For(ce) the sake of those who have not, lets be respectful and keep any spoilers in hiders, aye?
We personally liked it very much. It was more than worth watching.
Both unexpected events and expected.
Yes, we doubled hider just to be extra safe.
The reason for "chewie, We're home!" was highly unexpected, even after seeing the curiously familiar shape of the YT-1300 transport.
The family of Kylo Ren was both expected and unexpected. But we still harbor some curiosity about just who Ray's parents are. We suspect multiple sources. As it is not defined yet in public, we won't speculate.
I'm going to update this over time to get all my thoughts in..... but here we go. Tiered hider tags will indicate clearly how far you should read.
This is in the running for the best Star Wars movie ever. IN THE RUNNING -- not saying it's flat-out better than Empire. It's just really, really, REALLY freakin' good. It has all the charm of the original trilogy, none of the cheese of the prequels, and off the scales better directed. The cinematography is great. The action is great. The script is great. The characters are great. The effects are great. It's.... dude. Go watch it, for real. Not convinced? Risk a few more spoilers and follow another click.
Let's start out basic. The overall plot and pacing of this movie were spot-on. You'll notice some STRONG parallels to older movies -- one in particular -- and a somewhat familiar vagueness as well, concerning the overall state of the galaxy. Remember in A New Hope, when Vader announces that the Emperor has dissolved the senate and from now on they'll rule through fear? You had no idea what the senate was, but you got the point -- shit was about to get bad. It's a lot like that. Don't expect any drawn-out hour-long forray into the nitty and gritty of trade franchises for the Naboo. JJ Abrams gets right to the goddamn point. You'll know as much as you need to know, to follow the characters, and that's it. That felt right to me -- if this was an RPGC entry, I might mention the possibility of doing a LITTLE exposition -- since there's friggin' none of it, it could probably handle a little. But it's fine, it's really fine, it's great even. Exciting.
Okay, so the characters then. Right? Characters are good. By now you've seen the previews, you have a pretty good idea of what people look like. What you don't understand yet is, they are so real. These people are deep. The heroes are deep. The villains are deep. Nobody is perfect and everybody is developing and it's just so good.
Can we talk conflict? Not much, without ruining everything. Suffice it to say -- the movie cuts a clear path from point A to point B to point C and so on. You are joining a world already in progress, and you're following people who know just as much as you do. It's the opposite of convoluted, without being too simple. And best of all, it's character-driven in ways that make sense.
Getting to the action. It's intense, man. It's really intense. When people get shot they get shot, and they stay shot. It verges on brutal -- like if they'd gone very much further at all, they would've had to look at an R rating.Edit -- I'm walking that back. Watched it again, it's not AS hardcore as I initially thought. Blasters hit hard, that's the moral of the story.This is not forced. It fits. It's done naturally and complimented by camera work and effects.
How about the overall tone? The thing that shocked me most was, it's funny. It's original-trilogy, witty, funny. Not 'ooooh icky icky pooo' prequel funny -- I'm talking "WHO YOU CALLING SCRUFFY LOOKING?" funny. Naturally. Not forced (okay maybe once or twice forced). This is a serious, brutal, and yet upbeat and exciting film. You haven't seen that since episode 4. It is easily on that level. Right now, I think better.
Dude -- go watch it. STILL NOT CONVINCED? Okay. Spoilers ahead.
Let's talk about some fears and expectations.
There was some concern that the villain in this movie is Darth Revan, from KOTOR. It's not. The reveal is made pretty early on, so you won't have to wait long to learn his identity. I won't tell you who it is -- what I will tell you, is this is one of the most interesting people in the Star Wars universe to date. Not because of 'what the book says,' not because of his SUPER SECRET IDENTITY, but because of the depth of his character as seen on camera. He has so much going on and it is absolutely goddamn brilliant. All the best parts of the prequels -- shut up, there were some -- dealt with a 'villain in progress.' Someone who's growing into their role, whether that was Palpatine's cunning rise to power or Anakin's (rare) moments of organic development towards the dark side. In this movie, the villain is extremely "in progress." And it is so cool, so good.
Weren't we all a little worried that this was gonna fall on its face? It doesn't do that. VII comes out of the gate running and it doesn't stop. I mentioned earlier that the pacing was brilliant. I meant it. It's not simply that "it moves fast." It does all of the things it needs to do, and moves at the right speed, AND it's interesting the whole time.
But isn't this just using nostalgia to make some more money? The old Disney treatment? A little, I suppose. There's definitely nostalgia factor times a million, you just can't avoid it with such a big release. Rest assured -- it is handled masterfully. I mean shockingly, hilariously, epically well done. You'll know it when you see it, and oh my god.
So wait -- is there anything new, or is it a bunch of old stuff tacked together and re-released? It's the right amount of both. Strong, strong parallels to Episode 4. It's not literally the same story, but let's be honest, it's almost. And you know what? I wish the prequels had done that. What's great though, is that the reason I want to watch Episode 8 has nothing to do with the throwbacks -- I want to see what happens to these new people. I care about these people and this story. We have been sorely missing that.
Still not convinced? I, uh.... I'm not sure I can convince you. But if you want to learn more, keep reading. Otherwise, stop now until you've watched the movie.
This is gonna be sparse for now. Dude..... Kylo Ren was so fucking good. I can't believe it. Every line, EVERY LINE that Poe ever said was solid goddamn gold. Fin -- "I'm a Resistance fighter. This is what we all look like." Oh my god. The lighter thumbs-up? LOST MY SHIT. "Where is my boyfriend, Chewbacca?" Killed it. 3PO popping up in the middle of Han and Leia's reunion? The way Fin was introduced -- that bloody streak on his helmet, the fear, the look from Ren, then the PTSD and the shiny chicktrooper and..... holy shit. I cannot believe how much JJ pulled off.
If I have a complaint -- and I do, and I whined about it already to my peeps -- it was casting the senior staff people on both sides of the war. Nobody in this movie looked like a general or an admiral or whatever, except I guess Han and Leia. Who were great. The new faces didn't really do it for me -- That's JJ Abrams signature style. Everybody must be young and beautiful, especially admirals. What can you do. But then, the people involved in action (even the people who were just voices, like "annnnnnnd I'm dropping my gun" trooper) were stellar.
But the best part -- THE BEST PART -- they got the universe so right. Remember how shiny and bullshitty all of the prequels looked, because George wanted to play with his new VFX computers? This universe was right, down to the goddamn binoculars.
Okay. That's all for now. I'll come back and add more thoughts probably, and if I do, I'll note that it's been edited so you don't have to click through everything again. Or just talk about it in new posts, whatever, don't matter. Tired. This is the Star Wars movie I've been waiting for since 1992.
edit -- modified the description of the action a little. It's heavy, but it's not quite as heavy as I was talking before.
80% Awesome, 10% Nostalgia, 10% Too Much Nostalgia.
Like mdk mentioned, biggest selling point (and overall improvement) is that the dialogue is about ten times wittier and snappier than the prequels, and at least half again that of the originals.
Also, the villain is probably in the running for best yet, at least in a three-part race with the Emperor and Vader. The couple of scenes where he loses his shit and sabers the crap out of his surroundings are brilliant, and are a welcome change from the stoic not-so-different from Jedi except lightning hands villains of the past. Also, he's been set up well for future installments alongside the two new protagonists, who are excellent, with the female lead genuinely being an excellent actor, which is very optimistic.
Also the villain actually utilizes the force, a lot and in new ways, which was always going to be a plus.
No real disappointments overall, only some slight issues and the perhaps overly nostalgic story-line which mirrors episode 4 just a little too closely, to the point where it got a -little- distracting. Everything else was awesome.
Having had a few days to think, we have some additional thoughts.
It is nice that while the more powerful villains are all male, the protagonist with the most power is female. Shows that great power in the Force and destiny isn't males only. We've not had protagonists before with such. In the past they've never been more than support for a male lead, always weaker.
We do hope they show even more nuances of the light and dark sides. The light is not just serene, and the dark can also have self-control.
Just saw it tonight and it's a bit late so I haven't really read much of the above posts yet, but will do given some time.
Overall it felt like a revised "A New Hope". This isn't a good nor bad thing, but it allows for a redesign of the original trilogy and makes me wonder where it is that they are going to take the next two movies. It somewhat comes back to that old saying of History repeating itself and how a river will always flow in the same direction, even if someone attempts to stop it.
So many elements did feel repeated. The beginning sequence of the droid having the hidden data and the villain making an appearance; the 'death star' and the mission to destroy it; the 'sacrifice'; and these are just just a few. The positive of this goes back to what I said before and that's how it's a new vision so the story can now go a different direction since this move played a well designed prequel for the events to come.
I also thought the characters were fairly well designed. Kylo Ren did surprise me a bit when he took off his mask to reveal that he was a normal person, and although it wasn't unexpected for him to be Han and Leah's son, it was a well designed plot point. He also seemed like a character in trouble. Someone that is evil because they don't understand the benefits to being good, but also sad at the direction their life is going. When compared to Anikin, Anikin was just a spoilt twat that became evil because he was a very naughty boy and deserved a spanking. Kylo Ren... I felt sorry for him, he seemed conflicted and used.
Rey and Finn made a brilliant lead. Finn, even in the trooper outfit, had emotion. You could see that he was afraid of what he saw and realised it wasn't right. You could understand that he wanted to do better. He wanted to change and was willing to rebel against the largest threat in the galaxy to achieve that dream of freedom. Rey on the other hand was a powerful character that was unsure about her abilities but soon came to realise how much she played in this adventure. Her fight at the end was brilliant with her overcoming her fears of the lightsabre and using it to protect her friend and to resist evil.
So yeah, overall I enjoyed it very much. It's late so this probably all sounds messed up, but the positives and negatives of this movie balance out in a way that leaves me satisfied and willing to brush off some of those co-incidental parts (Like R2 booting up at the exact right time).
It is good, it is Star Wars. Those two important, oh so incredibly important goals are what the movie nailed.
That said it does have flaws. There are moments that the film harkens back to the original trilogy a bit too much.
Overall verdict: A proper Star Wars film that has a low enough entrance barrier even someone who never saw any of the previous movies can enjoy it. 9/10 would watch again.
While there was good production value in the appearance the new guys weren't all that great, save for the one Ace rebel pilot whose name I can't remember but he was hardly there. But beyond that, the film felt weak through the rest of it. Too much exposition at the start before it cuts to rushed and rather flimsy second half. And by that point everything that happens sort of falls off the skin like you knew it would happen. It doesn't shock, it doesn't surprise, and...
The Star Killer Whatever-the-fuck was an incredibly limp-dick thing that had so long plagued the Expanded Universe: a lot of shitting about with guns bigger than the last with no real point but to try and be more dramatic while all the while forgetting the quantum nature of coming to a point the human brain can actually fail to cope scales so large, so they stumble over the drop-off of the ability to care.
All in all I give it...
No-JarJar outta den
You'd be better off with the original trilogy imo.
Too much vanilla-bean from Disney
So go watch that Moby Dick movie instead as a modern place-holder to Master and Commander.
The movie did what it was supposed to do, which is to say that there was no point during the movie where I felt like checking the time to see when it was going to end. I was interested the entire way through.
My thoughts while staying vague. Spoilers in Hiders.
1: This set of Sith seems more interesting than any the others we have seen, at least in the films.
I like the Plageuis theory for Snooke, even if he sounds like he was named after somebody's Hamster. Also, I think the Kylo Ren character is a refreshing take on the Sith. After so many people who were just powerful narcissists, we suddenly get something from the opposite side of the spectrum. He ain't Sith because he's too awesome for everyone, he is Sith because he is a little bitch. He's not likable at all, and that is something that Star Wars hasn't really done with their movie villains (I mean, even Palpatine had cool laser hands and the best acting in all the prequels.)
2: The war and government don't make sense.
Who is in charge, the Republic or the First Order? Who is rebelling against who? Why is there a Republic and a Resistance at the same time? Then again, this is Star Wars, so they get a pass on this, since only the first trilogy's politics ever really made sense in any way.
3:
I do wish they had went a different direction on Starkiller Base. I mean, i'm fine with another Death Star, and I like where they went with the weapon itself, but did they have to do the exact same 'plucky rebel space fighters take out the big bad ship in the nick of time' story that they've already done in three of the other six movies? Surely there is another way to do it.
4:
In the next movie, is Luke going to train Rey by riding on her back as she hops around tiny ocean rocks?
Most of all, we feel facts are unknown about the pair. It was refreshing to see someone speaking of "the lure of the light side" instead of "the lure of the dark side"
We believe the answer is "yes". Both of them are in charge, neither controlling the whole. But some parts hint at the first Order being somewhat more powerful, but not powerful enough to simply squash the republic. We suppose that the First Order and the Republic have some sort of truce, that both acknowledge the other (because of a lack of choice).
The Resistance, from what we understand is those who fight the first order. They're supported in secret by the Republic.
We believe that they went that way because turning an entire planet into a weapon is definitely within the parameters of the rule of cool. We do hope they do not create yet another supersized weapon in episodes 8-9, though. Then it would be getting ridiculous.
See, the beginning makes it sort of feel like the First Order is the Empire, but then as the movie progresses they give off more of an organized Neo-Nazi Vibe. The Republic and the First Order don't seem to be at war, but they do seem to share the same space, which makes it look like the First Order is just a really powerful para-military force within the Republic. I guess I could see a situation where that is all true, and the Resistance is another Paramilitary force that the Republic is secretly supporting while they publicly try to hold the government together.
But I'm probably overthinking it way too much. It didn't diminish the movie for me in any way, it's just something I kept trying to put together when I was watching, and still haven't completely wrapped my head around.
Why hide spoilers when you could have just put a spoiler warning in the title? So now we have a thread full of hidden text.
Anyway...
I liked the movie, it was impressive-looking and all round good but several things bothered me and the more I think about it the more they impact my overall opinion of the movie. Leaving a load of little inconsistencies aside, I really don't like the amount of convenience in the plot. Nearly everything is a "just-so-happens" situation and that's just lazy writing. Speaking of which, just pretty much remaking A New Hope, yeah, pretty lazy. I really liked most of the characters, Finn was a little hard to swallow at the beginning, I mean why he's on that mission at the start when you learn later on what his actual position was. But the worst is Ray who is apparently the best pilot ever, the best fighter ever (with 2 different weapons, one of which she's never used before), the best mechanic ever and I guess
the most powerful Jedi ever.
Honestly, she's a character without any fault whose presence and role in the story is yet again a massive, magical convenience. I guess the answer to that is that it's "The will of the force", but in that case; Hey Dark Side, Supreme Leader Snoke, First Order guys... You might want to just give up, the very energy that binds every living thing together in the universe is really really biased against you. Shit, that kind of makes them the under dogs in this story.
I will preface this by saying that I am not a star wars fan, and only saw the original trilogy about 12 hours before I saw episode 7. If you don't really think about the film too much, it's pretty decent. At its core, the film is a mindless space opera that captivates you with relatively good characters, dialogue, and action, well, at least until you pull the film to bits. Most of my issues with the film are in the last third of it.
The giant death planet star base thing was cool upon first look, but it was another fucking death star. I was already sick of the death star thing after episode 6, and really didn't want to deal with villains who couldn't realize that their opposition is surprisingly good at taking down giant space lasers. Also, if we can assume the first order is much less powerful than the empire, which seems very likely (If the first order had more power than the empire, then that kind of erases the relevancy of most of the original trilogy's content), how the hell did they build something that is so much larger than the death star? [insert "The villain is the villain so they can make any doomsday weapon regardless of time, money, or resources needed" logic here]
About Rey suddenly mastering her force wizardry magic powers, how the hell did she do that over the course of [insert relatively short amount of time that she was most likely kept captive here]? She barely knew anything about the force, and from what I could tell, didn't know that she had force powers. She was somehow able to do something that she showed no previous proficiency for, and she didn't have any training. Luke had to train for a while to even be decent at what Rey does almost effortlessly.
Also, how about that fight? Kylo Ren is worn down by a traitorous stormtrooper with a lightsaber, and is defeated by a girl who never used a lightsaber before, and somehow has magical god-tier force powers. Neither of Kylo's opponents have any training in the use of a lightsaber, and Kylo is known to have some sort of training with the weapon. How does he not wipe the floor with both of them? Oh yea, they be the main characters.
Oh, yea, the characters. I should examine them new ones.
Poe (Po? I don't know): He seems like replacement Han Solo, with very similar mannerisms and all. He will probably be filling in for Solo so that we have a younger face in the role of "charismatic pilot guy". He didn't do much in this film other than help Finn escape, and then be "dead" for the rest of the film, so we will have to wait for him to be fleshed out more in future installments.
Kylo Ren: New Vader glorifies Vader and wishes to be just like him. He definitely gets more characterization in this film than Vader got in episode 4. Vader was just "I am scary villain in mask, fear me and my space-wizardry" while Kylo is... an immature prick who's feelings are manipulated by the new emperor-esque character. I have to commend the scenes that show his immaturity with his anger-fueled destruction of stuff. I was kind of disappointed that his identity was revealed so simply, well, I would have been happier if they just didn't remove the mask. With the mask on, Kylo seems sort of like a zealous evil dickbag, and was kind of cool at times. As soon as they unmasked him, I realized that we weren't supposed to think he was cool. They got around making him cool by making him pathetic. I have a bad feeling that they are going to completely copy all of episodes 4-6, making the next film into "The Force strikes back" and the following film into "Return of the Force". Kylo Ren seems like a character they deliberately humanized so that his eventual turn to the side of the heroes would be better. Of course, now we can see it from a thousand miles away.
Finn: Honestly, this is my favorite new character. He seems to be rather original, at least within the star wars universe, being a stormtrooper that turned against his origins because he realized the horror of what they were doing. I doubt that a character would wield and fight with a lightsaber for that much of the film (as well as be featured with one on the poster) if they weren't a Jedi/Sith. Finn will be a powerful GodJedi, just like his friend Rey, the living Deus Ex Machina.
Rey: For most of the movie, she seems to be just getting dragged around by the plot and other characters. She ends up overpowered by the end of the film (without any training!), and is the least interesting character in the whole thing.
The Droid: Token robot companion/10
Snoke: We know little to nothing about him, and have only seen a hologram of him. I will be waiting to see what becomes of him.
I don't think I missed anyone important..
The plot is driven by coincidence, and it got distracting and grating at points. I mean, the original trilogy was guilty of this at points as well, but there are some moments in this film that are much more egregious than anything the original trilogy ever did wrong. When Rey found the droid by complete random, I got pretty annoyed. In Episode 4, at least Luke had a logical reason for finding those droids. He had to buy some droids. Rey wasn't even looking for parts when she found the droid, which would have worked more than just hearing the noises of a droid being snatched up by some guy.
Alright, I'm getting tired, so I will stop with this. I might expand my thoughts later.
I finally watched it about a hour ago. I liked it, it wasn't perfect though and there were somethings that bugged me. My thoughts:
- The plot got lazy in certain areas, it felt like a rehash of Episode IV. BB-8 is a droid that has vital information the good and bad guys want, he ends up on a desert world. Stormies coming looking for him. The final assault on the superweapon is very similar to the trench run in the original. The idea of that also annoys me, I disliked having a second Death Star in 6, one of my reasons for not enjoying it as much as the two before it. The Starkiller base, essentially the third coming was lame. Hopefully they go with some different, bold ideas for the sequel.
- Maybe they were scared to veer too far from mirroring the OT?
- I liked Kylo Ren, glad that he was different from Vader. Reminded me of whiny Anakin in Ep II, but that's not bad, hopefully his defeat changes him. Excited to see how he comes back in the next one. The Han slaying was bold, I'm surprised he killed his daddy and that the writer's decided to put killing such an iconic character in the film. Similar to how Obi Wan died in IV. Snoke was interesting too, reminds me of the Emperor.
- I liked the three main characters, would have liked more screentime from Poe. Finn is my favorite, they really nailed his character. Han, Chewie and all the returning characters were solid too. BB-8 was awesome.
- Rey did annoy me in some areas. A talented pilot and engineer, also great with blasters despite never using one before Han placed it in her hands. It annoyed me how great she was right away with the Force and a lightsaber. She had zero training yet showed skill of someone who did. Also sweeped the floor with Kylo Ren who had training and talent, he was injured but still. She showed no faults.
I'd give it a 7 - 8 out of 10. Like it, but not as much as New Hope or ESB. Better than TPM at least.
So, you came here to complain, state that you didn't like it, won't see anything Star Wars again, but have no intention of explaining why you hated it. soo very conductive to a discussion.