Sunday, January 17, 2016

Review of the New Star Wars Movie

It had spaceships.

(Ed:  that's it, the whole review?)

Oh, yes ... it was also loud, really loud.


Much of it was edited like a Jason Bourne car chase and that would be fine except we get bored senseless by Jason Bourne car chases.  For the movie and just as with those car chases, my thought during the course of them is whether anyone will try to sneak any kind of a story line into the show.  We found the first part of the movie almost incoherent.

(Ed:  you're just an old crank)

Bite my old crank.  The Mystery Lady and I were there for the midnight premiere for the first Star Wars movie so I believe my ticket is punched and validated as a Star Wars fan.  The last three of the six mostly sucked but any of them had more personality than this one.  The charm of what George Lucas did was in the characterizations of the players which is usually weak in sci-fi movies, not that Star Wars ever approached being a sci-fi movie.

(Ed:  more heresy!  Of course Star Wars is sci-fi!)

You might want to back off the thrusters, Buck Rogers.  They're still doing the Kessel Run in twelve parsecs ... and a parsec is still a unit of distance not time (i.e. a bit more than three light years).  That's a lot of fi without much sci.

(Ed:  the Kessel Run seriously came back?)

It's a great line.  It doesn't mean anything but it's a great line.


Rey was cool but we don't think the part gave her enough to let her define herself.  She's highly likeable and a great leading lady but we would like to see her with opportunity to define herself better.

FN was cool too and he was the only other to evolve much during the course of the story.  At first he wants nothing to do with the Rebellion but he's right in the thick of it at the end.

Han Solo and Princess Leia brought all kinds of character but that had been defined already in the previous movies.  Leia was criticized for her role in this but we thought she did a fine job.  Maybe people were annoyed she didn't come out in a harem outfit but she and Solo were charming as always.


All in all, we thought the new writers reduced the show to another "Ironman" in which it's only required to amuse southeast Asian teenagers with explosions and spaceships and they will pony up ten bucks a head for tickets all day long.  That demographic is easily capable of all by itself making a movie return big bucks and that's why so many cartoon movies of late.

The latest Star Wars has made an unbelievable amount of money so it's not that southeast Asian demographic alone doing it.  Maybe femmes are getting into it because of Rey and possibly black people are drawn because of FN but his color really doesn't have any more to do with the story than Rey's femininity except insofar as the two are attracted to each other.


Yevette didn't want to call it a disappointment right after we came out of there because she knew I had spent my last on it in the thinking, wtf, if we're screwed then let's do something for fun to blow what's left.  That meant Star Wars on IMAX for the late show and that dayum sure was a spectacle.   It's been enough years since I've been in a moviehouse that I'm really not sure how many it has been.  Yep, it was impressive.

(Ed:  did you drive?)

Nope.  Not much ganja left but going to Star Wars in a zero buzz situation was not going to happen.  So Yevette drove.  Stoners got rules, you know.  In fact, I'm race-trained and can probably drive faster and safer than most of you ... but I don't.  It blows a perfectly good buzz to be concerned over whether I will be hassled.  Screw that.


It sure was a stoner spectacle, tho.  The IMAX screen is even more enveloping than I remembered and the thing is gigantic.  The spaceships flying about make one incredible effect but that's where the story got into trouble.

In the first Star War movie, there was an intricate spaceship move the pilots had to do to attack the Death Star and it was a most impressive visual effect but they saved that until the end of the movie.  The current approach is to fire all of your guns at once right from the start ... and keep firing them.

In-between, the music was so symphonic as to be oppressive and the result was minimal overall dynamic.  Lucas knew to bring it down at times for Luke to have an extended talk with Yoda or Obi-wan Kenobi or other similar types of breaks.  These interludes gave a respite from the grand scope and action of the rest of it and that dynamic makes the action parts all the more impactful for the contrast.

So, yah, it had spaceships ... and it was loud, really loud.

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