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2. A New Hope - IV
3. Return of the Jedi - VI
4. Revenge of the Sith - III
5. Attack of the Clones - II
6. The Phantom Menace - I
7. The Force Awakens - VII
The first six have something TFA doesn't have: original ideas, a creative vision and an original story.
TFA felt like the 4th Indy-movie, to me.
(....no I'm just kidding myself 8-> )
Another question. It is well known that in all the previous films an arm has been cut as an homage to Kurosawa's Jojimbo
About Craig's cameo,
I can appreciate that. I am curious to know what your top 2 Bond films are though.
:-SS
If it's not DAD and CR'67 I'll be disappointed in @fjdinardo. ;)
lol @DaltonCraig007
my top 2 are
1. The World Is Not Enough
2. Moonraker
Return of the Jedi........umm, film has an excellent ending, but i thought the bit with the forest teddy bears (some call them Ewoks), was a bit silly, though fun.
The original film SW, well that's obviously great.
The second trilogy, was OK, but suffered from too much political debating scenes, and the films lacked any sort of joy.
Overall, Empire is probably the best film.
Was it as good or better than entries in the original trilogy? I wouldn't say so. Maybe that is nostalgia getting in the way, but Force Awakens wasn't completely perfect. I did have a few issues, and I guess I'll cover those before diving into the positives.
My BIGGEST problem with the film....did we really need another Death Star? Seriously. One of my knocks on ROTJ was that the 2nd Death Star felt like a bit of a retread, but now this is the THIRD friggin time they've had to destroy a planet busting weapon. I guess you could even sort of count the Droid Control Ship from Phantom Menace as a big bad base they had to blow up at the end, so that's four! They even did a whole scene telling us "Its like the Death Star....but BIGGER!". To me, the movie wasn't even really about stopping the Starkiller Base, so it just felt tacked on. Cutting it out could have avoided comparisons to A New Hope, and prevented the last star battle from feeling tacked on. And honestly, they had enough character reasons that were relevant to get all the characters on the base. Han wanted to bring his son home. Finn wanted to save Rey who was held captive there. The Resistance wanted to stop the First Order from finding the map to Luke. You could have made Solo and Finn's mission to save Rey and destroy any information they have on Luke's whereabouts with the starship battle serving as a way to draw the First Order's attention while Han and Finn sneak into the base and accomplish their mission. That said, the one major positive to the Starkiller Base was how it drained its power from a nearby sun, which affected the lighting towards the end, which made the bridge scene even better, so it did work for that.
And that is really part of the main overall problem with the film is that it is a hair too much like A New Hope. There were many references and callbacks and borrowing of plot points to that original film. Don't get me wrong. I love the original film and this movie has enough going for it to stand out on its own, but it wasn't necessary to have another Death Star. A droid carrying the important mcguffin that drives the story? Did we need a retread of the Cantina scene? Little nods like the Holichess or the remote and things of that nature felt a tad much as well. To me, Star Wars should be bove winking to the audience and going "See what we did there? You remember that, right? Huh huh". It is a balancing act and working in the old stuff with the new setting, story, and characters is hard and for the most part, they made it feel organic. I just wish a few of those could be avoided.
And this isn't a knock, but while we're on the topic of nostalgia, did anybody think of this? When you think of locations in the first film, what do you think of? Sand and deserts. When you think of the second movie, what do you think of? Most likely snow. When you think of the third movie, what do you think of? Forests and trees. This movie had all three of those. I won't knock them for not having unique locations since I feel like the prequels pretty much exhausted every unique location you could possibly have. I mean once you've done Lava planet, that's pretty much as far as you can go.
And I know this is going to sound weird as one of the knocks on the prequels was that there was too much in terms of the politics, but I would have liked more of an explanation of how the Republic works. Actually, I think I would have liked it more if there was no Republic. What if the last galactic war left the galaxy without any uniform government and the fighting between the Rebellion and Galactic Empire (turned Resistance and First Order) tore the galaxy apart and left it in anarchy as these two factions fight over land without any government overseeing any of it.
Finally, this is a small issue, and really more the fault of the marketing but...Captain Phasma did, uh, nothing. I was so excited that they casted Gwendolyn Christie and Phasma looked like she was going to be a major player. But....she did nothing. Who the hell was that random Trooper with the anti-lightsaber weapon? Why was he the only Stormtrooper with such a weapon? Personally, I would have liked it more is Phasma was the one that Finn fought. At least she was established and she would have, you know, done something.
Now lets get to the good stuff!
First and foremost, I loved the new characters. Rey and Finn were great and had great chemistry with each other. Kylo Ren turned out to be an effective bad guy. BB-8 is friggin' adorable and the actors did a really good job playing off of the prop. Even Poe was likeable in the little that he did and had good chemistry with Finn. And for her one real scene, Maz Kanata was a fun character. She was Yoda-ish in a way, but different enough to be memorable. If the new characters didn't work, then the movie wouldn't work, no matter how much nostalgia was thrown at us. Fortunately, the characters worked, the actors were likable, and they were able to carry the movie.
As for Kylo Ren, I figured he would have some relation to the classic characters, so him being Han and Leia's son was no surprise, but it served the movie very well. What made Vader so great was how casually menacing he was. He wouldn't throw temper tantrums or rant and rave. He was always in control, but would be exceedingly ruthless at the same. Like him just casually choking out officers that let him down. The show Star Wars Rebels had a great moment with him where he proposed cruel plans to draw out the rebel fugitives as if he was ordering coffee. I highlight this aspect to Vader's character because Ren actually plays it differently. Ren does get mad when things don't go he was and he will rage out the second he isn't getting what he wants. That makes him different from Vader, in a good way, and it displays an inner turmoil just waiting to bubble over. Actually, you know what. I just thought of this. Kylo Ren is basically the Prequel version of Anakin Skywalker. He's a greedy whiner that craves more power. Kylo works much better because A) You have a better actor and B) He's actually the bad guy, so we're supposed to hate him, lol.
How were the old characters? Well Han and Chewie were the bridge between the old and the new and they were great. They were still their loveable selves and they were great with the Finn and Rey. Han's admiration of Rey and giving advice to Finn were nice moments, and for the knocking I just did about them referencing A New Hope too much, I was glad to see Han not become a straight up Obi-Wan. It would have been easy to just make him the old guy that tells stories and gives sage advice, but no. He is still the thief with a heart of gold that we all love. Chewie is also still the loveable sidekick and his interactions with Han and Finn were spot on.
The other classic characters played much smaller roles, which I was fine with. The new cast needed to shine and for what we got of Leia, 3PO, R2, and even Luke, I was happy. It was nice to see them and it was nice to see them play a part in this experience. I also fully defend Luke being saved for the very last scene. It ended the movie on a major high, a big cliffhanger,and that was what the movie, it was the moment that was built up from the opening crawl onward, and having Luke out of it allowed the new characters to get over. And Leia, for the little bit of time she got, made her parts count. It was cute seeing her with Han again.
Building off of the characters, I really appreciated that they made the movie funny. Star Wars is supposed to be fun and have comical moments. The first movie is loaded with legitimately funny interactions (Han's intercom bit cracks me up to this day), and even Empire Strikes Back, the darkest entry, has funny moments and interactions. This movie had legitimately funny interactions. BB-8 playing wingman for Finn? Hysterical. The Stormtroopers going "nope" and walking the other way when Kylo was throwing a fit? Hysterical. I like to laugh and Star Wars is supposed to be fun, and I was fearful that in tacking this project seriously, they'd make the film overly serious and overly dark and, NOPE. It has that classic Star Wars vibe of fun and adventure mixed with drama and it worked well.
What were some of the great moments?
Loved the opening sequence. That was how you kick off a new trilogy. It was brutal and vicious and established everything you needed to know without getting too bogged down in dialogue, much like how A New Hope started.
As much as I said the starship battle at the end felt tacked on, the one in the middle where the Resistance saved the group and the Tie Fighter/Falcon chase were both very cool and very nice.
Speaking of all that, the look of the film was very well handled. If I had it my way, there would be no CGI at all, but everything looked very nice, and the film definitely had more of a classic organic look to it that the prequels were lacking. And it was nice to have practical effects and sets again.
Now lets talk about the bridge scene...my favorite moment in the movie and also the most heartbreaking. It was handled perfectly. I knew from the first trailer that Han was going to die. I felt it. When he got on that bridge to reach out to his son, I knew it wasn't going to end well for Han. But it was still a tense moment. The acting was great, and Chewie, Rey, and Finn sort of acted like we did...waiting and holding our breath to see what would happen. When Kylo cut down his father, our beloved Han Solo, it was like he stuck that saber in my heart. And even worse, Chewie's reaction was devastating. Even worse than that, cutting to Leia as she felt his loss (ala Obi-Wan for Alderaan and Yoda for the Jedi) hit me right in the feels.
Now the lightsaber battle, THIS is what I look for in a lightsaber fight. It doesn't have to be top notch choreography. If anything it wouldn't make sense because these guys are new or newish to the sabers, where as in the prequels it did make sense because that was the peak of the Jedi. But, if you build up the characters, build up the tension, build up everything to that point, and everything works well. I wasn't surprised that Rey turnedout to be the true Force sensitive over Finn, but again, you great moments out of that. I cheered at the lightsaber grab and the ensuing fight was appropriate and tense.
All of that said, there is plenty to look forward too in the future. Where does Finn go from here and will we ever find out how he broke his programming? I am almost certain that Rey will be revealed as a Skywalker, most likely Luke's daughter (Mara Jade as the mommy?!?!? Yeah, lets get that!). I have heard the theory that Supreme Leader Snoke is Darth Plagues which that would actually be a nice way to tie the prequels into this as well. Also, who are The Knights of Ren? What is going to happen now that Luke is back in the mix? Episode VIII pretty much writes itself where Luke will be training Rey and Kylo Ren will be finishing his training.
And finally, yeah, John Williams music was once again great to hear.
I don't know if there is anything else to really say. I really liked The Force Awakens. It has it faults, sure, and I wouldn't say it is as good as the original trilogy, but it is definitely can be listed as being in the same class. Thoroughly enjoyable experience with great new characters, and classic fun and adventure.
I know you can hide them, but it is tempting to open them, its just human nature.
Thanks, from someone who hasn't seen the film yet. :)
Eh, nearly everyone in the world has seen a SW film, are you saying you are one of the few people who hasn't seen them?
:-O
My love of Bond just overwhelms any interest I could have for those two franchises.
HA HA! I haven t seen it yet, but I don t care if it gets spoiled. It was worth it just to read your hilarious post. Plus, I already knew about that spoiler since forever. Saw it coming a mile away.
1) The Old Guard still has it.
2) The Young Ones will soon become favourites too.
3) In Daisy Ridley a new star found we have.
4) There are moments where the HSQ goes through the roof.
In short, I would rank it third, right behind Empire... and Revenge.... Or even second, just before Revenge.
Yay, a fellow Revenge of the Sith fan!