[polishgenius]

QuickTidal, on 18 December 2015 - 02:05 PM, said:

Spoiler

I'm not sure I get your "distance" gripe. I thought it was all fine (and moreover fits into the way the existing universe has always been portrayed.

Spoiler

The old films didn't exactly make a huge thing of travel, but it felt like it was taking time to go places. Here, they just hopped into some X-Wings and popped on over to the Big Death Star, maintaining real-time comms with home base the whole time (as opposed to all the older films where long-distance communication was shown as a faff, with those holograms, and often recorded). And the BDS firing scene, as I say, was just a mess. Wasn't clear what was being destroyed and in which systems and whether they were close to each other etc etc.

[Nevyn]

QuickTidal, on 18 December 2015 - 02:05 PM, said:

Spoiler

I'm not sure I get your "distance" gripe. I thought it was all fine (and moreover fits into the way the existing universe has always been portrayed.

I LOVED that there were mirrors to ANH...but there weren't TOO many, which was nice. He played it very deftly to ride that line. I mean think about it, Instead of Luke and Obi-Wan going to confront Vader and Obi-Wan dying...you get Han going to face Kylo in an attempt to turn him back and gets killed as a result. It's a flip of the ANH idea, mingled with Luke meeting Vader in Empire (father and son confrontation)...except in this case no fighting. Han with no weapon pointed, confronts his son and in an attempt to help his own soul AND keep his promise to Leia get his son back...only to be the thing that allows him to turn fully. Phasma was (I think) intentionally a Boba Fett. She's there to be cool, and we'll get more on her in the following films. The movie can only contain AND explain so many characters. So like Snoke, we get a taste of Phasma as a promise to what will come. She wasn't wasted, she was just not expanded YET. If that makes sense?

Spoiler

On the distance grip, he has a point. Think back to the very first hyperspace trip ever shown in star wars. They set coordinates, and they have time to go play 'chess', train in the force, have Han not believe in it, etc. You have a real feeling of elapsed time. The Death Star is slowly approaching the rebel base, and the x-wings don't need to go far to attack. Even in other moments and prequels, someone goes into hyperspace, and they cut away to other stuff for a feeling of elapsed time. Here, people just leave and arrive. Keeps the action coming but it is quite different.

I would also dispute that there were not too many mirrors. I think a couple parallels are appropriate, but he brought back the old cast, the old ships, the old lightsaber battles, and that could have been enough even with a new story. The amount of similarity and parallels were one of the factors taking me out of the story.

[Brujah]

There's no way I wouldn't enjoy it, no matter what. It's Star Wars. It's good to hear positive reviews tho.

Was going to see it tonight, but the wife is sick.

[QuickTidal]

polishgenius, on 18 December 2015 - 02:20 PM, said:

QuickTidal, on 18 December 2015 - 02:05 PM, said:

Spoiler

I'm not sure I get your "distance" gripe. I thought it was all fine (and moreover fits into the way the existing universe has always been portrayed.

Spoiler

The old films didn't exactly make a huge thing of travel, but it felt like it was taking time to go places. Here, they just hopped into some X-Wings and popped on over to the Big Death Star, maintaining real-time comms with home base the whole time (as opposed to all the older films where long-distance communication was shown as a faff, with those holograms, and often recorded). And the BDS firing scene, as I say, was just a mess. Wasn't clear what was being destroyed and in which systems and whether they were close to each other etc etc.

Spoiler

It happens in the same system. It fires and stretches across the system and takes out what looks like a few moons and two major planets. It's not stretching across the universe or anything. I thought it was perfectly illustrated. They have to have a star in system to power it, and then they can take out any planets in range...which appeared to be the same system. Re: Comms. Sorry, you buy holo communication, but not long distance audio comms....not to mention you think in 30 years that things haven't advanced at least a bit? Or how about that the Rebels in the OT were fighting a covert war where they were the underdogs...this is the Republic's military wing now....methinks they have better capabilities.

Nevyn, on 18 December 2015 - 02:35 PM, said:

QuickTidal, on 18 December 2015 - 02:05 PM, said:

Spoiler

I'm not sure I get your "distance" gripe. I thought it was all fine (and moreover fits into the way the existing universe has always been portrayed.

I LOVED that there were mirrors to ANH...but there weren't TOO many, which was nice. He played it very deftly to ride that line. I mean think about it, Instead of Luke and Obi-Wan going to confront Vader and Obi-Wan dying...you get Han going to face Kylo in an attempt to turn him back and gets killed as a result. It's a flip of the ANH idea, mingled with Luke meeting Vader in Empire (father and son confrontation)...except in this case no fighting. Han with no weapon pointed, confronts his son and in an attempt to help his own soul AND keep his promise to Leia get his son back...only to be the thing that allows him to turn fully. Phasma was (I think) intentionally a Boba Fett. She's there to be cool, and we'll get more on her in the following films. The movie can only contain AND explain so many characters. So like Snoke, we get a taste of Phasma as a promise to what will come. She wasn't wasted, she was just not expanded YET. If that makes sense?

Spoiler

On the distance grip, he has a point. Think back to the very first hyperspace trip ever shown in star wars. They set coordinates, and they have time to go play 'chess', train in the force, have Han not believe in it, etc. You have a real feeling of elapsed time. The Death Star is slowly approaching the rebel base, and the x-wings don't need to go far to attack. Even in other moments and prequels, someone goes into hyperspace, and they cut away to other stuff for a feeling of elapsed time. Here, people just leave and arrive. Keeps the action coming but it is quite different.

I would also dispute that there were not too many mirrors. I think a couple parallels are appropriate, but he brought back the old cast, the old ships, the old lightsaber battles, and that could have been enough even with a new story. The amount of similarity and parallels were one of the factors taking me out of the story.

Spoiler

The planets in TFA are all fairly near to one another (maybe even be in the same system) See map further upthread for reference. There doesn't seem to be any really long distance travel here. In ANH, for example, they are going from the Outer Rim ALL the way into the inner systems (Yavin 4) which is a much longer distance.

Mirrors are a Star Wars thing. That's just how this is. It's always been like that. I don't expect that to change. REBELS even does it. The way it works is that it never feels boring to me.

Exmaple: Is Rey and Finn watching Han be killed by Kylo too similar to Luke watching Obi-Wan be killed by Vader? Nah, it's got mirror nodes you can see, but the action, reasoning, and everything else is completely different. To me, that's homage and much welcomed.

[Serenity]

Really fun interview with JJ on Radio 5 Live's Mayo & Kermode Film Review just now. My favourite bit:

Simon Mayo: Who would win in a fight between Han Solo and Captain Kirk?

JJ: I think Han Solo - because he'd shoot first.

[Nevyn]

QuickTidal, on 18 December 2015 - 02:58 PM, said:

Spoiler

It happens in the same system. It fires and stretches across the system and takes out what looks like a few moons and two major planets. It's not stretching across the universe or anything. I thought it was perfectly illustrated. They have to have a star in system to power it, and then they can take out any planets in range...which appeared to be the same system. Re: Comms. Sorry, you buy holo communication, but not long distance audio comms....not to mention you think in 30 years that things haven't advanced at least a bit? Or how about that the Rebels in the OT were fighting a covert war where they were the underdogs...this is the Republic's military wing now....methinks they have better capabilities.

Spoiler

I didn't get the sense it was the same system at all. I mean, they hardly mention any planet names at all so getting bearings is tricky, but in contrast to the original, there was little sense of the weapon being navigated, nor that something like that would be built essentially NEIGHBOURING all the resistance and the galactic republic main planets. And they really did give a sense of the weapon fire travelling some distance. And if the Resistance base is in the same system as the planets destroyed, why did they spare that one?

QuickTidal, on 18 December 2015 - 02:58 PM, said:

Spoiler

The planets in TFA are all fairly near to one another (maybe even be in the same system) See map further upthread for reference. There doesn't seem to be any really long distance travel here. In ANH, for example, they are going from the Outer Rim ALL the way into the inner systems (Yavin 4) which is a much longer distance.

Spoiler

I don't particularly buy it. And where Luke was can't have been that close. Think JJ just glossed over it all and will continue to.

Quote

Spoiler

Mirrors are a Star Wars thing. That's just how this is. It's always been like that. I don't expect that to change. REBELS even does it. The way it works is that it never feels boring to me.

Exmaple: Is Rey and Finn watching Han be killed by Kylo too similar to Luke watching Obi-Wan be killed by Vader? Nah, it's got mirror nodes you can see, but the action, reasoning, and everything else is completely different. To me, that's homage and much welcomed.

Spoiler

Well, this one is mainly a taste thing. Saying they do it all the time just makes me want to not watch the other material.

As I said, it was one of the factors 'taking me out of' the movie experience, which I suppose is my main gripe.

And this part needs no spoiler tag. Expanding on the above, the way I sum it up is that there are some movies that pull you in for the ride so much that you simply follow along. You are immersed in the story. Your lap could be on fire and you may not notice. And there are others where you are very conscious of being in a theatre watching a movie. You can still enjoy parts, but its a more intellectual than emotional exercise. And for me this was the latter.

I acknowledge that that is a very personal sentiment that others may not share. I acknowledge that it is more difficult to built that type of immersion with a familiar world/story and with hyped expectations. And I acknowledge the difficulty of making a new movie that caters to new kids, satisfies nostalgia, etc. But most of the complaints I have made upthread come back to this. They were choices made that I became conscious of that got me thinking about 'do I like that?' at a time when I should just be immersed in the movie.

This post has been edited by Nevyn: 18 December 2015 - 03:21 PM

[Brujah]

Light-sabres induce a warm, fuzzy and hypnotic effect on the mind and body. I believe there is concrete scientific data backing this statement.

[amphibian]

Fury Road is a better movie than almost anything, so it's not really a bad thing to say SWFA is not as good.

SWFA is a good movie. Fury Road is a masterpiece.

I'm directing this at QuickTidal. SWFA may be far more important to you, so enjoy that as you will while seeing them for they are.

This post has been edited by amphibian: 18 December 2015 - 04:53 PM

[QuickTidal]

amphibian, on 18 December 2015 - 04:51 PM, said:

Fury Road is a better movie than almost anything, so it's not really a bad thing to say SWFA is not as good.

SWFA is a good movie. Fury Road is a masterpiece.

I'm directing this at QuickTidal. SWFA may be far more important to you, so enjoy that as you will while seeing them for they are.

See, this is where subjectivity comes in. I think both MAD MAX and TFA are masterpieces...and I like TFA better of the two.

It's okay that you don't feel the same way, but your scale isn't somehow better than my scale for that reasoning, nor is there some filmic barometer which says that Mad Max is an untouchable pinnacle of filmaking in comparison. It's ALL subjective. Stand in any Film Festival lineup full of film critics, and film nerds, and none of them will universally agree. I don't have to "see things as they are" or something so subjective.

I'm cool with Mad Max being better in your eyes...be cool with TFA being better in my eyes, and we can call it a day.

[Garak]

This movie had the alien Hive creatures from the Merrimack books in it (unintentional but that was my immediate thought upon seeing those three monsters).

Spoiler

This was good. I felt so good. The new characters are great and the actors nailed it.




-Phasma .... I hope she's still alive because so far she didn't really get to do anything, which is to bad. Still, this series seems better at keeping the villains alive from one movie to the other (which was a big problem in the PT, the bad guys were disposable)

-Hux. Again, not much to say but I loved the speech scene. Both for the visuals and how insane Hux looked. Like a total fanatic, like he did his best Hitler impersonation (of course no one can yell and rant like Hitler did). The follow sieg heil salute the stormtroopers did was just lol.

-Kylo Ren. He was actually fun to watch. Visually he made me think of Revan (duh) and I also kept thinking "Hi, Jacen" when he took the helmet off. But I like him as a villain and want to see what they do with him (he seems to have a lot of raw Force power, like freezing that blaster bolt damn). I began liking him even more when I remembered that in Truce at Bakura Leia was afraid of ever having kids, fearing they might end up like Vader. For most of Legends they were fine untill Jacen faceplanted into the Dark Side but whatever. I then thought, what if she had the same fears in this timeline as well? And they come true in the most horrible way.

-BB-8 was adorable. Was that little guy making purring sounds when he sentimentally swindled Rey into giving him shelter?

-Poe Dameron. Next generation's Wedge Antillies (both in skill and narrative role). Definitely. And I think Wedge would approve of the guy.

-Finn. While his defection seemed easy I don't mind. He was funny (holy hell the humor worked the entire movie I can't believe that!). Bit of a tangent but was it me or were the stormtroopers more .... I don't know... I felt them more as guys doing their jobs (like the two who turn around and go the other way when they realize Kylo is raging about again). They also seemed more competent (Finn got his ass handed to him by a random mook) and the pilots largely avoided being tricked to run into a mountain and die via collision.

-Han Solo. I knew he was gonna die. I just knew it in my heart and while I didn't cry, I still felt hit hard by that scene (I liked the scene btw). But it was good seeing Han Solo again.

-Best for last. REY WAS AWESOME! She's my favorite character from this movie and I can't wait to see where her story goes next (trained by Luke of course). Oh man, she was so much fun to watch. Daisy Ridley did a great performance and I hope she keeps it up.




Starkiller base was cool and all, too bad it got blown up. Also wanted to see more stormtroopers with flamethrowers turning Resistence soldiers into candles (my 40k side has it's needs). The killer beam from Starkiller Base being visible ..... meh, I'll let it slide, it doesn't bother me that much it not making sense. Action scenes were cool, here's hoping we get some fleet battles later on. Btw with the leaders of the Republic being deader than dead right now, it would be cool if the next movie has the First Order launching an all out attack on a disorganized Republic (maybe with whatever's left of the Empire being opportunistic and joining the brouhaha). It will be fun to see.




The only thing this trilogy needs (still has plenty of time) is a defining bad ass theme (it's Duel of the Fates or Imperial March).

This post has been edited by Garak: 18 December 2015 - 05:49 PM

[polishgenius]

QuickTidal, on 18 December 2015 - 02:58 PM, said:

Spoiler

It happens in the same system. It fires and stretches across the system and takes out what looks like a few moons and two major planets. It's not stretching across the universe or anything. I thought it was perfectly illustrated.

Spoiler

I don't think this is clear at all, and they talk about superluminal firing or something along the lines. Regardless, even if that was, it's certainly not in the same system as the Rebels in the finale and it's cleared to fire upon them. Plus iirc you could see the shot from the pirate lady's gaff and I'm pretty sure that was elsewhere entirely.

Quote

Spoiler

Re: Comms. Sorry, you buy holo communication, but not long distance audio comms....not to mention you think in 30 years that things haven't advanced at least a bit? Or how about that the Rebels in the OT were fighting a covert war where they were the underdogs...this is the Republic's military wing now....methinks they have better capabilities.

Spoiler

All entirely viable points that didn't stop the presentation of it in the movie annoying me. Space should feel vast, dammit! And Abrams just doesn't do that at all.

ETA:

Quote

I'm cool with Mad Max being better in your eyes...be cool with TFA being better in my eyes, and we can call it a day.

Just as long as we agree that Kick-Ass is better than both.

This post has been edited by polishgenius: 18 December 2015 - 05:56 PM

[QuickTidal]

polishgenius, on 18 December 2015 - 05:55 PM, said:

QuickTidal, on 18 December 2015 - 02:58 PM, said:

Spoiler

It happens in the same system. It fires and stretches across the system and takes out what looks like a few moons and two major planets. It's not stretching across the universe or anything. I thought it was perfectly illustrated.

Spoiler

I don't think this is clear at all, and they talk about superluminal firing or something along the lines. Regardless, even if that was, it's certainly not in the same system as the Rebels in the finale and it's cleared to fire upon them. Plus iirc you could see the shot from the pirate lady's gaff and I'm pretty sure that was elsewhere entirely.

Quote

Spoiler

Re: Comms. Sorry, you buy holo communication, but not long distance audio comms....not to mention you think in 30 years that things haven't advanced at least a bit? Or how about that the Rebels in the OT were fighting a covert war where they were the underdogs...this is the Republic's military wing now....methinks they have better capabilities.

Spoiler

All entirely viable points that didn't stop the presentation of it in the movie annoying me. Space should feel vast, dammit! And Abrams just doesn't do that at all.

ETA:

Quote

I'm cool with Mad Max being better in your eyes...be cool with TFA being better in my eyes, and we can call it a day.

Just as long as we agree that Kick-Ass is better than both.

Ah, good points. I could see that. I guess the Starkiller base bit felt more realized to me than to you.

RE: the comms. Yeah, space should feel vast...but Star Wars has never felt exceptionally vast to me I guess. None of the shows (TCW, REBELS) or the main movies ever felt like long trips were such a given.

And no PG, You know I loathe KICK-ASS. LOL!

This post has been edited by QuickTidal: 18 December 2015 - 05:59 PM

[QuickTidal]

FYI: I'm buying the Greg Rucka book BEFORE THE AWAKENING which tells the story of Poe, Finn, and Rey directly before the movie, I'll let you all know if anything comes up important in there...

Alan Dean Foster's official novelization is coming out soon too, which I'd like to read and see what other tidbits I get.

[Obdigore]

Some things that are being discussed, and some other shit:

Spoiler

They straight up say in the movie that the starkiller's projectiles are traveling through hyperspace. And no, it wasn't destroying planets and moons in the same solar system. They also said 'our system is next' when they saw it started charging again. Of course, this all ignores the fact that light wouldn't travel fast enough for them to see those things being shot then destroying worlds, but anyway... I agree that the weapons projectiles shouldn't be visible to anyone about to get nailed, unless somehow they've gone plaid.

I don't mind the 'not super vast feeling', and in reference to the one x-wing squadron standing off starkiller waiting for the shields to come down, they could be just outside of the solar system then hyperspaced in. That would make sense. I feel like there was a lot left on the cutting room floor (like an explanation of the play between the First Order, the Republic, and the 'Resistance'. Hopefully more of Rey trying to figure out her force powers after the lightsaber, before the First Order attacks.)

I agree with whoever is saying the travel feels relatively instentanous, which it shouldn't. I don't mind instant comms, but filling some troop transports and then launching them from your base to another solar system, or even in solar system, isn't going to take the 7 minutes it did in the movie. I mean its boring but that's how it is. I feel like at whats-her-face's bar (who was a cool part of the movie, and hopefully a recurring character), they should have taken rooms and spent the night and tried to find good freighters for what they needed instead of just '3 minutes later, WHAMMY!'.

Not sure about the two-seater tie fighters, or the numerous implications that tie fighters are now equipped with hyperspace motivators, but 30 years later it certainly could be. I guess if I were designing the tie fighters I'd have the pilot with stationary guns in front and then have the 'gunner' control front facing missiles and a more movable turret in the back.

Not sure if I like the new look of the X-wing, disliked the fact that the x-wings apparently no longer have shields...

None of that is to say I didn't enjoy the movie quite a bit, and will probably see it at least once more in theaters.

Edit: I swear I heard Alec Guinness' voice in the movie during the vision quest. You all know what I'm talking about. That thing sent shivers up my spine.

This post has been edited by Obdigore: 18 December 2015 - 06:37 PM

[Grief]

In general, I really thought the film was excellent. However, it definitely had some things that I felt could have been done rather better. Big spoilers for all that follows.

The Good:

Spoiler

The feel of the film was excellent. I was worried it wouldn't really feel like a star wars film, and have been mostly re-assured. The new generation of actors were generally fantastic -- Ridley, Boyega, Isaacs, Driver... really superb individually, and their interactions with each other managed to be convincing and humorous.

The cinematography was also generally great.

I was also happy their weren't too many nods and winks to the fans. It was perhaps verging on it, but I was worried it would pander a bit too much and didn't feel it did (outside the roles of the original cast, which I'll mention in a bit).

In general, a very solid effort. Very enjoyable, and nothing stood out as awful (no Ewoks, Gungans etc), and it didn't feel like there were any unecessary subplots particularly.

Best scene in the movie was Rey touching the lightsaber imo. I was very happy to see them moving back towards the Force as a mystic living force rather than a biological power level fight, and the scene was tremendous in its own right.

I thought the music was also generally solid, but without anything astounding (such as Duel of the Fates).

The less good:

Spoiler

The general plot, as others have noted, was a bit uninspired. Another Death star? Blah. Personally, where I felt the film really shone was on the smaller scale; the character interactions etc. I feel that the film could've been rather improved by focussing on a tighter, less "epic" plot, and rather just having it revolve around a frantic chase to find Luke first. I found the first half better than the second, broadly speaking. The pacing felt that it got a bit rushed, a bit abrupt (while at the same time, certain specific scenes took way longer than they had to).

The original cast. They rather handwaved the fact that Han Solo and Leia were basically in exactly the same roles as 30 years before, and I think this was a much less interesting option than them actually playing different roles (Han in a more responsible general role for example). It didn't feel like a ton of character growth. I also felt like the actors maybe just aren't great in those roles, in terms of emotional range. Losing Ben would be so huge for example, and I just didn't feel like they pulled it off that well (the scene on the bridge, for example, which I felt Ford just didn't quite carry). I honestly would've been happier coming out of the film if I'd known Carrie Fisher was not going to be in the next one along with Ford. Ford was playing close to the same rogue role, yet he just doesn't carry that as well either these days (for obvious reasons). In the scene in the ship with the monsters (a low point of the film for me; it seemed like a scene from Guardians of the Galaxy or something with the various smuggler groups and what have you, and the monsters seemed generic), it was hard to believe he wouldn't just be caught (another example of convenient coincidences in the film being the amount of time Fin is held by the monster without dying compared to the others). Here I felt that playing to the older fans (and the desire to see Han flying about in the Falcon with Chewie) sadly does play into it.

The cinematography, while generally good, got a bit heavy handed in places. Particularly the scene at the end, which went on for about 3 times as long as it needed to, to the extent that it got kind of awkward to think about them just standing there like that. Another example being after "the force" occurs to Rey, and stands there calmly for a rather long time when the lightsaber is inches from her face (also, the fact that she didn't then actually do something more active with the force -- where she'd shown she could unsettle Ren -- irritated me a bit. I felt it just moving to lightsaber fight part 2 except with a change of tide was rather cliche, and that her using the force in some clever but unrefined way to get a brief respite and escape would've been much better).

Inconsistent characters. Fin switches from panicking about killing people, to celebrating blasting people to escape, and never really considers this. Fin also finds his courage rather quickly, and I felt that this missed an opportunity for character development. In general, it felt like in their rush to fit everything in, they ended up rushing things like that. Another big example is Rey/Kylo Ren at the end. I feel that Rey being so competent at everything might hurt her potential to grow as a character. I think the main issue here comes down to the use of convenient plot devices and lazy writing (and they definitely exceeded the number of overly convenient coincidences that I can quite stomach). They obviously wanted a climactic lightsaber fight (also fantastic was the emotion and weight behind the hits), but I honestly though it would be better if the victory of the film had just been them escaping. Kylo Ren became much less intimidating throughout and I thought it was mostly a change for the worse. Yes, she was obviously proficient in combat beforehand, and he's wounded, but it still didn't sell it to me. He takes her out of the fight with the force at the start of the fight then never uses that advantage again? I can put for excuses for why the fight might have went that way, but I shouldn't have to do that, and ultimately it felt unconvincing. Likewise, I felt Rey's development with the force was too quick, used as a convenient way to get her out of the corner she'd been written into, and again could've been an area where her character developped or an obstacle for her.

I was also pleasantly surprised by the football bot, which doesn't fit into this "less good" section as I'd feared it might. Of course, it was balanced by the less pleasant surprise of "Snoke", which just isn't a very intimidating name. Not a huge complaint, but really... I've heard people complain that the names in the Original Trilogy are unsubtle, but at least they're a bit more imposing than "Snoke". As others have noted he was also a bit too close to the Emperor V2 from what we saw, and the disfigured bad guy trope is a bit hamfisted as usual.

I do realise my "bad" section is rather larger than my "good" section. This is a bit misleading, and probably more because I find it easier to identify what I disliked in detail than what I liked. Overall, I'd give the film an 8, maybe 8.5 out of ten.

Anyway, I enjoyed it a ton. I feel like it generally met my prediction that there wouldn't be too many risks taken, but that the film would be very solid. Although in terms of just how good it was, I'd say it surpassed my expectations. At the same time, I did come out feeling that with just a little more polish, it could've taken it to a whole different level; what I find makes my gripes most irritating that so many of them just seem very avoidable. It's certainly sold me on going to see the rest of them (as if I wouldn't have even it had been terrible ).

Oh, and regarding one of the things being discussed in this thread:

Spoiler

I personally really don't mind if Rey's parentage doesn't turn out to be something force related, and almost think it would be better that way. The further the force moves from biological ties, the better, to my mind. There's plenty they could do that would be interesting with her parents without them tying into the force at all. As well as this, the possible force-user parentages all seem like they'd be a little obvious (Luke's daughter might be an interesting parallel to Kylo, but just seems a bit contrived -- there's the whole universe to choose from, yet it's conveniently the same bloodlines fighting it out as it was in the past... meh, I don't know if I'd like to see that)

[QuickTidal]

I think we need to remember that Star wars is not science fiction. It's fantasy.

Spoiler

I'd missed that line about Hyperspace firing. I'll concede that point. Though how far away Starkiller was from Hosnian
Prime (since it does move in space as a base....it has an "origin point" on the star maps) when it fired...and was there some implication of who the people who were watching it were and what planet they were on?

[Cause]

Spoiler

Re the weapon: They definitely meantioned something, I forget the science magic word they used to explain it but my impression was the weapon fires its laser beam (or whatever energy beam thingy) through hyperspace or some such. The weapon does not need to move this time. Its bullets go wherever they want them to go.

The thing I wan to know is who is stokes. A clone of palpetine? I wont like it if suddenly we have an extremely powerful dark force user who no one knew about just appear. That said the clone thing would be lame.

[QuickTidal]

Cause, on 18 December 2015 - 07:23 PM, said:

Spoiler

Re the weapon: They definitely meantioned something, I forget the science magic word they used to explain it but my impression was the weapon fires its laser beam (or whatever energy beam thingy) through hyperspace or some such. The weapon does not need to move this time. Its bullets go wherever they want them to go.

The thing I wan to know is who is stokes. A clone of palpetine? I wont like it if suddenly we have an extremely powerful dark force user who no one knew about just appear. That said the clone thing would be lame.

Spoiler

Starkiller Base definitely moves...as the Canon map has it with an "origin point". It was made and then is moved. In fact it HAS to move so that it can devour another sun. It cannot be a stationary weapon.

Re: Snoke. There is a running idea that he is Darth Plagueis the Wise. The idea being that Palpatine only THOUGHT he killed his old Sith Master Plagueis. Plagueis (who was obsessed with living forever) instead, allowed his apprentice to "kill" him, and then went into hiding while Palpatine orchestrated the Clone Wars, the fall of the Republic, the purge of the Jedi, the rise of his Empire and ultimately its downfall during the civil war...knowing that his apprentice was too overconfident to achieve final mastery of the galaxy, Plagueis decided it was prudent to wait. Let all this shit go down, and then when the Empire was pretty much defeated, allow it to slink into the shadows where he grabbed hold of it and is going to reassert it to REALLY show the galaxy was the Sith are.

There are things that lend to this idea.

1. Plagueis in the old Canon was a Munn (there is only New Canon MENTION of him, not his species or a visual yet)...Snoke does look like a Munn.
2. Snoke bears what appear to be lightsaber slash scars and possibly the effects of Force Lightning on his face...possibly the result of Palpatine's attempt on his life.
3. Snoke is known to have been around long enough to remember the Clone Wars.
4. The music that plays during ROTS when Palpatine speaks to Anakin at the opera and relates the tale of Darth Plagueis The Wise is nearly identical to the music that is called "Snoke" on the TFA soundtrack and plays over his scenes. Leitmotifs in John Williams scores are PRETTY specific to character, so that seems to line up well.

This may all not be the case, and he could just be a dark force user adept.

I seriously doubt he'd be a Palpatine clone.

This post has been edited by QuickTidal: 18 December 2015 - 08:06 PM

[Obdigore]

Just so you all know, I've been "spoiling" everyone at work by telling them this:

The bad guy is luke and leia's inbred son, and he looks like Sloth from the Goonies which is why he always wears a helmet.

Some people think I'm serious, and it is entertaining.

[Tsundoku]

Well played Sian.

http://www.news.com....0b177e4b1be5227