ALL SCI-FI

[orzel-w]

[bulldogtrekker]

So, have you guys seen Star Wars: The Force Awakens yet? I saw it today and liked it. The theater was crowded and sold out after we bought the tickets. The audience seemed to like the movie.

There were no lens flares in the movie. (JJ Abrams loves lens flares)

Please post spoiler free comments here.

[Bud Brewster]

Bulldogtrekker, is it true that in this movie, Luke has sex with Leia so she can have a baby that they'll name Vader Skywalker, and then Luke can say --

"Vader, I am your father . . . and your uncle! Your mother is my sister . . . and your aunt! My father was your grandfather . . . but he was also your mother's father!"

"And who was your grandfather's father, you may ask?"

"Hell, he didn't have one!"
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Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)

[bulldogtrekker]

Ah, go see the movie so we can talk about it.

[Robert (Butch) Day]

This is going to make certain fans angry!

http://www.cinemablend.com/new/Original-Title-Force-Awakens-Revealed-102357.html
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Common Sense ISN'T Common

[Custer]

The original Star Wars: Shadows of the Empire was created not just as a novel... the idea was to do a spin-off that was "a movie without a movie," so that there was quite a lot of merchandising. Maybe not as much as for one of the actual Star Wars movies, but statuettes, action figures, micro machines, trading cards, a video game, and even a soundtrack, though not by John Williams. According to the Wikipedia page, George Lucas reportedly said he would have made a story like this into a movie, if he had had the time and effort to do so back in the early 1980s.



Is it just me, or does the face in the background look a little like an elderly Mark Hamill, if he turned to the Dark Side...?

[Bud Brewster]

Well, so far I've found four critics who think that The Force Awakens looks like a version of A New Hope made in a parallel universe.

I agree. The movie was pretty disappointing, folks.

You can read the article below even if you haven't seen the movie yet, and it won't ruin the good stuff (such as it is). But it will prepare you for the surprising lack of originality and the embarrassing "Hey, let's just do all those ideas again!" which the filmmakers employed in this movie.

Critics are going too easy on Star Wars: The Force Awakens

by David Roberts

On the other hand, you won't know what Dan Woburn is talking about in this article unless you've seen the movie, so come back to this post after you've watched The Force Awakens (aka A New Hope Rides Again.)

8 Problems Nobody Wants To Admit About Star Wars: The Force Awakens

BGR collected excerpts from several scathing criticisms of the movie, just to provide samples. There don't seem to be any spoilers, just a critical analysis of how unoriginal the story was.

Critics of "Star Wars: The Force Awakens" blast new film — here's what they said

But the negative review below by Andrew O'Hehir earned the poor guy an avalanche of hate mail from Star Wars fans who would rather have their mothers insulted than to hear the cold, hard truth about why The Force Awakens is more like a clone of A New Hope than a sequel.

"Star Wars: The Force Awakens": You know all the spoilers in J.J. Abrams' obsessive reboot — because you've seen this movie before

If you're in a big hurry at the moment and don't have time to read the whole article, here's a sample of what got Mr. O'Hehir in trouble.
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Darth Vader has a copycat heir named Kylo Ren (Adam Driver, resisting shtick), who keeps his master's melted helmet around and wears one of his own just to look cool. (He doesn't need it to breathe, at any rate.)

There's an orphan who doesn't understand his or her true powers, a spectral demonic figure who is using the Dark Side to conquer the universe and a bunch of pompous generals with Nazi-like uniforms and a planet-destroying superweapon.

There's a crazy bar full of aliens, a climactic battle on a catwalk inside a spaceship, an evil character whose good side may not be entirely dead, and the unexpected news that somebody is somebody else's dad.

I could go on, and when you see this movie you will too. In fairness, there are no Ewoks, and no Lando Calrissian. And why the hell not?
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I feel a little better now that I know I'm not the Grinch who Stole Christmas and there are others who didn't leave the theater all giddy about this successful-but-unimaginative movie.

Actually, I wrote the comments below this morning before I found those reviews that supported my negative opinions, and I think maybe I summed up the sad similarities pretty well myself.

Here's what I sent Bulldogtrekker on Facebook earlier today.

*-------*-------*-------SPOILER ALERT-------*-------*-------*

Just so you'll stop wondering why I didn't like The Force Awakens, here's why. First of all, it blatantly copies a lot of stuff we've seen before. Like —

A Jedi pupil who is amazingly strong with the force betrays his master, destroys the Jedi order, puts on a black outfit, bows down to an aging "emperor" hologram, and helps the "Empire" (which is back with a new name) build a planet-destroying super weapon.

A cute droid possesses valuable plans in its memory banks that the "Resistance" (the Rebel Alliance) needs, and the "First Order" (the Empire) wants it, so a band of unlikely heroes escape from Tatooine (called Jakku in this one) in the Millennium Falcon and take the droid to the rebels.

The rebels plan a daring raid on the super-weapon, which has a convenient Achilles heel that leads right to place where high explosives will turn the whole shebang into nice big fireball and roast the Nazi guys who run it.

Han Solo is 30 years older, but he dresses the same, acts the same, and does all the same stuff. If you loved Indiana Jones on Social Security, you'll love seeing Han Solo looking just like Han Solo's father.

They did do new things in this movie — but they weren't any good either.

A stormtrooper has a guilty conscious, so he turns good and acts real funny and nervous while helping a cute girl find the rebels. She'd have made a great girlfriend for Luke in A New Hope. They dress the same, they both yearn to join the rebellion, they're parents are gone, and they're right at home on planets that are all beach with no ocean. Jakku is just Tatooine spelled with different letters.

The girl is totally ignorant of the Force and has never even met a Jedi, but all of a sudden (and with no training) she's got Force powers up the wazoo. And she can handle a light saber (remember, no training) well enough to beat the super villain in a fight.

In short, what this movie doesn't just copy, it does badly.
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Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)

[Bud Brewster]

So many of the negative reviews I read today talked about how terrible everybody thinks the prequels were, and how The Force Awakens tried to avoid all the bad mistakes they made.

Frankly, after seeing The Force Awakens I've gained a greater appreciation for the prequels! The Phantom Menace isn't really bad, and Attack of Clones is pretty darn good!

Several reviewers harped on the alleged over-use of CGI and how The Force Awakens avoided this. I've always thought the CGI in the prequels was very good — with the exception of Jar-Jar, and that was partly the character rather than the CGI.

I mean, good grief — since when is this bad?



As for the popularity of The Force Awakens (and the folks who proudly proclaim that they love it), I'm plum stumped by their devotion. I haven't been to a movie theater since Gravity in 2013, a whim I gave into while driving home one day — one I deeply regretted. So, going to see The Force Awakens indicates how badly I wanted to love this movie.

The positive reviews just seem to praise the film for pleasing audiences — but they don't say as much about they loved it themselves. However, the negative reviews present solid reasons for denouncing the film, reasons I agree with, I'm afraid.

And more of these negative reviews seem to coming in daily. Here's one I found tonight which was only nine hours old! Note the subtle suggestion in the title that hints at how film critic Michael Hiltzik of the New York Times feels about the movie.

Admit it: 'Star Wars: The Force Awakens' stinks -- and here's why

And here's a sample of his frank opinion.

The simple answer is that "Star Wars: The Force Awakens," is not very good. It's professionally made in the sense that it displays an industrial level of Quality Control.

But it's depressingly unimaginative and dull in long stretches, and — crucially — reproduces George Lucas' original 1977 movie slavishly almost to the point of plagiarism.

I've read that in several reviews, and I agree that the story elements are there (as I listed them above), but I think that's actually being too kind to the film. If J.J. Abrams had actually remade A New Hope with the same youthful sincerity and boundless imagination George Lucas had, it would have been a far better film.

But The Force Awakens looks like exactly what it is — the work of a less committed and passionate filmmaker trying to piece together the flashiest elements of another movie and assemble the same winning combination.

Lucas made his Star Wars movies (all six) from the heart. Some where better than others, naturally. But this one is a just a two-hour toy commercial for a corporate machine that disparately wants us to buy their products.

I really hate the fact that their plan is going to work . . .
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Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)

[Robert (Butch) Day]

Everyone was warned.

J. J. Abrams made Star Trek Into Darkness, a blatant rip-off of Star Trek II The Wrath of Khan.
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Common Sense ISN'T Common

[orzel-w]

I guess Abrams should have held his ground on the lens flares.
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...or not...

WayneO
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[Pye-Rate]

Finally got to see this. Fortunately a low res pirated copy so I was not distracted by all the eye candy. Disjointed, piecemeal, too long for what story is there. Not surprized that Harrison opted out of the franchise. The Skywalker family reminds me of the Borgias'.
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The road to tomorrow runs through yesterday.

[orzel-w]

[Bud Brewster]

[Robert (Butch) Day]

Do we REALLY want to see Episodes VII and IX? Or even potential Episodes X, XI and XII [Lucas' original intent]? More stories about this incredibly dysfunctional family?
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Common Sense ISN'T Common

[orzel-w]

Both TV series on the Borgias did pretty well.
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...or not...

WayneO
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