Apparently in the novels that precede TFA and TLJ, he plays a major role working alongside Leia. But onscreen he’s a “fan favorite” because he’s a cool looking alien with a single memorable line of dialogue. And that’s fine – it’s not like Nien Nunb had any quotable lines, and he’s all over the place in TLJ – but his offscreen death seems like an exceedingly goofy reason to hate an entire film. But hoo boy do fans use that as a “symbol of its hatred” or whatever.
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It reminds me of a part in Man of Steel in which Snyder kills Jimmy Olsen in the beginning of the movie because he said there wasn’t room to do anything with him in the movie so he’d “have a little fun” by killing him off. That’s the kind of contempt for what people really love about the story that I think comes through (although to a MUCH lesser degree) from Johnson in TLJ.
The Ackbar thing is emblematic of some issues, so I don’t mean to imply that it’s a huge deal in and of itself. But in the context of the rest of the problems of the movie, it doesn’t help. As you reference, I do think the movie seems more interested in “letting the past die” (with a pillow over its face, if necessary) and less interested in being good and fun.
But aside from the Ackbar thing, the structure of the story is just kind of nonsensical, and I really do think that the stakes just seem like smaller and shabbier versions of the sequels. The Resistance is just a less impressive version of the Rebels, the First Order is just a less scary and less coherent version of the Empire, nothing seems to be an improvement.
That was Batman V Superman, not MoS. But then that whole series is designed to upset the apple cart and challenge preconceptions. Didn’t necessarily work, but I appreciated the attempt. It has nothing to do with contempt of the character (but lets face it, as a concept Jimmy Olsen is kind of stupid) and any assumption it does so comes from ones own personal dislike for something not familiar and not the film makers intention.
That is just because its a smaller story in the greater SW narrative where usually bigger things occur
All blame for that should be on JJ for the terrible results of TFA than anything else. Rian had to course correct much of that shit show into TLJ to be able to tell a good story. (see Snoke’s lack of importance, Rey’s lineage, etc…)
folklore.org, tvtropes.org, and wikipedia.org are perhaps the biggest k holes for me on the Internet. I can get lost in those sites for hours at a time.
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Wow, am I the only one here who thought Solo sucked? I was bored for the first two thirds of it. The settings were often so dark they were hard to see. Didn’t buy the actors in the roles of Solo or Lando. The movie felt like an unnecessary telling of what little we already knew of his backstory: Han wins the Falcon off of Lando, check. Kessel run, check. Han meets Chewie, check. That said, the last half hour did partially redeem it for me. For what it’s worth, I also thought The Last Jedi was the best SW movie since the 1980s, so maybe it’s all a matter of taste.
It was probably the theater you saw it at. My showing was amazing (at a dolby cinema with laser projection) http://www.indiewire.com/2018/05/solo-star-a-wars-story-theatre-projection-problems-bradford-young-1201969989/
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I guess that’s the disconnect we may be having. I’d rather have a really nice cart full of delicious and beautiful apples. But more seriously, I think that decision of what to do with a throwaway character you don’t know what to do with demonstrates something at the core of the storytelling. It is a form of contempt, I think, to know that you have this minor character that doesn’t fit what you want to do, so you might as well kill him unceremoniously.
And c’mon, the structure of the story is nonsensical not because it’s a smaller story, it just doesn’t make much sense. Keeping the plan a secret, the casino planet maguffin that serves no purpose, a lot of it really doesn’t hold up if thought about for more than a moment or two. Which would probably all be forgivable if the rest of the movie were fun, but that’s just not what I was left with.
And I also didn’t think that TFA was that great, and like it less as time passes. It think there are the bones of a good story in both movies, but I just can’t imagine seeing one on TBS ten years from now and getting sucked into watching the last 45 minutes.
Great article. This is key, I think:
He added that the issue stemmed from digital projection issues. “The problem is digital cinema brought automation, and there’s no longer a trained technician checking that a film is projected correctly,” he said. “These machines drift, bulbs dim, and they need constant adjustments. You can save a lot of money, but the problem is if we aren’t showing movies the way they are meant to be seen we are giving people yet another reason not to come to the movie theater.”
So much this.
Like the author of the article, I frequent the fancy movie theater in my area (with assigned seats, food and drink service, and such). Even with the “premium” experience I almost always end up complaining to the manager afterward that the film is just too damn dark. I purposefully avoid 3D movies because I find with the polarized shades they are often unwatchable because of the low light levels.
My first job was working in a movie theater and I have fond memories shadowing the projectionist as he went between the different theaters in the cineplex verifying the equipment was up to spec, and those giant platters the film would sit on. These days nobody’s actually in the projection booths unless something’s going horribly wrong.
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Everything you mentioned made perfect sense to me and serviced the story just fine. But that is the joy of art, not everyone can come away with the same results and reactions. I still feel people are projecting their own prejudices when they claim a film maker has contempt for their story by doing things that one does not care for.
For instance in Solo: I thought in a film of call backs, easter eggs and fan service throwing in Darth Maul was way over the top and unnecessary. But never would that distate make me claim that Ron Howard didn’t care about his product and threw that in just to meet a check list of requirements thus lessening the impact of the story.
except one of them hasn’t actually…ya know…seen it.
Since when has that stopped anybody from expressing outrage?
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actually. outrage over something that you do not personally experience is fine IMO. I am not black…but my 3 kids are half black. So I do empathy-wise have a lot of outrage over racial injustices even though I may not have experienced them first hand.
A film or TV franchise though? Really? Look I loathe American Idol and most shows like it…but I do not go seeking out articles and reviews about those shows and start screaming how “I do not watch Dancing With The Stars and I think its sucks!!”
JUst what kind of god damn free time do those kinds of folks have?!
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You can link to Women in Refrigerators (women in refrigerators)
There’s also a Boing Boing article with BBS discussion on the same subject, more or less.
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I’m tabula rasa on the spinoffs (save the Tartakovsky Clone Wars animation), but I think at this point folk understand that “Star Wars” strongly implies a connection to a larger network of media with story interconnection.
I personally didn’t have any issues with the reveal at the end. I thought Maul was pretty well dead (and I recognized it being Ray Park, in spite on only seeing him in a prequel more than 18 years ago and that Xman movie). But even though I pretty well assumed Maul had been killed at the end of the prequel, Star Wars has so much clunky prosthetic tech that it fit right in with the world I’ve come to expect.
Speaking of world-building, I thought Solo had the best examples of this I’ve seen in a good long while in a Star Wars movie. Maybe since Empire, to be honest, even if the train sequence made no sense.
The fight scene at the end of Phantom Menace ended with two guys receiving major abdominal injuries from a lightsaber duel. Both looked pretty serious but if either one was going to pull through, I would rather expect it to be the guy who
- Didn’t fall down a giant pit immediately afterwards
- Had an ally present who could have rushed him to the ER
- Was still in possession of more than 70% of his vital organs
Holes? What’s the plot hole RO fixes?
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Why the Death Star can be destroyed by shooting once down an exhaust port.
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Nullified completely if Maul is an alien.
In a civilized planet, you might not need this to be true.
Why can’t force/sith/jedi/whatever ever seem to slow their descent? Also: alien, so who knows?
