Star Wars: The Force Awakens (2015)

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shabushabu

Molten Core Raider
1,408
185
I think Lucas has proven that anything he's done right was by complete accident. Who gets credit isn't really the point, but more that people saying Vader was so deep and conflicted from the very beginning are dumb.

The original ESB script had Vader and Lucas's Dad/Anakin as 2 completely different people.
In 6 years you and many others are going to realize that Lucas was a creator and a true artist... You may be too young to know but he also penned the story for Indiana Jones.
 
253
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Making a women the central character when the franchise fanbase is overwhelmingly male was a bad idea. It will cost them in future as they have failed to link up with the young male audience the way the previous moves did. They likely also wont catch a female replacement audience to replace those they're losing. Casting choices was clearly politics before money in this movie.

...
ding ding ding. men make heroes of men. men want to be them. you wont see girls buying rey toy dolls as much as boys would buying luke skywalker equivalent toys. even with good actors/characters like arya, you wont see boys roleplaying them. this is a merchandising error that i doubt can be compensated for by supposed increased female target demographic. adults might be encouraging their young daughters to see it, but i doubt it has the same effect as a frozen disney princess. i would hazard to say that female action leads have less general appeal for all genders as they have been (for the most part) a female casted for a male's role. it's the relationships and love angle that is central for women(hungergames); whereas men its the action itself (or valor or camaraderie).

finn's character is neutered, uncharismatic and physically unattractive compared to a young harrison ford.
his and rey's characters are so bland.
 

Zignor 3_sl

shitlord
180
1
I know I regularly lose sleep worrying over merchandising errors made by companies that profit over $8 billion dollars per year. Please tell me again about the egregious casting mistakes made in the third highest grossing movie in history.

Honestly, how do some of you people make it through each day without choking to death on your own saliva?
 

Famm

Ahn'Qiraj Raider
11,041
794
Finn was engaging and likeable. Poe was a dashing badass. Rey was fun and well casted/acted (she seems like a plank of wood in real life interviews though). You're reaching.
 

Muligan

Trakanon Raider
3,233
908
Everyone is entitled to their opinion but it must be empowering or makes people feel superior, maybe intellectual to over analyze and critique these films. Bottom line, it's a StarWars film. A sci-fi movie with a beloved story of good vs. evil. It's really not very complicated and most of this is really irrelevant to the fundamental premise of this franchise. If it was done any different, it would be the same tune but different conversations.

In my opinion they did exactly what they needed to do. They established that heart & soul of the franchise and it will now be up to 8 & 9 to determine if these movies are going to be "epics" or just "good movies".

Star Wars should be up there with Lord of the Ring, Harry Potter, etc. in terms of recent blockbuster/epics but one movie isn't going to determine it's status. It's a tough spot to be in, JJ had to consider the original films, the prequels, expanded universe, and all the emotions compounded over decades expressed through fan followings, conventions, writings, etc. Star Wars was a deeply rooted part of pop culture so that's something more movies don't have to deal with...

Was it perfect? no. Is it fair to not like the movie? sure, I guess but some of the reasoning and analytics just seem a bit forced and more of plea for attention than honest critiques. Maybe i'm just reading it wrong but I guess it's all in good fun.
 

Lithose

Buzzfeed Editor
25,946
113,036
I thought all the characters were great; I even liked Kylo. Only part I didn't like was the final fight, Rey turning the fight around like that seemed really silly and made it feel like there isn't a place for her character to climb to later. Despite what Gav said, Rey was a Mary Sue, but that's NOT always a bad thing; someone else pointed out earlier Leie was kind of one too but, the difference is, we knew Leie was a space princess who was in the rebellion and obviously had tons of education and experience. Rey? Not so much. (Like SOME engineering skills, I could get...Even piloting, but her learning all the force powers without a teacher, and all the languages and being so good at engineering she overshadowed even Han and Chewie on the falcon? Felt silly.)

I'm willing to bet, of course, it will be explained by Abrams stupid 'magic box' device, where we find out Rey was super specially trained to be the one and had her memory wiped. And that will make the trilogy feel a lot stronger for her as a character, but it still doesn't stop the fact that she felt a bit over the top in this stand alone film.

Also, they did try to focus on Kylo being injured, I know...Some people point to that as a reason the fight went the way it did..However the final actual round of fighting did a piss poor job of showing that, Rey just straight up kicked his ass, without his side hampering him.

In any case, this doesn't make Rey a bad character...but as said, the writing for her was ham fisted at times. It almost felt like Abrams was treating the trilogy as one long movie, and while that's cool, as a stand alone film it did leave parts of THIS film feeling odd. (Still very enjoyable though).
 

Abefroman

Naxxramas 1.0 Raider
12,594
11,937
Also, they did try to focus on Kylo being injured, I know...Some people point to that as a reason the fight went the way it did..However the final actual round of fighting did a piss poor job of showing that, Rey just straight up kicked his ass, without his side hampering him.
I think they showed plenty of scenes that showed that he was not a bad ass and a poser that hadn't finished his training. The problem with that is he did the most badass fucking thing in all the movies when he froze a fucking blaster bolt in mid air casually as fuck and held it there for 5 minutes while carrying a conversation in the first fucking scene! Come the fuck on.

This all boils down to the force became too easy way to fucking quick with two inexperienced force users. Combine not only new force powers but the ease that they were obtained and you get comic book levels of power that are as weak or powerful as the scene requires. I can understand wanting to make the force more magic like and more actiony but you have to have some god damn consistency or a growth of powers. Not just bad ass then fucking bafoon.
 

Lithose

Buzzfeed Editor
25,946
113,036
I think they showed plenty of scenes that showed that he was not a bad ass and a poser that hadn't finished his training. The problem with that is he did the most badass fucking thing in all the movies when he froze a fucking blaster bolt in mid air casually as fuck and held it there for 5 minutes while carrying a conversation in the first fucking scene! Come the fuck on.

This all boils down to the force became too easy way to fucking quick with two inexperienced force users. Combine not only new force powers but the ease that they were obtained and you get comic book levels of power that are as weak or powerful as the scene requires. I can understand wanting to make the force more magic like and more actiony but you have to have some god damn consistency or a growth of powers. Not just bad ass then fucking bafoon.
The thing is, I don't think they did show a lot of scenes showing he was a poser, though. They said that, for sure..But as you illustrated, Kylo consistently showed us he was pretty much a bad ass. Stopped a blaster bolt mid air and held it there without even focusing on it. Pulled men around like rag dolls, and had enough control over the force to manipulate individual limbs of people with his telekinesis. Put Rey to sleep with a wave of his hand. Wasable to read minds....Not to mention he fairly easily blocked most of the blasters fired at him with his saber. (Except obviously one, but the story reason there was decent, just killing your father tends to take your head out of the game.)

With the mind reading? We've seen him do abilities no other Jedis have ever done, even 'masters'. Just watching these scenes, there is no reason to believe he's not a knight, and a powerful one. The only thing that makes him seem like 'not a bad ass' is his temper tantrums. The blaster bolt though was just one aspect of how the movie consistently showed this guy was boss with the force.

But yeah, I agree with you 100%, the main issue was the force just came too easy, to both of them. I have no doubt you're right, Kylo was SUPPOSED to be a 'poser' playing at being a bad ass, hence Snope's words. But, what we saw was radically differently.
 

Famm

Ahn'Qiraj Raider
11,041
794
Not just the injury but his emotional state. Like you said, he just killed Han. He's obviously being pulled in different directions with the light/dark. Dark side harnesses anger, but at the same time rampant emotions that are not being controlled and focused can't be good for your performance. There was a lot of fear and uncertainty and even regret present when he fought awakened Rey and those things aren't good dark side power harnessing emotions. The fear maybe under proper circumstances, but he essentially had lost control and it bit him in the ass.

I don't really have a problem with him being powerful. Anakin was supposed to have been strong at a young age (going by Obi-Wan's words to Luke here, not anything "else") and Luke became powerful early so its not out of the question. This is a kid who ostensibly had been trained by Luke from an early age, then moved on to being trained by a dark side master. He's been under force tutelage for his entire life on top of being extraordinarily force sensitive. Yeah he's powerful, wasn't there a line somewhere (Snoke?) describing him as the perfect mix of dark and light to be harnessed as a bad ass weapon? The kid has pedigree but he also has emotional weaknesses.

I never got that he was a "poser" just a loose cannon with some serious issues. I feel like "unstable" was more what they wanted to get across than "poser" but the only problem is that he did end up coming off a little emo in some ways. At least he was more angry and disturbed emo though, I didn't really see him as "whiny" like certain Anakin portrayals that are better left unmentioned.
 

Gavinmad

Mr. Poopybutthole
43,759
52,339
Despite what Gav said, Rey was a Mary Sue, but that's NOT always a bad thing;
I don't recall saying she didn't fit the 'Mary Sue' trope, I just think it's a fucking retarded term. I've never once in my life heard someone bitching and moaning about whatever the male version of the Mary Sue is, seeing as how it's incredibly common.
 

Zignor 3_sl

shitlord
180
1
I think they showed plenty of scenes that showed that he was not a bad ass and a poser that hadn't finished his training. The problem with that is he did the most badass fucking thing in all the movies when he froze a fucking blaster bolt in mid air casually as fuck and held it there for 5 minutes while carrying a conversation in the first fucking scene! Come the fuck on.
That's the point. We're shown early on that he is clearly a powerhouse of deadly force abilities, but we eventually come to realize that his fatal flaw is his almost complete lack of control whenever he is emotionally compromised. It's the same reason we see Luke continually fail in ESB. "Control, control, you must learn control!". It's also why he was pounding on his wound during the lightsaber fight. He knows he's emotionally spinning out after having just killed Dad and failing to constrain this upstart girl, so he attempts to channel his pain and anger to pull himself back into focus, cause that's what dark-siders do, but it's not enough to overcome his psychological failings.
 

Draegan_sl

2 Minutes Hate
10,034
3
ding ding ding. men make heroes of men. men want to be them. you wont see girls buying rey toy dolls as much as boys would buying luke skywalker equivalent toys. even with good actors/characters like arya, you wont see boys roleplaying them. this is a merchandising error that i doubt can be compensated for by supposed increased female target demographic. adults might be encouraging their young daughters to see it, but i doubt it has the same effect as a frozen disney princess. i would hazard to say that female action leads have less general appeal for all genders as they have been (for the most part) a female casted for a male's role. it's the relationships and love angle that is central for women(hungergames); whereas men its the action itself (or valor or camaraderie).

finn's character is neutered, uncharismatic and physically unattractive compared to a young harrison ford.
his and rey's characters are so bland.
My 3 year daughter runs around the house saying she's Rey and shooting stormtroopers and Darth Vader.
 

Muligan

Trakanon Raider
3,233
908
I think they showed plenty of scenes that showed that he was not a bad ass and a poser that hadn't finished his training. The problem with that is he did the most badass fucking thing in all the movies when he froze a fucking blaster bolt in mid air casually as fuck and held it there for 5 minutes while carrying a conversation in the first fucking scene! Come the fuck on.

This all boils down to the force became too easy way to fucking quick with two inexperienced force users. Combine not only new force powers but the ease that they were obtained and you get comic book levels of power that are as weak or powerful as the scene requires. I can understand wanting to make the force more magic like and more actiony but you have to have some god damn consistency or a growth of powers. Not just bad ass then fucking bafoon.
He's been through a lot of training. We know he and possibly she had been training with Luke for some time at a very young age. We also don't know how Luke and/or Snoke trains. To me, Kylo was not a very solid force user but mainly selected a couple of their best "tricks" as they were most advantageous for his position. He's probably focused on the mind reading more than anything because that's the type of person he is... It seems to be the only thing he can do. Also, Yoda as mentioned several times that the dark side is an easier path and leads to the more unnatural, dangerous side of the force. I think the force is pretty flexible as you never really see Jedi dive too deep into it as they're afraid of it's various paths but nearly every dark user has a particular flavor of the dark side.

I think you just have to deal with whatever the writer feels is sensible. Hopefully the next installment will clarify just how Snoke and Luke approached training people. We really don't now just how powerful they are and what they learned over the years. Even Qui-gon had something to teach Yoda just because he approached the Force differently than Yoda who was a more conservative, fearful user of the force.
 

radditsu

Silver Knight of the Realm
4,676
826
Watched it with the 4 year old last night. When Poe came in with the X-wings he strapped his chair to himself where the four legs were like X-wing Engines and started making laser sounds and said he was "Pewing"(his word for shooting) the bad guys, and flew around the living room for the rest of the movie.



This is the greatest movie of all time.
 

Jive Turkey

Karen
6,725
9,097
When BB-8 bursts through the bamboo doorway at the start of the movie, the apparatus they use to drive BB-8 around that was later removed in post prevents the bamboo from swinging in a realistic motion. Then when they come to a rest you can see them part for the same reason. Just something I noticed
 

Miguex

The lad himself
<Gold Donor>
2,247
1,806
Watched it with the 4 year old last night. When Poe came in with the X-wings he strapped his chair to himself where the four legs were like X-wing Engines and started making laser sounds and said he was "Pewing"(his word for shooting) the bad guys, and flew around the living room for the rest of the movie.



This is the greatest movie of all time.
This is what its all about. Totally awesome man.