"The Force Awakens" (with SPOILERS)

Well, pornography is a little different.

I'll use two movies I liked: 'The Avengers' and 'Ghost World.'
I enjoyed both movies, so both are good movies. I was entertained, and movies should entertain.
I'd say 'Ghost World' was better because it resonated with me very deeply. I think about it and quote the movie often.
I still enjoyed 'The Avengers.' I'm not saying it was a bad movie because it didn't leave the lasting impression upon me that 'Ghost World' did.
One is a blockbuster action movie, and the other is not. Neither is trying to be anything more than what it is.

 

There are plenty of movies that are so bad they are entertaining.

 

But you also didn't write a column about it entitled, "'The Avengers' stinks, and here's why."

 

OK, to get back to an earlier point: One thing that seems to be a problem for at least this movie is that Lucasfilm/Disney/Marvel are counting on a lot of background being revealed in the new expanded canon. In the past, you could watch the movies and understand pretty much everything going on. The EU broadened the universe, but not at the cost of introducing things that would lead to confusion in the movies. I have seen several articles that argue about confusing plot points in this movie (the New Republic/Rebel Alliance relationship, for example), and seen counterarguments that show how many of these problems are handled in the EU. That's a problem. Some of us (I've been reading some of the comics and was a big EU fan) will read that stuff; most won't. This poses a problem for people who wonder why C3-PO has a red arm. They'll probably never know the story. Why introduce that at all? It comes across as a simple money grab.

 

It's funny to me that there are so many posters on this thread who attack the "comic book geeks" and EU fans. I'm a comic geek, and I've tossed around lots of things with other comic geeks. Trust me, the Han-is-alive thing is not something most of us espouse. The majority of us simply want good moves not garbage twists. A small minority root for that stuff. Most just want a movie they'll enjoy. There are some that hate on everything, but trust me, they're the vast minority.

 

Wouldn't Snope know if he didn't actually kill Han?

 

Agreed. Comic book geeks are the ones who will scream the loudest over crap like that.

 

Dude from the LA Times just came off as a cranky old fuck and needs to lighten up. Made sure in the first sentence to make it clear he was begrudgingly seeing the movie. "Doing his duty as an American consumer" ... what a martyr this guy is. Ranting about commercialism. Check. Bemoaning how movies aren't as great as the ones from decades past. Check. Blah blah blah. If he didn't like the movie, fine. But why do people feel the need to talk down to others like we're damn morons just because we did enjoy it? We have to be saved from ourselves, and he's the hero to do it. Bless your heart, pretentious LA Times columnist.

 

"Doing his duty as a modern consumer" was a funny line. Some of you Star Wars fans need to get laid.

 

As a star wars geek since I was a kid, the franchise has put plot extras/hidden facts out there since day one. I remember having the star wars source book for the first movie that talked about han having served in the empire, Owen Lars being obi wan's brother, what the imperial senate was, etc. Empire and Jedi had the same things.

 

I feel like they should explain C-3PO's red arm in the films, especially since he specifically points it out, but beyond that, TFA stands well on its own. Stuff like the relationship between the New Republic and the Resistance seems pretty obvious and doesn't need to be explained in great detail (a lesson they likely learned by airing Galactic C-Span for 45 minutes of Episode II).

In 1977, Lucas dropped us into this galactic conflict with no knowledge of this universe and expected us to fill in the blanks. Audiences did, and they loved it. For the people who enjoyed it enough, Lucas gave them books, TV specials, toys, video games and more that fleshed out finer details that didn't appear in the films. It added enjoyment for those who wanted to seek out those stories, but it didn't detract from the films that we didn't know the family lineage of Obi Wan Kenobi on Tatooine.

 

Harrison Ford spoiled Star Wars: the Force Awakens before it opened, and nobody noticed

Does this actually count as Harrison Ford spoiling the movie? Or is this writer just being a jackass?

I'm leaning toward the latter. It's not like there aren't plenty of folks who know that Harrison Ford wanted Han Solo to be killed off during the original trilogy.