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 Manchu wrote:
His Star Trek movie was super fun and superficial.

How is that different from the prequels?

The prequels were painful, not fun. That would be an important difference.

I'll wait to see the result.

At the end of the day, it could be worse.

It could be George Lucas.

 Ahtman wrote:
The prequels were painful, not fun. That would be an important difference.

Oh don't be that way. They had their fun moments, just as Abrams's Star Trek had its painful ones.

 Manchu wrote:

 Ahtman wrote:
The prequels were painful, not fun. That would be an important difference.

Oh don't be that way. They had their fun moments, just as Abrams's Star Trek had its painful ones.

I got almost no fun moments out of the prequels. The only two characters I liked were killed in the first movie, and all the bad ones (i.e. everyone else) seemed to live on forever. If I had to say nice things about them I would say that I thought that Ewan McGregor did a decent Alec Guinness, and the Rifftrax of the prequels were fairly funny. Outside of that, I found them just terrible from almost start to finish. I don't begrudge others for trying to find a silver lining in them, but I sure didn't.

For my money the best Star Trek anything in the last 20 years was Galaxy Quest.

I loved the new Star Trek. Did it have plot holes? Yep. Did every single Star Trek series have massive plot holes? Yep. Did they generally have them on a per episode basis? Yep. Not really seeing the issue. I enjoyed the casting for the relaunch and in general the way it was handled. And I got started on Star Trek in The Next Generation.

I like Joss but Serenity was horrible for consistancy and non-plot holes. I only really enjoy it now because I watched Firefly and then rewatched it. And even then it was pretty crappy some of the jumps it made. I just happened to like the characters now. While Avengers was excellent for a brawler film (also with massive plot holes).

I would have been ok with Joss but am happy with Abrams.

@Ahtman: Nothing good to say about Ian McDiarmid's performance? The battles of Geonosis and Courscant did nothing for you visually or aurally? How about the sight of Kamino or the design contrasts showing "historical" development? The idea that the clones were not the enemies during the Clone Wars, as many had guessed in the interim, but rather the Jedi's own troops who would eventually and catastrophically turn on them doesn't motivate you to give Lucas some credit as a clever writer? And, most of all, the theme of how even enlightened stoicism implies myopia rather than moral clarity did not in your opinion inform and ground Luke's experiences in the Original Trilogy?

I mean, I know it's possible for someone to dismiss everything about the prequels. It just seems a bit of a shame.

 Ahtman wrote:

 Manchu wrote:

 Ahtman wrote:
The prequels were painful, not fun. That would be an important difference.

Oh don't be that way. They had their fun moments, just as Abrams's Star Trek had its painful ones.

I got almost no fun moments out of the prequels. The only two characters I liked were killed in the first movie, and all the bad ones (i.e. everyone else) seemed to live on forever. If I had to say nice things about them I would say that I thought that Ewan McGregor did a decent Alec Guinness, and the Rifftrax of the prequels were fairly funny. Outside of that, I found them just terrible from almost start to finish. I don't begrudge others for trying to find a silver lining in them, but I sure didn't.

For my money the best Star Trek anything in the last 20 years was Galaxy Quest.

What guys did you like? I guessing Darth Maul but who was the second one - Liam Neeson's dude?

Everything you listed has zero to do with 'fun', which is what you originally asked about.

I also think you are giving much of that way more credit then it deserves. There was nothing about it that was clever, and seemed that much of it was every bad decision was given a yes, and anything that might actually have been clever a 'no'. I thought the Battle over Courscant was a kitchen sink of CGI and flashing lights, hoping we wouldn't notice it was devoid of anything interesting.

I know it is possible for a person to want to like something so badly that they imagine quality, weight, and subtext that doesn't exist in the work, but it happens sometimes.

This is one area I don't think we will find much common ground. THE LINE MUST BE DRAWN HERE!


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Frazzled wrote:
What guys did you like? I guessing Darth Maul but who was the second one - Liam Neeson's dude?

Yup.

 Ahtman wrote:
Everything you listed has zero to do with 'fun', which is what you originally asked about.

Good acting, special effects, thematic content, and plot twists ... don't make for fun movies? Again, not saying the prequels were perfect or even good, just that you seem to be going out of your way to miss what is good about them. Such is the way of the internet.

 Manchu wrote:

 Ahtman wrote:
Everything you listed has zero to do with 'fun', which is what you originally asked about.

Good acting, special effects, thematic content, and plot twists

And here I thought we were talking about the Star Wars prequels.


Admittedly I wasn't as adverse when I first saw them, but each subsequent viewing the films get worse and worse. Some movies get better with repeated viewings, I found it to be the opposite in this case, to the point where I really don't see much good in them, and I honestly don't see how you get good acting, (good) thematic content, and plot twists out of it, unless we view them as some sort of Rorschach test where the viewer sees in them what they want to see, whether it is actually there or not.

Don't pretend I'm saying they're good movies. I'm saying there's good in them. Cf. Luke on his dad.

 Manchu wrote:
Don't pretend I'm saying they're good movies. I'm saying there's good in them. Cf. Luke on his dad.

I suppose I can relent on that point, I just think you have to mine a little to deep to make it worth the trouble. Now the new FFG Star Wars game, that is good stuff, assuming you can get past the proprietary dice, which some I guess don't like.

I agree with you that there are a ton of obstacles between the audience and the precious few worthwhile insights in those films. But they are definitely there.

The whole series is clearly about the decay of moral clarity because of emotional suppression.

Episode I: Qui-Gonn tells us to be mindful of the Living Force and to keep in touch with what's going on in the here and now. Meanwhile, Yoda and Mace Windu are standing right next to Darth Sidious without knowing it.

Episode II: Anakin and Padme fall in love but instead of this being a happy and open issue, the structure of Jedi morals means their relationship is intense, guilt-ridden, and generally dark. Similarly, the Confederacy -- which could be a proto-Rebellion in a sense -- is actually a shell for Palpatine's totalitarian machinations.

Episode III: Anakin, now scarred by war and death, becomes intensely afraid of losing Padme. Yoda's advice: get over it, nothing lasts forever. At this point, Anakin can't tell the difference between good and bad anymore. Friends and enemies are indistinguishable, ultimately including Padme herself.

 Manchu wrote:
intense, guilt-ridden, and generally dark.

You just described my entire dating life, and I'm not even a Jedi. Or am I?

If you are a Jedi and want to ever be happy, resign immediately. I don't care what kind of check Abrams says he'll sign.

 Ahtman wrote:

 Manchu wrote:
intense, guilt-ridden, and generally dark.

You just described my entire dating life, and I'm not even a Jedi. Or am I?

Hell thats me the last time I went to a barbeque joint.

EDIT: I'm down with Abrams doing it. Its an established genre. At its best its a roaring high tech version of a serial / B movie. He seems to do that rather well.

Plus he can actually direct living actors...

No complaints here. I've enjoyed all of his films so far.

EDIT - And about half of Lost (Seasons 3, 4 and 5)

I enjoyed the original Star wars (had my dad record them on video for me when I was like 6 because I had to go to bed)

I enjoyed the Prequels

I've enjoyed the Star trek movies I've seen (not seen all of them)

I enjoyed JJ's reboot

They're all good for different reasons, The original star wars were pretty epic, different to anything I'd ever seen (which was mainly cartoons ) and were definatly a product of their time, same as The star trek movies.

JJ's Reboot and the Star wars Prequels are also a product of their time, CGI heavy, flashy, Obvious, and simple. Whenever they try to balance flashyness with deep plot, flashyness wins, beacuse it makes the money.

also

 FM Ninja 048 wrote:

Spoiler:

Maby JJ could reboot starwars, starting from The phantom menace, like he's done with Star Trek.

Or is that too much to ask

That's not happening. At least, not in the next 3 movies.

Count on it being centered around Luke rebuilding the Jedi order and Leia rebuilding the republic. Han and Chewie will stir up trouble, and C3PO and R2D2 will get into some hilarious hi-jinx!

 kronk wrote:

 FM Ninja 048 wrote:

Spoiler:

Maby JJ could reboot starwars, starting from The phantom menace, like he's done with Star Trek.

Or is that too much to ask

That's not happening. At least, not in the next 3 movies.

Count on it being centered around Luke rebuilding the Jedi order and Leia rebuilding the republic. Han and Chewie will stir up trouble, and C3PO and R2D2 will get into some hilarious hi-jinx!

With different actors... right? 'cuz Ford, Hammil and Fisher are getting a bit "geriatric".

 Manchu wrote:

 Ahtman wrote:
Everything you listed has zero to do with 'fun', which is what you originally asked about.

Good acting, special effects, thematic content, and plot twists ... don't make for fun movies? Again, not saying the prequels were perfect or even good, just that you seem to be going out of your way to miss what is good about them. Such is the way of the internet.

Good acting?

"I'm a creepy stalker. I luuuuvvvvvv you Padme."

"Stop it Anni."

"But I luuuuvvv youuuuuuu."

"Your freaking me out."

"Watch me fall of this animal!"

"CAN I HAVE YOUR BABIES!"

I think it'd be interesting if they brought back Mark Hamill as old Luke Skywalker in a sort of Yoda role. They could even make it 100 years or more after RotJ and use Hamill as a hologram training program or ghost or something. That could be a cool nod to the original trilogy without making it completely idiotic.

 djones520 wrote:
Good acting?

Come on now, don't take what I said out of context.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Hordini wrote:
use Hamill as a hologram training program or ghost or something.

I like that idea a lot. You're thinking of a holocron, btw.

It had robots that coughed... robots that coughed.

In other countries George Lucas would have been drawn and quartered for that alone.

This may be the only time I say this, but I'm entirely with Ahtman on this one.

The new logo?

Normally Id say this is a good thing, but the fact he said he originally turned it down makes me think he wont be that into it and it wont turn out that well.

 djones520 wrote:
It had robots that coughed... robots that coughed.

General Grievious (or whatever) wasn't a robot, but a creature inside a powered suit. Didn't you notice he had eyes? Apparently in the cartoon he was much more interesting and dangerous, and at some point Samuel Jackson used the force to crush his armor and damage most of his organs, including lungs and such. At least that is how it was explained to me.

This was a problem that the new Star Trek had to some extent as well. A lot of the story is told through another medium, in Star Trek's case a comic book, and then just tossed into the movie as if everyone should have watched/read the outside material. I'm a firm believer that a work should be able to tell it's story without having to get you to buy other parts to really understand what is going on. There is nothing wrong with side stories and the like, but when huge swaths of exposition that play out on screen are left out on the assumption you will go out and by a comic, well, that is just bad storytelling.

 Ahtman wrote:

 djones520 wrote:
It had robots that coughed... robots that coughed.

General Grievious (or whatever) wasn't a robot, but a creature inside a powered suit. Didn't you notice he had eyes? Apparently in the cartoon he was much more interesting and dangerous, and at some point Samuel Jackson used the force to crush his armor and damage most of his organs, including lungs and such. At least that is how it was explained to me.

Long story short, Grievous was originally an alien warlord. Count Dooku used the force to down his ship, nearly killing him. Dooku gave him the droid prosthetics and Grievous never learned why his ship had crashed. During the early part of the clone wars Mace Windu was able to use the force to crush Grievous's internal organs as he narrowly escaped capture.

The problem with making a new movie is that so much of the canon, hundreds of years past the end of the 6th film) is already written and the novel s have done an amazing job with being detailed and keeping the canon. Any changes to the existing canon will throw the Star Wars universe out of whack and those hundreds of book will have been retconned out of canon. I would love to see a series about the Yuuzhan Vong war, but it would be hard to find replacements to Hamill and Ford...

Can Sean Bean be in this movie... only to be struck down.

 Squidmanlolz wrote:

 Ahtman wrote:

 djones520 wrote:
It had robots that coughed... robots that coughed.

General Grievious (or whatever) wasn't a robot, but a creature inside a powered suit. Didn't you notice he had eyes? Apparently in the cartoon he was much more interesting and dangerous, and at some point Samuel Jackson used the force to crush his armor and damage most of his organs, including lungs and such. At least that is how it was explained to me.

Long story short, Grievous was originally an alien warlord. Count Dooku used the force to down his ship, nearly killing him. Dooku gave him the droid prosthetics and Grievous never learned why his ship had crashed. During the early part of the clone wars Mace Windu was able to use the force to crush Grievous's internal organs as he narrowly escaped capture.

Ok, makes a bit of sense.

But I could literally spend hours explaining how horrible the prequel was, I've done it before. I don't wish to get into it again. I just want to be happy that Lucas can no longer abuse his child like he has been doing. Star Wars has been removed from the abusive home and hopefully its now in the caring hands of adoptive parents who will love and nurture it back to what it was meant to be.