15 minutes ago, SEApocalypse said:

And yeah, everyone uses mystery boxes. But JJ is obsessed with them, it is an obsessive part of his career. You can say something similar about Snyder and how he sacrifices any substance in his movies for his "moments", those slomo scenes which are supposed to have great emotional impact, but lacked most of it because Snyders obsession and over-use with them. Now I could say something about making dumb movies and Boll as well and how all three are very talented in making crowd pleasers without substance ... but actually Snyder seems to have stopped pleasing crowds and it would get off topic anyway.

Don't get me started on Snyder, I think he is one of the most misunderstood directors of our time. Watch the Watchmen and Koyaanisqatsi back to back. It is kinda mind blowing. Or even Sucker Punch, as bad as it was, and how you (the audience member) are a reality layer of the movie. His movies are so much more than slo-mo.

4 minutes ago, Jadotch said:

Don't get me started on Snyder, I think he is one of the most misunderstood directors of our time. Watch the Watchmen and Koyaanisqatsi back to back. It is kinda mind blowing. Or even Sucker Punch, as bad as it was, and how you (the audience member) are a reality layer of the movie. His movies are so much more than slo-mo.

Now you get me interested in actually starting about Snyder, because if something went straight over my head, I would happy to enjoy that part of his movies.

16 minutes ago, SEApocalypse said:

Now you get me interested in actually starting about Snyder, because if something went straight over my head, I would happy to enjoy that part of his movies.

Koyaanisqatsi is a indie film from the 1980's pretty much shows the evolution of earth until the possible man kinds destruction ending in a Hopi Prophecy. All put to Philip Glass's score. It is pretty much saying life is out of balance, and it will cause nuclear war.

Anyways it is this score Snyder uses in the Watchmen for the Dr. Manhattan scenes. Dr. Manhattan representing the nuclear bomb is Alan Moore's work, however the sound track and the life out of balance and the doomsday prophecy is Snyder tying everything together with the music choice.

It is pretty cool if you watch them back to back. It helps you know what was going through Snyder's mind when dealing with Dr. Manhatten.

I think Snyder is tragically flawed that he does not really know how to put human characters on the screen to make people care. But some of his ideas are pretty deep.

(Sorry off topic)

OK. But that strengthens my point about Snyders fixation about special moments when he can run the music, have his slomo rain, etc … while totally lacking the ability to build good scenes, place the characters into the world, which gives them character and makes them relatable.
Besides, it does not sound that deep or awesome, more of a really great reference to something which actually is great than Snyder being great himself.

1 hour ago, Otacon said:

This is something about the production of these movies that is baffling to me. To some extent, there's a lot of movie by committee going on, even if the the credits don't seem to indicate otherwise, because that's just how this kind of movie gets made these days...But it's crazy what's apparently going on with Star Wars. "We're going to make a new trilogy but we don't have an over-arching plan for it, we'll just let the creative team of each installment wing it" seems like such a bizarre creative choice. In a way it makes me glad Treverrow got dropped, because what has he done that was good(for certain values of good...) outside of Jurassic World, a movie that was very definitely by committee...

It blows my mind that JJ and Kasden spend TFA setting up mysteries without planned solutions, and did so with no guidance or oversight from anyone. That Johnson was apparently allowed to do whatever he wanted with what they left him, and that now JJ will have to pick up from what Johnson has done for the last film. And that both of these things happened beacuse there was no outline from the start about where this story was going in even a rough sense. This is how they're handling their $4 billion dollar acquisition? Don't get me wrong, as I've said before I enjoy the film we got with TLJ, but it seems like a lot of the issues people have with it stem from Disney's bizarrely hands off approach, rather than the heavily hands on one people were initially afraid of.

EDIT: I mean, it's not like the OT was exactly plotted out from start to finish, but Lucas apparently at least had a rough outline of ideas to go on for sequels.

I agree. Why on earth would you buy out Lucasfilm and decide to make a new saga trilogy, but...not plan out the overarching story of said trilogy? You can have an overall story you want told (who certain characters are - like kylo/ben being han and leia's son, certain events you want to happen, etc) but still leave plenty for the directors and writers of each individual movie to have creative freedom for most of the movie itself as long as it fits the narrative. but for Rian to go into episode 8 with no input from on who snoke was or where he came from? Or who Rey's parents were (even if the input was that they were nobody like Rian decided)? Or...where the story was heading at all?

I've liked all of the new star wars movies, but it's a baffling decision in terms of the trilogy...

I feel like there might end up being a sort of tug-o-war with JJ Abrams and Rian Johnson now that Abrams is doing Episode IX. Johnson undoes some of what Abrams established, then Abrams undoes what Johnson did to follow through with his original vision. Hope not, but it does feel sorta like Johnson threw out Abrams’ playbook.

That said, I’m looking forward to Johnson’s all-new trilogy. I like how he makes movies and think that if he gets to create and follow through with his own vision, it could be pretty spectacular.

If I were JJ I'd really screw the universe so there's nothing for the next trilogy to work with, kill rey have the resistance wiped out then have a plague kill off all the humans.

I mean he can't remake Jedi now and he's incapable of making films on his own without something to comply, look at the Calvin timeline.

4 minutes ago, Hobojebus said:

If I were JJ I'd really screw the universe so there's nothing for the next trilogy to work with, kill rey have the resistance wiped out then have a plague kill off all the humans.

I mean he can't remake Jedi now and he's incapable of making films on his own without something to comply, look at the Calvin timeline.

Johnson planned already ahead for that ;-)
He has his broom kid to start his new trilogy and 5 force ghost jedi masters, all of them have learned from the past, 4 of them are passed the old ways of the jedi even.

Now if JJ comes up with some stupid way to kill those 5 gods … Johnson would still write something interesting, just starting some new force tradition.

If I have time to spend on the Star Wars universe, it isn't getting into the EU. I've spent time on a few models for the series, my favorite recent built was The Force Awakens Star Destroyer, which has light up engines and noise. But it's really a great model and I have to say, the simple visual aspect of these movies is amazing. Models for capturing the ships still have an edge over the FFG versions for obvious reasons, although of course its a ton harder to put a fleet together!

But models are for the one-ups anyway. I encourage anyone who like to put a thing or two together to get something from the series. Didn't even look yet but I will absolutely lay my hands on one of the new awesome AT-AT's from The Last Jedi.

If I'm ambitious and in a painting mood, and they exits, I'll definitely get a Finn and Rey. And Phasma? That's probably too far. To capture that chrome suit is a lot of work. Still...

4 hours ago, patox said:

The Last Jedi Killed my Childhood.

Grow up.

1 hour ago, Hobojebus said:

If I were JJ I'd really screw the universe so there's nothing for the next trilogy to work with, kill rey have the resistance wiped out then have a plague kill off all the humans.

I mean he can't remake Jedi now and he's incapable of making films on his own without something to comply, look at the Calvin timeline.

nothing says the Rian's trilogy has to take place after the current one chronologically.

20 minutes ago, Odanan said:

Grow up.

Did you read the article? Its a positive article.

6 hours ago, GreenDragoon said:

a) her "powerlevel" is explained to be the force balancing out Kylo. Snoke dies, Luke dies. These two remain. Kylo getting stronger makes Rey stronger.

b) Rey is established to have the mindset of an engineer or hacker. Her main ability is to quickly grasp the points where and how a system can be manipulated. All else she does can be traced back to that ability - her flying, her engineering, her force skills.

So complaining that she learns too fast is like saying an olympic level athlete is too fast at learning a new sport. He has everything he needs, physically, and "only" needs to learn the intricacies of the new discipline. Or a good Warhammer 40k player switching to X-Wing.

She gets the powerlevel for free, and already has the necessary mindset/abilities to learn fast on top of that.

That's all in the movie. Also, that's a discussion for TFA, so where have you been the last 2 years?

So you mean to say that some person, even gifted, could learn about a given activity and then master it at gold medal Olympics proficiency within a week?

6 hours ago, Knightcrawler said:

If there had been a time gap between TFA and TLJ, I would at least have been able to excuse Rey's super-awesomeness in TLJ. But no, we didn't get that.

Oh there was a time gap, it just was a few days to a week in comparison to years in the OT and PT.

6 hours ago, SEApocalypse said:

I don't see how this ship could be the falcon, but considering how GL make all those kids experimenting with the force even as childs, I don't think training is necessary. Little **** Anakin was using the force while Pod Racing as well, Luke was intuitively using the force while shooting Womp Rats too, broom kid might have been using the force without noticing for a while now. As I said, there is a whole new generation of force sensitives, tens of thousands. The jedi purge is over since 30 years.
You may not like that TCW scene, but it has been canon since the prequels, it is not something that was an idea of Disney either, it not even just Filoni because Lucas was heavily involved in TCW. Investing a lot of money into it, because he wanted to tell those stories.

Both Anakin and Luke both didn't really use the force directly without training, they just had better reflexes due to being force sensitive. There is a big difference between being able to slightly better perceive your surroundings than others and then being able to use telekinetic powers.

6 hours ago, thespaceinvader said:

It's exactly the same criticism of the same time jump in Empire, TBH. It's not explicitly mentioned on screen that Luke spent weeks if not months training with Yoda, and it's never explicitly mentioned that it took Han and co. the same amount of time to get to Bespin, and so a lot of people assume he's only there for like 36 hours. It could have been clearer, though, for sure.

It is a bit fair of a complaint to an extent, though we do know that the Falcon's hyperdrive is offline so they have to hoof it at sublight/use a backup slow hyperdrive to get to Bespin which should at least take a little bit of time, certainly more than the short span that TLJ locks itself into with the 18 hour fuel plot.

4 hours ago, SEApocalypse said:

You do understand why JJ Abrams is a successful hollywood guy with his mystery boxes while still everyone hates him for his lost ending? Mystery Boxes work just fine … until you open them. And btw, there was no aura of mystery around the character, just a mystery box for the audience. There is a huge difference between those two.

Mystery boxes are not a bad thing by themselves but they need to be paid off. When you play up a big mystery in one film with fans spending the next two years theorizing and trying to figure it out and then in the next film you just go "Its nothing and she is a nobody!" it comes off as really unsatisfying. It will be less of an issue for people watching these films back to back or not having to wait but for theatrical releases and the wait time between it just makes it all the worse. That said they probably played it up so much that everyone wouldn't have been happy with whatever they choose to do.

2 hours ago, Otacon said:

This is something about the production of these movies that is baffling to me. To some extent, there's a lot of movie by committee going on, even if the the credits don't seem to indicate otherwise, because that's just how this kind of movie gets made these days...But it's crazy what's apparently going on with Star Wars. "We're going to make a new trilogy but we don't have an over-arching plan for it, we'll just let the creative team of each installment wing it" seems like such a bizarre creative choice. In a way it makes me glad Treverrow got dropped, because what has he done that was good(for certain values of good...) outside of Jurassic World, a movie that was very definitely by committee...

It blows my mind that JJ and Kasden spend TFA setting up mysteries without planned solutions, and did so with no guidance or oversight from anyone. That Johnson was apparently allowed to do whatever he wanted with what they left him, and that now JJ will have to pick up from what Johnson has done for the last film. And that both of these things happened beacuse there was no outline from the start about where this story was going in even a rough sense. This is how they're handling their $4 billion dollar acquisition? Don't get me wrong, as I've said before I enjoy the film we got with TLJ, but it seems like a lot of the issues people have with it stem from Disney's bizarrely hands off approach, rather than the heavily hands on one people were initially afraid of.

EDIT: I mean, it's not like the OT was exactly plotted out from start to finish, but Lucas apparently at least had a rough outline of ideas to go on for sequels.

I was just talking about this yesterday, it really does seem that both movies were written independently of each other. Was there a big story board made for the trilogy before TFA was written? Both writing/directing teams appear to have totally different visions. They really set me up for disappointment at the end of TFA with Luke. Snoke ordered Hux bring him Kylo to complete his training, but how much time did that take? How much time from the destruction of Starkiller base until the beginning of TLJ?

With the OT, A New Hope was written as thefirst, of a series, but needed to be a self contained story in case it wasn't successful enough for a sequel. Empire clearly had some things leading to Jedi, with Luke's sister being the only thing that really changed from planned(from what I've read, Leia wasn't originally his sister, that they were setting it up for a later movie, but decided against it, so they had to make it Leia)

Since they finally answered some questions about Luke, maybe they will start to fill in some post RotJ gaps in his story. If not through animation (please!) at least in books. The comic can finally move past the ANH/ESB gap.

58 minutes ago, Odanan said:

Grow up.

36 minutes ago, dsul413 said:

Did you read the article? Its a positive article.

No kidding. The point is: He did.

4 hours ago, Otacon said:

This is something about the production of these movies that is baffling to me. To some extent, there's a lot of movie by committee going on, even if the the credits don't seem to indicate otherwise, because that's just how this kind of movie gets made these days...But it's crazy what's apparently going on with Star Wars. "We're going to make a new trilogy but we don't have an over-arching plan for it, we'll just let the creative team of each installment wing it" seems like such a bizarre creative choice. In a way it makes me glad Treverrow got dropped, because what has he done that was good(for certain values of good...) outside of Jurassic World, a movie that was very definitely by committee...

It blows my mind that JJ and Kasden spend TFA setting up mysteries without planned solutions, and did so with no guidance or oversight from anyone. That Johnson was apparently allowed to do whatever he wanted with what they left him, and that now JJ will have to pick up from what Johnson has done for the last film. And that both of these things happened beacuse there was no outline from the start about where this story was going in even a rough sense. This is how they're handling their $4 billion dollar acquisition? Don't get me wrong, as I've said before I enjoy the film we got with TLJ, but it seems like a lot of the issues people have with it stem from Disney's bizarrely hands off approach, rather than the heavily hands on one people were initially afraid of.

EDIT: I mean, it's not like the OT was exactly plotted out from start to finish, but Lucas apparently at least had a rough outline of ideas to go on for sequels.

It is a long way from having something planned vs having something actually scripted. Things can and should change from the plan to the script. The loss of Carrie alone would've forced changes to Episode IX. And I am extremely pleased that they didn't seem to change the movie to acknowledge her loss. Because we got a great send off, letting Leia be great.

The problem Kennedy has run into is that she has been trying to get up and coming sci-fi directors. Gareth Edwards wasn't ready for back to back blockbusters. Trank decided he didn't want to work in film. Lord & Miller's method just doesn't work for a movie like this. And I shudder to think what Colin Treverrow was pitching for IX.

I do think, Kennedy letting directors have more creative freedom than Feige over at Marvel is going to result in far better movies.

its not a bad movie, i still like it over a lot of other movies. But it had some glaring problems

1) Again, Finn had photographic memory of top secret crap because he used to be a janitor there. What? The starkiller and snoke's ship are way too massive to just accrue that knowledge. That pissed me off in TFA, basically saying he had magical knowledge of a planet sized freakin top secret base as a JANITOR there, and it pissed me off more in TLJ because he somehow also was on snoke's ship long enough to know everything as well, AND hes still a young man? wat?

2) Poe/Finn/Rose half of the movie literally was pointless. Some neat scenes but they contributed 0% to the story, in fact they HURT the main plot because the hacker guy revealed the cloaked transports. Also i fail to see how such a highly regarded and awarded pilot somehow had issues listening to his superiors and keep that rank (even captain).

3) Rey still has 0 training. She had a spot session or two with Luke, thats it, and somehow shes that powerful in the force? For that matter the way Leia survived was something only highly powerful jedi masters could pull off (force keeps them alive in space for a short time). We know shes force sensitive but she never had any real powers before, apart from sensing things and visions.

To the people complaining about Rey's parents being nobody, dude seriously? we heard that from KYLO when he was trying to turn her to his side. Do you honestly think he was telling the truth? positive that was a lie.

Still no idea what was with the whole "ominous dark hole calling to me" thing was about. Unless i missed it that felt like a wasted scene.

21 minutes ago, Otacon said:

This is something about the production of these movies that is baffling to me. To some extent, there's a lot of movie by committee going on, even if the the credits don't seem to indicate otherwise, because that's just how this kind of movie gets made these days...But it's crazy what's apparently going on with Star Wars. "We're going to make a new trilogy but we don't have an over-arching plan for it, we'll just let the creative team of each installment wing it" seems like such a bizarre creative choice. In a way it makes me glad Treverrow got dropped, because what has he done that was good(for certain values of good...) outside of Jurassic World, a movie that was very definitely by committee...

It blows my mind that JJ and Kasden spend TFA setting up mysteries without planned solutions, and did so with no guidance or oversight from anyone. That Johnson was apparently allowed to do whatever he wanted with what they left him, and that now JJ will have to pick up from what Johnson has done for the last film. And that both of these things happened beacuse there was no outline from the start about where this story was going in even a rough sense. This is how they're handling their $4 billion dollar acquisition? Don't get me wrong, as I've said before I enjoy the film we got with TLJ, but it seems like a lot of the issues people have with it stem from Disney's bizarrely hands off approach, rather than the heavily hands on one people were initially afraid of.

EDIT: I mean, it's not like the OT was exactly plotted out from start to finish, but Lucas apparently at least had a rough outline of ideas to go on for sequels.

Yup, agree completely. While I liked TLJ, my biggest criticism of the ST is the lack of a visionary. It seems like what we got with TFA and TLJ is two totally different movies with shared characters and setting. I don't know what direction they're trying to take the series and I'm not sure Disney does either. This is one of very the few times I wish Lucas was still around.

17 minutes ago, Vineheart01 said:

To the people complaining about Rey's parents being nobody, dude seriously? we heard that from KYLO when he was trying to turn her to his side. Do you honestly think he was telling the truth? positive that was a lie.

I firmly believe it is Rian Johnson’s intent for this to be the truth. And I applauded the reveal, because it was better than all the speculation that preceeded it.

When Rey confronts the mirror and asks for the truth about her parents, the image on the other side is her. Because who her parents are does not matter. What matters is who she is. She is free from the burden of her parents; this makes her yet again the opposite of Kylo Ren.

When Kylo tells Rey that she is not a part of this story, it felt as though Johnson was talking to the audience. As if to say, “Throw away your fan theories; the galaxy does not revolve around the Skywalkers.”

And, as if to emphasize the point, the very last scene is of a “nobody” kid using the Force.

I worry this might be one of the issues where JJ Abrams “tugs” back and issues a retcon in Episode IX. If it does turn out that Rey is a Skywalker or a Kenobi, then I think the story will be weaker for it. I hope he does not go that route.

4 hours ago, VanderLegion said:

I agree. Why on earth would you buy out Lucasfilm and decide to make a new saga trilogy, but...not plan out the overarching story of said trilogy? You can have an overall story you want told (who certain characters are - like kylo/ben being han and leia's son, certain events you want to happen, etc) but still leave plenty for the directors and writers of each individual movie to have creative freedom for most of the movie itself as long as it fits the narrative. but for Rian to go into episode 8 with no input from on who snoke was or where he came from? Or who Rey's parents were (even if the input was that they were nobody like Rian decided)? Or...where the story was heading at all?

I've liked all of the new star wars movies, but it's a baffling decision in terms of the trilogy...

Actually the OT was never planned out from the beginning either. Lucas had Splinter of the Mind's eye written to be a low budget sequel if Star Wars failed at the box office. He didn't decide that Vader was Luke's father until halfway through writing Empire Strikes Back. Han was frozen in carbonite in case Harrison decided not to come back. Return of the Jedi was originally supposed to be just about getting Han back with Boba Fett as the main villain with Lucas imagining a second trilogy all about Luke confronting the Emperor. He got fed up with the franchise though (went through a painful divorce) and decided to kill Boba off unceremoniously and rush the Luke/Emperor confrontation (which is why ROTJ feels like 2 short movies with their own story arcs).

Snoke was just some dude, just like the Emperor was just some dude. We didn't get any substantive background on palpatine for decades yet everyone was fine with his character just showing up and dying. We fall into the trap of having decades of expanded universe knowledge about every character from the OT and then judge new characters by the same standard of character development. Snoke will be explained in a novel I'd wager, just like Palp's origins were explained outside of the movies.

1 hour ago, Vineheart01 said:

2) Poe/Finn/Rose half of the movie literally was pointless. Some neat scenes but they contributed 0% to the story, in fact they HURT the main plot because the hacker guy revealed the cloaked transports. Also i fail to see how such a highly regarded and awarded pilot somehow had issues listening to his superiors and keep that rank (even captain).

Still no idea what was with the whole "ominous dark hole calling to me" thing was about. Unless i missed it that felt like a wasted scene.

First you make the point that it was pointless. It did not contribute to the plot. And in the very same sentence you write that it "hurt the main plot" by actually advancing the plot by allowing the bad guys to follow the cloaked transports instead of missing on that plan and killing of the whole 3rd act? DUDE. Seriously?

"The ominous dark hole, calling to me", the very thing Luke is afraid off, reflecting the dark side of the Island, and it's a freaking mirror. How more obvious does it need to be? Luke, the guy who is afraid from failing the galaxy again? Who just has told Rey that he is afraid from her as well, because she might fall to the dark side herself too. It's a mirror god **** it. Empire had a cave and in that cave Luke was fighting against himself.

How the mirror is executed makes the scene even better, see @Atticus Havelock's post above. He explains it perfectly well. This movie has so many layers, themes and all, it's great. You really can see that Johnson loves Lucas work and Star Wars, it rhymes in so many good ways.

(Bonus Points for not sharing GLs obsessive bad dialog weakness and being in general in many ways a much better director)

1 hour ago, Vineheart01 said:

Still no idea what was with the whole "ominous dark hole calling to me" thing was about. Unless i missed it that felt like a wasted scene.

I took this as Rey's "Failure at the cave". In ESB Yoda sends Luke into the cave where the dark side is strong on Dagobah and then reminds him of his "failure at the cave" when he leaves for Bespin. This moment in TLJ may actually be more pivotal than first viewing suggests. Yoda suggests that Luke had not passed on lessons learned from failure as well as from success. Rey doesn't get (fails) the answer she went looking for, how she fits in/ who she is. Yet she still courageously goes into the future with hope (...always in motion is the future) Kylo attempts to use power to assert his will over the future, even destroying what it was built on. Kylo rages against the failures of his past, Rey moves forward in spite of her past.

51 minutes ago, defkhan1 said:

This is one of very the few times I wish Lucas was still around.

Rian Johnson is getting a whole star wars trilogy after the current one. So we get a more complete vision next time. I am thrilled about watching that. I just don't know what to do about 9, which is gonna get awkward. °_^

17 minutes ago, KommanderKeldoth said:

Snoke was just some dude, just like the Emperor was just some dude. We didn't get any substantive background on palpatine for decades yet everyone was fine with his character just showing up and dying.

I just can't understand this analogy. The difference between Palpatine and Snoke is that, when we meet Palpatine, it's established that their is a Galaxy-Wide Empire ruled by a cruel and powerful Emperor. That's the world that is presented to us, and it doesn't have any "Past" to contradict. All we need to know is there's this big Empire and this powerful Emperor, and we gotta deal with them. We don't need to know how or where they came from (though the Prequels, for all their faults, do a very nice job of answering this question and exploring Palpatine's rise). We don't have that same reaction when we first meet Snoke because the world of Star Wars isn't a blank slate by the time he comes on the screen. In TFA/TLJ we're given a world that is radically inconsistent with the world we'd expect to exist given Episodes 1-6 (and TFA's own opening scrawl), and yet as viewers we're given no context or explanation for how this incongruous world came about... that's bad world-building, and as such bad story-telling.

39 minutes ago, Atticus Havelock said:

When Kylo tells Rey that she is not a part of this story, it felt as though Johnson was talking to the audience.

Which is actually my biggest issue with the scene. It felt too much like Kylo was breaking the fourth wall and talking directly to the audience. I'm fine with her parents being nobodies (other than the fact that such a big deal was made out of "who are they"), but not the presentation