Film Star Wars Episode IX The Rise of Skywalker [Theories]

evil_geko said:
Do not apologize, the fun was all mine, I mean I knew todays viewers standards dropped but you really take the cake, and who knows what those cakes had in them by reading your posts here.

And here we go again, by saying Fallen Order is much better story than pile of shite Disney produced here, which doesn't take much to do, in your eyes that made the game "masterpiece" and my "favorite game of all time" right?

You are irreparable... :lol:
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You said it's a good star wars story. It is not.

You love the game, so you love mediocrity.

It's really not that hard chief!
Let the hate flow through you...​
evil_geko said:
Yeah, but first film was passable just because it ripped of from actually good SW stories, and it ripped it so fecking much. The moment they had to actually write their own stuff it fell apart like a house of cards. This trilogy is just a mess where they changed directors where every one of them want to do their own thing while ignoring what previous one already did. They had no long term plan at all.
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Yep. So why are you acting like I think differently? I think you've got me confused with someone else :lol:
 
Redlambs said:
It certainly put me and the missus off. We didn't bother going to see Solo, and we will see this but really don't care now.

Even haven't started the Mandalorian yet thanks to just being so meh about it all now :(
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Haven't started the Mandalorian only because Disney+ isn't in Norway yet.
Skipped Solo, won't watch it.
Will likely go to the skywalker movie tomorrow because my wife and I want to get out of the house for a little while and it's a baby-cinema going, so we can be there and have it in the background while we play with our boy.
 
Redlambs said:
You said it's a good star wars story. It is not.

You love the game, so you love mediocrity.

It's really not that hard chief!
​
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No, it wasn't the best or most original SW story, but was pretty decent. Respawn did a pretty good job. And the reviews reflect that (actual SW fans reviews, not payed journalist ones). Does every SW story has to be KOTOR quality which one of my favorite games of all time? Of course not.
 
Ramos said:
Yeah, but ROTS had Anakin going from "OMG Palpatine is a Sith Lord!" to "Might as well go slaughter some Jedi kids" in a matter of minutes.
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They could at least had Anakin being badass and killing Windu in a fair fight or something rather than killing kindergarden jedis.
 
I don't know why you two argue!

The new Star Wars films are terrible and Watchmen is mediocre (from the first 4 episodes I've seen) - so you're both right.
 
FreakyJim said:
I don't know why you two argue!

The new Star Wars films are terrible and Watchmen is mediocre (from the first 4 episodes I've seen) - so you're both right.
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You actually stopped at the worst possible time because the last five episodes are way, way, way better than the first four.
 
Eckers99 said:
From Harry Potter to Endgame, the modern trend for the final film in a series leans towards giving an unreservedly positive review as a kind of catch-all for that's gone before. So these mediocre reviews must mean that this is properly shite.
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I can see where you're coming from but I don't quite agree with you.

(Sorry, the below is quite long so I've spoilered it)
Deathly Hallows brought about the end of a franchise with source material that had finished years before and had been received fairly positively by fans and critics alike. Also, its fanbase was almost exclusively still very young when the last film came out, so it was ultimately judged on its ability to close the story in a satisfying way for those kids and their parents (as opposed to it being analysed as a serious piece of cinema like Star Wars is often viewed). And as has been further evidenced by the years since it ended, it was very much a family saga. You could throw them on at Christmas when the family was round without fear of offending anyone or sending them to sleep - everyone from tiny kids to grandparents took something out of the films. Crucially as well, all the potentially alienating lore and mythology was added retroactively, so it was there for superfans to access if they wanted to but never forced down the throats of casual viewers. By the end, everyone was involved. It was a simple story of good and evil that was easy to track, had characters who were easy to root for, and where good was always likely to triumph. Keep everything on the straight and narrow, keep within the conventions of the rest of the series, throw in a couple of tearjerkers, and you've got a golden closer.

With regards to Endgame, I take a slightly different view. I think the Marvel Cinematic Universe is the only major cinematic franchise left that still has the goodwill and trust of fans and critics (although fans seem to dig it more than critics do). I'm not sure why exactly, but people seem to still be excited before a new MCU film as opposed to worried or nervous, like some people have been for The Rise of Skywalker. Audiences are still happy to suspend their disbelief with it, or to let the writers take them on a journey, or to leave their hopes and wishes out of it. In other words, the fans seem to take a very keen interest in the films but somehow remain casual in their devotion to the franchise as a whole, which means they're always at least generally happy with the output. I've tried working out why this is but I can't quite seem to make any theory stick. The only one I've stuck with is that the MCU takes what I'll just refer to for now as the "South Park" model, where not every film shoots for something epic (like Star Wars does). Between $2bn box office Goliaths like Infinity War & Endgame, they also shuffle out half-decent connective tissue films like Far from Home or Captain Marvel that don't achieve much on a grand scale but keep the story ticking over and take some of the weight off the bigger ones.

They essentially run the story like a TV series that just so happens to have two-hour episodes.

I'm not sure if that explains everything (or anything), but when you measure those two franchises up and compare them to Star Wars, there are a dozen reasons why expectations and tensions are a little cooler. Harry Potter never really challenged its fans' demands or expectations because it never had to - J.K. Rowling mapped everything out, kept everyone entertained by the books, and then gave everyone a happy ending. Aside from Alfonso Cuaron, Warner Bros. never really hired a serious writer/director who insisted on a "unique vision" for the films, so the books could just play out on screen as safe adaptations of what everyone was expecting. The same goes for the MCU really - I disagree with Scorsese when he says they're "not cinema" but he's tapping at something that, much as I generally enjoy MCU films, prevents me from ever being a strong convert. They're not so much "serious films" with grand designs and big ideas, they're more a series of entertaining moments and pleasant experiences on a screen. They're not written by-committee exactly, but they are written with the audience in mind, which means that the closest we'll ever get to seeing the MCU take a big risk is the final moments of Infinity War (a risk that they reversed within a year anyway). It's easy to forget how much criticism they got during Phase Two (people still don't like The Dark World or Age of Ultron much when compared with the others, and with good reason). It was the serious introduction of the Russos and the success of a Guardians that completely shifted the tone of the films and set things in motion to end up where they are now.

Whereas with Star Wars, people just seem to be so much more emotionally affected by what the franchise does.The Harry Potter books were finished so the films just followed the path they laid out and everybody went home happy. The MCU is currently ongoing so expectations and hype haven't had decades to build, so people are just pleased if the story makes sense. Star Wars, though? Man. These three films are completely original stories with no determined endpoint, they're picking up after a 12-year gap from the prequels and an even longer gap from the originals, and if you throw in all the expanded universe stuff, and the video games, and the lore and mythology, etc. you begin to get a picture of a critical sphere and fanbase that's got a lifetime's worth of investment to match up to. In fact, returning to Harry Potter for a second, just look at the response to the Fantastic Beasts films now that enough time has passed for anticipation and expectation to build up about the franchise they're part of. Lukewarm responses to the first one, negative reactions to the second one. That's not to say they're good films that are gravely misunderstood (I haven't seen either so can't comment), but it does suggest that long-running franchises eventually squeeze themselves out of having any creative room to breathe.

I think we're at a bit of a cultural crossroads at the moment, where serious franchise fans are started to become irritated with an increasingly concentrated market that they view as creatively bankrupt and incapable of coming up with genuinely new ideas. I love The Force Awakens and The Last Jedi, and I'm still pretty excited for The Rise of Skywalker despite the initial reactions, but I'm still slightly irked that the next potential Star Wars moment that enraptures an entire generation and spawns an expanded universe, or another franchise to love, is having its space taken up by yet more Star Wars films. The next Lion King or Dumbo or Aladdin that gets a generation of kids into the magic of animated storytelling is having its space taken up by extremely bland "live-action" re-tellings of the originals (which are really just glorified tech demonstrations). And on and on it goes. Original storytelling on a blockbuster scale is being gradually phased out as the various studios are bought out by Disney, who are showing that they're no longer willing to take as many risks, and by the looks of things The Rise of Skywalker represents a lot of that to the critics who've seen it. I don't think fans are entirely blameless because I think we're too clever for our own good now - we both want and don't want too many things at once - but the next decade will be incredibly interesting. A three-way battle between fan ownership, creative ownership, and corporate ownership is beginning, and based on the last 5/6 years I can't see anyone coming out of it looking any good.
 
Massive Spanner said:
I think Fallen Order is good :nervous:
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It's actually alright, me and geks are just fecking around ;)


evil_geko said:
It IS good though, some people hate on it because of EA and some because they expected some masterpiece or something.
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Neither of those categories are me. It's better than I expected. I hope there's a polished sequel.



I don't think this film will be though, but then my expectations are rock bottom going in to it so maybe there's at least some part I'll like.
 
If Stuckman doesn't like it I might feel bad, seeing as the only film so far I've disagreed with him on is Transcendence.
 
robinamicrowave said:
I can see where you're coming from but I don't quite agree with you.

(Sorry, the below is quite long so I've spoilered it)
Deathly Hallows brought about the end of a franchise with source material that had finished years before and had been received fairly positively by fans and critics alike. Also, its fanbase was almost exclusively still very young when the last film came out, so it was ultimately judged on its ability to close the story in a satisfying way for those kids and their parents (as opposed to it being analysed as a serious piece of cinema like Star Wars is often viewed). And as has been further evidenced by the years since it ended, it was very much a family saga. You could throw them on at Christmas when the family was round without fear of offending anyone or sending them to sleep - everyone from tiny kids to grandparents took something out of the films. Crucially as well, all the potentially alienating lore and mythology was added retroactively, so it was there for superfans to access if they wanted to but never forced down the throats of casual viewers. By the end, everyone was involved. It was a simple story of good and evil that was easy to track, had characters who were easy to root for, and where good was always likely to triumph. Keep everything on the straight and narrow, keep within the conventions of the rest of the series, throw in a couple of tearjerkers, and you've got a golden closer.

With regards to Endgame, I take a slightly different view. I think the Marvel Cinematic Universe is the only major cinematic franchise left that still has the goodwill and trust of fans and critics (although fans seem to dig it more than critics do). I'm not sure why exactly, but people seem to still be excited before a new MCU film as opposed to worried or nervous, like some people have been for The Rise of Skywalker. Audiences are still happy to suspend their disbelief with it, or to let the writers take them on a journey, or to leave their hopes and wishes out of it. In other words, the fans seem to take a very keen interest in the films but somehow remain casual in their devotion to the franchise as a whole, which means they're always at least generally happy with the output. I've tried working out why this is but I can't quite seem to make any theory stick. The only one I've stuck with is that the MCU takes what I'll just refer to for now as the "South Park" model, where not every film shoots for something epic (like Star Wars does). Between $2bn box office Goliaths like Infinity War & Endgame, they also shuffle out half-decent connective tissue films like Far from Home or Captain Marvel that don't achieve much on a grand scale but keep the story ticking over and take some of the weight off the bigger ones.

They essentially run the story like a TV series that just so happens to have two-hour episodes.

I'm not sure if that explains everything (or anything), but when you measure those two franchises up and compare them to Star Wars, there are a dozen reasons why expectations and tensions are a little cooler. Harry Potter never really challenged its fans' demands or expectations because it never had to - J.K. Rowling mapped everything out, kept everyone entertained by the books, and then gave everyone a happy ending. Aside from Alfonso Cuaron, Warner Bros. never really hired a serious writer/director who insisted on a "unique vision" for the films, so the books could just play out on screen as safe adaptations of what everyone was expecting. The same goes for the MCU really - I disagree with Scorsese when he says they're "not cinema" but he's tapping at something that, much as I generally enjoy MCU films, prevents me from ever being a strong convert. They're not so much "serious films" with grand designs and big ideas, they're more a series of entertaining moments and pleasant experiences on a screen. They're not written by-committee exactly, but they are written with the audience in mind, which means that the closest we'll ever get to seeing the MCU take a big risk is the final moments of Infinity War (a risk that they reversed within a year anyway). It's easy to forget how much criticism they got during Phase Two (people still don't like The Dark World or Age of Ultron much when compared with the others, and with good reason). It was the serious introduction of the Russos and the success of a Guardians that completely shifted the tone of the films and set things in motion to end up where they are now.

Whereas with Star Wars, people just seem to be so much more emotionally affected by what the franchise does.The Harry Potter books were finished so the films just followed the path they laid out and everybody went home happy. The MCU is currently ongoing so expectations and hype haven't had decades to build, so people are just pleased if the story makes sense. Star Wars, though? Man. These three films are completely original stories with no determined endpoint, they're picking up after a 12-year gap from the prequels and an even longer gap from the originals, and if you throw in all the expanded universe stuff, and the video games, and the lore and mythology, etc. you begin to get a picture of a critical sphere and fanbase that's got a lifetime's worth of investment to match up to. In fact, returning to Harry Potter for a second, just look at the response to the Fantastic Beasts films now that enough time has passed for anticipation and expectation to build up about the franchise they're part of. Lukewarm responses to the first one, negative reactions to the second one. That's not to say they're good films that are gravely misunderstood (I haven't seen either so can't comment), but it does suggest that long-running franchises eventually squeeze themselves out of having any creative room to breathe.

I think we're at a bit of a cultural crossroads at the moment, where serious franchise fans are started to become irritated with an increasingly concentrated market that they view as creatively bankrupt and incapable of coming up with genuinely new ideas. I love The Force Awakens and The Last Jedi, and I'm still pretty excited for The Rise of Skywalker despite the initial reactions, but I'm still slightly irked that the next potential Star Wars moment that enraptures an entire generation and spawns an expanded universe, or another franchise to love, is having its space taken up by yet more Star Wars films. The next Lion King or Dumbo or Aladdin that gets a generation of kids into the magic of animated storytelling is having its space taken up by extremely bland "live-action" re-tellings of the originals (which are really just glorified tech demonstrations). And on and on it goes. Original storytelling on a blockbuster scale is being gradually phased out as the various studios are bought out by Disney, who are showing that they're no longer willing to take as many risks, and by the looks of things The Rise of Skywalker represents a lot of that to the critics who've seen it. I don't think fans are entirely blameless because I think we're too clever for our own good now - we both want and don't want too many things at once - but the next decade will be incredibly interesting. A three-way battle between fan ownership, creative ownership, and corporate ownership is beginning, and based on the last 5/6 years I can't see anyone coming out of it looking any good.
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I'm sure you've addressed what I said concisely but I don't have time to digest this just now, so I'll have a read on the train and come back to you ;)
 
Star Wars is probably the one saga were I tend to disagree with the reviews. I actually think Return of the Sith is the 2nd best star wars movie in the franchise and I get shot for saying that. The last jedi however was poor. Was extremely disappointed coming out of that movie. Watching this one on Friday. Reviews are pretty mixed so this will be an interesting one. Can't possibly be worse than that shite Rian Johnson produced though

1. Empire strikes back
2. Revenge of the Sith
3. Force Awakens
 
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Rotten Tomatoes (which is a terrible way of measuring anything but I'll use it anyway) currently has it on 58% from critics, which is the second worst of all Star Wars film.

I'm wondering whether the negative reviews are a fair reflection of it actually being prequel-level bad or actually a reflection of how the critics have reacted to perceived backtracking on TLJ, which they largely admired. A lot of the negative reviews seem to be attacking it for being safe fan service in a way that implies the latter, as if TFA wasn't also very safe fan service.

Have to say though, all the arguing about the series is more interesting to me than most of the actual films, which are more often than not pretty mediocre.
 
sullydnl said:
Rotten Tomatoes (which is a terrible way of measuring anything but I'll use it anyway) currently has it on 58% from critics, which is the second worst of all Star Wars film.

I'm wondering whether the negative reviews are a fair reflection of it actually being prequel-level bad or actually a reflection of how the critics have reacted to perceived backtracking on TLJ, which they largely admired. A lot of the negative reviews seem to be attacking it for being safe fan service in a way that implies the latter, as if TFA wasn't also very safe fan service.

Have to say though, all the arguing about the series is more interesting to me than most of the actual films, which are more often than not pretty mediocre.
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Yeah I read a couple of reviews and it seems they are largely going on a backlash to the TLJ backlash as if it somehow proves their earlier reviews right?

Thing I don't get, is why people actually think TLJ was ever much different anyway? It was still the same old formula, just Johnson decided to make a thing out of pissing off the manchildren. Then added a flying Leia.

And yep, your last sentence is bang on. It is much more fun winding people up about them than watching them ;)
 
I'm watching this tomorrow. My enthusiasm has been dampened somewhat, but I'm still optimistic!
 
El-Manos said:
Star Wars is probably the one saga were I tend to disagree with the reviews. I actually think Return of the Sith is the 2nd best star wars movie in the franchise and I get shot for saying that. The last jedi however was poor. Was extremely disappointed coming out of that movie. Watching this one on Friday. Reviews are pretty mixed so this will be an interesting one. Can't possibly be worse than that shite Rian Johnson produced though

1. Empire strikes back
2. Revenge of the Sith
3. Force Awakens
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I don't know. Revenge of the Sith had Anakin killing kindergarten jedi's 15 minutes after he realized Palpatine was a Sith Lord.

General griveus.

Anakin losing his duel against Obi Wan because Obi had the "High Ground" after they had been flip flopping all over the place for 30 minutes.

Dialoge was still mostly awful. However I agree it was the best of the prequels.
 
Shamana said:
I don't know. Revenge of the Sith had Anakin killing kindergarten jedi's 15 minutes after he realized Palpatine was a Sith Lord.

General griveus.

Anakin losing his duel against Obi Wan because Obi had the "High Ground" after they had been flip flopping all over the place for 30 minutes.

Dialoge was still mostly awful. However I agree it was the best of the prequels.
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"You're either with me or against me."
"Only a Sith deals in absolutes."

That's fantastic dialogue that is.
 
So Rey is Palps granddaughter. Surely if you're going down that road, don't have a scene where she kisses her now relative? Star Wars retreading old ground again, tsk.
 
Mrs Smoker said:
What are family relations of all these people?
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Rey is Palp's granddaughter, while Kylo is technically his great grandson. His mother is Leia, who's father was Anakin, who was created by Palpatine. Think I've got that right.
 
2 man midfield said:
Rey is Palp's granddaughter, while Kylo is technically his great grandson. His mother is Leia, who's father was Anakin, who was created by Palpatine. Think I've got that right.
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Yeah as far as I'm aware that's right which just makes it all the weirder. I regret them even starting this trilogy, I'm going to pretend it never happened.
 
evil_geko said:
It isn't.
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Nobody can have any complaints about the new trilogy and Rey's powers if after about 10 hours of constant non stop parkour
a padawan with no confidence who has to learn how to even force push can then take on Vader himself and manage to get away despite the fact that Vader has slaughtered countless Jedi, and we literally just saw him freeze one of his inquisitors in place. But no, the wet behind the ears padawan and the master who hasn't even used the force for God knows how long can just escape.
And that's without even looking at the bland personality of the characters and the fact that the gameplay is simply the same button press sequence repeated to infinity. Walk forward, jump, grab, left/right, drop. Walk forward, jump, grab, left/right, drop. Walk forward, jump, grab, left/right, drop. Walk forward, jump, grab, left/right, drop. Walk forward, jump, grab, left/right, drop. Walk forward, jump, grab, left/right, drop.

Game of the year material right there.
 
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Zarlak said:
Nobody can have any complaints about the new trilogy and Rey's powers if
a padawan with no confidence who has to learn how to even force push can then take on Vader and manage to get away
after about 10 hours of constant non stop parkour. And that's without even looking at the bland personality of the characters.
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You're not even touching on the fact the gameplay was average to the point of almost being offensively bland. There's just nothing at all special or even good about it, it's not shit, but it's not good either.

The story is pants and is just filler. It's an excuse to get you from planet to planet.
 
Zarlak said:
Nobody can have any complaints about the new trilogy and Rey's powers if after about 10 hours of constant non stop parkour
a padawan with no confidence who has to learn how to even force push can then take on Vader himself and manage to get away despite the fact that Vader has slaughtered countless Jedi, and we literally just saw him freeze one of his inquisitors in place. But no, the wet behind the ears padawan and the master who hasn't even used the force for God knows how long can just escape.
And that's without even looking at the bland personality of the characters and the fact that the gameplay is simply the same button press sequence repeated to infinity. Walk forward, jump, grab, left/right, drop. Walk forward, jump, grab, left/right, drop. Walk forward, jump, grab, left/right, drop. Walk forward, jump, grab, left/right, drop. Walk forward, jump, grab, left/right, drop. Walk forward, jump, grab, left/right, drop.

Game of the year material right there.
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So that is why you are mad at the game, because Vader had a boo boo and couldn't slaughter them all? :lol:

Far from game of the year material, but also far from trash, nice little action adventure game. Still haven't read a legit complain about the game that makes sense, only excuses for hate. And no, that "walk forward jump" etc is not a legit complain, I can "complain" like that literally about any video game out there.

Anyway, too much into offtopic, I am done.
 
evil_geko said:
So that is why you are mad at the game, because Vader had a boo boo and couldn't slaughter them all? :lol:

Far from game of the year material, but also far from trash, nice little action adventure game. Still haven't read a legit complain about the game that makes sense, only excuses for hate.

Anyway, too much into offtopic, I am done.
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I put plenty in the game thread, from both a technical and design perspective too. Just because you can't answer them, doesn't mean they don't make sense and it's hate :lol:

Having said that, it's not a garbage game of course, in fact parts were good fun. It's just a shame it's so unfocused is all. The sequel should be much better, especially if they either drop the parkour or make it actually free from strict constraints.
 
2 man midfield said:
Rey is Palp's granddaughter, while Kylo is technically his great grandson. His mother is Leia, who's father was Anakin, who was created by Palpatine. Think I've got that right.
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Wasn't it Plagueis who created Anakin?
 
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