The Great Star Wars Watchthrough

[Dienekes]

I don't think combining Dooku and Maul would work, they have opposing story functions.

Maul has to be the mystery assassin no one knows anything about, they don't know who he is or what he wants.

Dooku has to be the supposedly utterly trustworthy ex Jedi, people like him, they know him, they trust him.

One character can't be both those things.

I’d agree with you, if the movies did anything to explore those two concepts. But they don’t. Dooku’s ex-Jediness is mentioned then brought up in the Qui-Gon interrogation scene where he comes across as distinctly villainous from the get go. The reveal that he was actually evil the whole time had no weight at all. While I don’t think I need to explain why Maul wasn’t really filling the mysterious assassin role. There was never a mystery to him. We knew he was a Sith right away, and nothing further is revealed about him. He’s just generically scary looking.

Besides Palpatine already has the seemingly trustworthy older friend hiding villainy role pretty much nailed down. We don’t need another.

[Sapphire Guard]

Edit: Maul does exactly two things in the movie: reveal to the Jedi that the Sith are still a thing and kill Qui-Gonn, Dooku could have done both of those.

Not without breaking cover. If Dooku kills Qui Gon in TPM, the Jedi know the Separatist movement isn't sincere from the start, and they now have him on the hook for a murder.

Maul can't lead the separatists, because everyone would just say 'who the hell are you ad why should we listen to you?'

[Fyraltari]

Not without breaking cover. If Dooku kills Qui Gon in TPM, the Jedi know the Separatist movement isn't sincere from the start, and they now have him on the hook for a murder.

Yeah it’s almost as it’d start a war or something, wink wink, nod nod.

No but seriously, I am arguing for major plot changes, of course they wouldn’t work within the plot we already have (then again that plot hardly makes sense within itself).

The first movie should have been about Obi-Wan and his new apprentice Anakin trying to find a solution to the growing separatist movement spearheaded by a former Jedi named Dooku. They get help from Palpatine, Padmé and Dooku’s old apprentice a Jedi named Qui-Gon who has quite an influence on Anakin which Obi-Wan doesn’t really like since Dooku’s gone rogue and is on the opposite side here (remember according to the OT, Yoda was Obi-Wan’s teacher). They talk At the end however Dooku kills Qui-Gon starting a war and revealing himself to the Jedi as a Sith. Then we get a cliffhanger showing us that Dooku works for Palpatine who is a Sith.

The second movie takes place during the Clone War as Anakin and Obi-Wan grows distant as the war takes its toll and Anakin. He and Padmé grow closer together something that is encouraged by Palpatine who starts becoming more of a mentor to Anakin.
Anakin tried to kill Dooku un revenge for Qui-Gon’s death but fails. However the Jedi start to suspect a Sith Lord is working within the Republic. We get an introduction to Grievous as a lackey/apprentice to Dooku (the Jedi assume he is his apprentice for a while). Padmé and Anakin marry.

RotS happens pretty much the same with the difference that Dooku and Anakin’s fight is emetionnally significant (as in they have personal stakes), we’ve been introduced to Grievous and we’ve actually seen Obi-Wan and Anakin be friends for a while.

[Dienekes]

Not without breaking cover. If Dooku kills Qui Gon in TPM, the Jedi know the Separatist movement isn't sincere from the start, and they now have him on the hook for a murder.

Maul can't lead the separatists, because everyone would just say 'who the hell are you ad why should we listen to you?'

This is a show where masks and dramatic reveals have gone hand in hand since the first movie.
Movie 1
Palpatine: Here is my apprentice Darth Maul
[enter masked sith]
Trade Toads: This is getting out of hands, now there are two of them!

[Masked Sith kills Qui-Gon]

Movie 2
Dooku: Oh Kenobi. This is all a misunderstanding. Trade Toad came to me because there’s a Sith in the senate. And they killed my old padawan Qui-Guy. Help me rid the galaxy of corruption. And thankfully because Palpatine is also clearly doing this bit, the audience won’t even expect me.
[insert sci-fi adventure nonsense and mystery plot]
Obi: We found the masked villain. Now Ani we attack together.
Anakin: Leeerooooy mmmmJeeenkinnns!
[fight fight fight. Mask comes off]
Obi: By the Force! You were masked villain all along!
Dooku: And I would have gotten away with it too.

Just, you know, written better. It let’s the mysterious assassin actually be mysterious for a reason and you can add some pathos movie 3 if we get rid of Grievous too and have Obi fight Dooku at that point.

Obi: Why did you kill Qui-Guy?
Dooku: he was like my brother. But once you go down the dark path it pulls you to do even more horrible things. Now listen to me foreshadow Ani’s fall all the more.

[JadedDM]

Because their portrayal is so ridiculous. 99.9% of the Empire members we ever see are either cartoonishly evil or mindless, nameless mooks. And the only things the Empire ever seems to do is brutalise people and use all its resources to build planet-destroying superweapons (which immediately get blown up).

After a while it gets impossible to take seriously, and it starts to feel like lazy storytelling. The writers just want a monolithically evil villain so that they don't count as humans when the protagonists kill them.

I would agree that the Empire is usually depicted as incompetent--there was a running joke with the OT about how Stormtroopers can't hit the broad side of a star destroyer. And I can see how that would make it difficult for you to take them seriously, sure. But sympathize with them? Wouldn't them being incompetent make you want to side against them, not with them? I don't understand that. They're evil and bad at what they do. That seems like two reasons to root against them.

[Peelee]

I would agree that the Empire is usually depicted as incompetent--there was a running joke with the OT about how Stormtroopers can't hit the broad side of a star destroyer. And I can see how that would make it difficult for you to take them seriously, sure.

Except it's easy to take them seriously because they are constantly shown as god shots and competent enemies who represent real danger.

[Narkis]

D+. It’s better than Force Awakens and way better than Last Jedi, but it’s not really worth seeing unless you’ve got nothing better to do.

Yep, I agree with your ranking and your gripes with the movie, though I'd rate it a bit higher. I'm not sure if this means my expectations were lowered too much by TLJ.

Except it's easy to take them seriously because they are constantly shown as god shots and competent enemies who represent real danger.

I've always disliked the "stormtroopers are terrible shots" meme, especially since it's inspired by the time they were ordered to let their targets go and make it look convincing so they could be tracked to their base.

[Zevox]

So, the one moment that I find memorable and fun from Solo was from right near the end, the final standoff with Beckett, where Beckett gives his ominous line that clearly tells the audience (due to basic genre awareness) that he's about to fire - and Han immediately pulls his blaster and shoots him before he can do it. Not only a good subversion of expectations for a dramatic scene like that, where it's set up for Beckett to dramatically fire first or for them to fire at the same time, but a great nod to the infamous "Han shot first" issue. This time around, he not only shoots first, he's the only one who shoots.

Beyond that and Lando, yeah, pretty mediocre film.

After I explained that in the cartoon Maul survived being cut in half and dropped down a huge pit. His response was “that’s stupid."

An appropriate response with which I agree. Not one of the better parts of the Clone Wars cartoon.

[Narkis]

An appropriate response with which I agree. Not one of the better parts of the Clone Wars cartoon.

I too had some trouble accepting him surviving TPM. But his Clone Wars arcs were great, giving us some terrific scenes we wouldn't have had otherwise. And the fact there was more than one example of ancient Sith Lords who survived worse injuries made it easier to swallow.

[TheSummoner]

This time around, he not only shoots first, he's the only one who shoots.

He was always the only one who shoots and no amount of bad CGI is going to change my mind.

[Saph]

So, the one moment that I find memorable and fun from Solo was from right near the end, the final standoff with Beckett, where Beckett gives his ominous line that clearly tells the audience (due to basic genre awareness) that he's about to fire - and Han immediately pulls his blaster and shoots him before he can do it. Not only a good subversion of expectations for a dramatic scene like that, where it's set up for Beckett to dramatically fire first or for them to fire at the same time, but a great nod to the infamous "Han shot first" issue. This time around, he not only shoots first, he's the only one who shoots.

I thought the Han/Beckett interactions were the best bit of the movie. It starts to feel almost like a father-son relationship (which Han's obviously been badly lacking) which makes the ending a lot sadder than it otherwise would have been.

[Kornaki]

So the Maul=Dooku idea could be wrapped up a bit more simply. Just keep everything the same except Maul doesn't die in episode 1. Maul covers some of the sithy stuff in episode 2. Then we change it where mace windu finds out palpatine is a sith at some sort of peace meeting with the separatists. Dooku is also there, not yet outed as a sith. He pulls his red lightsaber to help palpatine kill mace. Mace says something like "but you and maul... There can only be two! Dooku let's out an evil grin as he flicks on the second side of his saber. Then we fade away and don't even see him die.

Could have been a decent twist, idk.

[Peelee]

He was always the only one who shoots and no amount of bad CGI is going to change my mind.

I'm actually more bothered by them changing Kenobi's krayt cry. It sounds so much worse in the current version on Disney +.

[uncool]

But there's no point in having a "mysterious assassin no one knows about" at all. Because Maul isn't a character. He's a roadblock for Obi-Wan and Qui-Gonn.

The fallen former Jedi now leading a Rebellion against the corrupt Republic but secretely being a Sith is all that's needed to get the plot rolling.

Edit: Maul does exactly two things in the movie: reveal to the Jedi that the Sith are still a thing and kill Qui-Gonn, Dooku could have done both of those.

He does one more thing, rather subtly, for the trilogy: show the disposability of Sith apprentices, setting up the beginning of Ep 3 (and, inherently, justifying some of the OT).

[Rakaydos]

The point is I shouldn't have to. The movie should stand on its own.

The movie does. there's only a "plot hole" if you include outside material- TPM. And that plot hole is... well, it's pretty much ignored, but he's reintroduced in a different secondary material available on the same platforms as TPM.

Movies arnt special anymore.

[Seppl]

The movie does. there's only a "plot hole" if you include outside material- TPM. And that plot hole is... well, it's pretty much ignored, but he's reintroduced in a different secondary material available on the same platforms as TPM.

Movies arnt special anymore.

is the reliance on outside material really the main criticism here? Should we not rather talk about the fact that this is some cheap "He was not really dead!" plot twist just for the sake of having a twist? Darth Maul was clearly intended to be dead in TPM. He died a Disney villain's death because of PG13 but he did not fall down that chute so that the audience would wonder if he is really dead. Are we supposed to believe that Obi Wan just never mentioned that the mysterious Sith assassin fell down into a hole and that nobody ever bothered to look?

Spoiler: Rise of the Skywalker

Show

I wrote the text above before I remembered that they did the same exact thing in the latest Star Wars. Again. Apparently, death in Disney's Star Wars is now as impact- and suspenseful as in comic books

[Peelee]

The movie does. there's only a "plot hole" if you include outside material- TPM.

"Outside material," in this case, being "other movies in the same series which introduced and seemingly killed off the character." If someone dies in one movie and is alive with no explanation in a later movie, taking place later chronologically, then you can't claim outside material and that the later movie stands on its own, because it introduced a seemingly nonsensical element. If Thanos snapped and then the next movie shows all the superheroes right from the start without mentioning anything about it, would you claim that's only a problem if you include outside material - Infinity War?

[Rakaydos]

"Outside material," in this case, being "other movies in the same series which introduced and seemingly killed off the character." If someone dies in one movie and is alive with no explanation in a later movie, taking place later chronologically, then you can't claim outside material and that the later movie stands on its own, because it introduced a seemingly nonsensical element. If Thanos snapped and then the next movie shows all the superheroes right from the start without mentioning anything about it, would you claim that's only a problem if you include outside material - Infinity War?

The problem is, you're picking and choosing from "Disney canon" to blame a problem that has already been in existence on the new movie that acknowledges it. This is no worse than Chopper or the VCX in Rogue One.

Agents of Shield doesn't work as a point of comparison, because the Netflix TV shows are explicitly not MCU canon.

[dancrilis]

"Outside material," in this case, being "other movies in the same series which introduced and seemingly killed off the character." If someone dies in one movie and is alive with no explanation in a later movie, taking place later chronologically, then you can't claim outside material and that the later movie stands on its own, because it introduced a seemingly nonsensical element. If Thanos snapped and then the next movie shows all the superheroes right from the start without mentioning anything about it, would you claim that's only a problem if you include outside material - Infinity War?

There might be two different elements:
1: Does the movie stand on its own.
2: Does the movie stand as part of a series.

If you have never seen a Star Wars movie other then Solo - Maul's inclusion is not a plot hole.
If you have never seen The Phantom Menace (and seen every other movie) then Maul's inclusion in Solo is merely the introduction of some crime lord with a lightsaber (possible hinting at a Jedi who has fallen to the dark side or the like - an interesting character that could be explored further).
If you have seen The Phantom Menace (and none of the other material, such as Clone Wars or Rebels) then Maul's inclusion is seemingly a plot hole.
If you have seen everything than Maul's inclusion is a bit odd but not overly so.

I think the solution to this that we can all be happy* with is for a new movie to be made: Maul.

Done well it could be fairly interesting.

*we will not all be happy with this solution ... we will not all be happy with any solution.

[Peelee]

The problem is, you're picking and choosing from "Disney canon" to blame a problem that has already been in existence on the new movie that acknowledges it.

I'm not. I've drawn a very clear line - only information in the other movies, not ancillary material like TV shows, books, comics, games, etc. etc. I've been consistent on this point for years.

[Saph]

The Rise of Skywalker

Introduction

Well, we’re finally here, the climax of the Disney trilogy! After the somewhat mixed reaction to The Last Jedi, J.J. Abrahms came back to replace Rian Johnson for the last film. I’m sure you’ve all been looking forward to this one, so lets get straight into it.


Movie Summary

• A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away . . . STAR WARS!
• Into the opening crawl. The Empire First Order may have lost its last planet-destroying superweapon, but now it’s got a new planet-destroying superweapon that’s even more powerful than before.
• And the Empire First Order may have lost their fleet in TLJ, but now they’ve got a new fleet that’s also even more powerful than before.
• And they may have had their Supreme Leader killed in TLJ, but now they’ve got a new Supreme Leader who’s ALSO even more powerful than before. The Rebellion Resistance whatever they’re calling themselves now are in grave danger of losing, seriously guys we really mean it this time.
• The only people who can save the galaxy are our three heroes. Well, one hero, really, Rey’s the only one who actually matters, but we’ll pretend that Poe and Finn count. The three of them (plus droids and Chewie) go off on a quest.
• They travel around the galaxy visiting planets and killing Stormtroopers for a couple of hours.
• Poe does nothing very important.
• Finn gets friendzoned by Rey, and also does nothing very important.
• Rey meets Kylo and has an on-again off-again romance. She probably duels him once or twice and they kiss. Kylo falls for Rey and helps her kill the new Supreme Leader but either dies or gets removed from the story some other way. (It’s one thing to have a romance with a bad boy, but we can’t have our family-friendly heroine actually marrying him.)
• The First Order gets defeated (again), the galaxy’s saved (again), and Rey becomes the first new Jedi. The end!

Well, that was fun. I feel much happier than I did after watching Episodes 7 and 8.


Thoughts While Watching

. . . Wait, you expected me to actually WATCH this thing?

Ha ha ha ha ha!

Look, when it comes down to it, there are two reasons you decide to see a movie: (1) you think it’ll be good/fun and (2) you want to know what happens. (1) is a nonstarter, because JJ Abrahms, Rian Johnson, and Kathleen Kennedy have made it pretty clear by now that they couldn’t make a good Star Wars movie if their lives depended on it. So that just leaves (2), and sadly, Disney Star Wars has gotten so predictable by this point that I don’t NEED to watch the movies to know what’ll happen. That list of bullet points didn’t come from me reading a summary, it was just a guess. I’d ask people who’ve seen the film to tell me if I’m right, but I honestly don’t care.

I said at the beginning of this thread that I’ve been a Star Wars fan for a long time. I really love it, and that love survived all the bad stuff in the prequels and all the bad stuff in the dump-truck load of EU material that was put out over the years. Because while those things had a lot of bad stuff, there was a lot of good stuff, too, and it was fairly easy to ignore the bad bits while enjoying the good stuff like Thrawn.

But the Disney movies finally did what midichlorians, over-use of CGI, Lucas edits, and Hayden Christiansen couldn’t: they managed to kill my interest. I just don’t care enough to watch new Star Wars movies any more. In fact, it’s more than that: the thought of doing it is so unpleasant that if someone put Rise of Skywalker on in the background when I was at a party or something, I’d probably go to another room.

Lots of people have written about the problems with the Disney trilogy, and I’ve written a ton in this thread about all the individual things I didn’t like (and the few that I did). But if I had to come up with a two-word summary of Disney Star Wars, it would be creatively bankrupt. For all the things he did wrong, George Lucas was an amazingly creative storyteller. The Disney writers aren’t. At their best the Disney movies are nostalgia trips, echoing what Lucas did without any real understanding of why it worked. At their worst, they’re boring crap.

So at this point I think I can say I’m officially done. I’ve got zero interest in seeing RoS, and the fact that it’s currently in cinemas and I’d have to pay for it is just the icing on the cake. It’s going to suck, and I’ve not spending two and a half hours of my life discovering just how it sucks.

No doubt Disney’s going to keep putting out these 2.5 hour yawnfests at yearly intervals until they’ve squeezed the last drop of money out of the IP and even the fans have given up on it, at which point they’ll drop it and go onto the next thing and Star Wars will finally be declared dead. It’s kind of depressing to see a franchise end this way, but it’s the way things go, I guess. Nothing lasts forever, and Star Wars had a good run.

Final Grade

What’s the grade for ‘couldn’t even be bothered to watch?’ Maybe I’ll have to add a new letter.

[Peelee]

I was really looking forward to this one because I wanted to see just how much commentary you would have had before the opening crawl finished.

Also,one final attempt to see if you'd be willing to tack on The Mandalorian to this great watch through. Bonuses: it wouldn't take much longer than TROS, and it's already broken up into 30-40 minute segments. Convenient!

ETA: Your bullet point list is remarkably close.

[Saph]

I was really looking forward to this one because I wanted to see just how much commentary you would have had before the opening crawl finished.

Also,one final attempt to see if you'd be willing to tack on The Mandalorian to this great watch through. Bonuses: it wouldn't take much longer than TROS, and it's already broken up into 30-40 minute segments. Convenient!

I burnt myself out on 'things wrong with this movie' doing The Last Jedi.

And I'm thinking about it. It does sound pretty good.

[Rodin]

I'm not. I've drawn a very clear line - only information in the other movies, not ancillary material like TV shows, books, comics, games, etc. etc. I've been consistent on this point for years.

100% with you on that.

I'm also not saying it was a plot hole - I'm saying that it was BAD WRITING. There's a difference.

If you're asking your audience to know who a character is after 20 years of not appearing on the screen, that's bad writing. If you're asking your audience to know who a character is when their only recent appearance is as a cartoon, THAT is bad writing.

The Rogue One example Rakaydos gives only exemplifies this. I don't know who Chopper or VCX are. I don't even know who they are after looking them up! But neither do they have any sort of role in the plot, or at least not one that matters. You can watch Rogue One without knowing who Chopper is and get the exact same experience as someone who does know who it is.

That's not true of Solo. Darth Maul is set up as a major villain for the next movie, were it ever to happen. They don't say his name, they just show his face and show that he has Force powers.

This leaves a big knowledge gap between 3 sets of moviegoers: Those who saw Phantom Menace, those who saw the cartoon, and those who saw neither.

For two-thirds of the audience, that scene does not work on multiple levels. Those who saw TPM have to both recognize a character from 20 years ago and get over the fact that he's dead. For those that saw neither, the scene is also confusing - who is this Sith dude, and where did he come from? Why's he bumming around with mafia types while Palpatine is out there?

It's all about reasonable expectations from your audience. Expecting your audience to watch 5 seasons of a TV cartoon to keep up with canon is categorically not reasonable.

[TheSummoner]

[list]

I mean, you're not far off.

(1) you think it’ll be good/fun and (2) you want to know what happens.

(3) You want to tear it a new one, though that might fall under #1 as "fun". The best part about Ep9 is picking apart how bad it is. His many plotholes there are, how many times they tease major consequences and then go back on it, just how the world seems to revolve around making sure the protagonists succeed and how conveniently everything seems to work out for them. Movie is bad. The hard question is whether it's as bad as Ep8 or not.

What’s the grade for ‘couldn’t even be bothered to watch?’ Maybe I’ll have to add a new letter.

I suggest Φ.

[dancrilis]

It is a bit of a pity (I would have been interested of you thought it better or worse then The Force Awakens) - but I can understand it.

I personally liked Rise of Skywalker (best of the sequels) - but I think that is because my expectations were so low that it would have to be as bad as The Last Jedi not to exceed them (and I only saw it because someone else was going to see it) reviewing it critically it was maybe 'ok' but sortof 'empty'.

Spoiler: ROS

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Although Ian McDiarmid I do always find entertaining as Palpatine, so himself alone would likely have had me give it a better rating then the other two - and then that is likely not critical evaluation.

Which I think might be the problems with the sequels - the prequels (for their flaws) added to the universe that the Original Movies established, Jedi/Sith/Fall of the Republic etc - the sequels added nothing and actually took some things away.

[comicshorse]

Well that review pulled off more genuine surprises than the movie did
By my remembrance you got only one plot point wrong. Which is either a tribute to your genre savvy or a damning indictment of modern movies

[AMX]

Aw, I was so looking forward to you demolishing that abomination (which actually did kill my interest in the franchise, at least as far as the "sequel era" is concerned).

But you're probably right, it's better to just completely avoid it.

[Bartmanhomer]

Spoiler: The Rise Of Skywalker

Show

It was a great movie I enjoy it. The best part of this movie was Rey and Kylo Ren kissed each other. It was the most romantic kiss in Star Wars history.

[Saph]

(3) You want to tear it a new one, though that might fall under #1 as "fun". The best part about Ep9 is picking apart how bad it is. His many plotholes there are, how many times they tease major consequences and then go back on it, just how the world seems to revolve around making sure the protagonists succeed and how conveniently everything seems to work out for them. Movie is bad. The hard question is whether it's as bad as Ep8 or not.

Thing is, I really don't enjoy that all that much. Criticising things is sort of fun for a while, but after a couple of bad movies it just starts to depress me and I start looking for excuses to do something else. After TLJ it took me more than a week to motivate myself to do Solo, and that took effort.

I'm just not a very negative person when it comes to media, I guess. If I don't like something it doesn't take long before I drift away.