The Last Jedi vs. The Dial of Destiny (film & score)

[Jurassic Shark 12,080]

Two controversial movies among fans... which one do you like the most?

[Bellosh 3,419]

Film: The Last Jedi

 

Felt like a singular vision from a very very competent director. I'll take that over a committee every day of the week.  It's the only sequel trilogy movie I liked.

 

Score: Dial of Destiny

 

It has 'To Athens'

[Jurassic Shark 12,080]

Film: DoD. Both films are entertaining throughout their runtime, but the story in DoD feels more coherent and meaningful.

 

Score: I need to refresh my acquaintance with the Last Jedi score, but for now the scores are tied. 

[JTN 2,036]

Haven't seen any of the films (more like couldn't watch them all the way through). 

 

Score: The Last Jedi. 

[Datameister 2,044]

I gave both to TLJ.

 

Both films disappointed me a lot at first; maybe DOD will grow on me with time like TLJ did. But that hasn't happened yet. DOD vs. TROS would be a tougher choice.

 

Music-wise, both suffer from excessive reuse of existing material. Both also bring good new ideas to the table. At the moment, TLJ interests me more, but I'm also more familiar with it.

[GerateWohl 4,371]

When I think about it, I would say, it is a tie for both movies. But I enjoy The Last Jedi more.

I don't think, that I am going to watch Dial of Destiny ever again.

I tried to re-watch it, when it appeared on Disney+ and just made it half way throught the movie and switched it off bored. I rather listen to the score instead.

Crystal Skull is much more rewatchable. The Last Jedi, too.

 

For the score, I don't like the The Last Jedi OST at all and I adore the Dial of Destiny OST. 

When I want to listen to TLJ I listen to the FYC program, which is great and I believe superior to Dial of Destiny.

On the Other hand, Helena's theme is better than anything from TLJ. Still the TLJ score feels overall richer to me. 

Difficult choice as well.

[Sandor 797]

1 hour ago, Bellosh said:

Film: The Last Jedi

 

Felt like a singular vision from a very very competent director. I'll take that over a committee every day of the week.  It's the only sequel trilogy movie I liked.

 

Score: Dial of Destiny

 

It has 'To Athens'

 

This! 

[Tom 4,666]

DoD for both.  TLJ is a great score, but not enough of a spark to make it truly outstanding (yes, intended).  The last third of DoD is greatness (but (just?) below masterpiece-level).  

 

I strongly dislike both movies for reasons better left in other threads.  However, I will say this: these two directors have shown the more respect to Williams's music in film more so than other directors (including SS) over the last two decades.

[A. A. Ron 1,742]

Films: I’m ambivalent to vaguely positive about DOD. Absolutely hated TLJ. That said, I think DOD would get better poll results against TROS.

 

Scores: I don’t like Rose’s theme, but the material for Luke and the source music on Canto Bight are great. TLJ’s high points are better than DOD’s, but I consider DOD more consistently entertaining.

[artguy360 1,843]

I'm glad to see the correct options are winning the poll. TLJ is JW's last cohesive blockbuster score.

[Jurassic Shark 12,080]

On 28/12/2023 at 3:07 AM, A. A. Ron said:

I consider DOD more consistently entertaining.

 

That my take as well. 

[Schilkeman 964]

I find the score to TLJ a kind of late-stage wonder. DoD is entertaining, but not as good. I haven't seen the film, and I don't like TLJ, but I still count it as a tie.

[GerateWohl 4,371]

If Rian Johnson had made Indy 5 the McGuffin would be unknown during 90% of the movie. Indy would be send on a mission to save the planets ecosystem. By the end the McGuffin would be forgotten by everyone. Marion would have been sent on a useless side mission to get medicine for Indy to save him from a deadly desease and in the end they find out that Indy wasn't sick at all.

 

Dial of Destiny is the better movie. 

[Muad'Dib 1,802]

The problem with TLJ as a movie is that it's a mixed bag. The whole stuff with Rey, Kylo and Luke is fresh and fantastic, if the movie had focused on them it could have been great; even if you take into consideration the new interpretation of old Luke. When the movie's good, it's really good. It's the rest that really drags the movie down.

 

I feel like DoD is consisently average, except for the last 20 minutes or so where it finally dares to try something different. But by the time we get there, it's a little too late. 

 

As for the score, there's a particular sweet spot TLJ hits in terms of orchestration and sound that takes the lead for me. It's clear than in both movies JW has told -of decided- to follow the temp-track closely, but I feel in TLJ he was able to create a little bit more. The Spark, The Rebellion is Reborn and The Fathiers come to mind in terms of "Damn! Look at him go!". 

[igger6 894]

Great question! What a leprechaun's dilemma.

 

I say DoD for film because, while I was rarely, how you say, entertained by it as I should have been, I spent way less time actively frustrated and angry while watching it. Also, each movie has one really big idea (send Indy back in time and tempt him to become one with his life's work rather than work through his family issues in the present; tempt Luke to lose hope in his life's work and redeem him last-minute with a noble sacrifice that inspires the future). DoD features a deeply flawed execution of a big idea I rather like, while TLJ features a mostly competent execution of an idea I abhor.  Both films feature overhyped side characters who divert or muddy up the central plot, or just make no impact whatsoever where it would be reasonable to expect one (hi there, Benicio and Antonio).  Both feature characters we're apparently supposed to like who come off as obnoxious (Helena and Holdo), and both fail miserably at comedy.  (I do like Rose's line about "doing talking" with a Resistance hero.)

 

For score, I'd say DoD for a couple of reasons.  Frankly, my expectations were lower, because JW was six years older when it came out.  But also, astonishingly, it features more new melodic material than TLJ, where you get past Rose's theme and Luke's island half-theme, and you're gnawing Harry Potter and prequel leftovers in the action music and trying for years to successfully hum Holdo's theme.  DoD, on the other hand, has several notable minor motifs that actually feel like crafted melodies rather than riffs of a handful of notes.  (I can't name any of them on the spot, but I just rewatched the CGI prologue a week or so ago and kept thinking, "Oh, there's that one again!  Something about the Nazis/the Greeks/the Dial!") Both scores have more needle-drops than I'd like, but TLJ's are more obnoxious because they're straight from the concert arrangements (Leia and Yoda) or from extremely famous pre-existing score setpieces (Jedi Steps, the Emperor) or both (Here They Come!).  I don't know the depths of Indy action music well enough (nor, I would argue, does the culture) for those drops to be egregious, especially for a 90-year-old composer.  Finally, hearing Williams play around with Helena's theme, a new melody, in a million wonderful guises, is another gulp of the same oxygen I've been breathing as a JWFan for decades.  TLJ had far fewer moments of that.  You could also argue that, because of the prominence of Helena's theme in the score vis-à-vis Rose's in TLJ, DOD owes far less to previous Indy films than TLJ owes to The Force Awakens, where most of its melodic material comes from.

 

 

[Tom 4,666]

What a brilliant post.  You are articulating my own thoughts, even though I am not sure that I knew that I had them.  

[Schilkeman 964]

"Lester Young and Wayne Shorter were my two guys. And then it grew from there. Then I joined Blakey’s band, because he would always tell me how sh–ty I was. And then he would tell me why, ’cause I didn’t know anything and it was impossible for me to say you’re wrong. I’m like, well, touché. You can sit here and rip me all day, or you can tell me what to start listening to so I can shut you up. And he started telling me, check this guy out, check that guy out. You’re learning all this Coltrane. When Coltrane was your age, what do you think he was listening to? Tastes of himself in the future? You need to go learn the cats he’s learning from." - Branford Marsalis

 

A lesson that needs to be learned for all the people making legacy sequels. What were George and Steven watching or reading as kids? Because it sure as shit wasn't Star Wars and Indiana Jones. Disney and its cadre of directors/writers put themselves in an unwinnable situation by being insularly referential, but also needing to be original, which causes all the new stuff to feel like it's spoken with a bad accent. It's a copy of a copy. What were the original creators experiencing that made them want to make those movies? Take it in. Maybe then these films will stop eating themselves.

[Damien F 1,742]

I'm not the biggest of Rose's theme. I'm not saying it's a bad theme but it's just personal preference. I can still enjoy it while listening to the score but it is probably my last favourite Star Wars theme. I like Helena's theme much more.

 

The Airport / Battle of Syracuse / Centuries Join Hands are the best trio of tracks from both scores.

 

As for the movies, TLJ is a decent Star Wars adventure (aside from the terrible Canto Bight stuff) but it is an awful sequel to the story threads introduced in TFA. For that grievance alone, I prefer DoD.

 

 

[Tom 4,666]

11 hours ago, Damien F said:

I'm not the biggest of Rose's theme.

 

 

Yes, but I hope you know that this theme by any other name would sound as sweet. 

[Muad'Dib 1,802]

You gotta hand it to Johnny: when Rose's theme appears one last time at the end of The Rebellion is Reborn it's like