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.