There are still no big stories worth writing about, so more thoughts!
● The left loves to claim that they are on the right side of history. Yet, the Kavanaugh smear and other instances like it will be remembered historically as the second age of the witch hunt... or perhaps The Age of McCarthy Redux.
● The Carolina floods have claimed the lives of 1.7 million chickens. Without those votes, the Democrats are sure to lose. In all seriousness though, doesn't that seem Biblical. And the Lord did say, "I hate chicken" and he wiped out 1.7 million chickens. So we ate beef, and it was GOOD!
● Speaking of Biblical things, Burt and Ernie from Sesame Street are not gay. So says their creator, Frank Oz. In fact, he said, they are just puppets and puppets don't have orientations. I'm glad to hear this from him. To claim otherwise, as a former Sesame Street writer has (he tried to claim they are gay), sexualizes something that should not be sexual. It also puts an intolerable suspicion on same-sex friendships, which of course is what the left has done -- take a history course and you'll hear how every single person or person who had a same-sex friend just had to be gay. Idiots. Maybe some people just don't think with their genitalia? Ever consider that lefties?
● I'm still high on the Dorco razor stuff (no, they have never paid me a penny or offered anything). I finally got through the whole sample pack I bought and I'm super happy. $40 for a year and a half worth of razors is amazing. In the end, I like the 3 blade ones. Anything higher than that clogs too quickly and wears out to fast. So if you're thinking about razors, that's my recommendation.
● It is not news when some celebrity "claps back" against some troll. That just publicity.
● Anderson Cooper looks sooooo pissy responding to Don Trump Jr. calling his water stunt fake. Trump definitely got under Cooper's skin. Ha ha.
● Cruz is up by 9% in Texas now. No surprise. Despite all the media shock, Cruz was always going to win.
● The left loves to claim that they are on the right side of history. Yet, the Kavanaugh smear and other instances like it will be remembered historically as the second age of the witch hunt... or perhaps The Age of McCarthy Redux.
● The Carolina floods have claimed the lives of 1.7 million chickens. Without those votes, the Democrats are sure to lose. In all seriousness though, doesn't that seem Biblical. And the Lord did say, "I hate chicken" and he wiped out 1.7 million chickens. So we ate beef, and it was GOOD!
● Speaking of Biblical things, Burt and Ernie from Sesame Street are not gay. So says their creator, Frank Oz. In fact, he said, they are just puppets and puppets don't have orientations. I'm glad to hear this from him. To claim otherwise, as a former Sesame Street writer has (he tried to claim they are gay), sexualizes something that should not be sexual. It also puts an intolerable suspicion on same-sex friendships, which of course is what the left has done -- take a history course and you'll hear how every single person or person who had a same-sex friend just had to be gay. Idiots. Maybe some people just don't think with their genitalia? Ever consider that lefties?
● I'm still high on the Dorco razor stuff (no, they have never paid me a penny or offered anything). I finally got through the whole sample pack I bought and I'm super happy. $40 for a year and a half worth of razors is amazing. In the end, I like the 3 blade ones. Anything higher than that clogs too quickly and wears out to fast. So if you're thinking about razors, that's my recommendation.
● It is not news when some celebrity "claps back" against some troll. That just publicity.
● Anderson Cooper looks sooooo pissy responding to Don Trump Jr. calling his water stunt fake. Trump definitely got under Cooper's skin. Ha ha.
● Cruz is up by 9% in Texas now. No surprise. Despite all the media shock, Cruz was always going to win.
42 comments:
I'd heard about the Bert and Ernie thing, but not Oz's response. That's good to hear. Interestingly, I recently read "The Four Loves" by C.S. Lewis, in which he notes the longstanding cultural association of same-sex (especially male) friendships with homosexuality, and the deleterious effect that's had on individuals and society as a whole. In a book published in 1960! Really makes you think about how much leftism has already influenced out culture.
Thomas, Most of the media ignored Oz's response, but it's slowly getting out. What Oz said is what common sense should tell us. If the Sesame Street puppets are having sex, then the show should be cancelled.
I think the effect on same sex friendships is horrible. The world thrives on friendships. Human need them. I would argue we need them even more than lovers. Yet, this idea that every same-sex friendship must be a secret homosexual friendship strips people of the ability to have those close friends. And I think that comes from this push by the left through culture and education to convert single people in the past into gays for political purposes.
Thomas, Andrew, Sesame Workshop put out a statement saying Bert and Ernie were created to show children that very different people can be friends. That’s fairly ironic when set against people demanding puppets to be like them, or else.
Andrew, 100% agreed. When I went to college, after having gone to a private Christian high school, I found I had a hard time connecting with most people, and I think that's probably part of it. I was lucky enough not to be exposed to the expectation that close friends = gay while I was growing up, but a lot of people inadvertently get conditioned into keeping everyone at arm's length, which then ends up negatively impacting their ability to connect on a more basic level. And don't get me started on people being "converted" to being gay--I couldn't prove it in court, but I've seen it happen several times to people who feel like outcasts and want to be "special."
tryanmax, That really is ironic. And how much more important is it to teach children the broad lesson "you can get along with people who are different" vs the narrow "gay people are just alright"? You could argue that the latter is a subset of the former, but why focus on it with kids?
1) It would be nice if the Kavanaugh smear came to be viewed as some exceptional low point (Ford says she will talk eventually, but not anytime soon) but I doubt it. Smearing one's opponents with lies (according to our current president Ted Cruz's father killed JFK) is just the way the game is played nowadays. That won't be changing anytime soon.
2) Good to know about Bert and Ernie. I still think that Lando is pansexual (meaning he'll have sex with anything of any species or gender) thing hurt the Han Solo movie.
3) Donald Trump Junior posting an old photo of Andersen Cooper and claiming it was current and an attempt by Andersen to make his daddy look bad was pretty nutty but par for the course nowadays. Both sides are filled with whiny conspiracy theorists who see themselves as victims and will embrace anything (no matter how tenuous) which supports that view and ignore anything (no matter how substantial) which doesn't.
Anthony, I thought it was Woody Harrelson's dad. (with the candlestick...under the triple underpass.)
Oh, I'm so confused.
An Hispanic Republican won a congressional seat in Texas by 12 points that hasn't had anything but a Democrat in 169 years...and Ted Cruz is 9 points ahead of O'Rourke...the moron Dim in Montana ain't doing so well....and neither is McCaskill in my state....things may not work out for the Democrat Party come November. If the GOP holds on to majorities in both houses I want Trump to put the hammer down on immigration, etc..and fire a bunch of deep-staters all across the Federal Government.
Anthony, you crack me up! I just love how Trump can say "nobody's talking about this" and suddenly people start talking about whatever it is, adding more and more embellishments until it's nothing like what it started out as, and never letting it go! It's proof of the saying "The first liar doesn't stand a chance."
Blasey Ford won't testify until after the FBI has investigated Kavanaugh. But don't suggest that the Democrats have politicized the Bureau.
Thomas and tryanmax, The left once pushed the idea of diversity -- we should all get along with people who are different from us because we learn so much, it broadens us, etc.
That was before identity politics really poisoned them. Now they want everyone segregated and, what's more, through this asinine half-baked idea of cultural appropriation, they want everyone to stay in their box and not enjoy any aspects of someone else's culture.
Anthony, The democrats will keep finding new lows. It's what they do.
Lando being pansexual is kind of sh*tty... like the movie.
Rustbelt, "under the triple underpass" -- LOL!
Critch, I think that with few exceptions, the states are going to vote how they naturally vote this year. That means no wave for either side.
tryanmax, I think the fact the FBI refused to investigate has all but ruined her claim from a PR perspective. She's hoping to change that while delaying the hearing until it's too late to act. This game is about timing. They want to push the vote off until the next Senate, which is all they've ever wanted.
I just saw a short blurb that Grassley says they are going to go ahead and vote to confirm Kavanaugh...we'll see if it pans out..
Why would the FBI have any authority to investigate something that happened 35 years ago and all they have is the word of a person who seems to change her story sometimes..
What Oz says also applies elsewhere. I am just, as a man interested in women, just friends with women who aren't my wife as well. I am also just friends with other guys. Nothing wrong with being just friends with people. As for Star Wars, it's a lower grade of spaceballs, and a lot of the jokes are essentially plagiarized fromy Futurama, which delivers the jokes better.
BTW, anyone want to bet the Democrats are working hard on finding another liar to add to the Kavanaugh mix? If they can get one, look for this woman to "finally come forward" probably Monday.
Critch, The bigger question is what they would investigate? There's no proof. Her witness denies it. She has changed her story to add Kavanaugh and change the number of rapists and she didn't even invent the story until 2012. Only a fool (lying Democrat) would think there is any truth to this.
Ben, Disney has ruined Star Wars. I don't even want to watch the films anymore.
Not to derail the thread, but...*braces* I actually liked the Last Jedi. *ducks in case of rotten tomatoes being thrown* I'm guessing you didn't, Andrew? (Rogue One and Solo are hot garbage though, no argument there. Ok, I didn't actually bother to watch Solo so I can't officially call it garbage...but yeah.)
1. Not much I can add to the discussion on Kavanaugh or how vile and shameless the Democrats' smear is. Here's hoping they go ahead with the vote.
2. Hard to tell whether the Chick-Fil-A cows or their suggested alternative meat is going to come out of this worse!
3. Good move by Oz here and excellent points on how obnoxious the genitalia obsessed thinking involved here really is. It also reminds me of how over the top obsessed I've seen a certain element of fandom get with gay relationships, whether it's with a fictional work or even celebrities and how quick they are to screech homophobe if you find this to be crazy. Some people really take their wank fodder a bit too seriously, don't they?
On the new Star Wars stuff, I don't have it offhand and haven't read it myself but there's an interview with Kathleen Kennedy, one of the higher ups in charge of Star Wars (I can't remember her exact title) where she basically said she was making the new Star Wars entries with the goal of drawing in new, mostly female fans to the franchise and expressed contempt for the longtime, mostly male fans. I still need to read it for myself but this does explain a lot about the direction of the series if it's true.
Thomas, It's fine. We let people have different opinions here... we're not liberals after all! :)
I thought Rogue One was a total waste. This was a movie that had no idea what it was trying to do except kill off the cast at the end for a dramatic touch. There were so many possibilities, but it felt like they never even considered them.
Solo struck me as a confused mess. It was like a fan-service film sprinkled with leftist political ideas and no real idea why it existed. If you didn't already know the main character(s), no one would ever have made that film.
Last Jedi was ok to me. It struck me as very by-the-numbers and rather dull, but it made sense and it did what it was supposed to do. The problem is that I think what it was supposed to do is act as a placeholder until they can figure out how to wrap up the story. As I watched it, I kept losing interest. This was made as an event rather than a film. But on some levels at least it did work.
What did you think?
Daniel,
That drives me nuts, when the "HE NEEDS TO BE GAY!!" people invade a film or television fandom. Good grief, no one needs to be gay. No one needs to be sexual. I don't want to see Luke Skywalker getting it on with a woman or a man... or a wookie. Can't we just let some character be normal people who aren't sex obsessed?
My youngest is OBSESSED with Chik fil a. LOL! I really don't get it. She even owns their calendar.
On the female thing, the studio types have come to believe that (1) male science fiction fans will turn out no matter what, (2) females will only become fans if science fiction become rom-coms. So they are feminizing science fiction in the hopes of adding female fans.
I doubt this will work. For one thing, women just don't seem to like science fiction, no matter how feminized. For another, sagging sales suggests to me that males are leaving science fiction. Where are they going? My guess is (1) gaming, (2) anime, (3) horror.
I think the feminists who grabbed Dr. Who are in for a shock. They'll do well enough with the new chick doctor on the first night, but then they will discover that the males have left and this army of feminist girl-power viewers won't show up after all.
Andrew, thanks for the welcoming response! I've received antagonistic responses for liking Last Jedi both online and in real life lol.
Totally agree on Rogue One. I think they wanted to make a Seven Samurai/Magnificent Seven-esque movie, but it pales so much in comparison to those classics. There's no reason to care about any of the characters.
That's an interesting take on Last Jedi, and I think indicative of how fan culture warps perspective. In a lot of online circles, the movie is hated more than Hitler. I can't swing a dead cat without running into someone who thinks it's worse than the prequels. (!) Even the RedLetterMedia guys hated it (the Plinkett review of it was a big disappointment--it was mostly just nitpicking minor plot contrivances). But when I talk to people who aren't part of the Internet hive-mind, they generally think it was ok-to-good.
Anyway, it's interesting that you found it to be by-the-numbers--most of the criticism stems from it being too different and subverting expectations too much. People hate that Luke became a recluse/cynic, that Snoke was killed without having his backstory explained, that Rey is actually a nobody, that one of the main themes was about not idolizing the past, etc. The claim is often made that a storyteller only relies on subverting expectations so much when he has no better ideas, but I didn't see it that way at all; I thought all of those things were good ideas, or at least made sense given the context of the previous movie, regardless of how they played into expectations.
As for why I actually liked it: I thought it felt like a return to form, and also addressed the underlying philosophy of the series in an interesting way. I liked the Force Awakens, but it was a blatant rehash of the original movie, so I was really glad that, while Last Jedi "echoed" Empire, it was by no means the same thing. I found the drama between Luke, Rey, and Kylo Ren to be fascinating. Granted, I don't think Rey is the greatest protagonist ever, but I liked Luke's character arc a lot, and Kylo is the most dynamic villain Star Wars has ever had--he's evil, but also very understandable, and he he straddles the line between being redeemable and not. "Philosophically," I liked that the movie went out of its way to make the Force less "aristocratic"--until now, a handful of people, most of them named Skywalker, have had an insanely huge amount of power over the galaxy. With Rey not having a special heritage, Luke's "the Force is not a superpower" speech, and the random kid in the final shot being presented as, basically, the future of the Jedi, it went a long way towards making the Force less "elite," or even (arguably) Nietzschean. I also really appreciated its take on tradition--something a lot of people missed is that Rey took the sacred Jedi texts with her in the Falcon, so when Yoda told Luke the she already had everything she needed with her, he wasn't *really* dismissing the Jedi ways; it's more that he wants the Jedi to learn from their failures, amending the traditions as necessary, rather than repeating the same mistakes over and over. I don't often encounter media that affirms tradition (especially in Hollywood) but also doesn't advocate blind obedience to it, so I found that quite refreshing. It also makes for an interesting commentary on the state of the Star Wars fandom (wanting the same stuff over and over) and the movie's own place in that (trying to move the series forward while still staying true to its roots).
(Continued) I'll admit I wasn't as crazy about the other subplots--they did their job of tying into the themes about failure and what have you, but they weren't anything super memorable. Based on those, I can definitely see how the movie could feel like a placeholder, though I'd offer the counterargument that Empire Strikes Back had a similar lack of plot progression. (Not that I think Last Jedi is as good!)
That was far longer than I realized until I posted it--my apologies! I've spent way too much time thinking about it over the last several months, and I didn't even address everything I could've. But I'm curious to hear your response!
And the handful of feminist girl-power viewers that do show up will focus only on the problematic bits and demand they be changed.
Andrew, on fandom even about 18 or so years ago you didn't have to do much to encounter those types of fans, especially once you became aware of fanfiction. That's where you found the really scary obsessive types, including the ones who wrote fics about celebrities. I found the overwhelming presence of it in game and book related works exasperating enough but for me the people doing the celebrity fics really crossed the line into creepy territory. I'm not surprised that they've brought their obsession out in the open through things like the Twitter hashtag campaigns for Captain America and Elsa from Frozen needing to be in gay relationships in the next movies. I'm guessing this stuff has no more appeal to the general public now than it did back then (if you wanted to get a good "WTF?!" reaction out of a mainstream Harry Potter fan back then you'd mention to them how you can'f find a decent discussion group that isn't overcrowded with talk of fan-made gay pairings) but with the way Hollywood is who knows?
On Chick-Fil-A I live in their home state so of course it's big here even though it was late nigh school before I got into them. What can I say, their food is good and the cows are always worth a laugh! Shame that this is the last year for calendars, though, since both the humor and the monthly special offers were great. Now if only the sit-down restaurant in town would finish its reconstruction so I don't have to go to a dead mall or temporary drive-through to get my chicken sandwich fix... Still, my compliments to your daughter for her excellent taste in chicken!
On fandom you're exactly right, though of course there's some identity politics at work here. To an identitarian the only reason that women aren't into sci-fi absolutely has to be misogyny from the male fans so they make changes like Dr. Who, find a few trolls to use as the face of male fandom, and pour their self-righteous, smug wrath out on said fans, labeling even thoughtful criticisms as misogyny. It's definitely a self-fulfilling idiocy, to borrow a phrase from one of my old favorite blog reads. Can you tell I'm well beyond sick and tired of this crap lurking around things I enjoy?
For one last note on beloved series in decline, I feel you there Andrew. I'm primarily a gamer with a taste for JRPGs but in these past few years I've seen a lot of series and companies crap the bed. Final Fantasy's been stumbling since XII, with XV ending up as an unholy chimera of DLC and patches, some of which even change the story around. Square-Enix itself is also going further and further down the rabbit hole of the "games as a service" business model and putting especially obnoxious DRM on the PC versions of their games. I don't know what Konami was thinking with a lot of their decisions in the past few years between separating Metal Gear from its creator to use its name for things like an online survival horror game. This doesn't even get into how they split up MGSV into two games and practically forced online PVP onto the players in the Phantom Pain. Naturally pretty much all of their other quality series, whether big like Castlevania or small like Suikoden, are effectively dead now. Series under the umbrella of the EA Borg pretty much go without saying as well and I'm finding myself less and less willing to take a chance on a possible Dragon Age 4. Honestly, it seems like the only series I have left anymore are the Shin Megami Tensei games, primarily the Persona series, and the Legend of Heroes Trails series as far as games go! Thankfully books don't have things like microtransactions so they're still on the table!
Sorry, Andrew. I was tired when I wrote that. I meant to say it was Woody's dad with the lead pipe while Jackie finished the job with the wrench.
(You'd be surprised how many conspiracy theories require Jackie's involvement in order for them to work.)
"Not to derail the thread, but...*braces* I actually liked the Last Jedi."
Thomas, (grasps lever of catapult loaded with tomatoes, coconuts, watermelons and cartoonish bombs shaped like bowling balls with the sparking, white fuses), START RUNNING!!!!!!!!
Thomas, What bothered me about the film was:
1. The dialog was crap. It was modern slang, which has no place in this set of movies. It was also full of fakery. Almost everything Luke said was nonsense.
2. It tried desperately to be witty/funny, but the jokes were stale and cynical. It was hipster-self-aware humor which isn't clever or funny.
3. The time scoping made no sense. Luke's story was months, the pointless trip to the casino of political correctness should have taken days... but it all had to fit within a few hours so it did.
4. Nothing in this movie was earned. None of the characters deserved any of the things they achieved.
5. The constant speeches were meaningless dribble. I will say though, they did capture the Pussyhead March spirit: "Let's run away and hide until someone else fixes this thing!"
6. Every single moment, plot point, or even dialog point was stolen from other movies. And they were stolen so blatantly that it was almost insulting. It was like the director figured no one had ever seen any other movies.
If you can look past all of that, it was a pretty movie that had some fun action moments in it. It was watchable, unlike the others, but that's about all I can say for it.
In terms of Luke, Rey and Kylo Ren, I thought that Ren was improved in this film. His character was fuller and he seemed evil rather than childish. That's a plus.
Luke's talk was all kind of nonsense. He's disavowing something that is part of nature and can't be disavowed and he's quitter. The point to the first three movies was that he would gain some wisdom, but he seems to have forgotten that. His plan doesn't work either if other people get the force naturally. Then letting the Jedi die only wipes out the school for good.
Rey doesn't interest me really. I don't care for the actress and I think the character is very under-developed.
But I did like the Kylo Ren stuff.
Off topic...
I've talked about how sportswriters seem to truly despise the NFL and other sports leagues today, right? Check out this quote. This is from an apologetic article in which a Yahoo sporty is trying to deny the claim that Hall of Famers deserve massive salaries. Notice what he says about the NFL though:
... the last thing anyone in the world needs is someone strapping on a cape for team owners or the league commissioner, who all make absurd sums of money on an annual basis. Particularly when there are so many things to loathe in the NFL – concussions; domestic violence; officiating; rules; the Colin Kaepernick and Eric Reid sagas; or any multitude of embarrassing issues involving the billionaires who are at the controls.
Notice the word "loathe." Is that a word someone unbiased uses? Nope.
Rustbelt, *does C3PO voice* I surrender, I surrender!
Andrew,
1./2. Some of the dialogue was definitely off, and the prank call at the beginning was awful. I'm having a hard time thinking of other things that bothered me, though, other than some incredibly cringeworthy deleted scenes. I'll keep that in mind next time I watch it, though.
3. I didn't get the impression the parts on the island took more than a few days, or needed to. Though I think they started, chronologically, a bit before the other parts of the movie, since they picked up directly from the end of the last one. And I think the casino bit only taking a few hours at least kind of made sense--in all the other movies, they seem to be able to travel pretty much anywhere in the galaxy in a matter of hours. It definitely is somewhat muddled, but...not to rely on the "ESB did it too" defense, but I always thought it felt like the scenes on Dagobah took a lot longer the the Han/Leia stuff.
4. Did anyone really achieve anything? Rey and Kylo failed to turn each other, Finn failed to help the fleet, the pilot dude's attempted coup was misguided and a failure. Luke helped everyone survive but died in the process. I think survival is all they really achieved, unless I'm missing something.
5. Are you referring to Luke mirroring the Pussyhead attitude? That was kind of annoying, but see my last paragraph. I guess there was also the "save what you love, don't fight what you hate" thing at the end--yeah, that was stupid. I think maybe the idea they were trying to express was that you shouldn't be so consumed with winning that you destroy yourself for no reason...but as it is, it's an awful line.
6. I honestly didn't pick up on that. Maybe I just haven't seen enough movies? There were definitely a lot of parallels to the original trilogy, but it felt like it was using those to play with expectations rather than mindlessly copy.
As for Luke, Kylo, and Rey--agreed on Kylo, and mostly agreed on Rey--I think the actress does a fine job, but the character is definitely bland. She's only as interesting as her relationship with Kylo. As for Luke: what I got from it was that Luke quit because he failed so hard with Kylo. He wasn't right to do so, but seeing his nephew kill all his other apprentices (spurned on by his own momentary lapse of reason) understandably made him cynical. And I don't think he forgot that other people would learn to use the Force naturally; he thought that the ways of the Jedi needed to end, because they failed him, and had previously failed to keep the Emperor from rising to power. He figured future Force users would be better off without them. But his arc is about realizing that he should learn from his failure instead of giving up, and that the ways of the Jedi shouldn't be discarded, just improved upon.
Thomas,
1/2. As a writer, the dialog hit me particularly hard. It was absolutely the worst choice in terms of style and word choice. Then you add the jokes that never reached a real punch line, the indifferent speeches, and the utter lack of any chemistry and it all just screamed horrible writer to me.
3. I think the time scoping made it all appear like it worked, but in the prior movies, it sometimes took days to get from planet to planet, even at lightspeed. Yoda took days to start the training, and the exercises were similarly deep and contemplative. Here they condensed all of that into "sit on this rock... OMG, you're evil!" It felt like a super crash course in Jediism.
4. I'm thinking more in terms of... an X-wing against a dreadnought and the X-wing basically wipes it out while dodging the entire fleet without breaking a sweat because the bad guys do nothing... the First Order brings a bunch of star destroyers which don't bother to attack the transports or anything else... they are tossed into a cell with a code breaker, such luck... they are all freed when the dreadnought selectively explodes killing only bad guys... the girl happens to have a metal conducting necklace... the coup takes place entirely off screen until it happens... no one blows up the defenseless cruiser as it turns around and aims right at the bad guys... the escape planet comes out of nowhere... the killing of Snope is done with no real effort, etc. Things just happen in this film without any prep or effort.
5. Actually, I mean the rebellion with the Pussyhead attitude -- it was clearly a political anti-Trump analogy, by the way. The old rebellion took risks. This one just wants to hide and run and berate people who want to fight because their goal is to do nothing until other people come along and save them.
6. Everything was stolen... dialog, scenes, imagery. Much was stolen from the original films (this was a rework of Empire and Jedi with most scenes stolen from those films), but things were stolen from all kinds of things. Even the R2D2 "language" joke came from the Avengers.
You might be right about Luke, but he just struck me as the "new" Hollywood idea (see in all superhero movies now) that being a hero is wrong and causes evil.
Andrew,
1./2. As an aspiring writer myself, I'd better take notes! Definitely going to be picking through those aspects with a fine-toothed comb next time I watch it.
3. The training definitely did happen way too fast. There was another scene of Luke teaching Rey that they cut for time--really, they probably should've cut something from the casino instead.
4. Oh, I see what you mean now. Some of those things didn't bother me (like the escape planet--I think the plan was to go there all along, though I could be wrong about that), and there are always going to be a few convenient coincidences in any movie...but yeah, they definitely relied on convenience too much.
5. Ah, that makes more sense. To be fair, they _did_ proactively take out the superweapon in the last movie. They were only running because they were out of options and had to focus on short-term survival, and they berated Poe for disobeying orders and winning a Pyrrhic victory they couldn't afford. (Though it may have been framed more in terms of "oh no you ordered people to their deaths in a military situation," which is...unspeakably dumb if that's the case.) The anti-Trump-ism was definitely annoying, though I got that more from the casino planet.
6. With regards to the stuff taken from the original films--I thought things like the throne room scene were cleverly implemented, because it sets you up to expect a confrontation similar to the one in RotJ, but then it goes in a different direction. The prequels did the same type of thing, but there, it felt blandly copy/pasted because Lucas was out of ideas, whereas in TLJ, I got the impression they actually wanted you to compare and contrast this movie with the older ones. (To draw a very pretentious comparison, I thought it was sort of similar to how, in the Bible, Jesus will do or say things that mirror the Old Testament, but with a new twist that changes the message. Or how the basic plot of Lord of the Rings mirrors that of The Hobbit in a lot of ways.) Especially because the last movie was an exact copy of the original--it seemed like one of the goals of TLJ was to get through the "expected" plot, but twist it enough so that the next film will have to do something different. Of course, I suppose it could've...gasp...just done its own thing, and maybe that would've been better. But then that might've left the door open for the next movie to go back to doing what's expected.
As for the other stuff--the "language" thing rings a bell now that you mention it. This is definitely something I'm going to have to look out for next time I watch!
I can definitely see why Luke would come across that way; I had serious reservations about that part of the film until I pondered it a bit more. But ultimately, I think it was meant as a subversion of that line of thinking/an affirmation of real heroism, especially considering that his final (I think) line in the movie is, "I will not be the last Jedi," after finally committing a heroic act.
We have a film finally.. from tryanmax. Here's the link:
LINK
Thomas, After a while you start to get a feel for hearing good writing and bad. You start to hear what works, what doesn't and what would have worked better. This is one of those that just screamed out that this was the wrong writer.
You might be right about Luke. I watched the film but couldn't get into enough to think much beyond the surface. So I will defer to you on this. :)
I think you're right about them doing the expected thing and then twisting it. What bothered me though was how every single scene came from the prior films. It felt to me like they had no original ideas whatsoever. Granted, they assembled what they stole well enough, but it got to the point of "name that scene" to me.
I will say, because this was just a remake of the original movies, that it felt like Star Wars which Rogue One and Solo did not. But it did give the whole film a workman quality rather than an artistic or storytelling quality. But that's nothing new these days, sadly. I can't think of the last film I saw which surprised me in any way.
P.S. I'm glad you enjoyed it. :) I didn't not-enjoy it as much as my criticism suggests. I didn't love it, but for modern films it was pretty adequate.
Andrew, there were definitely a few "bad dialogue moments" that stuck out to me. But I'll have to pay closer attention to that for sure. And you may be right about them choosing the wrong writer--the writer was also the director, and apparently they gave him almost complete freedom. Unless you've got a true visionary, movies usually turn out best when there's a bit more collaboration involved.
On Luke, I'm flattered! :)
You may have a point about it "borrowing" too many things from the originals. If I were to try to read into it, I might say that they wanted to make a comment about how stale Star Wars has become. But that's a Olympic-level stretch, and even if it's remotely true, they could've dialed it back, or found a better way to express it.
It definitely felt more like Star Wars than those other movies--maybe more than anything since the originals. But that's not exactly a high bar to pass, sadly. (I honestly think the best Star Wars "thing" outside of the originals is the animated Clone Wars series. When a cartoon is better than most of your actual movies, you know something's amiss.) For what it's worth, it did surprise me more than most recent movies--mostly for reasons revolving around Kylo. And one of the biggest things I appreciate about it is that the way it ended presumably forced the next one to do something other than copy RotJ. If it gets J.J. Abrams to make an even mildly original movie, it will have done a great service to the world. :p
I'm glad I enjoyed it too! :p You've definitely gotten me to reevaluate it a bit--so much criticism of it veers so far into "nothing about it is good" territory that I just can't see where it's coming from. And I wonder if I'm not overrating it because I was expecting it to be just another Marvel-esque movie, which I think it's definitely at least a little bit more than.
Tom, I was okay with Rogue One. It was by the numbers and safe since it was a prequel, and unlike the main films, it did feel like at least Jyn had a motivation with her parents being shot and wanting to prove herself a rebel. The film had a drag of a start. Maybe it's nostalgia, but the ending half of the film with the battle to get the Death Star design felt like a star Wars battle. Moreso than the other films. Ithe was a better job by Gareth Edwards than Godzilla, IMO.
Ben, I wouldn't say RO was an incompetent film, but I felt little to nothing for any of the characters. Jyn did have a clear motivation at least, but her personality beyond that was bland at best. (She also didn't make many proactive choices, a imperative for a movie of that style.) The battle at the end was about as good as it gets on a technical directing/editing level, but it hardly made me feel anything--only the deaths of monk dude and the robot played by the guy from Firefly made me feel even a twinge of sadness. I haven't seen Godzilla, so I can't comment on that.
Post a Comment