PT A Thread For Prequel Fans To Discuss New Star Wars Content (spoiler tags required)

3.5 is still pretty good, just not great. I do think most people would rank it lower than TDK and LOTR, and certainly lower than ANH, yes.

 

But the majority of people who have been discussing this issue of the negative marketing have been fans without qualification - you know people who love the films as much as any of the others, who don't have to say "this could have been better or that was a waste. the dialog stinks or it's a pile of racist bull but you know there are enough cool scenes".

I'm standing up to say I really liked all three films, that makes six. I see no mannequin skywalker or irritating kid and think the clone troopers are better than the OT stormtroopers and dont care at all that there isn't anybody in them, I don't think the turn was unbelievable, I like the CIS, love the designs of the films, don't give a hoot about it being 'shiny an new' or whatever, and think the fights are excellent and easily the equal of any of the others.

I even like the ....CGI !

Kids love them as well because they are not old cynics pining for nostalgia.

So prequal fans are rightfully none plussed by this weapons grade nostalgia and a little bit annoyed that you have to pretend that they never happened.

If you are not a fully paid up member of the fan club this is all great - it's what you wanted, you have the best christmas present you could have ever hoped for.
So why after all these years after finally getting what you wanted are people STILL rubbing peoples noses in it?

Is a slow 15 year painful death not enough? Can't we be left to have a final grumble without being made out to be the new bashers?

People have parachuted in since the beginning to try to deny the basic truth and make out everyone was hysterical. People who dont even like the films so dont even care about the new denialist marketing. SO what is in it for them except getting another boot in?

 

Cryogenic
Thank you for the Paul F. McDonald links. I will check them out. : )

 

That's what I mean, though.

3.5 equating to "pretty good" (I concur).

It's like saying the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel is "pretty good". Or "Moby-Dick". Or pizza. Or sex.

My brain refuses to see ROTS as "pretty good". It's like asking me to see the world in two colours.

 

Double Post.

But just to address the wider issue...

No, SW Saga Fan. Let's give the man his due on that point.

While the general focus of the discussion has been on the marketing, I think, and trying to feel behind it, some of us have given in to trashing Abrams and TFA a bit.

I'm guilty of that. But I make no apologies for it. I see the two as intimately bound. And since I don't care for Abrams' Star Trek movies, I don't see why I should hold back. Not when partnered with the marketing campaign we've gotten for this movie.

I just hope I haven't been too ill-considered or gross about it. There is always a point when criticism begins to take on an ugly character. And I can still find it within myself to be positive about this movie, so perhaps I should.

But I'm really trying to follow my heart in terms of the balance of criticism/praise. No trolling, no criticism "for the sake of it". Or, at least, I hope I'm keeping a lid on that, and the pot isn't boiling over. It's worth occasionally examining our biases, though.

 

That's fine. Every time I watch it, I enjoy it, which is good enough for me. I don't see greatness like you do, but I'm genuinely glad you see it that way.

But I also think 3.5 is also where most people would place ROTJ. It's sort of a zone where a film can be elevated on the back of two 4+ star films or tarnished by two weak predecessors. So the end result is that ROTS falls into the "PT = meh" category in most people's heads.

Anyway, back on topic, that JJ Empire piece really is an interesting look at the fan divide. OT fans (myself include) were typically very positive about the interview; over here, JJ's remarks were seen as a sign that things are going in the wrong direction. I honestly believe that the OT and PT have very different sensibilities and largely appeal to two very different fanbases, and the evidence is borne out in this thread vs. 7SA.

 

I haven't always been here on this thread, nor on the other theforce.net threads. The last time I've posted something here, excluding what I've posted during the last 24 hours, was when this short movie clip of TFA was released two or three days ago, I don't remember exactly...

With my other occupations and projects in life, I can't be 100% involved in conversations so I might be missing some big pieces, especially when the release of TFA is approaching rapidly. Generally, from what I could quickly see when having some free time, things on the PT forums were far from TFA bashing.

But even if someone has been crass towards TFA or Abrams, there's no need to generalize as thejeditraitor and the other members did previously.

 

Thanks. I don't know if I wouldn't say it lacks a bumpy moment or two, or doesn't have aspects that some might find a bit alienating or silly, but I also see it as unique -- in the better, deeper, more serious sense of the word -- and (to season with another descriptor) peculiarly grand. Not only are there, to me, very artful passages in it (the ruminations sequence, say, or Order 66, which follows barely ten minutes later), but the general construction and sweep of the entire movie really impresses me. I honestly think it's sensational. And no-one else has attempted a work of popular art quite like it.

Yes. You have a solid pragmatic take on it. That's also, again, exactly my problem, though. When you say "sort of a zone", my mind goes, "dead zone". It's in that tedious twilight: neither great nor terrible. And I personally can't see ROTS as deserving such a bland, milquetoast fate.

I think people in here might have gotten on his case a bit too much over some of his comments. But I can't really talk. I'd have probably said exactly the same a week or two before. Or if my Vitamin D levels were lower.

The one comment I strongly agree with the critics in here on, however, is that strange assertion that Abrams watched films by John Ford, Akira Kurowawa, and Terrence Malick, to absorb some of their sensibilities, and the implication that following their styles somehow takes TFA back to the "roots" of Star Wars, when Lucas was already influenced by all three; and, in the case of Akira Kurosawa, so strongly that he helped finance one of his films, then presented him with the Academy's Lifetime Achievement Award, along with Steven Spielberg, at the 1990 Oscar ceremony:



Let's remind ourselves of those remarks. And see if we've actually passed through the looking glass:

"Before he started The Force Awakens, Abrams watched some movies. No, not those ones, Other ones. He looked at “the confidence” of John Ford Westerns. He took in the “unbelievable scene choreography and composition” of Kurosawa’s High and Low. And he studied “the powerful stillness” of Terrence Malick. “It’s not something I would normally have thought of coming to Star Wars,” he says.

Through the looking glass? I'd say so.

Was it good for you, too?

Because, geeze....

Abrams pats himself on the back for upgrading his visual armamentarium when those sources were absorbed into Lucas' visual lexicon long ago.

Especially, again, Akira Kurosawa, whose work was very nearly the spiritual imprimatur for Star Wars, on at least a compositional level, but also in terms of that ascetic estrangement that Lucas wanted. And the plot of "The Hidden Fortress" provided a useful blueprint when Lucas was trying to weave his ideas into an appropriate (and appealing) "mass audience" story framework.

For Abrams to pretend that he had some sort of epiphany by consulting those filmmakers and their filmographies is off-putting and disingenuous. It's like some religious fanatic pretending there was no real culture or anything of value before their religion or revelation came along. He's pathetically co-opting the insights of his predecessor -- the genius who initiated Star Wars and crafted it into what it became -- and casually making out he had these ideas or impulses independent of George Lucas. Baffling!

No-one (I don't think) has said, on this matter, or would say, that Abrams shouldn't have consulted those guys, or even admitted to it in print; just to be clear on this. It would actually be a fairly humbling admission had he said he was following in Lucas' footsteps. But no. It's like he is trying to demonstrate some special insight there by maintaining willful ignorance (I suspect it's willful) of all the things Lucas was influenced by when he made the original trilogy; and which he continued to draw on, very poetically and thoughtfully (in my opinion), in the prequels. Another denial of history.

I'm getting a bit serious here; maybe too serious. But let me leave you with another fantastic "George":

"The most effective way to destroy people is to deny and obliterate their own understanding of their history."

 

I certainly have the same opinion as you do, Cryo, but I can understand why some people -- especially some general audience goers wouldn't fully appreciate ROTS. Some people just want to have fun when they go to the movies. So, they see SW -- ep. 7: ROTS on the marquee, and they think: "Oh Star Wars was fun. This will be fun too." Then, they go in and watch a Greek tragedy set in outer space, and they come out stunned. Perhaps it's sort of unfortunate that some people have such a "limited" concept of what they can get out a film experience, but I think that's the case.

Personally, that's one of the things I love about ROTS. It's so audacious. It's the first blockbuster tragedy. That's why I think it was a great way for Lucas to go out. ANH, though more original than what followed, was the first of modern fun exciting blockbusters, though it's rarely been equaled, and ROTS turned it around 180 degrees, and it ended his Saga with the first modern blockbuster tragedy. That's just crazy ambitious. Some more recent scholars, like Camille Paglia, have noted its unique contribution to pop culture.

To me, ROTS is right up there with TDK. Both were genre-breakers, on a epic scale, and very well done. I'd certainly say that it offers a far more unique film experience than Spider-Man or Avatar. Avatar, especially, feels like just another very good entry in the fun exciting blockbuster mode -- visually spectacular, but pretty formulaic. Its much more impressive overseas box office (comparable Star Wars, GWTW, Titanic overseas) I think can be attributed to the human beings (Americans/Westerners) invading the lands of the Navi (Iraqis/Colonial territories) storyline. It's hard for me to separate where LOTR the films start and the LOTR novels end, but LOTR was to fiction what Star Wars was to film.

 

As one of more vocally negative people about TFA, I wasn't always like that.

In the early days I was all geared up for TFA. Spent a lot of time on those boards. When the pictures hit the net of the set leaks, I was right there on those boards examining with other people examining them for clues. When every one thought we were getting Tatooine again, I was ok with it. Set leaks of the X-Wings being built got me geared up. X-Wings made sense, the Rebellion won the war. It made sense that we would see them at some point in an updated fashion. Even at first when we all thought we were starting off on Tatooine again, I wasn't critical of it because it could be seen what Abrams and company were going for.

However, the problems started to have a snowball effct. Then the Practical Marketing Campaign hit, then the rumors/spoilers started to come out. Tie Fighters, Star Destroyers Stormtroopers, Super Weapons. Now the picture started become clearer. A move in the marketing to pander to disenfranchised fans and insure thy came back to the franchise. I saw it in the marketing, which then translated into seeing it in the actual movie. Each time we learned something new it added more to that snowball effct. The. The leaked plot summary hit, and that just absolutely blew my mind that it was so close to ANH in many aspects. Still that snowball kept rolling, til we got to Lucas's comments a couple weeks ago where everything that the snowball had picked up on its way was confirmed.

It's good that you feel that you should try to balance your view of TFA going in. I'm a bit different. There are things that geniuly interest me about TFA and I've pointed them out in this thread. However, I don't feel the need to balance stuff out by prequalifying my critical opinions with saying something nice about TFA. Just like I don't feel the need to prequalify my praise and love for the PT by pointing out any problems I might have with it.

When people expect others to take that approach to giving an opinion (not saying you Cryo, just in general), then that is just another form of pandering to individuals to make them happy that something was said they could agree with.

Yes I am very critical of Disney, LFL, Kennedy, and Abrams and their decisions. Am I bashing them? No I am not. I am sure Abrams is a great guy, good father, good husband etc etc. I just highly disagree with what he is doing with the story. Disney does tons and tons of charity stuff, raises millions of dollars, makes children all over the world happy, but that doesn't mean I should give them a pass on their corporate decision making regarding the direction of the story.

To me, bashing is more than just criticism from a fan that doesn't like a movie, it's personal and nasty. If I walk into a resteraunt and find their food sub par, and tell my friends that I thought the food wasn't great and I was unhappy with it am I bashing it? To me no, however if went to Facebook/Twitter/food forums and ranted over and over and over for months how the food ruined my week and I told my friends that I was going to burn down the resteraunt and shoot the cooks dog because they served me a subpar meal I wasn't expecting, well now I think I've crossed a line into bashing.

Just because someone doesn't have something nice to say doesn't mean they are bashing or are being unreasonable.

 

edit: deleted

 

You're okay. I otherwise agree with your other post.

Love that signature, too!

General moviegoers, yes. Who either didn't want such a dark movie; or thought it was a piece of tat.

But I wish some Star Wars fans could have tried to be a bit more open-minded to what George served up.

However, maybe those categories of people blur together, and it goes back to what you just said.

Although, even then, I'm not so much in the game, right now, to speculate on others' motives over a difference in taste (fun to do that in certain contexts, though). I just think, wow, what a movie, what an experience, what a confidence of vision. And for it to be spat at like it has been!

Great thoughts on ROTS. I think it's quite amazing on that level, yes. And even more amazing where you see where Lucas came in. From "THX" (and Sith, of course, still bears stylistic resemblances to THX, through it all), a white-walled, abstract, almost anti-people documentary film, to a colourful fantasy film -- one of six symphonic portals -- with sweeping worlds, grand art direction, tender scenes of affection, sneaky scenes of plotting, glorious battle sequences, surging music, glinting humour, and thundering tragedy. Has any other filmmaker ever come quite so far -- and with such a small (yet awesomely impactful) clutch of movies?

Yes. They're the cream of their genre: ROTS and TDK. Although I have considerably more affection for the former.

Good speculation on the mass appeal of the other visual mythologies.

Oh, it was rather like that for me, too.

I was never particularly happy that Lucas sold to Disney. But I tried to ride it out.

I was less happy still to hear that J.J. Abrams was directing. But I again tried to ride it out.

I even liked that first batch of leaked production art.

But then ... the comments started stacking up, the spoilers as you say, the marketing, the general sense of safeness in the look of everything, the apparent back-stabbing done to Lucas.

And I couldn't help but feel like Star Wars has entered a benighted, corporate phase. And that some of the core reasons I fell in love with the prequels and the existing saga no longer apply.

Yes. All quite true. I wanted to affirm positive things for my own good. Just my own standard.

I don't think the film is crazily lamentable. Dead through and through. There's good in The Force Awakens, Mike. I know there's still...

Oh, yes. Bashing is very much about a certain position and tone one adopts.

One can be critical -- even super-critical -- and not be a basher.

No-one gets seriously angry at the Rebels for giving no ground to The Empire, do they?

 

Cryogenic

Lol... Well tell ya what, as of right now I am in the Obi Wan Kenobi club of skepticism. It's more machine now than man, twisted and evil. That's not to say TFA isn't capable of redeeming itself so that just as Obi Wan did in ROTJ, I would accept it like an old friend. However, it has a very long way to go for the movie and all those involved to be redeemed in my eyes.

 

Thanks, was quite heartwarming to read all of that

 

Whats going on with the forum? I haven't been able to access it until now. What happened?

 

It's been happening to me all day, on and off.

It's probably just a problem with the forum, or maintenance or something.

 

I hope they get it fixed, because i can only read one page before i can't access anymore.

 

I hope so too, it's really annoying.

 

My thoughts on some of the recent discussion.

Of the people who discuss TFA, that is in the TFA forum & in other parts of the forums including this thread, I'd guess there are 80-90% of fans who are talking about what they like &/or what they hope to like about this movie. Then there are the 10% who spend hours upon hours over weeks & months in this thread especially talking about what they don't like about it. I understand the first group. I'm baffled by the second. To be clear, I'm not surprised that they aren't jazzed about TFA. That's subjective & each to their own. What I don't get is that they like to spend so much of their time talking about a movie they don't like or don't expect to like. That's the conundrum.

 

I was quite shocked to be targeted like that on a quiet Friday evening.

I was just surfing the web (not even really looking at the JC specifically) and relaxing with a glass of pinot grigio when I decided to quickly drop by the Boards for a couple of minutes and was tagged/confronted with an amazing tirade, LOL!

It was rather fun actually... I haven't annoyed anybody on here quite as much as that since I moderated the Epsiode III Spoilers Allowed forum... Took me back to some of the more "interesting" unban requests I received!

Like you say it's odd that with less than three weeks to go to the movie someone should get so annoyed with little me (I don't mind admitting I'm pretty insignificant in the scheme of things) but it's all good.

 

And why in the blue hell are you so bothered about what other people choose to do with their own time when they're hurting no-one?

It's petty and captious; and even inflammatory to keep raising the same point, over, and over, and over. Films, not fans.

If we're getting into perverse, though, why have so many people spent years bashing the prequels, insulting those who like them, and even crafting long-winded fist-shaking YouTube video reviews; and entire spin-off forums around said reviews?

Prequel-bashing turned into a national pasttime. You can't deny this. On this place alone, there is a 600+ page "bashers' sanctuary" -- one of several that previously existed -- fossilized as the top thread on the now-inactive "The Phantom Menace" forum:

http://boards.theforce.net/forums/the-phantom-menace.10007/

Can you explain that kind of rabidity to me? Or the persecution complex that went along with it? Or what a bashing sanctuary is doing sat atop a forum ostensibly meant for fans of the movie?

Bashing and detraction have cast a long shadow over these films online and in the wider geek-media-industrial complex. And you're constantly pent up about a generic "new content" thread that just so happens to be focused on the new film right now: the first new live-action Star Wars film in a decade, accompanied by a marketing campaign that has implicitly denigrated the prequel films in a cheap attempt to bring disgruntled fans (see bashing sanctuary again) fully into the mix.

Are you seriously also baffled, on a personal level, that is, by the extent of hate/detraction/criticism/complaining about the prequels? Do you think it was wrong of people to spend time passionately railing against the last three films? Do you think it's acceptable to slam people in the middle of a conversation on, say, Jar Jar, if they like the character and the comedy, as blind gushers? Well, you did do this to me a few months ago; so, I guess, I'm asking, has your position altered since then?

If not, you look all kinds of hypocritical, to me. I think it's as Darth Nerdling called it. You can't stand to see this film being criticized. The tables have turned. Lucas is no longer in control. He can't rightly be blamed for anything. So if TFA gets dented in any way by negativity, well, what might that say, a) about J.J. Abrams, first of all, and b) the relative merits (or formerly-supposed debits) of George Lucas and the prequels?

 

Not bothered, curious. It's a genuine question. Maybe you could try to answer it. Mind you you're not someone who sees nothing worthwhile in this movie. Still, have a stab at an answer if you like.

As for your other comments, I have to ask, who cares about the history of PT bashing, & creating a contest over which group is more unreasonable? This is the PT forum. Everyone here would agree that the extreme end of PT criticism was & is way out of line. The comparisons are a bit pointless IMO. Mind you if you are that interested have a look for a forum that was hypercritical of TPM before it was even released. Don't spend too long on it though. I think it will be a futile search.

Strong stuff Nerdling. Are you taking a swipe at PT fans reacting to Pegg's comments? Or Daniels' a few weeks back? Or Gary Whitta's? Or other PT cast members over the years? Or the talk about too much CGI in the prequels? The marketing campaign? Or RLM reviews? Or other movie reviewers? The media in general perhaps? Or your average internet trolls??

I'm joking of course...but also making a point.

 

*sigh*

A "conundrum" is not a question. It's you implying there is something unreasonable and intractable about prequel fans who are less than amused by at least some of what they've been seeing and hearing.

You're conflating extremely dissimilar situations. And I think you know it. The Internet wasn't the force it is today back then. People generally had sky-high expectations about a brand new set of Star Wars movies coming from George Lucas himself. In 1998-1999, Star Wars was still very close to the only game in town. But fantasy franchises have since multiplied. And opinions since the prequels have diversified. The last sixteen years should have taught you that.

But we're not generally asking every other post: "Hey, RLM, dude! What is with you?" We generally deal directly with the opinions and attitudes expressed by a given interlocutor. And it's context-dependent. For example, in the case of Anthony Daniels, some people, myself included, felt his comments from a few months ago were callow and ungrateful; and therefore a little indiscreet and unprofessional.

You seem to have this burning inclination to keep ambushing those of us who are critical toward TFA (to varying degrees) with the same broadside -- over, and over, and over. So, yes, I think Darth Nerdling was right to call the mentality underpinning that to the carpet. Because you won't stop interjecting and harassing people when they've already pointed out the deficiency in mounting that objection. It's a red herring. Discussion naturally entails a range of opinion; particularly on new stuff when everyone has the right to assume a critical posture to new snippets if they wish.

 

I'm here because this is one of the more active threads on the forum I most often post in. If this whole Disney deal never came about and Star Wars was closer to the dead side of things, I'd still be here, likely posting in yet another thread about some alleged plot hole in AOTC. I'm here because I'm here, just like those people in the TFA forum who have more posts in three years than I do in 13. We don't engage with Star Wars in quite the same way, and I accept that rather than storming into the center of their good times and demanding explanations for how they spend their time.