Star Wars: The Force Awakens [** SPOILERS FROM POST 4472 ONWARD **]

faceman

heebusjeebus wrote: »

About Rey and her origins...

was it not made obvious that Rey is Lukes child going by how his lightsabre resonates to her alone?
Reading reviews and a lot seem confused about Rey's past but it seems to be obvious in my mind.

I interpreted that as the

Force is influencing events.

I really hope that she is not Luke's offspring. The galaxy is massive. They force shouldn't be limited to one family.

Sad Professor

heebusjeebus wrote: »

About Rey and her origins...

was it not made obvious that Rey is Lukes child going by how his lightsabre resonates to her alone?
Reading reviews and a lot seem confused about Rey's past but it seems to be obvious in my mind.

Not necessarily. She could be a survivor of Luke's academy, and in a universe with not many lightsabers left that would make her his natural successor regardless of her bloodline. But we also have to remember that the saber once belonged to Anakin. He made it and was using it when he turned to the dark side. Luke then lost it while fighting him. Things might not be what the seem.

Frankie5Angels

A_Sober_Paddy wrote: »

in responce to your first spoilered piece

I think that kylo probably only used his lightsaber to kill people and not go into combat with them would mean that his very very rusty with the lightsaber combat

Yeah, take your point, he's probably a novice on many levels, but what I was getting at was

it's almost as if she says 'oh yeah, the force, i'll use that now' and then whups him

.

micks_address

Did anyone else think it was silly all the talk about filming in Ireland etc and it was in fhe film for all of maybe 1 minute? I assume we will see more in the next film?

A_Sober_Paddy

Frankie5Angels wrote: »

Yeah, take your point, he's probably a novice on many levels, but what I was getting at was

it's almost as if she says 'oh yeah, the force, i'll use that now' and then whups him

.

Ok i understand you,

i think when she touched lukes saber, there was an awaken within her about the force and her abilities to use it

faceman

micks_address wrote: »

Did anyone else think it was silly all the talk about filming in Ireland etc and it was in fhe film for all of maybe 1 minute? I assume we will see more in the next film?

It's more for the next one. Filmed the scenes back to back.

micks_address

faceman wrote: »

It's more for the next one. Filmed the scenes back to back.

the most spine tingling bit for me was when rey was fighting ren and she used the force to retrieve her lightsaber... i don't know why but it just had real impact for me.. i also loved how her lightsaber seems to be amp'ed up to 11 in terms of volume..

A_Sober_Paddy

micks_address wrote: »

the most spine tingling bit for me was when rey was fighting ren and she used the force to retrieve her lightsaber... i don't know why but it just had real impact for me.. i also loved how her lightsaber seems to be amp'ed up to 11 in terms of volume..

Think the music playing helped with that feeling, i was the same

robinph

micks_address wrote: »

the most spine tingling bit for me was when rey was fighting ren and she used the force to retrieve her lightsaber... i don't know why but it just had real impact for me.. i also loved how her lightsaber seems to be amp'ed up to 11 in terms of volume..

She's picked up the tricks of the force way quicker than Luke ever did. It took him until being captured by a Yeti several years after he acquired his first lightsaber, to figure out how to make it fly. And even then it wasn't as if the Yeti was using his force powers to try and stop him. Rey, as someone who knew nothing of the force until a couple of days at most beforehand, has already figured out how to stop an experienced and trained opponent doing the mind meld thing, and can beat him at making things fly and in sword combat.

OK so her opponent was a bit compromised at the time, but still she must be on some kind of super performance enhancing force drugs to allow her to do what she is so quickly.

I'm sure I remembered some sequence in one of the trailers where Leia was speaking in the background saying the line about the force being strong in her family, and my brother has it, my dad had it and you have it kind of thing. Didn't notice that anywhere in the film itself though.

ZV Yoda

I’m a big Star Wars fan (oh yeah, my user name is probably a bit of a giveaway).

Anyway, saw The Force Awakens it last night in 3D. I really enjoyed it, as did our 12 year old. He reckons it’s the best Star Wars movie so far. Having watched both trilogies (yet again!) in the past 2 weeks, as a stand-alone movie, it certainly ranks close to the originals. I don’t really have a favourite from the originals (I love all 3), but at a push I’d probably go for ANH.

It has its flaws. Story-wise, with such a legacy of movies and expanded universe, they'll never please everybody. There’s a very lacklustre score, over-reliance on nostalgia and re-use of many of the original trilogy’s story ideas (and one-liners). JJ definitely jumps on the tailcoats of the original trilogy by recapturing (copying?) a lot of what fans love about them. It’s a safe option – but that’s what the majority of fans wanted.

Having said that - who cares? Visually, I think it looks amazing (better than the originals... never mind the prequels). It’s very realistic & gritty in parts. Some of the space battles are real edge of the seat rollercoaster rides. The hand to hand combat scenes are great (unlike the cartoon / video game shyte of the prequels). There’s none of the appalling wooden acting found in the prequels. As with the originals, the human characters are engaging … and there’s plenty of them to choose from too.

Bottom line for me, these movies are meant to be about enjoyment & escapism.

As I started to reverse out of the car park, I reminded my son to fasten his seat belt & asked him if he was ready to head home. He said “My seatbelt’s done, but it'll take a few moments to get the coordinates from the navi-computer.” On the way home, we chatted non-stop about the movie, theorised about all of the new characters & what’ll happen in the next one.

We’re both looking for any excuse to go back & see it again. Sure, isn’t that what it’s all about?

Red King

Kirby wrote: »

Is he though? I think not. I'll run through my thoughts on it. Spoilers from here on.

He starts out with a bang coming down to the planet. He is scary and foreboding and oozes power. He has the look and the voice and he commands all around him. He plucks that blaster shot out of the air and you think "This guy is dangerous".

And then all that disintegrates through the course of the movie.

He is shortly unmasked and talked down to by both the new emperor but also a first order minion. He loses his menace. This is really hammered home in the final fight sequence where he fights

Rey and Finn

. He fumbles around like a novice. He struggles with this pair of amateurs that have barely held a lightsabre before. We have already been told that he

betrayed Luke and killed all the other Jedi trainees

. We have seen him demonstrate his power and yet here he is, fumbling around in the snow.

Cast your mind back to Empire Strikes Back. Luke shows up at Sky city to face vader with only a small amount of training from Yoda. He is clearly outmatched and Vader fights 80% of the fight one handed in a show of arrogance and superiority. It's easy for him, as it should be. Thats a villain and how to portray it. He's clearly better than luke and you sit there watching him toy with him. "It was all too easy" he says. Because it was.

That is how the fight in end should have gone down.

Finn should have been played with like a piece of meat and Rey should not have been able to defeat him so easily.

It neuters the villain. He just isnt scary any more. Perhaps they will bring him back stronger after he is trained by his new master but thats a story for another movie. In this one, they missed the mark with him.

Having him be

Han's son

is fine from a narrative standpoint. It creates tension and conflict and raises the stakes beyond mere "good guys versus evil guy". Having him lose the rag a few times in fits of rage is also good as it shows he's unstable. And being tempted by the light. He's not a cookie cutter bad guy. That makes him interesting. But Vader he is not.

I have quite a few problems with the movie overall and thought it was only okay....but talk of Kylo Ren being a strong villain doesnt sit right with me.

I think you are misreading his character entirely. He apes after Darth Vader but there is a lot more to Vader than a mask and black cape. Vader was a Sith Lord in A New Hope, Ren is nowhere near that, he is a loose cannon messed up in the head playing pretend Sith Lord. Even his saber is a knockoff off the real thing, a crude attempt at the real thing.

The whole point is that he is a poser, albeit still dangerous in his own right. He is not in control like Vader but wants to be. Snoke knows this and it looks like he is waiting to see how far Ren will go before he completes his training.

And in the end fight he has been shot in the side by Chewie, something everyone seems to overlook. He kicks Finns ass and had Rey on the ropes until the end.

And people thinking Rey is a noob might just be wrong there too as I suspect she had some sort of Force training as a kid.

robinph

Red King wrote: »

And people thinking Rey is a noob might just be wrong there too as I suspect she had some sort of Force training as a kid.

But then forgot all about the existence of the force it what it is until a lightsaber calls her down to the basement of a bar for a chat.

Red King

faceman wrote: »

I interpreted that as the

Force is influencing events.

I really hope that she is not Luke's offspring. The galaxy is massive. They force shouldn't be limited to one family.

Eh...you do realise that the whole story from Episode 1 to 9 revolves around the Skywalker family?

Red King

robinph wrote: »

But then forgot all about the existence of the force it what it is until a lightsaber calls her down to the basement of a bar for a chat.

That can yet be explained. People are nitpicking now because they want every question answered in the first episode of a three part story.

Kalyke

Kalyke wrote: »

What order should I watch previous Star Wars movies, chronologically or by episode number?

What I mean is, I have never seen Star Wars... (I know, I know.....) I now have all the previous movies. Should I start by watching the one made in 1977 OR Episode 1 The Phantom Menace? Or , does it matter?

Drumpot

After having time to see it twice and sleep on it, I feel my position is softening.

Some of the things that were annoying me:

Hans Death was more the fact that I loved the character as a child. It was
quite upsetting to see such a hero get such a sh*tty death at the hands of a
spoilt child. On second viewing, it was kind of sad (as a father with 3 boys!)
to see Hans sacrifice his life to try and save his sons. It was easier to see as
a heroic gesture in this context, not just a shocking plot.

The story had already established that Rey was good at defending herself. You
could compare her hard upbringing with Ren coming across as a spoilt child who
got everything and was never satisfied. You can compare this with spoilt
children who struggle to work hard, with children who had to work hard for what
they got and benefit when they are older and come up against adversity. In
short, I think its very plausible that she could learn very quickly because that
was the kind of environment she grew up in.

Then there is also the fact that Ren probably never had to duel with another
Jedi. Sort of like when a good football team has it easy in their own league but
suffer when they come up against better teams in Europe. Psychologicaly, Rey had
already unsettled him by challenging him in the mind tricks and exposing his own
fear about not living up to Vader. Then she beats him in the force duel trying
to just get the lightsaber just before the fight. And she turns down his
desperate plea to allow him to teach her the force. She pretty much owns him
from the first time she challenges him in the interrogation room.

I wasn't that bothered about the fact it was like a summary of the orginal
three movies. I mean if its not broken right ? It made the film a bit
predictable, but again I went in to be entertained and I cant say I wasn't!

Lastly, my initial feeling on first watch was that Ren was awfully whiny and
unlikable, not too dissimilar to Anakin in E2. As soon as Ren took his mask off,
he seemed to get annoying. On second viewing I didn't find him as annoying for
some reason.

I really enjoyed the fighting scenes, especially anything with the Millenium
falcon. Seriously, anybody who enjoyed the movie should go and see it again just
for the fighting scenes with the falcon, they are just beautiful!

All in all, I would upgrade my rating to 8 out of 10 and I believe I may even revise that when I goto see it again.

Drumpot

Kalyke wrote: »

What I mean is, I have never seen Star Wars... (I know, I know.....) I now have all the previous movies. Should I start by watching the one made in 1977 OR Episode 1 The Phantom Menace? Or , does it matter?

You could only watch the originals and be well up to speed on this movie.

That said, I wonder would watching the prequels all the way through the originals, give you a better appreciation for the movies? In essence, the story would get better and more enjoyable as you went along.

The prequels, particularly first and second movies, were not great, but they do explain the back story of vader. I think revenge of the sith was actually a good movie, but the hate for the prequels is strong !

Grayditch

Total miss with that spoiler tag there, mate!

Into The Blue

Wonder if rey had jedi training as a nipper, but when kylo went looper she survived, was hidden and had her memory wiped and the subconsious need not to move of jakku imprinted by luke

faceman

Folks, some spoiler tags aren't showing correctly on mobile versions but are showing correctly on desktop. If you haven't seen the film and are reading this thread, do so at your peril.

Rubber_Soul

Kalyke wrote: »

What I mean is, I have never seen Star Wars... (I know, I know.....) I now have all the previous movies. Should I start by watching the one made in 1977 OR Episode 1 The Phantom Menace? Or , does it matter?

In the original series you're watching the film from Luke's POV. You're learning all about the Force, the Empire, Vader etc at the same time as him. This is the way it's meant to be viewed for the first time. If you watch the prequels first you'll be ahead of Luke and it won't be as enjoyable an experience.

ibFoxer

Into The Blue wrote: »

Wonder if rey had jedi training as a nipper, but when kylo went looper she survived, was hidden and had her memory wiped and the subconsious need not to move of jakku imprinted by luke

This is where I'm at with it, would explain a lot. Also the final scene, there was familiarity in the eyes of one of the characters.

Sad Professor

faceman wrote: »

Folks, some spoiler tags aren't showing correctly on mobile versions but are showing correctly on desktop. If you haven't seen the film and are reading this thread, do so at your peril.

I fixed Drumpot's earlier post. I think the extra code was messing up the touch site.

chops018

I saw it last night and here's my rambling thoughts on it:

I was never bored for a second, loved how it was made and some parts were beautifully shot, I liked all the new characters and obviously it was great to see all the old characters too. All in all I really enjoyed watching it, however nothing in it really made me go "wow", that's how I set my memorable movies, and it's been a while since that has happened (Inception is the last one I can think of).

Anyway, as has been pointed out, when you really sit down and think about it there is a lot of similarities with the overall plot of "A New Hope".

I think they were trying to introduce new, likable characters, to appeal to new/young fans (and the fans of old), all while having the old ones there to keep the old fans happy. Also, I think the reason it is so like ANH is to keep the old fans happy too, but if you really are a hardcore fan then you should have wanted something a bit different to ANH - I suppose there is only so many ways you can take a sci-fi film like this.

I am hoping that the next installment will wow me with something, and that this was just a nice way to introduce the newbies and move onto something fresh, while giving the old fans all their nostalgia.

I'm giving it an 8.5 out of 10 - reason(s) being:

I came out of the cinema very happy and said to myself that I would defo go to see it again, it's rare that happens, so obviously I will go with a high score. Straight after the movie I would have given it a 9 due to the pure enjoyment and the fast pace the movie moves at that you rarely have time to sit there and think about scenes too intricately. Finally, I really liked all the comic relief, usually I hate it in movies, and marvel seem to constantly try to get comic relief in so it just becomes annoying in what is to be taken as a serious film and then they try to pop in these jokes for no reason, but the jokes and comic relief were done very well in this, I genuinely was laughing out loud at them.



Overall I am happy, and will hopefully go to see it again. I suppose as I said above, I am waiting to see how the next one goes, if it wows me and doesn't follow the story of the original trilogy (like TFA's did) then I will let slide the similarities of TFA's and ANH and trod it down to the fact that new characters were being introduced etc. and we needed to pay a bit of homage to the old ones and now we can get moving on a proper new plot/take on the Star Wars world. So as I said, looking forward to the next one, and it's not even too far away with being slated for release in May 2017. Also, they're releasing a kind of spin off movie (Star Wars Rogue One) about the team who went and got the plans to the Death Star, as has been said, from the poster it looks very dark, I am looking forward to this I must say. Hopefully it is only low budget movie like 30-50 million though as I cannot see it doing fantastically well like TFA and further new trilogy movies, but if it's low budget and does well enough at the box office and critically then it will be a great step for Star Wars and setting people up for Episode VIII. I actually thought it was going to be a TV show when I was first reading about it, and thought it would be awesome, and if it was aimed at adults we could see a Game of Thrones esque sci-i with proper violence from the Dark Side, but with Disney being Disney we are probably not going to get a TV show like that, and the movie will probably end up being 12A so they won't be able to go too dark.

Anyway all of the above are my thoughts on it. I tried my best to talk about it while not putting in spoilers, I don't think any are there but if there is I will edit them out or I will put spoiler tags on.

johnny_ultimate

While I think it's fair to say the score is a bit of a disappointment overall and definitely lacking something as forcefully rousing as Duel of the Fates (perhaps the best thing about the prequel trilogy?), I do think Rey's theme is worth singling out. It's less bombastic than the majority of iconic compositions from the series, but it elegantly brews up a mood of adventure and curiosity, which suits both the tone and the character it's written for. It's playful too, which suits the overlying mood of the film. It's soaring and intimate at the same time - which is what I liked about the film overall, and encapsulated succinctly in that piece of music.

It's a novel and fairly unusual sort of composition for the series, but it also has that classic Stat Wars - and by extent John Williams - flair in excess.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=65As1V0vQDM

The only issue I had when watching it was

After Kylo Ren does his most despicable act, Fin and Rey shoot him for a bit and run outside to a snowy forest. Suddenly Kylo is front of them. How?

Clareman

Deleted User wrote: »

The only issue I had when watching it was

After Kylo Ren does his most despicable act, Fin and Rey shoot him for a bit and run outside to a snowy forest. Suddenly Kylo is front of them. How?

I think

they had a massive ladder to get up to the top, he was already of ground level and they came out at different spots which meant he was in front of them

david75

Kalyke wrote: »

What I mean is, I have never seen Star Wars... (I know, I know.....) I now have all the previous movies. Should I start by watching the one made in 1977 OR Episode 1 The Phantom Menace? Or , does it matter?

Ignore the prequels completely. Start with a new hope. Then Onto empire and Jedi.

Clareman

david75 wrote: »

Ignore the prequels completely. Start with a new hope. Then Onto empire and Jedi.

New Hope then Empire, then Attack then Revenge then Return, ignore Menace complete, that's the best order

e_e

Kermode and Mayo will be talking about it for most of the next 2 hours I reckon:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/5live