The Force Awakens - 20 x better than the prequels!

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Re: The Force Awakens thread - Better than the prequels!

Post by GreyWizzard »

Another issue... Why would Leia and Han call their kid Ben? He was nobody to them. Leia never met Kenobi and Han spent a couple of hours in a ship with him, and it seems like they didn't get along.
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Re: The Force Awakens thread - Better than the prequels!

Post by guttermouth »

"I dont care for you but Help me Ben Kenobi your my only hope......"
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Re: The Force Awakens thread - Better than the prequels!

Post by GreyWizzard »

LOL OH FUCK!

Did she actually know him though? Beside as a general in an army... No fuck it, I'm out...
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Re: The Force Awakens thread - Better than the prequels!

Post by GreyWizzard »

Okay, not 100% out.

So she was sent by her dad Bail to retrieve Kenobi a general who served with her dad during the clone wars. She has never met him but he was a friend of her Dad. I guess since finding out who her real dad was and that Ben poorly trained him in the way of the force... and then under prepared Luke... At times it can seem tenuous for her to name him Ben.
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Re: The Force Awakens thread - Better than the prequels!

Post by Peppermint Lounge »

Finally had a window to watch this. First half is outstanding. Comedy moments work really well. The bow they wrap around the poleaxing of the First Order c/- one kidnapped captain, a handful of small explosives and a few x-wings is a stretch to put it kindly. Seeing Kylo Ren, injured or not, get tagged in a light sabre duel by a beginner and an ex-stormtrooper who specialises in sanitation is a stretch. This rendition relies on being a sufficient spectacle for fans that they would forgive its many stretches.

Still enjoyed it a lot more than I thought I would.
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Re: The Force Awakens thread - Better than the prequels!

Post by Rorschach »

The theory behind Rey and her particular lightsabre style is really interesting and makes it more plausible she'd be able to hold her own and then over power Kylo.

I think Finn will turn out to be a latent Force user but in the fight against Kylo a combination of Kylo's injury and Finn using brute force allowed him to compete before Kylo could focus (something the film plays on throughout that he doesn't have control at times over his emotions, he did just kill his Dad prior to the fight) and laid the smack down.

Not perfect, and it relies too much on nostalgia, but it washed away the bitter after taste of the prequels.
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Re: The Force Awakens thread - Better than the prequels!

Post by Cletus »

Rogue One

I saw this tonight (with Hercy, Burnzoire, Juz and one other fellow not on the forum) and I don't think I really rated it. I won't talk too much about the story or give too many spoilers because there really shouldn't be any. We all know the Rebel Alliance manage to steal the plans because they end up in our beloved R2 unit in a movie made decades ago. The CGI battles are excellent, there's not too much going on, but that's not to say there isn't a lot going on, there is, they just didn't over do it. I think they were mindful of what didn't work in the prequels. And while I was somewhat impressed with Grand Moff Tarkin, essentially I knew I was looking at a very well drawn videogame character. He looked good and bad depending on the scene. His voice seemed like the real deal. Oddly more so than Vader's..which didn't have the same commanding depth it has in the OT. I thought Tarkin's eyes were a bit too dark and CGI Leia's head looked out of shape to me. I was told it was old footage of Carrie, but I'm not convinced. It looked like CGI to me. More so than the Grand Moff. Her head looked a bit caddywampus. Maybe it was the 3D glasses. 3D fucks with me a bit.

There are a lot of nods to the OT and you'd expect that. But maybe there were too many. Personally, the only two (fan service) characters I was happy to see in this movie were 3PO and R2, but it's brief and certainly unnecessary. Nevertheless, I love them both and was pleased they were in this film too. Thankfully Vader isn't over used in this one either. He shows up a few times. It doesn't have any real impact on the story. There are a few others. "He doesn't like you...I don't like you either".

It wasn't all bad. It just wasn't all good either. I didn't like Jin, the main character. She's just another Rey. I didn't really think much of any of the characters. Ben Mendelsohn did an adequate job. I suppose everyone but Jin did..and man was she uninspiring and difficult to connect to. It started to get annoying because - this might be a spoiler I suppose but it isn't worth hiding the text so skip to the next paragraph if you totally want to go in fresh - it just seemed to do the same thing over and over at the end in that a character has a special task, character performs that task, character dies. I'm all for killing off characters, but repeated patterns bother me a bit.

Are Asian people the only people in the universe that can be blind martial arts experts? This movie was part Kung FU tv series and part Band of Brothers but not in a good way. This didn't really feel like part of the main story. It felt like it was composed by a committee. As if a panel of hundreds had their ideas incorporated into it. TFA was a strong reboot, it was something to kick off a new story, but this felt quite a bit weaker. Actually, it felt unnecessary. Did we really need to go all the way back to when the Deathstar was near completion? Did we really need to know how the plans were stolen and why the Deathstar was actually so easy to destroy? Maybe some people really did need to know.

I don't think we did.

6.5 out of 10. So pretty but pretty boring.
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Re: The Force Awakens thread - Better than the prequels!

Post by GeneraL CyberFunK »

I loved Rogue One.

I wasn't on board right throughout the lead up to it. I will concede the fact I didn't get a Star Wars BAM at the start.. it made it obvious that it wasn't a star wars episode and by the end of it.. I completely appreciated it.

Jyn was a hard character to root for I will admit.. but I kinda got her motivation and understood her after Jedha.

The last 3rd of the movie was fucking awesome. I was floored by the ending.. even though we all know what happens.. but I think it was how well they tied it to EpIV.

The CGI or Tarkin and Leia was a bit odd.. though expected.

I liked this more than Force Awakens. I'm giving this 9 dead springbreakers on the beach out of 10.
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Re: The Force Awakens thread - Better than the prequels!

Post by Cletus »

I will admit the scene at the end where Vader goes full ninja Sith Lord was amazing. Also felt very true to the original fight styles rather than that bopping and spinning shit Lucas did in the prequels.
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Re: The Force Awakens thread - Better than the prequels!

Post by Mavy »

Yep pretty much the same. I loved it but I think it was really the last act that made me love it. That battle at the end was awesome and the way they tied it straight into Ep IV was so well done I've been talking about it for days. I was sitting there smiling. It was pure enjoyment.

The movie dragged a bit for the first half though and really seemed to speed through the good quips and lines which were scattered here and there. Made me feel like I wasn't paying attention at times. Hard to explain.

Tarkin was distracting. I couldn't look at him and accept him as anything remotely real. I think they would have been better off recasting with a look a like and some prosthetics to get that Tarkin look. Leia, yes her head was too wide. They were talking about using Carrie Fisher's daughter in TFW why not here? Also the Vader scene with Ben Mendelsohn did look weird. Vader looked almost comical. Like he had kind of a bounce in his step when he moved. Not imposing like he was in the originals. He looked awesome at the end though. They probably should have held him back just for that scene.

The one thing I've been contemplating since seeing it is if the scale of the battle and the pretty decisive arse kicking the rebels gave the Empire lessens the victory at the end of Ep IV. Destroying the Death Star was such a monumental achievement for these ragtag rebels against all odds. Now it seems like it was more inevitable and winning is something they do easily. Silly Empire thinks a giant battle station will stop us don't they ever learn? etc. Even following up and destroying the second Death Star seemed believable in the original arc in a last stand sense.

On the other hand I suppose they should have had some victories to make the Empire pay attention. Maybe this one just shouldn't have been so big so close to Ep IV.

Ah too much thinking. It was great!
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Re: The Force Awakens thread - Better than the prequels!

Post by Madmya »

Cletus wrote:Are Asian people the only people in the universe that can be blind martial arts experts?
Cultural appropriation.
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Re: The Force Awakens thread - Better than the prequels!

Post by Cletus »

I did read that last night after posting my thoughts here. Apparently it's to appeal to the Asian markets..thing is, they killed the characters off so they can't really appear in any other films.
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Re: The Force Awakens thread - Better than the prequels!

Post by Cletus »

CGI Grand Moff Tarkin looked pretty realistic to me
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Re: The Force Awakens thread - Better than the prequels!

Post by Vince »

Saw Rogue One yesterday. From the outset I'll admit- I'm a prequel fan. I didn't think much of TFA and, even though it was serviceable l, it was too derivative of A New Hope. Nothing new happened. It wasn't exciting. The character were all boring and I had no feelings for ANY of them. Even when Han got killed I could see it coming a mile off... not great directing. I left the theatre hollow and shattered. My childhood had been raped!

So to say I went into Rogue One with low expectations would be an understatement. Edwards' previous film, Godzilla, polarised me. I loved the first half with the human characters dealing with each other. Once Breaking Bad died and Godzilla arrived it bored me to tears. So I took those expectations into Rogue One yesterday afternoon. To say I enjoyed this film would be an understatement! This movie had characters I really cared about. I admit I teared up at the end. It was so well put together. The score was great (another weak point for TFA) and I was invested in this story! I mean I knew roughly what would happen considering A New Hope, but they far exceeded my expectations! Vader's final scene was orgasmic! It has overtaken the opera scene in ROTS as my favourite scene in any Star Wars film! Much like you get a true glimpse into the emperor's evil in that opera scene, you see just why Vader is held in such high regard and is so feared... Tgis is easily the most pleased I've felt seeing a film in a very long time. I'll go back and see it in 3D now! An easy 10/10 and goes straight up there with Empire, A New Hope and ROTS as my favs of this (mostly) amazing set of films!
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Re: The Force Awakens thread - Better than the prequels!

Post by GameHED »

Saw yesterday.

Way better than Force Awakens.
But not perfect as the characters all felt like they couldn't care less if they succeed or fail in the mission so you don't care if they actually die off.

There was this one scene where the asian guy with the cane decided to walk out in the open and not do acrobatic martial arts stuff to avoid being killed and it made no sense. Why would he do that when in a previous scene he was shown kicking Storm Trooper butt almost singlehandedly without much help from the other guy with the beefy gun? They need to hire a person whose job it is to look for inconsistency in the character's abilities on screen.

For instance we know Anakin was a great saber duelist in prequel trilogy times so you see him do his shit realy really fast being a young guy. Then in OT, we see a crippled version of him in Vader so he moves slow and never jumps around anymore due to the replacement of limbs. But in this the chinese guy doesn't use his ability and I really think it was pointless scene.

When the green droid was shot I was sad as he was the only one in the crew with actual personality and I think his action figure will probably sell ten times more than the others. (kids don't want apathetic weaklings who are scared to die as their role models - lucas knew what he was doing on that part of the star wars property)

The fanboy in me wants to say I recommend the movie but really only the hardcore OT fans should see this one. You won't really see anything you haven't seen before from the numbered movies. Just more of the parts you liked from those movies especially the battles but with less interesting people doing the fighting.

Basically this is Halo Reach for Star Wars and if that is all you wanted then go see it. I felt like it needed more danger. The empire are beaten by guys who are crap at fighting and they look weak similar to the scene in OT where ewoks could kill storm troopers by throwing rocks at them. What they needed was have scene where alien characters are seen kicking butt (to make fighting the resistence seem like a tougher task to give a sense that the skill of the alien was what tipped the fighting in favour of the inexperienced crew) similar to the prequel trilogy not people of different races. Too many human imo. Boring...

Yes and that was stupid putting a girl who doesn't care about the rebel alliance again as the main character. The only time an apathetic character works like that is when Square did it with Final Fantasy 7 or when it is a post apocalyptic movie where the survivalist has to make those tough decisions on whether to serve themselve or risk losing stuff to help others ie Mad Max and the person has become more mercenary in their way of living and things like codes of honour and sense of duty are seen as useless in their world.

I didn't feel like they needed to put a female lead in this one like FA. In FA they wanted little girls to have role model. And as we see in that she kicks male butt without even trying to. Even friend-zoning the thirsty black criminal gangster rapper who lost his gold chain and his big black dick wasn't enough to get her to be interested in sex despite it being a disney movie where they always put sex in the backgrounds in the subliminal messages in Lion King.
They went to all the trouble to put in a romance scene right at the end as if they needed to tick a box and I'm sorry but in this movie there was no build up to that scene like you see in George Lucas Prequel Trilogy where Anakin Skywalker has the hots for Padme. Obviously this doesn't matter to the neckbeards who watch Scifi movies and stuff but in order for us to have a deep connection to these people we have to see evidence that those characters actually give a fuck about it each other to want to see a scene like that of people hugging and kissing. Otherwise it looks forced.

Bring Lucas back you dickheads. I miss Jar Jar. (at least his kills were meant to be humourous and accidental so you knew that anything he killed was part of the visual joke. In this useless people that can kill storm troopers is taken seriously. The chinese guy can dodge storm trooper bullets by simply walking slowly and they miss him because doing it fast by running around acrobatically in the earlier scene is less effective. Nice one you dickheads! :lol:

3 out of 5 stars. They all die and you know they are average joes so it's not a true science fantasy movie with wonder and adventure and mystery. It's basically war story more than fantasy and that's ok. But if you want that balance of the OT (hopping from one place to place a lot, mystery, but war is the backdrop to the drama between family in-fights) you won't get it here. This is a quality fan movie for fans of SW more than a interesting new SW movie with stuff you haven't seen.The Prequel trilogy despite the bad bits WAS new and Lucas can't be accused of retreading old content. Disney is just here for a cash grab of existing SW fans and you can tell. They are pandering to OT fans for the $ but forgetting that people who liked both OT AND PT (because they was unique and different) want something NEW. Anyway maybe next time...

FA sin: making mary sue character nobody cares about because she already does everything by herself without need for other characters to exist

Rogue One sin: making storm troopers look like absolute fools that can't even hit a guy who walks really slow. At least not hitting an ewok easily made sense since they were tiny targets that hid in the bushes making them harder to see. But in this they made Storm Troopers ridiculously underpowered and the plot armour stuck out like a sore thumb this time.

I agree with AJ opinion about the Troopers looked cool
....but it's all cosmetic. They don't have the coolness factor of Bobafett or clone troopers in terms of what they do. (it seems like everyone's gotten more incompetent after the clone wars hehe)
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Re: The Force Awakens thread - Better than the prequels!

Post by stanard »

Was fun. I enjoyed it.

Third act was sweet and space battle was suitably meaty. Wasn't a huge fan of the entire Rebel fleet getting involved but it was done well and there was some excellent Y-Wing love. Red and Gold Leader cameos were brilliant and made perfect sense. Dr Evazan and Ponda Baba cameos were - while they made me smile - kind of lame.

Tarkin and Leia CGI didn't bother me in the slightest. Sure it was noticible, but so are most of the alien prosthetics. Don't get why some people get so worked up about it - I find it pretty amazing that someone who's been dead for over 20 years can be (almost) brought back to life.

Annoyed by all the "it's dark like ESB!" talk though. Just cause everyone died doesn't make it dark.
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Re: The Force Awakens thread - Better than the prequels!

Post by GameHED »

It's dark because Darth Vader is back to being a grim reaper like figure again rather than an emo who hates sand and kills helpless little kids. teeny vader who whines about shit != to OT vader who is ruthless conquerer with no face. (until the end of course)

I think the reason Vader is so iconic is precisely because he isn't able to be relatable for a large portion of the OT series.
Things were black and white. Good vs Evil. Then Prequels came out and we stopped being afraid of the Vader character. This goes back to before there was Prequel trilogy aimed at tweens.

I;m not sure I want to see young Han Solo series. I would rather they make a side story about Han at the age he was in OT. Fuck the prequel shit. I want to see bounty hunters, jabba the hut, han and monsters and aliens again. All getting into situations that are humourous and funny but with loads of action and suspense. Something like Trigun where you know the main character can easily die but lucky opportunity manages to save the skin of the adventurer more than the skill. But skill and street smart is necessary to use opportunity to your advantage. Rogue One imo has too serious a tone. Almost like they stopped caring about the fun of SW movies and focus on trying to do cool stuff only.
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Re: The Force Awakens thread - Better than the prequels!

Post by GameHED »

So what do you guys think about CG being overused in place of practical FX?
Personally I think CG will never go away, but we know from movies like Mad Max Fury Road that practical has more character to it than the lifelessness of CG. The sense that everything feels solid by how it reacts to impacts and the way it gives a sense of realism to movies and not a cartoon like toy story but with high quality texture maps pasted on to mimmick realism.

The fact of the matter however is without CG you would not have gotten the epic Yoda vs Sith Lord fight in ROTS. The froglike motions and leaps from one place to another was only possible when he went CG. Puppets and animatronics have their place.
If they ever do another mad max it better not go full cg. But for Star Wars given how you are dealing with fights I can forgive the usage of it. Just use it only when necessary as last resort, not as replacement of practical effects. We get enough CG from videogames and final fantasy cutscenes. It's lazy.
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Re: The Force Awakens thread - Better than the prequels!

Post by Cletus »

Funniest first two minutes of a review I've ever seen.
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Re: The Force Awakens thread - Better than the prequels!

Post by t0mby »

stanard wrote: Annoyed by all the "it's dark like ESB!" talk though. Just cause everyone died doesn't make it dark.
Thanks for that.
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Re: The Force Awakens thread - Better than the prequels!

Post by Cletus »

Grad Moff Tarkin, Dath Vader and Leia survive so it's not exactly accurate.
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Re: The Force Awakens thread - Better than the prequels!

Post by t0mby »

I love Dath Vader.
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Re: The Force Awakens thread - Better than the prequels!

Post by Cletus »

Sorry, I meant Dark Voider.
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Re: The Force Awakens thread - Better than the prequels!

Post by Gamma »

Caught it last night, it was enjoyable. Interesting to see how it distanced itself from the main series in presentation- little twists on the musical motifs, no wall of text intro, and I don't remember any of the staple screen wipes. Tarkin was an impressive technical feat but still obviously CGI, I think it would have been better to just show his reflection in the window and leave it at that. Leia looked like a complete muppet. Battle towards the end was pretty sweet, Vader scene was boss. Snarky robot guy was the best character.

Not brilliant, but If they can keep this up with the other spin-offs I'll watch them.
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Re: The Force Awakens thread - Better than the prequels!

Post by ObSoLeTe »

i enjoyed it

Vader just chopping fools down at the end was awesome
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