Star Wars: The Disney+ Empire Strikes Again and Again and...

De-aging technology still has some way to go

lol yeah Hayden definitely looked much older than in prequels

I watched five seconds of that opening scene and turned the show off.

I have to admire their gutsiness in wanting to front-and-center the "Darth Vader is the same person as Anakin Skywalker" aspect of this whole universe/saga/whatever. It makes obvious narrative sense to do so, but has this problem where the three movies devoted to making the Anakin-Vader transition actually left me less convinced, emotionally speaking, that the murderous death robot voiced by James Earl Jones was once a whiny, angsty youth played by Hayden Christensen. It's a huge huge journey for this guy to have taken, but it's never felt real to me. And it's so important to Obi-Wan's motivations and feelings in this show!

Maybe if Anakin had been a young man in the first one, half-man half-machine in the second, and mostly Vader in the third, or something.... oh well. I don't think it's something they can really solve at this point, although maybe people who read the comic books or novels have other stuff filling those gaps.

I've always felt the prequels should have started w/Anakin as a young man, and taken place over a shorter period of time (like the OT). The events of TPM bring almost nothing to the table, other than showing you the roots of Palpatine's long game (which really don't matter).

fwiw I really liked the last episode and this series so far. it's character driven, not so much plot driven.

Why did they inatall the electical box in a vent?

Suppose it looks cleaner and everyone always has a droid handy anyway.

Droids are important to have around, you see. (I like Lola.) Good episode and I'm now puzzling out how the last one will play out; I have a few ideas but still...

yeah i liked this episode - also liked vader fighting third sister unarmed at first, that was kinda badass

finding this pretty gruelling - it is not much fun, i suppose the chronology/setting kinda precludes fun but it just feels like franchise bran - any lingering fondness for OWK I might’ve had based on Alec Guinness is long gone - if you saw this without any SW knowledge surely you’d be bored witless?

I'm into it enough to keep watching, but not swept up enough to not be distracted by little things. My favorite might be the jump from "your terrible injuries need more time to heal" to "I'll drop you off somewhere on this briny ocean planet and you'll swim the last few miles underwater."

Also, what the hell was Third Sister doing while Vader's attention and powers were completely occupied holding down that spaceship? Was she in the bathroom? Filling out paperwork with some stormtroopers? Really missed an opportunity there, oh well.

xxp I'm liking it fine (my reaction to everything star wars since i dunno, 2002) but yeah it would be a dreadful introduction to Star Wars

lol xp

Was thinking similar "I'll just wait until Vader stops struggling with that spaceship before attacking him sneakily from behind"

Reva doing the "keep your enemies close" long game is the plot point that rang really false for some of the reasons stated upthread. I like the angle of her being a Youngling that escaped, but I don't really watch this for the plot, more for the character moments of rusty Kenobi and sloppy, vindictive Vader.

My quick fix for this whole thing: have Christensen voice Vader, and he only acquires the James Earl Jones voice as a result of additional injuries suffered at some point in this series. Obviously this contradicts the ending of Episode III. But I think for this character story between him and Obi-Wan, it'd work better to ask Christensen to play bitter, self-loathing mid-30s psycho Anakin, still in denial about the exact way things went down back in the day.

well, but Vader speaks outside the mask towards the end of Jedi, and his regular, wispy speaking voice is nothing like the Vader voice he used 3 minutes prior.

i always assumed the voice synthesis technology of the helmet modulated his voice for intimidation purposes

a la Dark Helmet

i can't breathe in this thing!

I love though that after Vader is unmasked in Jedi, he acquires a British accent

is there any footage of Vader ordering lunch and springing for a beans on toast

I suspect when Hayden C is a little older, they’ll re-edit that scene and remove Prowse completely.

and then, years later, Justin Bieber, III will make an impression on Lucas, now 136, and he will recut all of the movies with 3Bieb as Anakin, and Darth Vader will sing

(Sorry, I meant Sebastian Shaw)

what could have been

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=txmcsU5eFw4

despite the numerous weird plot holes and sometimes ridiculous logic in this series I am thoroughly enjoying this. As mentioned upthread maybe just because of some interesting character development, which isn't something you see as much in the star wars movies.

glad that people are enjoying it - for real! following comments offered merely as grist for the "internet forum"

the character development thing is interesting - i don't feel very interested in these characters as characters i gotta say - nobody is particularly charming/compelling - and their ability to meaningfully change is limited by their need to slot into their allotted positions for ep 4 - a grim ewan macgregor going from checked-out to marginally less checked-out isn't a super compelling arc for me

(i also think that as a kid who saw OG SW '77 in the cinema, i find it particularly difficult to think of these particular pieces of IP as actual characters with motivations and such - is it because i was so young when i saw it? but for me they'll always be brilliant archetypes who serve a plot function in those 3 films - and any attempt to give them proper psychological depth just bounces off my brain - same with Doctor Who, when people start talking about his PTSD or whatever I just tune out - he's The Doctor! that is all)

anyway, definitely think the Mandalorian is far and away the best of these series so far because it uses new characters - and i could probably make a case for Rogue One being the best film qua film of the Disney era

This is ridiculous and therefore great

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RZnXjJqJp8g

Been mostly enjoying the series but that was a disappointing finale apart from the main duel (tho this ended unsatisfyingly also and didn't mean enough to justify the retcon). Stakes too low, villains weaknesses brought about far too easily. What even was Reva's plan? Would've liked more Hayden and there were a few ways they should've handled that but didn't.

haven't watched finale yet, have re-started watching Clone Wars, but I fear that until I get deeper into the series, I'm not going to have the itch to watch more than two a day. (I'm on Season 2).

This series was a’ight overall. But barely. Last two eps the best imho.

I like how things finally progressed from "sad man carries his guilt around and tries to help a special little girl" after a cool fight scene, immediately followed by "here's the fan service you've been waiting six episodes for"

I'm officially someone with Star Wars fatigue, having consumed almost all of the new media. My friends and their kids are enjoying Obi-Wan and the cool new stuff. But nearly every location, character, or plot point has happened in another Star Wars property so it's not new for me. Looking at that entire Inquisitor base bit that was nearly copy-pasted from the Jedi: Fallen Order video game with a little bit of side-eye

Thanks for not saying “content”!

…

…

..

content

You horrid person.

Anyway I enjoyed it overall — a nice fillip in the end with a couple of striking moments. Roll on Andor….

felt a little flicker of engagement in the last ep
but it is my overall feeling that this show was Not Good

yeah i feel the same as mh - the story is deadened by being such a narrow arc within well-worn story beats we already know that i found it hard to get overly enthused or excited. i think i prefer something like mando where there’s more freedom in the storytelling? idk

the moments btw obi & leia were lovely though, and i thought mcgregor was a+

xxxpost to mh

“Aaaaarghhh!”

my reaction to the last two eps

https://i.postimg.cc/23NW4p2J/Capture.png

emsworth OTM for mine

Would've like to have seen Vader unboxing his replacement helmet while being berated by Palps.

Also godawful deaging going on in the series. Very plastic seeming.

The most biting criticism I read of the show is that nobody has a conversation even for exposition, every bit of dialogue is there to move the plot forward.

So did they end up addressing why Leia doesn’t acknowledge having previously encountered Obi-Wan, when she leaves her hologram message in the first movie?

I mean, she says "you fought for my father in the Clone Wars", her not mentioning "and you rescued me as a child" doesn't mean it didn't happen, esp since she was quite in a hurry to record the important parts of the message.

on a "from a certain point of view" scale, really rates a 5 or less.

I do think the last ep was only really interesting for the moment of broken helmet Anakin speaking and hearing his real voice and synthesized at same time.

nice visuals, but I liked the previous two eps better.

Eh she still talks like they’ve never met. I wouldn’t expect her to go “What’s up, B! Remember that shit with Flea, that was wild”—but if the retcon adventure really had happened first, you’d think her message would have been a little different.

(This had also been one of those “everyone’s talking about it” angles on Twitter, so… whether Disney likes it or not, it’s in fan’s heads)