A/V Rogue Squadron movie announced, directed by Patty Jenkins

Seems to me that her direction on those movies could have been pretty meaningless in the end result

The first one was very good, the second was terrible, and she directed both. Common sense would dictate that the difference between the 2 is what made them good/bad, ie. mostly the writing.

 

The fact that Zack Snyder's story for WW is superior makes it seem like even more of a fluke tbh.

 

As an old boss of mine used to say, "Can't make a silk purse out of a sow's ear". If the base is bad, you can only do so much.

I don't get why people keep thinking a good director is also a good director. While there is some cross over it isn't everything.

 

Saying something in preproduction is a "mess" is kinda meaningless because almost all good movies are? Like I don't know what that is supposed to mean.
The damn shark didn't work and we all know how that turned out!

 

Double

 

Have you heard anything specific? Everything I have heard is vague and frankly sounds like the standard "executive meddling from bussinesspeople who don't understand basic storytelling" story to me.

And I remember the second Wonder Woman generally being considered solid if not as good as the excellent first movie - when did the discourse change to it being terrible?

 

I don’t know that there was some big revision about the film, people seemed mixed on it upon release and that’s solidified as time has gone on and people have given the film greater thought. The Steve Trevor subplot has especially come under fire because of the uncomfortable implications with Diana using another man’s unknowing body to continue her romance with Steve.

 

When it needed to to support a "Patty Jenkins is awful and the Rogue Squadron movie will be terrible" narrative, perhaps? By most accounts the movie's greatest sin was that it was run-of-the-mill compared to its superior predecessor. It certainly wouldn't be the first time a little "it was terrible actually" revisionism was applied to one film's legacy in order to drive opinions about another, not that we in the Star Wars fandom would know anything about such things

 

The discourse I saw around it was mixed. But the plot with Trevor is problematic, as it involves both possession and lack of consent. Those are pretty heavy areas to mess up on. Not helped by Jenkins trying to spin it as a homage to dodgy 80s movies that look very different to modern eyes e.g. Big.

When you've got Forbes noticing your film being off, that's a bit of a red flag:

https://www.forbes.com/sites/danidi...orality-of-wonder-woman-1984/?sh=75c828ca3e23

 

I don't recall hearing anything particularly positive about WW84, which is why I've never bothered to watch it. Not even on HBO Max at no additional cost.

It's reception wasn't glowing and Rogue Squadron was pretty quickly dropped from the schedule in it's wake too.

 

The only thing I’ve seen is that Steve Trevor was going to be resurrected again.

 

Yeah I rented it to watch it with my wife because we both loved the original Wonder Woman. We were majorly disappointed with the movie. It was the only movie I've watched in recent years that actively bored me and after the superb first one was a major let down. Though I don't watch many movies admittedly, I wouldn't recommend this. We defientely regretted spending money for it.

I'd still be perfectly content with Jenkins making a Rogue Squadron movie but her involvement was a major plus for me during the original annoucement since I don't much care about the fighter pilot aspect of Star Wars. After WW84 this is definetely no longer a plus. If it gets made I'll happily watch it but if it doesn't I'll also not be disappointed.

 

haha seriously? oh that is 'great'.

 

wow really? It was pretty widely panned from everything I've seen, and rightly so. It was pretty bad

 

Yeah the Lazarus pit was going to be involved apparently.

 

Oh so absolute bull in other words.

That's my uncle works at Nintendo level of rumoring

 

Oh I know you can’t trust everything you read on the internet, admittedly I can’t find where I did read that. I was sure it was in the Hollywood Reporter.

 

Looks like X-Wings are back on the menu boys!:

I was aware of the subplot and controversy, and yeah that was really bad, should have mentioned that, but I also remember that often being mentioned as the main down point in an otherwise solid film.

Indeed, such a thing would be totally alien to us.

Huh.

If so, guess that makes Jenkins the biggest Steve Trevor fan out there.

 

New information in this tweet --- she originally left the movie, but LFL were like "nah just come back to it after Wonder Woman 3 yeah" and she was like "Ah sweet deal" and the movie has technically been in "active development" since but she won't know for a while yet if it's actually going to happen and even though WW3 has been cancelled we still really have no idea if Rogue Squadron is going to happen or not. Just like every other future SW movie!

Also Wonder Woman 1984 totally got an underwhelming reception and it's not at all revisionism to admit that. If we want to talk about the kind of revisionism that tries to claim later on that poorly-received movies were "good, actually," though, that's totally more in Star Wars's wheelhouse.

 

Underwhelming, or terrible? No one's arguing with underwhelming. But there's a wide gap between that and "terrible."

I'm not going to follow you down that rabbit hole, except to point out that the concept of "poorly received" is meaningless to a franchise with multiple, highly fragmented and contradictory fanbases. Even Solo, the one Star Wars film that it can legitimately be said failed at the box office, scored an A- CinemaScore. The few who actually went to see it by and large did think it was "good, actually." And the film that had the lowest CinemaScore of them all still pulled in a billion dollars at the end of the day (and wasn't exactly a slouch on that CinemaScore, not for nothing). What's the takeaway? That the Star Wars audience isn't homogenous, and it's not nearly as easy or accurate to apply blanket statements to this franchise as it is to something like WW1984.

 

I was mostly talking about prequel revisionism. And the idea that they've been "redeemed." After all, the toxically negative part of the fandom isn't the only group that insists on a strict dichotomy --- in the other direction is the worryingly large group whose blind spot is literally the entire franchise, and who act absolutely astounded when anyone has even the slightest criticism of a single Mandalorian or Book of Boba Fett episode. The toxically negative fans aren't the only ones who like to adamantly insist their opinion is and/or always was actually the majority, and who actively strive to make any sort of discourse that involves both pros and cons a nightmare.

 

To the extent that the prequels needed "redemption," they got it - not because of the type of revisionism that tries to rewrite a film's perception in the short term in order to drive narrative about the director's next one, but simply the progress of time and the evolution of ideas and thinking about them (and, of course, the changing demographics of the fanbase itself). Hard to believe but we're coming up on 24 years since TPM. That's sufficient time for a more intellectually honest re-evaluation.

 

Prequel revisionism isn't driven by intellectual honesty --- it's driven by nostalgia for the Star Wars that a lot of today's fans grew up on. It's driven by a desire for something that's comforting and familiar. It's driven by a pushback against toxic negativity that turns into a refusal to be at all critical of anything within the franchise. It's a freedom to pretend that they're good because most of the people who did evaluate them with intellectual honesty have long since moved on and aren't here to argue anymore. The same thing's going to happen to Episode IX when enough time has passed --- to a large portion of the fanbase, if it's Star Wars then it must be good, period. Especially if it's the SW from their youth. It's the furthest thing possible from intellectual honesty.

 

On the anniversary of TLJ's release, I find it funny that there's suddenly a fan war over film receptions.

 

There's no "cult of toxic positivity" in fandom working tirelessly to override decades of "intellectually honest" negative evaluations of the prequels. It's all about the changing demographics. The most virulent of the prequel haters eventually moved on, died off, or finally moderated their opinions over time. It was the latter group, along with the kids who grew up with the prequels, that drive the re-evaluation we've seen recently. And sure, nostalgia largely drove that re-evaluation. Nostalgia makes the franchise go 'round. If the argument is that a view of the prequels through rose-colored glasses can't also be intellectually honest, fair enough, but I'll add that looking back at them through the haze of decades of lingering bitterness isn't going to turn out any better as far as that goes.