Star Wars Ep 8

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  • #61
    Re: Star Wars Ep 8

    Originally posted by FoxHound View Post
    This isn't Rian Johnson's fault, it's JJ's. If JJ had something interesting to say about Snoke or Rey's origins, then he should have said it in his damn movie! You can't just mystery box critical characters backstories. THAT'S NOT CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT JJ. I think Rian just said: "Look, these are your set-ups not mine. I don't know how to proceed with them." So he just cut it all out. In other words, Abrams' mystery boxes ****** him up his ventilation port.

    Despite its flaws, I enjoyed this film a lot... primarily because it sh*t on JJ's Force Awakens.
    Okay, so 1 or 2 out of Johnson's roughly 10 (minimum) poor writing choices that I listed was somehow JJ's fault. Whose fault was it in Empire Strikes Back that the Emperor's backstory was "mystery boxed?" That one seemed to turn out fine in ROTJ.

    I suppose that Nicholas Meyer should've thrown his hands up in the air and complained that there's no way to make a great Star Trek 2 because The Motion Picture was so awful.

    You can't blame Johnson's shitty writing on JJ's, Kasden's, and Arndt's. Doesn't matter who's to blame for the weak parts of TFA; Johnson is wholly to blame for the weak parts of his own writing, ergo the weak parts of TLJ.

    There were no weaknesses in TFA's story that were so utterly overwhelming and irredeemable that a halfway decent writer couldn't have fixed them in TLJ. Hell, there are hundreds of fanfic writing fanboys on the internet that have written better stories.

    Kevin Smith and Mark Bernardin spitballed much better ideas than Johnson's off the top of their heads, on a live podcast, while knocking back beers.

    Johnson had years to come up with better and he dropped the ball. The only person to blame for Rian Johnson's poor writing is Rian Johnson.
    "Tact's just 'not saying true stuff.' " - Cordelia Chase

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    • #62
      Re: Star Wars Ep 8

      Originally posted by Optimus View Post
      Okay, so 1 or 2 out of Johnson's roughly 10 (minimum) poor writing choices that I listed was somehow JJ's fault. Whose fault was it in Empire Strikes Back that the Emperor's backstory was "mystery boxed?" That one seemed to turn out fine in ROTJ.
      The Emperor wasn't mystery boxed. The OT set up the civil war very clearly and the Emperor was even mentioned in ANH as having dissolved the senate and taken control of the galaxy. He isn't shown until ESB because he has no direct effect on ANH's plot. Also everyone can guess what an Emperor is and does.

      The rules are different when you're creating an entirely new series in that you don't have to go into too much detail and how people got to where they are, or what their background is.

      TFA on the other hand is the 7th film in the series and a sequel to the original trilogy, where the empire was supposedly defeated and the Sith destroyed. Snoke has a visual presence throughout and speaks directly with the lead villain but there's no info on who or what he is.

      Also JJ didn't just mystery box Snoke, he literally mystery boxed the entire movie: how the First Order was created, Rey's origins, how Luke's lightsaber ended up in the cantina, Luke's location and how he failed Ren, etc. There's just no storytelling at all. TFA is just a bunch of scenes and concepts which act as excuses for JJ to pander to fans.

      I'm sure a lot of TLJ's problems are due to Johnson being the wrong kind of director, but he was saddled with doing the second film in a trilogy that wasn't properly established to begin with.

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      • #63
        Re: Star Wars Ep 8

        I'm sure a lot of TLJ's problems are due to Johnson being the wrong kind of director
        It's his writing that's the problem and anyone who's seen Looper could have seen this coming. He has no problem setting up 'the rules of the world' then ditching them when they get in the way so disregarding an entire universe worth of other people's rules is no big deal.

        He also doesn't like traditional heroes - look at the choices he makes for JGL's character early in Looper. If Rian Johnson had written Die Hard, McClane would have walked out of the bathroom with his hands on his head and joined the rest of the hostages.

        I really liked Brick and would love to give him the benefit of the doubt by putting the writing choices in TLJ down to studio interference but I just can't see things like Luke tossing the lightsaber over his shoulder being a note. Just one of many choices that are incomprehensible to me.

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        • #64
          Re: Star Wars Ep 8

          It IS mainly the filmakers that made TLJ that is responsible for making a bad movie. Stop making excuses for poor writing.

          TLJ's main problem, aside from not being an adventure movie like all the rest of the star wars movies, is that it's an exercise in why "convenient storytelling" should be avoided. It leads to taking short cuts because you are so obsessed with forcing in some element into the story, be it a message, comedy, a cool shot, useless characters etc This weakens the actual element because it comes at the cost of poor logic, uneven tones, conflicting messages, etc. It's a mess.

          When I saw TLJ I could not help notice how he went out of his way to convey all these messages, themes, shots etc from the particular war movies he listed as inspirations before they shot the movie. The problem is that all these movies are different, and most of all; all of them concern themselves with telling stories about and in the real world. Star Wars is not a good wold to preach about realistic messages. This comes with an additional cost of constructing TLJ as more realistic in the way it is shot(very few old school transitions, very fiew weird aliens who speak, fast cuts and ww2 combat homages, etc). All this undermines the star wars universe as an extraordinary world(like in joseph cambell terms) and its lore. War movies primary purpose is to tell a strong message about how of war(the very universe those movies are set) creates negative effects. In other words: a complete opposite of Star Wars, where the very universe where it is set is suppose to be something we love. *

          Even the very reason Luke wanted to kill Kylo is taken from Rian Johnson's previous movie, Looper. Why is this not mentioned? The problem is that taking this from Looper into TLJ does not work because the characters and the world do not belong in the same categories. Kylo is not at all comparable to the rainmaker, and luke is not at all like bruce willis' character. Luke's decision to confront Kyl's darkness is extremely poor, because the whole story is about this moment. You need to flesh that out far more in order for any normal person to buy it. And if you buy that moment, you must surely understand why so many people don't and that this is a major reason for not liking TLJ (as it is representative on the kind of fimmaking in the movie where you accept all these type of elements that is told in this way or not).

          I thought this was a hillarious "review" on TLJ.

          * I'm a big fan of old movies and that is why I was excited to see Rian Johnson list all the movies he used as inspiration two years ago. I love movies like Twelve O'Clock High and Rashomon. In fact, I've seen them all many times. But to read reviews that praise TLJ for how elements is taken from them and used to good effect, I think is borderline ridiculous. The Kylo and Luke flashback scenes have nothing to do with Rashomon other than being two versions of a flashback retelling. In fact, it displays a lack of understanding of it's source materials than anything else.
          Last edited by Bananos; 01-27-2018, 05:01 AM.

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          • #65
            Re: Star Wars Ep 8

            Underwhelmed.

            Too much prequel-style slapstick. Snoke was a crap antagonist. All he does is sit in a chair, FFS, at least the Emperor looked scary when he did that and eventually got up and did something. Kylo Ren killing him was telegraphed so blatantly that even Stevie Wonder saw it coming. Rey is learning faster and has seemingly more innate control of the Force than even Darth frikkin' Vader. OT was practically all-white (thus setting up the universe) and now it's blatant attempts to play the United Nations (ooh, let's have Chinese and Indian characters so we can sell the film in those untapped territories).
            M.A.G.A.

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            • #66
              Re: Star Wars Ep 8

              Originally posted by SundownInRetreat View Post
              OT was practically all-white (thus setting up the universe) and now it's blatant attempts to play the United Nations (ooh, let's have Chinese and Indian characters so we can sell the film in those untapped territories).
              Setting up the universe? In a universe with Jabba the Hut, Greedo and Ewoks you think Chinese people are a bit of a stretch?

              I'm sure there are business reasons for making the cast less white but there are a lot of kids who were given somebody to look up to in Rose that they didn't have before.

              B******t criticism.

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              • #67
                Re: Star Wars Ep 8

                Originally posted by TheConnorNoden View Post
                B******t criticism.
                Nope.
                M.A.G.A.

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                • #68
                  Re: Star Wars Ep 8

                  Originally posted by SundownInRetreat View Post
                  Nope.
                  Go on. Convince me. I personally think that ethnicity one way or another has very little to do with the overall quality of a film. That said I would love to hear why it does and why Roger Ebert and Pauline Kael never picked up on it.

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                  • #69
                    Re: Star Wars Ep 8

                    I don't understand why a diverse cast, or making an effort to have a diverse cast, would be considered bad.

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                    • #70
                      Re: Star Wars Ep 8

                      Originally posted by TheConnorNoden View Post
                      Go on. Convince me. I personally think that ethnicity one way or another has very little to do with the overall quality of a film.
                      I wish that more people held this point of view. If they did, then every film that didn't reduce the number of white people to Black Panther levels wouldn't be denounced as "[X] So White!", and could simply be appreciated on its own merits, free of politically correct whinging about "needing more 'diversity'

                      Also, if more people held this point of view, then such whinging would be rightly scorned and laughed off as transparently political, instead of guilting creators and studios into craven attempts at appeasement.

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                      • #71
                        Re: Star Wars Ep 8

                        Originally posted by karsten View Post
                        Also, if more people held this point of view, then such whinging would be rightly scorned and laughed off as transparently political, instead of guilting creators and studios into craven attempts at appeasement.
                        Yes, it's too bad people are finally realizing that other races exist and it might be a proven benefit, to both society and boxoffice, to include them in film.

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                        • #72
                          Re: Star Wars Ep 8

                          Originally posted by TheConnorNoden View Post
                          Go on. Convince me. I personally think that ethnicity one way or another has very little to do with the overall quality of a film. That said I would love to hear why it does and why Roger Ebert and Pauline Kael never picked up on it.
                          1) You can't be convinced
                          2) Falling back on film critics for your defence is ridiculous
                          3) The diverse cast wasn't a criticism of the film's quality
                          4) I wrote 4 lines and you ignored the actual criticism of its quality



                          Originally posted by Karsten
                          Also, if more people held this point of view, then such whinging would be rightly scorned and laughed off as transparently political, instead of guilting creators and studios into craven attempts at appeasement.
                          Ghost in the Shell. Virtue-signalling white Americans kicked off about casting Scarlett Johansson in an Asian role - whilst Japanese citizens loved the casting and didn't care about ethnicity, only the film.
                          M.A.G.A.

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                          • #73
                            Re: Star Wars Ep 8

                            Ghost in the shell is perhaps a poor example to pick if you want to talk about virtue signalling and race.

                            This film wasn't spoiled by the casting of Johansson, though they SHOULD have cast an asian actor because leading roles for female asian actors are rare and because diversity and role models do matter. And there was nothing special in Scarlett's performance that could not have been matched or improved by an Asian actress.

                            But really the gravest error was in the choice of director.

                            Takeshi Kitano who played Aramaki was the only bright light in the whole cast and completely stole the show in his scenes. He also just happens to be a pretty ****ing brilliant filmmaker. But for racism, he would have been the PERFECT choice to direct and would have been able to do justice to the source material.

                            Check out Zatoichi or Hana Bi. That the producers had him there as part of the film and not directing tells a pretty sad story about hollywood attitudes.

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                            • #74
                              Re: Star Wars Ep 8

                              Originally posted by karsten View Post
                              I wish that more people held this point of view. If they did, then every film that didn't reduce the number of white people to Black Panther levels wouldn't be denounced as "[X] So White!", and could simply be appreciated on its own merits, free of politically correct whinging about "needing more 'diversity'

                              Also, if more people held this point of view, then such whinging would be rightly scorned and laughed off as transparently political, instead of guilting creators and studios into craven attempts at appeasement.
                              I should stress that there is a great need for diversity and representation in film for many reasons so that's not fully my view. Films should be judged on their own merits but beyond that it is important.

                              I don't know which creators have been guilted or if they have said as much but it stands to reason that throwing the casting net wider than white people would lead to potentially finding a perfect actor for a role e.g. Idris Elba as James Bond.

                              People can write what they want to write and cast who they want to cast which is fine with me. At the end of the day it's their choice. That said I think as white writers we aren't doing enough to accurately depict today's society on screen. The idea of white being 'default' is still very much ingrained and I have been guilty of thinking that myself in the past. The thing is that as a white man I've seen a thousand versions of myself in a thousand films. It doesn't matter to me. But there are millions if not billions of people who don't have that luxury of seeing themselves on the screen. We're in the process of seeing that change now.

                              I went to see Black Panther last week and loved it. I expected that. But then I noticed something off to me. It is very white where I live and so in my screening there only two black men. They weren't friends and say no way near each other. After the film ended they saw each other and began speaking about how good the film was. I've never felt the need to talk to a stranger after a film and likely never will. But they did because seeing a part of themselves like that in a blockbuster is so new to them and means so much.

                              I saw it with Wonder Woman. I saw it with Star Wars. I saw it with Black Panther. It matters. It isn't about being PC or any of the other usual trash. Other cultures need to be brought to the table in film like they are in music.

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                              • #75
                                Re: Star Wars Ep 8

                                Originally posted by SundownInRetreat View Post
                                1) You can't be convinced
                                2) Falling back on film critics for your defence is ridiculous
                                3) The diverse cast wasn't a criticism of the film's quality
                                4) I wrote 4 lines and you ignored the actual criticism of its quality




                                Ghost in the Shell. Virtue-signalling white Americans kicked off about casting Scarlett Johansson in an Asian role - whilst Japanese citizens loved the casting and didn't care about ethnicity, only the film.
                                Probably not. It was a cruel trick.

                                Is it? Their job is to critique films. And the only critics who bring things like PC or SJW into it are talentless hacks. Rex Reed.

                                I do genuinely apologise if it wasn't meant to be a criticism of the film. As it followed your criticism it felt like it was all part of the reason as to why you didn't enjoy the film but that was my mistake. That said I don't agree with most of the PC bit that you said.

                                I can see that your other points are valid. They weren't enough help to ruin the film all that much for me but I can't blame you if those points soured it for you. Literally a couple of lines about Snoke's past would have helped.

                                To be fair, the Ghost in the Shell film was very meh. That film would have been forgettable even if they hadn't whitewashed it. But they did and that choice kinda sucked. Don't we have enough white characters without having to steal them as well? It didn't really ruin the film for me but it didn't do much for me either.

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