Miss having friends in your forum? We've migrated over to discord! Many of the threads that started here years ago continue on in a new setting. Come join us!
So, a friend of mine who owns a barber shop wanted to make a little video for his Facebook page of him and one of the other barbers having a lightsaber fight. It escalated a little bit and now it has gotten a load of views and coverage in the local newspaper.
It was a very rushed shoot that was mostly made up as we went along and an even further rushed post-production schedule (most of which was done the night before release - so excuse the roughness). I don't expect many of you to even be able to understand what is being said by us silly scousers, but I thought I'd share anyway. At the end of the day, it's not really meant for a wide audience - more for their customers who'd get a laugh out of seeing their barbers bash some sabers together.
Also, our very own Writhyn voiced Darth Vader in the thing.
Maybe I need to watch the movie again, or maybe I'm just an ashole, I honestly don't know. The movie just didn't hit for me as well as it did for other people. I loved about 75% of it but there were things that bugged me and didn't allow me to fully enjoy the movie.
One of the lesser talked about things (as far as I can tell) was Finn's motivation for leaving the First Order. Visually it looks like its the loss of life, which we see when the fallen storm stroopers blood is splattered on his armor. He seems remorseful at any loss of life. When he escapes with Poe he has no issue killing countless storm troopers though. Later he mentions he was a sanitation worker, so what was he even doing on Jakku as a front line soldier anyway?
Then we have the final battle with Kylo Ren... sure he's shot in the side by Chewie, but he held a blaster bolt in the air with the force. That was teh first time we've seen anyone hold a blaster bolt, surely that elevates him to bad ass of the month no? Yet he gets cut by Finn with a lightsaber. If Finn has the force he's still untrained hell, he picked up that light saber yesterday.
Besides those two things and the rehash of the old plot and the glut of characters I did like movie. There was a lot of stuff to like as well but everyone everywhere has talked about the pluses. The fight for one felt real, not overly choreographed. Daisy Ridley was a gem. BB-8 was hilarious and fit in well as a trio with Boyega and Ridley. The Luke reveal worked for me. The movie was again about an actual War among the stars and not just about the Jedi.
In any case I'm going to try to rewatch again this coming tuesday to see if I'm simply being harsh.
I think Finn's motivation is more just him realising that he's on the wrong side. Once he realises this, he wants out and doesn't care how. I don't think sanitation was his primary job as a Stormtrooper though, he probably just had a brief stint cleaning toilets at Starkiller Base for a little while.
Regarding the battle with Kylo, not only was he hurt - the guy had just killed his dad. We see early on that he's struggling with 'being seduced by the light side' and multiple times we're shown how emotionally unstable he is, so it wouldn't surprise me if throughout the fight all this was still playing on his mind and thus, not completely focused. Also, about Finn's skill with the saber - I think I recall seeing somewhere that he was very well trained at using one of those stun batons that we see that other Stormtrooper use. So there is probably some overlap there.
Apart from that, the visual story and action won me over when the kids blasted that second TIE fighter on Jakku, and the tentacle creatures are my favorite monsters yet. I did not retain their species name, in spite of the triple repetition... started with an R did it?
Rathtars.
Boter wrote:
Regarding the setting: How big is the First Order? The Republic? Why the separation between Republic and Resistance? I figure we'll get more details on that in three years. For now I'm happy the focused on the characters because, as Praxus said, they're making me want to stick around for the next one.
Going off some of what has been said in offshoot material and my own speculation. After ROTJ, nobody in the Empire really knew who was in control and it was all a bit of a mess. Some Imperials went in to hiding, like Nazis heading to Argentina. I believe that the First Order is mostly comprised of the children who grew up around those who would say how great the Empire was. They're frustrated that the older generation seem unwilling to fight for what they believe is right and rise up.
On the other side, the full name for the Resistance is The Resistance Against The First Order. The Republic does not want to be seen as highly militarised as the Empire was, so the Resistance is formed as a splinter group, funded secretly by The Republic, to combat the rising threat of The First Order.
Saw it at midnight and then immediately after. This film is like meeting up with some old friends who you haven't seen in a long time and finding out that you get on amazingly with their new friends.
I bumped in to an old friend of mine today who now runs a monthly comedy club, so I've offered to come down and shoot the shows. I'm just trying to work out the logistics of what I'd need to produce something similar.
I think you've also gotta take in to account the size of the galaxy and the Jedi Order. During the time of the prequels, there were what...10,000 Jedi total? This is a galaxy of probably hundreds of trillions, maybe more. To your average citizen of the planet Bumblefuck, the Jedi are probably seen as just some odd group of religious people who have ties with the Senate because well, it's tradition. They supposedly could do some really strange stuff, but who knows if that's real?
I've never seen the WWII aspects as comparisons, but more of a constant reminder as to what the first brick in his wall was. No matter what he's feeling at that present moment in time, he's still the little boy who's father went away to die.
Fun fact: I first saw this film on VHS after getting beat up by three teenage girls.
Ha, I failed at 22. I put Castaway instead of Cast Away, and I also assumed the plastic bag (?) was an American Beauty reference. Forgot what my 3rd mistake was though.
I managed to get in to the early access beta, so I've been playing this for the last couple of days. Now that the beta is public, I thought it'd be fun if a few of us on here got together for a few games.
This may not be much merit, considering I'm the resident Doctor Who apologist. But this episode really was bloody good, I'd be more than happy with it as the first part of a series finale - nevermind and opener.
So I finally got round to watching this and bloody hell, this was a brilliant movie. It seems that every time I watch a classic from the 70's, I just think 'Damn, I really love 70's movies'.
One thing that stood out for me listening to the commentary is how you guys didn't buy Robert Redford as Hooker 100%. Maybe it's because I have yet to see Butch Cassidy, but I was completely sold on him and thought he totally worked as the naive little hotshot.
Also, I had the same reaction as Teague at the beginning. Is that James Earl Jones? No, it can't be. Fuck, am I being racist? *checks IMDb* Phew...
I don't know if it's standard practise, but it's what I do.
I downloaded a credits template from somewhere a while back, so whenever I need some standard rolling credits I just switch out the names and pick a relevant font.
I've been playing around with Super Mario Maker over the past day. It's a lot of fun and there's already some great stuff being made by the community. Here's a video of the first level I made.
