Star Wars: The Final Solution

I think I've figured it out. Critique of this movie is understandable, and all quarters seem to say variations on the same thing. But I think the focus on canon and the flaws of the Star Wars universe is somewhat misplaced. Hear me out, this'll be contained in a few long posts but hopefully worth reading to anyone who actually cares about this.

1) The original trilogy that gained a loyal fanbase did so because of a single reason. The characters were built as simple archetypes and there was little to no subversion of these archetypes in the movies. In ANH, the only subversion that existed was Leia; she should have been (classically) only a damsel in distress, but they had her also be a fighter (surprise) who tried to help them escape when the initial break-out-of-prison situation goes awry. It works because it fits in with the 'rebel' characterization. Aside from this, all the other characters play their parts without deviation.

2) In ESB, it's possible to continue this situation because the baseline archetype of the characters has not changed. Luke is still the hero, but he wants to know more about the force, so instead of learning from his mentor who was killed in the last one, he learns from another mentor. He hasn't changed, he grows. The end of the film shows that he's learned something, but that he's not yet 'an adult'. Han is still the rogue smuggler, but his enemies finally caught up with him. Leia is still the rebel princess, etc.. Everyone's characters and their roles stay the same, however now they are thrown into different situations that give them heartache.

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3) In ROTJ, once again, the characters as baselines are the same as before. Luke is still the eternal good, but he's learned his lesson and is now good and 'ready'. Han is rescued, though it seems like his rogue days are numbered if he ends up with Leia forever at the end. Leia is the same, just put into more unfortunate circumstances again. The big change of course is the evil Darth Vader, who is turned to good for a moment at the end. Redemption that is touching.

The point is that these movies work because the characters are internally consistent. They are very strong archetypes with all the variation weeded out so that they are simple, easy to understand, and appeal to the masses. They are direct, in other words, and they don't require explanation or extended canon or mystery. Any mystery is generated solely by audience members who want to know MORE about their favorite characters; mystery is not generated by the movie through events or dialogue that are purposefully or accidentally ambiguous.

When we get to the Prequels, problems begin. On the one hand, you if you're going to tell the story of the origin of Darth Vader, then you have to have a character arc that is the opposite of what most people enjoy watching; someone who is exceptionally good turning into pure evil. This is very difficult to engineer in popular culture; it is accomplished in literature all the time, but in film it tends to leave the audience feeling horrible, and the feelings of the audience do matter and must be taken into account.
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The only way to make this work is to have a character who is like Luke in the beginning but then gets gradually corrupted as he goes along the storyline. This is where TPM failed first; it should NOT have started with little Ani as a kid...it should have started as Ani as a teenager being trained as a Jedi, and being as talented, genuine, and sincere as Luke but engineered to be more open to suggestion. You could do this simply by making sure that Anakin didn't have any of his mentors killed; in a sense, that he wouldn't have experienced significant loss, and therefore the only influence he would have that is telling him that the Sith are evil are Jedi. Then you introduce Sidious into the equation, who posits that the force is not only good vs. evil, but something grey in between. Easy as pie, and it's what we see in the ROTS and why people like this one so much. But I'm going ahead of myself.

In TPM, we've lost our archetypes, to some degree. Padme is a princess, built along the same lines as Leia, but she has no personality. This isn't solely the fault of the writers; it's because she has no one to be in conflict with, and to make matters worse, she's a child in the movie so her ideas are shut down by her elder counselors and the Jedi of course. In other words, her ideas don't have equal weight.

The two Jedi serve the function of one...and the only reason I can think of that they exist is to show the padowan/master dichotomy. But once again, it doesn't really work because even though Ani is supposed to be learning from Quigon by watching him, Quigon tends to do things that are not the greatest (cheating Watto, etc.). When we think of Old Ben Kenobi, we think of someone who was good, wise, and experienced....Quigon doesn't fit this at all, which is why we're confused as to his motives.

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There is no lovable rogue to balance things out or at least fight with Padme (they tried that with Quigon, and it just looked funny), they added in Jar Jar as comic relief even though they didn't need it (because of R2 and C-3PO), and ultimately you had characters who were all slightly watered down. The only one who wasn't was Darth Maul; he was obviously evil, and it would have been even better if we'd seen him do evil things; torture people, etc. The only reason we know he's evil in the first movie is because of the music...

In AOTC, the situation is actually slightly worse. Obi is supposed to be the wise sage character, but given his age at the time he's also supposed to be a kind of hero. In this movie we see the first elements of Anakin turning as well to the dark side, which is a nice idea but leaves his character as a bit of this, a bit of that, which is not a very strong thing at all.

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You are mistaken, user. No one on Sup Forums wants to have any real discussion about movies. You either make two word posts or you don't get any attention at all.

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When we look at the peripheral characters, we get into even more watered down problems. All the Jedi we see and hear from (Windu, Yoda, etc.) are all wise and characterless...too many wise sages, and if you diversify them in terms of character, you lose power of the archetype. Darth Tyrannus is cool but again, not terribly evil. Just a Jedi with a different point of view, which is not enough to warrant fighting against him passionately. Jango Fett is another one; yes, he apparently tried to orchestrate the assassination of Padme, but why? Why did he want to kill her, who paid him, etc etc. Is he evil enough to fight, or just another side character? The music tells us that he's evil, but it's not a strong evil character...he's more like the angry trees in the wizard of Oz who throw apples at Dorothy...they're awful, but we eventually beat them and move on without any consequence.

Padme is the same as before, but this time she tries fighting, which is not a problem really, but not really foreshadowed or explained...it's just assumed. All they needed was a line where she says that after her role as the princess and all the assassination attempts she endured, she took combat training because she wanted to learn how to better protect herself, or something stupid like that. But they didn't bother. She fights, and we assume that she can.

Anyway, by this point, the archetypes are either watered down, or non-existent. Once again, though the writing could have salvaged it somewhat, the flaw of the strength and lack thereof of archetypal characters is what causes the failure in the movie.

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By the time we reach the final ROTS, we have an interesting situation. The Palpatine is clearly evil, though it's only in the second half of the movie that we see him doing evil things. Anakin turns rather quickly from kind of good to evil...fair enough really, and perhaps that's why people see this as the strongest of the prequels. Obi-wan is clearly 'good' for the most part, Padme is reduced to a crying mess, and that's about it. The main characters that do exist are pretty strong in their archetypes; there's no questioning the motives of anyone.

And now we reach the point that I really want to get to with all of this.

The reason why TFA and most recently TLJ suck so badly is because we're currently in a kind of artistic hellhole where the 'in' thing to do in cinema (and many other art forms, incidentally) is subversion and destruction of the past. It's not limited to TLJ...it's been happening for years.

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Very good so far desu.

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With TFA, the movie failed for all the reasons associated with building or destroying classical archetypes. The further you go away from an archetype, the fewer people understand and enjoy the artform; the audience has to be looking for the subversion, and indeed hoping for it, in order to be successful.

TFA attempted to follow the plan of ANH, which it did in terms of story very closely. But look at the differences, and the weaknesses throughout. First, Luke is someone who wishes he could be doing something more exciting; he explicitly gets upset about it, and complains to everyone who'll listen (even the droids). Rey kind of wishes for this, but doesn't say anything because there's no one to say it to...so it's implied. Weakness no. 1. We can infer that this is how she feels, when she puts on the resistence helmet and eats...but it could be her simply wanting out of a shitty planet...or poverty...or anything else. Just getting off that rock. That is not specific enough for people to feel sympathy with. Luke wants to leave to be in a greater adventure. Rey wants to leave...to do...something.

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Keep going user, I'm going to incorporate your work into my review video.

I’m nodding in agreement at the moment. Diggin this.

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Luke gets a father figure in Obi Wan, the wise sage who guides him out of tragedy and helps him to understand his purpose. Rey gets...Han Solo? Think about it...Han is supposed to be the father figure who guides Rey after she's gone from her home world...because it's certainly not supposed to be Finn (we'll get to him later), as he is also escaping something. But what does Rey learn from Han?

Luke learns a multitude of things from Obi; the history of the Jedi (condensed), the force, how to use it in a basic manner or at least how to perceive it, and Obi gifts him his father's lightsaber. Furthermore, Obi shows Luke through his actions the ultimate thing about the Jedi; their self sacrifice to save others.

What does Rey learn from Han? She already knows how to fly the ship better than him...she can fix it too...he doesn't give her anything of value....and his sacrifice on the bridge is for what, exactly? He's not stalling for time to let anyone escape, at least, not really. Does anyone know why he dies? Because I don't. In other words, what has Rey learned from Han? I would submit she's learned nothing.

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Bump

> The original trilogy that gained a loyal fanbase did so because of a single reason.
People ignore the this, but presentation was the major factor in the success. It was a story with the best special affects ever at the time. People fell in love with the characters because they could believe they were real, due to how high the quality of the effects were. It was something never seen before, and it's understated.

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Now, the bad guy. In ANH, it was clear that Vader was the bad guy, that he wanted something specific (the plans), and that he would stop at nothing to get it. He'd kill everyone in his path, and furthermore, he could use the force like the wise sage, which meant that if the wise sage was powerful, we would immediately think that Vader was powerful too simply because he could use the force as well. It's beautifully constructed, actually when you think about it.

In TFA, who is the bad guy and what does he want? Well, it's Kylo Ren, however he's clearly not a fully fledged baddy; he's a kid trying to be bad. Now, this isn't bad on its own; it could be done if he had a mentor to show him the way. That's what Snoke is for...but Snoke doesn't do this at all...he acts as the Emperor did in the ESB. So what do we have? We have a teenager who's playing at being evil. This isn't a strong character. It is a strong character if and only if the purpose of the film is to subvert expectation, deconstruct the archetype and critique the strategy of filmmaking; we see this in indie films all the time, and it's powerful if used by the right director in the right situation. But if you're goal is to tell a fantasy epic in space, what the fuck are you doing questioning the purpose of your own character? All this does is weaken the character to the point where people don't think of him as being legitimately dangerous.

The power of Vader in ANH was that not only did he have a mask, but he was a powerful enemy who had no weaknesses that we could see. He was inhuman. There's no reasoning with him, no begging, no nothing, because you have no idea HOW to beg or reason with something behind a mechanical mask.

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Keep going OP

This is gud, go on

This is incredibly banal, entry level analysis
Please stop
Stop

I think the mistake of the PT and ST are characters who don't know what they're doing. They're developing characters who are inexperienced to build up to that archetype. We see this with Finn, Rey, Kylo ren. In contrast to the OT with simple characters to understand since they've already gone through enough experiences to act the way they're shown. With these new generation of characters, reflects a problem or maybe genius insight at the hand of the directors of clueless people. And that specific stereotype can be a huge hit or miss with this generation or the audience seeing the film.

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Kylo was weak from the getgo, not in terms of his force powers but in terms of his focus. He threw tantrums, and not the type of tantrums that make someone dangerous. The Joker in TDK is a perfect example of someone who is dangerous due to unpredictability, and a tantrum from him would be catastrophic. But Kylo Ren? Taunt him enough and he'll cry. This is a weakness in character that doesn't work in this kind of fantasy epic because you're not supposed to feel sympathy for the bad guy. If you do, he's not bad any longer, or at least, not as much of a threat because you can easily be convinced that he won't go through with whatever terrible plan he might come up with. Vader was dehuminized, and this was done on purpose to make him 'evil'....Kylo is humanized, and thus he's simply a kid who got in with the wrong gang at school. It's a flaw, a calculated deconstruction of the 'bad guy' archetype for the sole purpose of subverting our expectations, nothing more.

The side characters also seem to suffer greatly. Finn, aside from a backstory that doesn't make sense, changes allegiance all too easily to the point where you can't believe that he was either trained as a soldier or brought up in this system since being a child. His fight against his own brothers-in-arms is such a strange thing, and to make matters worse, he ends up fighting Phasma, who also has no place or function in the story other than to exist as Finn's arch nemesis.

Poe, who was easily the most popular character from TFA, was only popular because he represented something utterly familiar, not only to us as the audience, but to the Star Wars world: A rogue who played by his own rules and saved the day. He didn't need a backstory...he didn't need an arch nemesis...all he needed to do was exist. That's also why BB-8 was so popular...just plug into the archetype a new looking character, and you're done. It's so easy, isn't it?

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Leia was there, but wasted, and the interactions between her and Han was terrible because, once again, it was about subversion of expectation. We see them at the end of ROTJ, we assume they'll live happily ever after, as we would like in fantasy, and what do we get instead? That they broke up...that Han is now a smuggler again, just geriatric, and that they had a son who's a fuckup. That's great....it certainly wasn't what anyone was thinking in the audience, so they fooled us all. But does it mean anything? Is there any purpose to it other than to subvert expectations? Of course not.

In TFA, the archetypes are weakened or destroyed, which is why the characters (aside from Poe) seem somewhat all over the place in terms of their motivation or the passion behind the goal they are shooting for. It's not solely due to the writing, or to Ridley's wooden 'acting', it's because we really can't get a handle on what characters want, what they like/hate, and how they'll react in a given circumstance.

Now to the shitfest that was TLJ

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Bretty gud/10

Keep going OP.

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TLJ had potential in the form of Luke. The only archetype left that could give us hope of a kind of eternal good, something that was reliable and predictable. What is the first thing that happens when we see Luke? He throws his fucking lightsaber (the one GIFTED to him by Obi) behind his back like it's nothing, like it has no sentimental or even practical value to him whatsoever. This is a destruction of his archetype, immediately. Throughout the movie, he says things that are uncharacteristic (young Luke wanted to learn everything he could about the force...but old Luke can't read a few books?? WTF), he does things that are uncharacteristic (he would go through the possible suicide mission of taking a chance to save his father and turn him from the dark side and yet he'd easily and willingly consider killing a kid he's training because of...a dark potential and power he sensed within him?), and of course the other things that people have pointed out at nauseum.

But it's worse than this, of course. Rey has no figure to guide her in the force; she needs Luke to train her, and the necessities of the storyline REQUIRE him to train her if she's going to be seriously useful in it. But what happens? He doesn't want to after a few lessons, and eventually she leaves. Now, note how it appears that she seems to know quite a lot already about the force...not in what she says, but by how well she controls it and IS NOT FRIGHTENED BY IT! To this point, I still have no idea what she actually learned from Luke aside from opening her mind to it when she sits on a rock and that from Luke's point of view the force is a spectrum and the Jedi were wrong about it all. Has she learned any skills? She knew how to force persuade before....the point is, she doesn't fail at it...it is Luke who fails her as a teacher.

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This is nice OP, keep it up.

I actually dig subversion when it's done with thought and purpose. Sadly, neither were present in implementing it in this film.

Good stuff. Do continue!

Bump for interesting thread while I read

Deep enough to explain why the OT works and the sequels are shit

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This is an important point: in the original trilogy, we see Luke grow, and he does so because he has mentors who help him, who guide him, and help him up when he fails. Rey as a character NEVER fails, which means that there is NO purpose to having a figure to guide her. Every guiding figure she has, she bests (the most obvious is when she beats the shit out of Luke on the rocks before leaving) or she doesn't need (poor Han). So in a single stroke they've destroyed two archetypes that hold the whole damn thing together: That the main hero/heroine of the series has to grow and learn, and that they can be encouraged and taught by someone wiser and more experienced than them. Both archetypes are now gone.

TLJ does nothing with both main bad guys: Snoke doesn't change and is killed off, and Kylo is potentially tempted by the light side because of love but then after killing Snoke wants to just continue as a ruler instead, though in many respects it's left open to interpretation as to how bad or how good he'd be That is, until he trains all the super ATAT guns at Luke in the saltdesert.

In ESB, Vader, believe it or not, did have a small character arc; he revealed to Luke about the parentage, and offered for them to join forces. In some ways, this is a concession by Vader, but also an indication that Vader thinks of Luke as a legit threat.

We could argue the same for Kylo, but the problem here is that Kylo killed Snoke for Rey....Vader didn't kill the Emperor at this juncture for Luke. Also, familial love is different to romantic love, even in film, and we as audiences perceive that difference; that familial love is enduring and unassailable, and romantic love shifts with the winds and is not reliable.

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STFU fag I'm enjoying it

>When we get to the Prequels, problems begin.
Stopped reading right there. The prequels are flawless.

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I'm almost done Anons...and I appreciate that you're still here reading. Now, onto the final thoughts.

So, in TLJ, Rey doesn't really learn anything that she doesn't already know, either within the film or from the previous one...she could exist without any of the events happening, and she'd still be as brilliant at what she does.

The only other strong archetype that is present in the new Star Wars is destroyed as well: Poe. Notice that for some reason it was decided that Poe needed to be taught a lesson in this movie; that his rogue ways were not good and that he needed to stop being so damn rogey or else he'll get people killed. Like the little boy in school who keeps on acting up and is put in a corner by the teacher.

This is perhaps the most interesting subversion that happens in this movie, because he was easily the most popular and memorable character from the first one. Can you imagine that happening to Han in the original series? That he'd suggest doing something risky, it doesn't work out, and then he gets lectured by someone higher up in the chain of command? Of course we can't imagine it, because if even a whiff of this were to get to Han's ears, he'd simply say, 'fuck you all, I'm leaving'. But for some inexplicable reason, Poe doesn't do this. He takes his punishment, his lecture, because that's what is necessary to destroy his character.

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Vey good analysis mate, I think you're spot on. They deliberately destroyed all the archetypes Star Wars is based on and replaced them with meaninglessness, because that's the cool post-modern thing to do.
The reason we respond so strongly to archetypes like the ones you've described here is that map onto the real world in some way and we recognize that subconsciously if not consciously.

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I know this has been long, and I appreciate you all staying for this. Here's what I really just want to say (and it's not, 'walk the dinosaur', as much as you'd like it to be).

All of the critique that we're seeing from people who care about the series, about the characters and canon, all fit in the realm of 'it's not what I expected' or 'it's not how the character would act' or 'it's not how the force works'. These are all legitimate criticisms if we consider that the writers know the canon and Star Wars universe inside out. It's proven beyond any doubt that they do not, so now we're left with a more unfortunate conclusion.

The purpose of the New Star Wars is to deal with an equation that cannot be balanced. The fans of the original are fans because of archetypes that are no longer used in modern cinema, and if they are used, they are openly mocked by the media and film pundits. You can't have a damsel in distress. You can't have a lovable rogue. You can't have a wise sage and you can't have an eternally good hero. All of these things are considered too predictable in modern film.

The first stage of distance from this is to do what movies did until the late 90's; take the archetypes and put them in a different, unusual scenario. We could still recognize the archetype for what it is, because the archetype was unchanged, but the location or situation they were stuck in was alien to us.

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>alt-right faggot complains about literally everything

Very good analysis, virgin. You're a total faggot, kill yourself.

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The second stage of distance is one we passed through in the early 2000s: you not only change the location of the archetype, but you change the archetype itself so that we no longer have any connection to it. This works only if the audience knows the original archetype to begin with. Think of parody movies; you won't understand the parody unless you've seen the movie they are parodying. This is why 'Not another Teen Movie' will not last beyond another decade, as no one will get the jokes who hasn't seen any of the shitty teen movies that came out before it.

Today, we've hit the point of third stage distance. Not only do we change the archetype, change the setting, but now we actively critique the archetype within the aesthetic, pointing fun at all the expectations that stupid audiences have, and subverting those expectations so that the audience gets a lot of stimuli but no substance. Nothing can be relied upon any longer, and thus we have no connections to any of the characters. A character needs to be predictable to a degree in order for us to feel like we know them; in real life this takes months or years, but in the movie realm we have 3 hours to make this happen with a character. When you destroy archetypes, you destroy the ability of the audience to predict what a character will do in a given situation; an archetype is like a Coles-Notes to a character, a cheat sheet so we don't have to learn everything about the character from everything in the movie...we just know 'okay, good guy...he won't like this' or 'bad guy, he'll respond like this', and so forth.

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I don't think anything you've said is contradictory to what he's saying, you've just gone a little deeper into the characters, I which I also appreciate. Notice that those things you mentioned are only from TESB and ROTJ, the original Star Wars film keeps its archetypes untarnished.

>When we think of Old Ben Kenobi, we think of someone who was good, wise, and experienced....
If we view the OT through the lens of the magic feeling that is so successfully generates, yes. But if we look at what the OT actually shows us about Obi-Wan, forgetting what we want Obi-Wan to be, we see that Obi-Wan is actually more complex than that. He lied to Luke about Luke's father and let the inexperienced young man go with him on an extremely dangerous mission. Now, I guess you could argue that Luke was safer with Obi-Wan than back on Tatooine, but that doesn't explain why Obi-Wan let Luke find the truth out on his own when presumably, he could have let him know by appearing to him at some point before Cloud City, or why he seemed defensive and self-justifying when he appeared to Luke after Yoda's death.
Yoda's character is similarly complex. The OT shows both Obi-Wan and Yoda as well-intentioned, but willing to conceal the truth from Luke and overly focused on trying to bring down the Empire by using Luke as a pawn (despite Yoda's "war not make one great").
I think that because the OT as a whole generates such a powerful archetypal magic, we ignore some of the complexity and strangeness of the characters Obi-Wan and Yoda and forget that it's there.
>This is perhaps the most interesting subversion that happens in this movie, because he was easily the most popular and memorable character from the first one.
But Poe is not the most popular and memorable character from TFA. I don't know who is, maybe Kylo or Rey, but it's not Poe. Poe was barely in TFA.

...

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Now, you can have films without strong archetypes still work, but not in a film series that keeps on trying to appeal to children and grownup children. Furthermore, by criticizing aesthetically the archetypes that caused an original fanbase to exist, you end up alienating the brand from the fanbase. Now, that wouldn't be too bad, except for the fact that a person coming to this new series without any backstory or understanding of the original movies will find characters that are so far away (third stage distance) from something recognisable that they will be lost. So you lose both; the old audiences and the new.

That's all I really wanted to say. They can save the Star Wars empire, they really can, but the only way to do it is to reintroduce strong archetypes after the last of this trilogy. They've already destroyed Rey; she's not on a journey of any kind, and you can't suddenly create a journey to make up for the lack of development in two previous films. They've destroyed Kylo...he hasn't gained in maturity at all, has he? They killed off Han, and Luke, and Leia is exactly the same. Chewie is different...why didn't he eat the Porg? Or at least, why does he feel sympathy for the food he's about to eat? That's not Chewie.

Thanks for reading...it's always appreciated, even if you want to call me a fag afterwards.

There's a lot to talk about though regarding the motivations behind the destruction of archetypes, but that goes into feminism territory, and that's a whole other kettle of fish.

meant for

Cont.

>The fans of the original are fans because of archetypes that are no longer used in modern cinema, and if they are used, they are openly mocked by the media and film pundits. You can't have a damsel in distress. You can't have a lovable rogue. You can't have a wise sage and you can't have an eternally good hero. All of these things are considered too predictable in modern film.
Well, yes and no. You yourself said that Leia isn't really a damsel in distress. And like I said in my previous comment, Obi Wan is more complex than just a wise sage. As for eternally good hero, Neo from the Matrix is a successful and popular one. But I guess maybe that is an exception that proves the rule.

Oops, sorry for the delete. I wanted to edit my comment. Yes, I agree that in the 1977 movie, the archetypes are pure.

Fag!

Lol jk, that was a great analysis and I enjoyed reading it. It almost made me feel a little more at peace regarding the rapemurder of my childhood

Great read.
Post a link with the complete text.

You forgot to mention the new concept for the Force.

>You can't have a damsel in distress. You can't have a lovable rogue. You can't have a wise sage and you can't have an eternally good hero. All of these things are considered too predictable in modern film.
Isn't this why Lucas created Star Wars 1977 in the first place? he wanted to get away from all the current trends at the time

I ain't even mad, just...resigned.

Everything you wrote needs to be compiled together and put into video or something.

I've watched tons of reviews and criticisms of the film since it came out but none of them were so perfectly lucid like what you've written here OP. Thanks for sharing.

Very good.
When thinking back about the books, it struck me.
Page turners they are not, yoda says.
The tone of this is so wrong...

Like Yoda would be reading a book, and you'd be like sup Yoda what you reading, and he'd be like, Oh it's the latest intallment in the Space Wars saga, a real pageturner it is heehee!

Yoda should have said: Boring they are.
Now it's a litle to close to saying: space bestsellers they are not.
It's little stuff like that, I wanna immerse myself but I keep getting taken out!
BAKA!

"Following Archetypes" does not equal good writing. That's exactly how we got the prequels.

>Post a link with the complete text.
Yes please, and do a few edits and corrections, this will make great copy pasta to explain why TLJ didn't work with people in debates.

>Or at least, why does he feel sympathy for the food he's about to eat? That's not Chewie.
Why not? He's a good guy.

Fuck off this is some good shit

Now that I think about it, that's exactly how we get soooo many bad movies. The writers trying to roleplay archetypes instead of simply writing cool characters.

>but that goes into feminism territory
Aw man, don't tell me you're about to go Sup Forumstard on us.

Yeahhhh. That line just felt so wrong to me. I couldn't figure out why, but I think you've nailed it there. It brings the Star Wars world too close to our own.

Who is this giant whore and why does she look like she drinks the blood of freshly slaightered babies every night at exactly 12:01 am on the dot?

>The point is that these movies work because the characters are internally consistent. They are very strong archetypes with all the variation weeded out so that they are simple, easy to understand, and appeal to the masses. They are direct, in other words, and they don't require explanation or extended canon or mystery. Any mystery is generated solely by audience members who want to know MORE about their favorite characters; mystery is not generated by the movie through events or dialogue that are purposefully or accidentally ambiguous.

This is a great thesis. Great analysis overall, OP.
And I think the HITB review had a good observation about Rey being in a position of "I just want some direction, I want to do good but don't know how to go about doing it", which is an interesting premise, and could possibly even be wrapped up in an interesting way in part 9. But by then it won't matter because the films individually are so shitty. I can't retcon my appreciation of a movie because the sequel is good; they have to stand on their own as good films. And they don't, and the OT does, for all the reasons you've said.

I’ve always thought of a potential ST in this pattern:

PT: How does something good turn bad?
OT: How do you turn something bad into something good?
ST: How do you prevent the good from turning bad again?

This plays into the themes of “learning from your mistakes”, grey morality, that good and bad really are points of view. (Which TLJ alludes to very clumsily.)

You do need some subversion of Star Wars tropes, in order to face the uncomfortable fact that bad things often come from good things. Therefore you need at least one character who isn’t seduced by an outside evil, but by his own good intentions. You can’t have a big bad in the ST, because it would undermine the achievements of the OT (though the current ST does exactly that).

This is also why Finn in the beginning is actually an interesting character, because he humanizes those who seemed unequivocally evil before. He shows that everyone on all sides are really not so different, which gives hope that the galaxy can live in peace once more. (Only TFA undermines this immediately by having him shoot his fellow stormtroopers in cold blood.)

I really believe a modern, slightly subversive Star Wars sequel trilogy had been possible that still felt like it fit within the grand Star Wars saga, but they blew it.

>People still think this trilogy is about Rey

The point is that archetypes and their employment in writing can be avoided/subverted for a variety of reasons. They're not inherently good or bad. They can be helpful and they can be condescendingly simple.

I don't know what Disney's aim is regarding this. Truth be told, I don't know that it's even an intentional act on their part; I think they're simply too obsessed with tokenism to care whether their writers are doing it with any real thought.

Chewbacca was going to rip C-3PO's arm off in ANH because he was beating him in a chess game. He should not give a shit about some retarded fat gerbils.

best thread on this movie yet. props OP

>This is where TPM failed first; it should NOT have started with little Ani as a kid...it should have started as Ani as a teenager being trained as a Jedi
QFT

>In ESB, Vader, believe it or not, did have a small character arc; he revealed to Luke about the parentage, and offered for them to join forces. In some ways, this is a concession by Vader, but also an indication that Vader thinks of Luke as a legit threat.

We also get the first subtle indications of Vader's internal conflict. In his conversation with the Emperor, it seems as if Vader is actually trying to find a way to not have to kill his son, and proposes trying to turn him. In that light, the line about getting rid of the Emperor and ruling together as father and son seems like less of a trick (which I used to think it was) and more of an earnest plea.

After Luke jumps, we see a clearly upset Vader leaving Cloud City (more obvious with the original "bring my shuttle" line than the new line from the SE).

The OT works powerfully on the level of archetype because it is really all about Luke, and all the other characters are only really important for the roles they played in Luke's psyche. This also explains why we ignore a lot of the weirdness in Obi-Wan's character. It's not really important whether he is a nice old man. He is one to Luke. When Luke forgives him for lying, so do we.
The PT didn't have a main character like Luke. Anakin, Obi-Wan, and Palpatine all split protagonist duties. That gives the PT a political, rather than a magical vibe.
TFA has one actually interesting character - Kylo Ren. Rey is a Mary Sue and Finn is a cross between a Han Solo rehash and the "goofy black sidekick" trope.
I haven't seen RO or TLJ.

shhh

okay okay, however
>When we think of Old Ben Kenobi, we think of someone who was good, wise, and experienced
The same old Ben who walks straight to the bar and orders stiff drink as if he's a regular (does this in ep2 also). Your rose glasses are a little dark

I always assumed that was just Han exaggerating. Chewie seems pretty gentle overall. We never really see him act like an animal, and he's nice to C3PO in ESB.

Curious how you'll evaluate TLJ based on this post. Do return if it happens soon.

>I really believe a modern, slightly subversive Star Wars sequel trilogy had been possible that still felt like it fit within the grand Star Wars saga, but they blew it.
It was certainly possible, but not for J.J. Abrams, and certainly not for Rian Johnson. You'd need someone with a lot better grasp of storytelling. And you'd need to have ONE of them, not one director and one set of writers for the first installment, and then a different director and writer for the second one, then back to the first ones again for the finale, with no one with final story authority overseeing them all.

She doesn't drink the blood of slaughtered babies, only the milk of broken dreams and hopes.

Post yfw you are reminded that this boy is now sad

Excellent read.
Why is Chewie so different? He had to hunt porgs, right? He shot them with a crossbow I assume?
But when they come at him with the big eyes, he's all like, ah hell, these poor creatures... I'm not hungry anymore.
He was literally drooling like a cartoon character a minute ago.

Maz katana is an elderly halfblind bar keeper but now she's fighting some space battle while casually explaining they need a master hacker that they never even reach...

There's too many things wrong so I am glad you explained what was so right about the first ones.
I am just sad I guess for one main reason.
I wanted to see Luke train Rey!
I needed this pay off!

OP you fucking fag

HURRR DURR MUH ARCHETYPES> TRADITIONAL ROLES

fucking alt right trash. new star wars trilogy is amazing, or can you not fathom the idea of a female protagonist?

Absolutely agree.

It’s baffling to me that people in charge of a multi-billion dollar franchise don’t know these things and are alienating so many with their ignorance.

Thanks guys; had to take a moment, but I'll try to address everything I can. I very much appreciate the ideas and discussion that is occurring; my thoughts as such are as assailable as your own, so please do take it in that light that I started this posting to begin a discussion, not to in any way end it with finalities.

I agree that presentation is a major factor. But we've seen how great presentation in the Prequels did nothing for the characters who were boring. People tend to forget that the special effects at the time were really unique looking, and in some ways, convincing. They don't age well, but that's beside the point...at the time, many loved it and accepted it because it was better than what we'd had before.

I agree with you on the idea of them showing characters who don't know what they're doing, but then you run into the problem we see in TFA: that NO one knows what they're doing. Han doesn't know, Rey doesn't know, Finn doesn't know, Leia is the only one who kind of knows...but she's not guiding anyone, she's just a background leader. You need a guiding figure in a movie that takes place in strange environments in order to make the movie have sense to the audience...but if every main character doesn't know what they're doing, it's like mice in a maze.

>The PT didn't have a main character like Luke. Anakin, Obi-Wan, and Palpatine all split protagonist duties. That gives the PT a political, rather than a magical vibe.
I wonder if Padme shouldn't have been the main protagonist. At points it felt like that's what Lucas was trying to do, but she'd have needed a lot more screen time for it to work.

She did have an entire arc in RoTS (in which she is conspiring with Bail Organa and Mon Mothma against Palpatine) that was filmed but got cut from the final picture.

Good thread OP.

Oh this is about the alt right now.

Sadly, I don't think they care.

I think they mostly take the established fan base for granted, and expect that any people they alienate will be a drop in the bucket compared to the new fans they will attract.

Oh my god, that was Han and Chewie pulling a fast one on c3p0 to win.

>On the one hand, you if you're going to tell the story of the origin of Darth Vader, then you have to have a character arc that is the opposite of what most people enjoy watching; someone who is exceptionally good turning into pure evil. This is very difficult to engineer in popular culture; it is accomplished in literature all the time, but in film it tends to leave the audience feeling horrible, and the feelings of the audience do matter and must be taken into account.
This is the exact character arc that Michael Corleone follows in The Godfather, and that's loved by audiences and critics alike.

Yes, Obi is complex for sure, but in the first movie we don't know that he has lied to Luke about anything...in fact, everything he tells Luke works to the benefit of all. ESB is a movie that shows all the faults with each character; that Han and Leia are in love which can compromise their rational skills, that Luke can fail at everything, that ObiWan may have lied (or that at least there are always two sides to each story), etc. In other words, ANH presents a perfect hollow glass ball, and ESB shows the cracks in the surface and hints at what might be inside of it. But in ANH, these are still rather pure archetypes, so I agree with you, but only after the second and third movies are taken into account. Incidentally, this is how you make characters grow; you take archetypes, and you put flaws in them after, and only after the audience loves them.

My understanding of Poe being the most popular character in TFA comes from the media where I live; they talked about him the most after Rey, his toys were more popular than anyone else's (even Kylo), and you'd get lots of kids dressing up as him for Halloween. But this could purely be geographical in nature, so I understand your idea to a point.

I agree. They know it isn't a free market. Child-friendly movies drive box office sales. There's a limit to how many blockbuster movies kids will drag their parents to. Other than Star Wars and superhero movies, there's not much competition. Disney can afford to suffocate anything new with millions of dollars of advertising so the kids never even think they want to see anything else.

>Literary concepts are alt-right
The absolute state of the left in 2017

And many a classical tragedy follows the same plan, more or less, but tragedies are not as popular as they used to be, and you have to admit that the average normie appreciates The Godfather more for the gangster stuff than for Michael's character arc.

I said that Leia is a damsel, but not as weak as the archetype is normally made; the damsel is usually only rescued, and nothing more (a love interest and incentive for the main hero); they changed her in the original to make her a fighter, which is consistent with the Rebel scenario. However, her role as a 'princess' (sexual object of desire) is still the most prominent function in ANH.

Yes, Neo is successful in this kind of scenario, and this is yet another reason why the first Matrix movie is so perfectly put together. It's efficient in terms of the characters and the storytelling, and the only mystery regarding who's good and who's bad is resolved quite quickly once Neo is released from the system.

I don't know if it's an exception, but it's like LOTR, which came out around the same time...we still could use archetypes. Titanic is another one. But this has disappeared today.

Thanks, but I wrote this on the fly...that's why it took so damn long between posts. I don't have the complete text, it was just what came to mind (which is why it is not really too clear in the last 3rd or so). But I appreciate it all the same, as I'm trying like most fans to figure out what the hell went wrong and if it's possible to salvage any of it (and it isn't possible, in my view).

I'm still trying to figure out when kid-friendly and PG-13 became compatible.

I know when I was a kid, my parents weren't taking me to see PG-13 movies when I was 8 or 9, but apparently it's normal now to take even 4 and 5 year-olds to them. And Disney is certainly playing these up as kid-friendly films, despite the rating.

>left: dumb, talentless smug cunt
>right: the mastermind behind podracing

I honestly have no idea who this bitch is.

Yes, but you have to consider the movies happening then; space movies had for a while been the staple of B cinema in the 50s/60s, so you'd had about 15 years to get out of that. Gritty realism and artistic films really took flight in the 70's, where there was a reaction to the 60's conservative and comfort epics (Ben Hur, The Ten Commandments, My Fair Lady, etc etc.) that dominated the theaters. The technology had improved to a degree as well that what Lucas ended up doing was something that was not from the 70's, or 60's, or 50's, but from modeled on the aesthetic of the early 40's (I think, someone correct me if I'm wrong) with the basic structure of that japanese film which I can't remember the name of...you guys know what I'm talking about; Lucas did a mishmash; he took a successful dramatic idea for a movie and switched the location from Japan to outer space. None of the ideas was a current trend at the time, so in a sense he did go away from the trends. Does that make sense?

Yes, this was a problem for me as well; the quick denigration of knowledge. There have been too many civilisations that destroyed past knowledge by burning books, and though Yoda didn't actually do that (because Rey had them in the ship), Luke may have died thinking that. And that's horrible. But the tone of what Yoda said (to get to your point) is wrong because the use of language in this movie follows the idea of destroying archetypes. In short, when you use modern day language in something that is not supposed to take place in the modern day, you date the film immediately and force a viewer to confront the inappropriate timeline. The movie is not timeless, it's clearly filmed in 19xx or 20xx.

The special effects were important, but not the reason for the loyal fan-base. If it was just a great effects film it would have done well and been loved by people into effects, but it wouldn't have been an important cultural artifact, and certainly wouldn't have been getting so much content years after its release.

PG-13 is the new PG the way PG is the new G, notice how all the animated family movies from Disney, Dreamworks etc are PG when they would've been a G 15 years ago, it's all marketing. They want to get the tween/young teen audience that think they're too "mature" for an animated family film, so all of the PG franchises like Star Wars and Star Trek get bumped up in rating.

I've said it before and I'll say it again until I'm hoarse. TPM Anakin needed to be a teenaged blend of Luke and Han. All of Luke's idealism and strong sense of right and wrong, and all of Han's cynicism and hardened cockiness.

Make him a teenaged slave who has spent his adolescence racing pods for the hutts and feeling somewhat cocky about what he's able to do, while hiding underneath that brash exterior a vulnerability and sense of right and wrong from growing up with his mom as just another slave boy. Have his entry into the Jedi parallel Luke's, and have his romance with Padme echo Leia and Han's. Anakin's happy, flirtatiously cocky, wisecracking nature would also be a dark prelude to Vader's one-lining as he strangles his terrified underlings to death, and would add another dimension to OT Vader as you see that his classic personality quirks are glimmers of his earlier, happier times as Anakin.

Keep all the "he leaves his mom behind to become a Jedi and she dies alone while he's off adventuring, leaving him with a festering sense of his own inadequacy over his inability to save the one person he loved the most" business, because the part when he kills the sand people was arguably the most k i n o part of the prequels, but use it to highlight just how different and sensitive he is compared to Han, because you'd never see Han break down in tears because he killed Greedo in cold blood.

At least, if I was writing the prequels, that's how I'd do it.

>right: mastermind who promoted the talentless cunt on the left

Anakin was supposed to be a teenager in the initial drafts, Lucan decided right before casting started to make him younger because a teenager would have less of an emotional hang-up leaving his mother behind.

Well, I agree and disagree. Archetypes work if the character is written as an honest character. Once subversion of the archetype appears, then we as viewers don't accept the archetype at all, and we see it as a character that 'doesn't make sense' or at worst 'a shitty character'. Rey is by far for me the best example of this, because she's supposed to be the hero, and yet to be the archetype of a hero (literary) she must have failure, overcome this failure, learn a lesson, and then succeed. She doesn't fail, she learns nothing, and she succeeds all the time. That's why the Mary Sue argument is correct, though overblown all the time; we're not angry that she's a Mary Sue, we're angry that her character has no consequence that we care about. By this point in the series, fans would give a standing ovation if at some point in the next film we see her failing at something. Actually failing. But it's not going to happen.

No no, I won't. But it must be said that there is a reason why these specific archetypes are being destroyed, if we allow for the possibility that this is done on purpose. Remember that Disney is attempting to get the one demographic that historically has never been interested in Star Wars in large numbers. But they're not doing it the traditional way (i.e. princesses), they're doing it by translating 1-1 a female body onto a male archetype character.

Tarantino proved this could be done with Kill Bill, but he adjusted the character to still be female (she's 'the bride', she is pregnant, she loses a child, she gets raped, etc etc etc). There is nothing female about Rey. As I said before, this is another kettle of fish, but in short Disney's strategy is entirely flawed because they don't understand what draws people to archetypes in the first place; familiarity.

>Gritty realism and artistic films really took flight in the 70's
This.

Lucas was partly trying to reclaim sci-fi from 2001 on the one hand, and Planet of the Apes, Logan's Run, and Zardoz on the other, and bring it back to its Buck Rogers roots.

Easy.

Have his mom be older and frail and set up a Peter Parker/Aunt May relationship.

That, or go dark and make it clear that Watto is abusive to her.

I really wonder whether they’ve made a mistake with TLJ. I surprised I find myself considering just not seeing any new Star Wars anymore and I hear so many saying the same.

And a hich new audience are they trying to reach? People who prefer movies with plot holes? People who are impressed by visual spectacle? People who like diversity? Star Wars has always been a visual spectacle. George Lucas designed them as if they were silent movies. And they could have made them more diverse (which I don’t mind at all), while still making something with a good story. If they did that they would gain new fans without losing any of the old ones. Everybody wins.

Personally I think it's a social experiment to see how bad they can make a film and still have everyone eat it up. It's the only way I can interpret half of the scenes in TLJ