SPECULATION Lets talk about The Hate (no spoilers)

Well said, that was my mind set the second time around and helped immensely to forgot some of the toxic negativity on these forums.

 

Words of wisdom

 

Frankly, some of the negativity is not unexpected.

1: First and foremost is that any time a film has to meet expectations of THIS level (probably unprecedented since TPM, and probably greater than the expectations had for TPM), many are bound to be disappointed. It's impossible for it to be otherwise. That wasn't something ANH had to deal with.

Luckily, this is only a problem for the first film of a trilogy.
By the second film (ESB, AOTC, Ep 8), people have more reasonable expectations; they've already had the time to decide how they feel about the characters.

2: The lack of Luke Skywalker (among the Emperor Abrams uber-OT-fanboy types) and the lack of PT-type exposition (among the uber-PT-fanboys) is also fueling some of the negativity. Ultimately, screenwriter Michael Arndt is 100% right that Luke's presence would've made audiences immediately stop caring about the new heroes (especially if it was Luke who saved the day instead of Rey). The PT fanboys forget that the OT had little to no exposition; ANH had less exposition than TFA!
ANH had literally one or two throwaway sentences from Tarkin and a few lines from Obi-Wan and that was it. This is a new trilogy. We have to care about these characters; we have to not have the past spoon-fed to us. Obi-Wan only briefly alluded to the mysterious "Clone Wars"...and that was cool. It was Luke and the new heroes who won the day, no all-powerful being swooped in to save them at the last second. THEY were the heroes, not the previous generation.

3: The negativity (fueled by the above) is very hyperbolic and very much *in the moment*. It's temporary. The critical reviews offer a better idea of where the movie will stand in, say, a year. It's a great Star Wars movie. The best since ESB, IMO.

 

You'll note that most of the hate for the movie getting posted on this message board is coming from members that were already very negative about this movie long before it was released, and brand new members. There are exceptions, certainly; no movie will please everyone. But the vast majority of hardcore Star Wars fans seem to love the movie. Casual Star Wars fans love the movie. Critics love the movie. General audiences love the movie. According to audience tracking, women love the movie - as do people under the age of 18.

The Force Awakens is appealing to a higher percentage of people that I ever would have imagined - even in a best case scenario.

It's not a perfect film. If you're so inclined you can pick it apart, but no more so than any of the other movies in the saga - A New Hope and Empire Strikes Back included. I don't know why anyone would want to nitpick the enjoyment out of the films, but they can if they're so inclined.

I have a hard time understanding a mindset where something like R2 powering up without a detailed explanation, or Chewy and Leia not consoling each other would ruin an otherwise great film, but everyone has different things that they can't get past.

 

The hate is pretty simple.

When certain people dream up their own personal, unrealistic expectations for a movie and that movie doesn't meet all of them perfectly, they whine about it. They also refuse to accept any simple explanations or wait until the next film for answers. They need everything answered now.

The truth is, the film is being very well-received, with glowing reviews, making it one of the top reviewed films of the year at 95% positive, with a 92% positive viewer rating according to Rotten Tomatoes.

Out of 292 professional reviews, 276 have been positive. That's a pretty convincing consensus if I ever saw one.

 

I don't know. I'm in my 30's seen the OT as a kid, not in the theater, but I was still a kid and I love TFA. I liked the PT but liked ROTS the best. I didn't go having a mindset of it must be this or that, or high outer space expectations. I just went in ready to see it and I loved it.

 

Well,... also... A LOT of fans have created their whole follow-up to ROTJ. At least 2 generations of fans.
Then, there is the EU.

I watched it all going... I am an old Star Wars fan. I was back in the days where Star Wars was all but forgotten (Late eighties).
Back then, I collected Star Wars memorabilia for pennies and when Empire Strikes Back was playing on TV, it wasn't rated as a classic, but as a casual Sci-Fi movie with fair rating.

Then came the 90s and Star Wars resurrected with the Timothy Zhan trilogy of books, and role-playing games, and video games... I was happy back then since I wasn't the crazy lunatic who was nostalgic about these movies and didn't feel crazy anymore of collecting all these toys and books and all.

But, at the same time, I felt like Star Wars was becoming something else... and I felt alienated in this new universe and I stayed far FAR away from any material that expanded the stories past ROTJ. I NEVER considered them canon in any way, for me it was the original movies and nothing else.

Then came the Special Edition, at the time I considered great.... and I still think they were important to Star Wars. Of course the CGI aged terribly (like any other CGI movies from the era)... but first, the objective was to "clean" these movies... make them watchable again on a big screen. And one must admit, it worked... if it wasn't of the Special Editions, there would be a huge gap on the quality of the images and TFA (or the Prequels). Of course... I hated a lot of GL's alterations to the classics, but I liked some a lot (Like what he did with Cloud City, the subtle corrections to SP/FX.

Yet again, people are bashing the Special Edition when it's probably the reason why it's now possible to watch it now Digitally and on Blu-Ray.

Then came the prequels.... People are sending these movies altogether in the garbage can (trash compactor).

There were some great moments from these movies...some bad ones, but again... you see what you want to see. The Prequels (moreover Attack of the Clones) changed a lot (induced) the way you see a movie in your local theaters. Pushing the technology. And some of the scenes of these 3 movies will always remain classic.

Then comes The Force Awakens 10 years later in a universe that just became bigger than what it was originally.
With people knowing the origins of the bartender in A New Hope and Luke's love interest after Return Of The Jedi... and the whereabouts of Luke's grandchildren.

In my opinion, The Force Awakens was supposed to be, yes A REBOOT of the Star Wars franchise (it worked, calculating the numbers)... but also be a sequel to Return Of The Jedi. For that to be humanly possible to accomplish, you had to put away 20 years of fan fiction, EU + avoid the same mistakes that failed the attempt to reboot the franchise in 1999. Because, if The Phantom Menace was targeted to the general public... Attack of the Clones and Sith were targeted to fans only.

This time, they are targeting the general public and the world.

So, I can understand some fans are not having the sequel they already had created in their minds.
And, of course, there are some elements in the movie that would fuel this hatred:

The Death of Han
The absence of Luke
Having not everything explained to them yet on screen (like the prequels or the books)
Keeping the story simple
Remixing elements from the OT that worked without taking too much risks at first

Then, once it is triggered, An angry Star Wars fan will nitpick about everything (like they did for the Special Editions and The Prequels)... and forget that, HEY, it's only a movie. It doesn't have to be perfect! No movie is perfect. Even Citizen Kane is not perfect. Empire Strikes Back is not perfect.

Is Star Wars The Force Awakens entertaining for you?
No?
Then maybe you should try another movie, there are plenty of good movies out there!
It's not a religion... it's not the meaning of life.
It's a movie made by humans for humans.

 

This is what I was saying for quite awhile prior to TFA opening. I am glad things have played out the way they have though and some of the irrational anger and bitterness that was out there has been exposed. And I am not talking about people that have a list however long of things they didn't care for, heck I have my own. But there are people wrought with such negativity I think honestly they are either desperately seeking attention or attempting to gain company in their misery.

 

All of these posts are fantastic. Really hit the nail on the head.

What gets me is why complain? What's the point? If you are really a fan of the series, and I would think all of us on this site are, then you really have nothing to complain about. 10 years ago there was no chance of a new film ever coming out, much less 5 new ones. Heck, 3 1/2 years ago if someone would have said we'd get 5 new films we all would have laughed. This is like a dream come true, and yet there are still those who just can't enjoy it. "It's stupid! Finn doesn't use the lightsaber properly!" "There are SOO many holes in like X, and Y and oh Z!" Blah blah blah.

It's one thing to criticize a film for not achieving what they were attempting to achieve. However, criticizing it for not being the film YOU would have made is just wrong. Enjoy the fact we have new Star Wars films to enjoy and be thankful they are in capable hands.

 

For the record:
I really liked the first hour of TFA and i know that my posts on this board are no hate posts because i can't hate a thing or a movie or perhaps sand. Furthermore i don't want to take away any good feeling from anyone considering TFA. Social behavior in a forum, or better the whole net is a decision everyone of us needs to do for his own. People believe this is something bad considering the Internet, fun part about that is, everyone of us can also decide for himself how and whether he reacts to specific behavior or trolling.

My mindset is that criticism is to improve, not to make something worse.

Can you guys answer me the question, why it even bothers you that some other guys you don't know for real are NOT of the same opinion as you? Or don't you mind that and it's only the "BRING BACK GEORGE!!!11 posts?
My position would be the following. If the movie would be a masterpiece for myself, for my view only, there is not really a point of defending it. It's not my girlfriend or something like that, right? I would just be happy, that i was very well entertained and are able to dive deeper into the follow ups and universe of Star Wars.

Some posts on a forum where there are caps-locking people the blast out of their keyboards, i don't read. Story ends here.

On every good forum there are different opinions. Why? Because there are more then 20 people taking part in. No one would care about this site or this forum, if it would be different. Do you guys understand that bashing people who do have a different view of something is like being the first order, the empire and in real life fascism?

On topic:
I think a lot of people are mad because of the marketing and target group of TFA, the marketing was perhaps for people like me and i fell for it (to my rescue, I'm a cinephil and was interested in what JJ Abrams could do as well) and the target group is for sure not really people like me. BTW this has nothing to do with age. I'm completely fine with that and again the first hour or so was really good with the potential to be awesome and perhaps, just perhaps, people like me want to be or wanted to be back in the target group. To my mind this could easily be achieved with acknowledging some flaws, in order to not be reproduced. This should NOT interfere or scare of the intended target group who already is completely in love with the movie. Which is very important

I'm going so far that i think would Disney have been calm about the whole process and the publishing date, to give more time for some re-thoughts, TFA would have crushed Avatar in 3 weeks without China.
If there ever was a franchise in movie history which is capable of uniting different target groups, it is Star Wars. Or perhaps it was, which would be a little sad. This could be the intention to further posting for people like me.

I admit i have no idea why people hate a movie, but on this side and even the newest reviews on rotten or imdb people are not hating TFA, they express their view, their view, on the matter. Not yours.
The haters of which there are some, as written above, i don't read. I don't read posts about praising TFA either, it achieves nothing but a really good feeling for those who are writing them. Which is fine, its called celebrating.

 

I was pretty disappointed in the movie; the plot felt particularly artificial, even for Star Wars, and the background story was too sketchy too entertain: When the movie should have been something to reward long-time fans, it ultimately became a cooked-down, and way inferior, rehash of the Darth Caedus storyline. Outside of that, pacing and dramatic structure were outright terrible: Every time the movie tried to be anything else than *funny*, it failed. - I can stand behind two early reviews of the movie that said, in these words, "solid action, bantha poodoo story", and "competent movie, but made for a stupid audience".

I don't think it's "hating" to do that; it's holding something you like to a high standard: SW, over the years, sported a murderer's row of good script writers, and associated authors, from Timothy Zahn to Michael Stackpole, Kevin J. Anderson, and Haden Blackman. How it could possibly happen that the responsibility for the new, rebooted universe was handed to, first, the author of "Little Miss Sunshine", of all people, and then to the director who has been universally criticized for delivering bad and pointless movie and series plots - for crying out loud! - I do not even begin to fathom. I think it's legit to express that criticism; it might help the creators to make the next movie better. Not to mention that they make a product that people want me to buy. "I'd like this car in blue" is not hate.

In short, I don't think this movie is "controversial", or "art", or "stylistic". (Oldschool fans might cringe at that last word, and think of a certain Mad King.) I think it tries a few things, and doesn't quite get at the point where it executes them as beautifully as it could.

This is not hate, this does not lead to the dark side. This is "meh", and it leads to indifference. And indifference leads to waiting for the DVD of Episode VIII, instead of taking Thursday off to go to Wednesday night's Midnight premiere.

 

Michael Arndt won the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay for that movie, I can't see how that's any kind of negative.

 

Well, no disrespect to Mr Arndt, but wouldn't a more sci-fi savvy writer have been a better choice? - Scott Frank comes to mind, or people like Drew Goddard, who is even an Abrams man.

My honest impression of E7 is that the similarities to the old EU are coincidental - meaning, it felt to me like the writers didn't even look things up, and ended up where they did because there are really only so-and-so many ways to continue the story of the old characters.

 

I think people got hung up on the Jedi aspect of the SW saga. I view it as history being told. with the OT, you have the force as a knowledge basic power. then comes the PT, which is more Jedi force lightsaber battle stories. then with TFA they are using the force as a whole. its more driven with consuming the force abilities and using it around you like yoda said in the past. ive seen people get mad just cause Kylo stops a blaster mid shot, Finn wielding a lightsaber. people are stuck with Jedi's equals lightsabers.

May the force be with you always...

 

Irrespective of what approaches Disney via their directors or George Lucas via himself would make for a ST - the hate would exist.

SW "fans" hating on SW movies is a past time now.

 

Since I belong to Camp "Indifferent" and am therefore neither a lover nor a hater I don't think your analysis is correct. From what I have read here and at other message boards, I believe it's fair to say that approx. 80-90% of the sceptics, disappointed and haters agree almost unanimously that the first 20-30 minutes of the film were excellent and had a true and original Star Wars feel to them. I'd say here we have one of the best Star Wars scenes ever featured in all the seven films.

But then large plotholes start to show up and while I opened a thread to discuss or rationalize these I have not yet seen really serious attempts to fill these.
If it was an unrealistic expectation to see a plot that gets the characters from A to B in a fashion that feels believable, then so be it.

What George Lucas accomplished back in 1977 was to convey the impression of a Star Wars Universe that exists and feels real and large. But to show the instantaneous visibility of an event light years away somewhat shrunk the size of the Star Wars Galaxy to that of a solar system - and just felt like the step into a much smaller world.

IMHO, this is less about explanations of currently undisclosed mysteries, but rather Star Wars having gone so "mainstream" with a disturbing lack of originality. YMMV.

 

First post hit the nail on the head.
I was just curious, and this really only hit me when reading this thread: where is Emperor Abrams at? Was he banned orsomething? And if so, for what? (I'm guessing one '2 second cameo' fit too far?) I went dark the days preceding my trip to the cinema so I missed that.

@Lt. Hija Don't know if you are old enough to have been there when the OT ran in cinemas but by the time episode 6 was announced Star Wars was very, very mainstream.

 

^^ I am one of these old fossils, watched ANH in 1978 and ESB in 1980 - in a theater and several times. Yes, ROJ was very mainstream in 1983 and is the one of the OT I like the least. Already then, it was obvious that the intention was more creatures, more speed, a bigger Death Star and so on. But there are memorable scenes both in ROJ and the PT and both range from "really bad" to "fxxxing brilliant".

The opening of TFA was fxxxing brilliant, IMHO, but after that I don't recall too many scenes that were memorable. Again, I'm happy for everyone who got more excitement out of the film than myself.

 

From one fossil to another: try not to expect the same feel of the first two. I know. I was there. But, like you said, Star Wars has been this phenomenon ever since 1983. Given that, I believe episode 7 is a miracle.
The two scenes that made the film for me (apart from the stellar Jakku opening) were the Solo/Kylo Ren encounter on the bridge for story and performance reasons and the final lightsaber battle in the snow because of the cinematography.
Scratch that, make that three: Rey climbing the stairs to find space jesus was brilliant as well (thank you John Williams).
That plus all the practical f/x wizardry on display. How can you feel indifferent about all of that?