The Star Wars Cinematic Universe

[CMcK]

->Open Spoiler<-

So, to a fair extent I'd say the most common issues are correct. The films two most jarring elements are the first half's pacing and the aspect of pulling force powers out of thin air for seeming convenience sake. The film is breakneck paced and in many places it feels poorly done. I don't mind it cutting to chase on several fronts, this many films in I don't need 30mins going on set up, but it's definitely a case of cramming too much in at the expense of story telling.

The second half of the film is better paced even if much of it comes down to them being on the run the whole time. The things I'd expect to be common issues would be:

-The extent of Rey and Kylo's powers
-The Emporer's return
-The Force Healing
-The continued reliance on Death Star weaponry as a key threat
-Rose's sidelining
-Rey's reveal

There's a few other elements but along with the pacing but when it comes the films biggest issues I can't help but lay most of the blame on the obvious elephant in the room...

The Last Jedi

A lot of this comes from that film. Well, that and Disney's pointless stubborn sticking to the idea of this being a trilogy where an Episode X would have really come in useful to do this storyline properly. Broadly though I think a lot will rest on what the viewer wants from the franchise. To me Star Wars has never been anything other than a very simple adventure film in space, like Indiana Jones with space ships etc. There's little depth to them or plotting and by that simple measure TROS delivers a lot of fast paced Star Wars action with a lot of fan nostalgia (which is perfectly fine in this case given this is the final Skywalker arc film) and enough of an ending even if it would be incredibly easy to do Episodes X-XII on the back of this given the plot doesn't actually stop the end of the Empire, First Order or Emporer etc.

To be fair The Last Jedi set things up so Star Wars films didn't have to revolve around the Skywalker clan but this latest film bins that and sidelines probably the best new character that film introduced.

[teddymeow]

My review...

->Open Spoiler<-

I prefer The Last Jedi

[Neon Ignition]

Star Wars definitely needed to and needs to establish storylines and a world beyond the Skywalkers but whilst I didn't mind the film I can appreciate that Last Jedi was the wrong film to do that in and it was a poor take by Johnson etc to take that approach in a film that is literally the penultimate Skywalker film. It leaving the overall storyline so poorly set up for a finale means that if Trevorrow had remained on board I'm not sure how a suitable ending could have been delivered then either. So much of TROS should have been delivered in Last Jedi which would have helped things immeasurably, from where it picked things up I'm okay with TROS focusing on what it did. Lucasfilm desperately needs to get to grips with the films though, it may be post Skywalker era now but for general audiences it feels like there's still little to care about without an EpX so the risk of another Solo feels high

[Dogg Thang]

Oh boy, this is an absolute mess of a movie with some Harry Potter level nonsense. Written by a sugar-filled 6 year old who then dropped the script pages and hadn’t numbered them, it spends most of the first half introducing a whole bunch of new stuff in a film which needed new stuff and yet the exact opposite of this new stuff. Then it proceeded to try to wrap up all that new stuff with pretty much no context so it was hard to know why anyone was doing anything. A mess which seemed determined to undermine all other Star Wars movies including Abram’s own and, in places, even undermine the stuff we just saw minutes before.

And yet... I enjoyed it. Why not? It’s a silly movie but it had some fun. Not the fun of The Force Awakens (and admittedly I missed that) but it had plenty to keep me entertained, had some great sequences, some enjoyable characters and, at a few points, it managed to make it feel like maybe there was a bit of weight somewhere buried in there. I would like to have seen Driver get more out of the movie but he was like a grain of sugar in a giant bag of Skittles. But it was an enjoyable watch. It is what it is - a silly space movie and, as silly space movies go, it’s fine.

And kudos to the effects team. The practical effects were lovely to see and while the film didn’t aim for pretty (and that’s fine), I thought it looked pretty great.

[teddymeow]

It was a handsome looking film. The effects were fantastic.

It just felt really, really, really, really, really safe. No danger, no peril.

Driver is the best thing in this whole trilogy. I find Ridley a little wooden in everything I've ever seen her in. Grant was a superbly OTT baddie too.

I can tell I wasn't fully invested in it as I kept fidgeting in my seat and looking around wondering how long there was to go.

I didn't do that in TFA, TLJ or RO.

[Neon Ignition]

A more paced, coherent version of TROS is pretty much what these films should have been all along. They'd probably have felt more like modernised OT films then leaving all the experimentation and growth for the mountain of other films we'll get here on out.

[Dogg Thang]

I totally disagree with that.

[Neon Ignition]

It would feel more like the OT's? Or that they should be making more paced, coherent films?

[Dogg Thang]

It’s that there wasn’t a single point in the movie where I felt, oh THIS is what they should have been. Paced and coherent is something that is at odds with every fibre of this movie’s being. Every single other Star Wars movie that exists, including probably the Ewoks films, is more coherent. So all we’re just left with what’s in the film and it just trades too much on what has gone before, undermining it in the process. So no, while I certainly enjoyed it for what it was and I like aspects of it, there isn’t a single thing that could have me thinking that we needed more of this and less of what else we got.

Edit: oh another thing (not related to the points above) - I thought they did wonders with Leia given the circumstances. Sure, I could see they were writing around stuff but I thought they did it brilliantly and respectfully. I thought they did a great job with what must have been a difficult situation.

[Neon Ignition]

I get ya, I think I've kind of just accepted Eps VII and IX as a greatest hits tour. I know some enjoy Last Jedi's subversiveness or Rogue Ones war movit like nature but neither felt like something I wanted more of. What Abrams has rushed in EpIX is like an EpVIII redux crammed in with IX which suggests he'd have only ever delivered fan service. Though with were things stand I think I'd have preferred 3 consistent nostalgia trips than the 5 ropey bolt ons we do have.

[Dogg Thang]

Yeah, I can understand that but, like I say, I disagree. But it’s just a difference in what has worked for us personally and that’s cool. I think when it comes to the approach of Abrams in this one, it’s probably best I don’t think too much about it because I think his need to retcon not just Last Jedi but other movies too would annoy me. It feels like fan service and I guess it is and yet, at the same time, could be taken as a total disrespect for those who have gone before... weirdly, including him. I think ticking the boxes of vocal fans wants has led to a far, far stupider movie and trampled on others in the process. That makes things worse, in my view, not better.

But I don’t really want to dwell on that because I’d rather just enjoy the movie for what it was.

A lot of what I liked I can’t really get into without spoilers (I’ll do that another time) but he does a lot of stuff right along the way, as much as I felt it was a total mess. And I think many, and I’d probably include myself in this, are guilty of getting too attached to what ultimately are silly space movies - even the great ones. And it’s totally okay for them to be that (to this day, Rise Of Skywalker included, I don’t think anything has been as silly as Leia turning out to be Luke’s sister). Abrams embraces the silly space movie aspects and is really good at some of that, but he has never been great at coherence or delivering on early potential. He’s a fantastic setup guy.

I think ultimately I find myself falling back on an earlier thought on these movies before this one - I never thought we’d get a good Star Wars movie again. As it turns out, I’ve enjoyed all of the new ones to varying degrees. They all have stuff to like. And if you don’t like a Star Wars movies, it’s no big deal because there will be others. Or now TV shows. Any good Star Wars movie is a bonus. A gift.

Anyway, one more observation for now - Rose got totally shafted.

[Neon Ignition]

Yep, my view of theae films is definitely taken from hindsight. If I were Lucasfilm pre-Force Awakens there's no way I'd nod through this trilogy. It's amazing how much we've heard of how controlling they are and yet that suggests poor things going forward given the lack of planning the trilogy seems to have had.

I'm not sure of a precise order yet but if I were to rank them I don't think I was originally far off. TROS would be higher on the list than 5 of the other films at first thought, I think I'd want to see them again first to be sure.

[Dogg Thang]

Yeah, I’d find ranking very difficult now because I have a bit of Twin Peaks The Return going on with this one in that I both enjoyed it and found it incredibly frustrating all in one. I probably need the dust to settle on it or to see it again (although maybe one sign here is that I’m in no hurry to do that).

I agree with you on the lack of a plan. But looking at The Force Awakens, as imperfect as it may be, it really seemed to have so much potential and so much direction. Writing movies is hard. Writing good movies is much harder. Seriously, the amount of different crafts a writer has to be good at to put together a good movie is astounding so every good movie is a thing of wonder. So it doesn’t surprise me that things got difficult. I mean, nine movies into Friday the 13th, Jason was body hopping and we had demons or whatever! But if I was to boil down all the recent Star Wars movies to one overly-simplistic thought, it would be this - almost every attempt to bring something new has been fun and successful, almost every attempt to cling to the past has been messy and difficult, weighed down by prior love and expectation. And juggling the two meant the latter kept getting in the way of the former.

Edit: I won’t embed the tweet but I found this pretty funny (no spoilers in it but be wary of any replies, which I haven’t read) - https://twitter.com/bdgrabinski/stat...687448576?s=21

[buster_broon]

Saw it last night and loved it

[Neon Ignition]

Curious what the casual audiences think too. For the missus TFA was 'fun', TLJ was 'a bit boring', Rogue One was 'crap', Solo was 'boring' and TROS was 'epic'