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 Riquende wrote:

 AlexHolker wrote:
If anyone wants to listen to a thorough dismantling of The Last Jedi, MauLer has finished putting out a five hour critique of the movie. Part 1 Part 2 Part 3

I'll give it a listen, but before I do can I ask if it's like a lot of YT reviews in harping on about SJW/Feminazis/etc? I'm interested in a discussion its failings as a film, not hearing a rant about Hollywood agendas.

I listened to part 1 and more or less half of part two, so far is more about character motivation, logic, consistency etc
No idea about the rest.

The saddest part is that the main gist of complaints against the last jedi might end up convincing disney they need to play it safe and fun for every movie. The last jedi at least tried to brooch relatively new storytelling. I mean if you're gna copy stuff , it might as well be battlestar galactica.

 Earth127 wrote:
The saddest part is that the main gist of complaints against the last jedi might end up convincing disney they need to play it safe and fun for every movie. The last jedi at least tried to brooch relatively new storytelling. I mean if you're gna copy stuff , it might as well be battlestar galactica.

Well as the main gist seems to be it's a horrible story with 2d characters, How do you play it safe from there? write a good story with interesting characters? I'd hope so.

instead of introducing characters to try to appeal to a larger box office opening in China, just play it safe and introduce a memorable character that contributes to the story.

Kylo ren is the most 3d character in any star wars movie. People only ever complain about him being whiny and not as terrifying as darth vader, duh that was the point. i'd liek to point out if you're a basic grunt he's gna kill you just as quickly as vader does.

Luke would never try to kill his nephew he is perfect saint/paragon of light. well he didn't he just had a half second madness and ignited his lightsaber. In parallel to return of the jedi, he almost totaaly loses it at one point tough holds back from actually slaughtering vader thus leading to his triumph over the emperor.

It wastes the setup of TFA for rey's parentage and Snoke.
The only scene in TFA where Rey's parentage is discussed ends with Maz Kanata's line : "The belonging you seek is not behind you ..." But I just wondered what reveal about Rey's family could they have made?
Snoke yeah could be a waste but really we didn't need another emperor so why not off him, gives us more time to focus on the actually important pay off next movie. Tough I do understan the dissapointment there.

It has no central theme. Yes it does failure and coping with it.

There are some legitimate criticisms but the whole it betrays star wars doesn't make any sense to me.

I started watching Mauler's first video but his arguments don't hold water. The way he compares to the originals disproves his point. Did destroying the death star not even slow down the empire? then what was the point? No the prequels didn't do world building with their politics, they just delivered a story badly. Star wars movies do almost no world building for the universe. We only once here a story/myth.

There are some very legit criticsm as well. Gosh that opening space battle was painfull to watch the first time around. I hate action scenes that are a contest of dumb.

P.S. I have not read through this entire thread, so I am presuming a number of things.

It feels like a bit of a strawman, really.

Broadly speaking, even amongst those who disliked The Last Jedi, Kylo is often seen as one of the stronger parts of it.

 Earth127 wrote:
The saddest part is that the main gist of complaints against the last jedi might end up convincing disney they need to play it safe and fun for every movie. The last jedi at least tried to brooch relatively new storytelling. I mean if you're gna copy stuff , it might as well be battlestar galactica.

What about just writing a believable story with good characters that overcome challenges instead of a bland rehash with empty mistery boxes (TFA) or DUDE SUBVERSIONS (TLJ)? You can make a good movie in few ways, but you make a bad movie in many, many ways.
At this point in the trilogy, don't even have a main character sensibly invested in the main story so far. Is a disaster.

Also, the prequels were bad but the worldbuilding is good. Just wasted.

Remember when we saw Luke struggling away with Yoda on Degoba? And he couldn't lift the x wing out of the swamp because he didn't believe it? And he fought Vader and got his ass kicked both physically and emotionally? That element is sorely missing from the new movies. Ray went straight to mind tricking Daniel Craig and so on.

 Earth127 wrote:
The saddest part is that the main gist of complaints against the last jedi might end up convincing disney they need to play it safe and fun for every movie. The last jedi at least tried to brooch relatively new storytelling. I mean if you're gna copy stuff , it might as well be battlestar galactica.

What new storytelling elements did you think TLJ broached?

I didn't get the sense of anything new so much as old elements of storytelling poorly executed, or elements that are intentionally avoided for good reason.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Earth127 wrote:
Kylo ren is the most 3d character in any star wars movie. People only ever complain about him being whiny and not as terrifying as darth vader, duh that was the point. i'd liek to point out if you're a basic grunt he's gna kill you just as quickly as vader does.

I think Kylo is one of the stronger points of the movie, but still overall not a great character.

I don't really have the complaints that he was whiny in TLJ, he came across as that in TFA, not so much TLJ.

I didn't hate the Kylo-Rey dynamic until I remembered Kylo's history from TFA, then it's a bit "wtf", she watched him kill his father out of the blue for little apparent reason in TFA, the dude is a sociopath.

Kylo isn't so much a 3d character as a whacko.

That I see Kylo as one of the stronger elements isn't really a great compliment to the film

Kylo comes across as dangerous because he is unstable, whereas Vader was calm and collected, which is a more terrifying thought IMO. One of the reasons the prequels were disappointing is because the fall of Vader undermined the presence that Vader had; Anakin just came across as an impulsive moron who fell to the dark side for rather shallow reasons ("Oh I want to save my girlfriend and make the universe a better place where everyone listens to me, so I'll just go kill these dozen younglings, yeah, that'll help").

Though personally I don't think Kylo needs to be like Vader, I'm happy for him to carve out his own path.

Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Kaiyanwang wrote:

 Earth127 wrote:
The saddest part is that the main gist of complaints against the last jedi might end up convincing disney they need to play it safe and fun for every movie. The last jedi at least tried to brooch relatively new storytelling. I mean if you're gna copy stuff , it might as well be battlestar galactica.

What about just writing a believable story with good characters that overcome challenges instead of a bland rehash with empty mistery boxes (TFA) or DUDE SUBVERSIONS (TLJ)? You can make a good movie in few ways, but you make a bad movie in many, many ways.
At this point in the trilogy, don't even have a main character sensibly invested in the main story so far. Is a disaster.

Also, the prequels were bad but the worldbuilding is good. Just wasted.

I didn't mind TFA mystery boxes because I figured they were leading somewhere, I was expecting a complicated trilogy fulls of twists and gradual reveals.

That expectation was subverted when Rian just lopped the head off TFA and made what could basically be a standalone fanfic film.

Huh...

Why didn't the First Order launch shuttles to move towards the Raddus (remember that smaller ships are faster...) and then just hyperspace ram them once in optimal range?

 Riquende wrote:

 AlexHolker wrote:
If anyone wants to listen to a thorough dismantling of The Last Jedi, MauLer has finished putting out a five hour critique of the movie. Part 1 Part 2 Part 3

I'll give it a listen, but before I do can I ask if it's like a lot of YT reviews in harping on about SJW/Feminazis/etc? I'm interested in a discussion its failings as a film, not hearing a rant about Hollywood agendas.

You should be fine. He makes the occasional aside in his videos to talk about other reviews he's seen, but that tends to be when they made a stupid argument that doesn't stand up to scrutiny.

 Riquende wrote:
Huh...

Why didn't the First Order launch shuttles to move towards the Raddus (remember that smaller ships are faster...) and then just hyperspace ram them once in optimal range?

Be careful - finding fault with a "critically aclaimed" film means one of these things:

You are not clever enough to understand it
You are sexist, racist etc
You missing the point of the film
Characters, plot and inernal consistancy do not matter if its considerd artistc
You are too old

Remember its never the film (or the critics) who are wrong - its you.

 AlexHolker wrote:
If anyone wants to listen to a thorough dismantling of The Last Jedi, MauLer has finished putting out a five hour critique of the movie. Part 1 Part 2 Part 3

That's twice as long as the actual film.

Yoda wrote:A life to get, someone needs.

I'm kind of impressed that someone takes it so seriously as to put in this much effort. At another level, though, it looks obsessive.

One might think if the film actually was that bad it would be easily demolished in a much shorter piece.

 Kilkrazy wrote:

 AlexHolker wrote:
If anyone wants to listen to a thorough dismantling of The Last Jedi, MauLer has finished putting out a five hour critique of the movie. Part 1 Part 2 Part 3

That's twice as long as the actual film.

Yoda wrote:A life to get, someone needs.

I'm kind of impressed that someone takes it so seriously as to put in this much effort. At another level, though, it looks obsessive.

One might think if the film actually was that bad it would be easily demolished in a much shorter piece.

Errr, you do realise this thread is up to 100 pages? We've probably dissected the movie more in this thread than that youtube dude has done in his long arse review. Not all those posts are by 1 person of course, but I'm sure if you flick through your posts alone you would have written at the very least several pages about it.

One might think if the film actually was that bad it would be easily demolished in a much shorter piece.

Mauler did a thorough dismantling but IMHO he is also wrong.
He's acribing virtues to the other star wars movies they did not posses (including the prequels) confuses story in a prequel for worldbuilding. In f act lack of worldbuilding I'dd say is one of Star wars' main characteristics. It's masssively stick to the current important information.

Yes Rey is apparently more talented in learning basic force abilities than Luke was on Dagobah. Or at least she is quicker to grasp what Luke is telling her. But she is thrown around like a ragdoll by Snoke. He dies blind in his arrogance by unexpected apprentice backstab.

Luke I have already adressed.

Time and basic plot points are indeed all over the place in this movie but cohesiveness in theme is not.

Does the casino scene feel padded and strange? yes, but woud I heave preferred it being cut entirely? It would need character interaction between Rose/ Finn/Poe as replacement not a bigger fight scene with Phasma.

And boy do military tactics make no sense in Star Wars. Poe is an idiot saved only by his Skywalker lvl ace flying skill. But the movie is consistent in this depiction. I am a big fan of battlestar galactica and I guess Rian johnnson is as well.

 Earth127 wrote:
The saddest part is that the main gist of complaints against the last jedi might end up convincing disney they need to play it safe and fun for every movie. The last jedi at least tried to brooch relatively new storytelling. I mean if you're gna copy stuff , it might as well be battlestar galactica.

I mean TLJ is basically a very poor copy of 33 minutes.

 Earth127 wrote:
Mauler did a thorough dismantling but IMHO he is also wrong.
He's acribing virtues to the other star wars movies they did not posses (including the prequels) confuses story in a prequel for worldbuilding. In f act lack of worldbuilding I'dd say is one of Star wars' main characteristics. It's masssively stick to the current important information.

Yes Rey is apparently more talented in learning basic force abilities than Luke was on Dagobah. Or at least she is quicker to grasp what Luke is telling her. But she is thrown around like a ragdoll by Snoke. He dies blind in his arrogance by unexpected apprentice backstab.

Luke I have already adressed.

Time and basic plot points are indeed all over the place in this movie but cohesiveness in theme is not.

Does the casino scene feel padded and strange? yes, but woud I heave preferred it being cut entirely? It would need character interaction between Rose/ Finn/Poe as replacement not a bigger fight scene with Phasma.

And boy do military tactics make no sense in Star Wars. Poe is an idiot saved only by his Skywalker lvl ace flying skill. But the movie is consistent in this depiction. I am a big fan of battlestar galactica and I guess Rian johnnson is as well.

Well he did take the basic premise of the excelent and tense "33" episode and turn it into turgid and boring nonsense.

The Casino scene may have actually worked with out the whole lets go off on a silly adventure in the middle of a battle (well dull and tedious chase).

Sadly there is little to no actual chracter interaction between Rose and Finn - she shouts a bit but I did not see any sexual or romantic tension, no charisma between the two - they have to be together becuase that what the script says and the makers are too lazy or don't care enough to try and make us believe it.

This thread isn't the work of one guy.

One might think if the film actually was that bad it would be easily demolished in a much shorter piece.

Not just "33" it also uses some general themes and plot points from "Oath"/ "Blood on the scales".

It also totally rips off a major plot point from The Iliad.

Which would all be fine if the creative team had actually made a decent film.

But they didn;t.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
It also totally rips off a major plot point from The Iliad.

I don't recall the Greeks using Hyperspace ramming on the Trojans.
Would have been easier than using a horse.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
I mean, "Rian clearly wanting scene X so contriving scene Y so it can happen, in my view is exactly how films are made.

Sorry, I should have said "poorly contrived".

Instead of focusing on the journey that makes the pay off scenes good, which is actually what makes the pay off scenes work well in good movies.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
It also totally rips off a major plot point from The Iliad.

Wich one?

It is not the best made film ever but I wouldn't call unforgivably 0/10 bad by any measurement. That's reserved for battlefield earth and its ilk.

Also isn't that how you do most of the writing for any story? You first decide your general structure and major plot points/twists and then write the middle to make it cohesive and fitting.

Luke Skywalker is similar to Achilles. He is the Resistance's best warrior who takes himself off in a huff and refuses to help the cause, but eventually relents and has a huge fight with the champion of the First Order, and gets killed.

Obviously they've adapted it a bit for the Star Wars setting.

 Earth127 wrote:
Also isn't that how you do most of the writing for any story? You first decide your general structure and major plot points/twists and then write the middle to make it cohesive and fitting.

But it shouldn't be obvious to the audience that's what you did.

Any fool can write a few plot points on a piece of paper, the difference between good writing and bad fan fiction is making them flow together naturally instead of having circumstances awkwardly shoehorned in to force the plot points/scenes/visuals to occur. You might even end up compromising on your desire for specific scenes in order to have the story as a whole flow better.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

 Kilkrazy wrote:
I mean, "Rian clearly wanting scene X so contriving scene Y so it can happen, in my view is exactly how films are made.

Sorry, I should have said "poorly contrived".

Instead of focusing on the journey that makes the pay off scenes good, which is actually what makes the pay off scenes work well in good movies.

I agree with your point that scenes X and Y need to be well contrived.

Of course I do think scenes X and Y are well contrived, and I usually disagree with the reasons why people think they are badly contrived in LTJ.

However all those arguments have been gone over several times already.

 Earth127 wrote:
Mauler did a thorough dismantling but IMHO he is also wrong.
He's acribing virtues to the other star wars movies they did not posses (including the prequels) confuses story in a prequel for worldbuilding. In f act lack of worldbuilding I'dd say is one of Star wars' main characteristics. It's masssively stick to the current important information.

Yes Rey is apparently more talented in learning basic force abilities than Luke was on Dagobah. Or at least she is quicker to grasp what Luke is telling her. But she is thrown around like a ragdoll by Snoke. He dies blind in his arrogance by unexpected apprentice backstab.

Well they used the old tropes for world building, pick one feature and make the entire planet that way. the desert planet, the ice planet, The swamp planet, the jungle planet.

I saw a interesting bit from a fan of course, not that it was any way hinted at in the movie, though. It was actually ray who killed snoke and ben was telling her what to do and showed her how far to turn the saber when he turned his.

Ray isn't just more talented, she's flawless, which like superman makes for a really dull character.

Not to go on too big a tangent but I disagree with the illiad idea.

Achilles refuses out of pride and kills Hektor in vengeance and thus gets murdered in vengeance of vengeance.
Luke flees out of shame and sacrifices himself to right his wrongs and save the resistance.
Luke and Achilles have almost nothing in common bedsides being tragic heroes.

Rey's flawlessnes was more irritating in TFA than TLJ where she has 2 clear flaws. She jumps headlong into any situation believing herself totally right due to a combination of Naïvety and impulsiveness.

Achilles motivations are better explained and in-character.
Earth127, I suggest you to read the thread, you will find a lot of points raised against and for your argument.

I do agree that Rey is less obnoxious in TLJ but there is still the basic problem of her lack of challenge, and thus growth.

 Kilkrazy wrote:

 AlexHolker wrote:
If anyone wants to listen to a thorough dismantling of The Last Jedi, MauLer has finished putting out a five hour critique of the movie. Part 1 Part 2 Part 3

That's twice as long as the actual film.

Yoda wrote:A life to get, someone needs.

I'm kind of impressed that someone takes it so seriously as to put in this much effort. At another level, though, it looks obsessive.

One might think if the film actually was that bad it would be easily demolished in a much shorter piece.

You seem to forget that this franchise changed filmmaking and influenced an entire generation. There was a reason $4 billion for it was considered quite a bargain. It has a cultural impact that rivals Shakespeare's, at least for one generation, and no one would balk at a critic spending 5 hours breaking down Twelfth Night.

The film has been demolished left and right in much more concise pieces. Why should criticism be limited so?