THIS movie is how the first act of a Star Wars trilogy is supposed to go - Star Wars: Episode VII - The Force Awakens (2015) Discussion

[–] mxpowers43 (367) 7 years ago

I think you are totally wrong about people ignoring and not critisizing the similarities between ANH and TPM. I remember quite a bit of people complaining about the similarities. TFA goes even further and is nearly a frame for frame remake of the ANH with some elements from ESB and ROTJ thrown in. I mean the similarities have been identified hundreds of times now and you are seemingly ignoring it for the sake of creating a new thread pretending like those valid critiques are not there.

Also the super strong with the force is not a fair comparison either. Only luke displayed what the audience saw as an acceptable level of force ability in his first outing and that is because he lost nearly the entire film until the very end. Anakin was highly criticized for being overpowered, and no one liked the midochlorians or 'chosen one' nonsense. Rey takes it to a whole new level of overpowered to where it actually breaks the continuity and lore and now needs an explanation of memory lose or some kind of force reincarnation to explain here contrived abilities. Remember Luke nor Anakin could force pull, mind trick, lightsaber fight, pilot expertly without knowing how they did it (remember both Luke and Anakin not only did not really now what they were doing in there 'dog fights' at the end and only 'got lucky' because of the force both nearly crashed and got shot down multiple times and relied heavily on R2D2 to make up for their lack of knowledge). Don't get me wrong Anakin was bad but Rey much much worse.

reply

[–] Frogarama (12942) 7 years ago

and is nearly a frame for frame remake of the ANH

I love how you really hone in on it being so literal of a remake that it's even "frame for frame," which is just compounding a badly thought out comparison with more and more mindlessness.

How did I know you'd be one of the three most likely suspects to respond to this topic first?

"Rey takes it to a whole new level of overpowered to where it actually breaks the continuity and lore and now needs an explanation of memory lose"

NOW needs? She already has memory loss in TFA. It's part of the story.

"Remember Luke nor Anakin could force pull, mind trick, lightsaber fight, pilot expertly without knowing how they did it"

Okay so... Right here you're actually bashing TFA for doing Rey differently from the older movies.... Even though your main method of bashing TFA is for being too similar to the older movies. I'm just making sure ;)

As for your point:
Luke NEVER got lightsaber fight training, yet defeated Vader in a saber fight in Return of the Jedi. Vader was supposed to be one of the best saber users EVER.

THAT is overpowered.

BUT OF COURSE Luke is going to get the least criticism, regardless of the facts, because his movies started in the 70's. It seems modern nitpicking moviegoers have little to no ability to analyze movies that came out before 1990... And if the movie came out before 1980, well then it's basically considered "untouchable" and suddenly all facts become irrelevant.

So, due to that, I basically expect you to brush off this point about Luke.

reply

[–] mxpowers43 (367) 7 years ago

"I love how you really hone in on it being so literal of a remake that it's even "frame for frame," which is just compounding a badly thought out comparison with more and more mindlessness."

I like how you leave out the word "nearly" when quoting my "frame for frame" critique. Also you don't actually try to prove how it is not a remake, you just claim those that say this are mindless. This is called an ad hominem and is not an argument.

"How did I know you'd be one of the three most likely suspects to respond to this topic first?"

given the level you obsessively post about this topic it was bound that one of those three that commonly also discuss this topic would reply first. This suggest nothing other than I happened to see your nonsense post first. Another ad hominem. You think by pointing out I responded first somehow invalidates my criticism?

"NOW needs? She already has memory loss in TFA. It's part of the story."

When did TFA say she has memory loss? She just doesn't remember her life prior to being about 8 years old. How much do you remember about your life before 8? probably not much. Usually only significant events stand out from our earlier years.

"right here you're actually bashing TFA for doing Rey differently from the older movies."

because it broke the lore and the continuity; reducing the force to magic without the spirituality. This is not doing story or characters different this is just overpowering one character to show them off.

"Luke NEVER got lightsaber fight training, yet defeated Vader in a saber fight in Return of the Jedi."

He did have training with the lightsaber and had experience fighting Vader once before and losing. This is called growth and character development. And come on this was the last movie in the trilogy, not the first. This is such a bullshit comparison.

"Vader was supposed to be one of the best saber users EVER."

According to whom?

reply

[–] TheUltimateHippo (2250) 7 years ago

Yes Luke defeated Vader who was portrayed as being far more advanced than he was, that's because Luke had to put some goddamn effort in and he actually got his ass handed to him the first time. And it took him 2 movies to make it up to that level. Rey was already an expert Jedi the minute we met her, there is ZERO point to her character she is already flawless at everything. She's a bland, lifeless character, she is a Mary Sue.

The Force Awakens doesn't feel like Star Wars, it feels like a really really bad remake of A New Hope made by someone who is trying to be cool.

reply

[–] mxpowers43 (367) 7 years ago

Exactly. Well said.

reply

[–] TheUltimateHippo (2250) 7 years ago

I've noticed that Force Awakens fans are generally very stupid, either that or they are in denial at how bad this movie is and that it did nothing but remake the original.

reply

[–] mxpowers43 (367) 7 years ago

I do not think it is stupidity that drives it; I think it is blindness caused by cultural pressure. TFA was PC friendly and pandered heavily to nostalgia so those that hold ideas similar to that of political correctness or those that had there wish fulfillment satisfied were predisposed to liking it. And criticizing would disrupt their ideology.

So I guess I think it is blindness caused by ideology; not stupidity. That is why some of the arguments seem so poor and ignore even the most basic facts. Ideology has a powerful affect on psychology.

reply

[–] TheUltimateHippo (2250) 7 years ago

Yeah I see what you're saying. On youtube one of the comments I read was "I never understood why people think Rey is a Mary Sue, I mean Indiana Jones always beats the bad guys and gets the girl so is he a Mary Sue" and that was probably the dumbest thing I have ever heard of. Indiana Jones has weaknesses, snakes being the main one but look at what happens every time he tries to bluff someone, he fails at it. Plus I'm pretty sure he gets captured every movie and doesn't always succeed, I mean he loses the idol at the beginning of Raiders, then gets the arc stolen from him and locked in the Well of Souls, then he gets the crap kicked out of him by the German mechanic, then dragged under a truck and then gets captured again on that Island, then he gets poisoned by Lao Che, gets captured by the Thuggees, gets voodooed, gets brutally whipped, gets turned into a mindless servant of the Kali Ma, gets the crapped kicked out of him again by Pat Roach's character and then trapped and cornered on a rope bridge, and that's just the first two movies. Indiana Jones is vulnerable, he has challenges he has to overcome, Rey does not because she is perfect at everything. I am a HUGE Star Wars fans and I noticed these flaws in the story immediately and it boggles my mind how everyone else didn't notice.

reply

[–] mxpowers43 (367) 7 years ago

Well yes, they try doing to Luke in ANH as well and he is belittled, made fun of and gets his ass kicked nearly 90% of the whole trilogy. Think about it he has 3 moments in which he 'wins'. ANH he makes the one shot during the trench run; but for the remainder of the film he is instructed by Ben, scolded by his uncle, belittled by both Han and Leia, gets his ass kicked by sand people and random bar thugs and even during the trench run nearly crashes and is almost shot down 2 (being saved by Han and Wedge). In addition to that he was relying on R2 heavily to make up for his lack of knowledge in that aircraft. His second time getting to 'win' is not until the beginning of ROTJ when he successfully rescues Han (with help from Chewie, R2, Leia, and Lando). His third and final time is beating Vader but that is immediately followed by him nearly easily getting destroyed by the Emperor only to be saved (yet again) by another character this time Vader. And he does not 'get the girl' at the end. Funny thing is I could make a long long list of his failures but really he only has 3 successes.

The fact that the fans of TFA think Rey and Luke are equally comparable in terms of power portrayal is utter craziness and a sign of their blindness by ideology. I mean they are pretty much polar opposites as much as can be in terms of how they are presented.

reply

[–] TheUltimateHippo (2250) 7 years ago

I know that I am probably in the minority on this but I find Rey to be more annoying than Jar Jar Binks. Jar Jar was at least intended to be a joke, Rey is supposed to be taken seriously and I just can't. I have no idea what the point of her is, she can already do everything without breaking a sweat, she has nothing to overcome, she is perfect. I have a feeling that the PC police insisted they write her character that way to show that women are just as strong as men are, blah, blah, blah.

reply

[–] mxpowers43 (367) 7 years ago

Yes, I also find Rey to be worse and more annoying character than Jar Jar. I have said before I think Rey is by far the worst character ever in a big budget film. The only one I think that comes close to this bad is Dom Torrito in Fast and Furious.

It is not 100% surprising that this happened. For the last 10 years or so many action heroines have been written in a overcompensating fashion to make up for perceived (imagined) inequality in action films; which ignores some of the best female action leads from the 70's 80's and 90's. But also KAthleen Kennedy and JJ were both overcompensating as well. Kathleen obviously has a huge chip on her shoulder ('I don't owe male star wars fans anything') and JJ was reacting to his rather lazy sexist portrayal of women in Star Trek into Darkness (and because he is a spineless twerp he caved to those criticisms).

What IS surprising is just how blinded many 'fans' are to this. And the lengths they go to in order to justify or mitigate the criticisms of the film. Like they legitimately do not see it for being bad. That is the more interesting thing to talk about the unwillingness to allow the ideology to be disrupted. It is truly a remarkably crazy thing to see.

reply

[–] TheUltimateHippo (2250) 7 years ago

I think in today's society it is just the "cool thing" to heap praise upon TFA and bash the prequels relentlessly.

reply

[–] mxpowers43 (367) 7 years ago

Yeah I did not like the prequels but the relentless bashing combined with the unjustified praise of TFA has me looking at them in a new light. The story was good at least, just not executed good. A few small changes they could have been great. TFA would need to be reworked in almost every aspect.

reply

[–] TheUltimateHippo (2250) 7 years ago

Exactly the main thing that hurt the prequels was the over reliance on CGI, if they had gone with actual sets, dubbed over jar jar, maybe got a different actor to play young anakin and rewritten some of the love dialogue the prequels would have been on the same level as the originals. The force awakens however would need to be completely ripped apart and changed into something completely different.

reply

[–] mxpowers43 (367) 7 years ago

Not disagreeing, but they would not be on the same level as the Originals (just because we as the audience new where the story would end) unless they did something really unexpected. Like I heard a 'rumor' that original script was going to have Padme actually betray and plot to kill Anakin when he starts to become evil. Now that would have been something.

Also in TPM they would need to rework the Obi-won, Qui-gon and Anakin dynamic and have it be more Obi-won pushing to train him. Also as you said an actor for anakin that was a little older and a little more focus on showing not telling the state of bureaucracy/corruption of both the republic and the jedi.
In ATOC it should have been Padme pursuing Anakin and him trying to resist not vice versa. Yoda fight I thought was dumb. Also more focus should have been put on Anakin's dark side.

reply

[–] TheUltimateHippo (2250) 7 years ago

I disagree, while I did know the basic way the prequels would end up they still surprised me. Some examples are:

- Finding out who Luke/Leia's mother is
- Where the Emperor came from
- Why Obi-Wan ended up with Anakin's lightsaber
- Why Vader has the wear the suit (also explaining why he hates Obi-Wan so much)
- Where Owen/Beru came from

reply

[–] mxpowers43 (367) 7 years ago

" Finding out who Luke/Leia's mother is"

yeah and they kind of got that wrong. Leia's states she remembers her 'real' mother meaning she would not have died right after giving birth. So the prequels kind of botched that a bit. not a huge problem but a simple one.

"- Where the Emperor came from"

This I actually kind liked. The Emperor's rise to power is one of the best executed concepts of the prequels. and was hell of fun to watch.

"- Why Obi-Wan ended up with Anakin's lightsaber"

Ah this one is kind of trivial. As far as we knew prior to the prequels the jedi might have allowed marriages and Obi-wan could have already been aware of Anakin's soon to arrive child/children. They might have discussed him wanting his child to have his lightsaber. That actually would have been better. Certainly better than "i have the high ground" and picking up the lightsaber after.

"- Why Vader has the wear the suit (also explaining why he hates Obi-Wan so much)"

Well we knew he suffered some kind of severe trauma, likely burns. I think most of us assumed it was at the hands of Obi-Wan; I know I did. But again we knew he would end up in the suit; the manner in which is trivial.

"- Where Owen/Beru came from"

Yeah they butched this one too. Anakin meet him once in his life; why was Owen so "afraid of" Luke being like his father. All the talk from Obi-Wan "he didn't hold with your father's ideals". It was all false and made up according to the prequels. He should have just been Anakin's real or even step brother that he grew up with. This was poorly executed.

Don't get me wrong most of teh problems with the PT are minor but glaring (they stand out) structurally though the stories are sound. TFA would need to be rewritten from scratch to be anything decent.

reply

[–] FFNogoodnik (774) 7 years ago

Anakin was highly criticized for being overpowered, and no one liked the midochlorians or 'chosen one' nonsense. Rey

I thought the midi-chlorians was a great idea. It demonstrated how far the Jedi council had veered from the original path and had become a bureaucracy. It showed that they cared more about cold stats than actually using the force. I am sure there was a test and if your midi-chlorians were below a certain number you didn't get a chance to learn.

Qui-gon sensed through the force that Anakin was strong but also knew the council would not accept his (Qui-Gon's) word and used the test to convince the council to let him take him from Tatooine.

Additionally, one of the critiques of the use of midi-chlorians was that is made it too scientific and took away a person's ability to gain force use through training. Well, we already knew that is not true because Vader being Luke and Leia's father shows that force use is transmitted through biology and not training.

reply

[–] TheUltimateHippo (2250) 7 years ago

I didn't mind the midi-clorians either, in fact it never crossed my mind that they were a legitimate complaint until I read fanboy rants on the internet. My only real complaint about the Prequels was the over reliance on CGI, yeah it was blatantly obvious that those were not real sets and I kind of felt like I was watching Space Jam all over again. But I will take the Prequels over The Force Awakens (aka A New Hope 2015) or Rogue One any day.

reply

[–] mxpowers43 (367) 7 years ago

I was not against the concept per-say but manner in which they presented it like a weird blood bacteria that somehow had a spiritual/biological communication. It hurt the mysticism of the original presentation of the force.

But it is an interesting interpretation of the jedi council becoming bureacratical over counts and stats and not the force. I do not think it is right though because if that is the case they would have jumped all over Anakin but at least yoda was tied to the force and could sense the darkness in Anakin. Mace seemed to be hiding behind the Bureaucracy of age not mid-chlorians.

I also do not like the connotation that strength of force potential is predetermined by you blood count. I much preferred a spiritual approach in which only by being close to the force (for those that can use it at least) was the way to be strong in the force.

But that is me

reply

[–] FFNogoodnik (774) 7 years ago

By bureaucratically I am just thinking along the lines of they do not search through the force to find people, they send out people who check MC counts and any that are high enough are brought to the council.

When in reality we know that it is not just the count but who you are. I am sure they would have missed many good Jedi candidates who did not have the MC count but whose patience and maturity would have made up for the lack on MCs.

The spiritual approach, to me, went out the door the minute it was confirmed in RotJ that Vader was Luke's father and both of Vader's children were force sensitive.

reply

[–] mxpowers43 (367) 7 years ago

"By bureaucratically I am just thinking along the lines of they do not search through the force to find people, they send out people who check MC counts and any that are high enough are brought to the council. "

I did not get the impression this was how they did it. It seemed they identified them by identifying kids with exceptional reflexes and testing if it from the force. They never really flesh out what the MC counts mean other than being similar to IQ a measure of one's potential.

"The spiritual approach, to me, went out the door the minute it was confirmed in RotJ that Vader was Luke's father and both of Vader's children were force sensitive."

It did kind of change it from a spiritual only to a biological likely I suppose if you look at it that way. I mean spirituality in certain beliefs can be generational and not always biological. But yeah both Vader's children being force sensitive does suggest a biological component. But it was not fleshed out and just seemed to be an arbitrary measurement of force potential. I did not like that suggestion. I liked better the idea that You either could us the force and its strength was based on how much you feel it; not based on a predetermined amount of blood microorganism.

reply

[–] FFNogoodnik (774) 7 years ago

In both "A New Hope" and "The Force Awakens" the story starts out with someone putting information into a droid that is then told to take that information to the good guys. This does not happen in "The Phantom Menace"

In both "A New Hope" and "The Force Awakens" the droid is then put with our force hero and the force hero helps get the droid to the people that need to get the information. This does not happen in "The Phantom Menace" because there is no droid with information.

In both "A New Hope" and "The Force Awakens" the goal is to destroy a planet killing weapon and this does not happen in "The Phantom Menace" as there is no plane killing weapon in that movie.

Both "A New Hope" and "The Force Awakens" ends in the destruction of the planet killing weapon with the main antagonist getting away. This does not happen in "The Phantom Menace", in The Phantom Menace the antagonist (Darth Maul) is killed.

The devil is in the details.

reply

[–] TheUltimateHippo (2250) 7 years ago

Also in The Phantom Menace there was no Empire, while in TFA we had Empire 2.0. Yeah Jar Jar Abrams just had to erase all of the progress the Rebellion made in the OT and just reset the galaxy to how it was in ANH because he was too damn lazy to do anything original.

reply

[–] AP (5261) 7 years ago

I hate to do it, but I actually have to defend TPM.

Yes, all three movies involve finding a powerful Force-sensitive kid in the desert who saves the day in the end, but the similarities between the three movies end there.

ANH: The bad guys are an authoritarian Nazi-based government with a Death Star.
TPM: The bad guys are a corrupt trade federation based on the East Indian Tea Company with no super weapon.
TFA: The bad guys are an authoritarian Nazi-based government with a Death Star.

ANH: The bad guys have an army of Stormtroopers.
TPM: The bad guys have an army of robots.
TFA: The bad guys have an army of Stormtroopers.

ANH: The good guys are a ragtag group of under dogs trying to fight against tyrants.
TPM: The good guys are people in authority trying to maintain law and order.
TFA: The good guys are a ragtag group of under dogs trying to fight against tyrants.

ANH: The evil Force user leads an army of Stormtroopers to attack the good guys at the start.
TPM: The good guys are attacked by droids and the main villain of the movie doesn't show up until a good 20 minutes in.
TFA: The evil Force user leads an army of Stormtroopers to attack the good guys at the start.

ANH: After the initial attack, a main character is captured, but not before giving stolen plans to a droid and sending him across the desert.
TPM: No stolen plans. No droid. No desert. Although a main character is captured.
ANH: After the initial attack, a main character is captured, but not before giving stolen plans to a droid and sending him across the desert.

ANH: The droid is briefly captured by one or more little nomads.
TPM: The Jedis find an annoying creature who leads them to his underwater kingdom.
TFA: The droid is briefly captured by one or more little nomads.

ANH: The droids runs into the Force kid and one person who has past experiences with the bad guys, then they flee the desert in the Millennium Falcon once Stormtroopers show up.
TPM: The Jedis find passage through the water and begin a rescue attempt for the captured character.
TFA: The droids runs into the Force kid and one person who has past experiences with the bad guys, then they flee the desert in the Millennium Falcon once Stormtroopers show up.

That's just the opening few scenes. Let's skip ahead to the climax.

ANH: The good guys lead an aerial assault against the Death Star, hoping to blow it up before it destroys them. No land battle.
TPM: The good guys form an alliance with the undersea creatures and launch a land battle and an aerial assault.
TFA: The good guys lead an aerial assault against the Death Star, hoping to blow it up before it destroys them. No land battle.

reply

[–] Bubbathegut (17285) 7 years ago

Thats odd, I find that ANH and TFA are eerily similar.

Good write up. I had a similar one as well about the 3 main characters.

reply

[–] Bubbathegut (17285) 7 years ago

An orphan on a sand planet escapes the empire oops I mean first order on the falcon oops I mean Millennium Falcon. Finds a droid R2D2 oops I mean BB-8 with top secret information. Fights off two tie fighters oops I mean first order tie fighters as they leave the planet. Princess Leia I mean Poe Dameron put the death star plans I mean map to Luke Skywalker into R2-D2 I mean BB-8 just minutes before he is captured by Darth Vader I mean Kylo Ren. Then later Princess Leia I mean Poe Dameron is rescued by someone in a Storm Trooper uniform. Meets up with the rebels oops I mean resistance then visits a cantina oops I mean cantina and learns about the force from yoda oops I mean Maz K. Then Luke oops I mean Rey watches her mentor be killed by Darth Vader oops I mean Kylo Ren. Then lets call her "Rey" helps destroy the death star oops I mean starkiller base by deactivating the shield generator so that x-wings oops I mean x-wings can make a trench run.

Yeah, basically its a brand new story...

reply