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Hey Gaf, is Disney bad at handling Star Wars?

Interesting article. I think the writer is a bit charitable to Disney, but it's not horrible to present the facts in a neutral way.

As someone whose enthusiasm for the franchise was completely shattered, I'd say Disney has been quite bad at handling the brand. Any and all success they've had has either been by accident or from riding the tailcoats of pre-Disney content. They've tried expanding in all kinds of directions over the years, and pretty much all of them have led to a dead end. There's hardly anything left to try or to explore it seems, unless they completely wipe all failures from the canon. Star Wars lies in shambles, and the potential to turn it around is extremely small it seems.
 

Northeastmonk

Gold Member
If it wasn’t for The Mandalorian I doubt I would be a Star Wars fan. I love episodes 3-6, but that’s about it. As a kid I thought that made you a Star Wars fan.

Disney money and the Extended Universe would have been great. It feels like the Marvel Avenger films. Watered down and pampered plots with special effects. Nothing truly amazing, but it scratches that itch for the franchise output.
 

Kacho

Gold Member
It ain’t dead, but they’ve damaged it to the point where the brand name isn’t carrying the franchise anymore. We’ve crossed the threshold where apathy has set in. Acolyte and Outlaws bombing as badly as they did, has probably got them worried.
Disagree. If they go back to putting out quality stuff that feels like Star Wars they can save it. All it takes is one great movie that gets the bitter fans excited again. The market is primed and ready to respond to good Star Wars content. It's up to Disney to deliver that.
 

Kacho

Gold Member
They still can’t bring themselves to admit that this piece of shit movie was a total disaster for the franchise and set the downward trajectory in motion.
Did they ever officially cancel his film trilogy or did they memory hole it?
 

jason10mm

Gold Member
he fact that the Rogue Squadron film is dead just BAFFLES me.

"Hey, how about a film about a scrappy group of x-wing and y-wing pilots who have to take on dangerous desperate missions for the Rebellion? Based on a beloved video game series?Wait, the one possible lady director can't do it but there are literally 30 dudes who want to take on this project? Oh well, guess it's dead. So, how about this Acolyte script with a showrunner who seems likely to rile up our audience and make them boycott us, can we throw a quarter billion at that instead?"
 
Blade Runner and Alien are way better than any Star Wars film. I've always found the Star Wars films to lack any real substance and incredibly boring. Too much focus on fancy smancy space battles and lightsaber fights is its main problem.
 

jufonuk

not tag worthy
The quote box cuts of an analysis to make it look like Anal…

So add in the rest as you please

Andor, Rogue one , Solo(it wasn’t that bad) the force awakens (only because it was a new hope retold) maybe Mando. Are the best of the new star wars and Andor and Rogue one are Legit.

But I feel Andor will get cancelled somehow.
 
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Paasei

Member
Apparently some shows caused a major disturbance in the force. I liked the Mandalorian and Andor. Obi-Wan was a let down and just felt unnecessary. Haven’t seen the others.
 

Saber

Member
They created a problem that never existed and probably sell the franchise as the solution, so yeah.
 

jason10mm

Gold Member
They're bad a light sabering. This is what it should look like.


Are you kidding? Thats just as bad as what they put on screen.

The goal of fighting with a bar of molten plasma is NOT to tap your opponents blade as much as possible! A "real" lightsaber duel would be all lunges and thrusts, with a 360 degree cutting surface you just need slight cuts to sever arteries and tendons. These axe swing style slashing cuts are COMPLETELY irrelevant since the lightsaber does not need speed or momentum to cut so there is zero reason to make a big overhead swing. If anything they should all have a beskar buckler to allow for a parry (or a smaller main gauche lightsaber) and the choreography needs to redirect its inspirations.
 

jason10mm

Gold Member
Blade Runner and Alien are way better than any Star Wars film. I've always found the Star Wars films to lack any real substance and incredibly boring. Too much focus on fancy smancy space battles and lightsaber fights is its main problem.
Thats all Star Wars is though, they are action serials set in space. The Empire/Rebel Alliance, Jedi/Sith dynamic can't bear any more weight that that, it's just a framework to quickly establish who is "good" and who is "evil" and then it is on to the swinging, jumping, punching, blasting, and lightsabering. Grey morality has no place in the main Star Wars arena because then the entire house of cards collapses under the slightest scrutiny.
 

Madflavor

Member
Is Star Wars really that interesting of a setting? I feel like the mysticism side of it (Jedi, Sith, The Force, Light vs Dark, Lightsabers would fall under that umbrella) is what carries the franchise. If you remove the mysticism side of it, what are you left with? Is the setting still good? Yeah I know you've got the criminal underworld and shit like that, but really. When you take away the force, jedi, lightsabers, etc, how does Star Wars stack up against other Sci-Fi/Fantasy settings like Warhammer 40k, Dune, Mass Effect, or Star Trek?

I feel like someone wwill bring up Andor, but I don't think Andor was good because it was Star Wars. It was good because it was just very well written, with great acting and directing. It just happened to take place in Star Wars, but I don't think the setting itself did anything to elevate that show.
 

RAÏSanÏa

Member
It's always been a bit uneven.

Rogue One is good but great with noble and deserved deaths for all ages and occasions of developed characters who no longer serve a purpose but help propel the story.
Mando has good seasons. Ahsoka was great, developing on force lore in that type of direction is something I wanted. Andor was pretty good.

Mando movie has potential to be amazing.

Haven't watched the cartoons. Didn't care for much else of live Disney. Some scenes and characters here and there. Agree with the sentiment that Rey should've been a nobody, and believe that premise alone would've prevented a lot of problems within and continuing the story.

Acolyte was awful.
yrv6wy7getpd1.jpeg

It didn't even seem like witches, it looked and sounded like exchristian new agers thinking this is what witches do.
Studios should be investing more in consultants and hiring those that can write these things at a professional level than worrying about focus groups.
 
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For whatever reason they were very good with the Rogue One/Andor storytelling. They've just fucked up everything else( well except the aforementioned and Mandalorian Season 1/3 but 3 was a letdown)?
 

Krathoon

Gold Member
For some reason, they really drag out the shows. Ashoka and Acolyte were bad about that.

Mandalorian and Boba Fette were pretty good.

I actually did not like Andor as much. Too serious.
 

RoboFu

One of the green rats
So in every new starwars story they do the same exact same things and they fail. every one. Lucasfilm needs to clean house.
 
It's dead Jim!

They had tons of great books that could of been movies. Instead, they put out those abomination sequels and doubled down on identity politics.
 

IntentionalPun

Ask me about my wife's perfect butthole
They've made some good content. In the moment The Force Awakens was a fun event movie (but it's really not great by any means)... I think Andor is just a great show and I did enjoy Rogue One. Some of Mandalorian has been great, but it's gotten pretty bad.

They've made the best content since the original trilogy and also I'd say the worst. Ahsoka was just bad to me.. Acolyte even worse somehow. Much of the last season of Mandalorian was goofy / bad and for the most part the sequel trilogy wasn't good.

From a film standpoint Star Wars was already on shaky ground before they were sold to Disney, as while the prequels printed money, they weren't good IMO.

(I'm not counting animation or games as TBH have not watched/played any of that)
 

NecrosaroIII

Ultimate DQ Fan
Lucas wasn't very good at it either. I think Star Wars just kind of sucks in general.

Good titles:
A New Hope: Sort of. It's cheesy and basically an indie movie. But it's fun.
The Phantom Menace
Rogue One
Ewoks 1
Ewoks 2

Great movies:
Empire Strikes Back

Bad but with redeemable elements:
Revenge of the Sith
Return of the Jedi
Mandolorian S1
Mandolorian S2
Force Awakens

Just Plain Bad:
Solo
Mandolorian S3
The Last Jedi
Attack of the Clones
Utter Shit:
Boba Fet
Obi Wan
The Rise of Skywalker

I haven't seen anything else.
 
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Neolombax

Member
Sometimes I feel its okay, sometimes its ridiculously bad. It's inconsistent to me, maybe because there's so many interpretations from different directors.
 
Started super late into the Live action Star Wars, watched ep 1 to ep 6 in story order last year for the first time. I haven't watched anything after Episode 6 yet except for Spaceball as the unofficial far sequel to EP 6. And sometimes I consider myself lucky that I haven't watched EP7 and up yet because of how many people say they're bad in so many places. Maybe I might give them a try including the acolyte someday. I did enjoy the PREQUEL trilogy a bit more than the original trilogy although both were top tier. Natalie Portman and Harrison Ford are my favorite from both of those trilogies.
 
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Pegasus Actual

Gold Member
So when was the first time you realized Star Wars could be bad?

For me it was when I read these pieces of shit:
N7uyAFX.png

Before then I was riding high on the original movies, the Zahn books, Super Star Wars on SNES and X-Wing/TIE Fighter on PC...

I think it really softened the blow for when I went to see The Phantom Menace.
 

dave_d

Member
So when was the first time you realized Star Wars could be bad?

For me it was when I read these pieces of shit:
N7uyAFX.png

Before then I was riding high on the original movies, the Zahn books, Super Star Wars on SNES and X-Wing/TIE Fighter on PC...

I think it really softened the blow for when I went to see The Phantom Menace.
For me it was Super Star Wars. When that came out the Star Wars fans went crazy over it. However when I played it, I thought it was pretty generic and not special at all. (I mean it wasn't bad like a lot of licensed titles at the time. I'd describe it as competent.)
 
Star Wars is the biggest case of franchise destruction of all time and in a sane world there would be tsunamis of articles every day pillorying them for how they've degraded it into oblivion, to the point where a massive AAA open world Star Wars game is struggling to hit 1M sales. Utterly embarrassing.
 

Lord Panda

The Sea is Always Right
So when was the first time you realized Star Wars could be bad?

For me it was when I read these pieces of shit:
N7uyAFX.png

Before then I was riding high on the original movies, the Zahn books, Super Star Wars on SNES and X-Wing/TIE Fighter on PC...

I think it really softened the blow for when I went to see The Phantom Menace.

I remember the absolute disgust I felt after slogging through a Kevin J. Anderson Star Wars book, right after devouring Zahn's Thrawn trilogy. As a kid, I naively thought all Star Wars novels would be on that same level of brilliance, only to get smacked in the face by Anderson's trash writing that just couldn't measure up to Zahn’s work.
 

Blackage

Member
They acquired Star Wars in 2012 right?

So the good:
Star Wars: Clone Wars Seasons 5-7, I don't know how many episodes you can attribute to Disney, Season 7 is 100% Disney, and those last 4 episodes are just great.
Star Wars: The Force Awakens, yep, reboot, rehash, remake make of New Hope, call it whatever you want people were excited and liked it, and were looking forward to the next movie(at the time).
Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, the only movie that actually made me think of the Rebel Alliance as the underdogs fighting against a force much bigger then themselves that required sacrifice and struggle. I really in all honesty never gave a shit about the Rebel Alliance before this movie, as they were the foregone conclusion heroes that would always win with snippy remarks against incompetent Storm Troopers and Imperial officers. This movie kinda showed it wasn't always such a fun and chill ride to overthrow the fucking Empire.
The Mandolorian Season 1 & 2, because sure. 1 more than 2, lost it's edge in 2, 3 is on the other list.
Star Wars: The Bad Batch, actually enjoyed it, no where near peak Clone Wars, but some episodes were great, still think about the destruction of Kamino, and Papa Palpatine's speech that ended the remaining clone's hopes of a future in the Empire.
Andor, what hasn't been said, same feeling I got from Rogue One.
Tales of the Jedi, this was a fun watch.
Star Wars: Visions, also a cool & fun watch, was neat seeing different directors give them unique spin/ideas for Star Wars.

The Bad:
Star Wars: The Last Jedi, the worst movie in the franchise, divided the fan base, started the whole "Well if you don't like this movie you're clearly racist" because the worst character was played by a minority actress, and actors don't know how the internet works so they assume if some random dipshits are racist everyone who doesn't like their character or the movie is racist, also the movie that got me banned from Era, so bonus points for that. I was excited for this movie the night it came out and I remember how disappointed I was when the credits started to roll, my girlfriend turned to me and actually asked me if I was ok and my reply was "I....I think that movie kinda sucked?"
Solo: A Star Wars Story, nobody cared, mediocre forgettable movie I've never watched again also caused Disney to start deep faking everyone because they are convinced nobody could be recast after this movie's performance.
Star Wars Resistance: 2 seasons animated, nobody cared it didn't get a 3rd season, only good thing is watching Starkiller Base blow up some planets from a different perspective.
The Mandolorian Season 3: Brought back Baby Yoda literally for merchandising, took focus off Mando, tone was in decline since season 1 and this just kinda solidified it into campiness, waste of Giancarlo Esposito's talents, etc etc.
Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker, awful, only saving grace is they kinda unfucked some lore bits after TLJ, but then proceeded to fuck new ones, nothing was really salvagable from this movie.
The Book of Boba Fett: The 2 best episodes didn't involve him, why they decided to make him a soft bad guy having a change of heart instead of the ruthless bounty hunter he was known for being, I do not know.
The Acyloyte: Awful, the Jedi aren't the bad guys, but the director/producer of this show missed the memo.

The other:
Obi-Wan Kenobi: I know...I know, it's actually pretty damn bad, but my Star Wars brain takes it out of....the bad batch(ho ho ho), because of the Vader/Obi-wan duel near the end and Anakin telling Obi-wan he wasn't his failure, I've watched that scene like 10 times.
Tales of the Empire: Disney seems to be afraid to show villains really winning in modern Stars Wars with few exceptions, and this was another example of that where the ball was kinda fumbled, not horrifically bad, but also not great.
Young Jedi Adventures: This one is for the kids, never watched it! Shame they'll all get Order 66'd!
Ahsoka: I want to like Ahsoka, so I did. The show has a lot of flaws, but some strong performances kinda saved it for me from the bad list, but it wasn't good enough to be good. I need Rosario Dawson to not fold her arms and smile in every scene lol.
 

Superkewl

Member
The only Disney star wars I have enjoyed was Rogue One and Andor. Mando season 1 was just alright. I checked out in season 2 and didn't even come back for season 3.
 
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