Thread for those who loved the movie

a better description i saw said: their journey began with Leia asking for help through a projection, and ended with Luke bringing it by the same means.

 

This is tweet I believe:

 

i watched it again on blu ray, some very minor parts I still have issues with, but damn i love this movie. All i can think about is where IX will go and what is answered in this trilogy.....whist hopefully setting up another episodic trilogy

It hit me whilst watching it again. I seriously cannot believe how vitriolic this movie has become in the fanbase. I mean just look at this forum. We've sub-divided ourselves into "Hate" "Love" "mixed" threads, has it really gotten to this point?

I don't know if it was and is the out of control hype culture we live in now, or the endless speculation videos and "theorists" that set up too many expectations for answering questions in a specific way. But i sit down and watch this movie again and again and i just don't understand how it's come to this. It's a bog standard star wars movie that simply chose one direction and ran with it. It's not like Rian filmed it on his go pro and was an OBJECTIVELY horrific movie. I can understand the SUBJECTIVE reasons for not liking story decisions. But are we really now at the point of segregating ourselves into love and hate groups over this? Are we really going to go to war with each other and quote mine every single thing Mark Hamill says just to "win the argument"? Where is all this heading?

I dunno, maybe i just don't get it

 

There are a lot of nutcases in this world:

 

I think it’s as divisive as it’s always been (going back to the PT days), but I think there are just more avenues of Social Media to express your opinion then 15 years ago so we are swamped 24/7.

I say this cause I was a member of TFN during the PT era and it was an all out civil war as people took sides and we battled just like we did now. The battle back then was mostly over Lucas because it was all his vision so the lines were clear cut on both sides. Now fans are pro/con with Disney, JJ Abrams, Rian Johnson and even Mark Hamill has taken strong stands. That is why this fight seems more protracted because there are different factions. Some like/hate JJ, some like/hate RJ, Kathleen Kennedy, etc.

I can only speak for myself but my friends and I have argued regarding every SW movie since 1999, some movies stronger then others. Now definitely TLJ ranks up there because the fanbase is split on Luke’s arc.

I think this passion is a good and bad thing. The fact that we’re still discussing these movies shows SW is still relevant so somebody out there cares. Are people really debating Comic Book movies to this degree as it seems they move onto the next? The bad is it gets ugly and fans take sides and nobody budges. That is why I sort of focus on certain fans here who I like and stick to debating them.

For the record, I hated TLJ in December and really enjoy it now so this forum really helped me look at the other side and I gave it another shot. In the end the internet is great cause it gives everyone an opinion and it’s bad because it gives everyone an opinion.

 

This seems to be a pretty common occurrence. I'm happy Solo is out next month to give some of the "hate crowd" a break on The Last Jedi.

I was just watching Revenge of the Sith and it's jarring watching those films after watching Rogue One, TFA and TLJ. RotS is my favorite prequel film, but the writing/execution just isn't at the same level as the newer films.

 

While I agree the execution/stilted acting is inconsistent throughout the PT, I have learned to appreciate the big story Lucas was telling. I struggled with the PT just as I did with TLJ until I found the right context to enjoy them.

I focus on the grand story (The Republic, The Rise of Palpatine, The Jedi Order) and those parts really fill in the dots of the OT as that story was told on a smaller scale.

So I think the TFA, TLJ and R1 are better made films then the PT, but I enjoy the PT story more because there is so much content in there regarding the galaxy.

 

I agree, my point isn't to dredge up the PT again, but just to point out that the execution was much better in the new films. The PT story is probably my favorite Star Wars story, but it could use a couple of revisions.

The biggest difference now at Lucasfilm is that when a film has problems the studio does what it can to save it (see: Rogue One/Solo). Lucas was only one calling the shots for the PT. He could have used some course corrections.

 

I really do not like TLJ, my position has not changed. Subsequent conversation on here has only served to cement that position. But that said, having those 3 threads isn't necessarily a bad thing. The intensity of the people who liked and disliked this movie almost begged to have separate areas where they could be posted and not inundate the entire forum with it. As an exercise I think it's been interesting to see that many of the things that some people hated, didn't bother me at all. And some of the things that grated me, didn't register on other people's radars. I imagine a similar phenomena happened in this thread (people mentioning a scene that they liked, that hadn't necessarily been something someone else had liked or noticed).

And I think the "Mixed" thread was a good choice (by whoever it was that created it) because that is where you can go to find whatever common ground there is between those who intensely disliked or intensely enjoyed the movie (provided both sides check their tone and assume a less adversarial posture). And if they can't find common ground at least it's a place where the ideas can be debated and, if necessary, agree to disagree.

 

As a passionate TLJ hater i hesitate to post here but I think I may actually give a useful reply to this. One of the things that actually makes me hate the movie more emotionally than I maybe should are these types of statements from TLJ lovers. I'm fine with debating wildly opposing opinions about a movie. It's a different thing to constantly be told "No, I don't care what you say (or the hundreds of pages documenting every problem people have with the movie). I know why you REALLY don't like it and it's just because your highly specific pet theory wasn't validated!"

The idea that speculation sets up unreasonable expectations is utterly absurd. It's a slightly more adult version of making up stories while playing with your action figures and frankly, it's probably the main thing that keeps the fandom and forums going between movies. Even the craziest theorists are aware that most theories are contradicting each other and don't really need any specific thing to be true. In fact, there is probably nothing most theorists would have loved more than getting something unexpected ("omg, that's BETTER than anything I thought of!"). The whole point of doing something unexpected is to do something that's better than expected. What we got instead is, in many people's opinions, much much worse and in particular worse executed than expected.

For me specifically, I actually predicted and/or hoped for some of the more controversial things that happened (Rey nobody, Snoke+Luke die, Leia uses the Force), its the HOW that bothers me. And that's something that I see extremely rarely addressed when TLJ lovers talk about TLJ haters.

Not to get too political, but it's a much more general problem that people generally only tend to engage with a caricature of whatever the opposite of their view is.
For a Star Wars example, consider Pablo Hidalgos twitter account. It's a lot of fun to follow but it's quite clear that he only ever replies to the really stupid or vile TLJ haters that he can easily dunk on. That's fine, it's a lot of fun and twitter is not a platform that's good for more nuanced debate, but that doesn't mean there aren't any reasonable people who dislike the movie.

 

That's a matter of taste. If someone like yourself didn't like the "how" that fine. There's nothing wrong with liking or disliking a film. There's no accounting for taste after all. There's things I don't like about The Last Jedi, but the good is much better than the bad.

To be fair his account is overrun with vile people. Pretty much every tweet by Rian Johnson is littered with abuse. When I tried to have reasonable conversation in the hate thread my posts were loaded with negative ratings. Eventually we were asked to leave simply because people complained the thread was only for people who hated the film.

 

I watched the BTS docs yesterday and I have to say that it, I think, left me wanting somewhat with what Johnson went for with the final edit. I refer namely to two scenes (that, by the way, I loved in the film):

Luke mourning the death of his students and Luke and Leia's meeting.

In the BTS shots, whether it be because of the music or the takes shown, I felt the scenes were actually more emotive. Now, I think in the actual film, Johnson was looking for a different feeling and didn't want it to be overwhelmingly sad. But the music coupled with MH's incredibly emotional performance as he watches his temple burn, is really powerful in the doc. I felt that this emotion wasn't captured to the full in the movie and had it been then it could've been even more powerful than it was.
With the Leia/Luke scene, the take shown in the doc is really emotive because of CF's performance. In this take she is much more emotional herself and is crying about Ben - in the film she is much more stoic (it might've been good to have witnessed Leia's suffering more as it does kind of feel that she let's of Ben a bit too easily). It might be down to the way the doc was cut, playing on the tragic death of Carrie somewhat, but again, I felt that this scene played out with more emotion in the doc.

Again, I LOVED both those scenes in the movie but I just thought it interesting how these alternate takes with the different music were more "moving" for me.

 

I feel the same. As I watched that scene from the Making Of I was "shocked" that they didn't use this one. It was great and it actually felt like something sad and bad happened in their life. What a shame... Well, Rian cut a lot of good stuff. At least so it seems.

 

@master_shaitan @NinjaRen I think the answer to your question is in the movie itself:

 

Sorry bud, I don't follow...

 

I was curious about the context of this clip as well. @Pawek_13, what question is that clip answering?

 

After watching TLJ multiple times, both on home video and in theaters...I genuinely wonder how anyone can say that Rian Johnson doesn't "get" Star Wars if they've watched the Yoda scene. It is genuine Star Wars at its finest!

 

True, but on the other hand I have trouble forgiving him for not having the classic dissolves.

Its a very minor thing and it doesn't keep me up at night, but I do miss them, and it does bug me.

--- Double Post Merged, Apr 18, 2018, Original Post Date: Apr 18, 2018 ---

I'm firmly in the mixed category.

I do believe its a great movie, but there are a lot of things that bug me. I love it and I hate it.

I wish it had more "content", more depth, more lore or an epic nature to it. I'm not sure i can find the words for what I mean.

It does have my favorite moment in any star wars film, but I also feel like it just misses the mark. So many themes at play and yet "for me" none of them really feel perfectly executed or profound. (loneliness, failure, regret, ego,....). In the end the film is beautiful and each of the main character's journey's are significant, and their arcs are profound, yet I don't feel it. Maybe it's just me, maybe I just don't care for the characters in the same way I care about Han and Luke. Well I know I don't, but this film doesn't help me care for them as much as TFA did. In a lot of ways I feel less for the characters. Not however for the story. Epix could be a game changer for me. In shaping how I feel about the ST. I hope it is.

 

Yep that was a great scene & reunion by the old friends.

 

i think it has to do with expectations after quite a few years of not having a star wars move (and even more if you think about quality star wars movies). anyways, one thing that caught my attention in your post was the notion of objectivity. What are the things someone could say are objectively good in this movie?