Cara Dune
- Thread starter Vulture
- Start date
Introduce a new character, and just act like he/she means something to the main cast. /
Whos that?
Oh that guy the General?
Yeah, never seen him before.
Oh you have, you know the bad guy we've delt with for 3 years? yeah that guy.
No, first time seeing him.
No, you've fought him dozens of time.
Whos that?
Oh that guy the General?
Yeah, never seen him before.
Oh you have, you know the bad guy we've delt with for 3 years? yeah that guy.
No, first time seeing him.
No, you've fought him dozens of time.
I think it's the hardest balance that Star Wars tries to strike and some times misses in ways that doesn't work for me. It tries to establish a history and let the passage of time continue on, but yet still wants things to be familiar enough. I think ROTS tries, but it leaves a lot of questions that distract me in the moment. Same thing with TPM. It tries to establish these structures but the consequences are not clear or why I should be invested in this story or these characters. It feels very much like "Just jump onboard and don't ask questions," to me and it's a feeling I've never quite been able to shake with the prequels.Introduce a new character, and just act like he/she means something to the main cast. /
Whos that?
Oh that guy the General?
Yeah, never seen him before.
Oh you have, you know the bad guy we've delt with for 3 years? yeah that guy.
No, first time seeing him.
No, you've fought him dozens of time.
Valorum's actions and motivations are spelled out in exposition literally as he's making them. He's compromised and weak. The bureaucrats (one of which ends up being Imperial High Vizier; what a coinkidink!) talks him into asking Naboo to defer their accusations in favour of a commission (because: politics) . . . and is then blindsided when Amidala immediately turns on him, calling for a vote of no confidence, cutting him off at the knees. He saw Amidala as an ally; thought she would decline the deferral and that would be that. Time to chastise the Federation and order their withdrawal. What a shame Palpatine had just planted a seed of doubt in her mind about his reliability. Palpatine set a trap and he walked right into it. What fractionally small political support he still had in the senate was vaporized in an instant.
And the Jedi? One of their most contrarian and individualistic members shows up with a ragamuffin in tow saying that: -
1) Some nutter in a black cloak came at him out of nowhere on some random dustball planet in the middle of nowhere with a red blade, therefore the Sith (the galaxy conquering menace that have definitely been extinct for a thousand years) are back.
2) By the way he's the Chosen One destined to destroy the Sith (remember those guys we already destroyed?) and bring balance to the force, in accordance with some ancient stuffy prophecy. The kind that are notoriously unreliable to interpret in anything but hindsight?
An incredulous reaction to both claims seems entirely consistent for a stuffy, complacent and dogmatic priesthood that's gone essentially unchallenged for a millennia. They already know everything, so why alter that attitude now?
Despite that, they still give both claims a fair hearing; they give the kid an assessment and judge him both too old, too ruled by fear, and thus too dangerous to train (they were right!) They also send Qui-Gon and Kenobi back with the Queen to see if the "mysterious warrior" shows up after her again.
Could they have handed that second one better? Sure. But at the same time they had good reason not to take the claim at face value and are unwilling to act without further information. Just like the Senate, they're paralysed by dogmatic bureaucracy into complacent inaction. It's a deliberate parallel; the system is broken.
Would have it been more obvious if he had also kept the severed shrunken heads of their former owners on his belt too? Maybe a little more, but it's still a kid's movie!
Seriously though, he literally talks about adding their lightsabers to his collection. Did you think he just half-inches them when nobody is looking? Qui-Gon even said about his own sabre "maybe I killed a Jedi and took it from him?" as if that's the only other way to have one. This isn't what I'd call a leap of logic.
It's not exactly a brag either given how many Jedi die in the film prior. But, your point is well taken. And the implicit part works for me too. I don't agree on TPM but that's OK. I can figure stuff out through implicit means
Yes and that's stupid. They literally have, like, so much proof (to quote How it Should Have Ended). Again, it's politics for a kid's movie that works because the narrative says it works, and not expecting me to think about it 5 minutes after the film. Except I did and really didn't like it until I read the book. Maybe that's not a fault of the film but a fault in myself, but every time I try to watch the film the opening crawl just makes me go, "What?" and I check out in the movie.
The Jedi are politically neutral and have no voice in the senate. Holo-records can be faked, and a full scale invasion of a developed world by a commerce guild is an unprecedented event. That's enough doubt to make a request for an independent fact-finding mission to actually establish what the hell is going on out there seem reasonable to most moderate Senators (that aren't just puppets of whoever is lining their pockets.)
It'd be like someone showing up at the UN saying Amazon just took over their country and their only evidence is a blurry video taken on someone phone, and the supposed testimony of a pair of monks. That's not enough to do much more than seek clarification, what is exactly what happened.
Here's the thing though; had Amidala allowed things to proceed as planned, then all of that evidence would likely have been presented . . . but it never gets that far. She sinks her own petition by calling for the no-confidence vote, because Palpatine has already convinced her that Valorum is as good as in the Federation's pocket and the deck is stacked against them, no matter what they do. So replacing him was the only move she could see open to her, and her only opportunity to do so was right then and there while she had the floor. Palpatine played them both like a fiddle.
Last edited:
Well, I guess that goes back to my original irritation with the film. The heroes get played way too much.
I mean it's the origin story of the villain of the previous movies. If the "heroes" were on top of everything then there wouldn't have been a villain, let alone a "the previous movies". Did you honestly expect it to be a feel good story where the good guys win? The point of the lesson is that evil is deceitful. It doesn't play fair. That even the best people can be taken in and played against their own interests.
Whether you liked it or not is besides the point. The reality is that it did what it said it was going to do and it played fiar with the audience the whole way though, which is the point of this whole discussion.
Also Lucas showed a generation of kids what the disintegration of a democracy and the rise of authoritarianism looks like from the inside. For that alone he deserves applause.
It comes up in more than one scene.
After a second viewing I decided it had to be "I'm Force sensitive".
But I've heard other suggestions.And it's not the only plot point inexplicably left out of the film. They also left out the part about Lando having lost a daughter who was taken by the FO. Without that you really have no idea what the scene with Lando and Jannah is really about.
It sometimes feels like the editors of the film had no idea what they were doing and may not have been well versed in SW. There's that scene at Exegol where Pryde says "use ion cannons" and then... no ion cannons.
A normie off the street wouldn't know the difference between an ion cannon and a turbolaser.
I don't completely agree with this point but I will concede that it probably did it better than I am remembering.
*applauds*
I love this assumption that I just want a feel good movie where the heroes win. I want the heroes to feel competent. Which they don't in the PT, at all. But that's a whole other discussion.
Sure we do. It's just the villain was more competent. Proficiency is not a zero-sum game.
The villain feels hyper-competent, as in unbeatable at the time of the films. The films feel very much with the assumption that we, the audience, know all the ins and outs, and the end, and thus have no care for the Jedi or the Republic in their ability to combat Palpatine. The outcome feels very much prejudged. Which is fine to a certain degree but makes for a less than enjoyable film. Which is the case for me. The books are more enjoyable than the films. Thus why reading books makes them make more sense rather than the incompetent heroes against a hypercompetent villain.
The first movie of the trilogy is call 'The Phantom Menace' for a reason. They can't effectively fight an enemy they can't see, even when he's sat right in front of them. Also the guy's name was "Sideous" for goodness sake. This are not intended to be subtle hints.
The main failure of the Jedi isn't that they were incompetent, it's that they failed to understand the nature of the conflict. The Sith of old were conquerors. Brutal blunt instruments of chaos and avarice that spent as much energy fighting each other as anyone else. The Jedi had never had to deal with an enemy that took advantage of the rot from within. So they were trapped by their own good intentions and forced to play his game.
And Sidious was not hyper-competent. His plans went off the rails all the time; that's literally the plot of the first movie. Hell, half of the Clone Wars show was his plans getting thwarted. However the nature of a good Xanatos Gambit is that even the lesser outcomes of his plans benefit the larger agenda in some way, and Sidious was in it to play the long game. This is what any good strategist does.
And he wasn't unbeatable. We saw him beaten. His overconfidence was his weakness, and it got him thrown down a reactor shaft. The seeds of that defeat were planted in the PT. The Jedi turned the tables on him because now his Empire was the giant, sluggish, immobile threat and they were the ones striking unseen from where his foresight couldn't reach. They learned their lesson, and you can't learn your lesson if you don't fail at first. That's just how that is.
If only I felt like I saw that in the film. People weave such pretty words around the PT and then I watch it...like I said, book is better. I don't watch the TCW because, as you say, I shouldn't need ancillary material to feel like I get the films. Palpatine feels hypercompetent in the PT. Nothing about TPM feels "off the rails" for Sidious. His plans continue, the Jedi destroyed. The Jedi are just too stupid to see it. That's not a fun story to watch.
Again, TPM novel and ROTS novel make the PT 10x better in my view. There's a warmth there I don't feel in the films.
Last edited:
The biggest sins from the Sequels is they didn't use the classic characters in a proper way. Instead of seeing them interact together for one more adventure and then break in the new characters and eventually get to a point where the new characters are now ready to take over and become front and center of this new time period we got very little interaction.
Plus they didn't plan the 3 movies out. It's like they didn't even have a trilogy in mind. They were going to let all 3 movies be their own things making the crossover stuff feel disjointed
. Also the idea people don't want new characters was disapproved in The Mandalorian or I would even say the Clone Wars and Rebels. It's a good thing that SW is a brand name that will make money even if the product isn't good all the time. This was the same for the prequels and outside of SW I would say the DCU. Those things made money but most people seemed to dislike all those movies up until they made Wonder Woman.
Plus they didn't plan the 3 movies out. It's like they didn't even have a trilogy in mind. They were going to let all 3 movies be their own things making the crossover stuff feel disjointed
. Also the idea people don't want new characters was disapproved in The Mandalorian or I would even say the Clone Wars and Rebels. It's a good thing that SW is a brand name that will make money even if the product isn't good all the time. This was the same for the prequels and outside of SW I would say the DCU. Those things made money but most people seemed to dislike all those movies up until they made Wonder Woman.
Yes, they went the Lucas way. Didn't quite work.
I don't think the whole sequel trilogy needed to be planned out to the minutest detail, or needed to have every little thing under the tight control of one creative figure. But having a bit more of a guiding hand with the overall story development would have helped. The original trilogy struck the right balance.
Kor
Kor
Agreed. I am long under the belief that the ST was constructed as a reaction to the PT, and all the negativity associated with it colored perceptions. You had too many people who were fans and had their precious darlings they wanted in the production, from X-Wings vs. TIE fighters, to giant weapon in space. These are traps that Star Wars has long struggled with, be it video games, books or even ROTJ. So, having one creative figure, rather than relying upon fan interests, would have gone a long way.
I still like the ST, but it definitely could have been done better.
I agree. More like some guidelines in place. Like maybe something like this
Movie 1 =ALL main Classic actors together. Establish new bad guy. Establish some vague goal for bad guy he or she want to pull off in movie 3. Establish one character who will be equal to plot importance as the regulars and will be lead in movies 2 and 3. Kill off Han Solo. Harrison Ford wants it and it gives something to end on. Luke leaves. Won't show up until cameo or small role in movie 3.
Movie 2 New lead has daring adventure in Act 1 to establish characters new role in trilogy. Introduce new side characters. Finn and Poe. Leia provides link to pass in leadership role. Droids and Chewbacca stay in small bit roles. Main baddie has big reveil. Find out he is Darth Plagueis who has found ways to never die by possessing peoples bodies through the use of his force ghost energy or something.
Movie 3 Rey has to pass some test to get a magical light saber or something that is only thing that can kill Plagueis. Luke gives her a test and she passes and she leaves to join friends to take fight to baddie. Leia dies peacefully in this movie and see's Han again on death bed. Rey beats the bad guys. Becomes head of the new Jedi council. Finn and Poe finally get together after their will they, won't they romance signals in second movie. Movie ends on the Droids sort of commenting on all the movies in as they muse about all the things they have been through over decade after decade.
Other than keeping Poe alive, which I think he 100% should have stayed dead in TFA, I would watch this.