Unpopular Sci-fi/ Fantasy movie opinions!

[God Magnus]

I know I'm probably alone in this, but I did not enjoy the ending to "Angel" at all. I thought it was a cop out. I know it is touted as a statement that the heroes will go on fighting no matter what, and the fight goes on etc. but I don't see why that same message couldn't have been conveyed without killing a major character, severely wounding another and then sending the remaining folks into what looks like an absolutely hopeless battle before fading to credits.

Re: the SW prequels (just because I've seen them brought up over and over in this thread), I am not one of those rabid fans who disowns them, but what I'll definitely say is that I didn't enjoy them as much as the original three movies. There were bits and pieces I liked, but I never truly felt "love" for them. ::Shrug::

 

[JediKnightButler]

I agree. The forest battle kicked ass

I agree. I was sad/pissed that they *killed* Optimus during that scene (I had bad flashbacks to 1986 TF:TM) but was pleased that they resurrected him by the end of the movie. I liked his line to Megatron: "You won't stop at just one!" (almost on par with some of the lines from the G1 series.
Another thing I liked about the movie was that it brought back the Megatron/Starscream dynamic/relationship which was totally absent except for a single line (by Megatron) in the first movie. The second movie was very much a "hero's journey" for Sam and it worked out pretty well.
I like Steve Jablonsky's score for the two movies but wish that they had signed Vince DiCola (who composed the awesome synth-rock soundtrack for the 1986 Transformers movie).

 

[JediKnightButler]

Re: the SW prequels (just because I've seen them brought up over and over in this thread), I am not one of those rabid fans who disowns them, but what I'll definitely say is that I didn't enjoy them as much as the original three movies. There were bits and pieces I liked, but I never truly felt "love" for them. ::Shrug::

The prequels- with the possible exception of ROTS- are rather pale in comparison to the OT (which I originally grew up with). With the ongoing Clone Wars series, the prequel characters are now much fresher in most people's (kids') memories than the OT characters are anymore. I will say that the Clone Wars series has actually somewhat improved my feelings about the PT and its characters but I really yearn to see a series featuring the OT characters set in between the OT movies (i.e. between ANH and ESB) or post-ROTJ. Thank goodness for the EU.

 

[Harvey]

I have in my possession three boxes. In box #1 are three SF novels. In box #2 are three SF novels. In box #3 are three SF novels. Make your choice!

For the audience watching, box #1 has a John Birmingham, a David Weber and a John Ringo. Box #2 has a Catherine Asaro, a Kage Baker and a Justina Robson. Box #3 has Isaac Asimov's Caves of Steel, The Naked Sun and The Robots of Dawn.

If I say I have five crime films, it could mean I have "Bullets over Broadway," "Pulp Fiction," "The Texas Chainsaw Massacre," "West Side Story," and "Wetherby." I could have also stated, of course, that I held a comedy, a horror film, a musical, a drama, and whatever the hell "Pulp Fiction" is. But that doesn't really come close to the exact nature of each film, either (you'll accept my apologies for resorting to film references, but my background isn't in literature).

It seems to me, then, that the use of both labels is preferable, since it's only in combination that any worthwhile description is obtained. Excluding the exacting precision of a precise subgenre

If I'd said, one contained military novels, one contained romances and one contained mysteries, I would have given real information. A person could have a reasonable chance of getting the kind of story they like. Even people convinced they didn't like SF might find they liked their favorite genre even contaminated with SF elements. This sort of thing is why I think it's a bad idea to confuse "science fiction" with real genres like mystery, romance, war novel, when it's a term more like "prose" or "short story."

You've lost me on this point with the comparison to "prose" or "short stories." They're forms, not genres.

But this is obviously derailing the thread a little, so I'll do my best to end this here (unless somebody else would be interested in another thread about genre).

 

[milo bloom]

-
1. -Robotech, despite being hampered by 80s censorship and other problems, is a lot more interesting than post Macross Plus Macross

2. -Fanfic writers can do just as good a job or better than the people actually paid to write TV shows, movies, and video games

3.-I don't care about a show being deep or thought provoking as long as it has interesting characters and interesting situations that cause those characters to develop

1. Robotech is a lot more interesting than people give it credit for, period.

2. That's bloody fantastic.

3. I'm confused. To me, the idea of a deep show is what you said about characters. Characters that get "reset" every episode make for shallow storytelling, no matter how interesting each individual story is.



-----------------------------------------


And now my points:

I'll start off with an easy one, as soon as I saw the robot design of the new Transformers I knew Bay had screwed it up before shooting a single frame of film.

The SW prequels should have kept the tone and feel of TPM all the way up until Anakin's turn, this includes expanding the roles of both Jar Jar and the midichlorians. It was a copout the way Lucas dropped them due to fanboy whining. With the midi-chlorians, we could have had a very timely religion vs science debate, with factions on both sides taking both sides of the argument. With Jar Jar, we could have seen a character do a truly incredible growth arc, culminating in him giving his life to save a pregnant Padme. (In the first Clone Wars animated series, there's a fantastic sequence with Shaak Ti and two other Jedi fighting a running retreat to protect Palpatine from Grievous. That should have been Obi Wan and Yoda with JJ carrying Padme, all running from Vader and the 501st).

And even as is, the midi-chlorians don't bother me. It is very clear from Qui Gon's dialog that the midi-chlorians do not create the force, they're simply the antenna. What pisses me off more are people too intent on bitching to listen to the damn words spoken by the characters.

Regardless of what I just said, the prequels aren't nearly as bad as people make them out to be.

One more SW bit: Empire isn't the best because it's all "dark and shit". Looking at it objectively over the years, it's simply the most well put together.




As bloody brilliant as Eccleston's turn as the Doctor turned out to be, if he was only going to do one season they shouldn't have wasted a regeneration on him, or they should have not counted McGann (I say that without having seen, read or listened to anything of the 8th Doctor's, so grain of salt, all that.)



ST5 The Final Frontier has a lot of good character moments that make the film worth watching despite it's other flaws.


Enterprise's 4th season was excellent and was how the whole series should have been.

A remastered version of the international theatrical cut of Blade Runner, with the voiceover and all, probably drove me more to get the new mega DVD set than the Final Cut did.


Rose was a great companion.


The extended TV cut of David Lynch's Dune is the only way to watch that movie anymore.

 

[Flying Spaghetti Monster]

That should have been Obi Wan and Yoda with JJ carrying Padme, all running from Vader and the 501st).

I don't think Jar Jar is strong enough to carry even a small adult female

 

[Andrew_Kearley]

As bloody brilliant as Eccleston's turn as the Doctor turned out to be, if he was only going to do one season they shouldn't have wasted a regeneration on him, or they should have not counted McGann (I say that without having seen, read or listened to anything of the 8th Doctor's, so grain of salt, all that.)

I'm not sure I see the point you're making here. In what way are they "wasting" a regeneration? Since, as you say, he was bloody brilliant, isn't it better to have had him even for a short while, than not at all? (And again, what's wrong with including McGann? He's brilliant too.)

 

[Shazam!]

Indiana Jones and The Last Crusade is the best Indiana Jones film.

There's nothing wrong with Ghostbusters 2.

Lost In Space was a pretty good movie.

Star Trek XI is actually pretty bad. In fact...

Star Trek V: The Final Frontier is better.

Prisoner Of Azkaban is actually a pretty good movie in its own right.

Pitch Black is one of the worst films ever made.

The Avengers movie is kinda fun.

 

[Deckerd]

Most of the opinions expressed in this thread are not actually held, but are calculated to tick others off.

Possibly, but not mine.


In no particular order:

* DS9 isn't as good as it's made out to be
* Voyager isn't as bad as it's made out to be
* TWoK isn't as good as it's made out to be
* Firefly is the most overpraised and overrated TV show I've ever seen
* what I saw of nuBSG was boring beyond any attempt at description
* new Doctor Who is okay, but no more than that. Classic Who made far, far, far better use of the show's premise than new Who has ever looked like doing
* Whedon, Moore and RT Davies aren't the second coming
* dyed in the wool fan of B5 that I am, Straczynski isn't the second coming, either
* Berman and Braga aren't evil incarnate
* Star Wars (collectively) isn't as good as it's made out to be
* Blade Runner isn't as good as it's made out to be
* TOS wasn't some sort of revolutionary, groundbreaking masterpiece and Roddenberry wasn't a great visionary. He - with considerable help from other talented people - made a pretty damned good TV show. No more or less than that.

There are undoubtedly others, but that will do for now.

I don't mean to quibble but none of these opinions is exactly unpopular.

 

[stj]

Most of the opinions expressed in this thread are not actually held, but are calculated to tick others off.

Possibly, but not mine.


In no particular order:

* DS9 isn't as good as it's made out to be
* Voyager isn't as bad as it's made out to be
* TWoK isn't as good as it's made out to be
* Firefly is the most overpraised and overrated TV show I've ever seen
* what I saw of nuBSG was boring beyond any attempt at description
* new Doctor Who is okay, but no more than that. Classic Who made far, far, far better use of the show's premise than new Who has ever looked like doing
* Whedon, Moore and RT Davies aren't the second coming
* dyed in the wool fan of B5 that I am, Straczynski isn't the second coming, either
* Berman and Braga aren't evil incarnate
* Star Wars (collectively) isn't as good as it's made out to be
* Blade Runner isn't as good as it's made out to be
* TOS wasn't some sort of revolutionary, groundbreaking masterpiece and Roddenberry wasn't a great visionary. He - with considerable help from other talented people - made a pretty damned good TV show. No more or less than that.

There are undoubtedly others, but that will do for now.

I don't mean to quibble but none of these opinions is exactly unpopular.

Beg to differ but on this bbs, each one (but the very last, damning Roddenberry's vision,) is Holy Scripture.

 

[Deckerd]

My own opinion is that Roddenberry had some very good ideas but wasn't actually up to making good TV. I think you'll find most of the posters on this board don't have very strong feelings about him one way or the other. The Roddenberry worshippers are all old and wrinkly and irrelevant now.

 

[Orac Zen]

I don't mean to quibble but none of these opinions is exactly unpopular.

On a mirror universe TBBS, perhaps. Certainly none of the opinions I expressed is exactly mainstream on this board, and some of them are anything but.

Edit: On reflection, I need to modify that second sentence. The opinion about JMS probably is mainstream on this board; plenty of (apparently highly knowledgeable) people have a pretty low opinion of him. It would probably be more accurate to say he's nowhere near as bad a writer as some people make him out to be.

No matter, though; to each their own.

[...] damning Roddenberry's vision,) [...]

Not damning it, more questioning its existence. I reckon TOS has been imbued with all sorts of virtues after the event; a remarkable amount of significance has been read into it that wasn't thought of or planned or considered at the time. IMO, anyway, and the mileage of others very clearly differs. On this board, anyway.

 

[Rii]

Two opinions that are unremarkable of themselves, but unusual in confluence: both Starship Troopers the novel and Starship Troopers the film are pretty good.

 

[jefferiestubes8]

The Postman

I liked 'The Postman', enjoyed every minute of it.

I did too. The soundtrack has a few really good orchestral songs too.

I have not yet seen the other 2 recent post apopcalyptic films set in the USA.
The Road (2009)
The Book of Eli (2010)

 

[Rii]

^ The Road deserves recognition for its Special Achievement in the Colour Grey.

 

[stj]

My guess is that only a minority of people on the bbs have any opinion about Joseph Michael Straczynski. They're just repeating their opinion of Deep Space 9 when they mention him.

 

[bullethead]

-
3.-I don't care about a show being deep or thought provoking as long as it has interesting characters and interesting situations that cause those characters to develop

3. I'm confused. To me, the idea of a deep show is what you said about characters. Characters that get "reset" every episode make for shallow storytelling, no matter how interesting each individual story is.

I'm referring to shows and movies that believe that focusing on social commentary or examining ideas instead of the characters makes them great.

 

[captcalhoun]

Transformers was one of my favorite movies of all time.

How's THAT for unpopular?

and mine.

2001 is boring and Blade Runner is overrated.

amen

The two (live action) Transformers movies weren't totally awful.

I actually enjoyed them for the most part, particularly the second one- since the characters had already been established and didn't require (re-)introduction and we could move right along with the main storyline.
I suppose that a large part of why I like them (or at least don't hate them) so much is because I loved Transformers as a child and was really pleased that they kept Optimus Prime looking the way he was in the original G1 series AND got the same voice actor. They may not have been the best movies ever and are basically your average mindless "popcorn flicks" but I don't think that they're like the worst movies ever made by any means either.

i like both Transformers movies

i like GI Joe: Rise of Cobra and i say that as a long-standing GI Joe fan.

X-Men 3 ain't that bad. nor are X-Men Origins: Wolverine or Spider-Man 3.

Elektra's not bad either.

nor are either Hulk movie or Ghost Rider.

Firefly's not all that.

neither is nuBSG.

Predator 2 is good.

 

[Myasishchev]

My guess is that only a minority of people on the bbs have any opinion about Joseph Michael Straczynski. They're just repeating their opinion of Deep Space 9 when they mention him.

Actually, that reminds me of an unpopular opinion of mine: the Shadow War was either very poorly plotted, or JMS indeed intended the Shadows to be some of the dumbest antagonists in the history of SF. There is not a single frame of Babylon 5 where the Shadows act in a competent manner.

Evil Species Rule One: don't let your parlaying enemy park a spaceship in orbit, ever, but especially if he can remote-control it to crash into one of your cities.
Supplemental to Rule One: if you're going to go to the immense trouble of putting your cities underground for "safety reasons," don't go to even greater trouble to excavate great big holes over them so you can also erect a giant window that will not stop spaceships being remote-controlled to crash into said city.

Another unpopular opinion: Tom Cruise is an excellent actor, especially when he's playing Tom Cruise. Hence--a third unpopular opinion--Vanilla Sky rocked, even being marginally better than Abre Los Ojos.

 

[captcalhoun]

the Fantastic 4 movies are good and Jessica Alba's not that bad as Sue.