53 minutes ago, Smutpedler said:

Fire from an explosion after a long fall in a ship that had a big section falling off because it was hyper rammed by another capitol ship. I get what you're saying and it wouldn't be any more ridiculous than Maul, in fact far less so, but I personally wouldn't like to see her just saunter up saying "FN-2187!" in the next movie.

well they completely recycled Finn's story arc, so might as well right?

2 minutes ago, defkhan1 said:

This may be the thing that bothered me the most. I get that this is Star Wars and you have to have some suspension of disbelief going in. That's perfectly fine! Holdo's hyperspace missile didn't bother me. Finn and Rose miraculously meeting another master codebreaker in their cell didn't bother me. Luke Force projecting himself halfway across the galaxy didn't bother me. But the entire premise of this chase scene did. Why didn't they just take half the FO fleet and hyperspace in front of the Resistance to intercept? It seemed like such an obvious answer to the problem and took me right out of the film as I was watching.

Like, it wouldn't be such a sticking point if it didn't drive the entire plot of the film. But it did, and that's the part that bothers me. I hate not understanding the driving force between the entire Resistance/FO plot in this film. Was it simple arrogance on the FO's part? That feels like a total cop-out of an answer to me. Yes, the FO is full of arrogant idiots just like the Empire, but to have that arrogance and stupidity be the thing that drives the entire plot just feels cheap.

I have a cousin who can't see this film because reasons, so he's going to call me up in a day or so and ask me to summarize the film for him. I know that when I get to this film-spanning chase scene, he's going to ask "but why didn't they just jump ahead of them?" and I won't have an answer for him.

I actually did really like a large portion of the film. It had some of the best scenes of any SW movie. But there were some major issues I had with the plot, and this was one of them.

As far as I know, mini-jumps were never used in (new)canon Star Wars. Hyperspace always required complicated calculations (even a dedicated computer or astromech), and there's probably not possible to have that precision.

I felt like the Resistance/FO plot could have been helped SO easily too.

Just have that last jump be trying to get to Crait, but you have to go through a weird nebula. You can't jump to hyperspace in the Nebula, and your targeting is thrown off. That solves the boring-ness of the chase and doesn't make the FO seem like total tools for just pootling along behind firing the occasional shot. They get lucky sometimes and kill the smaller ships in the fleet, but they can't get enough hits on the Raddus to deal any major damage.

Have the Res come across a lost civilian ship inside it, like Del Toro's character has been living on his own for years just stuck in there so he's a bit cooky. But he says he can help them get on board the FO flagship and do what they need to. The Nebula gives them the sensor cover they need to sneak aboard.

No massive detour across the galaxy to find some dude, only to not find him and stumble into another one. No weird prequel animal chase. No saccharine kids scenes. No 20/30 mines too long in the film.

2 hours ago, FlyingToaster said:

The Poe-Hux dialogue at the start worked really well for me, partly as it felt exactly like every video conference I've ever taken part in.
'Hello? can you hear us? We can hear you, can you hear us? Oh, now we can't hear you any more, are you talking? Say something.'

Except they could hear eachother and Poe was just pretending he couldn't to make jokes. About Hux's mom.

Star Wars Episode 8 starts with a prank call and a "mother" joke. That's what this franchise has been reduced to, lol

3 minutes ago, InterceptorMad said:

I felt like the Resistance/FO plot could have been helped SO easily too.

Just have that last jump be trying to get to Crait, but you have to go through a weird nebula. You can't jump to hyperspace in the Nebula, and your targeting is thrown off. That solves the boring-ness of the chase and doesn't make the FO seem like total tools for just pootling along behind firing the occasional shot. They get lucky sometimes and kill the smaller ships in the fleet, but they can't get enough hits on the Raddus to deal any major damage.

Have the Res come across a lost civilian ship inside it, like Del Toro's character has been living on his own for years just stuck in there so he's a bit cooky. But he says he can help them get on board the FO flagship and do what they need to. The Nebula gives them the sensor cover they need to sneak aboard.

No massive detour across the galaxy to find some dude, only to not find him and stumble into another one. No weird prequel animal chase. No saccharine kids scenes. No 20/30 mines too long in the film.

In all honesty this does not make for a better plot... No offense meant.

I think Poe's arc was the best arc aside from Kylo. I got so much more respect for Kylo now that he's gone off the deep end.

Oh....

can we talk about the elephant giraffe in the room. wTF was with the milking? seriously....

and please, no more deus-ex BB8.

1 minute ago, Andreu said:

In all honesty this does not make for a better plot... No offense meant.

Well I was basing it on them not changing their minds on the chase lol But they could have made it better than "and now we cut back to empty space with some boring chase happening...and now we do it again...yep still chasing...". Every time I felt like it needed one of those Spongebob "3 hours later..." insert cards

The Imps chasing the Falcon in ESB works because it isn't just a chase that lasts half the film. There are things in the way, things hiding the Falcon.

If it were up to me I'd have cut the entire Finn sub-plot and changed the chase entirely...

Just now, Wiredin said:

can we talk about the elephant giraffe in the room. wTF was with the milking? seriously....

That was the biggest WTF moment in the theatre. Luke’s obviously gone off the deep end, I appreciated the absurd humor. No worse than the tentacle porn monster in Rogue One.

3 minutes ago, InterceptorMad said:

If it were up to me I'd have cut the entire Finn sub-plot and changed the chase entirely...

I agree, the casino DJ is quite off and the chase lacked something. But still, despite its ups and downs the movie is good actually, but it breaks so much of the star wars clichés and expectations that we hardcore fans have felt violated somehow along the way. Luke and Leia are total beasts in this movie and those are the characters I cared the most so I'm quite happy... If I truly want to complain I would complain about the lack of battles.. I wanted more space/ground battles, they felt a bit short and rushed.

20 minutes ago, Odanan said:

As far as I know, mini-jumps were never used in (new)canon Star Wars. Hyperspace always required complicated calculations (even a dedicated computer or astromech), and there's probably not possible to have that precision.

They could do a full jump out then jump back in then same result.

4 minutes ago, Hobojebus said:

They could do a full jump out then jump back in then same result.

Right, if a mini-jump is not possible (which the film never mentions it's not), just have part of the fleet jump somewhere else and then jump in front of the Resistance. I like the nebula idea too, it at least gives some reasonable explanation for the sub-light chase.

On another note:

**Poe and Finn are responsible for nearly all Resistance deaths.**

1. Poe disobeys orders. Attacks dreadnaught.
2. Poe, Finn, and Rose mutiny brings back someone who exposes the escaping cloaked transports.

A terrible movie composed of a disjointed series of underwhelming crises.

Extremely lame capital ship slow chase brought on by unexplainable hyperspace tracking and sudden concern for fuel consumption.

At least there wasn’t another Death Star...yet. They’ll save that for Ep.IX.

Many, many problems with this travesty; easily the worst SW film.

The bright side: still better than anything Chuck Wendig ever wrote.

Was I the only one who thought the Rey/Kylo team up was both awesome but way to B-Movie?

I've always disliked Rian J. tho... I hated Looper and Brother Bloom... so I shouldn't be surprised.

1 hour ago, grandmoffjoe said:

Did this movie remind anybody else of Dunkirk? Spending most of the movie almost cornered. Trying one plan after another to escape, then failing spectacularly and losing friends in the process. Yeah I'm pretty sure I just watched Dunkirk in space. None of this should be construed as me not liking it. I was thoroughly entertained. I'm gonna go see it again on Sunday.

Also I hope Snoke is as hard to put down as Legends Palpatine. As far as villains go, he was pretty rad in a "diabolical hugh hefner" sorta way. Up there on his throne all smug in his gold bathrobe.

The difference between Dunkirk (which I thought was brilliant and really put the hairs on end) is that everything contributed to making you feel uncomfortable; the harrowing soundtrack, the camera angles, never once seeing the face of the enemy. Completely compelling.

I really didn’t care about the Resistance fleet. The First Order never once felt overwhelming.

Also, the whole “We should have launched the fighters five minutes ago” thing after an almost endless sequence of blunders... Good God. What the **** was that.

3 minutes ago, patox said:

On another note:

**Poe and Finn are responsible for nearly all Resistance deaths.**

1. Poe disobeys orders. Attacks dreadnaught.
2. Poe, Finn, and Rose mutiny brings back someone who exposes the escaping cloaked transports.

That was one of my favorite parts. They ****** up. They made choices based on the information they had and it was wrong. There wasn't a deus ex machina allowing the transports to get to ground, they just blew up. Actions having concequences make for good storytelling, and I for one can't wait to see Poe and Finn deal with what they've done.

Another good point: Resistance bombers *are* terrible, and A-wings are ROTJ sized, not Rebels-sized!

10 minutes ago, defkhan1 said:

Right, if a mini-jump is not possible (which the film never mentions it's not), just have part of the fleet jump somewhere else and then jump in front of the Resistance. I like the nebula idea too, it at least gives some reasonable explanation for the sub-light chase.

I mean there were ways around it if they were near gas giants the gravity shadow would of stopped them jumping, if the rebels had an old interdictior ship from gcw era.

But they were in open space even if the cap ships didn't jump do the fo really not posses bombers and assault shuttles that could of gone for the weaker front shields.?

I thought the movie was pretty good as a top notch action adventure movie. My problem with the movie is it seemed Ryan Johnson (director) was having a bit of a fight with JJ Abrams. JJ Abrams set up several interesting mysteries in The Force Awakens that I was excited to get further development on in this movie. I wasn't expecting to get all the answers, but I was expecting some answers or at least a development of the mystery. These include:

1) Who are the Knights of Ren?
2) Who are Rey's parents?
3) What is Snoke's backstory?

So I don't recall the Knights of Ren even being mentioned at all in this movie. Rey's parents was a pretty huge let down, making the entire mystery seem pointless. Snoke's backstory also seems unimportant now that Snoke was killed without a fight.

I know Snoke didn't have much in The Force Awakens but it seemed he was being built up as this ominous character that will be more important as the story unfolds, yet Ryan Johnson just seemed like he didn't really like the character so got rid of him at the earliest opportunity. You get to see some powerful force powers from him, but his death seemed anticlimactic. I think it would have better to see Rey start to have a real fight from him, only to have Kylo turn on Snoke mid fight to land the final blow. Snoke just toying with Rey and getting killed without a fight seemed like a waste of the entire build up of Snoke. It would have made more sense if he was just some faceless voice in The Force Awakens, and then he is first seen in the thrown room when Rey arrives, and then is killed in the manner seen in the film, that way you wouldn't have a 2 year investment in wondering how Snoke got injured so badly, etc.

Luke's ending I also thought was less than satisfying. You see Luke has his X Wing at his little Island paradise, and it seemed like such a missed opportunity making him just a force projection at the end. How awesome would the ending have been if Luke came flying in in his T-65, shot down Kylo's shuttle, used force powers to cripple the walkers, and then went out in a blaze of glory taking on Kylo with his green lightsaber as well as a horde of storm troopers, again buying time for the resistance fighters to escape? It could have been an incredible ending to the character.

It doesn't bother me that Luke dies though. I always thought Luke HAD TO DIE in this movie, because his shadow is just too large over the franchise. If the movie ended with Kylo leading the First Order and both Luke and Rey are going to be against him in Episode 9, you'd think Kylo wouldn't stand a chance. So Episode 9 needed to be a showdown just between Rey and Kylo with Luke out of the picture. And him just saying he wants to stay on his little island wouldn't have been good enough.

Overall though I liked the movie, and think it is in the better half of all Star Wars movies. Of the 3 new movies I still think Rogue One is the best.

1 minute ago, Joe Censored said:

So I don't recall the Knights of Ren even being mentioned at all in this movie.

Not by name. Luke has a single line about how Ben Solo took some of his apprentices with him. Then it drops that toy and wanders off like a toddler to play with something else.

Overall, I enjoyed this movie, but I feel like you need to approach these movies as essentially big-budget fan films. On that level, it's awesome. As an actual Star Wars movie, that's a tougher call. I will say, these new movies are giving me a new appreciation for the prequels. They still suck, but at least they fit into the universe of Star Wars and feel like a continuation of the story. These feel very disjointed, and I still can't help but feel they don't really connect with the original Star Wars, except maybe in an alternative timeline kind of a way, maybe where the Rebellion ultimately lost the war or something. These just don't fit in my understanding of the Star Wars universe.

But the main thing I want to do is to say that, if the Force Awakens was basically a redressing of New Hope, this was definitely a redressing of Empire. Let's just summarize the new movie, and I'll let you be the judge.

1. Movie starts with the First Order finding the hidden Rebel base. A losing battle is fought by the Resistance which gains them enough time for the rest to escape. One major unit in the First Order's forces is destroyed by the Resistance, which causes cheers, but overall the battle is at best a Pyrrhic victory in which the Rebels limp away.

2. In the middle of the movie, we find ourselves between two story lines. One follows a young Jedi in training who has sought out a Jedi Master to complete their training. This Jedi Master does not react to them the way they expected, and at first are reluctant to train the newcomer, and actually refuse. Then, another character from the earlier movies intercedes for the padawan, so now the Master agrees to take on the new padawan for training. Meanwhile, our other intrepid heroes are running away from a bunch of Star Destroyers that are trying to capture them. Tie Fighters give chase.

3. The Padawan, during their training, goes into a dark cave in order to learn something of themselves. Meanwhile, our heroes that are being chased decide to go to an independent system in order to seek the aid of one of the locals there that can help them shake the empire off of their tails.

4. The Padawan gets a vision during their training that they need to stop their training right away and run towards the vision. They are counseled by the Master not to do this, but they disagree. Meanwhile, our heroes who are trying to escape the First Order's chase are betrayed by the very person they sought help from, and are imprisoned by them.

5. The Padawan, following their vision, walk right into a trap that was laid for them in the vision. A Lightsaber battle ensues in which the main hero was inches away from death, but narrowly escaped. At the end of the battle, the main bad guy asks the Padawan to join him in ruling the galaxy together. Further, the Padawan finally learns the truth of their heritage. Meanwhile, our heroes who have been captured escape (but are banged up).

6. Our Padawan, after refusing to accept the offer to rule, escapes in the Millennium Falcon.

7. The First Order tries one last ditch effort to catch our heroes and the Millennium Falcon with their military, but luckily, for our heroes, they escape on the Millennium Falcon to lick their wounds and return in the final movie to win the day!

Now, I understand that alot of the trappings are different, but those are the story beats of this movie. Now don't get me wrong. I think the throne room scene and the Luke confrontation are awesome scenes, but as a whole, this movie follows the beats of Empire. Plain as that. These movie makers used concept art to make everything, and they've used the beats from the OT to write their script. It's fun, but it really just made me want to watch the OT again, TBH. I give the movie an A-. Fun to watch, but other than the Luke confrontation, forgettable.

1 hour ago, Wiredin said:

Was I the only one who thought the Rey/Kylo team up was both awesome but way to B-Movie?

I loved it. That was probably the high point of the movie for me. The Rey/Kylo/Luke scenes were amazing while the Resistance/First Order plot was just not very good. Felt like one really good movie mashed with another pretty mediocre film.

Full disclosure guys, pretty sure the Praetorian Guards are the Knights of Ren, it's just that nobody said so.

54 minutes ago, Joe Censored said:

1) Who are the Knights of Ren?
2) Who are Rey's parents?
3) What is Snoke's backstory?

So I don't recall the Knights of Ren even being mentioned at all in this movie. Rey's parents was a pretty huge let down, making the entire mystery seem pointless. Snoke's backstory also seems unimportant now that Snoke was killed without a fight.

Apparently, the Knights of Ren are Kylo's (Jedi) school buddies. You know the guys who gravitate a bully? Those. We don't know what was made of them, but the next movie has a chance to introduce some as Supreme Leader Kylo's personal guard.

There was never a mystery about Rey's parents. Only crazy theories and "everything must be connect" (poor) mindset.

And we might know more about Snoke in the next movie (more flashbacks?) or in books. His death was very well done, because it surprised everybody (specially the own victim).

5 minutes ago, Captain Lackwit said:

Full disclosure guys, pretty sure the Praetorian Guards are the Knights of Ren, it's just that nobody said so.

Oh, that's a good theory. But I hope not. They didn't show actual Force powers any moment. (and their loyalty is clearly on Snoke, not Kylo)