Walter said:
Hang on, I'm being picked on for not liking The Force Awakens
enough?
It is pretty funny when you put it that way, especially since I myself am not exactly endorsing it as an all time great, but I don't mean to pick either. For the record, I think your position and enthusiasm, or lack thereof is reasonable, but I'm genuinely curious about the reticence to fully embrace it, incuding my own, to the point I think even its good points, including some of its more novel and elegant ideas, have become under-appreciated.
What I think is ridiculous are those breathlessly decrying it like it's objectively terrible or somehow the worst thing to happen to Star Wars.
Walter said:
Is that so objectionable? It's in line with how you weighed in after the premiere:
Are things so different now? I mean ... I seem to remember that all three of us (Aaz, me and you) were pretty much on the same page about our reception of The Force Awakens back when we talked about it on the podcast. It was fun! And it felt hollow... The classic Enerton Machine effect of recent Disney films.
I've mentioned I became a convert, not so much because it became a favorite movie or anything but I began appreciating it for what it does well and was attempting instead of what it wasn't. I feel what's good about is dismissed too easilly based on feel. The ANH thing is a particularly weird litmus test rather than just saying, "I didn't like the characters, story, or how they handled Han Solo." Those are reasons not to like it, not because it pays tribute to ANH. I also haven't heard why that's so bad and feel like if it was anything but Star Wars the perception would be different, but you continue...
Walter said:
The surprise of it being NOT a complete shit show, and ticking the marks on all the ingredients for a successful action/scifi does not alone excite me. That's because The Force Awakens was built on a rigorous scaffolding of A New Hope. I imagine that was intended to elicit a sense of resonance with fans, but ultimately came across as tracing on top of another success. Once I realized that was the direction of things, it was hard for me to really get into the movie, because only in small moments did it really feel like it was going out on its own.
Well, you're obviously prioritizing fresh ground and something really different. But that could be too little like Star Wars for my, obviously more nostalgic, taste. I don't think it's so dependent on A New Hope or substantially like it outside of superficial similarities that people focus on to the exclusion of everything that's
not like it.
Walter said:
I sentence you to 200 hours of watching the prequels! No, too cruel, ten minutes or whatever you can take.
Walter said:
That was a decision made in a board room. Disney's machinery doesn't require much soul to drive its engines and get people into theaters these days. Pure, calculated competency will do the trick most of the time, which is how I'd categorize the recent Marvel movies — HUGE SUCCESSES — and yet somehow I couldn't give two shits about them.
That sounds like a nerve, tell us how you really feel. =)
Walter said:
What impressed me about TFA was that in a few instances, it did succeed in lightly tiptoeing out of the shadow of its legacy AND the homogeneous men in suits cracking the whip on J.J. Abrams back. But it still wasn't quite enough for me to cheer. Enjoyable? Certainly! CLASSIC FILM? No, and I think it's a mistake (albeit inevitable) to judge it by those standards at this point. What will the legacy of this new trilogy be? That's up to Disney and its franchise machine.
Well, that seems to inform your perception. I'm pretty sure studio suits decided to make The Empire Strikes Back in a boardroom at some point too, doesn't mean that Lucas, Kershner, Kasdan and Kurtz weren't making the film. This movie was also made by individual creative people that love Star Wars: J.J. Abrams, Lawrence Kasdan, Michael Arndt, and they made creative and artistic choices here we can disagree about, but I don't think there's much to indicate it was just written in a memo or that it's illegitimate because it was really made by THE MAN or something.
Not
Rogue One though; totally focus-grouped and artificially constructed in an editing bay from raw Star Wars fan service footage.
Walter said:
I didn't, and don't expect them to trump Empire either. And I'm okay with that. I just want them to tell a great story with great characters. So far we've got one of the two elements.
I just think the way they covered so much old and new ground while paying tribute to the original film was an impressive feat. That's really what turned it around for me. I didn't like the Death Star redux part deux any more than you, and could do without it, but when I view it in the larger context of how it pays tribute to one of the most significant films ever, not just as one Star Wars movie referencing another, as a film fan I really like that they did that. To me that was better, more worthwhile, and a greater degree of difficulty for a Star Wars revival than any random new plot they could've come up with. You're seeing this as a cheap and lazy calculation by Disney and its associates, but I think it was a labor of love by the filmmakers that ultimately might have hurt the movie, and certainly it's reputation in these media-savvy and cynical times.
Walter said:
You make it sound as though I'm some kind of inferno of passion either for or against Star Wars. I ain't.
I didn't mean to, more just reluctant, but I'm seeing that passion about Disney/Studio films though, which isn't necessarily a bad thing. I just don't think it's an outlook that meshes well with Star Wars past (except the original) or present.
Walter said:
As with most things, I just want to see the story go into exciting, surprising places, and do some new, interesting shit. So yeah, pretty vague I guess.
I think it did with it's characters and the reinvention of some of the series' tropes, but tropes nonetheless. I'm not sure how far out it could go without reestablishing that world 30+ years later in the "first act." I wouldn't want it to be too
unlike Star Wars without a transition either, it's already different enough by default.
Walter said:
What's funny about Rian Johnson is that more than a decade ago, I was immediately taken by the guy before I even saw his movies. If you've heard or read him talk about films, he's fascinating, has some big ideas. But both Brick and Looper seemed terminally ill-conceived. I wanted to like those movies, but Christ, they were both so juvenile it was tough to stomach. That being said, I still harbor a small flame for the guy, and genuinely hope that he has the vision to make this new movie really GO PLACES.
Yeah... I'm hoping this is his moment to shine because while I like him and his work, especially his directing on Breaking Bad, his writing hasn't necessarily screamed, "This is the guy to do Star Wars!" Then again, Star Wars is full of big AND juvenile ideas, so here's hoping. BTW, doesn't the fact that they're letting him do this kind of disprove your Anti-Mouse House mantra in this instance? Selecting, supporting, and letting creative people do the creating is about the best thing a studio can do from that point of view.
Walter said:
The parallels are more substantial than just Starkiller Base. Did I somehow miss your point here? I don't think you're blind to all the New Hope parallels.
I'm not, but that one is the most substantial, and otherwise those parallels are fine and good, brilliant even how they're weaved throughout or reinvented, and don't really matter to the rest of the plot, which most definitely isn't just the skeleton of A New Hope. Like I said, people have it backward, they managed to weave A New Hope through their new plot, not the other way around. Someone correct me if im wrong, but I think the way the film was purportedly written supports this as the Starkiller stuff that cements it was added relatively late. But, it so quickly became the conventional wisdom, repeated ad nauseam, that nobody even questions it (and cites every tenuous connection as proof, ignoring the rest). It's a structurally very different and modern movie for better or worse, and having heavy allusions doesn't make it a remake (even if there's a desert and a detention center) or render the rest of the plot, which I demonstrated actually has little to do with it, moot. Now one can say it was a mistake that distracted from and overshadowed the plot, or it was weak plot, and/or they didn't like the characters or what happened (note: nobody actually says t =), but I don't buy the whole, "It's just like the first Star Wars and that's lazy and bad." Just as you're skeptical that the Disney workshop will produce anything of original artistic story value I'm skeptical of that conventional wisdom so especially prevalent online. Of course, that could also be coloring my perception.
). Anyway, the honeymoon with the fans seems to be over; this one better really be as good as Empire! 
