I never had a problem with the Ewoks.

There, I said it.

OK, so they were cute little merch opportunities, and the Ewok glider (when FFG, when) was ridiculous, but yeah. Kids mostly loved them.

And RotJ is much, much more than Ewoks. It actually provided a thrilling and satisfying conclusion to the Original Trilogy, with Han's rescue, the Biggs's space battle in the series and Vader's redemption.

The only thing bad about RotJ is the excessive post release CGI tinkering from Lucas. Jabba's palace dance number, changing Anakin's force ghost, galaxy wide celebrations etc.

Disney would right many wrongs in my opinion with an original theatrical cut re-release of the OT.

5 hours ago, Odanan said:

Wow, that would be amazing! But you know, Lucas had to sell toys...

I'd consider Kashyyk is too well known and traveled to be a good place to build a secret space station. Endor is so out of the way the language isn't in C-3PO's database.

5 hours ago, FTS Gecko said:

OK, so they were cute little merch opportunities, and the Ewok glider (when FFG, when) was ridiculous, but yeah. Kids mostly loved them.

I'm not one to engage you anymore, but I have a burning question in my mind.

Why are Ewoks okay, but Disney's merchandise opportunities not okay? What is the distinction? At this point I genuinely want to know.

1 minute ago, KCDodger said:

I'm not one to engage you anymore, but I have a burning question in my mind.

Why are Ewoks okay, but Disney's merchandise opportunities not okay? What is the distinction? At this point I genuinely want to know.

You aren't seeing a difference in the parts Porgs and Ewoks played in their respective films? Carnivorous stone-age teddy-bears that stood up to fight the planet-killing evil of the Empire versus being food for a Wookiee.

57 minutes ago, Frimmel said:

You aren't seeing a difference in the parts Porgs and Ewoks played in their respective films? Carnivorous stone-age teddy-bears that stood up to fight the planet-killing evil of the Empire versus being food for a Wookiee.

Does the motivation matter in their respective choices? One replaced Wookies, the other "replaced" as in masked real life seagulls in wide shots and added some comic relief and wasn't relevant.

46 minutes ago, GreenDragoon said:

Does the motivation matter in their respective choices? One replaced Wookies, the other "replaced" as in masked real life seagulls in wide shots and added some comic relief and wasn't relevant.

It does. The Ewoks participated. The porgs were set dressing. The Ewoks were shown to be sentient while the porgs were shown to be prey and then pets. And as you note they came up with them to solve a problem in production not to be participants in the story.

12 minutes ago, Frimmel said:

It does. The Ewoks participated. The porgs were set dressing. The Ewoks were shown to be sentient while the porgs were shown to be prey and then pets. And as you note they came up with them to solve a problem in production not to be participants in the story.

I'm not trying to be contrarian here, but I think it's genuinely more regrettable that Ewoks exist than that Porgs exist. The alternative of Wookies vs nothing does it for me.

Let's face it, they made the Star Wars movies to make money at the box office and to sell toys. All of them. This isn't some highbrow cinematic art we are talking about here. However, the distinction between the OT and the other trilogies is they actually tell a complete and concise story. For sure there are plot holes in the OT, but they aren't enough large enough to lightspeed skip the Millennium Falcon through.

Now, I think the Ewoks are stupid and a poor choice by Lucas (foreshadowing what was to come), but they don't kill the entire movie for me. They are more of a goofy distraction, an annoyance. However, if one of the ST movies had Ewoks in it and they beat up on the FO, that would be the least of the movies problems.

2 hours ago, KCDodger said:

I'm not one to engage you anymore, but I have a burning question in my mind.

Why are Ewoks okay, but Disney's merchandise opportunities not okay? What is the distinction? At this point I genuinely want to know.

There is no distinction to me.

I've never criticised any of Disney's merchandise attempts. As @Jo Jo rightly said, the Star Wars movies are there to make money and sell toys. Deathtroopers, the new starfighters, Phasma, Kylo's sabre, yes, even Porgs. No problem with any of them. In fact, I think I've said on a number of occassions that Porgs are probably the least offensive part of the last jedi to me, and their moments were some of the few comedy beats in the film which hit the mark.

My criticisms of Disney's handling of the Star Wars franchise have been purely down to the (lack of) loyalty to and respect for the characters and setting, plot, storytelling and direction. In those regards - for me - the Force Awakens did OK (apart from Starkiller), Rogue One did brilliantly, Solo did OK and tlj and ros both totally **** the bed.

As far as Porgs go, I haven't got a problem with them.

3 hours ago, GreenDragoon said:

I'm not trying to be contrarian here, but I think it's genuinely more regrettable that Ewoks exist than that Porgs exist. The alternative of Wookies vs nothing does it for me.

Oh wow, same.

3 hours ago, GreenDragoon said:

Does the motivation matter in their respective choices? One replaced Wookies, the other "replaced" as in masked real life seagulls in wide shots and added some comic relief and wasn't relevant.

Puffins.

Seagulls are rats with wings.

1 hour ago, kris40k said:

Se agulls are rats with wings.

They're not. They're really not.

Seagulls are velociraptors with wings. Seagulls will ruin your day. They are insatiable, voracious, opportunistic top of the food chain predators that will eat anything.

They have been filmed swallowing rabbis whole, snatching bats out of the air, drowning pigeons or just eating them alive; they've been known to attack pets and carry off small dogs. They even attack seals an sea lions on the beach, having learned flippers aren't going to stop them from getting a beakful of blubber.

Seagulls are a blight.

Have not had the time to read the newest page, but I have to write it now, otherwise I never get around. Above is a comparison to a porcellaine burger. That was a good metaphore. I would say for me it looks like a delicious pasty. And the first bites are partly wonderful, partly strange. Then you bite through the crust, and it is mostly a hollow shell below, but then the taste turns to crap and leaves a really bad to bitter after taste.

This time I managed a relatively early viewing, but with the holidays I never got around to do a write-up. I have not seen any of the videos linked above or listened to the pods. Let us dive into it, wall of text warning.

I actually wrote this before any of the previews were out (and without
knowing any spoilers) back in april:

"No, no, JJ is in charge again: It will be a thinly veiled copy, a railroaded plot with a lot of
inexplainable random encounters (like Rey+Finn meeting Han, Kanji Club
and the other gangster clan, all within 5minutes, at the same place in a
galaxy(!)), no understanding of distances in space (seeing the death ray
from several sun systems) and a lot of stupid mystery boxes.
Lando will come out of nowhere, with a whole navy of secret warships. No
explanation, where the resources for this fleet came from, and how
everyone missed its building up. Also, they will be color inverted
y-wings and b-wings. Poe will totally realistically shoot down 15
enemies in 1.47seconds. All with lense flare (TM)!"

So, I partly called it. Ok, not colour inverted ships, but still copy paste. And there is a whole navy of secret ships, albeit from another faction. And Lando is actually coming with a fleet of a bazillion ships out of nowhere (so many that they cannot even fight orderly in such a stupid stack), coming to Exegol(!) within like 2 hours. Whereas no one answered Leia in TLJ, yeah right.

But forward to december 2019.
So, sitting in the cinema I actually enjoyed some parts of the movie and was spellbound in some scenes. But in others I was wildly thrown out off the
immersion, more on that below.
Neither was I mad when going out of the cinema, but that was due to going into it with the lowest expectations. More like disappointed. I
actually got more mad the more I analysed what I actually had seen.

We could not get a babysitter for the younger kids, so my better half went with the oldest (13) on friday after premier, and I went with the second oldest
(10) on saturday after premier. We were not talking about the movie until sunday, in order to not spoil anything. Independent of each other we were disappointed after the movie. The 13 year old called it ridiculous. So it is not a being adult problem, when even the kids were not enjoying themselves!

The good
Really beautiful. The Pasaana Festival of Ancestors, the colour
explosion, the oppressive atmosphere of Kijimi.
The Sith temple style, so far only seen as cartoon in Rebels, now on the
big screen in the Exogol exposition!
Some nice space fighter sequences.
Some really funny commentary of C3PO and others.
A fun rollercoaster ride.
Good acting.

The minor bad :
Why do you have to have the camera extremely low to the ground, partly behind grass or boulders in a 3D movie. That was really strange.

And some of the space shots looked really bad in 3D, you saw a plastic model taking a ride before a background.

Apart from the Han and Luke vision/force ghost scenes no time to breath or digest what you saw.

The bad :
I do not even know where to start.
The crawl starts with "Oh, by the way Palpy is back". Apart from the fact that this could have been done as a "cool" surprise reveal about 1/3 in if properly handled, and now is just a "in your face" moment;

it is just INCREDIBLY CHEESY. Really, that is the best you can come up with? Destroying even
more Luke and Darth Vader's effort and sacrifies in RotJ, than TFA already has done?

Palpatine, the mastermind behind Phanom Menace and the whole Clone Army, where HE wins independent of which side wins the war, and the mastermind behind the Endor trap, the mastermind in Rebels, who influences the temple network though a mirror, does not know what his SON does? He lets his son escape his sphere of influence, really? That his son finds a partner, that they have a daughter, who is really strong in the Force? He is incapable of finding her, and lets some stupid bounty hunter kills his son, loosing the lead? Yeah right, totally credible.

Then this ridiculous upscaling of a power. No longer a Deathstar, no longer a idiotic unrealistic Deathplanet like in TFA, no, now it has to be a whole fleet of bazillions of planet killing Destroyers.

Corporate build(!) they are now at Exegol. How the h3ll did they or their parts even get there, when it is so difficult to get there? Exegol is barely capable of supporting life, nor can you transport stuff there, as it is so difficult to reach, but we have a whole manned fleet suddenly (logistics nightmare, is hate and electric Exegol discharges their only fuel and only food and water?), and bazillions of Sith cultist. Speaking of loosing immersion and credibility....

Chewbacca dead, accidently killed by a Rey loosing temper and control. Wow what a bold move! I was sitting stunned and spellbound, feverishly thinking through the implications? Is she turning darkside now? Is she rejecting the force? Some minute later: Oh Chewie was not on this transport. Speaking aboit breaking immersion.

Already as kid I was critical, and could let imagination only stretching so far before breaking immersion. Quicksand, which simultaneously is the stable roof of a cave? Quicksand you can fall through in several minutes without being crushed or suffocated? Attacking an antenna on a destroyer (easily destroyed by 1 stupid X-wing) with ground forces on space horses.
Kylo's fighter, a spaceship, build to withstand the heat of a spacebattle, and atmospheric entry, is burnt with wet flotsam wood? Sorry, ridiculous a too weak a word.

"Oh, we have 18 hours left" Interesting how long these 18 hours are! So unnecessary. Feels like that they had neither enough time for story development and movie writing nor for cutting in the cutting room. Chaff like this and other stuff could have been trimmed. Was this supposed to create a feel of urgency? As it is now, it feels just ridiculous.

The D-O droid.
Like both(!) kids expressed it "he is just there to be cute". It is actually worse than that or just merchandising. Apart from it being a stupid JJ cameo, it should have been called D-E-M. Standing for Deus ex machina.
As, of course, that Deus ex machina JJ bot suddenly has the way to Exegol. So no need for all the sith crystal/pyramid meander plots. And as credible
as TFA Finn the part time stormtrooper and part time toilet attendant suddenly knowing everything about Starkiller base.

The glueing of Kylo's mask
As one of the kids was saying, "oh Disney red glow superglue! Glows red even after months!"

What was even the purpose of this (apart from pissing in the direction of Johnson) when Kylo shortly afterwards puts the mask
away again. And it repeats the mistake of TFA, hiding a really good actor behind a mask.

There was a beautiful symbolic with Kyle and Rey ripping apart Luke's saber in TLJ. Now we suddenly have a ton of lightsabers, no one can keep track of them.

Rose relegated to 1minute in the background (pissing towards Johnson). Instead we get Jannah and her stupid space horses who without problems can galopp on a hardened sleek armour of a destroyer. Without a real possibility for proper introduction and story/arc building of her character.

Speaking of that, throwing away a lot of good conflicts, this applies also to the rivalry and bickering of Hux and Kylo. Now Hux gets some 1.5 minutes, and is disposed. Instead we get Pryde out of nowhere, and again, no time for development.

I could go on, probably I forgot a ton of things.

But let us conclude with the most glaring points :

1) all the pseudo sacrifies:
Chewbacca dies, Rey learns a very important lesson. Oh right, some 2 minutes later. He was on another transport.
Zori Bliss sacrifies her ONLY chance to get out of Kijimi. She and the whole planet gets blown up. Oh right later she mysteriously and
unexplained got off the planet, in time, nonetheless together with Babu Frick.
C3PO sacrifies everything by giving up his whole identity and memory - basically he dies. Only to be backuped later.
Is this some frikking videogame, where you just reload or respawn - what is the MESSAGE here? Sacrifices should mean SOMETHING. Totally worthless cinema.

2) Rey being a Palpatine. So cheap. Her having really being nobody, coming from nowhere would have been the right move, and stringent with the important cave scene on Ash To.

3) the message of this film? What is the message?
OT: control yourself. Sacrifices. Love is stronger than hate. etc.
TLJ: Failure is there to teach you, stand up again! And: Anyone can rise to
greatness.

RoS: You have to be born into the right family. If you are so lucky, then, and only then, you are destined for greatness. Genetics are everything.
Everything is destined beforehand.

Is this what you want to teach our children???

1 hour ago, Managarmr said:

Have not had the time to read the newest page, but I have to write it now, otherwise I never get around. Above is a comparison to a porcellaine burger. That was a good metaphore. I would say for me it looks like a delicious pasty. And the first bites are partly wonderful, partly strange. Then you bite through the crust, and it is mostly a hollow shell below, but then the taste turns to crap and leaves a really bad to bitter after taste.

This time I managed a relatively early viewing, but with the holidays I never got around to do a write-up. I have not seen any of the videos linked above or listened to the pods. Let us dive into it, wall of text warning.

I actually wrote this before any of the previews were out (and without
knowing any spoilers) back in april:

"No, no, JJ is in charge again: It will be a thinly veiled copy, a railroaded plot with a lot of
inexplainable random encounters (like Rey+Finn meeting Han, Kanji Club
and the other gangster clan, all within 5minutes, at the same place in a
galaxy(!)), no understanding of distances in space (seeing the death ray
from several sun systems) and a lot of stupid mystery boxes.
Lando will come out of nowhere, with a whole navy of secret warships. No
explanation, where the resources for this fleet came from, and how
everyone missed its building up. Also, they will be color inverted
y-wings and b-wings. Poe will totally realistically shoot down 15
enemies in 1.47seconds. All with lense flare (TM)!"

So, I partly called it. Ok, not colour inverted ships, but still copy paste. And there is a whole navy of secret ships, albeit from another faction. And Lando is actually coming with a fleet of a bazillion ships out of nowhere (so many that they cannot even fight orderly in such a stupid stack), coming to Exegol(!) within like 2 hours. Whereas no one answered Leia in TLJ, yeah right.

But forward to december 2019.
So, sitting in the cinema I actually enjoyed some parts of the movie and was spellbound in some scenes. But in others I was wildly thrown out off the
immersion, more on that below.
Neither was I mad when going out of the cinema, but that was due to going into it with the lowest expectations. More like disappointed. I
actually got more mad the more I analysed what I actually had seen.

We could not get a babysitter for the younger kids, so my better half went with the oldest (13) on friday after premier, and I went with the second oldest
(10) on saturday after premier. We were not talking about the movie until sunday, in order to not spoil anything. Independent of each other we were disappointed after the movie. The 13 year old called it ridiculous. So it is not a being adult problem, when even the kids were not enjoying themselves!

The good
Really beautiful. The Pasaana Festival of Ancestors, the colour
explosion, the oppressive atmosphere of Kijimi.
The Sith temple style, so far only seen as cartoon in Rebels, now on the
big screen in the Exogol exposition!
Some nice space fighter sequences.
Some really funny commentary of C3PO and others.
A fun rollercoaster ride.
Good acting.

The minor bad :
Why do you have to have the camera extremely low to the ground, partly behind grass or boulders in a 3D movie. That was really strange.

And some of the space shots looked really bad in 3D, you saw a plastic model taking a ride before a background.

Apart from the Han and Luke vision/force ghost scenes no time to breath or digest what you saw.

The bad :
I do not even know where to start.
The crawl starts with "Oh, by the way Palpy is back". Apart from the fact that this could have been done as a "cool" surprise reveal about 1/3 in if properly handled, and now is just a "in your face" moment;

it is just INCREDIBLY CHEESY. Really, that is the best you can come up with? Destroying even
more Luke and Darth Vader's effort and sacrifies in RotJ, than TFA already has done?

Palpatine, the mastermind behind Phanom Menace and the whole Clone Army, where HE wins independent of which side wins the war, and the mastermind behind the Endor trap, the mastermind in Rebels, who influences the temple network though a mirror, does not know what his SON does? He lets his son escape his sphere of influence, really? That his son finds a partner, that they have a daughter, who is really strong in the Force? He is incapable of finding her, and lets some stupid bounty hunter kills his son, loosing the lead? Yeah right, totally credible.

Then this ridiculous upscaling of a power. No longer a Deathstar, no longer a idiotic unrealistic Deathplanet like in TFA, no, now it has to be a whole fleet of bazillions of planet killing Destroyers.

Corporate build(!) they are now at Exegol. How the h3ll did they or their parts even get there, when it is so difficult to get there? Exegol is barely capable of supporting life, nor can you transport stuff there, as it is so difficult to reach, but we have a whole manned fleet suddenly (logistics nightmare, is hate and electric Exegol discharges their only fuel and only food and water?), and bazillions of Sith cultist. Speaking of loosing immersion and credibility....

Chewbacca dead, accidently killed by a Rey loosing temper and control. Wow what a bold move! I was sitting stunned and spellbound, feverishly thinking through the implications? Is she turning darkside now? Is she rejecting the force? Some minute later: Oh Chewie was not on this transport. Speaking aboit breaking immersion.

Already as kid I was critical, and could let imagination only stretching so far before breaking immersion. Quicksand, which simultaneously is the stable roof of a cave? Quicksand you can fall through in several minutes without being crushed or suffocated? Attacking an antenna on a destroyer (easily destroyed by 1 stupid X-wing) with ground forces on space horses.
Kylo's fighter, a spaceship, build to withstand the heat of a spacebattle, and atmospheric entry, is burnt with wet flotsam wood? Sorry, ridiculous a too weak a word.

"Oh, we have 18 hours left" Interesting how long these 18 hours are! So unnecessary. Feels like that they had neither enough time for story development and movie writing nor for cutting in the cutting room. Chaff like this and other stuff could have been trimmed. Was this supposed to create a feel of urgency? As it is now, it feels just ridiculous.

The D-O droid.
Like both(!) kids expressed it "he is just there to be cute". It is actually worse than that or just merchandising. Apart from it being a stupid JJ cameo, it should have been called D-E-M. Standing for Deus ex machina.
As, of course, that Deus ex machina JJ bot suddenly has the way to Exegol. So no need for all the sith crystal/pyramid meander plots. And as credible
as TFA Finn the part time stormtrooper and part time toilet attendant suddenly knowing everything about Starkiller base.

The glueing of Kylo's mask
As one of the kids was saying, "oh Disney red glow superglue! Glows red even after months!"

What was even the purpose of this (apart from pissing in the direction of Johnson) when Kylo shortly afterwards puts the mask
away again. And it repeats the mistake of TFA, hiding a really good actor behind a mask.

There was a beautiful symbolic with Kyle and Rey ripping apart Luke's saber in TLJ. Now we suddenly have a ton of lightsabers, no one can keep track of them.

Rose relegated to 1minute in the background (pissing towards Johnson). Instead we get Jannah and her stupid space horses who without problems can galopp on a hardened sleek armour of a destroyer. Without a real possibility for proper introduction and story/arc building of her character.

Speaking of that, throwing away a lot of good conflicts, this applies also to the rivalry and bickering of Hux and Kylo. Now Hux gets some 1.5 minutes, and is disposed. Instead we get Pryde out of nowhere, and again, no time for development.

I could go on, probably I forgot a ton of things.

But let us conclude with the most glaring points :

1) all the pseudo sacrifies:
Chewbacca dies, Rey learns a very important lesson. Oh right, some 2 minutes later. He was on another transport.
Zori Bliss sacrifies her ONLY chance to get out of Kijimi. She and the whole planet gets blown up. Oh right later she mysteriously and
unexplained got off the planet, in time, nonetheless together with Babu Frick.
C3PO sacrifies everything by giving up his whole identity and memory - basically he dies. Only to be backuped later.
Is this some frikking videogame, where you just reload or respawn - what is the MESSAGE here? Sacrifices should mean SOMETHING. Totally worthless cinema.

2) Rey being a Palpatine. So cheap. Her having really being nobody, coming from nowhere would have been the right move, and stringent with the important cave scene on Ash To.

3) the message of this film? What is the message?
OT: control yourself. Sacrifices. Love is stronger than hate. etc.
TLJ: Failure is there to teach you, stand up again! And: Anyone can rise to
greatness.

RoS: You have to be born into the right family. If you are so lucky, then, and only then, you are destined for greatness. Genetics are everything.
Everything is destined beforehand.

Is this what you want to teach our children???

Perfect!!

Talking about sacrifices, you forgot the Rey's sacrifice to save Kylo.

And the escalation of Force powers (force teleportation? WTF?! Palpatine electrifying a whole fleet... Force resurrection...).

Oh, and who here historically laugh when Rey kisses Kylo? The guy is a MONSTER who not only killed billions, but also his own father. I don't want he redeemed, I want he burning in ****.

Jeez, I could go on all night. What a stupid movie.

5 hours ago, FTS Gecko said:

Seagulls are velociraptors with wings. Seagulls will ruin your day. They are insatiable, voracious, opportunistic top of the food chain predators that will eat anything.

This one time, my sister and I were hiding in the kitchen, and then a seagull came in and called for its friend seagulls, and that's when we knew we were dead. So scary. Grateful for walk-in coolers, though.

I'm honestly surprised nobody already posted that....

5 hours ago, FTS Gecko said:

They're not. They're really not.

Seagulls are velociraptors with wings. Seagulls will ruin your day. They are insatiable, voracious, opportunistic top of the food chain predators that will eat anything.

They have been filmed swallowing rabbis whole, snatching bats out of the air, drowning pigeons or just eating them alive; they've been known to attack pets and carry off small dogs. They even attack seals an sea lions on the beach, having learned flippers aren't going to stop them from getting a beakful of blubber.

Seagulls are a blight.

No more Hitchcock for you. It's gone to your head.

So I watched the pitch meetings for the other 6 movies and wow... the OT is bad xD

11 hours ago, FTS Gecko said:

They have been filmed swallowing rabbis whole...

I didn't realise they were anti semitic, but that would definitely make them monsters! 😁

15 hours ago, FTS Gecko said:

They're not. They're really not.

Seagulls are velociraptors with wings. Seagulls will ruin your day. They are insatiable, voracious, opportunistic top of the food chain predators that will eat anything.

They have been filmed swallowing rabbis whole, snatching bats out of the air, drowning pigeons or just eating them alive; they've been known to attack pets and carry off small dogs. They even attack seals an sea lions on the beach, having learned flippers aren't going to stop them from getting a beakful of blubber.

Seagulls are a blight.

Jews watch out!

They obviously can't carry off dogs.

But yeah, everyone can agree that seagulls are the worst.

1 hour ago, Cerebrawl said:

T hey obviously can't carry off dogs...

OK, so technically Chihuahuas and Terriers have more in common with rats than wolves, but no one around here dares leave a puppy unattended in the garden during nesting season.

...underestimate these roided up avian freaks at your peril.

Mauler's review just came out ! 😁

3 minutes ago, Shadowshand said:

Mauler's review just came out ! 😁

Welp. There goes the neighborhood! 😂

So, anything to these Colon Treverrow IX leaks? Episode IX: Duel of the Fates?

https://uk-ign-com.cdn.ampproject.org/v/s/uk.ign.com/articles/star-wars-episode-9-script-leak-colin-trevorrow-duel-of-the-fate s

A cursory inspection would say fans of Roan's effort would have been happier with Colin's alleged plans at least

2 hours ago, FTS Gecko said:

So, anything to these Colon Treverrow IX leaks? Episode IX: Duel of the Fates?

https://uk-ign-com.cdn.ampproject.org/v/s/uk.ign.com/articles/star-wars-episode-9-script-leak-colin-trevorrow-duel-of-the-fate s

A cursory inspection would say fans of Roan's effort would have been happier with Colin's alleged plans at least

Major entertainment news sites are reporting on it so it seems to be legit.