The Force Awakens
Dec. 27th, 2015 06:51 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
foxinthestarsSo I saw the new Star Wars movie, thought I'd give my reactions. Reasonably SPOILER-FREE this time. Maybe I'll do more spoilery reactions later.
I enjoyed it! And the first thing I will say is that the movie succeeded very well at the A-Number-One thing it needed to do, which was being an actual honest-to-god Star Wars movie. They had me by the end of the opening text crawl, and that trademark Star Wars epic grunge aesthetic? Totally nailed it. (There's a starship graveyard in this thing; it's the perfect backdrop of grand and humble and "I would have known that was there all along if I'd just thought about it;" you just have to see it.) The new heroes (and one new villain) are engaging, and the return of the old heroes is great to see; not sure what to add on that front without getting spoilery.
I will say, though, as the movie went on, at a certain point the magic started to wear off somewhat (like about the time the Resistance showed up; not their fault, but best landmark I can find for it). After that, it felt like it got stretched too thin, like there was so much stuff in the movie that nothing had enough space to feel grounded or develop organically, which left certain people's character arc points (and the fallout therefrom) feeling hollow to me.
(Lately, I seem to ding movies a lot for that kind of problem, of feeling like characters' motivations and development, etc., were just declared and never shown to my satisfaction. Either I have become a very tough audience or the inevitable (and admittedly awesome) crowd-sourced internet exegesis has become an acceptable substitute for putting this stuff in your goddamn movie.)
My one other complaint with The Force Awakens: it is blatantly incomplete. The thing ends on what's essentially a big, lush, cinematic "To Be Continued" sign. One of the main characters' arcs is at a satisfying checkpoint; everything else is pretty much left up in the air.
But you know what? I'll be happy to see the next episode. And that's kind of what Star Wars has always been like for me. Not perfect, but good, with food for thought and a fun, immersive ride.
Oh, and I made a note to myself in the trailers that the Warcraft movie actually looked interesting. I also noticed that a lot of trailers these days try to skate by on audio/visual/visceral thrill riding and maybe a dash of pseudo-profound bullshit without actually telling you anything about the story. It was after a few of those that the Warcraft trailer came up and lo and behold, I felt like it was actually trying to sell me on its plot and themes! Don't know if I'll pop for a cookie for them yet, but it is appreciated.
ETA: CAUTION - COMMENTS CONTAIN SPOILERS.
I enjoyed it! And the first thing I will say is that the movie succeeded very well at the A-Number-One thing it needed to do, which was being an actual honest-to-god Star Wars movie. They had me by the end of the opening text crawl, and that trademark Star Wars epic grunge aesthetic? Totally nailed it. (There's a starship graveyard in this thing; it's the perfect backdrop of grand and humble and "I would have known that was there all along if I'd just thought about it;" you just have to see it.) The new heroes (and one new villain) are engaging, and the return of the old heroes is great to see; not sure what to add on that front without getting spoilery.
I will say, though, as the movie went on, at a certain point the magic started to wear off somewhat (like about the time the Resistance showed up; not their fault, but best landmark I can find for it). After that, it felt like it got stretched too thin, like there was so much stuff in the movie that nothing had enough space to feel grounded or develop organically, which left certain people's character arc points (and the fallout therefrom) feeling hollow to me.
(Lately, I seem to ding movies a lot for that kind of problem, of feeling like characters' motivations and development, etc., were just declared and never shown to my satisfaction. Either I have become a very tough audience or the inevitable (and admittedly awesome) crowd-sourced internet exegesis has become an acceptable substitute for putting this stuff in your goddamn movie.)
My one other complaint with The Force Awakens: it is blatantly incomplete. The thing ends on what's essentially a big, lush, cinematic "To Be Continued" sign. One of the main characters' arcs is at a satisfying checkpoint; everything else is pretty much left up in the air.
But you know what? I'll be happy to see the next episode. And that's kind of what Star Wars has always been like for me. Not perfect, but good, with food for thought and a fun, immersive ride.
Oh, and I made a note to myself in the trailers that the Warcraft movie actually looked interesting. I also noticed that a lot of trailers these days try to skate by on audio/visual/visceral thrill riding and maybe a dash of pseudo-profound bullshit without actually telling you anything about the story. It was after a few of those that the Warcraft trailer came up and lo and behold, I felt like it was actually trying to sell me on its plot and themes! Don't know if I'll pop for a cookie for them yet, but it is appreciated.
ETA: CAUTION - COMMENTS CONTAIN SPOILERS.
no subject
Date: 2015-12-28 03:07 am (UTC)(But I like our new heroes and I enjoyed the movie as well.)
no subject
Date: 2016-01-19 06:43 pm (UTC)So, spoilers posted, what were your thoughts about focusing smaller?
no subject
Date: 2016-01-19 07:21 pm (UTC)The Starkiller base was just so over the top that I had to tack my suspension of disbelief back together in the theater so I could go on enjoying the movie. It's like they took some of the most ridiculous EU/Legends superweapons and made a supersuperweapon. It eats suns, it fires across trillions of miles of space, its beam can be seen by completely unaffected planets, it is built out of an entire planet, yet must be able to go through hyperspace, it appears to be the base for the First Order, which means destroying it should pretty much fuck them over. Edit: How in hell did they finance it? There are just too many things wrong with it. And that's before we get to the question of "Are they going to try to TOP this????"
They should've played to their strengths and had the story focus on something smaller scale and more character focused. My first thought (and I think I mentioned this on one of your spoiler posts) is to have a rescue mission to free people from a First Order indoctrination/re-indoctrination center. You get a mass rescue, which should be pretty satisfying, and lots of tense sneaking around, minor sabotage, whatnot, and lots of opportunity for character interactions. And you wouldn't have to - as the movie does - ignore that the people fighting for the First Order are, well, people. And may have doubts and be sway-able to the side of good. May simply not have had the opportunity Finn did to get the hell out.
I know they wanted us to have the YAY STAR WARS is back feeling, but, honestly, people did pretty much from the get-go. A superweapon wasn't needed. (And many people's favorite movie of the OT is The Empire Strikes Back, which has no superweapon and is, again, character centered.)
no subject
Date: 2016-01-20 04:42 pm (UTC)I was a little slower on the uptake (and didn't have the EU/Legends experience), so my disbelief did stay suspended in the moment --- and even that didn't save the star killer thing. As I described elsewhere, it just came off as a big "yeah, whatever" excuse-plot.
And dear gods I hope they don't try to top it.
And yes, I love your idea of rescuing Storm Trooper trainees! If they wanted to make the Resistance the good guys as shamelessly and cathartically as New Hope did for the Rebellion, that would actually be a better way to do it. Rather than the shopworn ridiculousness of the star killer thing, we could be rescuing children from evil abusive indoctrination! We could even be returning them to the families from whom they were stolen!
(Which gets me into another thought: Finn has birth-parents, whose identities are probably in a database somewhere. Was he stolen from them and they'd be overjoyed to get him back? Were they killed, and does he have grandparents/aunts/uncles who would be overjoyed to get him back? Did his parents knowingly give him up, either because they believed in the First Order or for economic reasons or whatever, and how would he deal with that? Does he even want to know? Interesting possibilities!)
For the "Star Wars is back!" --- a bit of retreading at the beginning for a kickstart I think was okay, but after a while it wears thin and comes off as a lack of imagination and/or confidence.
no subject
Date: 2016-01-20 06:54 pm (UTC)Why weren't we consulted on this? We clearly have better ideas than they did.