PT Why Are The PT Films criticized? (catch-all thread)

Like Bugs Bunny. It's all good, really.

Like a loaded diaper. "Well that smells stinkawith!"

Same here, actually. Talk about selling us on something far greater than what was actually delivered. Phasma really was the Boba Fett of the film.

 

OK, so we agree that Grievous is very important plot wise, that Phasma was quite uninteresting and underdeveloped and that Hux is a bit more, but not much. That's all I wanted to say.

Dooku's introduction in TPM and Grievous' in AOTC would be pretty much pointless.Dooku was in two movies, Grievous is a cyborg fleshed out in later stages of war.

You may like Phasma and Hux in TFA because they may have some bigger role in the next two movies, but in TFA they weren't that important for their role to be justified.

 

Grievous is a bit like a "Psycho Jar Jar". He sort of looks like him and even has an outrageous persona to match. Moreover: Jar Jar sometimes talks to himself in an animated way (well, of course, he's animated!) in TPM, the "bright and happy" regal intro to the "grim dark" majestic outro of ROTS.

That, and, my other metatextual reading of Grievous is, he's sort of the "mad marble" of the movie come to life. He even can't help coughing before he says Anakin's name. *cough* *cough* Oh, excuse me, I'm just the movie, talking to myself. *cough* *cough* (It's also Lucas' cough, BTW).

As ezekiel22x just suggested, Grievous is also a good balancing element -- like the film trying to balance its own darkness out -- given the stark, Stygian end. After Obi-Wan extinguishes Grievous' life force, the movie gets progressively darker, as if now racing down a cliff.

All these elements are in play; along with various others. Lucas once described Episodes I and II as "jazz riffs" with a lot of "hamburger helper" thrown in. Grievous is a kind of direct continuation, and a summation, in an individual character, of the playful, discursive essence of those preceding movies. The series is very self-aware; it's as if these characters were all emanations inside a larger Dagobah cave. Sort of this odd mix -- if you want a physics metaphor -- of particles and waves. Think Picasso, rather than, say, Rembrandt, and you won't be far off. Although, do think Rembrandt, too. There's so much going on.

I just love Lucas. He's quite clever, you know. For a human being.

 

I'm not sure if couching ideas inside a glut of references and sesquipedalian loquaciousness adds any more validity to them. George Lucas is more Bob Ross than Rembrandt, in my opinion. He paints a pretty picture, for sure, though!

 

Really? "Sesquipedalian" is a longer word than any I used above.

Okay. Whatever. I'm happy for you.

 

I thought it was meant as ironic, self-effacing humor.

 

"sesquipedalian loquaciousness"

You're probably right.

 

"In fact, yes, by employing the same level of diction, I'm displaying the problematic trait."

In better words, I used big words to show how they can unintentionally get in the way of making a plain point. If the goal is successful transmission of ideas, then speaking/typing plainly does help us to parse your intended meaning.

I get it. Anyone who does a lot of reading tends to have a larger vocabulary. Instead of parse I could use "understand." Etc.

The problem is when the speech becomes so flowery with wall-to-wall verbiage (gah, word use) that it tries to lend weight or false credence (there we go again... I should say truth instead of credence) to the claim.

Additionally, when those words are used incorrectly, or carry a meaning that actually occludes (sorry, "gets in the way of") what one is trying to say, it becomes problematic.

Specifically, I'm referring to this:

Grievous was one element, that sort of corny Saturday matinee villain, mixed in to an overall darker film, which is another element. Two elements. Discursive implies multiple, if not rambling, incoherent tones. He's not Jazz. He's one-note.

 

The other day, you had a problem with my paragraph lengths and took several swipes at me.

Now, you're critiquing my word usage.

You sound just like one of those goons on IMDb.

Yeah, well, on the one hand, I'm (allegedly) difficult to "parse"...

But then, as you just indicate, you understood me just fine. You simply don't agree with my opinions.

That, to me, looks like the real root of the problem; you'd rather attack the way I write than debate, challenge, or refute what I say.

No, Grievous is not complex, per se. I meant, in relation to the more serious elements of the film, he stands out, somewhat -- and that, to me, is what makes him a summation of the discursive/complex tapestry of the former movies (they're a colourful puzzle, basically, that you can't solve). Even Lucas called the design of Grievous "weird" in the "Making Of" book. My contention is that he stands for something in a more general sense about the crazy-quilt construction of the prequel trilogy; and Star Wars as a whole.

 

Cryogenic usually doesn't bother making plain points.

 

It's more that I want to respond to individual points, but have to unpack and divide each one up, which is time consuming, especially when you make a multitude of claims in each post. Unpacking those points, when you hit a critical mass of things you disagree with, then just becomes this draining process rather than an energetic debate. It's ten rounds of verbal tag per reply and that is simply not a compelling way to suss out points. The language becomes a gauntlet to hammer through, because almost every sentence, if not every clause, has to be dismantled.

 

Well we could all just list our rankings and call it a day if paragraphs are too tough:

1. John Wick
2. John Wick 2
3. Revenge of the Sith

 

Less vapor, more substance would be ideal. Paragraphs are fine if delineated adequately, especially for screen consumption.

 

My point was that Griev is a bigger character and more important plot wise than either Phasma and Hux. But he is just as underdeveloped and uninteresting.
But since his role is bigger and he is onscreen more, this lack becomes more of a problem than with Phasma and Hux. At least to me.
Since you wanted to compare Griev with them, I don't think he can be compared with Phasma since her role is this small. And not with Hux either since he has no interaction with the heroes.

Hardly, AotC does try to make Dooku seem ambiguous and the audience would not be sure if he is a good guy or bad guy at first. This, to me, failed as the crawl makes him sound like a bad guy and then Padme accuses him of murder. And later we see that, yes he was trying to kill her.
Dooku is a fallen Jedi and he knew Qui-Gon well. Why did he turn and why is he working with Sidious? Not answered.
The character had loads of potential for interesting drama but that went unexplored due to his limited screen time.
Same with Griev, he was supposed to be an intimidating villain, a Jedi killer. But he kills zero Jedi in the film. And mostly runs away from fights. Also him being the general comes out of nowhere as is his sudden importance. Having him in AotC and showing him to be a Jedi killer and a tactical genius would build towards RotS and build tension. How will the Jedi deal with this very deadly enemy?
Instead we get a joke of a villain that is all talk and no delivery.

[/QUOTE]

Hux is serviceable in TFA, I don't much like him but I don't dislike him like I do Griev. Phasma was just there, didn't add much but didn't bore me either.
Hux did have a role to play, he just wasn't that good in it. Phasma you could cut.
Griev has a much bigger role than either but was worse in it.
So their introduction wasn't anything great but something might be made with them.
Griev was introduced and killed off in the same film. So no potential for more here.

Take the original version of the OT.
Both Jabba and the Emperor were mentioned in ANH but not seen. ESB showed a little of the Emperor and mentioned Jabba again. And then we finally saw them in the third film.
This is build up.
Dooku gets introduced in the second film, no build up. As is the seps movement.
Griev comes out of nowhere in the third film and is now suddenly a major player.
Here I think that Lucas didn't take advantage of the three three films he had.

He did have Mace in TPM but not doing much and his name was never mentioned.
Bail was in AotC but his big part was in the next film.
But in both cases Lucas did introduce a character in one film but the bigger part was in subsequent films.

Bye for now.
Old Stoneface

 

Yes, this is a big problem with General Grievous. The plot demands that he be there but there's no free time to develop his character to any kind of consistent personality. It doesn't help that Lucas was tinkering with the character right through the production process, and in general created one that has dissonance in his position and presentation, being much weaker and more comic than he should be. I agree that this is less of an issue for Phasma and Hux, because they don't have a central role in the plot. Although Phasma seems like a cheap attempt to create a Boba Fett-ish character to me (and I don't like BF).
And Grievous was a wasted character in the overall sense plot, as Obi-wan simply needs to be apart from Anakin, and in terms of character development, as Obi-wan's character is not affected at all by their conflict, thus making his death a waste of a great looking but severely underdeveloped character.
As you said he needed to appear in more than one film, and I think he needed to be stronger and more serious, and his death wasn't required.

 

"In better words, I used big words to show how they can unintentionally get in the way of making a plain point. If the goal is successful transmission of ideas, then speaking/typing plainly does help us to parse your intended meaning."

"So this is how self expression dies? With thunderous likes....."

 

The same can be said about Boba Fett, he is mostly just there in TESB and ROTJ to serve the plot of separating Han from the rest of the heros. Like GG, he is comedic during the fight at the Sarlacc pit.

However I believe Plasma hurts the plot of her film much more than GG did. The FO soldiers are supposed to be super fanatically loyal to the FO, yet their commander easily and quickly betrays her cause rather than die to protect it and is almost an insult. At least in the films GG had the brains to not get captured and knew when to run and fight another day. Plasma is a bigger coward than GG imho. Personally I don't think GG really needed much character development as he is a side character as is the war a side plot to the main plot of Anakin's fall and Palps rise to power. The clone war is in itself a red herring by Palps. Like with Boba, we know as much as we need to know about GG, he is a foolhearty, weaselly, ruthless, bad tempered, low regard for his own troops, and likely easily controlled by Sids like the rest of the CIS leaders. What we know about Plasma is she is strict with Finn but caves easily which makes her characterization a mess. Hux is just a generic movie nazi officer who thinks he is better than Kylo, basically a Admiral Motti clone put into Tarkin's role. Plasma's character undermine an entire fraction which is pretty bad.

 

I tend to agree that Phasma's quick relenting also felt off and misplaced. Like they played the scene only for comedic effect and it undermined what was supposed to be incredibly powerful training, indoctrination and loyalty. I mean, GG is basically a Scooby Doo villain, but her mini-story resolves with the same sort of slapstick ending too. Tonally, I do think that whole segment, while amusing, is too much comedy and undermines the threat the heroes are supposed to be in.

 

I wonder if they originally captured a regular FO stormtrooper but changed to Plasma to give her more screen time. Many view stormtroopers as keystone cops and JJ. may wanted to have that element, such as the scene where two of them back away when Kylo is slicing up a computer.

 

That's hardly Keystone Cops. That would be all of the battledroid slapstick in the PT. The Roger Roger jokes got old 10 mins into TPM.

 

I don't view stormtroopers as keystone cops, but many other people do. Often joking about how ineffective they are. JJ in an attempt to please fans likely followed this common belief. As for rodger rodger, I think the bds only said it a couple of times in TPM, but it was quite overused in TCW. It is not until ROTS when the b1s turned into so much slapstick which got worse in TCW. In TPM they are quite emotionless and lack fear, though not bright.

 

TFA went in the opposite direction. Depicted them as quite competent. Those two turning around showed smarts & common sense.

Those jokes were throughout the whole PT. It was funnier when it was in Airplane! in the 70's:



Unfortunately Lucas cribbed his PT humor from dubious real-world sources like that. Another example was the pod race humor including the announcers. You can see where the whole thing came from (& the character of Sebulba):

 

Even wacky racers borrowed alot of ideas from Ben Her, the cartoon was a parody of it at times with the fanciful cheating like in the film (spiked hub), so it fits. In real life racing, cheating is very common and racing bodies work hard to stop it. Look up Smokey Yunick, he was a clever gearhead who also invented some shady ways to win. Like putting a football in the gas tank to fool inspectors about the tank's capacity. Lucas did some hotrodding in his youth and probably knew about the cheating. Heck early Nascar drivers were rum runners as their main jobs, and hotrodding got its start from bootlegging during probation to outrun cops.

 

The battle droids saying Roger Roger occurs once in the films I believe, in TPM, when the droids check on Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan in the gas room.

That's it.

Go ahead and blame ROTS or TCW for making the droids more comedic, but in TPM and AOTC the battledroids are never used for slapstick or comedy. It's only the characters around them that are, like Jar-Jar and C-3PO.

Until ROTS of course, where we get the weirdly high-pitched Super battledroids. That's about it though, other than the droids in general having a slightly higher pitch as well.

 

Nope, several more times.

Would've been cowardice if Finn had gone along with the others & murdered the villagers. To get away from the FO after that took guts. Just as with Nazi deserters in WWII. Sounds like to you they'd be wimps!
Those troops showed common sense. Who wants to go near Kylo Ren when he's having one of his fits?? I'm sure an Imperial trooper would avoid Vader while he's choking some poor sap.

Yeah, very common for someone to sabotage an opponent's vehicle then snigger & twirl their mustache. TPM gave us Wacky Pod-Racers