JCC Embrace The FU - Formerly the STAR WARS IS BAD thread

The hazards of growing up on a monoclimate desert planet homeschooled by your aunt and uncle. His fingers are going numb and he probably thinking how weird it is that something can be so cold it dies.

 

Enhanced and expanded Bespin doesn't make ESB better?

 

Totally disagree. The unseen monster is the scariest. Think of Jaws; the big robot shark chewing on the boat wasn't nearly as scary as the vague shadow in the water accompanied by John Williams' amazing 2-note theme.

 

Yeah, I will say heading into episode 6 it kind felt like the season was lacking something on the level of The Eye or One Way Out but then it delivered in these last three.

 

I don't know that anything added to the Special Editions actually makes any of them better.

But I do know that ESB SE is the only one I don't object to as a version.

 

The first SE versions in ‘97 made the very annoying addition to TESB of having Luke scream as he fell (intentionally, mind you) on Cloud City after his duel with Vader. Thankfully they removed that scream for the 2004 DVD.

 

The funniest part was that it was a repurposed scream from the Emperor.

Now that I think of it, was this an attempted ‘rhyme’?

 

I don't get why some people are saying Dedra didn't want what happened on Ghorman, she suggested this tactic to Krennic after all. That's the way I read it anyway. She's obviously shaken by what's happening, but I read that as the experience of the reality being different to the theory.

 

Gilroy made a film a few years back called Michael Clayton, in it Tilda Swinton played an absolutely fascinating character who's not a million miles away from Dedra. She's like a corporate lawyer or something, but the thing is she's all front, she has to psyche herself and prepare like crazy just to function, but inside she's an absolute mess.

 

It's also a matter of priorities. Dedra does not look like a person who feels a sadistic pleasure in inflicting pain, though she is willing to do it if it will lead to a personal advantage.
And if she finds herself in a position in which she has to choose between carrying on her task efficiently or sparing innocent lives, she is going to choose the former.

The core of her view of the world nicely emerged in her final exchange with Syril, when she says something like "they were working on this since long ago, if I did not do this, someone else would" which is a very typical alibi people use when they perform some convenient yet questionable action.

When it comes to the Ghorman project, she absolutely hated the idea of working on it. Though, when she is given the responsibility, her professionalism and her career ambitions are switched on and they trump everything else. So, after Krennic insists in asking her opinion, she comes up with the most horrific yet practically effective plan to achieve the goal.

 

Could be a degrees of separation thing too, like she’s fine with the idea of ordering somebody to kill everyone being efficient but actually being the one to oversee killing everyone is uncomfortable for her. Not uncomfortable enough for her to not do it though.

 

Well, from certain points-of-view.

 

I haven't watched anything but the despecialized (and my favorite the semi-specialized) versions in so long that it's honestly almost shocking when I see a clip of something like ANH Jabba or Jedi Rocks because I've forgotten how ridiculously terrible they are.

 

The people got what they wanted.

Spoiler

A last B2 appearance!

 

Episode 10

Spoiler

Y'know I was like "Oh no, Luthen is going to die in that dumb wig." When Dedra showed up and then she called out his ridiculous wig ahaha, Dedra is the best. But he passed properly not wearing that dumb wig, not for lack of trying! I guess the medics removed it when he was undergoing treatment

i guess the dumb wig Is part of his cover? Luthen knows how to spot a fake.

 

Spoiler: spoiler

I hate to be a downer but honestly were these last three episodes really needed? This feels like Solo: A Star Wars Story movie logic where everything has to be set up to lead to the next thing. The lead up to Rogue One is unnecessary, completely. If you want to watch Rogue One, you can watch Rogue One. Rogue One starts the story of the Death Star plans exactly where it needs to start (you can argue that for A New Hope too, honestly). Also we don't at all get to see how Dedra catches on to Luthen. It's told, not shown. This season should have just been one long storyline, just have the Ghorman stuff happen over the course of the year, Krennic could be in charge of that and have Dedra be focused on finding Luthen. Then, as Mon Mothma's giving her speech and has to be extracted, Luthen is about to get caught. A decision has to be made about who to extract. And then after Mon Mothma escapes, the season ends.

 

Spoiler

I think Episodes 8-9 were the overall plot climax, the "Star Wars" climax, and then Episode 10-12 were the climax of the more personal stories, focusing on Andor, Kleya, Luthen, Dedra, and others we've gotten to know.

I'm glad Kleya survived, and Dedra's "end" was actually pretty satisfying. I wonder if she'll be sent to one of the same kind of prison labor camp as Cassian...

RIP to Lonnie.

How Heert died was something I didn't think we'd actually see.

I'm a little unsure of why the other director, Partagaz, died? Were going to try to pin the leak on on him - if so, why, when Dedra is already imprisoned for it?

I'm glad we got to see some of Luthen and Kleya's "origin" story. I knew they were close, but I didn't know he basically raised her from so young of an age. If they weren't rebels... their dynamic is nearly what I'd imagine a typical "rule of two" Sith dynamic to have been while they were in hiding.

While no fault of the actor... I'm kind of puzzled why they decided to write Bail Organa this way. He's not unreasonable, but he's not very likeable.

Another casualty of this not being 4 seasons is I wish we got to see when there were enough recruits that new leaders started to whip the rebellion into shape, and its new leaders making that break from Luthen. I'd guess that would be Bail Organa's people? And those other senators who I guess are theoretically as important as Mon Mothma and Bail Organa. I wonder how Draven came into all this.

We did see Perrin, definitely wish there was more, but I guess it shows what happened... he was left behind, and going on drunk affairs. I hope we'll get to see the reaction with him and Leida at some point, and see what becomes of them in the Rebellion and New Republic times...

A callback to Cassian's sister, but I guess one of those mysteries he'll die without ever knowing...

I was pretty sure Bix was going to be shown with a kid, and that it would lead into just days/hours before Rogue One.

Other Star Wars media is sure to cover Kleya, Bix, Dedra, Wilmon, and Vel.


And this was a cool design:

 

Spoiler

So is The 1 BBY title card wrong because the last Three episodes are like 48 hours BBY. Leads into R1 very well though!

And I guess Saw blew himself up when he was screaming and huffing bomb fumes like in between episode 9 and 10

 

@BigAl6ft6
I might be confused, but to my understanding, in our calendar system as well, the year 1BC is followed immediately by 1AD.
There is no such thing as the "year zero".

 

I thought that was an essential capper to an amazing show.

Spoiler

While the penultimate arc was what galvanised the Rebellion into existence, this arc was Luthan and Keyla, in a coup de grace as the Empire closed in, gifting the Rebellion what it needed to actually win. Without it, they discover the Death Star and a path to destroy it too late. Without it they’re forming a new ring around Yavin, while their home planets become asteroid fields. Luthan and Keyla were both the only people who had the intelligence network to get the info and have the whole thing come together, but Luthan was the only one with the cynical mind to believe it to be true without second thought. He immediately knows the Empire is brutal enough to build something like the Death Star. Whilst the leadership of the Rebellion doubts it and needs to think it over, Luthan kills his source, sacrifices himself and does what he can to get Keyla away with his final warning. I also like how he proves Dedra wrong to her face - he’s not someone, like her, who merely orders others around whilst he’s high and dry. He’d rather gut himself with a 60 century old knife than tell what he knows. He also manages to take down three high ISB officers in the scramble to stop what he started (and makes Krennic late for a meeting).

I also like that it makes the Death Star less of a mad supervillain weapon, and more of a foreboding but unseen spectre, that threatens not only its intended targets, but also destroys its creators.

 

I wrote my review of the final arc elsewhere, but I feel like sharing it here as well

Spoiler

 

On Kleya,

Spoiler

it seemed to me that she wanted to stay because she didn’t want to leave Luthan and her old life behind. The part about not wanting to go to Yavin because they hate Luthan was an excuse, even if it spoke to the deeper reason why she didn’t want to leave. Her entire life had led to the Rebellion being set up, and it had reached its natural end point with the discovery of the Death Star. Once she handed off that information, she felt that was the end of her purpose. She knew (or at least believed) that she was heading to a place of irrelevance. She yearned to go down with Luthan, but ended up being saved by the very thing she had worked to set up.

On Dedra,

Spoiler

I thought the point was more that her investigation wasn’t the important part anymore (as Luthan tells her, the rebellion isn’t in his shop, and she’s far too late). Instead it was the leaks caused by her investigation which were actually consequential. It’s the irony of the story that it was in her efforts to find Luthan so outlasting its usefulness that it actually turned out to become an asset of Luthan (they found out about the Death Star from her files). In that way, the episode wasn’t about Dedra, it was about Luthan; she became a cog in his intelligence network. The tables had been completely reversed. It didn’t matter what crum of information led to finding him - what mattered was that in finding him they created their own undoing. Whilst Luthan was raging about the complexity and the sloppiness as they got deeper in, it was Dedra’s sloppiness, in fact, that led to her direct downfall - subverting orders and feeling the need to lecture her enemy are what did her in, as was the need to comb through Death Star files. Luthan’s didn’t lead anywhere except, ultimately, getting him the ultimate prize.

 

Great show. Super tiny nitpick: why "in Ghorman", "in Yavin", "in Coruscant"? As with the lack of aliens, the show sometimes made me wonder if Gilroy is trying to remind us subliminally that it's not actually in space but right here on earth.