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| 25 new of 150 responses total. |
brighn
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response 100 of 150:
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Apr 25 20:23 UTC 2002 |
For those who are coming in late, a summary of the discussion so far:
"It sucked!"
"No, it didn't. Here are some reasons why..."
"No, it sucked!"
"Ok, here are some more reasons why you might have thought it sucked..."
"No, it sucked!"
"Fine. There's no arguing with such a one-dimensional perspective."
Oh, by the way, mcnally, fuck you.
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gull
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response 101 of 150:
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Apr 25 20:35 UTC 2002 |
Re #81: Episode I is razzed because it didn't live up to people's
expectations. Part of this is the long anticipation and the incredible
amount of marketing hype, and part of it is because the other Star Wars
movies have gotten a reputation for being better than they actually are.
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oval
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response 102 of 150:
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Apr 25 21:25 UTC 2002 |
besides it's obvious suckiness, ep 1 also sucked for me because of the blatant
racial stereotyping of the characters.
boba fett IS a badass and i didn't even read the comics. he's the guy i'd want
on my side if i had to go to war with leeron.
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jmsaul
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response 103 of 150:
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Apr 25 21:30 UTC 2002 |
Re #95: I know what "puerile" means, and I was using it to indicate that
the movie was made for children, and only for children. It's the
Barney of Star Wars -- designed specifically for kids, and thus
really annoying to adults. That's certainly less of an insult
than the figurative meaning would have been, but it's accurate
and explains in large part why I hated the movie... and it's
precisely what I meant to say.
So there. <pbbbbbbbbt>
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jp2
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response 104 of 150:
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Apr 25 21:42 UTC 2002 |
This response has been erased.
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senna
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response 105 of 150:
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Apr 25 23:09 UTC 2002 |
You mean V?
The movies are actually rather good. I don't think Ep 1 is as good as brighn
is saying, but it isn't awful, either.
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jp2
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response 106 of 150:
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Apr 25 23:54 UTC 2002 |
This response has been erased.
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brighn
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response 107 of 150:
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Apr 25 23:54 UTC 2002 |
I haven't said EpI was stellar. I've said it didn't suck. That's what you just
said, so you agree with me. ;}
Um, oval, racial stereotypes? I suppose that means you missed that, in Star
Wars Ep. I, most of the baddies were British and acted like Nazis (Darth being
the prime exception), and most of the goodies were American (Obiwan being the
prime example). Ep 4 was cast, fairly thinly, as a WWII epic with sterotypes
all around.
Also, me-sa nevah heard a Jamaican -- or a Jamaican stereotype -- say me-sa.
The racial stereotypes weren't put in by Lucas, and weren't intended, they're
partially the actors relying on the direction of "make it sound foreign" and
partially the audience mapping the unknown to the familiar.
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jp2
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response 108 of 150:
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Apr 26 00:40 UTC 2002 |
This response has been erased.
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russ
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response 109 of 150:
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Apr 26 02:30 UTC 2002 |
Re #76: You don't understand, Jon. My reaction is only partly
to do with what Lucas might have this time (and his reduction in
merchandising stuff is, I've heard, due in no small part to the
huge inventories remaining from Episode 1; the sales stank as
badly as Jar-Jar).
No, I'm boycotting because Lucas played to the kiddies two films in
a row when he'd *proven* that he could do a lot better (TESB). It
would have been easy to have a decent characterization of Darth Maul
instead of an ugly-looking bad guy with three lines, to give just
one tiny example. If Lucas wants to be a kiddie-film maker, I'm not
going to go. He's exhausted the goodwill he made with TESB. There's
much better work out there; I don't feel like wasting time and money
watching Lucas' merchandising vehicles any more.
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jmsaul
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response 110 of 150:
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Apr 26 03:18 UTC 2002 |
Re #107: Obiwan was played by an American? That will come as a shock to
a lot of people, including the woman who knighted him.
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jp2
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response 111 of 150:
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Apr 26 04:18 UTC 2002 |
This response has been erased.
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janc
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response 112 of 150:
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Apr 26 20:22 UTC 2002 |
Well, there was a lot wrong with Episode one. It was interesting to me
a collision of marketing and plot. Since this is a prequel, we already
know how the first trilogy works out. The hero, Anakin, turns into an
evil mass murderer, betraying and killing most of his friends. Pretty
much all the good guys are killed or chased off into exile. The bad
guys win. That's the plot line Lucas has to work with.
Oh, yeah, and this is supposed to be packaged as a blockbuster movie
that everyone will want to take their kids to and watch over and over
again.
If you consider that as the basic dilemma that Lucas had to work with,
then Episode one is a work of genius. It looks like the same kind of
rah-rah for the good guys story as the other Star Wars movie, complete
with the big celebration in the last scene. Only on close inspection
does it become obvious that we've just watched the emperor seize power,
while the forces of good not only stood by impotent, but hardly noticed.
All the Jedi make repeated major errors of judgement.
I'll be interested to see what Lucas does with the next film. He
obviously learned from his mistakes in overmarketing EpI. I'm
optimistic that we'll see a stronger movie this time. But the one I'm
really waiting for is EpIII. I want to see how he pulls of the
Anakin/Vader transformation in a way that is fun for small children and
families to watch.
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brighn
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response 113 of 150:
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Apr 26 20:31 UTC 2002 |
#107 contained a typo. "Obiwan being the prime example" should have read
"Obiwan being the prime exception," on the same pattern as the immediately
preceding parenthetical. Apparently people would rather assume I'm an idiot
that putate that I made a typing error.
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jmsaul
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response 114 of 150:
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Apr 26 20:44 UTC 2002 |
Well, you assumed that about my use of the word "puerile," so it seemed fair.
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jp2
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response 115 of 150:
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Apr 26 21:47 UTC 2002 |
This response has been erased.
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brighn
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response 116 of 150:
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Apr 27 03:37 UTC 2002 |
#114> Your explanation of your use of "puerile" still indicated that you
didn't really have a sense of the word. You've yet to demonstrate yourself
a non-idiot in that regard.
#115> Jamie, you're so adorable when you're condescending.
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jmsaul
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response 117 of 150:
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Apr 27 05:11 UTC 2002 |
Re #116: Oh, really? Pray enlighten me from your pinnacle of wisdom.
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brighn
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response 118 of 150:
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Apr 28 20:15 UTC 2002 |
#117> Nah. Maybe next time.
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jmsaul
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response 119 of 150:
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Apr 28 23:30 UTC 2002 |
I can't wait.
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cpnmonk
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response 120 of 150:
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Apr 29 12:38 UTC 2002 |
Just to toss my hat in, from what I recall of SW:Episode I the prime example
of ethnic accents was the members of the trade federation, who not only spoke
with vague evil Manderin sounding accents but also were wearing vague evil
Mandarin style clothing. A few other reasons why that film did not really
hit my happy buttons, in no particular order:
1) Insufficent politics - having only seen the original triology of films and
read one book trilogy (the one in which the empire under the grand admiral
has a last go at the rebellion), I always wanted to see the end of the
Republic and the rise of the Empire. Of course, that would require defining
what the Republic was first...
2) Anakin the Young and his badly written dialogue - Lucas does great epics
in the Star Wars series but excellent dialogue is not his strong suit,
Anakin's initial showing as a charecter to my mind reflected that. Cute
one-liners and momentary outbursts of speech.
3) Poor tactical planning - I know its good for a story, but it would have
been nice if the MOVIE explained why the trade federation removed all of its
large orbital support ships while still technically surpressing the planet
below. Plus, of course, there is the whole question of why a space faring
people would actually build a ship with critical energy transfer systems in
the landing bay of its capital ships, open to risk of damage from ships
damaged in combat entering the bay at high speed.
4) I am just going to toss it out, but why do all the Jedi wear robes that
look like low impact desert wear? Yes, I know its a uniform, yes I know it
is supposed to look mystical, but some variety would be nice.
5) Linking the force, a mystical powerful magical element, to a biological
process not only removed some of the magic as two of my friends pointed out,
it also clashes a bit with the back half of the series. Yoda might have
mentioned it on the screen during Luke's training, or Ben might have mentioned
it, heck if it was a factor why didn't the empire test every person it came
into contact with for having "force powers". Episode I even flatly stated
it was inherent in the system.
6) Proof the film is aimed at the kids, as was Ewok fun. Nobody cool or cute
dies in Episode one. Jar Jar and his buds are all perfectly safe in the midst
of what can only be described as a hellish battle. Yet baddies are mowed down
right and left. Even A New Hope had the perk that rebel pilots and soliders
died.
As well, just to toss out I never liked Bubba Fett either, hard core bounty
hunter or not. He always just struck me as being like Scud, the disposable
assassin. If the whole purpose of the charecter is to be a hard fighting
bruiser on demand it really does not matter what they happen to look like.
If you want to design a cool bounty hunter, go rogue Jedi. Besides as I
recall in the films old Fett did not actually DO that much dime for dollar,
except get a good pounding in the last film.
Finally, the Matrix was a poor written movie. It is, and I admit this to be
a commentary steeped in my own limited perceptions, a movie about computer
geeks kicking ass. That's it, thats the fan base, thats the movie, and thats
its appeal. I'll leave aside the weak science, poor sci-fi plot, and puny
attempt at a philosophical examination into how one identifies reality and
Plato's allegory of the cave, Matrix was a pure action flick. As such it must
take its place along with a huge number of other droll action films that
follow the same basic plot and with an outcome that is highly predictable.
To close out how odd I am, I liked Johnny Memonic. I apologize for the
grammatical errors in this post as well as the spelling mistakes, it was not
until the post was done I found out I could backspace up lines.
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remmers
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response 121 of 150:
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Apr 29 13:06 UTC 2002 |
(You can also type ":" at the beginning of a line and edit the
whole response with a full-screen editor. Not that there were
that many mistakes that needed correcting in this case.)
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jmsaul
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response 122 of 150:
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Apr 29 13:25 UTC 2002 |
Re #120: The other example of an offensive ethnic accent was Watto.
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brighn
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response 123 of 150:
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Apr 29 13:38 UTC 2002 |
#122> Watto I'll grant. I think seeing the Trade Federation as Asian and Jar
JAr as Caribbean are looking for offense where none is meant, but Watto is
so blatantly Greek-Arab-shyster, it's hard to deny.
#120> My only real comment is on point #5. Luke has the force. Leia, his
sister, has the force. Anakin, his father, has the force. Luke and Leia are
specifically sought out by both the dark side and the light side BECAUSE they
are the children of Anakin. How on EARTH did the concept that the force was
partially biological escape you?
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aruba
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response 124 of 150:
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Apr 29 13:48 UTC 2002 |
Re #120: Thanks for the summary, cpnmonk. I don't remember for sure, but I
thought the gene, or chemical, or whatever it was that Jedis have a lot of,
was just supposed to help them channel the force. So the force is
everywhere, and created by living things, but only certain people can tap
into it.
It sounds from episode 4 like no one much believes in the force anymore, so
maybe that's why the empire doesn't test people. But now we're getting to
the point where you shouldn't look too close, because it's only a movie.
My major problem with Episode I was that it seemed to be a series of video
games stuck together with a thin plot. I had seen a version of the race
scene a couple of years before in one of my nephew's Star Wars video games
(Dark Forces?) - and what was the point of the whole scene, other than to
be spun off into a video game? Likewise the underwater scene, which was
very cool technically, but so what?
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