[SPOILERS] Star Wars: The Force Awakens - It's True. All of it.

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I'm fine with how they used Phasma (I think it's perfectly fine to just have a small side character that looks cool) but I do think they could have pulled her into the ground attack on Jakku, particularly putting her in a tie on the tail of the Falcon.

They shoulda had her fighting Finn on Takodana with the baton.

Woulda made the "I'm in charge!" bit a little stronger.
 
Nah, the environments got swapped, but the character actions are basically the same. They meet a tiny wise sage strong in the force, where our hero descends into a hole and has a vision, before getting wrecked by the person she just had a vision about. (Empire), and then the run on the giant superweapon that makes the first Death Star look like shit, featuring Han Solo leading a small strike team to take out the shields so the attack run can begin, an attack run that ends with the ship flying INTO a superstructure, blowing it to hell, and flying back out again, while a climactic lightsaber battle takes place among three people (JEDI).

elements from all three movies are consistently sprinkled across every act of the film, but the key moments seem to follow that mixtape structure: Beginning = Star Wars, Middle = Empire, End = Jedi.

I dunno, Kylo killing Han feels like ESB to me. This is the third time in 4 stories they've blown up a big gun, I cant really bring myself to care about that anymore, it's like lunchhour in Star Wars land. And the end just made me think of going to meet Yoda, which again makes me think ESB.
 
It makes Luke look like a pretty shitty Jedi in comparison but yeah if Rey is way better at this force thing than Luke Skywalker it makes sense.

I just think it's surprising that Luke is being shown up to be pretty dang mediocre.

Is it so bad though?

The last jedi might not be THE best Jedi in powers, but in wisdom.
There's no need for Luke to be the Chosen One 2.0, he could be an average to good self-taught Jedi Master who actually wants his students to surpass him
 
Lol no man, it really isn't. Mind manipulation power is similar to other mind manipulation power. Invasive/suggestive, torture/basic commands... I'm not seeing the gap you're seeing here.

By that logic, she should have been able to use Force speed in the final fight. Whatever Kylo was doing was the first time we've seen that in any of the films. Even Vader doesn't do anything like that. If they had portrayed it similarly to how Kylo used it, I might be more understanding. However it's done in the same comedic way that Ben and Luke used it.
 
The first Director they talked to for a spinoff was Zack Snyder, actually.

I had no idea but that would have been great. Snyder flicks are absolutely incredible visually and that's just where Star Wars excels. I'd still like that spinoff that's likely never happening.

There's no one I'd rather see doing a Boba Fett spinoff when I think about it.
 
They shoulda had her fighting Finn on Takodana with the baton.

Woulda made the "I'm in charge!" bit a little stronger.

Finn was clearly the bitch in his squad. I think that scene had more than enough weight behind it. I actually enjoyed the more human "acting out" that these characters displayed at times.
 
Rey is clearly some sort of force prodigy. I'm not bothered on that front, I'm just interested in what her purpose is going to be in a series that is constantly referencing destiny. The wait for Episode VIII is going to be a nightmare for me.

her purpose is going to be a female version of Luke, for empowerment of girls. And that's fine with me. Luke wasn't all that interesting himself either.
 
Lol he honestly quite was at first. Remember how his first training was going with Obi-wan? He was scrub tier once too. Plus if the "Skywalker's daughter" plot point turns out to be true no reason she can't be even better than her father.

I kind of just assumed that being a Jedi was a difficult thing that required a lot of learning and knowledge. After all, when it was first brought up he was judged to be too old to begin the training, and in a few short years he was an incredibly powerful master.

*Shrug*

Maybe I was wrong and he was just shit. I guess that's possible.
 
Just got back from seeing it. I thought it was fine I guess? It certainly had its good moments. Rey, Fin, and Poe are all great new characters. The whole bit w/ Han Solo and Kylo Ren just felt like it was ripping from a couple plots in the old EU books, which is fine I suppose since there's only so many ways you can go with existing characters to make compelling drama.

My biggest problem with this movie was the music and the new alien design. As far as music goes, whenever they weren't using something cribbed from the original trilogy, it all sounded so generic and unmemorable. There wasn't a single new standout track or even an identifiable theme for any of the new characters.

My other major problem with the movie was the new humanoid alien design. Nearly all of them looked like LOTR orcish rejects, especially fucking Snokes. They should've taken more inspiration from what had come before and mixed more of the classic (or even prequel-era) aliens in aside from just cameos from Admiral Ackbar and Nien Nunb.

Lastly, I thought the movie could've done without Death Star 3.0. I mean, I guess that's probably what the public wants, but I felt like there was enough other drama in the other plotlines that injecting yet another Imperial superweapon felt kind of perfunctory. That final battle could've just all taken place aboard that Star Destroyer or something.
 
The biggest question I have after the movie is with BB-8. I thought he was part of the evolution of the astromech droid in the time since the end of the OT, but all the resistance fighters except Poe use R2 units in their X Wings. So what is BB-8? They say he's a BB unit casually, so he is part of a lineup of droid and not a modified droid. So why were there no other BB units?
Bb-8 is a new merchandise droid

Don't over think it
 
The Snyder spinoff was gonna be a Seven Samurai riff. Might have ended up being the Ben on Tatooine movie set between Sith and Star Wars.

When I picture in my head what films would have been influential to a filmmaker like Snyder, I think more along the lines of Transformers: The Movie (1986) than Seven Samurai.
 
It makes Luke look like a pretty shitty Jedi in comparison but yeah if Rey is way better at this force thing than Luke Skywalker it makes sense.

I just think it's surprising that Luke is being shown up to be pretty dang mediocre.

Luke was always mediocre due to a ton of reasons. He doubted the existence of The Force initially, ignored the advice of his Masters, had very little training, had too many emotional connections (something that is a liability to all Force users as it messes with their focus).

Luke doesn't actually become good until his EU books, which aren't even canon now.

Rey believes in The Force much more readily, comes to grips with her only emotional doubts mid-way through the movie, and by the time she fully taps into the Force everyone she's friends with is either dead (Han), missing (Chewy), or presumed dead (Finn). She's got nothing to hold her back.

Add to that, again, that Force abilities manifest differently at different levels of competency to different people even before training and you have everything you need to explain Rey's abilities.
 
Phasma was even worse than Boba. I don't even know how that was possible but there it is. She totally should have been that stormtrooper at the Pirate Base.

As it stands her character should have been totally cut. She does jack and shit in the film.
 
My guess is that a BB-unit is probably less used for industry jobs, and is more prominent in the civil sector. He was probably just Poe's personal droid from before joining the resistance. Poe certainly seems like the bourgeoisie gone freedom fighter type.

I like this explanation so much that I wish it was canon.
 
I don't see why the escalations of force powers as generations progress is some sort of ridiculous notion. Do you remember watching the early X games? A superman on a dirt bike was a huge deal. Now mother fuckers do triple back flips. Each generation is always going to out do the previous one, no matter how impossible it seems at the time.
 
Is it so bad though?

The last jedi might not be THE best Jedi in powers, but in wisdom.
There's no need for Luke to be the Chosen One 2.0, he could be an average to good self-taught Jedi Master who actually wants his students to surpass him

Self-taught?

Yoda?

Obi-wan?

What?
 
They like picking up and coming actors so maybe they extended that to directors. Except from JJ and including Gareth Edwards, not one of them have a big track record. Even Josh Trank wasn't that big before he assholed out.


If Trevorrow was picked before JW released then, sure, I would call him up and coming. But after JW was the surprise hit of the summer he was cemented in the big leagues and that was when he was tapped.

They shoulda had her fighting Finn on Takodana with the baton.

Woulda made the "I'm in charge!" bit a little stronger.


Yep, that too. Makes me wonder if her schedule with GoT conflicted with having her in more scenes.

It makes Luke look like a pretty shitty Jedi in comparison but yeah if Rey is way better at this force thing than Luke Skywalker it makes sense.

I just think it's surprising that Luke is being shown up to be pretty dang mediocre.

*Edit*

Oh, she probably just has more midichlorians. :)

No it makes it feel better that he isn't perfect at everything. Having Luke instantly be this perfect, wise Jedi is pretty emblematic of what made so much of the old EU read like fan-fiction (and I read a LOT of it!). Why would we expect Luke to be good teacher? He received about 4 hours training from Obi Wan and 3 days from Yoda. Of course he isn't going to be perfect and when dealing with something like the Dark Side then failure carries a steep price. And it seems likely that Snoke was actively working against him which made things even harder.
 
Wat? I think she is a perfect hero mold fit and Diasy Ridley killed it. What specifically do you think is weak?
Agreed completely. Rey was amazing, and they perfectly nailed what it should mean to have a heroine in center stage.

I can't wait to see all the kids going crazy wanting to be her.
 
her purpose is going to be a female version of Luke, for empowerment of girls. And that's fine with me. Luke wasn't all that interesting himself either.
But Luke's purpose was to be the one to redeem Darth Vader, the catalyst of reigniting the chosen one. We and Luke knew of his destiny from the beginning of A New Hope when Obi-wan hands him his father's lightsaber - he would be facing Darth Vader at some point to avenge his father. Rey's is much more open and mysterious. There are a lot of places to take her in this universe.
 
I don't see why the escalations of force powers as generations progress is some sort of ridiculous notion. Do you remember watching the early X games? A superman on a dirt bike was a huge deal. Now mother fuckers do triple back flips. Each generation is always going to out do the previous one, no matter how impossible it seems at the time.

But there was no jump between Anakin and Luke.
 
Why would he just burn armor? Burning of the body appears to be a way that the Jedi send off the dead. See Qui-Gonn from Episode 1 when they burned his body.

I always thought burning Vader's armor made perfect sense even if it was partly Lucas trying to retroactively maintain consistency. To me it was clearly Luke destroying the last remaining physical piece of his father's dark side so both he and Anakin could completely let go. Plus why would he just leave the suit laying around? Especially considering on its own visually, the suit was one of the nastiest pieces of imagery related to the Empire. Burning it would be most folks' first instinct in that situation. Even in real life a person will sometimes burn or destroy an object belonging to someone they were formerly close to for various emotional reasons.

Ok, so now I feel like I need to go on a long rant about force "ghosts."

Years ago I read a comment from someone that in the SW Annotated Screenplays section covering ROTJ that Lucas noted that Anakin became one with the Force and lived on specifically because Yoda was so impressed as he watched Anakin kill Palpatine and redeem himself that he rewarded Anakin by "absorbing" him so he could join both he and Obi Wan. Otherwise, based on this and the fact that according to Ep 3 Plagueis was the only non-Jedi who could "cheat death," if it weren't for Yoda intervening, Anakin would have simply died.

I think what a lot of people either forget or don't get is that in Star Wars it seems as though there is no literal afterlife or literal ghosts (in one of the audio commentaries Lucas even says "When Obi Wan dies...well Obi Wan's not really dead but...") which is part of the reason Anakin went off the deep end in Ep 3 (man did Anakin ever look irritated after Yoda told him dead people DON'T live on, they simply get absorbed into the Force). Unless Luke knows how to in Ep 8, Qui Gon, Yoda and Obi Wan are the only ones who can cheat death and live on in the Force (in an older draft, Lucas' original concept was only one Jedi at a time could disappear and if another Jedi tried at some point afterwards, that person would "switch out" the current force ghost Jedi causing them to physically return. Obi Wan was originally supposed to come back later in an earlier draft for RoTJ and help Luke fight Vader using this method). That said, Qui Gon becoming the first Jedi to attain this never made sense to me (even Lucas said at one point he made a mistake by not having his body disappear, it's one additional thing they should have corrected in the second edit of TPM, that's one addition I would have been more than OK with), it would have made more sense if it was Yoda who reached that level.

Anyways, will be interesting to see how and if that power factors in Ep 8 or 9.
 
My guess is that a BB-unit is probably less used for industry jobs, and is more prominent in the civil sector. He was probably just Poe's personal droid from before joining the resistance. Poe certainly seems like the bourgeoisie gone freedom fighter type.
His parents were part of the Rebellion/Resistance, and he grew up on Yavin IV, so he's been a part of this for pretty much his entire life.
 
Phasma was even worse than Boba. I don't even know how that was possible but there it is. She totally should have been that stormtrooper at the Pirate Base.

As it stands her character should have been totally cut. She does jack and shit in the film.
I think they introduced enough new characters in this movie that required some fleshing out. I think Phasma can wait until the next installment to get more screen time and character building.

A simple intro was enough IMO. Hope she comes back otherwise I agree.
 
Man when people kept saying Han was going to die because of how happy Harrison has been in TFA promo I thought it was nonsense but damn :( Had the feeling it was coming the moment Leia told Han to confront Ren and bring him home.

On one hand the next film will have Luke back in action, on the other no Han is like auto fail.
 
Phasma was even worst than Boba. I don't even know how that was possible but there it is. She totally should have been that stormtrooper at the Pirate Base.

As it stands her character should have been totally cut. She does jack and shit in the film.

This I agree with. They could have replaced her with a generic imperial commander and it would have changed nothing. They kind of ruined her for future movies since they made her basically responsible for the destruction of the Starkiller. Her character seems like the type who should demand to be shot before helping the resistance with anything. They should have just had her in the scenes other than the shield deactivation, leave some mystery to her then develop her in the next movie.
 
Luke was always mediocre due to a ton of reasons. He doubted the existence of The Force initially, ignored the advice of his Masters, had very little training, had too many emotional connections (something that is a liability to all Force users as it messes with their focus).

Luke doesn't actually become good until his EU books, which aren't even canon now.

Rey believes in The Force much more readily, comes to grips with her only emotional doubts mid-way through the movie, and by the time she fully taps into the Force everyone she's friends with is either dead (Han), missing (Chewy), or presumed dead (Finn). She's got nothing to hold her back.

Add to that, again, that Force abilities manifest differently at different levels of competency to different people even before training and you have everything you need to explain Rey's abilities.

I guess it'll just take some mental adjustment to consider Luke as a crappy Jedi considering how far he came in so long despite the fact that he was supposed to be too old to learn the ways of the force.

Like... I get what you're saying, but Luke didn't seem to be presented as a shitty Jedi by the time Return of the Jedi came out. Hell, given the name of the movie I thought he was pretty full fledged at that point.
 
The more people try to defend Rey's absurd proficiency with the Force and lighsabers as not being too far fetched and within the scope of her abilities for whatever reason, the more I actually dislike those aspects of the film and her character.

Kylo Ren is a powerful Force user who has been training at it and swordsmanship presumably for most of his life. It makes no sense whatsoever that Rey got the better of him during the interrogation exchange. I would have understood and actually liked it if she got a shot in after he extracted what he wanted and that startled him. For her to actually turn it all on him though, I don't think that should have happened. It made Kylo Ren look like a joke and sucked tension out of his subsequent scenes because he was prematurely neutered.

The sword fight at the end you could mitigate to some extent because he was shot and in pain and that clearly affected his stamina, but those should have been the reasons he lost instead of Rey pausing the game, taping into the Force just because he mentioned she needed to be taught how to use it and then suddenly whooping his ass. What that scene needed was an Empire inspired Vader VS Luke but with Ren being significantly more hurt by the end of it but strong enough to end in a tactical retreat either by Rey and Finn or by him after Chewbacca showed up in the Falcon or because, you know, the whole base was blowing up.
 
I mean, has there been a really really really bad JJ movie?



This is what I'm hoping too! I think that in the time that has gone by, Ben/Kylo killed those Jedi and Mara. Luke has Rey taken away and hidden while hiding himself. Rey has been having visions where Luke has been hiding and the look on his face either suggests...

1) That he's surprised to see his daughter!

or

2) That he's wondering just who the fuck that girl is, why she has Anakin's lightsaber, and if she has his old hand too.

That's pretty much what I was going for in my last post... And I really, really don't like the idea of Luke being alone all this time and R2 isn't a pleasure model.

Damn. I like that idea

Yeah, Mara and Luke's arc was the best thing to come out from early EU fiction. It would be a shame to remove her from the new universe, and I feel like her death could really be a strong motivation behind Luke's departure (besides Kylo's betrayal). Maybe Snoke's original plan was to have Ben kill her, hoping that it would push Luke to the darkside. Perhaps he came close, but ultimately managed to pull himself back and fuck off before he did succumb to temptation.

There's so many directions you could go with this premise. This plays well with the theory that Snoke is Plagueis, who is said to be a master of life. He could've pulled a Palpatine and offered Luke the same thing. Or, Luke could be searching for a way to bring people back to life himself, which would be a cool mirror to his father's own desire.

I know it sounds like crazy fan-fiction, but crazier things have happened in the EU :P

Another thing that caught me off guard was Kylo's real name. I really didn't expect Solo to call him Ben. In the EU, Ben is actually the name of Luke and Mara's firstborn. He also happens to be Jacen Solo's pseudo-mentor, so I'm hoping they'll play with this dynamic in the sequels. It would be fun to see the relationship between Rey and Kylo Ren if they do turn out to be cousins.

Or they could simply make them twins, and have Kylo die at the hands of his twin sister (which is what happens in the EU)
 
I think they introduced enough new characters in this movie that required some fleshing out. I think Phasma can wait until the next installment to get more screen time and character building.

But there was the perfect opportunity to show her off and they waste it on a random stormtrooper. Instead she has like five lines and does virtually nothing.
 
I don't mind whatever it is they're doing with Rey because I simply do not care much about the laws of the Star Wars universe. If it entertains me I'm satisfied, and Ridley has thus far ensured I'm entertained.
 
I thought the movie was really great - pacing was breakneck and had no dull moments, I really cared about the characters, above average acting (especially Rey, Kylo, and Han), and I loved the fact that we're seeing the villain's growth/flaws along with the hero's.

The main blemish I think the movie has is that it's too by-the-numbers. It doesn't create much new or creative content. It generally relies on previous themes and remixes them. I can't fault JJ for relying on source material as its a good way to ease people back into the universe and it's a risk to introduce too many new lore offshoots. But they could have done a lot more than they did.

Bottom line is that I loved the movie and they kind of did the impossible. OP delivered.
 
This I agree with. They could have replaced her with a generic imperial commander and it would have changed nothing. They kind of ruined her for future movies since they made her basically responsible for the destruction of the Starkiller.
So, in other words, her character and reputation were trashed
 
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