PT PT Discussion of future SW Content (Locked) - Discussion Moved to Saga Board

Well said, DrDre

 

Reading this reminds me of another one of the things that Kasdan had written into the original ROTJ that George nixed (apart from Han's death).....the bittersweet ending with Luke leaving and going off on his own. The more I think about it, the more I feel that Kasdan might have had an axe to grind for years and then got his new chance to put his stamp on the Saga by bringing back his original ideas about how it "should" have ended all those years ago.

I'm only theorizing here, of course, but if that was the case.....that is some massive disrespect towards Lucas.

 

Kasdan never wrote any of that stuff.
The idea of Han dying was DISCUSSED by Lucas,Marquand and Kasdan, but it was never on the table as a serious option because Lucas vetoed it.
And the "bittersweet ending" is just stuff that Gary Kurtz made up in recent interviews.

 

I don't think that it would have been the "end" of Luke's story though. I believe Kasdan and many at Lucasfilm (including Kurtz before he left) assumed that the saga would continue. It would go on with Luke and Leia as the lonely, orphaned figureheads of two families, the Republic and the Jedi. The many worlds of the Republic would be in chaos that Leia needs to resolve in peacetime, while Luke has the onerous and dangerous task of seeking out possible Jedi candidates, all by himself.

George wanted to cap Star Wars in order to raise his own family instead and decided to wind up the saga on an emphatic note of triumph instead of an open ending. Which is totally fine. But now that ROTJ is no the end, there is no reason that Luke's and Leia's story was confined to continuing in the tone of post victory paradise that Episode may have hinted at.

 

after TFA how Disney expects us to take kylo ren and captain Phasma seriously as the bad guys Imagine that if Vader was the one lost his hand in ESB or count dooku in AOTC

The hero needs to lose at least once or maybe more before defeating the bad guy

and that duel oh that duel I feel angry at myself for using that word to describe it I watched kids with stick be more skilled and exciteing than the one in TFA

 

Ehm, Darth Maul was killed in TPM, and Dooku defeated by Yoda. By your standards Sith Lords are not much of a threat. Either way, it is called an arc. Rather than introducing a fully developed villain, the writers decided to introduce a villain in the making. Kylo Ren in TFA was like Luke in TESB, overconfident. Should we not take Luke seriously in ROTJ?

 

Agreed.

Well, at the beginning of TFA Kylo seams to be a real threat, doesn't he? He has an army, he kills that poor old man with no mercy, he stops a blaster bolt in the air and after that he manages to read Poe's mind. Later we learn that he turned against Luke and destroyed it all. It's not very likely that he needs additional training.
But they managed to undermine that by his temper tantrums and his loss against Rey. OK, so the Force is on Rey's side, but it goes against good storytelling. As Anakin first lost against Dooku and then managed to kill him, as Luke first lost to Vader and then managed to beat him, I expected the same situation here. But Kylo managed to lose and is called to complete his training. Although he destroyed all of Luke's efforts in rebuilding the Jedi. That's not a consistent character making.

 

I agree with this. While I'm a bit wary of TLJ being too blah grim overall, one area I think it could definitely use more heaviness compared to TFA is the villains. A goofy villain here and there is always welcome in the saga, but for me TFA went a bit overboard on the unintentional comedic value of most of the featured baddies.

 

Yeah, but that was the entire point. Kylo Ren is a poser. He's a threat, but he's still in a fledgeling state. So, Kylo and the Knights of Ren killed a number of Luke's students, and destroyed the Jedi Temple, while Luke was away, as it appears in the TLJ teaser. Why does this make him a dark side master? I'm sure he didn't announce he would be coming to kill everybody. So, he took them by surprise. If a guy buys a gun, walks into a military academy, and starts shooting everybody, does this automatically make him a Navy SEAL?

He was also seriously injured while he fought Rey, and so he was overconfident, AND physically impaired. You expected Kylo to be like Vader, and because he's not, it's not consistent, or not good story telling? You wanted to see another dark side master throwing stuff at the hero, and chop of a limb? Both Vader and Maul were one-note villains in their trilogy openers. You wanted another one? Why is it not good story telling for the villain to go through some development? Why can't the villain start off inexperienced, and come back to do a number on Rey? It's a three act story.

 

Except Kylo was shown to be experienced earlier in TFA, who can block laser bolts mid air and freeze people, then all of a sudden he isn't and defeated by a complete novice. Rey is such a low level novice that during the whole dual, she only had one attack move, a simple stabbing motion she kept reusing over and over. Even somebody with basic training could easily defeat a complete novice who predictably reused the same basic tactic over and over with no variation. Basically like a regular guy who only knows one basic move he reuses over and over vs a trained kickboxer who knows a 100 expert moves. Not to mention Kylo butt was saved by sheer luck, or plot convenience. Opposed to Dooku who at least realized when he was outmached and was time to retreat, as well as successfully distracting Yoda to cover his retreat which is still great skill and cunning. Even with Maul, at least he was killed by someone who had received extensive training since childhood. Not a complete force novice without any training, just PC girl power.

 

To me, the way Maul died made him look way more stupid and incompetent than Kylo.
Maul had been quite skilled and cunning in that fight and then he is given a massive Idiot Ball to hold so that Obi-Wan can win.

With Kylo, the film shows that when he is calm and in control, he is very powerful.
But the film also shows that when he looses that control and focus, he also looses much of his power. And Kylo has a great deal of difficulty in maintaining control and focus.
And when his confidence is shaken, he doesn't handle it well.

Anakin in AotC is quite powerful and skilled, yet when he looses control and charges Dooku, Dooku can take him out in two seconds.

Plus his injuries.
In AotC, Dooku nicks Obi-Wan twice and he falls down and now has considerable problem using the Force. So pain severely hampers a Force user from using the Force.
Kylo's wounds were worse than Obi-Wans plus he has lost all control and thus he is now much weaker.

Or take Vader vs Luke. Luke had what, a couple of weeks of training and then a some more weeks of training himself and yet he beat Vader, who had 20-30 years of experience.

I think that TFA did give Rey a bit much in terms of skill and the duel needed some work.
But overall, I found Kylo way more interesting than Maul or Griev.

Bye for now.
Blackboard Monitor

 

If you can convince me, you could walk normally after you have been shot in the gut, much less concentrate on beating someone swinging a sword at your head, even if that person is, as you say a novice, you've got a point. Otherwise it just isn't very relevant to what's happening in the film. Kylo was shot with Chewie's bowcaster, the power of which we witnessed multiple times. It's surprising he could stand, much less put up the fight he did.

Like Samuel Vimes said, Obi-Wan got sliced twice, and crumbled to the floor, yet you expect Kylo to put up a strong fight. It's ludicrous.

 

For my part, I'm just not sure what I'm expected to think of Kylo. The Last Jedi trailer/poster continues to sell him as this sinister threat, yet the inconsistency of his character thus far doesn't quite measure up.

He's introduced early on in The Force Awakens as forbidding a villain as any to have ever strolled into a Star Wars movie, garbed like a Bedouin Darth Vader, escorted by a battalion of murderous stormtroopers, cutting down old men in cold blood with a flaming bastard sword of a lightsaber and repelling blaster bolts midair (a first!), all of which impressive. But then later he throws a temper tantrum like the birthday boy at Chuck E. Cheese's who keeps losing at skeeball. Okay, I guess, because then later he swipes down close-range shots from pistoleer Rey and Force-paralyzes her with zero resistance. Neat. Except, later yet -- like, maybe, that day -- he attempts to interrogate his captive with some mind probing only to fumble awkwardly, à la severe case of sexual performance anxiety, where even Agent Spalko one franchise over managed to coolly play off as much with a quip. But then later he kills dad—score one for uncompromising evil. However, by the end climax he's reduced to a sulking bully who struggles in duel combat against Finn and Rey where, in the same shoes, Maul or even a 2nd-secondary baddie like Grievous would've made minced meat.

So that's Kylo Ren: the Bobby Riggs of Star Wars.

For a central antagonist he evokes little more than an ineffectual pretender with fleeting acts of genuine menace. Rather, the character (Driver's presence & performance) works best as a sore loser desperate to prove otherwise with muted inflections and some cosplay. But it seems Team Disney/Lucasfilm wants to have their cake and eat it too, and thus every time the presentation tilts towards memorable villainy, not even Williams' preying horns is enough to make the concept stick. So I'm watching the trailer for Episode VIII thinking, "Isn't there an IG-88 they can bring in or something?", because all this sequel trilogy has to offer at this point is a discount Lord Voldermort, a pie-in-the-face Phasma and the Donnie Darko version of teen Anakin.

 

yup.....and that would have made a better story than The New Hope Awakens.

 

Well... that was a little different. "You have that power too" from the TFA trailer was actually dialog from Return of the Jedi, as was the rest of Luke's "the Force is strong in my family" voice-over from that trailer. It was just edited and re-ordered to make it sort of sound like (or at least to imply) Luke was saying those lines anew in TFA.

But you're absolutely right, which was part of my point. It's "directionless," it's just a tease, probably just to hype the movie. Or to get Star Wars fans to argue about it for the next half calendar year anyway. "It's time for the Jedi to end" is probably taken way out of context like you said, especially because we know how they edited Luke's monologue from TFA trailer. I remember reading that someone thought the audio of the "...to end" sounded different acoustically from the first part of the line, like it was recorded in a different part of the movie. And we can all agree that "it's time for the Jedi to end" is awkward English at best. Not actually ungrammatical like some people have said, but still a poor choice of words. "It's time for [organization] to end" seems like something a kid would say, so to paraphrase RLM, it sounds like it could have been written by an 8-year old.

 

I've been hesitant to voice thoughts about the trailer because, I would like to be positive (or at the very least neutral) that it'll turn out well. But frankly, having been burned hoping that TFA would be better than it's trailers, I'm pretty disheartened.

They at least left Luke ambiguous in TFA, but here it seems what many of us were fearing is true. Luke is being completely out of character by thinking "**** it all" and hiding out.

Granted it could be some kinda swerve and they could sell it well. (Given that Hamill himself said that he's "fundamentally opposed" to Luke's behavior here, I seriously doubt it) And granted I'm guessing Luke has some kind of change of heart at some point during the story. ( I doubt they hired Mark to stand on a rock for 20 minutes of the film. He'll obviously train Rey to some extent) But again, it feels like part re-hash (Luke as grumpy Yoda 2.0) part characters regressing (Han going back to Smuggling at 70).

 

That is a common theme in Star Wars, the villains being undone by their overconfidence and hubris, Tarkin, GG, Jabba, Boba, and even Palps are done in by this. However, Maul did kill a experienced Jedi knight who was really at a master level.

What you describe about Kylo sounds an awful lot like a idiot ball too, and a much bigger than the one handled to Maul. Though the film, Kylo just keeps declining.

In AOTC, Anakin has not really learned control and one of the reasons Dooku, who has mastered control soundly defeats him. By ROTS, Anakin has learned at least some control which allows him to defeat Dooku, though Obi knows how to push Anakin to lose control.

If Kylo's injuries are as bad as you say, then it creates another plot hole as he should have been completely unable to fight, or even stand as shown by the PT. Also, Chewie's bowcaster is all of a sudden much more powerful than it was ever shown to be in the OT, it is why Han is all of a sudden making a big deal about the bowcaster. Plus Kylo should have been able to freeze like earlier in the film, but again he suddenly loses that ability just to give Rey a slight chance. Several plot holes and a bizarre retcon for plot convenience.


Lucas once said that in TESB, Luke trained with Yoda for 3 months which is how long it took the crippled MF to limp to Bespin. The events of ROTJ are about a year after TESB.

 

I would suspect Chewie replaced his bowcaster by a newer and better model after 30 years. Also, such plot holes/retcons are equally common in Star Wars. Remember that super speed, that Obi-Wan and Qui-Gon possessed at the start of TPM? Obi-Wan suddenly loses that ability, to give Maul ample opportunity to stab his master. How about that convenient kid sized helmet for Anakin, who then accidentally pushes the correct buttons to join and win the fight to knock out the control ship? How about the fact, that Luke is hidden on his father's home planet, with his father's family, keeping his father's name? How about Luke crash landing conveniently next to Yoda's dwelling in TESB, or Yoda conveniently dying at the exact moment Luke revisits him in ROTJ?

 

STAR WARS The Last Jedi SPOILER Pics! Part 56



New SPOILER pics! Director Rian Johnson, Oscar Isaac, John Boyega, Carrie Fisher, Anthony Daniels, plus sets and on location shooting pics!

 

Except Han states that it is the same bowcaster Chewie has been using since the OT. It does not need to be a newer model either, just a larger caliper weapon. Like going from a .223 AR15 to a .308 AR10, however this is unlikely given Han's dialog.

As for Obi, if had force ran he would have been cut in half by the last gate, which is why he didn 't force run. The helmet was oversized on Anakin, and it was an adjustable soft leather helmet like WW1 pilots wore. But this is getting besides the point.

The issue here is Kylo should have either reflected the bowcaster bolt or been killed or incapacitated by it. That he could still fight at all while lessor injuries stopped better force user like Obi indicates Kylo has superhuman strength. Another factor against Rey. The problem is TFA lacks any internal logic and just wings it and it shows pretty badly.

 

Nice one, but it took Obi-Wan and Qui-Gon a fraction of a second to cover a distance roughly equal or larger than the distance Obi-Wan had to cover to reach Qui-Gon. Also, Obi-Wan almost made the last gate at a normal pace, so the idea that he couldn't have made it using his Force speed, just isn't supported by the events of the film. Also, I would argue, that Anakin's accidental participation, and victory in the space battle is the worst case of abandoned logic and plot convenience in the saga, next to the ewoks defeating the Emperor's best troops with sticks and stones. The explanation that Anakin "got lucky" seems to me to be the poster boy for winging it in terms of story. You're defending TPM's lack of internal logic, whilst condemning TFA for doing the same thing. Both films have their lapses of internal logic, and convenient plot developments, but I'm certainly not convinced, that TFA is the worst offender in the saga. I would gladly discuss the topic further, but it's not really appropriate for this thread.

 

If TFA shouldn't be discussed, neither should TPM -- but I see you're happy to rope that one in and blast it some more. Also, of the two, running some Force calculus just now, I have concluded that TFA is a bit more pertinent to a thread about the "production of future Star Wars" material, given that the next film in the series follows on directly from it. TPM, meanwhile, is dust, is history; yet docking it, as I'm sure you know, is only going to have prequel fans (this is, after all, a thread in which prequel fans discuss the upcoming Disney projects) coming to its defence.

The Jedi Speed thing is an old complaint. Luke goes vertical against droid-man Vader in TESB when he jumps out of the carbon freezing pit, Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan go horizontal against some fortified droids in a maze-like set of hallways. Both times, Jedi characters, or padawan learners, are getting the better of machine entities. So there might be a bit of a rhyme there. It is arguable that the speed tactic is more a trick of perception, and that the organic Maul can't be confused in this way. And even if it extends beyond perception, beyond duping an opponent, Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan seem to originally pull the trick off as a symbiotic unit; a symbiosis that looks compromised, to me, after Maul knocks Obi-Wan off the catwalk and they become separated. Another piece of thematically-cogent visual storytelling, perhaps. Lastly, the gates. It is quite possible that using the Force in an overt way near such a mechanism actually triggers it prematurely; so Obi-Wan is running at normal speed and hopes he makes it all the way across in time. Of course, he just fails to do so; and history is set.

Certainly a bit better, I think, than a person's viscera half-blasted away, only for them to still have the strength to move around quite a bit, fling a heavy sword, and even use Force powers (as when Kylo flings Rey against that tree). Why doesn't he just freeze Rey and Finn, or also fling Finn aside, or knock the lightsaber out of his hand? The film obviously wants to reduce Kylo's strength enough to give total neophytes like Finn, and then Rey, a sporting chance; but in a somewhat "forced", contradictory (some might say contrived) fashion. The laser gates were cool and having Obi-Wan run at regular speed (much as the Jedi always appear to fight at regular, human speed; and not vibrate themselves out of existence) adds the right touch of visual realism and human vulnerability. But Kylo is turned into a bit of sword-swinging wuss so that an untrained girl, recently suffering from an intrusive mind probe, and violently smashed into a tree, can arm-wrestle him into submission. Convenient bowcaster shot + girl power = social justice achievement unlocked.

 

Hold your horses, cryo! I didn't rope in TFA, and it's percieved lack of internal logic. The discussion was about Kylo Ren's character development in TLJ. Some felt he was a weak villain in TFA, and therefore has less potential for TLJ, which is, while I don't agree, perfectly fine opinion, but others felt the need to devolve the discussion to bashing TFA. I simply pointed out the double standard used to judge TFA in this respect, and acknowledged TFA's short comings to a degree, but also pointed to similar short comings in the PT, and the OT. So, please don't pretend this is a case of coming to the defense against unfair bashing of the PT. This started with blasting TFA by others, and I've since compared TFA to both the PT and the OT, so my argument was pretty balanced. Your purported defense of the PT in this case is a lobsided overreaction.

I would also like to note, that while your perfectly happy to come up with contrived explanations, like "Lastly, the gates. It is quite possible that using the Force in an overt way near such a mechanism actually triggers it prematurely", but don't extend TFA the same courtesy, revealing a strong bias in the way you judge these two films. While I admit, that I favour TFA, and therefore am biased myself, I at least acknowledged TFA's weaknesses to a degree.

 

I barely saw you acknowledge any shortcomings in TFA. I saw you imply it's no worse than prior entries, straight after offering an explanation for Chewie's strangely-more-powerful bowcaster. And while you did highlight some conveniences in the OT, you ended up making multiple criticisms of TPM: the Jedi Speed issue, Anakin's victory in the space battle, even the helmet he puts on in the cockpit. It's like you felt you would come to the aid of TFA while deliberately poking at TPM. While I would declare it closer to the TFA/Kylo criticisms, you also liked a post accusing Maul of being given an "idiot ball" to enable Obi-Wan to win. So that's quite a few examples where you endorse TPM being criticized; playing the offensive card as much as the defensive one in TFA's favour.

And what is really "purported" about my defence of the PT? I defended TPM over just the speed issue in a single paragraph, then rounded off with an equivalently critical paragraph toward Kylo's powers/actions at the end of TFA. Yin-yang. Now, I did write out one other, shorter paragraph at the start, and I think it's fairly obvious why I started with that. I'll reiterate: This is a thread (or meant to be a thread) in which PT fans discuss the production of future Star Wars projects. So you taking jabs at TPM isn't likely to go unnoticed; especially not multiple jabs at things which don't even accord with the issue some have regarding the presentation of Kylo as a Force-endowed (and, presumably, reasonably skilled/well-trained) character.

That's an example of you cherry-picking to suit your purposes. I put that at the end of my defence, the bit about the gates, as one more possibility; one more way to read the film. I think it is clear that, based on where I situated it, I was giving that a lower priority than that I wrote before that: about the speed tactic actually being a kind of Jedi sleight-of-hand against droids or droid-like characters; and how it is executed only once by Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan when they are working smoothly as a team (they literally blur into a single swoosh). Later in the film, during the duel, they stop working as a team, of course, after Maul kicks Obi-Wan off that platform. The Sith literally separate and thin out the Jedi; due, in part, to the Jedi's over-eagerness to dispatch the threat. There are, in my opinion, some exceptionally cogent visually-articulated themes in the duel sequence. It's very abstract (as, I think, the laser gates themselves call to mind), and intended, I think, to be read into symbolically.

One courtesy I'll extend TFA, since you seem to be fishing for that, is that Kylo is obviously a Dark Side user and Obi-Wan is not. From that point of view, it makes sense that Kylo, unlike Obi-Wan, would be willfully calling on reservoirs of anger and hate to make himself more powerful; which is an advantage the Dark Side supposedly offers (albeit in something of a "fool's gold" fashion) over those committed to the light. Luke hits Vader in the arm (or shoulder) at the end of their TESB duel, and Vader cries out, but keeps fighting (although maybe that also plays a part in him bringing it to a swift end). So Dark Side users can obviously take more of a drubbing than clean-cut Jedi fighters in some ways. And yes, Vader is a machine and Kylo isn't (at least not so literally); and he's also had longer to live with his extensive injuries and re-focus his strength (etc.). But I don't think it's hugely problematic that Kylo has some fight left in him, no. It's quite obviously done, however, to allow Finn and Rey to stand up to him; which is a little odd since Kylo can apparently still use the Force to conveniently dispatch Rey and even goads Finn into a fight (so, he, like, wants to fight in that condition or something?). It's hardly the worst thing in TFA, in my opinion; but it's one more thing that makes me go, "So this is happening right now, huh?

 

is the PT fans giving criticism to TFA yes But they are nice about it Compare how the OT fans gives the PT criticism child Play

People complained and criticized the PT for giving Yoda who was a Jedi Master I remind you a lightsaber