ST Plot holes and lost exposition - real issues or not?

What "lies" is the Phantom Republic spreading? That's one of a million things I'd love answered about the state of galactic politics.

 

Watched the original today and there was no exposition in that movie.
Nope.

The movie told a story and had a coherent plot that was maintained throughout.
Every scene and every piece of dialog had a purpose and kept things moving from one place to the next.
Nothing was introduced that was not relevant to the plot and the story immediately or in some cases the next episode.
Everything fit together as part of the larger narrative leading up to the final conclusion.
Sure, were there places where you were like "how is that possible"? Of course.
But those were relatively rare because most of the rest was very reasonable and easy to follow.

1) Princess Leia on a diplomatic shuttle from Alderan sends droids to find Obi Wan
2) Princess Leia is captured by Darth Vader
3) The search for Ben Kenobi led to finding Luke who lives with Uncle on a farm and wants to be a pilot
4) Obi Wan is the key to helping defeat the death star
5) Obi Wan explains the force and the dark side and introduces Darth Vader and the Jedi and his father
6) Luke decides to join the fight against the empire
7) the Death star is a super weapon that is fully operational and will be used to run the galaxy through fear, but the resistance is a threat that must be defeated
8) Ben Kenobi and Luke need a ship to get to Alderan
9) They pick up Han Solo and Chewbacca who will take them to Alderan on the Millenium falcon
10) Leia resists giving up the location of the resistance
11) The Death Star moves to and destroys Leia's home world Alderan to force her to tell them where the resistance base is located
12) The Millenium Falcon arrives in Alderan space but the planet has been destroyed, Luke learns more about force on board
13) The Falcon is captured by the Death Star
14) They rescue Leia and escape but Obi Wan is killed by Vader (disappears and becomes "more powerful")
15) Leia takes them to Yavin IV with the plans for the death star to find a weakness
16) In the tactical command center they come up with a plan to defeat the death star
17) Luke meets friend and pilot from home pilot who vouches for his ability to fly a fighter
17) Luke uses the force to destroy death star during the mission from Yavin
18) Vader is only survivor as his tie fighter is knocked into space by dog fight.
19) Luke, Solo and Chewbacca are given awards as heroes
20) The end.

That is a story and plot told through a movie. It is not separate piece of 'exposition' in the movie, it is the movie.
TFA is a movie with no central plot or story. It introduces multiple plots and multiple stories that are not fully told and left hanging at the end of the movie.

 

I don't get it , some of you seem to be saying that the FO hasn't really done anything before the start of the movie , but we know they've been taking kids at birth and raising them as stormtroopers , and building snother DS out of a planet , so they've been at it for at least 20 years .

the Republic didn't notice this ?

 

Thread merge (and title updated).

 

As has been probably gone over in several places:

In ANH I think it was very ably done throughout the entire movie. That is a massive part of the fabric of the film. That really is the major role of Leia in the movie (the political figure) as she introduces us to Vader and Tarkin scenes, the Death Star Senate is dissolved scene, Obi-Wan and Luke, the actions of the Empire and Stormtroopers, Han the smuggler, 3PO telling us all sorts of information. Then of course the cut Luke and Biggs scene.

I have to say it's all over the movie.

TFA doesn't go to quite the same lengths as ANH does. That isn't the part of George's stories that they were pulling from.

Could it have been done better in TFA? Sure.

Was it done just well enough?

Probably but as ever we are talking about the difference between the vast regular audience and their experience and we the fan audience who are going to watch this over and over and pull information from all the other sources. The Visual Guide alone gives the basic backstory nevermind the details that I would assume are in the novel.

 

Do you guys think Senator Binks died in the explosion?

 

The major difference here is that this is NOT the first film any longer. It's now #7. 30 years has transpired since we left off, and the picture Abrams and Disney painted of the galaxy is an incomplete jumbled mess.

We don't need to know everything, and some elements are fine to leave for future installments, like ANH did. The amount of lacking information about the leadership and factions in the galaxy is too much, IMHO. Some exposition should have been made so that we knew the impact of the losses by the 2 factions. Losing the planets to the ridiculously impossible weapon was not felt at all because we dont know if that wiped them out, or if it was a minor loss, etc. Same for the First Order's super weapon planet and troops. It's implied by General Hitler's speech (Hux) and Finn's acknowledgement of seeing the strike on Hosnian that this strike crippled the Republic, by losing their seat of power and fleet. It's also implied that the First Order has additional resources by Snoke skyping in all the time from a different location.

More exposition and set up of the state of affairs should have been done. Not to answer everything, but at least to confirm and make the audience feel the losses, etc.

 

It's obvious we don't need to know everything it's the first movie of the series. Some people are very strange about this film. You want them to explain EVERYTHING in the very first film. Everything that is needed to know is told in this movie, and everything else makes sense to be found out in the sequels.

 

The Republican noticed it, or at least Leia did hence her building up a resistance.

 

No no no. I want them to explain EVERYTHING to me now. Then I will proceed to complain that they shouldn't have wasted so much time giving back story and explaining everything, and should have done more "showing vs. telling". I cannot be satisfied, and it is their fault.

 

I accept that TFA is a different movie telling a different story from the original Star Wars but within the same galaxy and themes of light and dark.
Its purpose is to introduce multiple plot line and characters as opportunities for further growth.
That is a fundamental deliberate act on the part of the movie makers, which kind of makes sense but I am not sure it is a good thing.

How this plays out we wont know until years from now.

 

I don't think a film leaving plot elements unresolved is and of itself a bad thing. But there is a difference between that and something that makes you go 'huh?'. TESB didn't have any 'huh?' moments from what I recall. TESB left 3 outstanding questions to be resolved... 1) Who is the "other" that Yoda spoke of? 2) Is Darth Vader really Luke's father? 3) Will they manage to rescue Han? I think the questions being raised in relation to TFA are more to do with internal logic than hanging plot threads (outside of 'is Rey a Skywalker or not?,)

 

the fact i and many others had to google the current state of the galaxy and the difference between the republic and the resistance means yes, they should have explained this. this info being released in a series of young audience books is not good enough. a few lines in the opening crawl could have solved this problem easily.

 

can I ask what links you read ? I'd like to read up on that stuff too .

 

http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Journey_to_Star_Wars:_The_Force_Awakens

 

Agreed.

To those that argue ANH had just as many questions, remember that in that story you knew nothing about anything going into it (assuming it was the first one you saw), so a line about an emperor dissolving the senate was all you really needed to understand who was in power. Plus the names GALACTIC EMPIRE and REBELLION kind of give it away.

In TFA we have the FIRST ORDER, the NEW REPUBLIC, and the RESISTANCE, so I wouldn't be surprised if some people left the movie thinking there were 3 distinct groups at play, and wondering where the third was the whole time. There's actually more politics in the state of affairs with this story, we just aren't keyed into any of them, unless you read the other media. You shouldn't have to read a book to understand the backdrop of the story, especially when it's made out to be a simple good vs evil one.

To those who think it will be explained in the next film, why should it be? This was the first story of the new saga, this was the perfect time to explain the situation without it feeling like exposition. Plus, we shouldn't need to wait for another movie to understand why or how things happened in the first one. As many others have pointed out, it wouldn't take more than a few lines, either in the scrawl or as dialogue, to explain the whole situation. We have two main characters that should know almost nothing about the situation to be our surrogates: Rey because she's lived on a backwater planet and probably doesn't hear much, and Finn because he's only ever heard First Order propaganda and should have no clue what's really going on.

 

I just don't understand all those complaints about lack of exposition : we had more than enough elements to understand what was going on in this film.
Now, for those who like to complain, remember :
_ this is a movie, not a book : you simply don't have the room to expose everything, and must stick to the essential, otherwise, the rythm of the movie will suffer.
_ this is only the first chapter of a trilogy : it's perfectly fine to let some elements unexplored for now, as other movies will cover that up.
_ this trilogy is part of an expanded universe, so anything barely covered by those movie will be explored in other medium (spin-off movies / cartoons / comics / novels / video games...)
_ failing all that, you still have the power of your imagination (and a bit of logic) to fill the gaps : use it instead of whinning for pre-made answers !

So, questions like "How did Maz end up in possession of Anakin's Lightsaber" or "What's the true nature of the Resistance and its relation with the Republic" are IRRELEVANT in that movie (you don't need those to understand TFA) : thus, it's better to not waste screen time with those, to keep the movie more entertaining.

 

People complained the PT had too much exposition, now people are complaining this one doesn't have enough!

 

Do you really think the rhythm of the movie would have been ruined if the opening crawl had a sentence explaining the two sides each control half the galaxy (or whatever it is), or to have Hux's speech include a line like "They claim they want peace, but then fund the resistance to attack our planets", or to have Finn question the resistance's motives since all he'd ever heard was first order propaganda about restoring order to the galaxy?

I absolutely agree about Maz and the lightsaber. It's an interesting question, but ultimately doesn't need to be answered for me to understand what's going on. However, I think the relationship between the three groups is relevant to understanding TFA. If you, or anyone, could answer the following questions, using only what's said (or seen) in the movie as evidence, I'll stop arguing that further exposition was required.

Who's the dominant power in the galaxy?
Why is there a resistance?
Why doesn't the New Republic fight the First Order?

I've still only seen the movie once, so maybe I missed the answers to these questions, and I'd genuinely like to know what I'm looking for the next time I see it. These are the types of things that establish the stakes of the story, and give large set-pieces emotional depth.

 

I will bring this to light though. Doesn't Han allow Finn to keep the rifle he was holding before he left with the other two pilots heading towards the Outer rim? Then two minutes later after the First Order Attacks, He's claiming he has no weapon as Maz hands him the Lightaber? What did he leave it on the other people's ship, did it disappear on route? What Gives?

 

Sure they are. And they are precisely correct. I can understand that this is a serial and the "setup" movie. But it is plainly obvious that a checklist was made of "things we want in this movie" and the plot was simply a weak attempt to string those things together.

The Falcon was lost for over a decade, in an unknown part of the GALAXY and Han just happens by the first time it is flown in 12 years? Sure. That's just one example of which there are many. Like over 25 just that I was able to count. Exposition could have been well used in any number of scenes and would have gone a long way toward connecting the audience to the film. Not to mention solidifying the plot.

I don't hate the movie. It was fun and I enjoyed it. But puh-lease. Spare me. The plot was terrible.

 

I counted this one also. Han JUST gave him a blaster so where is it? He has it again later at the Resistance base.

 

I think we will get the hosnian prime stuff next movie because there was some important people on that balcony. But it wouldn't have really fit in this movie - for the story that was being told - there will be time to reflect on that in episode VIII

 

Man I hope you are right. I'm counting on you Rian Johnson. I get the impression it will be glossed over never to be mentioned again.