Disneys new star wars show is out
It appears to be set in the old republic era? I'm not sure how far back.
The visuals and effects are really cool, the fight scenes are a little more kung fu inspired than I like but seem pretty well done.
but the story..... I'm not looking for the great galactic novel but
The way the villain protagonist goes about getting their revenge against the quirky miniboss squad is pretty cool and moderately clever though. So maybe the writers will get better and at least hit the level where they're not in the way of the special effects crew.
It's set 100 years before the events of The Phantom Menace, as the opening scrawl (it has an opening scrawl, well not a proper one but some text) says, in the High Republic Era.
The central conceit was a bit shlocky but not too bad (the OG trilogy had its fair share of soap opera twists as well). The cast is solid and this is the first live-action Star Wars show that seems really happy to bring in the aliens, after almost none at all in Andor. And new aliens as well!
It also seems interesting in setting up the antagonists as having possibly valid reasons for doing what they're doing rather than just because they're evil.
RPG Superstar 2008 Top 32, 2011 Top 16
|
I was very meh about the first 2 episodes. Tons of super lazy writing, not even accounting for the soap opera evil twin trope. In the first episode
Then, on the prison ship, there's the comically so easy to have prevented prison break, with apparently deaf security droids not hearing the plans talked about in the open, followed by a plan that relies 100% on a cyborg that can remotely disable droids on an all droid ship, which it seems is not held in a Faraday cage shielded cell that would block the signal, and some tentacle alien which would have been completely stopped if the prison ship simply had walls on the cells instead of just bars.
Also, I can't wrap my head around the entire concept of the "it's illegal to have a mechnik humanoid creature repair your ship outside instead of an astromech droid", but then it seems there's a grey market out there of people who do it commonly enough that people hear about it and say "oh, that's dangerous". Droids are so omnipresent, and wouldn't make careless mistakes like living people would, how could it possibly be cheaper to skirt that law by having the living mechniks do it instead of just paying for an astromech, which also doesn't need to be paid each year, doesn't get sick, tired, etc. It's the same stupidity that Andor had with using hundreds of prisoners (requiring guards and heavy security) to build the death star components instead of droids.
The second episode was marginally better, but still had more dumb stuff than good stuff in it. Also, the core mystery of the show is completely non-interesting. Oh no, the real bad guy behind all this is doing a lot to keep their identity secret! But for a show set 100 years before anything we've seen in Star Wars before, it really doesn't matter who it turns out to be, since it either isn't anyone the audience knows so the reveal is meaningless, or it IS someone we know, which means it's something dumb like it's young Palpatine in some earlier identity setting up his 150 year plan to take over the Republic, get rid of the Jedi, and make the Empire, and then get cloned to extend his rule indefinitely. I don't necessarily think is IS Palpatine, but I won't be at all shocked if it is either.
|
RPG Superstar 2008 Top 32, 2011 Top 16
|
Also, maybe I'm being dense, but I don't get the multiple repetitions of the "wise advise" if you attack a Jedi without a weapon, you'll really crush them. Seems odd at best, but they are making it seem like some crucial plot point that just doesn't make a lot of sense.
The central conceit was a bit shlocky but not too bad (the OG trilogy had its fair share of soap opera twists as well).
A few things. One is that was 50 years ago. Time moves on (even when its going backwards). The second is that the "twist" was literally 3 minutes into the movie and you learn about the evil twin that can't possibly be alive practically in the same sentence you learn about the evil twin. And its not brought up by her master who really should have thought of that as a defense.
It also seems interesting in setting up the antagonists as having possibly valid reasons for doing what they're doing rather than just because they're evil.
I did like that part "AHHHH DON"T MIND WIPE MEEE" Even IF the jedi are the good guys, the state having a militant arm of super natural wielding mind reading police is going to stir up some justifiable fear and resentment from the populace.
Probably by having them skirt other laws, safety codes, and best practices that your astromech droid would be obligated to report you for.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I do not get the love for andor. Besides being artsy for arts sake and slow I can't see what it's supposed to be doing.
I really liked rogue 1. When Cassian shoots an ally to keep him from talking, that tells you a LOT about them as a person. In Andor he has almost no agency and thus no characterization. Pawn shop guy hires him and sets him down for a heist someone else is running and he goes along with that, then he's arrested and REALLY has no agency. If you'd only seen Andor and had to describe him you can only do slightly better than bella swann.
Aliens don't need to be a distraction. They can just be there. Without them it doesn't look like starwars so much as clockwork orange.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Love andor and will happily slaughter those who do not. AMAZING cinematography, storytelling, and gritty feel. Come at me, bro. FITE ME!!!!!
The Acolyte is a bit slow/cheesy, but I'm enjoying it so far. It's no andor but its going for a different feel. I also suspect it may be thumbing it's nose at the audience a bit and giving them EXACTLY what they asked for, intentionally clumsily, in some ways/scenes.
Love andor and will happily slaughter those who do not.
sure just wake me up for the fite i fell asleep watching andor...
ow ow ow model y wings hurt ow ow ow...
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
... I officially need 3 robot buddies to start watching these now.
|
RPG Superstar 2008 Top 32, 2011 Top 16
|
... I officially need 3 robot buddies to start watching these now.
While I agree overall, E3 was in most ways better than E1-2. Completely agree with your point though. That being said, as a self contained episode, it overall worked a lot better than either of the first 2. Unfortunately, the entire episode was a giant flashback to events which we really didn't need at all. We already know that Mai was a twin, and survived the fire. If that hadn't been known, then this episode could have been the reveal, but instead it was a super long drawn out "let me tell you all about my character's backstory, even though you don't care, especially since the character is so new you have no attachment to them."
It was fine I guess, but not something I cared about really. Literally the only interesting tidbits revealed were things that could have been done in other ways, including the nature of her family. But, being fine and pointless still made it superior to the first 2 episodes.
I enjoyed episode 3 more than the first two. Let's hope there's an upswing from here on. I disagree that it wasn't needed, that is being far too acerbic.
|
On the one hand, I agree that the notion that a stone fortress full of a dozen plus telekinetic, telepathic, precognitive warrior-witch-women just fell over dead in like, 5 minutes, because some girl upstairs dropped a flaming notebook, seems a bit unlikely, and yet also doesn't fit with the notion that the padawan from that mission was so wracked with guilt over what happened that he'd willingly drink a cup of poison handed to him by the girl who 'killed her whole family.'
It seems clear to me that he felt responsible in some way (and not just an innocent witness to a bunch of witches dying in some internal dispute), and that our protagonist has been handed a narrative that puts all the responsibility on her sister.
It seems like the wookie Jedi has also walked away from being an active Jedi, perhaps also having some moral quibble with events of that mission which we, the audience, are not yet privy, this early in the story.
At this point, I'm curious what Sol and Carrie Ann Moss (don't remember her Jedi name...) know about what really happened that day. Sol seems very much the sort who would try to work off guilt by diving into 'doing right by the survivor,' unlike the one or two from that mission that retreated from their Jedi mission, in one way or another.
Set
-It makes no sense your memories must have been altered- doesn't work very well as a narrative device unless you're adhering to a higher level of internal consistency than star wars has been for a while now. You could be right, I just don't think it would help at this point.
Although I suppose the coven could have died from Jedi and the fire was used to cover it up wouldn't violate anything we saw on screen
|
|
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Set
-It makes no sense your memories must have been altered- doesn't work very well as a narrative device unless you're adhering to a higher level of internal consistency than star wars has been for a while now. You could be right, I just don't think it would help at this point.Although I suppose the coven could have died from Jedi and the fire was used to cover it up wouldn't violate anything we saw on screen
Yeah, that's kinda my thought. I don't think it was intentional murder or anything, but I could see the Jedi having some clever plan to create a distraction with sleepy gas or something and use it to sneak the kids out without fighting the dozen plus force-sensitive mommas whose kids they'd be snatching, only for it to go tragically awry when one of the kids also starts a fire and toxic fumes kill all the sleeping moms...
Just some wonky thing like that were the Jedi could unintentionally be responsible for the carnage, and result in Carrie-Ann Moss' padawan being so guilt stricken over it that he'd later willingly drink poison.
But yes, it is also entirely possible that in 10 minutes of idle reflection I have put more thought into making sense of this than the writers did. That happens to me from time to time. :)
It's an OCD thing. I want stuff to make sense (to me), and try to rationalize it, even if the creator thinks it makes sense just fine the way they wrote it.
I didn't hate episode 4 but it was short and stopped right at the good part.
|
RPG Superstar 2008 Top 32, 2011 Top 16
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
It definitely should have been 10 minutes longer and shown the fight. As it was, it felt like I know I watched the episode, but I can't figure out if anything actually happened.
There were also two scenes which seemed to have elements which abruptly stopped and went nowhere. (not spoilering these since they're so pointless and nothing happens with them, it isn't really spoilering anything)
1) When annoying smug Jedi guy tells good twin main character - you're going to have to give me that blaster (for unclear reasons), and when she questions why, he says "cause technically it was given to you by the Jedi, so it's not yours" and somehow implies that despite the Jedi as an organization giving it to her, he somehow overrides that and should confiscate it. Then she says "nope" and the matter never comes up again. Not only that, but later in the episode, she doesn't as much as draw the blaster, much less use it, so the entire scene was pointless.
2) walking through the forest, the tracker indicates that the area is somehow corrupted. There's clearly giant alien tree snails covering all the nearby trees, and no one comments on them in any way in connection to the corruption, or seems to care that there's corruption in the first place. It's as meaningful as saying that sky is blue. Finally, as everyone else walks away, good twin reaches out to one of them, senses it with the force, and it wakes up and flies off (because weird tree snails should be able to fly, checks out). Somehow this doesn't wake any of the dozens of others, but it's a big problem enough when it starts to fly back that one of the Jedi goes and chops it in two for inexplicable reasons when it wasn't clearly attacking, nor was there any attempt to use the force to calm it down, despite respecting the sanctity of life and the force that flows through all things.
Maybe next episode will feature the tree snails again, but they seemed to be far enough away from the location of the end of the episode when the fight starts that I'd not expect it.
I think they were supposed to be disguised as burls. Of course if you've never seen trees with those or.. you know some burl trees that weren't giant insects, its not a very good disguise.
|
RPG Superstar 2008 Top 32, 2011 Top 16
|
I'm not a woodsman by any stretch of the imagination, and they clearly were creatures when first seen. I'm thinking if you were there in person instead of viewing from a distance on a TV, even a 4K one, they would have been ever more clearly creatures - or at least some sort of weird parasitic growth, fungus, etc. which after you were just told something's corrupted in the area would be a pretty good clue as to what the corruption was.
Episode 5
really fun fight scenes
The writing/story is still... Ok we'll randomly change our minds every 5 minutes just so the story plays out the way we want.
The editing has gotten so weird I noticed it. Like you're breaking up the fight scene with that same shot of the forest we've been looking at for 3 weeks... yes. They're in the woods. They're all in the same woods. We can tell that from all the trees....
|
RPG Superstar 2008 Top 32, 2011 Top 16
|
I'm at the point where my expectations are so low the only thing I look forward to are the fight scenes which are generally well done. That being said, I absolutely hated that they scammed us of half of a great fight scene, and only showed the 2nd part of it once Osha woke up.
Also, based on the length of last week's episode and this week's both being barely over 30 minutes, and that this week's strongly relied on the set ups from last week, it was clearly meant to be a single episode, that they cut in 2 since they didn't have enough content to make the season as many episodes as they wanted.
As for this week's "huh?!" moments:
1) so the whole season they are hopping mad that Mae the assassin was somehow trained by someone and were almost frothing at the mouth demanding to know who trained her, but when they finally meet the Sith who trained her, they don't seem to care at all who trained him, despite the fact he's clearly superior to a whole squad of jedi all at once.
2) The forest corruption tree monsters are attracted to the light so much (and how does Osha even know that) that they sleep all day long when it's light out. Ok, to be fair, some night bugs do this too, but still weird. Then when Osha lures them to the Sith guy, she has to sadly sacrifice her pocket droid as her only possible light source to stick on the back of the Sith guy. WHILE HOLDING the flashlight she had used to lure them there in the first place. Couldn't she have used that?
3) but it's super convenient that she had to destroy her friendly pocket droid, since next week's episode is apparently Star Wars the Acolyte: The Parent Trap! Lets see if the twins can take each other's places and somehow get the Jedi and the Sith back together into a beautiful and loving family once again! Be ready for wacky hijinx when they try to be like each other and fool their force sensitive parents/teachers to believing they're not acting unusual at all. But sure good that pesky droid isn't there to blow the whole charade!
4) Not only is the Sith guy deadlier than a whole ship full of Jedi, but he also seems to be the Flash, since last episode he was left hanging from his foot by a snare, upside down, and then somehow managed to beat Mae to the Wookie Jedi's home and kill them before she got there. Oh, and somehow he also hid his entire Sith armor, lightsaber and helmet somewhere, and put them on in the time he beat her to the clearing. Maybe he had a bag of holding?
The bugs walking into the light was shown last episode where one of them flew right at the light saber. One of the students commented on it.
I don't know if he was seen carrying it, but at the start he was seen packing a very large bag. Mae is one of those people who walk into the woods with nothing but the wrong shoes....
|
RPG Superstar 2008 Top 32, 2011 Top 16
|
It did attack the jedi with the lightsaber, but that's a big jump to say it's attracted to the light. It could have been attracted to the juicy warm blooded target that approached it and didn't run away. If another student commented that it was the light, then that was the big jump of assumption, but I didn't catch that line last week I guess.
RPG Superstar 2010 Top 16
|
1) My suspicions about the reveal turned out to be correct.
2) Something about light sabre battles keeps teams from being effective.
(Holding your own against a team of trained fighters, 7-on-1, ought to indicate a skill differential of two orders of magnitude. When the same Force user is down to 1-to-1, the fight shouldn't even be close.)
3) Mae's mentor was right more often than wrong, in the debate with the Jedi master.
"She was a child!"
"You [were the one who] brought her here." (Yeah! AND she was just a second ago swinging a deadly weapon at my face, trying to kill me.")
4) The switch at the end should have failed immediately, even without Force sensitivity.
|
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
2) Something about light sabre battles keeps teams from being effective.
(Holding your own against a team of trained fighters, 7-on-1, ought to indicate a skill differential of two orders of magnitude. When the same Force user is down to 1-to-1, the fight shouldn't even be close.)
That felt very much like a 'Law of Conservation of Ninjutsu' moment. (There can only be so much ninjutsu in a scene. If one ninja attacks Bruce Lee, it's an epic fight that lasts the entire scene. If *twelve* ninja attack Bruce Lee, the ninjutsu is divided among them, and he takes them out one at a time, so that it's still just an epic fight that lasts the entire scene.)
Same with Jedi, it seems. The more there are, the less impressive they are. Maybe there's only so much Force in the area and they are all drawing from the same well? :)
Once all those other chumps were out of the way and not draining on her supply, Daphne Keen's padawan character was all uber and stuff!
(Would also explain why the Sith are so big on murdering other force-sensitive folk, and not having more then one apprentice. Gotta cut down on the competition for that sweet, sweet Force mojo!)
Which is probably not at ALL how the Force is supposed to work (there can be only one!), but it sure seems that way!
2) Something about light sabre battles keeps teams from being effective.
(Holding your own against a team of trained fighters, 7-on-1, ought to indicate a skill differential of two orders of magnitude. When the same Force user is down to 1-to-1, the fight shouldn't even be close.)
That felt very much like a 'Law of Conservation of Ninjutsu' moment. (There can only be so much ninjutsu in a scene. If one ninja attacks Bruce Lee, it's an epic fight that lasts the entire scene. If *twelve* ninja attack Bruce Lee, the ninjutsu is divided among them, and he takes them out one at a time, so that it's still just an epic fight that lasts the entire scene.)
Same with Jedi, it seems. The more there are, the less impressive they are. Maybe there's only so much Force in the area and they are all drawing from the same well? :)
Once all those other chumps were out of the way and not draining on her supply, Daphne Keen's padawan character was all uber and stuff!
(Would also explain why the Sith are so big on murdering other force-sensitive folk, and not having more then one apprentice. Gotta cut down on the competition for that sweet, sweet Force mojo!)
Which is probably not at ALL how the Force is supposed to work (there can be only one!), but it sure seems that way!
if I'm not mistaken, a few early books heavily implied(but did not straight out say) this. It also implied there were hundreds of force traditions throughout the galaxy, but for some reason only the Jedi got famous, possibly due to the coffers of the Republic. This was only fought back against, in my recollection, in the KOTOR games, which seemed to push a (somewhat) different approach, although it could be argued that in 2 a bunch of people skilled in their own fields suddenly becoming jedi is attached to this conservation mindset.
Addition- there were supposed to be planets strong(and weak) with the force as well as planets strong with the light/dark side of the force. I think there were orders associated with specific planets...not sure.
|
RPG Superstar 2008 Top 32, 2011 Top 16
|
I realized today that the Sith master was just F-ing with Mae the whole time. "Kill a Jedi without a weapon. You really NEED to kill a Jedi without a weapon, it's the only way you'll defeat them."
Then when he confronts them - "I'll just use my lightsaber with a hidden lightdagger in the hilt. It's possible to kill Jedi without a weapon I guess, but it's way easier to kill a whole bunch with one. Oh, and at the end, just to show off I'll kill one without a weapon just for kicks."
I realized today that the Sith master was just F-ing with Mae the whole time. "Kill a Jedi without a weapon. You really NEED to kill a Jedi without a weapon, it's the only way you'll defeat them."
Then when he confronts them - "I'll just use my lightsaber with a hidden lightdagger in the hilt. It's possible to kill Jedi without a weapon I guess, but it's way easier to kill a whole bunch with one. Oh, and at the end, just to show off I'll kill one without a weapon just for kicks."
Sith lie. All the time.
G#!#*#n. That was brutal. Took way too long to get here, imo, but still. Damn.
He's come a looooooooong way from The Good Place. Excellent acting.
I realized today that the Sith master was just F-ing with Mae the whole time. "Kill a Jedi without a weapon. You really NEED to kill a Jedi without a weapon, it's the only way you'll defeat them."
Then when he confronts them - "I'll just use my lightsaber with a hidden lightdagger in the hilt. It's possible to kill Jedi without a weapon I guess, but it's way easier to kill a whole bunch with one. Oh, and at the end, just to show off I'll kill one without a weapon just for kicks."
For some villains, the cruelty is the point.
Sith lie. All the time.
cough cough jedi truth cough cough.
|
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Addition- there were supposed to be planets strong(and weak) with the force as well as planets strong with the light/dark side of the force. I think there were orders associated with specific planets...not sure.
Yeah, there were definitely places 'strong in the dark side,' at least, IIRC, and I've read a theory that Yoda's home on Dagobah was near one, so that it helped hide his presence from the Empire.
I kinda wondered, if 'life creates it' and all that, if worlds like Dagobah, rich with life, were 'stronger with the force' than worlds like Tattooine or Hoth, both without big forests and teeming ecosystems.
Or if it was more based on sapient life, so that a world like Coruscant, which seems a sterile planet-sized metropolis, still has plenty of force potential because it has so darn many *people* on it.
Or maybe a mix of both.
It also follows that the force seems to respond to the emotions of the people. Fill your mind with anger and fear and all that stuff, and the dark side comes easier, but what if it's more causal than that, and the Empire was *deliberately* inculcating a sense of aggression and despair and fear and anger *among it's own citizens* because that 'riled up the force' (at least, in the areas where the Empire was strong) and made it easier for dark side users to call upon / gave them more force / tools to work with?
On the flipside, the Jedi would be striving for a galaxy full of people at peace, contented, satisfied with their lives, because a 'calm' force, all placid and still, is easier for *them* to tap into.
Both Jedi and Sith would be shaping the Republic and Empire, respectively, to feed their own power (even if the Jedi aren't necessarily doing it out of power-seeking, but because they mostly genuinely *want* to make a better galaxy). It would also fit with the notion that Jedi and Sith aren't terribly great at sensing each other. A 'disturbed' force that's all stirred up by emotional oppression and outrage among the people would muddy the waters and make it hard for Jedi to get a read, while a still calm one might be distracting and 'tell me nothing useful' to a Sith, who needs big splashy emotional storms to navigate?
|
RPG Superstar 2008 Top 32, 2011 Top 16
|
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
Well, another episode and another disappointment. First, it's 100% flashback again, and even worse, it's a flashback of most of the same events, just from a different point of view, which means while there's some new stuff here, a lot is recycled, and therefore not too exciting.
As for the specifics, it continues the trend of this High Republic era Jedi being practically force blind and unable to sense anything useful with the force. Instead they're using metal detectors and collecting samples to find some Mcguffin as for why they're on the planet, that it may be super high concentrated force planet that can create life and whole ecosystems from scratch. If that were the case, you'd think they'd just sense that and home in on it. Or decide that biology is actually good enough to re-seed life on a planet that was devastated by a disaster. Maybe the "lifeless" state a hundred years before was an exaggeration. It seems lots stays alive on devastated planets in Star Wars, see S3 of the Mandolorian for another example.
Then, they're absolutely shocked to find a group of people living here, in a big fricking fortress of stone, because when you go to survey a planet and you're a Jedi, you apparently don't look from orbit for signs of life and civilization like a big fortress, much less one that presumably has energy signatures, since it's got power.
We then learn that the High Republic era Jedi also super suck at not letting their emotions get the better of them, even when they are raised by the Jedi from the age of 4 or whatever, since half the survey team goes off half assed to kidnap the twins, even after being explicitly told not to. So the whole running thing about 8 (Anakin, Mae, Osha) year old kids much less 18 (Luke) year olds being too old to learn to use the force was simply always just BS.
Also, the Jedi "infiltrating" the stone fortress by first trying the doorbell, then scaling the walls just doesn't get noticed. The force witches aren't very good setting a guard on the walls, nor monitoring their super advanced Ring Doorbell on the fortress entrance to know anyone was there.
As for the big reveal, shocking, the Jedi screwed things up, didn't see that coming at all. What a mystery we've been following the whole season. Oh, and then they lied about it to the council, who ALSO don't seem able to sense much with the force.
I do wonder how in a 100 years, the Jedi learn to be sensing all sorts of things with the force? Maybe the Acolyte showed them that was a skill worth developing?
**headdeskheaddeskheaddeskheaddesk**
|
RPG Superstar 2008 Top 32, 2011 Top 16
|
Who was that blink-and-you'll-miss-it cameo, about 20 minutes in to the episode?
Some Sith pulling the strings. Internet seems to think it's Darth Plageous who was Palpatine's master. I still like my theory that it's Palpatine himself and he just adopts a new name every few generations. Maybe there will be some connection to the force emergence that he uses to get younger even.
|
RPG Superstar 2008 Top 32, 2011 Top 16
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
As for the rest of the episode, I can't say I'm shocked at anything - since nothing about this show was really ever shocking except the bad writing and plot details. It was just as good or bad as the rest of the season.
Fight scenes were great once again, have to give credit where it's due. As for everything else...not so good. The biggest WTF moment for me was towards the end when Osha is going to go back to train with the Jason from the Good Place, and then it seems the only possible option was to leave Mae behind, since his ship is clearly so tiny it couldn't possibly hold one more person. And since Mae had to stay behind, of course, lets mind wipe her so we can do the whole dumb (wait, I have a twin, that's who's behind everything song and dance next season, but reversed). The concept of taking her with them, or dropping her off at some other planet must not have crossed their mind. Much less dropping her off on the far side of the planet they were on, or letting her run off into the woods to fend for herself. It's not like she's some crafty assassin who could elude pursuers.
I guess the other surprise was that bad green Jedi never joined the battle. It seemed like they were building her up to do that, but I guess that's for next season, since clearly Yoda and the high council can't read that she's a sadistic political liar. Young 750 year old Yoda is such a gullible chump.
Also, the entire thing about Sol saying, oh, but if I could only have gotten both twins back, I could have PROVEN that they were creations of the force, since....reasons? That made no sense. Maybe if he had stolen some underpants he could really have convinced people of it.
Again, hearkening back to the "you must kill a Jedi without a weapon" thing, I guess all that training wasn't even needed, it seems any force wielder can force choke someone to death without knowing how if they just get angry enough and hulk out at them. That's what Luke did with the Emperor if I recall, spontaneously learned new powers without training cause he got angry.
The bit with Osha wearing the helmet and having a vision was also super lame. Since a) that was also apparently enough to learn new force powers, this time from her force witch heritage, and start to mentally control Good Place Jason Sith and make his eyes turn black, and b) why couldn't they have shown us the vision? We saw her other visions earlier in the season of Mae, and when Luke went into Dagobah dark side cave we saw his visions. Seeing it could have even been the correct amount of misleading, since she would have thought it was Mae she was seeing, but....wait for it....it was really a vision of herself! Cause they now have the same hair length.
I'm sure there were other bad parts which I've either thankfully already removed from memory, or will unfortunately remember again. At least The Season 4 finale of The Boys tomorrow will be a billion times better and I can look forward to that.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
The concept of taking her with them, or dropping her off at some other planet must not have crossed their mind.
This is what got me head desking. We an either erase your life and who you are as a person or you can sit in someones lap for a few hours.
I guess all that training wasn't even needed, it seems any force wielder can force choke someone to death without knowing how if they just get angry enough and hulk out at them.
Thats what the darkside is and what the darkside does. Its a quick and easy path to a lot of power, which was the entire point behind setting someone a task that would require a lot of power.
She is not going to beat a jedi master fair and square. 1) He's trying to get her to use the dark side cheat. 2) Mae has that training therefore Osha has that training.
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
I liked it. But I don't think it's very good. It IS high concept, and I liked that aspect of it, but I remain of the opinion if you are going go show something that happened already from a different point of view, you should re shoot the entire thing. It's an okay show, but tries too hard in some areas and loses the larger audience. I think it would have been better if it was shorter. It DOES get what my wife would call the art student crowd, and may really appeal to them(it did to her).
All that said, the anger aimed at this show is jarring, especially with some of the violent/dismissive aspects of bad faith criticism.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
It DOES get what my wife would call the art student crowd, and may really appeal to them(it did to her).
Ok so.. as an absolute philistine I have to ask what it's doing that clicks with people? Is it like an escher painting where the fact that it's not real allows it to make less sense and still work as a medium, or is it that they just don't care about the nuts and bolts?
The last jedi **shudder twitch shudder twitch** had the same thing going on and the same divide. It just completely rejects any concept of a metanarative or a higher truth as if they get in the way of the medium rather than informing it.
A story can be thought of as having three layers
The stuff happening on screen in front of you now (the tip of the iceberg)
The stuff that exists in the world even when you're not looking at it. (the bottom of the ice berg)
The deeper themes messages and morals of the story. (...kinda out of ice berg analogy. Maybe the currents the iceberg leaves in the water?)
The Acolyte and the last jedi are REALLY thin on that middle layer and really heavy on that bottom one.
Usually a created universe has an external reality to it (a fake reality).
It adheres kinda to normal physics to some degree but as long as its the same degree it doesn't really matter. (Say, even non benders in Avatar surviving unarmored swordfights without a body count)
The magic has consistent rules to avoid being a total other ysoki cheekpouch pull whenever magic solves something OR the writers set up a situation and the characters DON"T use magic to solve it.
Every story has the meta reality of the characters. Sol is a jedi. That persists from scene to scene. Good stories have characters with personalities, goals, motivations, wants needs desires and other characteristics. These can grow and change over time, but if they change so fast and so often they don't seem to exist that is
a) jarring b) doesn't let you build off of them c) under cuts a lot of what you're trying to build to. If anything can or can't happen you can't hint at things or set things up. You can't signal someone acting under mind control by showing them acting out of character if they don't have a character. You can build up tension with a cheap scene like luke tossing his light saber away as if there was some great reason for it and then never provide that reason.
This goes at least doubly in a created universe.
... and that's why I think you're seeing a lot of "bad faith" criticism. These two stories chuck out that middle layer so often that when it's there it might entirely coincidental. Qimir might have had a lesson to the darkside in mind, or I might be seeing a dragon in a randomly shaped fluffy cloud.
It's like someone crying wolf. If there is no logical explanation except one time in 10 you stop looking for it and stop having faith that the story will provide it.
Some find that lack of faith disturbing. I find it disturbing that losing that faith has been warranted.
What really bothers me is that there is almost NO downside to having that middle layer there. Taking a second whack with the writing isn't cheap, but writing is still by orders of magnitude the cheapest part of the show. You can almost always get the result you want anyway and it creates a better payout.
|
RPG Superstar 2008 Top 32, 2011 Top 16
|
I agree with everything Big Norse Wolf said. But in addition, the Acolyte was full of objectively obtuse and stupid characters being obtuse and stupid. Forget that they were Jedi and had all sorts of powers, but they didn't act the way people normally do, they ignored even the most basic common sense, and the random decisions of the writers to set up "better" story elements were never explained in a way that addressed why common sense wouldn't prevail.
Why couldn't Mae fly away with Osha and Qimir at the end? Because they wanted a season 2 story with them in flipped roles. That isn't even an issue with the middle layer of not jiving with existing Star Wars details, it doesn't jive with the reality of the normal world that you could easily have fit a 3rd person in the ship. Could they have addressed this with dialogue? Sure, but they didn't. Could they have addressed this by giving Qimir a really small ship that could barely fit 2 people? Sure, but they didn't.
If that was the only example, you might give it a pass, but it happened every single episode, multiple times, and with multiple characters. It's not even like one character was just so dumb they didn't get basic things, that can be amusing even. But when every character was like that, it was just painful to watch.
A bison on roller skates is clumsy that.... there is something weird going on.
was there any explaination at all, for why the ysoki wrecked the ship?