But Geena Davis won the Oscar!
Definitely the only memorable part of it, aside from maybe the turkey dinner disaster.
― Ned Raggett, Tuesday, 24 March 2020 23:43 (four years ago) link
simon im trying to get some sleep pls dont do this unmissable event
― ole uncle tiktok (darraghmac), Tuesday, 24 March 2020 23:51 (four years ago) link
A corona shit-talking watch party thread would be pretty fun imo.
― DJI, Wednesday, 25 March 2020 00:09 (four years ago) link
100% in let's gooo
― brechtian social distancing (Simon H.), Wednesday, 25 March 2020 00:28 (four years ago) link
fuck this
another reason to hate this scrambled egg of a movie
― ole uncle tiktok (darraghmac), Wednesday, 25 March 2020 00:29 (four years ago) link
Marvel-ass triangle cube trash
― brechtian social distancing (Simon H.), Wednesday, 25 March 2020 00:34 (four years ago) link
lol six whole minutes, you did ok man
― ole uncle tiktok (darraghmac), Wednesday, 25 March 2020 00:36 (four years ago) link
god I already hate this I think I'll just save my thoughts for the end, there's gonna be too much petty posting
― brechtian social distancing (Simon H.), Wednesday, 25 March 2020 00:37 (four years ago) link
ok that suits see ye in the mornin
― ole uncle tiktok (darraghmac), Wednesday, 25 March 2020 00:39 (four years ago) link
get what sic is saying but it’s more of a blend of strengths. you can have a scriptwriter who is kind of shit but the set and director make it good, but some directors really can’t pull a jewel out of a pile of dirt (thinking about a Joe Eszterhas script and the Mel Gibson tell-all he wrote and how I enjoyed some movies he “wrote”)
― absolute idiot liar uneducated person (mh), Wednesday, 25 March 2020 02:29 (four years ago) link
kind of love when a director takes a script that’sa vague sketch of garbage and works it into something interesting this was definitely not it
― absolute idiot liar uneducated person (mh), Wednesday, 25 March 2020 02:31 (four years ago) link
this scrambled egg of a movie
― ole uncle tiktok (darraghmac), Tuesday, March 24, 2020 5:29 PM (two hours ago) bookmarkflaglink
lmao goddamn
― mellon collie and the infinite bradness (BradNelson), Wednesday, 25 March 2020 02:40 (four years ago) link
I got 94 minutes and 42 seconds into this shitshow and I don't think I'll bother with the rest till tomorrow jfc you guys
― brechtian social distancing (Simon H.), Wednesday, 25 March 2020 03:37 (four years ago) link
it’s more of a blend of strengths. you can have a scriptwriter who is kind of shit but
it's not a matter of whether Kasdan is great (I haven't seen anything he's done in 29 years, and that one was boring) so much as if you're bemused as to why the characters are different between movie A and movie C when the director / one credited co-writer are the same, looking at what other elements are different might give a hint.
― Dollarmite Is My Name (sic), Wednesday, 25 March 2020 03:39 (four years ago) link
one credited co-writer
(both movies have additional credits for people whose scripts weren't used. skimming a couple of interviews, looks like Abrams' contribution to The Force Awakens writing was mainly recording long conversations with Kasdan about the plot on his iPhone, whereas he might have done more sitting-and-writing with Tessio on this thread's movie.)
― Dollarmite Is My Name (sic), Wednesday, 25 March 2020 03:53 (four years ago) link
ok I will probably finish this today at some point but I can't imagine any of my remaining complaints will be at all interesting so here's what I typed into a google doc as I watched
____
TRASH DIALOGUE this is by far my biggest complaint overall, bastard offspring of Sorkin (relentless walking-and-talking) and Whedon (z-grade “clever” chirping/snark). fucking shameful work all around
I know everyone said this already but it’s amazing how much stuff we’re just supposed to accept that was not foreshadowed at all. the Emperor is behind it all and announced it on Fortnite! Luke had a secret quest to find Exegol that he….never mentioned! special counter-Sith C3PO programming! trash
Acky Acky more like hacky hacky
so many cuet aliens crammed into so many frames you’d think Lucas sat in on post-production
Richard E Grant’s fabulousness is welcome but wasted. even his stride rules
major Joe Biden vibes from this Billy Dee Williams performance. “maybe take 22 is usable? fuck it”
THEY FLY NOW! they released this clip early to let us know what movie to expect, in retrospect, a great thankless service
even the generally reliable Daisy Ridley falls back on squintyface non-acting from time to time here
oh yeah chewie’s definitely dead, big moment. oh yeah ren just watches her leave from a few feet away cool fine
another fundamental problem is just that there’s never the slightest sign that Rey has any sort of interest in / is at all tempted by the DARK SIDE, just Ren. at the end of the day she’s just a goody-goody who shoots lightning sometimes
would way prefer this was a whole movie of Oscar Isaac, Handsome Adventurer tbh. face and hair, wonderful.
man, Keri Russell would have made a fuckin great Sith lord or something. oh well
“if this movie fails it was all for nothing!” oh well
it’s good that we had a character say “sad” aloud during the only genuinely sad scene so far so we know that it’s sad
“the Endor system...where the last war Ended??” the hint was in the name all along, lads
“does she do that to US?” ok that was almost funny
even for latter-day Star Wars the action beats are all so...dead, perfunctory, tension-free
“I never lied to you. your parents were no one.” don’t think that would hold up in court FRIENDO
low-key the biggest plot hole in this movie is that the dark side of the force can raise star destroyers from garbage but can’t sniff out a fuckin spy
one inarguable thing: holy crow they did Kelly Marie Tran dirty
lol at Driver’s wet fish face in this duel
I can appreciate that Carrie Fisher’s death put them in a bind but……….man there has to have been a more artful way to handle it
lmaoooooooooo @ “every ship in the fleet has planet-killing weapons” jfc this is some pure machine learning shit
I know this is shorter than the last one but it feels twice as long
“it was fear that kept me here.” BITCJ THEY JUST SAID YOU WERE LOOKING FOR EXEGOL HOW AFRAID WERE U
-----
end transmission
― brechtian social distancing (Simon H.), Wednesday, 25 March 2020 09:41 (four years ago) link
otm
― Doctor Casino, Wednesday, 25 March 2020 12:41 (four years ago) link
Aw man, I was going to rag on Simon for assuring us that Benicio Del Toro's character would be back for either a redemption or a death, but I can't even imagine watching this cup of cold sick now, this is solid work.
― Andrew Farrell, Wednesday, 25 March 2020 12:57 (four years ago) link
Lido HeyWritten by Lin-Manuel Miranda and J.J. Abrams; Produced and Performed by Shag F. Kava
― a struggle to make meat-snacking fit (bizarro gazzara), Wednesday, 25 March 2020 13:06 (four years ago) link
simon but you are lazy and to kind
this movie needs a serious and organised dispassionate technical writeup of 300 pages on why it was a sickening waste of time, money, effort, talent and most of all enthusiasm for everyone involved including anyone who went to see it with even a spark of joy in their hearts
― ole uncle tiktok (darraghmac), Wednesday, 25 March 2020 13:13 (four years ago) link
the inability to maintain even a pretence at consistency in the powers and abilities of either force users or empire throughout turns every facet - suspence, adventure, thrills, danger, emotion- into the deadened equivalent of an avengers battle scene.
no shots hurt, no impact matters, no danger can be treated as real in the moment because itll be overturned in a minute
VAR wars
― ole uncle tiktok (darraghmac), Wednesday, 25 March 2020 13:15 (four years ago) link
x 10000000
its a weakness in the originals
its actually best done with anakin (ill still rep for attack of the clones ahead of many better loved efforts in this series)
its absolute toddler special stuff here
it couldn't be less compelling short of here just saying "no" at the start, while looking at her fingernails in a bored fashion.
yet theres an hour of it.
fuckin trash
― ole uncle tiktok (darraghmac), Wednesday, 25 March 2020 13:18 (four years ago) link
lol this made a billion dollars
― a struggle to make meat-snacking fit (bizarro gazzara), Wednesday, 25 March 2020 13:33 (four years ago) link
But less than the others! It's a disaster! Reboot!
― Josh in Chicago, Wednesday, 25 March 2020 13:45 (four years ago) link
r3búT
― ole uncle tiktok (darraghmac), Wednesday, 25 March 2020 13:52 (four years ago) link
R3-b00t
― Doubling down on out of date information (aldo), Wednesday, 25 March 2020 13:53 (four years ago) link
R2ReeBoot.
― Josh in Chicago, Wednesday, 25 March 2020 13:56 (four years ago) link
Artie Bucci
― ole uncle tiktok (darraghmac), Wednesday, 25 March 2020 14:01 (four years ago) link
Atta Boyee.
― Josh in Chicago, Wednesday, 25 March 2020 14:02 (four years ago) link
― brechtian social distancing (Simon H.),
best line in "I Am the Walrus."
― TikTok to the (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Wednesday, 25 March 2020 14:02 (four years ago) link
Oscar Isaac, Handsome Adventurer tbh. face and hair, wonderful.
can't be emphasized enough
― TikTok to the (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Wednesday, 25 March 2020 14:04 (four years ago) link
Thank you Simon.
― DJI, Wednesday, 25 March 2020 17:54 (four years ago) link
just wanted to add that the shot of the 100s of star destroyers with the lightning and dark clouds looks like it was rendered with clip art
― brechtian social distancing (Simon H.), Wednesday, 25 March 2020 18:01 (four years ago) link
but tbf they only had three hundred million dollars to work with
― brechtian social distancing (Simon H.), Wednesday, 25 March 2020 18:02 (four years ago) link
the documentary clips about the movie make it clear that they spent a lot more time and money on puppets and animatronics -- which are excellent! -- than on the battle junk or the plot
― absolute idiot liar uneducated person (mh), Wednesday, 25 March 2020 18:04 (four years ago) link
ok I'm done
I demand a tell-all about how *this* happened
― brechtian social distancing (Simon H.), Wednesday, 25 March 2020 18:28 (four years ago) link
Kathleen Kennedy bonked her head on a girder
― silby, Wednesday, 25 March 2020 18:32 (four years ago) link
The best thing about this movie is that it led me to the palate cleanser of better (or 'better' if you prefer) SW product of the past that I'd previously passed over, eg. Clone Wars.
― Unparalleled Elegance (Old Lunch), Wednesday, 25 March 2020 18:38 (four years ago) link
well as noted, the debacle is mainly in terms of story and script - they maintained high production value and quality control to make it all feel "Star Warsy" etc. etc. seems pretty clear that, absent an actual planned story for the three movies (!!!!) they were counting on positive healthy handoffs between films. abrams isn't really good at finishing things story-wise, and in this case made a bad sequel both to johnson's film and to his own initial reboot film.
meanwhile, the films were made too quickly on each other's heels, so they made a lot of bad snap decisions based on overhyped early "fan" reaction to The Last Jedi. for example cutting Johnson loose entirely, and trusting that it would be a good look to ditch most of the exciting new stuff he did in that film. so nobody at the producer level was riding abrams to make sure this felt like a satisfying sequel, or saying things like "we can't just bring in the emperor as a villain, that's stupid, and anyway the last film ended by firmly establishing kylo ren as the new villain --- what can we spin that into?" etc. etc.
― Doctor Casino, Wednesday, 25 March 2020 18:42 (four years ago) link
It just seems insane to me to decide at the start "we're going to go make a 3-movie trilogy where each movie is by a different director and not have planned out a story ahead of time."
It's like "DC Challenge: The Movie"
― Piven After Midnight (The Yellow Kid), Wednesday, 25 March 2020 19:00 (four years ago) link
dr c has it nailed i think
also the acting is really bad, and i sympathise given the dialogue and the lack of any discernible character but at the same time, the acting is reaaaalllly bad
the scene where finn meets the other runaway storm trooper, if that was fifth year drama youd bust in halfway through with a "whats wrong with you? start that again"
― ole uncle tiktok (darraghmac), Wednesday, 25 March 2020 19:21 (four years ago) link
xpost in theory it could be way better than having things too tightly-constructed and just be filling in some master outline --- it's good to be able to pause and see what popped in the first film, where the energy is, which character dynamics are clicking. i think they just blew it on the pausing. even johnson i think kinda missed the boat a little by not really developing one of the strongest threads from TFA, the finn/rey relationship, though i liked everything else he did with those characters.
― Doctor Casino, Wednesday, 25 March 2020 19:22 (four years ago) link
i think TFA is hugely overpraised tbh
rogue one otoh is a legitimately excellent action movie
― ole uncle tiktok (darraghmac), Wednesday, 25 March 2020 19:23 (four years ago) link
even johnson i think kinda missed the boat a little by not really developing one of the strongest threads from TFA, the finn/rey relationship
agree with this, tho i know where johnson was coming from, echoing the separate-missions-until-they-converge-at-the-climax structure of empire strikes back.
― ooga booga-ing for the bourgeoisie (voodoo chili), Wednesday, 25 March 2020 19:27 (four years ago) link
uh of the two towers
― ole uncle tiktok (darraghmac), Wednesday, 25 March 2020 19:28 (four years ago) link
TFA has some serious issues (mainly everything to do with the bad guys and their Death Planet), but it's got momentum and energy and really really charismatic characters (IMHO). i've grumbled enough about rogue one on the appropriate threads - it doesn't work for me at all as an action movie or as a heist/mission/war/whatever movie. still arguably the best-looking one of these, apart from some of the TLJ sequences.
― Doctor Casino, Wednesday, 25 March 2020 19:31 (four years ago) link
xp not all the plots converge in the two towers!
― ooga booga-ing for the bourgeoisie (voodoo chili), Wednesday, 25 March 2020 19:33 (four years ago) link
I was about to say.
― Ned Raggett, Wednesday, 25 March 2020 19:35 (four years ago) link
TFA definitely had more going for it visually than this did. plus it actually breathed on occasion
― brechtian social distancing (Simon H.), Wednesday, 25 March 2020 19:51 (four years ago) link
I get the entire giant room full of shadowy figures concept, but with one of the major complaints with digital projection at theaters being bad reproduction of darker scenes, why the fuck did they choose to do *that*
I wonder how many theaters had people complaining about the projection quality only for the staff to have to explain, no, it's really supposed to be nondescript and dark
― absolute idiot liar uneducated person (mh), Wednesday, 25 March 2020 20:13 (four years ago) link