Into the garbage chute, flyboy.

Did another of my own edits to Episode VII yesterday.

[eye roll]

I did my first edited version back about a year or so ago. I'm a graphic designer by trade, and have managed to teach myself enough of using Premiere Pro to be a little dangerous with it. But I do have an understanding of how editing works and why editing works. And I also tinder like mad!

So, duh. Of course I'm highly trained and professional enough to tackle a Star Wars edit.

And it's also way easier to critique, bash, edit and redo creative work that someone else far more talented than I has already accomplished. So, I offer up apologies in advance to Ben Burt and Marianne Brandon and Mary Jo Markey. You three did a bang up job considering you were also likely saddled with a huge room full of Disney committee members give their two cents.

I, on the other hand, do not have such limitations. [insert evil Emperor laugh here]

I've been filling my ears and airwaves the last several months on and off with various banter about Star Wars via YouTube, a wretched hive of scum and villainy, for sure. And one of the off-handed comments caught my ear, because I agreed with it and it's bugged me on every re-watching of The Force Awakens. It's that Fynn is a bit of a whiny baby and there's too much contridctions in his manners. He's a bad ass trooper fighter dude when he wants to be; good with a blaster and in a fight. But then contrast that with how he's surprised when he actually hits someone or something, can't figure out how to manage the guns on the Falcon, a very old freighter of all things. He's telling himself to stay calm while walking Poe towards the hanger bay to escape.

He's a freaking stormtrooper (yeah, I can't say fir est oar der. Just can't.) And all he wants to do is run away all the time. And that's fine- be that. But don't be both.

Most of these things are put in there for comedy sake, and I get that part. But take Han for example. Han has his own brand of comedy and awkwardness in the face of struggle or overwhelming odds, or even capture. And you never doubt who his is through all those moments. And he doesn't start making your mama jokes for a chuckle. When Han wants a chuckle, it's something under his breath, or cocky, or blatant. But always him.

For me, I never know who Fynn is, other than another causality of this new franchise never making anyone interesting; everyone is just really good at being good at things, no one struggles, no one fails. Best fighter pilot, best Jedi who doesn't even have to train and knows how to fly anything even though she's been stuck on a desert planet her whole life and has never been anywhere, best bad guy teenager tantrum boy.

Not bitching. Well, OK I am bitching again. It happens. My blog. :)

Still, I tried to tackle this edit with that in mind. It's small moves here again; since I built this edit off the last edit I made it didn't take super long. Dropped another ten minutes off the runtime, though that wasn't my intention.

My intention was to make Fynn tougher. Make him personable. But he's a former trooper; so he's not such a chicken. He's maybe more capable this way.

I also removed the whole fight scene with Kylo at the end, which is a little awkward, since we have no reason why Fynn is injured. This part I may have wrong and will have to watch it to know. And some of that back and forth with Rey and Renn that is gone, too, and that might be missed.

The reason I wanted to remove this scene started with the whole "I'm really good at lightsaber dueling even know you're a dark Jedi master and I'm a scavenger from a desert planet who's never ever been anywhere, have never seen grass or snow before in my life, but I can still best you in this battle so bring it one tantrum boy" parts. Tossing out all the original movies training to become a Jedi thing just irritates me.

[sorry - I get that way]

Not sure if its works well like this or not. Would love a big bowl of popcorn and a snuggle buddy and give it a good watching.

You said you wanted to be around when I made a mistake.

This could be it, Sweetheart.

Mano a mano

OK, I liked it.

There, I said it. But having said THAT, I feel it's in my best interest to sort of dive in a little more deeply than a thumbs up review. After all, it is Star Wars and it is me.

First the good.

I thought the actors did a great job. Great job. I was hooked by the performances and not distracted by the “Look Star Wars fans see what we did there!” moments. Danny Glover nailed Lando (a young one at least), and Alden had more than a few older Han mannerisms thrown in there, which sold it for me. Good job.

The other characters were not Star Wars lore so while they were good performances, none of those people had anything to reference from and just were solid performances.

They did a great job of the whole ‘parsecs is a measure of distance and not time’ thing. This is interesting since in the Trilogy it’s not spelled out as a distance thing; only in the books, and not the canon books but the extended ones (now called Expanded Universe or something). But they stuck to what Star Wars fans know Han meant when he bragged about the less than 12 parsecs thing.

I loved that Lando just took off and left them there. Very Lando.

Loved how the Falcon looked at the end. And loved seeing it get that way, and for some reason it didn't feel forced to me. Maybe after I see it again tonight I may feel different about that conclusion.

The trailer line "I have a great feeling about this" was gone, or I missed it. Hmmm.

Oh, and super rad they did not get Boba Fett in there. but I bet there were a TON of arguments about doing it.

The groans.

My groans, mind you. Lots of people (well, some people) liked The Last Jedi, so while I can't help them any longer (and Lord knows I've tried), here's a list of some of my less than stellar moments or things that a committee decided.

Probably.

First off - my biggest groan is this, and it’s what I was afraid of. This was Indiana Jones, not Star Wars. The Empire had little or none to do with this story, and I even felt like it was forced into places just to remind us it’s a Star Wars movie. Every Star Wars movie has the good vs. Empire thing, and this one, while had good guys vs. bad guys, had nothing to do with Empire. (I say Empire loosely and will begrudgingly throw The First Order in there for the sake of this argument). It was two street gangs fighting over stuff, with one master boss dude.

Side note - parts of this one really reminded me of Gone in 60 Seconds, since the bad guys looked similar.

So to that point, it also felt really forced that we saw a rather fat looking Darth Maul (and he talks!) waving around his ‘special saber’ so we can go “WHOA THERE’S DARTH MAUL!”. My theater, and I, groaned at this appearance. I guess a Darth Sidious appearance would have garnered the same groans, but maybe that would have made more sense, if only because Maul never talked much before.

Oh, and I HATED they rushed in that line about ‘well I was a pilot but they kicked me out of the academy for speaking my mind” WHAT?? What committee wrote that spell it out for the audience line?? Han DOESN’T TALK LIKE THAT. He wold have said something smart ass. Would have been so much better.

In my opinion, this was a good movie and had a good story, but had little to do with Star Wars stuff. Here’s how I would have done it:

Drop the stupid ‘look we’re using the same font as the opening crawl, but we just did it straight across the screen instead so it’s different but the same’ garbage. A normal non Star Wars movie would never have bothered with this, as you don’t have to explain the story to me- just show me the story.

Meeting Chewie was awesome and played well. My only gripe is the eating of humans, though i could have read that part wrong. Beating them up, whats fine. The arm pulling off thing made me laugh out loud and smile.

The love story is great. Keep that. All of it. I have no issue with that whole thing. Even how in the end she ended up not being trustworthy anyway, she clearly still loved him, protected him from the future she knew she could not escape from. Her d e s t i n y…

Han gets accepted into the flight academy, but next we see him in the infantry. So story why other than that stupid line. This whole move is about him being the best pilot in the galaxy, and we see all but zero of him becoming that. He does all these IMPOSSIBLE things flying the Falcon in the original trilogy (and beyond) and this was a PRIME opportunity to show how he learned those skills. Could have had some great academy moments for this.

Another side bar, and sorry for all the yelling. Han wears freaking pants FROM THE ACADEMY in all the original trilogy movies@#$$%!! Never touched on, and could have been.

I would have made more Empire into this. Maybe the double crossing bad guy is his old nemesis from the academy or officer or something. Get the Empire more. It’s a Star Wars movie. The forced in the end Maul thing, and even the throw together stormtrooper scenes tossing people around in the airport was a little much.

It was like someone (perhaps like me) reminded everyone that the Star Wars bits were missing. Yes, I know it’s about Han Solo and he is very much Star Wars, but the character alone doesn’t make it feel like a Star Wars movie.

There are moments in the original trilogy that are people trying to do this and that but the Empire keeps getting in the way. That could have played out here a bit more. I guess what I'm saying is, not enough Empire Star Wars bits in here.

Even when the Star Destroyer shows up and blocks their exit (spectacularly beautiful and ominous looking shot. Amazing. I want a wall painting of that), maybe that was an opportunity to have the Captain call out to Han- he knows him and knows he's there and hates him for something. Probably sleeping with his wife or something.

More Empire!

It did have more nods to this 'Rebellion we're forming' things, just like Rogue One. That's fine and cool - it ties them together.

That's a quick two-cents writeup, with likely more things noticed and not noticed coming up. If your a Star Wars fan, go see it. You'll like it as it plays true to the Original Trilogy and doesn't mess with Star Wars, like The Last Jedi did. It's true and honest and they got it right, albeit with a little less of things that make a Star Wars movie a Star Wars movie.

Ron, I dunno what all went down before you showed up, and I have no idea if you wanted to do things they said no to, or if was all your doing, or anything spot in the middle of all that. Regardless, you made a good watchable movie. And that I would assume is what you were brought in to do.

She's got it where it counts, kid.

Episode VIII: The Last Time

It's been way over 12 parsecs since the last Star Wars blog (complaint) of mine, but perhaps this may be a better venue to air them out. Yeah... all of them. Probably better than one-off Facebook messaging gripes about plots and mishandling of characters and judgement calls and etc... That can get tedious for some no doubt, hearing from me yet again another whine about Jar Jar or lineage of the Skywalkers.

So I'll drop them all into this neat little pile of 'stuff no one but me and a few others really care about'. Perhaps it was Mark Hamill saying it best of late. Even with his very public prognostications of how the handling of his Luke has been mishandled, he's even ended all those rants with "hey, in the end it's just a movie and I hope people like it".

Went to see The Last Jedi with my son, as is tradition to do. That was opening night, or in official terms pre-opening night. But you get the picture. We're fans, have Star Wars stuff laying around the house and on the walls and on the shelves and in the toy boxes and always have, since a long time ago and far, far away. We're believers and dreamers of such things, and these characters and this place and their struggles have long been captured our in souls. It was, then, a perfect way to connect with a son of my own and it remains so even today.

We had our usual after viewing beer and talked about this and that, the good the bad and the rest. The thing that struck me? Not a ton of holy cow! moments. Yes, it was full of great effects and all that is OK (more on that later), but it sort of left us both kinda fishing for things we liked.

It was just sort of 'there'. Nothing really happened, which is what I used to complain about (among other things) with Episode I; it's really unnecessary and nothing happened of consequence to move anything forward. Or maybe it was just the Jar-Jar factor.

About those prequels...what was lacking in the prequels? A good script. Dialog. Conversation. People don't talk that way to each other, so it came off like a parody of a movie trying to act like a movie - instead of just being a movie. It was and could have been a powerful story, but the end result was replacing actual words with a MAC running a special effects program. Nothing intriguing or personal to say here? We'll just add some explosions instead. No powerful moments between characters? We'll just put some action there instead. Ugh.

Yes, I'm oversimplifying, but it is my blog.

Replacing people's feelings and emotions and dialogs and connections with 'some cool special effects' is a horrible mistake. The tension from what you CAN'T see but can maybe hear or maybe cut around is going to be more palpable than the actual showing of it. Once you show it to me, I can then judge whether or not I care about it, am afraid of it, nervous about it.

Yes, the walkers in the latest film look really cool and really real. I dig that stuff. But if they shot Empire Strikes Back now? We'd see a giant wampa that would tear limps off people, jump around the camera, make us dizzy, would jump 40 ft in the air and run 30 mph and throw things for miles and... you get the gripe here. Empire was the best Star Wars movie. And it had a 20 minute fight scene with frame by frame miniatures and an hour with a puppet.

It also had the best dialog, the best whit, the most tension, the deep reveal, the character development and earnings and getting to know this person and that one and what they may have seen or heard before this film got here. You wanted to soak it up, and wanted to revel in it. You wanted to like them, hate them, learn more.

Now, none of that is here. I don't care about Poe or Rey and I'm not afraid of Kylo Ren or General Hux.. none of them. For me, the worst thing has happened. I don't care about Star Wars anymore.

Yes- I'm being dramatic here. But that's the feeling from seeing this latest film, twice now. And I really had to talk myself into seeing it again. And maybe that's the biggest issue. I saw TFA in the theaters 6 times before it came out on DVD, which I bought pre-order on Amazon. And THAT movie didn't have a lot of new stuff in it. But at least it still had some character moments.

It might be said that maybe I just don't like the moments this film had. Maybe. That's fair. But Disney is replacing grit with polish, evil with toys, darkness with glimmer, drama with excitement (not the same thing).

It's become an action movie.

Star Wars was never an action movie. Never a Sci-Fi movie. It could have been a western- it was a Princess and a dreamer fighting tyranny. It was a boy and his horse or his car or his space ship. It was never about space. It just happened to be in space.

This franchise started with a dreamer who was bored and wanted action, only to learn that action has consequences and real people die. It had a girl who grew up raised in a royal family and with politics who was forced to follow what was right and fight for others instead of her own well being or want of privilege. A scoundrel with a checkered past and a checkered present who constantly fought against his own good heart to make a living and fun along the way. An evil man who's past decisions and desires rake his soul with the regrets of the past and the resolutions of the present.

Maybe this new series of Star Wars movies will be the answer. The original cast members are gone or old and disinterested in continuing the Star Wars thing. The fact is, this concept of fighting an all-powerful "Empire" and against all odds thing- maybe that's the part that needs to go. TFA was very very much A New Hope. TLJ was in a very very large stretch was still a little Empire Strikes Back, at least in that the bad guys are even more powerful and the good guys are in retreat and things look hopeless. But that's the biggest stretch I'll ever make to giving credit to this film.

Maybe the next Trilogy can just be about this character or that one. Maybe, just maybe, it can be a western, that just happens to happen in space.

So anyway, back to this one.

Second viewing yesterday. Since I've been complaining to others about my thoughts on this film, I thought at the very least I should go again, and see if my initial feelings were still accurate. And perhaps my bitching and moaning about it for weeks tainted my second viewing, but I may never know, since I'm not feeling the love for this one.

Too many ugh moments. BB-8 driving an AT-ST? Just no. Leia doing her best Mary Poppins? OMFG. What's happening here?? The actress is gone, and this was a prime way to let her go, and they not only kept her, but had her do this ridiculous reviving in space (where no one can hear you scream and you can't BREATHE), then fly back into the wounded ship, then spend half the movie in a coma, then wake up, then STILL be alive at the end of the movie. Somebody in some conference room in Disney HQ made them do this.

And when even Kylo himself doesn't know what he wants to be, how are we supposed to know? Do we laugh at him, feel for him, hug him? We definitely knew Vader was a bad guy.

Casino scenes. Never mind the ginormous stretch of plot to even be there and go there in the first place. Geeesh. Really?? Code breaker? Why not just have had that guy on the rebel ship to begin with? And then go the planet, Finn is all enamored with chips and bright lights, then this whole subplot to save a bunch of mistreated animals and saying it was all worth it... seems Finn forgot about Rey very quickly. And the whole animals crashing through the casino and the chase scene was dumb and unnecessary and so so Disney. Kids will love it!!

I could go on with the whole bitching and moaning thing about the plot holes, the inconsistencies, the 'that's such a dump idea' type stuff. In the end, here's my number one issue:

Too many liberties with Star Wars land.

The red lightsaber was the first shot across the bow. It doesn't glow, it's on fire. It's not a lightsaber. So, for a thousand generations Jedi guarded peace, the prequels had Jedi literally EVERYWHERE... and all of them traditional lightsabers in various colors. And yet, 20 + years in the future, one bad Jedi dude has made the anti-lightsaber, and now all the stormtroopers have lightsaber-like weapons of their own. Travesty.

Luke acting very very un-Jedi. Whoops, I trained someone who then went to the dark side so I'm just gonna hide out here instead and not care about my family anymore. Actually, I can sort of buy this premise a little, but Rey showing up and within hours can best Luke in a dual and can use the Force at will. At least do a little bit of that character development ala Luke's where she is impetuous and runs off before getting fully trained and could therefore be dangerous. They did do a little of this, but again - go deeper. Less dumb sea creatures you get green milk from and more emotions. We, the audience will care more about your movie if you do.

This film could have taken a couple of key things that we were left wondering about from the last film and did something with them. It's almost like what George Lucas said and did back in the 90's, telling his fan base he didn't care what they thought and was gonna do whatever he wanted with his creations. Like - let's build up who Snoke is and where he came from and all this mystery (there's a billion YouTube videos on fan theories) in this first movie, then let's just kill him off in this one. Whaaa??

Thing is, you can make the things you wanted to happen and still keep to what's 'real' within the Star Wars universe. The whole conversations between Rey and Kylo- these could have handled as snippets of voices calling to one another as in TESB or ROTJ. Instead we get Kylo without a shirt on and stupid jokes. Disney-style. Or Star Trek style- take your pick.

But once you start making people breathe in space and start changing characters mid-stream and creating and changing things because you can sell toys vs. make a movie better, that's when you fail.

I could just be progress and I could just be getting old and crotchety. But that's not it entirely. I like cool space movies. But the charm and whit of the past Star Wars movies is gone I'm afraid, and it's sad for me. And in the end, the idea that since we're making a new Star Wars movie we HAVE to use every tool that's now available to make a movie, vs. perhaps taking the fact that we CAN'T just show whatever we would want to means we have to tell the story in other ways is what's missing. Because now we don't need great characters or dialog, all we need is a room full of Macs and beautiful movie posters from the marketing dept.

For me - it said a lot that even the trailers for this film weren't very exciting.

Ultimately, I can't just sit back with some popcorn and turn off my brain and be entertained. I can do that with Guardians of the Galaxy or Godzilla. But this is Star Wars. This is my baby. I've raised this kid from it's youth and now others and making him do bad things. It's personal.

For the next film to be good?

Hey Disney- you must unlearn what you have learned.

Disection

I remember saving the actual file of the video teaser for Episode VIII on my computer when it first aired. In fact, probably before I even watched it- because I knew I would watch it more than 5 times and I would likely look to do so again.

So I did today. Some observations and questions and wonderings...

Rey looks to be fighting at least 3 people at once. Is there a big Knights of Ren standoff? Could Episode VIII have a dark ending where the good guys lose and need to regroup?

A very Naboo looking ship here. Could there be a return to this planet? There is lots of water there and seems to be at least one scene that's underwater...

Fynn waking up from his healing tank thingie?

Threepio gets his red arm fixed apparently.

Could be but not sure if this is the Falcon Chewie is piloting here...

Great look for Laura Dern. Meeting with Leia the General here?

 
Looks to be a throne room, Snoke's perhaps?

Checking out a very large creature or puppet...

Love this shot. Perhaps Chewie waiting for Rey to finish her training w/ Luke?

As fall approaches I'll get more and more excited about this new one. No doubt about it. It's funny how quickly it seems that these new films fall in line in my mind with the other ones. I see them and re-see them enough times that the stop becoming new and start just being Star Wars.

Love that.

R2 where are you??

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lSNTeLP3qKY

Unsure if I can road trip all the way from Arizona to Virginia just see this in person.

But I kinda wanna...

The Last Awakening Thingie

Since I cannot be out-geeked and not feel threatened to my core, I've got some observations and thoughts from the first Star Wars: The Last Jedi teaser trailer.

May the Force be with us...

Poe Dameron's X-Wing. Or what's left of it. So what does he fly for the rest of the film? Another X-Wing? An A-Wing? I spotted some A-Wings in the brief space battle clips, so perhaps they're gonna be in this film. Don't think I saw a single one in The Force Awakens, though perhaps they were in there. And... there was an A-Wing parked next to his X-Wing when it explodes, so there's that.

Those cool looking maybe next-gen B-Wings... maybe? Slow, pondering ships, so maybe they're not B-Wings and something new. Seem to take a lot of punishment, ala: the B-Wings, but maybe they're new. I dunno. It's a teaser trailer, so shut up.

Books on a shelf. Burned edges... like maybe rescued from an attack on the Jedi Temple by the Knights of Ren? At first glance or two I thought this was actually a cavern being lit from light through an opening. See how much I know... The tree/roots in the background might lean towards some expanded universe type things, like the Force Trees, but it could just be a handy place to put books, too.

I see some Empire parallels here. I've heard many say this film is expected to be much darker than TFA; unsure if that is coming from knowledgeable sources or speculation, but it would seem to be true. Also, looks like Luke is training Rey, so there's that whole Yoda training Luke in Empire parallel.

(which is also super rad and gave me goosebumps).

Then there's the mask broken on the floor. At first viewing I took this to be Vader's mask, and still may be. But there are some hints of silver in there (and others have spotted this too) that suggest perhaps Kylo Ren ditches the mask for this film, either intentionally or otherwise. Thing is, too- Vader needed his mask to survive. Kylo does not. So therefore I always felt like it was a little contrived or "Made by Kenner" type decision to sell toys vs. being an integral part of his character. But perhaps this will take shape in something else and it will be a cool reason why he's not wearing the mask/helmet any longer. It's cool that it's still smoking plus all that broken glass, so maybe it was a really intense reason, too. If it is indeed his. (plus the music on this scene hints at the Kylo Ren theme from TFA...)

Moving on...


The icon for the Jedi Order is subtly emblazoned on the map looking image. Hmmm...

Definitely spotted the walkers in the distance. Duh.

Super cool looking ships and design. Totally unsure what the dragging the things along the ground is doing, though maybe they're churning up the soil as a camouflage thing to hide their numbers. It's been done before, people.

So, from Rey's vision in TFA and from TFA trailer and that clip of Luke reaching out to R2 (or his hand), and it's all smoky and fire in the air... now we see that same shot wider and see indeed it is Luke and R2 with a building in flames in the background. And the next shot here comes Captain Phasma. So looks like we'll be seeing more from her in this film. Which is awesome. And about time.

Though given she's w/ First Order troops, perhaps this is a flash back to when his new Jedi Temple place was attacked and destroyed by them.

Plus I suppose Rey gets to be the one to tell Luke that Han is dead. And that Kylo killed him. So maybe that has something to do with Luke deciding to train her...

I dunno. There's probably more I've missed, and I look forward to seeing the first real trailer. It will, too, likely have some misleading things in it to confuse or confound and generally get all the geeks talking about it all and what it could mean.

Still, I always do like an excuse to talk geek with another.

Not a committee

I'm sitting here at my desk on a Thursday workday. Star Wars celebration is happening in Orlando and I've got the feed on another window open on my desktop. A touching tribute to Carrie Fisher by her daughter.

Then John Williams walks out and directs an orchestra to play "Princess Leia's theme"

Tears...