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Post by driver1980 on May 3, 2024 6:09:33 GMT -5
For anyone in the UK who can get to Leicester on this date:
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Post by Marv-El on May 4, 2024 17:15:48 GMT -5
This past Thursday (May 2nd) my wife and I attended the NC Symphony's Star Wars Night, the first of three such performances this weekend. They've been doing this (barring the pandemic lock-down phase) for a couple of years now and this was our first attendance of the event. Basically they show a SW film with the orchestra performing John Williams soundtrack live. This year's airing was Return of the Jedi. Having never attended a symphony performance before, we decided to dress up slightly. So when we arrived at the theater, it felt surreal because they were other people there similarly dressed mixed in with geeks in various SW attire. No true cosplayers per se but I did spot a Jedi Robe here and there among the audience. We were seated three rows from the stage front so we had an excellent view of the film screen. The string section of the orchestra was right before us and we had an excellent view of the conductor. However, we could not see the woodwind, brass nor drum sections near the rear (though I could see the top of the harp though  ) The lights go down and the film starts. It was close-captioned and the sound effects were slightly muted but man oh man once they started playing, holy cow! I got goosebumps as they played the opening crawl music. Hearing the likes of Luke's Force theme and the Imperial March being played live in front of you is amazing. It's been a long time since I've seen an OT film in a theater environment. Hearing the audience's reaction and laughter to Threepio's comedy, R2's antics, Han's glib remarks, it was refreshing. Coupled with the orchestra's amazing performance, it felt like I was watching ROTJ anew for the first time in a long time. Yes, there was an intermission (it occurred right before Han, Luke and the others go off in search of Leia after the speeder bike chase) and something cool happened in the intermission. Y'see, there were a few moments during the film where the orchestra was silent. During those moments, I spotted quite a few of the musicians gazing upward at the screen. Well one of the cello players was apparently a huge SW fan because during the intermission, he brought out his Darth Vader helmet and placed it underneath his seat. Then his string bow lit up red as Vader's lightsaber! It was so cool! It was really a fun night, the orchestra gave a phenomenal performance, a great way to celebrate (early) Star Wars day. |
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Post by lordyam on May 6, 2024 10:58:04 GMT -5
There really is a nasty, toxic underbelly to fandom in general. Tangent, but there's a lot of hostility and venom being spewed about Netflix's upcoming Avatar: The Last Airbender. As part of the ramp-up marketing push, they are doing some interviews and such where the creators are pointing out some (relatively minor, IMO) changes to character arcs and such, and people are losing. Their. Minds. It's just ridiculous, and it casts an ugly shadow on fandom in general. Ahmed Best and Jake Lloyd should have never gotten the venom they did. They were characters in a fantasy movie for Pete's sake. One of them was just a kid, and the movies weren't even that bad. On Star Wars in general, I'm going to paraphrase something I recently read. The OT was mostly great at what it was. The PT had shoddy execution, but the underlying story was good enough people were able to overlook it. The sequel trilogy was just a disjointed chaotic pile of crap from the outset. Shamus Young made the point that just because George Burns lived to be 100 even though he smoked it doesn't mean smoking is good for you as a way to show why just winging the sequels was bad even though the original was also winged to a degree. Lucas got lucky in that regard. And yeah, even many of the people who slammed Jar Jar back in the day have gone on record saying that they went too far in attacking Ahmed Best himself. It's also worth noting that George Lucas's direction hindered some; generally everyone agrees that Hayden Christensen did much better in Kenobi. Lucas is a great idea man and immersion expert, but he treats his actors like props. |
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Post by sunofdarkchild on May 8, 2024 12:18:27 GMT -5
I was pretty disappointed with Tales of the Empire. The first 3 episodes retained the same high quality as Tales of the Jedi, but the second set of 3 episodes made the mistake of trying to be a full character arc when the Tales format does not work for that kind of story. In addition, they made the same mistakes as the sequel trilogy in going out of their way to defy expectations, ignoring and ultimately killing off the vast storytelling potential the character started out with for an unnecessary story no one wanted, and having an unnecessary and unsatisfying redemption arc.
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Post by lordyam on May 19, 2024 10:48:03 GMT -5
Yeah, The Last Jedi was a threshold moment for me too in which I decided I was basically done with Star Wars. I still haven't bothered to watch The Rise of Skywalker. I actually liked that one a lot, even if with the benefit of hindsight I see many problems with its nonsensical plot. My initial enthusiasm was mostly a reaction to how bloody awful The Last Jedi had been; anything that erased that sorry episode would have been welcome. I also appreciated how the writers managed to pen a story that managed to cap the most recent trilogy and also the entire nine part opus. It could have been done in a less whimsical way and fewer fake deaths, but after The Last Jedi that didn't seem to matter so much. (Fan service was also very high on the list of priorities in that film, which can be both a blessing and a curse. I cheered to see old Wedge still kicking butt, but references to obscure EU characters were lost on me). I like it even more than RotJ!  Hear, hear! Maybe it's a generational thing. I had students who preferred episodes I-III to the original trilogy, which is their prerogative; but to me, that's like preferring Prometheus to Alien. Those three episodes made the universe much smaller by having everyone connected to everyone else, and motivations were reduced to simplistic and often childish ones (good guys good, bad guys evil). Star Wars, the 1977 one, was simple but not simplistic; the prequel trilogy is simplistic and convoluted. With the prequels you could see what Lucas wanted to do; this article actually sums up Jedi philosophy quite well. eleven-thirtyeight.com/2017/04/selfish-love-why-the-jedi-were-right-about-attachment/My main issue was Anakin killing the sand people; it made him too villainous early on. It would have worked better if it was just a band of thugs who committed the crime. The Clone Wars Cartoon royally fleshed Anakin out and made him much more likable. |
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Post by lordyam on May 19, 2024 10:56:18 GMT -5
For me the racist stereotyping wasn't the main problem - I had no trouble believing that it was inadvertent, though of course that doesn't excuse it completely. It wasn't just Jar Jar Binks that was a potentially offensive racial caricature though. Apart from the other Gungans, who were equally Caribbean/African-American stereotypes, there was also Watto, who was a blatantly anti-Semitic Jewish caricature, and the Neimodians, who were all crafty, "yellow peril" Japanese types. It was like George Lucas was wondering, "I wonder how many racially offensive stereotypes I can cram into this movie?" To be honest, it's a wonder that Disney haven't stuck a content warning onto the beginning of the film on their streaming service. One thing I do like about the Mandalorian; it addressed a lot of that. The Tusken Raiders, while still hardasses, are given a lot more nuance and it's clear that they have legitimate reasons to dislike the colonists. Din attempting to make peace is seen as good and Cobb Vanth's dismissive attitude is meant to paint him as a patronizing ass. Book of Boba Fett continued that. I actually spoke with an Arab writer who had previous expressed discomfort about how the Tuskens were shown. He gladly acknowledged that the Mandalorian's portrayal was better, and he agreed that Lucas's problem seemed to be more that he drew on a lot of old serials but failed to realize that not everything from those aged well The OT had some similar things but they were a lot more mild and overshadowed by the fact that the Empire is based on white colonial regimes. The Rebels are also diverse, and even Lando occurred because Lucas realized that the people arguing that Star Wars was too white had a point. |
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Post by sunofdarkchild on May 19, 2024 13:03:20 GMT -5
Agreed about Anakin massacring the Sand People being a bad move. It also makes Padme look ridiculous that her only response was to tell Anakin that 'to be angry is to be human.' The only possible conclusion is that everyone believes the Tuskens are a lower life-form like animals and even Padme thinks killing them is no worse than killing a family of tigers, which then defeats the purpose of even having the scene in the first place.
Lucas was so focused on foreshadowing Anakin's fall to the Dark Side that he seemed to forget that it was necessary to establish that Anakin was a good person so that his fall could be tragic and for it to be possible to redeem him. This, to me, is the biggest problem with the prequels, and why the Clone Wars series was so necessary. Revenge of the Sith did actually have a better and more rounded depiction of Anakin before his fall, but when Attack of the Clones failed to give him any likeable or admirable qualities it was too little, too late.
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Post by lordyam on May 21, 2024 4:23:35 GMT -5
In the EU there were at least two better options; in the Jedi Quest comic Anakin encounters Krayn, a vicious slaver from his childhood. The end of the story has them face off, but due to how it's presented it's unclear if Anakin killed Krayn in self defense or if he murdered him.
In the Genndy Clone Wars stuff Anakin also kills some scientists who performed Mengele style experiments on innocent tribesmen.
In both cases it was a bit easier to accept Anakin killing them; Krayn was a monster who enslaved countless people, and the other guys were the equivalent of Unit 731.
In the manga fullmetal alchemist one of the villains Envy is responsible for many atrocities (he helped set off a genocide that occurred in the series backstory among other things, and he killed a dear friend of many of the characters by impersonating the friend's wife and shooting the friend when he hesitated). One of the characters, Roy Mustang, was not only close friends with the soldier who was murdered, he's traumatized by the war crimes he was forced to commit during the genocide. As such, when he and Envy face off Roy goes apeshit, brutalizing Envy in such a way the audience is conflicted. On one hand, Envy is a monster responsible for untold amounts of pain and suffering.....on the other hand the sheer bloodlust Roy is displaying makes the characters and the reader fear for his soul.
Say it had been someone like Sebulba (the douchey racer from Episode 1) gathering thugs because he's still a sore looser even after all these years. That would be somewhat more sympathetic then Anakin killing children.
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Post by wildfire2099 on May 24, 2024 22:35:25 GMT -5
I wasn't conflicted... Envy WAS a monster and Mustang was totally justified |
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Post by Jesse on Jun 5, 2024 23:28:43 GMT -5
Watched the first two episodes of The Acolyte it's definitely weaker than some of their other prior TV series. The second episode is a little better than the first. I'm actually excited for episode 3. Wookies! |
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Post by Roquefort Raider on Jun 6, 2024 8:02:10 GMT -5
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Post by wildfire2099 on Jun 9, 2024 11:00:29 GMT -5
Watched the first two episodes of The Acolyte it's definitely weaker than some of their other prior TV series. The second episode is a little better than the first. I'm actually excited for episode 3. Wookies!
I hope so.. the 1st episode was painful enough I'm not watching the 2nd one right now... ugh. |
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Confessor
CCF Mod Squad
Not Bucky O'Hare!
Posts: 10,232 
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Post by Confessor on Jun 10, 2024 5:48:43 GMT -5
Watched the first two episodes of The Acolyte it's definitely weaker than some of their other prior TV series. The second episode is a little better than the first. I'm actually excited for episode 3. Wookies!
I hope so.. the 1st episode was painful enough I'm not watching the 2nd one right now... ugh. I have to say that I have zero interest in watching The Acolyte. Nothing I've seen associated with it has piqued my interest at all. I kinda think I'm done with this seemingly endless procession of Star Wars TV series. I just have no enthusiasm towards them at all. |
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Post by lordyam on Jun 10, 2024 18:14:40 GMT -5
That said the sheer amount of fandom menace making videos attacking diversity is irritating; it makes it harder for good faith criticism to be made.
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Post by sunofdarkchild on Jun 13, 2024 8:09:06 GMT -5
Having just watched the 1st 3 episodes of the Acolyte, I'm confused as to what the controversy is all about. Episode 3 is pretty bad, but breaking the entire franchise bad? And the first 2 episodes were fine, if nothing spectacular. From the reaction online, I was expecting a Kenobi-level or Rise of Skywalker-level travesty, and instead I got 2 mid-episodes and 1 unintentionally hilarious for the wrong reasons episode that very clearly is not meant to be taken at face value and is withholding answers for later.
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