Red Letter Media - The Last Jedi

[Turd Ferguson]

No offense, but I'm having trouble seeing how anyone could miss that, unless they feel that the survival of our principal characters literally outweighs the deaths of hundreds of others?

I've only seen the movie twice, so I've not had the chance to laboriously pore over every detail of the movie. The first time I never thought about it because I was still processing Luke's sacrifice to save the Resistance (which I thought was a pretty awesome scene, btw)

The second time I watched it I was bored most of the way through the movie, so again, I didn't think too much about it. Don't get me wrong, I like a movie that keeps you thinking and guessing, but, Star Wars is one of those I turn my brain off for.

 

[DarKush]

I thought the review was good, but late. Other people have covered many of these points, made similar arguments already. However there was still some good critiques of TLJ in this review. I don't think this was as comprehensive a breakdown as Red Letter Media's The Phantom Menace, which remains my favorite of the Plinkett reviews.

 

[fireproof78]

Finally, not sure why all the TLJ supporters need to make a video to legitimize their own analysis of the film.

And I ended up finding a video anyway, by accident:

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[Campe]

And I ended up finding a video anyway, by accident:

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There are quite a few out there.

 

[johnjm22]

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This to me is the most interesting critique of the film. It avoids the nitpicking and tired complaints about Holdo/Canto Bight ect.

It focuses on the philosophy of the film and whether or not it's moving Star Wars forward.

 

[Jedi Marso]

Just on general principles along and regardless of whether I agree with the guy or not, why would I watch some internet-asshat's critique of a movie that lasts half as long as the actual movie? That's not a review- you might as well just pop in the film and give it the MST3K treatment.

 

[David cgc]

Just on general principles along and regardless of whether I agree with the guy or not, why would I watch some internet-asshat's critique of a movie that lasts half as long as the actual movie? That's not a review- you might as well just pop in the film and give it the MST3K treatment.

Aside from the whole "fomenting extremism and spreading conspiracy theories" thing, making it easy for people to make things videos that don't need to be videos is the worst thing about the YouTube era. And, to be honest, the former is a subset of the latter. Videos make it easier to make bad arguments seem compelling, since you fill in a lot more of the blanks yourself, in a way you wouldn't accept if you were reading it.

 

[Turd Ferguson]

^Not to mention, RLM makes the arguments (for the most part) entertaining.

"At this point, Palpatine has to flat out tell Anakin that he's a Sith Lord, because he won't take a hint!"

 

[johnjm22]

The review is more entertaining than the movie.

Speculating about where the franchise is going, following the behind the scenes, and seeing the fan/critic/media reaction of it all is more interesting than these dull mediocre SW films themselves.

 

[fireproof78]

Aside from the whole "fomenting extremism and spreading conspiracy theories" thing, making it easy for people to make things videos that don't need to be videos is the worst thing about the YouTube era. And, to be honest, the former is a subset of the latter. Videos make it easier to make bad arguments seem compelling, since you fill in a lot more of the blanks yourself, in a way you wouldn't accept if you were reading it.

Not only that, it creates an echo chamber, as a lot of criticism simply gets silenced or shouted down. It doesn't lead to discussion or an exchange of ideas.

 

[Trekkin]

Just on general principles along and regardless of whether I agree with the guy or not, why would I watch some internet-asshat's critique of a movie that lasts half as long as the actual movie? That's not a review- you might as well just pop in the film and give it the MST3K treatment.

They did a review not long after the movie came outl. So really, the combined total probably is as long as the movie.

Not only that, it creates an echo chamber, as a lot of criticism simply gets silenced or shouted down. It doesn't lead to discussion or an exchange of ideas.

Funny enough, Youtube did have a system once that tried to address that. They essentially made it so you could ‘tag’ other videos into your own. So you could respond to something, and the original poster (or people searching for the original video) would see you were responding directly to them.

Of course, it quickly became obvious that people were just using it to air their personal feuds in public, and sic their followers on each other. YT got rid of it when that shit permanently trending made the front page unintelligible to newcomers or casuals, due to every recommended or highly viewed video being ‘Stupid Pettiness Video No #6.’

And that’s why we fans can’t have nice things, and have to rely on recommendation algorithms that are frequently borked or purposefully gamed.

 

[fireproof78]

Funny enough, Youtube did have a system once that tried to address that. They essentially made it so you could ‘tag’ other videos into your own. So you could respond to something, and the original poster (or people searching for the original video) would see you were responding directly to them.

Of course, it quickly became obvious that people were just using it to air their personal feuds in public, and sic their followers on each other. YT got rid of it when that shit permanently trending made the front page unintelligible to newcomers or casuals, due to every recommended or highly viewed video being ‘Stupid Pettiness Video No #6.’

And that’s why we fans can’t have nice things, and have to rely on recommendation algorithms that are frequently borked or purposefully gamed.

As odd as it sounds, I don't really expect YouTube to police such things (beyond the usual inciting violence, flame wars, trolling, etc). YouTube has become a weird hub of content creation that sparks some interesting debate, but it really isn't a finally authority that it is touted to be. I'm not trying to minimize the content creators because a lot of them do some great work, and it takes work to make them. But, I think they need to be taken in perspective of the larger discussion.

 

[fireproof78]

Hey, look, another video on the defense of "The Last Jedi." I don't need to say anything about it because I agree with everything he says

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[JD]

And how hard was this to find?

 

[fireproof78]

And how hard was this to find?

To be fair, it was shared on Reddit and I found it interesting. So, I have not searched YouTube yet to know exactly how easy it is to fine.

 

[Campe]

Cough.

 

[Awesome Possum]

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I agree with this 100%.

 

[cooleddie74]

The first time I saw a Plinkett video, his schtick really turned me off. After a while I realized it was just a cheap schtick like everyone ELSE seems to need to concoct in order to get hits on Youtube. Strip that away and you have a guy who is able to dismantle movies extremely well.

The reason why this review took so long is he turned this into a 1-hour War and Peace epic. Other than his vocal mannerisms, it was almost all meat with very few punch-line autobiographical detours about how much of a Crumb-like sad-sack his character is.

And the best part about this video was when he compared TLJ to Star Trek, which I would presume, is a soft-belly of the Last Jedi apologists on this forum, or it should be.

I loved the point he had to make about the importance of collaboration and how TLJ seems to emphasize top-down leadership, how Holdo pulling rank on Poe and demanding dumb loyalty is actually more akin to the Empire's approach. Then he goes on to show a whole collage of all of the input from the TNG crew to Picard drawn from probably every season. That took a lot of work on his part.

The film is dismantled with very little beating of the anti-SJW drum. The film provides more than enough ammunition for this, which is what gets lost in the ideological debates.

I challenge those here who think the movie is so great to produce a video essay as substantive as Plinkett's. But no, that's too much work.

So here's to Plinkett. This was one for the ages.

I have issues with TLJ and it's my least-favorite of the four films released to date by Disney, but....seriously? You don't need a damn five-part miniseries to either defend or condemn TLJ. Bulk and length do not always denote quality of video nor of message.

TLJ is nearly 2-1/2 hours long and full of filler. You think it sucks Bantha sack. Shouldn't the irony of your statement already be obvious in that regard?

 

[Gavin70]

And I can’t die in frickin Sydney. I’d reach Hell, and not even notice that I’d left yet!

So if you die in Sydney they bury you in Canberra?

 

[Ithekro]

Why not just catapult the body to Tasmania?