangements of the main theme, AND the original Imperial motif; I always thought it deserved it's own concert performance of some kind! Not to mention it underscores one of the most iconic scenes in all of Star Wars... I loved when Williams used to score big setpieces that allowed his themes their glory statements. They really were the money shot moments, musically. The Swashbucklers being Star Wars' moment. The Helicopter Rescue with the Superman March is full on marching band style. The German Sub in Raiders when Jones climbs out of the sea onto the sub and salutes the Bantu crew. The crew is cheering and so are we. and of course the Flying scenes from E.T. Manakin Skywalker and GerateWohl 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post GerateWohl 4,461 Posted August 10, 2022 Popular Post Share Posted August 10, 2022 22 minutes ago, Andy said: I miss Threepio and Artoo. They've been taken for granted for too long. Yes, but as the odd couple as which we got to know them. Since everybody understands even the language of astro droids, there is no need for protocol droids like C-3PO anymore. That was one of the major mistakes, to take over that bad habit from Rebels (I think, there it started) into the live action movies. Tallguy, enderdrag64, ThePenitentMan1 and 1 other 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Luke Skywalker 1,807 Posted August 10, 2022 Share Posted August 10, 2022 I think anakin understood r2 in the prequels Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GerateWohl 4,461 Posted August 10, 2022 Share Posted August 10, 2022 1 hour ago, Luke Skywalker said: I think anakin understood r2 in the prequels No, he didn't. From episode 5 we know, that in their space ships the pilot has a translater display in the cockpit, getting the R2 unit's talk as kind of chat message. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Luke Skywalker 1,807 Posted August 10, 2022 Share Posted August 10, 2022 The was a deleted scene in rots, in grievous ship that anakin and obi wan talk about r2 and anakin imitates the robots speech… Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post Yavar Moradi 2,640 Posted August 10, 2022 Popular Post Share Posted August 10, 2022 On 08/08/2022 at 9:39 PM, Andy said: It doesn’t need lightsabers. It doesn’t need intrigue and espionage. It doesn’t need gritty realism. It doesn’t need politics. It needs to be fun. Obi-Wan was many things, but it wasn’t a fun adventure. Andor looks to be filled with more of the all too serious tone. Remember Luke and Leia swinging across the Death Star bridge? That was Star Wars. Yes, that was Star Wars (1977). Have you seen this little 1980 sequel film called The Empire Strikes Back? Are you seriously going to tell me THAT is "a fun adventure"? And that was following the FUN movie, not three terribly-executed prequels where a lot of horribly bad shit happens which should definitely have an effect on Obi-Wan. (How, given the setup/background for the character, did you expect Obi-Wan to be "fun adventure"?) (SPOILER WARNING FOR THOSE WHO HAVEN'T SEEN THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK, lol...) 1. Opens with Luke being attacked by a monster, his tauntaun eaten...he barely survives thanks to Han and weeks in a bacta tank, but he's still permanently scarred. Up next is the Rebel Alliance utterly losing the battle on Hoth; our heroes split up, barely escape and most of them spend the rest of the film on the run. 2. Han and Leia have a few cute romantic moments here and there while they're on the run, and I guess the brief mynock cave sequence was *mildly* fun in a "haha we barely escaped being eaten" sort of way. Then they end up at Cloud City, where Han's old friend Lando betrays them to the Empire/Darth Vader. C-3PO gets blown into pieces, while Han (and presumably Leia and Chewie too) is tortured at length ("They never even asked me any questions") simply to lure Luke into Vader's trap. Then Han is torn away from Leia and Chewie and put into carbon freeze, a process intended as capital punishment for murderers and such. Sometimes people don't survive it, but he does ("in perfect hibernation") because Harrison Ford hadn't decided yet whether he'd come back for the third movie. (What an iconic fun sequence that was!) 3. Luke spends a long time training to be a Jedi with Yoda... I guess the introduction of Yoda with R2D2 is a bit fun, yes, but most of the Jedi training isn't really fun at all... and sometimes it's pretty damn dark (the cave). Through the force, Luke senses Han/Chewbacca/Leia being tortured by Vader, foolishly decides to cut his training short and go rescue them. This, suffice to say, does not happen. His presence on Cloud City doesn't make anything better; he is easily defeated by Darth Vader who toys with him and then chops off his hand. Oh, and reveals that he is Luke's father. Luke screams that's impossible but he knows it's true, and he essentially chooses to commit suicide, letting go and falling hundreds of feet down the shaft to a port which almost dumps him into the atmosphere of a gas giant. He himself is the one who needs rescuing, and in a neat twist on the original Star Wars film, the no-longer-plucky hero is rescued by the PRINCESS, who forces Lando (who, oh yeah... changed sides again and freed her and Chewie to try and save Han even though that failed) to go back for him. (HOLLYWOOD WOKENESS ALERT! ) The movie ends on a semi-hopeful note but very uncertain/murky future. Now by your criteria, I think the vast majority of The Empire Strikes Back would be considering "all too serious" in tone. I agree Andor won't have the tone of Star Wars (1977) but I think Andor will more take the tone of its sequel, which is equally beloved/revered today (and which many people consider still the greatest Star Wars film of all... containing arguably the LOWEST percentage of "fun" out of all nine films making up the Skywalker saga, no matter how bad the majority of those were in terms of execution.) As I keep trying to express: the Star Wars universe can cover *many* different elements, and types of tone/story, and even the original trilogy showed that. And that's a STRENGTH which will potentially/hopefully lead to it not getting stale. Yavar enderdrag64, greenturnedblue, Tom Guernsey and 1 other 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JohnTheBaptist 57 Posted August 10, 2022 Share Posted August 10, 2022 Someone really just wrote a dissertation on how Empire isn't a fun adventure. I think some of you people need to touch grass. Yavar Moradi 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nick1Ø66 4,838 Posted August 10, 2022 Share Posted August 10, 2022 5 hours ago, Yavar Moradi said: Have you seen this little 1980 sequel film called The Empire Strikes Back? Are you seriously going to tell me THAT is "a fun adventure"? Well, frankly…yes. JohnTheBaptist and Andy 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Faleel 5,410 Posted August 10, 2022 Share Posted August 10, 2022 Gonna have to agree with Yavar. As a kid, Empire was the one I watched less. 8 hours ago, Luke Skywalker said: The was a deleted scene in rots, in grievous ship that anakin and obi wan talk about r2 and anakin imitates the robots speech… But the same scene also makes it clear that Anakin is guessing. Yavar Moradi 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Yavar Moradi 2,640 Posted August 10, 2022 Share Posted August 10, 2022 29 minutes ago, Nick1Ø66 said: Well, frankly…yes. What happens in Empire that's fun (like the example of Luke and Leia swinging across in Star Wars), aside from the few bits I acknowledged? And adding up all the fun moments, do you really think they even come close in quantity/quality to the dark parts I listed? Can you at least acknowledge that the sequel film generally has a very different (and much darker) tone than the original Star Wars, and that there's therefore some room to push the boundaries of tone/story content in the Star Wars universe? I'll be surprised if there aren't a few moments of fun here and there in Andor... Rogue One had them, after all. Also, even the original (much more fun) Star Wars has pretty dark moments which would seem like they would fit in well with Andor (Luke's aunt and uncle murdered, Leia interrogated with drugs, the destruction of the entire planet of Alderaan??) It is still about "the last remnants of the Old Republic" being "swept away" (when the Senate is dissolved), after all, before the Death Star is (barely in time) destroyed. Yavar Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tallguy 3,486 Posted August 10, 2022 Share Posted August 10, 2022 Well, that's the real trick, isn't it? Star Wars has the dissolution of a major democratically elected body by a tyrannical empire, the murder of the main character's foster parents, the death of the mentor character, and THE DESTRUCTION OF AN ENTIRE PLANET just so the baddies could prove a point! But it's FUN! (And it is. It's fun!) Empire is the "dark one" but it's still a hoot. ("They just killed Dak! But I'm still having a really good time!") It ends on a downbeat note, but it's a Star Wars movie. You still have a pretty certain idea that everything is going to be OK. You're just a little confused because you've never seen a "To be continued" in a major motion picture before! Rogue One is mostly darker not so much for the body count but for the fact that the main characters know that they're in a "tragedy" and they aren't happy about it. (Really the first time in Star Wars this has happened, right? Anakin was a literal slave and he was very happy go lucky about it.) But even so, Rogue One is also... FUN! I had a fair amount of fun watching Obi-Wan. A lot of that came from Leia. I just had to say "Oh, they're inserting a story here where I didn't think there was one. OK. Why aren't they making something set between Star Wars and Empire?" It didn't set my world on fire but this wasn't a story that I've been dying to see. I'm kind of thinking that Andor might be a story that I've been dying to see. Or at least might have wondered about. And it might be fun! Yavar Moradi 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nick1Ø66 4,838 Posted August 10, 2022 Share Posted August 10, 2022 53 minutes ago, Yavar Moradi said: Can you at least acknowledge that the sequel film generally has a very different (and much darker) tone than the original Star Wars Sure, I guess the tone of the second film is dark, but only somewhat in comparison to the first film. But it's still a fun, grand adventure...every minute of it. At least, I have fun (and I'm often moved) watching it. It's my favorite of the films. I mean, Temple of Doom is described as "dark" (including by its director) the same way Empire is, but it's still mostly just a fun adventure, which is what people expect when they see these movies. Andy 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Edmilson 7,598 Posted August 11, 2022 Share Posted August 11, 2022 1 hour ago, Tallguy said: You're just a little confused because you've never seen a "To be continued" in a major motion picture before! I had this exact same experience as a kid, not with TESB but with The Fellowship of the Ring. I was a dumb kid and we didn't have internet in the early 2000s, so I honestly had no idea that the first LOTR movie would end with a cliffhanger. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Faleel 5,410 Posted August 11, 2022 Share Posted August 11, 2022 2 minutes ago, Edmilson said: I had this exact same experience as a kid, not with TESB but with The Fellowship of the Ring. I was a dumb kid and we didn't have internet in the early 2000s, so I honestly had no idea that the first LOTR movie would end with a cliffhanger. I was confused because I had watched the Bakshi film prior, so I was susprised it ended way before the battle of Helms Deep. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DarthDementous 1,060 Posted August 11, 2022 Share Posted August 11, 2022 5 hours ago, Yavar Moradi said: Also, even the original (much more fun) Star Wars has pretty dark moments which would seem like they would fit in well with Andor (Luke's aunt and uncle murdered, Leia interrogated with drugs, the destruction of the entire planet of Alderaan??) It is still about "the last remnants of the Old Republic" being "swept away" (when the Senate is dissolved), after all, before the Death Star is (barely in time) destroyed. Yavar In this instance it’s a matter of presentation and focus. We see Owen and Beru’s skeletons briefly and Luke doesn’t dwell on it, instead using it as motivation to leave his home behind. Same with the destruction of Alderaan, single self-contained sequence that has no long-term impact on Princess Leia These aren’t particularly realistic reactions from our characters, but it works because the movie is deliberately going for an optimistic tone rather than a pessimistic or realist one I can relate far more to the ESB’s realism because the characters feel far more like real people (Luke in stunned bewilderment questioning why Ben lied to him), but I recognise there’s a place for larger than life fairytale figures. ESB is the movie that establishes both approaches can co-exist in the franchise Yavar Moradi 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nick1Ø66 4,838 Posted August 11, 2022 Share Posted August 11, 2022 7 hours ago, DarthDementous said: ESB is the movie that establishes both approaches can co-exist in the franchise They co-exist in the same film. That's why Empire is the best chapter. Star Wars without any kind of grounded realism and characters acting like they're real people is Star Wars at its worst (e.g. AOTC). Empire is Star Wars at its best because it's both operatic, full of pathos and a heightened sense of drama, with the mythology and all the trappings of Star Wars fully intact, but also a story grounded in real characters acting like genuine human beings. But, like The Force itself, it's about balance...Star Wars needs both to be something truly great. Tallguy and DarthDementous 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DarthDementous 1,060 Posted August 11, 2022 Share Posted August 11, 2022 15 minutes ago, Nick1Ø66 said: They co-exist in the same film. That's why Empire is the best chapter. Star Wars without any kind of grounded realism and characters acting like they're real people is Star Wars at its worst (e.g. AOTC). Empire is Star Wars at its best because it's both operatic, full of pathos and a heightened sense of drama, with the mythology and all the trappings of Star Wars fully intact, but also a story grounded in real characters acting like genuine human beings. But, like The Force itself, it's about balance...Star Wars needs both to be something truly great. AOTC is many things, but it is certainly not grounded realism and full of realistic characters Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nick1Ø66 4,838 Posted August 11, 2022 Share Posted August 11, 2022 2 minutes ago, DarthDementous said: AOTC is many things, but it is certainly not grounded realism and full of realistic characters Which...is what I said. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DarthDementous 1,060 Posted August 11, 2022 Share Posted August 11, 2022 1 minute ago, Nick1Ø66 said: Which...is what I said. Woops you're right, I misread. That makes a lot more sense Nick1Ø66 and Tallguy 1 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pellaeon 593 Posted August 11, 2022 Share Posted August 11, 2022 Interesting parallel between Rogue One (2016) and Discovery, Season 1 (2017): Rebellion/Starfleet not idealistic Dead-faced protagonist super not idealistic Entire movie/season of gritty, cynical badassery Protagonist suddenly decides to lecture Rebellion/Starfleet on how they should be idealistic after all DarthDementous and Andy 1 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jay 37,479 Posted August 11, 2022 Share Posted August 11, 2022 12 minutes ago, Pellaeon said: Dead-faced protagonist ? Yavar Moradi 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Disco Stu 15,495 Posted August 11, 2022 Share Posted August 11, 2022 Rogue One made it pretty clear that she was hiding the idealism she took from her father for survival/to cope with the trauma. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nick1Ø66 4,838 Posted August 11, 2022 Share Posted August 11, 2022 She's a rebel. That's what she does...rebels. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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