Which is absolutely fine with me. But if we are willing to let the energy source be so hand-wavy, why are we getting so hung up about the minutia of the rest of it?
The energy required in not really the problem. The heating effect on the environment is. If you completely isolate the plasma, you get a baseball bat. If not, you get waves of heat from it that make a flamethrower look pale. Either way, holding the darn thing is likely pretty painful.
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If you completely isolate the plasma, you get a baseball bat.
And yet I'd still buy one. :P
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The energy required in not really the problem. The heating effect on the environment is. If you completely isolate the plasma, you get a baseball bat.
<Insert clip of Linkara screaming about laser bats here>
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All of that energy is supplied by the magic (sorry, Force-rich) crystals.
And viewers like you
I gathered this from the Chicago Tribune:New 'Star Wars' lightsabers have some technical problems, experts say
Jesse Kulla is an instructor with the Chicago Swordplay Guild in Ravenswood, a group of fencers who teach "Game of Thrones" nerds like me and my friend Old School how to properly handle swords in theatrical combat. "The biggest problem with it is when you're swinging the sword around is you have the tendency to actually touch that part of the sword (the cross-guard)," Kulla said. "And when you make some of those bigger swinging motions with a metal sword and a cross-guard brushes against you, it really doesn't matter … when you're doing some of those fancy moves, that cross-guard is going to come back against the arm of the person using it."
Maybe Midi-chlorians prevent loss-of-arms?
Don't forget the deheading he also did.
I am not normally one to be one the iconic/sacred cow bandwagon, but I think it should have been left alone, but it is not a big enough issue to warrant nerd rage. I will still see the movie when it comes out.
PS: I have not read any post so that "nerd rage" comment was not directed at anyone. I just mentioned it because of some things I saw on other websites.
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My only thing is that less is more.
If you want lightsabers to be cool, only show them to us a couple times during the movie. Then you don't need to make them funny shapes, because their rarity will naturally cause them to have a strong visual impact.
I stand behind the Gwendoline Christie theory though.
You aren't kidding, Iron; Luke turned the lightsaber on once, and then practiced with a blast helmet on one time in Episode 4, and that was it. We had to watch the sequel just to see an actual fight!
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I just think it looks silly. No issues with the science or culture or whatever. I just think it looks bad.
It looks Like some little eight year old jedi watched his fellow students slaughtered by anakin and converted to the dark side swearing dark bloody vengance on anakin and his bastard offspring hunting them down no matter how long it took and pulled together a realy nasty lightsabre.
I gathered this from the Chicago Tribune:New 'Star Wars' lightsabers have some technical problems, experts say
{. . .} "And when you make some of those bigger swinging motions with a metal sword and a cross-guard brushes against you, it really doesn't matter … when you're doing some of those fancy moves, that cross-guard is going to come back against the arm of the person using it."
Having a metal crossguard in front of the plasma crossguard solves this problem, but the metal crossguard has to be at least as large as the plasma crossguard. I couldn't see a metal crossguard in the trailer, but keep in mind that things could change between the trailer and the final release (and it wouldn't be the first example of something that did).
Maybe Midi-chlorians prevent loss-of-arms?
Actually, we know that they don't, from more than one of the movies.
I was actually less worried about the crossguard than how "unrefined" the blade looked. It looked like it was using an unstable crystal or something. If this is a one-off, no problem, but I hope they stick with the look all Lightsaber blades had in Revenge of the Sith. That is, IMO, when they looked the best.
There actually is a metal crossguard, if you look at a still picture.
The bit the plasma comes out of. Looks to be a few inches long on each side.
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I have finally gotten around to watching the Episode VII trailer. All I can say is, "Meh." I wanted my world rocked and I get bland.
The Age of Ultron trailer was so much better. It made me want to build a time machine to go forward to opening night. The best I can say about the Episode VII trailer is it didn't make me want to build a time machine to go back to before production started and take out JJ (but then, Into Darkness already did that to me).
If you already have a problem with Abrams, your aren't going to like EpVII. Do yourself a favor and skip it.
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I'm hard pressed to get in a huff over something designed to look cool in a series of things designed to look cool. I think just about everything in Star Wars exists in the way it does because "it would be cool".
Laser Crossbows, dudes.
Two opinions on the lightsaber by people who actually handle longswords regularly. Surprised me.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QsRVcmEG3VY
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J3MozbQj8tM
Interesting opinions, but they didn't answer the obvious one if they were actually correct.
Why weren't the crossguards razor sharp on longswords...
Because having a razor sharp edge (as your crossguard) on the longsword where it could cut you is stupid.
That's why.
If it were effective to have a cross guard that could slice and dice, all cross guards would be mini-swords that were just as sharp as the main blade.
If the metal is strong and resistant enough to a lightsaber, than there is no need for the mini-lightsaber cross guard in the first place, as simply extending the metal as a real cross guard would be more effective and efficient anyways. Plus, you wouldn't have to light the lightsaber up in order to block an in coming blow...it would work whether the lightsaber was lit up or not!
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My basic opinion is it looks really cool,This is Star Wars. The rest is unimportant.
No not quite correct; Better to say "This is JJ Abrams. The rest is unimportant." Remember JJ LOVES flashy effects and edge of your seat action scenes. He tosses canon out the window. Fortunately in Star Wars case I think Lucas did a horrible job recently. Maybe it will actually help Star Wars to have less canon and more flash and action. There are a LOT of Star Wars canon bits we could all sleep better forgetting; midi-chlorians for one. If he can change all that and make a great movie than I am more than willing to look the other way when he makes a less than optimal lightsaber design.
~raises a glass~
A toast to JJ Abrams and what could be the best Star Wars in a long while.
~raises a glass~
A toast to JJ Abrams and what could be the best Star Wars in a long while.
Considering the mutilation of Star Trek for which he's responsible, you're quite the optimist.
Hope it works out for you Warsies, but ... I don't think it will.
In that case, I would have you compare the Star Wars Prequel Trilogy vs. the new Star Trek. TELL ME STAR TREK IS AS BAD AS THAT. I DARE YOU.
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My basic opinion is it looks really cool,This is Star Wars. The rest is unimportant.No not quite correct; Better to say "This is JJ Abrams. The rest is unimportant." Remember JJ LOVES flashy effects and edge of your seat action scenes. He tosses canon out the window. Fortunately in Star Wars case I think Lucas did a horrible job recently. Maybe it will actually help Star Wars to have less canon and more flash and action. There are a LOT of Star Wars canon bits we could all sleep better forgetting; midi-chlorians for one. If he can change all that and make a great movie than I am more than willing to look the other way when he makes a less than optimal lightsaber design.
~raises a glass~
A toast to JJ Abrams and what could be the best Star Wars in a long while.
But I love conversations...
Who would have watched the two hour interrogation of princess leia by darth vader and a certain floating black ball interrogation droid with pointy needle?
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In that case, I would have you compare the Star Wars Prequel Trilogy vs. the new Star Trek. TELL ME STAR TREK IS AS BAD AS THAT. I DARE YOU.~raises a glass~
A toast to JJ Abrams and what could be the best Star Wars in a long while.
Considering the mutilation of Star Trek for which he's responsible, you're quite the optimist.
Hope it works out for you Warsies, but ... I don't think it will.
Here's something else to consider:
The original Star Trek series, the movies and most of the more recent series have all trended towards harder sci-fi. While the science isn't necessarily great in most of these, there are attempts to take their cues from actual science, grabbing interesting scientific hypothesis and giving them a Hollywood treatment.
Compare that to original Star Wars. There really is no science involved in this. We get a handful of terms, but really there is little to no science in these movies. There's no science in this sci-fi. More accurate would be to consider this space fantasy, with strong roots in the old adventure pulps.
Now re-examine the new Star Trek movies. They're pulp adventure. We get a handful of science terms, but there's no real attempt to make it about the science. It's space fantasy. The new Star Trek movies, in regards to storytelling style, have much more in common with Star Wars than the old Star Trek. They haven't been great Star Trek movies, but they've been decent action movies set in space.
I don't think JJ Abrams makes particularly great movies. He has interesting concepts for stories, but his follow through tends to be pretty *vomit sound*.
On a major plus side, Lawrence Kasdan is on the screenwriting team for Ep 7. Some of his works include:
Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back
Star Wars: Return of the Jedi
Raiders of the Lost Ark
Wyatt Erp
The Big Chill
Now, this isn't an amazing list, but it's a pretty apropos list. Some of his other movies aren't impressive, but nothing stands out as a ridiculous stinker either.
Another positive thing is that Disney owns it. While Disney does of course make bad movies, they also have a lot of resources and talent to tap into to make good movies, of which they've made more than a few. Marvel Cinematic Universe is essentially a Disney product.
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Honestly, I am a Trek Fan, and I enjoyed the hell out of the JJ films.
Granted, my favorite trek series from best to worst goes DS9>Next Gen>Enterprise>Voyager>TOS.
Yes, he threw canon out the window. He do so by a time travel plot that is a constant Trek plot device. They were entertaining films and they did a good job with the characters.
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Yeah, I liked the new movies too. They're explicitly an alternate timeline of some sort so it's at worst a minor continuity bend (to make separate timelines possible), not a complete erasure.
My personal series preference is DS9 > Next Generation > Voyager > Enterprise > TOS. I just couldn't get into Enterprise. Kept expecting Captain Whatsisface to Leap to another show.
I hope both of you got your lists backwards. DS9 was clearly the worst show in the Star Trek universe.
"Hey, guys! You know that show about space exploration? What if we did that but set it in one place?"
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I hope both of you got your lists backwards. DS9 was clearly the worst show in the Star Trek universe.
"Hey, guys! You know that show about space exploration? What if we did that but set it in one place?"
Sure if you use the "They changed it, now it sucks!" logic it was bad.
But if you look at it on its own merits it was well written, with likeable and relatable characters, most of whom had a definitive arc, and a much more coherent plot to each season than the previous series'.
Sisko best captain.
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I hope both of you got your lists backwards. DS9 was clearly the worst show in the Star Trek universe.
"Hey, guys! You know that show about space exploration? What if we did that but set it in one place?"
But that place has a wormhole to another part of the galaxy, and we go and explore it all the time. And hey, because we have a permanent base, we can actually explore the culture of the people that live there, and have multiple non-starfleet points of view.
DS9 has a depth and realism to the setting that every other series of Trek utopia lacks.
Although I'll always love "There are FOUR lights!"
I like the saber, but simply because it reminds me of the Kergan from The Highlander. As to the cross-guard 'problem', I'm hoping we get some sort of cool trick like Cortosis gloves (or whatever they would have to be called in Disneyland). Visually, I would love it if the bad-guy gripped the lightsaber away, like The Son in Clone Wars. It will be horribly ironic if said saber wielder loses a hand.
Unrelated: Does anyone else think the snowy-planet the Sith's walking through might be Dagobah? Like it starts freezing over once Yoda dies and maybe later gets influenced by the dark side. It has a very 'frozen swamp' look to it...
DS9 is where Star Trek fandom goes to die.