The Big, Dumb Star Wars: Force Awakens thread.

Fantastic. Yes, it had flaws, but they were minor and didn't detract from the experience and the emotion of it at all. The franchise is in good hands.

Thank you for putting my childhood back up on the screen again, JJ.

I won't say I'm disappointed, but jeez, how in the hell can you use the same exact story for 3 movies? Huge, deadly, bad guy ball in space. Good guys have to go in, disarm the shields, and then blow up the weak spot. Yeah, yeah, seen it all before. A few times. As many times as the Millenium Falcon has been shot, crashed, and otherwise run into the ground, I find it difficult to accept that it would still be in that good of a shape, never mind still space worthy after setting in the desert for that long. All these years in the future, but they're still flying around in the same X Wing and Tie fighters? That'd be like me going into a dealership and buying a brand new AMC Javelin. Visually, a stunning movie to see. The lighting and special effects continue to improve at an amazing pace. If Rey is not Luke's daughter or granddaughter, I'll eat my shorts.

In reply to ncjay:

Those are new streamlined X wings and tie fighters.

ncjay wrote: I won't say I'm disappointed, but jeez, how in the hell can you use the same exact story for 3 movies? Huge, deadly, bad guy ball in space. Good guys have to go in, disarm the shields, and then blow up the weak spot. Yeah, yeah, seen it all before. A few times. As many times as the Millenium Falcon has been shot, crashed, and otherwise run into the ground, I find it difficult to accept that it would still be in that good of a shape, never mind still space worthy after setting in the desert for that long. All these years in the future, but they're still flying around in the same X Wing and Tie fighters? That'd be like me going into a dealership and buying a brand new AMC Javelin. Visually, a stunning movie to see. The lighting and special effects continue to improve at an amazing pace. If Rey is not Luke's daughter or granddaughter, I'll eat my shorts.

I spent the better part of a day very much in this same camp. "They're just telling the same story again..." But I've come around a bit and realized that while they are recycling a lot of thematic and narrative elements from previous installments, that's kind of how the world works.

Two decades ago we were attacking Al Qaeda with F15s and A-10s. Today we're attacking ISIS with F22s and... well, A10s. The rebels (now the Resistance) have traded out Incom T-65s for T-70s which now face the TIE/fo fighters of the First Order, which is clearly build on the remnants of the Galactic Empire. The stories are the same because the players are the same. The Death Star keeps getting bigger because it'll have to work one of these times, right? Isn't that how government spending works.

The way I see it is the Rebels/Republic vs. the Empire/First Order is really just this sort of constant background churn that will always remain somewhat constant while we watch the misadventures of what has to be the galaxy's most dysfunctional family: The Skywalkers. Seriously, a strong case can be made for just rounding every last Skywalker and shooting them into the nearest sun. Something like 80% of all the problems in the Galaxy is caused by some Skywalker or another.

Anyway, this film would not be able to pull off the massive recycling if it weren't for the strengths of the actors playing the new crew. They are, to a man and woman, fantastic. Especially Adam Driver, who I would have never through would have been able to bring such complexity and unhinged angst to a space fantasy villain. I really think that Kylo Ren is his Ledger Joker moment.

The thing is, the new crew is good enough where the film didn't have to delve into fan service as much as it did. But I get it. And we also have to remember that there's a whole generation of folks that will reintroduced to these stories through this series of films.

So overall I say a solid B+ effort, but most of all it gives me real hope to see what Rian Johnson does with the story in VIII and IX. Abrams has a bad habit of rushing from set piece to set piece, when there's more than enough complexity and emotional weight among this story and with these actors that a few more talking parts would add even more weight to the narrative.

I think my favorite part was Rey and Fin trying to get to a good ship, "Not that one, its junk." The good ship gets blown up, "The junk will do..." And that junk was the Falcon. I had an awww, BERK YEAH moment there.

Good points JG. Plus, this is Star Wafs for the next generation, not as much for the previous fans. Disney/JJ was looking to pull in newer people who weren't able to see the original Star Wars in theaters, so they made A New Hope again. It's just the start of the next trilogy.

new crew - fantastic. They can actually act.

Dialogue between Han and Leia was soooo weak.

Recycled plot point of planet killing weapon with one easily destroyed weak point has me a bit disappointed.

Really interested in the Rey's Force Vision and the Knights of Ren.

Apparently Snoke is 7' tall and lanky. Lining up to be Plageuis.

If Rey is Luke's kid, who's her mother?

I'm assuming Finn isn't a force user, but he had extensive training in the First Order, making him better than the average Joe in a fight, although he just worked sanitation.

My wife believes that Luke was channeling some Force through Rey, and that is the only reason she's able to learn so quickly. Otherwise, she's got a real Neo kinda "I know Kung Fu" kinda vibe.

Appleseed wrote: I think my favorite part was Rey and Fin trying to get to a good ship, "Not that one, its junk." The good ship gets blown up, "The junk will do..." And that junk was the Falcon. I had an awww, BERK YEAH moment there.

That was one of several moments when the theater I was in broke into cheers.

Agreed on the performances. I maybe didn't like Driver as much as JG did, but he was very good. But Daisy Ridley as Rey just became an overnight star, IMO. Boyega as Finn was excellent, as well, and quite funny.

Overall, I didn't much care about the recycled story because it felt like Star Wars. It put me back into the theater as a 13-year-old kid watching Return of the Jedi, which was the last time I felt it. And the fact that I got to share it with my son.... I will admit, I got kinda choked up at the end.

I was looking around the theater while the lights were still up.I asked my son what percentage of the crowd was old enough to have seen the original movie in the theater. We figure less than 10% of the crowd was even born in 1977, including my 30 year old son. The "Hell ya" comments generally came from us older folks and there were three or four of those moments. First sight of the Falcon, Chewy and Han entering the Falcon,pulling the cover off R2D2, and CP3O walking between Han and Leia all got small cheers. When Han and his son were approaching each other on that cat walk I turned to my son and said "I've seen this before, someone dies right here". If you saw the original it was all somewhat predictable this time through but still great fun. My only concern is that they get episodes VIII and IX out in short order. I'm not getting any younger.

Another thing that I couldn't get off my mind today is the fact that all these years after the Rebels kicked Darth Vader's butt, and supposedly crushed the Empire, they are still hiding in caves and on the run from the First Order. At what point does the victor start building some nice bases, equipment, and stop running like a little bitch? First Order gets all the nice, new, kick ass stuff to work with while it appears the Rebels are working out of someone's basement. If you did just crush the Empire, why would you let the First Order get that powerful to begin with? Or am I just over thinking all of this nonsense?

Good points Jay, but the relationship between the Republic and the Resistance wasn't explained in the movie, which is one of its biggest flaws.

I'm thinking that the Rebellion became the Republic, who went back to the decadent ways of the Old Republic and basically just became a regulatory body with a police force instead of a military. Then, the First Order starts to form and the Republic says, "Meh, they are just a bunch of emo crybabies, nothing to worry about" and just tries to hide from the fact that there are more bad guys to fight.

The Resistance is formed by the old heroes of the Rebellion to fight against the First Order, with the Republic only providing marginal logistical support if any at all. Which is why they have shiny new X-Wings, but little else. Now that the First Order destroyed the Republic capital system of Hosnia, there may be a war between the Republic and First Order, with the Resistance supporting or joining the Republic.

I hope anyway.

First things first, WAAAAAAY better than "Episodes I-III". Had the "old Star Wars" feel to it. Plot was a little recycled, but the "bad guy struggling with not being bad enough" angle was somewhat interesting.

On the other hand, lots of plot holes, some of which may or may not be filled in the inevitable sequel(s). Oddly, the one that bugged me most was: if everything on a particular planet is picked apart for scrap, why is the Falcon still whole and flyable? Close second: Dear Bad Guys, Please keep building easily destructible superstation/planet killer/death stars. Sincerely, the Good Guys.

kazoospec wrote: Oddly, the one that bugged me most was: if everything on a particular planet is picked apart for scrap, why is the Falcon still whole and flyable?

Felt like the classic "I'm gonna restore it" rotting hulk of a muscle car at the junkyard situation to me.

The kids may not know what the Falcon is, but it's new illegal owner probably does. It's not scrap as much as a trophy.

Also, did anybody else think the Nazi symbolism was just touch heavy handed?

Kenny_McCormic wrote: Also, did anybody else think the Nazi symbolism was just touch heavy handed?

It's always kind of been there, just maybe not as obviously. From the beginning you've had things "Stormtroopers", cloning/eugenics to build the "super soldier", the fact that many of the Empire's weapons are pretty much exact copies of German WWII weapons, the continual, obsessive search for the "super weapon", the unquestioned "supreme leader", etc.

In reply to kazoospec:

Oh yeah, it's always been there, but not like this.

I mean, they even do the salute in that scene. It just made me think "WE GET IT, YOU'RE FASCISTS".

Kenny_McCormic wrote: Also, did anybody else think the Nazi symbolism was just touch heavy handed?

Nope, the Empire has always been the space Nazi's: that's what Lucas drew from for representing the epitome of evil ruling system. It's in the OT too...Nazi salutes and such; the PT are the ones that watered it down some.

Appleseed wrote: So...did anyone else hear/not hear the line from the trailer?

I heard it but it sounded likes Luke's voice.

ThunderCougarFalconGoat wrote: Good points Jay, but the relationship between the Republic and the Resistance wasn't explained in the movie, which is one of its biggest flaws. I'm thinking that the Rebellion became the Republic, who went back to the decadent ways of the Old Republic and basically just became a regulatory body with a police force instead of a military. Then, the First Order starts to form and the Republic says, "Meh, they are just a bunch of emo crybabies, nothing to worry about" and just tries to hide from the fact that there are more bad guys to fight. The Resistance is formed by the old heroes of the Rebellion to fight against the First Order, with the Republic only providing marginal logistical support if any at all. Which is why they have shiny new X-Wings, but little else. Now that the First Order destroyed the Republic capital system of Hosnia, there may be a war between the Republic and First Order, with the Resistance supporting or joining the Republic. I hope anyway.

I understood it as explained by the movie the the Republic were supporting the Rebels which since legitimized them and they became know as the Resistance. The remnants of the Empire were taken over by Snook and became the First Order.

What I didn't get was Ben Solo/Kylo Ren was last of the order of Ren. Who is the order of Ren and what happened to the other ones?

As far as heavy handed on the Nazi references, I thought the speech when firing the big gun was the only thing that was "more" than the rest of the movies.

It was a long film, and after watching it I can see there could easily be another 30~60 minutes of footage for a directors cut. Unfortunately this is a JJ Abrams film. For as good as it was and as many of his "trademark" things that were left out of this film, feeling like a little too much was left on the editing room floor wasn't one of them.

JG Pasterjak wrote: Two decades ago we were attacking Al Qaeda with F15s and A-10s. Today we're attacking ISIS with F22s and... well, A10s.

Because the guys and the Pentagon have been trying to kill the A10 and keep failing because nothing else can do it's job. The F4 was still finishing in the top 3 at William Tell until taken out of service due to the air frame hours. Tech is great and all but sometimes you just get it right. The A10 is one of those times.

Sorry for thread jacking on the A10. But it is cool.

Saw it today, enjoyable but not "blown away". So part of force training to be seperated from your parents and lose all track of your family? Seems like a fairly common thread out there.

Saw it Saturday morning so I can come back to this thread now.

I'll be seeing it again over the holidays. So many good stuff, so much awesome. I saw a Yahoo article that talked about most people loving it, except So-n-so quoted as saying "I went into it expecting a bitching fast-paced Star Wars movie, but I was disappointed. They made it an old-school Star Wars movie." THAT'S A GOOD THING YOU berkeleyING IDIOT.

My only complaint? ANOTHER Death Star / Star Killer / whatever it was. 3rd time's a charm? I like the Kylo Ren reveal, that was interesting. I'm thinking the girl is maybe a daughter that Leia had after Han left and didn't tell him she was pregnant maybe? Unless Luke hooked up with someone we don't know.

Saw it Saturday night, overall a worthy successor to 4/5/6. Adam Driver's performance really stood out and Kylo Ren was a refreshingly different bad guy for a Star Wars movie.

I know that Star Wars canon is just an endless cycle of destroying giant superweapons with one fatal flaw, and I know that it wasn't a huge part of this story, but that trope really needs to be retired now. It's tiresome to see at this point.

Also it's kind of a letdown that they telegraphed Han Solo's death so many minutes in advance. Once he walked out on that bridge over the bottomless shaft there was no way he was coming back. Either the precedent set for that kind of scene in a Star Wars movie, or the simple fact that Kylo Ren wasn't going to quit this evil business and go home with dad, would've made that clear.

I can confirm Luke's line from the trailer was not in the movie BTW. If Rey is his daughter, who's the mom? That's a big chunk of storyline to let fall into the cracks between movies.

The reason the Resistance is still "operating out of a basement" is because they operate more like a terrorist group than a government-backed military. This is by design, so that the Republic can give them support under the table and attack the First Order by proxy without drawing much blame themselves - until the First Order eventually had enough and blew up a bunch of Republic planets in retaliation...but it worked for a while.

In reply to GameboyRMH:

Including courisacant...