I have all kinds of thoughts about the new Star Wars movie but whatever trick Betty used to create the last secret thread apparently does not work any more. If anyone knows how to do that please feel free to share in the comments. Then again, you have all had weeks to see the movie. Maybe I can just put it in the extended content section below a ‘more’ button and those of you still desperately avoiding spoilers will just not click through. Discuss below.
Here’s a recent pic of Max looking pensively over the water. I still love what I get from my GH2 but I find it increasingly hard to resist pulling the trigger on one of the newer Olympus models. That 5-axis in-body stabilization is really sexy. On the other hand I cannot begin to describe how much I love that every feature I routinely use has a dedicated switch, dial or button on the GH2. I hear that you can put bracketing, focus mode, AF/MF, timer etc. on the dials of an OM-D but the menus are crazymaking and you have to remember what everything does. Plus the GH2 makes really nice movies.
Chat about whatever.
***Update***
Alright, Betty talked me into it. I just bigfooted all over an open thread that John put up three minutes before this one (Anne will have her vengeance, in this life or the next) so let’s spoil the hell out of the movie here. I put my longish, nerdy thoughts in the extended text.
***Update 2***
I forgot to add my non-nerdy/spoilery thoughts above the fold. Here you go.
Thought 1: The Force Awakens was a damn fun movie. Taken separately from where it fits in the greater Star Wars universe, is it worth your eleven bucks? Even if science fiction is not automatically your thing I would say yes. I cried a little, but I’m a parent and Abrams is a manipulative bastard. I guess that counts as spoiler-ish although Star Wars has always had parenting issues as a theme.
Thought 2: If you define ‘good Star Wars‘ as the first trilogy, later Clone Wars and the Thrawn books and bad Star Wars as the rest, this was good Star Wars. I agree with AV Club that JJ Abrams could have gone a bit lighter on the fan service, but he clearly made a new movie with new storylines characters that don’t fit in the original mold. Plus I think the call-backs are part of an interesting meta-narrative that I will get into in the spoiler zone.
Thought 3: spoilers below.
IF YOU HAVE AN RSS READER STOP READING HERE. SPOILERS AHEAD.
This movie was meta as fuck. So the bad guy has this overriding pathology; he wants to be awesome, and he is pretty sweet with the force, but at the same time his ‘grandfather’ a solid contender for GREATEST OF ALL TIME. I mean, the guy died thirty two years ago (both in in the movie and in our world time, HINT) and people still dress up as him for Halloween. That’s a tough shadow to get out from. Meanwhile ‘dad’ is a guy who did some cool things but does does not hold up as well in retrospect. Yes, I am analogizing Han Solo to the prequels, bear with me. Daisey Ridley no more a Mary Sue than I’m the Queen of England but Kylo Ren is unambiguously a stand-in for J.J. Abrams himself and the burden of expectations, which by the way is a topic that J.J. Abrams should know REALLY WELL by now. I wonder whether this helps explain why the movie called back to the first trilogy so heavily it risked spinal damage. Slavish devotion to grampa’s example can give you lots of power fast but it leads to bad places (GET IT?).
Based on that, here is my bet for Kylo Ren’s story arc: Ben/Kylo understands that his hangup about legacy and expectations is a stupid self-imposed burden (GET IT), and anyway grampa went light at the end. So he shrugs off Vader’s example and moves on to be his own person (AND MOVIE SERIES). Getting his ass kicked by a girl could be the trauma that clarifies it for him.
Next, the film has a Poe problem. Specifically, why is Poe Dameron a lead character? Yes he has some Han Solo charisma, but he has zero Solo problems. Finn has those (1. pissed off acquaintances hunting him down, 2. should he stay or should he go). Story characters need an outer or preferably inner conflict that prevents them from being who or where they want to be. As far as I can tell Dameron has a total of zero conflicts. I literally cannot think of anything he would want more than the job he already has from the beginning to the end of this movie. Despite its effects budget the climactic scene had vastly less drama than the same scene in ep IV because literally everyone from the Resistance base to stromtroopers unclogging toilets knew ahead of time that Poe Dameron was the guy who should be doing that trench run and he could probably pull it off. Poe Dameron may be the most fully actualized ‘main’ movie character since Robin Williams died. Star Wars traditionally has characters and then it has props (Joss Whedon is wildly successful in part for making every actor with a line of dialogue an actual character), and Poe is a prop.
Compare Dameron with the leads of IV-VI. Luke has so many great layers of conflict, mostly internal. Han has external problems and the compelling question of whether he can commit himself to something more profound than making a buck (the new movie retcons his progress a bit, but I’ll spot Abrams that one since Han sort of repeats the whole arc in fast forward). Lando Calrissian might be the most interesting character per screen minute in movie history. The first moment you see him Lando has this deep conflict about Solo that could go either way, a tension that the director masterfully lets hang for five or six beats, and in that scene Lando already has an even deeper conflict that you don’t even know about yet. Every time Lando shows up on the screen he makes a decision that completely changes what you understand about him and still makes sense within the story. In a word he’s great and Kasdan should win another Oscar just for creating him.
Leia…well, Leia goes from a badass and evolves into a badass who is a bit more willing to take charge and get dirty. Actually she starts out that way. Okay aside from that you have, well, she has to choose between two boyfriends. Fuck Lucas.
Rey is cool. Abrams clearly set her up as the Luke here – obvious even from the trailer, but she is generally the director’s favorite with layers of issues that the first movie only half starts to peel back. The story will revolve around a dance between her and Kylo/Ben, which will twist in directions that you don’t expect. Like, say, the scene where Kylo makes you think the story is going one way only to dramatically twist it in exactly the opposite direction (GET IT?).
I will eat a shoe if Rey is not Luke’s kid. Disney has said that Star Wars episodes will always center on Skywalkers yet Leia did not pick up on obvious hints like abandoned as a tween (?) on Jakku by off-planet parents. Even if you set aside her suspicious Force sensitivity, asking someone to leave your kid on a wasteland and not tell you which one is a dick parenting move even by Star Wars standards. I imagine it going one of two ways. Most likely she is Luke’s kid (by Mara Jade would be cool). Alternatively, maybe Anakin had a sibling. Shmi spent a lot of time off screen, and someone who can reproduce by parthenogenesis could pop off an offspring pretty much any time. Maybe she meant to tell Anakin about that after he murdered the tatooine native camp but she had more important things to cover first. Among arguments in favor of that theory is the non-trivial consideration that it would drive Lucas fucking insane.
Rey does have a meta-problem that I think bears heavily on the rest of the series. Let’s call it character duplication. Aside from her parent and abandonment issues Rey has (1) a surprising talent for piloting and seems to be a fast study, like Poe, (2) Jedi/Sith potential, like Finn (really, you only put someone in a lightsaber fight if that pays off later), and (3) decent fighting skills, like basically everyone except Gollum’s orange cousin. So in the lead trio of characters you have two pilots with the same talents and two proto-Jedi. (plus a supposed villain with shaky job security and heavily foreshadowed light side tendencies…) That would add up to a lot of stepping on each other’s toes, but only if they don’t come into conflict. We already know Finn will never go dark (he says it, what, eight or nine times) and Poe is a one-note good guy. That leaves the girl. Did anyone notice how she seemed to GIVE IN TO HER RAGE when she started wailing on Kylo Ren? I have heard it said that tapping into your passion gives you a lot of power in a hurry, but there’s a cost.
As I see it, Rey’s arc should basically answer what would happen if Luke Skywalker accepted the Emperor’s offer. It could go like this: Luke already feels once bitten twice shy about training Jedi and he correctly sees seeds of trouble in the girl, so Luke sends Rey packing. This triggers abandonment issues and sends her into a tailspin, making it easy for Snoke to move in as a surrogate father figure. The movie has dropped pretty strong foreshadowing that Snoke will grab whichever apprentice looks more promising, to the point where it should have a spoiler alert. I think we shoud assume that Kylo/Ben’s days in camp Evil are numbered (the light side just won’t stop pulling at him) and Snoke will do whatever he can to get ahold of the girl who kicked Kylo’s ass with no training. Rey’s combination of skills would make her a formidable Dark Side user, perhaps requiring the combined skills of a Really Great Pilot, a Reformed Villain and a Reluctant Hero to bring her down. The great bond that she has with Finn would amplify the drama when they come face to face for (presumably) the last time. (ETA) Oh yeah, imagine that Luke takes on Finn as an apprentice after he sees how much of a problem Rey has become. That would really piss her off.
Also, Snoke is the same species as Maz Kanata. Bet you five bucks.
Betty Cracker
Aha! Since there’s an open thread right below, we should make this one a spoiler-filled Star Wars extravaganza! You can share your thoughts using the below the fold feature and tell spoiler-avoiders to view comments at their peril!
Or we can write our spoiler comments in Klingon (I know, different property, but I don’t think there’s a Wookie translator):
‘e’ luke puqbe’, lugh ghaj rey?
That way, only native Klingon speakers will get spoilers without going through the trouble of translating the comment, in which case, they’ve only themselves to blame.
PS: Lovely dog, lovely photo.
trollhattan
Good boy, Max!
I have two E-M1s so lots of experience with those. Lots of adaption time needed on the menu system but I’m pretty happy with them now. Have not handled an E-M5ii but its feature set has some intriguing gems, including the hi-res mode. The GX8 looks interesting on the Panny side but I’m holding off any more buys until the E-M1 replacement arrives, which probably is at least half a year off. Oh yeah, had to take advantage of the half-off sale on the GM5. It’s adorable.
Amir Khalid
I wonder if Han and Leia’s son’s full name was Bengawan Solo.
schrodinger's cat
I would like recommendations for a DSLR camera < = $500.
benw
Star Wars spoilers: those little fins attached to the tails of the speeder bikes to keep the back-ends down.
Alexandra
Saw Star Wars last night. Only 6-8 people in the entire late screening so had choice of perfect seats. Thought it was pretty mediocre, tbh. First third was the strongest, Daisy Ridley gave the best performance. Still, as comparison, it was a cut above most superhero fare. Wouldn’t pay to see it a second time.
benw
Just saw the update. Now THAT’S how you SPOILER, baby! So I take it you liked The Force Awakens? I loved it. I’ll write out some longer thoughts in response to your update in a longer comment.
trollhattan
@schrodinger’s cat:
Do you own anything now, such as lenses, or starting from scratch? What are your shooting interests and habits? Do you have a size preference? There are SO MANY camera options it helps to narrow things down before shopping.
Mike J
schrodinger's cat
@trollhattan: Starting from scratch pretty much. I have a Canon Power Shot right now. Interests would be portraits and landscapes, also too still life. I like to photograph plants and flowers.
I would also like to be able shoot in low light (evenings, night etc). I am also looking for a tripod.
Amir Khalid
Liverpool lead 1-0 at Stoke City in the League Cup semifinal first leg. Yay. Phil Coutinho off injured. Boo.
Betty Cracker
I agree Rey has to be Luke’s kid, and I like your theory about her being spurned by Luke in the next picture and living out the parallel universe story line that would have occurred had Luke accepted the Emperor’s offer.
But I see the Kylo-Han relationship as shades of Judas-Jesus in the “Last Temptation of Christ” imagining, or, more importantly, Snape and Dumbledore in Harry Potter. Both are ultimately good; they are playing the parts they have to play due to destiny. Like Judas or Snape, Kylo may be the catalyst for Rey ultimately stopping Snoke.
As for Poe, I agree with your assessment of his role in the initial film, but I just figured it was clumsy storytelling and that he was there now without a whole lot to do because he’s important later.
Cermet
How can you possibly spoil a movie that is just a clone of the first star wars movie? The movie was boring and even the saber fights/battle action (what little) was very slow compared to the later Star wars action/fight scenes (attack of the clones – et al.) Can’t understand why this movie has made so much money. The monsters on the lose in the space craft was really pointless. AS for the new Darth Vader, OK, I guess but some back story would have helped – as long as they cut enough out to keep the (already slow plot) from collapsing in on itself. Killing Han Solo was a mercy killing considering just now bad his acting was in this show. That a storm trooper could fight a Sith wanna-be and hold his own for a while, much less survive, was ludicrous. Still, far better than that terrible star trek movie but this thing was far too slow.
Gimlet
@Amir Khalid:
BenGhazi Solo
Xantar
Let’s face it: the Jedi are assholes and their religion doesn’t make sense. One of Anakin’s worst sins in the prequel was apparently that he fell in love and got married. You know, like a normal human being. All the other good Jedi are completely unattached monks. Also, Jedi are apparently not supposed to feel anger because it leads to hate which leads to suffering. So it’s awful that Anakin feels rage when a bunch of slavers beat his mother until she dies a slow, lingering death.
And then whenever there’s a problem with someone, they just dismissively send them away instead of trying to work with them productively. And when that inevitably blows up in their face, the Jedi run away and hide so that other people have to deal with the mess they left behind.
Lee
I think you are giving Poe Dameron too much credit. He is an interesting character, but not really a lead. Checking imdb he is either the last main listed or the first secondary listed. Maz Kanata is the next entry. I looked at him giving Finn his jacket as handing off the ‘cool good guy’ role to him.
Yeah Rey is Luke’s daughter. If you notice when she is handing him his lightsaber there seems to be something that looks like a tombstone by Luke’s feet.
I did read something thought-provoking that I don’t agree with but interesting to consider.
Rey is not Luke’s daughter but Obiwan’s granddaughter and she is the one that is going to bring balance to The Force.
cleek
@schrodinger’s cat:
any particular features you want?
there’s plenty to choose from in that price range. you just need to narrow it down by feature.
RareSanity
You know Tim, for the first time since I got it almost 5 years ago, I’ve been seriously considering moving from my DSLR to a mirrorless. The options in that market are getting better and better.
But…
There is just…something…about that mechanical shutter, and the confidence of not having to worry about a “here today, gone tomorrow” camera system. I guess the safest way to go would be the micro 4/3s, as it seems to have the most broad ranged support. However, the EF/EF-S mount lenses that fit on my Canon have been around for decades.
So I’m kinda in a quandary. I really wish that either this stuff wasn’t so expensive, or I was a lot richer, because to get quality equipment, it seems like I’ll have to choose one or the other.
Roger Moore
@Amir Khalid:
No, he’s Benghazi Solo, which should have been a tip-off that he was going bad.
Frankensteinbeck
First, I was completely blown away to watch a character-driven Star Wars movie. Last thing I ever expected. The Star Wars movies are B science fiction, glitzy, epic, not aiming at realism of art. I thought Force Awakens both captured that Star Wars feel, but delivered it as background to interesting, moving character stories. I loved it. Plot wise, it’s weak and repetitive, because that’s kind of the point. Note that this movie ends, not with handing out medals after destroying a Death Star, but with Rey at the edge of her old life and a new life as a Jedi.
Second, I’m not worried about Poe. His role was ‘Cool guy Finn hero worships.’ He had a tiny part in the movie, and I suspect will continue to be a minor character.
Third, Rey as Luke’s kid would be weirdly out of left field, but they’re sure implying something, and ‘weirdly out of left field’ is a Star Wars thing.
trollhattan
@RareSanity:
To my knowledge, nearly all MILCs have mechanical shutters. Mine do other than the GM5, which uses an electronic first curtain and mechanical second in normal shooting conditions, going to all electronic in some settings.
The missing items are the mirror assembly and optical viewfinder, plus the long flange distances necessitated by the mirror. I’m nearly cured of the DSLR thing, only occasionally reaching for mine now.
Tim F.
@RareSanity: If you have the money, look at the Sony full-frame mirrorless cameras. Those things are sexy sexy sexy. However for a more reasonable price and portable size, I think the EM-5ii is close to perfect for almost every user. I think the m4/3 format will last as long as mirrorless cameras; it seems to be a sweet spot in terms of quality-to-price and a lot of companies have committed to it.
Amir Khalid
I’m confident that Rey is a Skywalker, although I think her exact place in the family tree is going to be a fairly big revelation/plot twist in this trilogy. I also suspect she and Finn are going to be the central romantic relationship in Episodes VIII and IX, since they’re the two closest male and female characters. Unless JJ Abrams does something interesting with him, Poe Dameron could turn out to be this trilogy’s Wedge Antilles.
schrodinger's cat
@cleek: In that case I would look at the price and a system that can grow with me, by that I mean I can add accessories as my skills get better and I get used to the camera features.
RareSanity
@schrodinger’s cat:
At the “entry-level” you really can’t go wrong with either a Canon or Nikon. They are the dominate forces in the DSLR market, which makes for easier access to both new and used items.
Even the options at the entry level are pretty mind boggling, especially with DSLRs. The problem for people getting their first, is that they (me included when I got my first one) don’t really know what is best for them until after they’ve used one for awhile.
I asked for suggestions before I bought my Canon Rebel, and looking back after gaining some experience using it over several years, I know much better what it is a I want in a camera, based upon how I use one…and most of those things were completely unknowable by people giving me suggestions, or even me personally.
My advice? Go to a store that sells both Canon and Nikon, and just play around with them. Don’t worry about features, megapixels, or model numbers. Just see which manufacturer seems to feel the most right to you, that is the most important part for your first. After you’ve made that decision, then start looking at the differences between the models of the manufacturer you felt fit you best.
Lee
@Amir Khalid:
I completely agree.
Interesting sidenote:
The actor that played Wedge was asked if he wanted to be in the new movie and he declined.
trollhattan
@schrodinger’s cat:
I suggest poking around the Oly-Panny/Sony/Samsung mirrorless options and see what they’re offering. I usually recommend shopping for lenses first, camera second. In micro-four-thirds (Oly-Panny) you’ll find a variety of standard zooms of various speeds and importantly, a huge collection of small, fast prime lenses for things like portraiture, scenery and street photography.
If you carefully shop the sales, older models can sometimes be had in two-lens kits for less than $500. It takes narrowing the field then being patient. Once you jump in, build the system over time with additional lenses. Happy shopping!
Tim F.
@Amir Khalid: That romance is just too effing obvious. There is no tension in it. Every single scene they have is a meet-cute, then the tension-building split that every romcom has, then a big passionate you came for me! In movie romance terms the two are way, way ahead of where Leia and Han ever got in IV. I think Abrams built that up to heighten the tension of future events rather than give us all diabetes.
Chyron HR
You dummies, Rey is clearly a force clone of Revan created by god (who lives in a giant space monolith in the Chrelythiumn system) manipulating the Midichlorians.
iLarynx
I saw it with the family and we all enjoyed it. Fun. A good start for the 3rd trilogy.
P.S. Sorry you didn’t receive the dictionary and thesaurus slated for your Solstice gift. I guess that means 2016 will be filled with f-ing pointless f-bombs.
RareSanity
@trollhattan:
Good point, allow me to rephrase…there’s something I just love about the sound of the mirror flipping up, combined with the mechanical shutter. :-)
I think my love for the DLSR may have already reached its apex, and is slowly declining. Maybe I’ll be able to kick the habit in the near future.
@Tim F.:
I have heard wonderful things about the full frame, mirrorless Sony cameras. As a matter of fact, I was very close to switching from Canon to Nikon (while I’m still at the entry-level phase, so not very expensive), because of how much I like the Sony sensors.
Then Canon released the 7DmkII, and now I’m all confused again. Good news is that until I figure it out, I still have an excellent camera, that other than being a bit bulky at times, basically meets all my needs.
One thing for sure if I go mirrorless, it would have to be one with an electronic viewfinder. I prefer viewfinders to LCD screens for composition.
Tommy
First off Max is a very fine looking dog.
With that said I am always stunned how often I buy and/or use a product and am totally not happy with it.
Well long story short got all the water out of the basement, sprayed it down with a combo of water and bleach for the last two days to kill any mold that might attempt to take up residence, and now going over the carpet again and again with a Rug Doctor.
First time I’ve used one and I have to say to rent the thing for 24 hours (the reciept actually says 36, but the sign on the display says 24 so who knows how long I have it) for like $31 and change with tax is a freaking bargain. The thing is amazing. First time in awhile I felt something I bought/used exceed my performance expectations. And this time by a lot. That is a nice feeling I bet we all wish we had more often :)!
Now I should have done some research online, because they will hammer you with the price of the cleaning solution, which I’ll end up spending more than the renting the Rug Doctor itself, but can’t believe how well it works and that I walk by their displays in stores multiple times a week and this was the first I rented one.
schrodinger's cat
What is this mirrorless option that you guys speak of?
Amir Khalid
@Tim F.:
Yeah, you can see that they’re meant to be an item from a mile away. We have to hope that it’s going to be interesting rather than sappy. It might make some people angry, though, just because Daisy Ridley is white and John Boyega isn’t.
RareSanity
@Tim F.:
Yeah, the romantic tension was a little overplayed. It was kept in check during the original trilogy because of the complexity of Leia’s character. In episode 4, we had no idea that Leia and Luke were brother and sister so that kept us wondering. Episode 5 was the first where Leia began to show an interest in Han, then it all culminated in episode 6.
Thank you for not including a link to the absolutely evil time sink of the TV Tropes website for the explanation of the romantic plot devices. I can’t remember every spending less than 30 minutes on that website after following a seemingly harmless link to a specific trope.
Amir Khalid
@Lee:
If I were Denis Lawson, I wouldn’t see the point either in coming back for less than a minute of total screen time in the new trilogy. Or maybe Lawson is sore that his nephew got so much more screen time in Episodes I-III than he ever did
Tommy
@RareSanity: I had, you know when 35MM was the camera of choice, an entry level professional grade Nikon. The thing cost an arm and a leg back in the mid-90s, but it was and still is the best camera I’ve ever had. Set it to full auto mode and it was almost impossible to take a bad photo.
But then I started to go digital.
I’ve had multiple Nikon and the final one I bought was a Sony. I was about as Nikon loyal and a Nikon “fan boy” as you can find, but when I got that Sony about five years ago I realized that Sony makes a pretty darn good camera, and the price point was fairly far below a similar Nikon.
I can’t comment on cameras today, because my Samsung phone’s camera is amazing in its own right. I just know, because I used to be one of these people, many will always say Nikon. Nikon. Nikon. Nikon. If I was going to buy a stand alone camera today I’d start with Sony first.
But then again my father has many thousands of dollars in lens for his 35mm Cannons (both 35MM and digital) and he swears by them.
So I guess in a long-winded way, it is really hard to go wrong these days with a Sony, Cannon, or Nikon if you get into the middle or upper middle of their lines/price ranges.
Turgidson
@Cermet:
I enjoyed but wasn’t mesmerized with the movie, but I think there is a pretty obvious explanation for why the lightsaber duels weren’t as impressive here as they were in the prequels. None of the people fighting in this movie were trained nearly from birth as Jedi. And Kylo, the one who presumably had the most training (though undoubtedly far, far, less than Yoda, Obi Wan, Dooku, Anakin, etc.) had just been shot in the abdomen and was purposely portrayed as being powerful but erratic with the Force. It would have looked bizarre if Rey had picked up a lightsaber and started twirling around like the old Jedi did. It’s just barely believable that she was as good at it as she was.
I hope there’s more explanation for why Rey was such a quick study, and while it seems telegraphed that Luke is her father, I hope it’s more surprising (or surprisingly boring, like her parents were nobodies but she’d been identified as a potential Jedi early and was miraculously evacuated from Luke’s failed training camp before Kylo had a chance to murder her) than that. We knew at least one of the young leads would be offspring of the original cast, and Kylo was a decent choice there.
I think I was OK with Adam Driver’s sorta emo pouty boy performance as Kylo because it was still more convincing than the idea that Hayden Christensen’s “whiny brat with undiagnosed head trauma” character would turn into Darth freaking Vader. (mental note – did anyone know who Benedict Cumberbatch was yet when the prequels were cast? He might have been a better young Anakin. Of course, I might have too.)
It would have been nice if the movie could have figured out a way to explain just how powerful the First Order is at this point. It seems like destroying the planet/superweapon where a huge number of their stormtroopers had just been seen gathering for a Fascist rally would deal a pretty big blow to their ability to project power if they had recently formed out of a rump of Imperial refugees. But presumably they’ll continue being the main adversary going forward.
The movie definitely delivered on looking like a Star Wars movie – clearly aside from Snoke, very little of it was shot relying entirely on CGI and blue screens. The place looked lived-in, like it did in the first trilogy. And the X-wing fights looked great, even if the Starkiller battle was disappointingly telegraphed/anticlimactic.
RareSanity
@schrodinger’s cat:
Check out this article for a discussion of the differences:
http://www.tomsguide.com/us/dslr-vs-mirrorless-cameras,news-17736.html
The simple explanation is that one has a mirror and one doesn’t. The longer explanation is that an SLR (single lens reflex) uses a mirror to reflect the image coming through the lens up to the viewfinder that you look into. This is called an “optical viewfinder”…it is a reflection of the exact image coming into the lens. This mirror has to be moved out of the way or “flipped up”, so that the image from the lens can be projected onto the imaging sensor to take a picture instead of the viewfinder.
The “mirrorless” cameras don’t have this mirror, so you use the LCD screen, or an electronic viewfinder instead of an optical one to compose you shot. Without the mirror, and all of the supporting mechanical systems that go along with it. Because of this the camera can be smaller, while still offering the same image quality, and interchangeable lenses.
There are other reasons as well, but the main one is size and weight.
David Hunt
Okay. A question for anyone steeped in SW lore. Where did Maz get that lightsaber from? The last we see it in the movies, it’s falling into that huge drop on Cloud City with Luke’s hand.
Tommy
Tim depending on our user role in WordPress there are several ways you can create a “hidden” post. The easiest would be just to create a page, make sure the “allow comments” box is checked, copy the URL, and just paste it into a thread. A page is really the same as a post, outside of the fact for it to appear on the site with a clickable link, you have to go into the Admin section of WordPress, under “Menus” and well add it to the top navigation. By doing this of course it won’t appear on the home page with all the other posts.
trollhattan
@schrodinger’s cat:
They’re interchangeable-lens cameras that dispense with some of the SLR bits–primarily the mirror and pentaprism optical viewfinder. They’re smaller in form and with the latest electronic viewfinders, offer true WYSIWYG in the finder along with much better low-light response. The only compelling reasons to shoot a DSLR are sports and distant wildlife, although those advantages are melting away too. I like mine in part because they’re much smaller. Three key systems:
micro four-thirds (Olympus-Panasonic).
Sony Alpha.
Samsung NX. (link deleted because FYWP)
Gussie
Boring retread of the original. Utterly -un- original. Or maybe I’m just old. But I thought it was even worse than the first Iron Man.
Amir Khalid
@Tim F.:
George Lucas only settled on the Han-Leia romance between Episodes IV and V, didn’t he? If I remember right, Episode IV was setting up for a Han-Leia-Luke tug-of-love.
trollhattan
@schrodinger’s cat:
They’re interchangeable-lens cameras that dispense with some of the SLR bits–primarily the mirror and pentaprism optical viewfinder. They’re smaller in form and with the latest electronic viewfinders, offer true WYSIWYG in the finder along with much better low-light response. The only compelling reasons to shoot a DSLR are sports and distant wildlife, although those advantages are melting away too. I like mine in part because they’re much smaller. Three key systems:
micro four-thirds (Olympus-Panasonic).
Sony Alpha.
Samsung NX. (link deleted because FYWP)
RareSanity
@Tommy:
I agree with that assessment.
The manufacture of cameras has been so perfected, that the “main” difference in any of them is the image sensor. And I think that, at least at this point, Sony has established itself as the state-of-the-art in regards to sensors.
P.S.
Tim, could you fish a previous comment of mine out of the moderation queue? I include a link to an article that explains the difference between mirrored and mirrorless cameras for @schrodinger’s cat.
Amir Khalid
@David Hunt:
I’m also wondering how Kylo Ren got hold of Grampa’s helmet. Did his Uncle Luke save it from the funeral pyre? I didn’t know you could do that.
Turgidson
@Amir Khalid:
Interesting. If I’d been him, I think I’d have been intrigued by the promised return on investment and accepted. And as someone who went through a major Star Wars Nerd phase as an 11 year old, I would have definitely liked to see Wedge come back as General Antilles in the situation room or something.
gene108
That would be some weak ass writing, if it is true.
Everyone thinks this. I’m not sure, if it is better do what the audience thinks and/or expects to happen or move the story in a different direction.
Maybe Rey is the kid of one of Luke’s students, who was murdered by the Knights of Ren and dropped off on Jakku, to hide from First Order pursuit.
Maybe Luke “seeded” the galaxy with kids of former students to rebuild the Jedi Order, if any of them could manage to find him. A test of sorts to see what the “will” of the Force is.
@Xantar:
Jedi aren’t normal. To be a Jedi is to be sworn to a specific order, with certain duties and obligations. That’s sort of the point of why you can use the Force, but can leave the Jedi Order, as Dooku did in AotC.
Yes. That is what Jedi are. Either you’re in with it or your out.
Jedi were a bit too meta, with regards to their views on attachment as being a cause of problems. They figured not giving into your emotions and following your duty was all you needed to focus on and anything else should be brushed off and ignored.
What the Jedi needed was a strong grounding in Cognative Behavior Therapy or at least a passing familiarity with the Three Stabilizing Questions:
1. What Am I troubled About?
2. How likely is it to occur?
3. What Shall I do about it?
I think these questions would have been most useful for Yoda n in RotS, when Anakin goes to him for guidance about his dreams on Padme. Instead of going all meta about how death is just a part of life and not a big deal, he should use the Stabilizing Questions to counsel Anakin:
Y: “What are you troubled about?”
A: “I have dreams a friend will die.”
Y: “What exactly leads you to think your friend will die? Are they sick?”
A: “They have a condition. I fear it will kill them.”
Y: “Is this condition likely to kill them? Is this a normal outcome from this condition or are you being a bit paranoid?”
A: “Usually it is not lethal, but it has been. It will be for my friend.”
Y: “What will you do about it? Sick friends need doctors. Expert medical care. Can you help the get to a doctor?”
A: “Yes. I think putting them under medical care is a good idea. It is better than what I was thinking”
dmsilev
@schrodinger’s cat:
Traditional DSLRs (and film-based SLRs before them) work by having a mirror just behind the lens which bounces the light up to the viewfinder. When you push the shutter button, the mirror swings up, blocking the viewfinder and exposing the sensor or film frame, and then it swings back down once the exposure is done.
A “mirrorless’ camera does away with the mirror (duh!) and instead runs the main imaging sensor all the time, and the viewfinder is a little LCD rather than a prism or set of mirrors directly bouncing light from the lens. It’s mechanically much simpler (no mirror that needs to swing up and down quickly and reliably), but the flip side is that the quality of the viewfinder display is limited by the resolution and response time of both the main sensor and whatever little LCD is in the viewfinder.
Turgidson
@David Hunt:
That was one of the biggest, “wait, WTF?” moments in the movie for me. Hopefully it’s explained later, but I kinda see it just being left out there in the assumption the fans won’t care by the time the next one comes out.
Another was the fact that apparently the entire galaxy could see the Starkiller’s weapon shoot across space and hit the Hosnian system. What in the fucking hell was that about.
Mike J
story
gene108
@Lee:
The screen time and acting required would have been similar to Episodes IV-VI, i.e. a couple of lines and some time flying around in an X-Wing.
Not really worth his trouble.
Would’ve been nice to flesh out the other core people in the Rebellion a bit, as a lot more people were involved than just Han, Leia, Luke, Chewie and Lando and those folks would’ve made friends with the main characters at some point.
Randy P
Some non-spoiler commentary.
Abrams reused the “12 parsecs” line. Aargh!!!
That was clearly an obvious bone to the fans. Are there people who like that line? The scientific illiteracry bugged me no end the first time I heard it, and this was one thing I could have happily lived without hearing again. I did in fact grumble out loud in the theater for about 30 seconds, but decided to let it go because I’m pretty sure Abrams knows the difference between distance and time, so it was just meant to be fun.
Yes, I am a curmudgeon, who wants to know?
Second comment, when I found out Supreme Leader Whatsis is played by Andy Serkis. I like Andy Serkis, but has Hollywood now decided that every single mostly-CGI character is to be played by Serkis forever?
Overall: Yeah, I liked this movie a lot. And the difference in writing quality over all of the originals was palpable. One of my wife’s first comments. I was watching in particular to see whether the old characters had become more three-dimensional in the hands of a new scriptwriter, and I easily convinced myself they had.
Agree with you that Poe is the flattest of the new characters, but from other commentary I’ve seen people like him and like the bromance with Finn (which I had a little trouble accepting actually, as it didn’t seem they’d had much chance to work together). So maybe that will drive a little more interesting character stuff with him in future.
Tommy
@RareSanity: Yeah the major camera makers kind of have the task of making a good camera down to an exact science. That Sony I got about five years ago was the lower middle of their offerings. Around $325 with a memory card I think. And it was a flat out wonderful camera.* As something of a minor shutter bug the problem I’ve always had is not being able to get into a habit of always having my camera at my side.
I mean there must be some “Murphy’s Law” at work. I take it with me and nothing I want to capture. I don’t, and everywhere I look the opportunity for a potential great pic :)!
This is the main reason I’ve gone away from stand-alone cameras to only my phone, and I got rid of my landline years ago, is it never more than a few feet from me at anytime, so I don’t even have to think about grabbing my camera bag anymore to take pics.
Just another note, I love my Samsung phone and tablet. I am a brand loyal guy and also bought a Samsung Chromebook. I love that company’s products. But looking to a new phone in the next month or two, not done the “deep dive” into research yet, but I keep seeing the HTC most current phones have an amazing camera. I might go with that phone, since they all do the basics the same, just because of the camera.
*I can’t even keep up with where cameras are today. Some tech/geek sites I follow on a daily basis talk about cameras more than a little and it seems there might be no technology out there, other then smart phones and tablets, where advances are happening as fast as they are with cameras.
Amir Khalid
For some reason, Adam Driver’s Kylo Ren made me think of Ross Geller as a Sith.
cokane
I love your Rey story arc idea but no way in hell do I see Abrams nor a major studio being willing to do such a risky plot like that. I suspect she’ll be tough-as-nails but essentially goody-goody almost all the way through the trilogy.
Turgidson
Snoke is either the Emperor resurrected in a new form, or that Sith who could keep people him dying (but presumably not himself) Darth Plagieus having survived the Palpatine’s betrayal, is my guess.
Would be best if he was just a new character, but given how tightly Abrams is embracing the original trilogy, I’m assuming there’s a tie-in.
Tim F.
@David Hunt: No one knows, but my guess is the guy whom Max von Sydow plays. He supposedly wandered the galaxy having adventures and finding rare things and information for the good guys before he retired on Jakku.
@Tommy: Thanks! I will try that.
@Amir Khalid: It’s an open question. Evidence strongly suggests that Lucas or the writers of V added it after IV was done, but later Lucas claimed he had planned out the whole thing from day one. Lucas is a wanker and the story looks awfully strange if the director had it in mind from the beginning, so I will go with added it after.
Larime
My theory is Rey is Luke’s daughter, but he thought she was dead. Kylo took her when the Knights of Ren busted up his school, but Kylo couldn’t bring himself to kill his baby cousin, so dumped her on Jakku. That’s why he loses his shit when he’s told the droid and Finn escaped with ‘a female’, and why he’s obsessed with her.
Amir Khalid
@Turgidson:
Watch Maz’s castle/bar very closely. Somewhere in the background there must be a jar of formaldehyde with Luke’s OEM right hand in it.
GregB
I too was shocked to find out that Rey was daughter of Leia and Jabba the Hutt.
Cacti
@Xantar:
I discussed this w/ others in a previous thread, but I’m with you on the Jedi Order in its previous incarnation. The nicest thing you could call it is an authoritarian mystery cult, based around the light side of the force. Whether they were motivated by the light is very debatable.
Consider, they separated new acolytes from their families at a very early age and encouraged cutting off any future contact with them. They discouraged emotional attachments of any kind, especially romantic love, and instead taught you to measure your individual value only with respect to the Jedi Order. They practiced heavy handed information control of what their adherents were allowed to study. They were lead by an undemocratic council of masters who appointed each other. And they styled themselves as defenders of peace and freedom in the galaxy, while being wholly unaccountable to anyone but themselves.
Now, is it any wonder at all why the Sith Order had such an easy time plumbing their ranks for disaffected members?
In the case of Luke, his nice Jedi friends Obi Wan and Yoda lied to him about his parentage and hoped to trick him into killing his father. How noble. Yoda also told him it was better to let his friends die on Bespin than to confront Vader (who would tell him the truth).
Tim F.
@Turgidson: I thought Maz Kanata’s bar was in the Hosnian system, but they didn’t blow up that planet/moon because they needed information from the droid.
RareSanity
@Randy P:
I think that Poe almost instantly develops a respect for Finn, considering the danger he is putting himself in to leave the storm troopers…I mean he’s going to get killed if he fails. In addition he almost sees Finn as a “little brother” of sorts. He sees that this guy doesn’t really know anything outside of being a storm trooper, so he wants to protect this idealistic, naive person, while helping him to get away.
I think their “connection” is plausible. For Poe, he is protecting someone and helping them get away from evil…and for Finn, this is the first person that has recognized him as an individual. I think that can lead to a pretty strong connection, regardless of how much time they actually spent together.
Germy
nice photo:
Kenny Baker as R2-D2, in 1977 and 2015
RareSanity
@Tommy:
Check out the LG V10 before you buy anything…I have it and absolutely love it. It is everything the Note 5 was supposed to be…sans stylus.
It is extremely underrated and might be the best phone on the market right now. The camera has both laser focus and optical image stabilization on its f/1.8 lens.
rikyrah
PRESIDENT OBAMA’S GUN CONTROL TEARS ARE THE BLACKEST THING THAT EVER HAPPENED THIS WEEK
Damon Young, 1/5/16
It’s been well-documented here that President Obama is firmly and fully ensconced in the fuck devoid span of his presidency. He has nestled in his full-length no fucks futon; his bare feet stretched on his no fucks ottoman, reading perhaps How to Give No Fucks and Influence People or Chicken Soup for the Fuck-less Soul.
This is the president we anticipated when all that hoping and changing was happening in 2007 and 2008. But, for very practical reasons — namely, the country wasn’t quite ready for a Black president, much less a fuck deficient Black president — we didn’t start to really see him until he was reelected. Which, again, makes perfect sense. You just don’t go all DeMarcus Cousins at your new job before your first performance review. But he’s here now, and it is glorious.
And, to clarify, “giving no fucks” does not mean that President Obama — or anyone else who gives no fucks — is without a care or concern. It just means that you no longer care about and you’re no longer concerned with meeting the unreachable expectations of people who don’t actually want you to reach them. In Obama’s case, these people are usually called “conservatives.” For laymen such as you and I, these people are usually called “haters.” President Obama does, in fact, seem to care about many things. ISIS. The economy. The Wire. Sasha’s sartorial choices. Selfies with Michelle.
And while tears aren’t always a reliable measure of ones actual feelings about a subject, I have no doubt that the ones he shed at today’s press conference, where he introduced new gun control measures, were real. Violence is not a uniquely American problem. For a developed country, however, gun violence is uniquely American, and its something we all have at least a tangential connection to. If you happen to be a Black American, this tangential connection becomes sturdier. I have been personally affected by gun violence. I’ve had friends killed, cousins incarcerated, and a home shot into. And I imagine most reading this can say similar things. No one — not even a millionaire family with two Ivy League-grad parents and two private school-attending teenage daughters — is immune, and I’m certain our president is aware of this. And I’m also certain he’s aware, as many of us are, that the primary factor morphing perfunctory human agitation and conflict to the type of murder and mayhem we see today is the availability of guns.
Tommy
@Tim F.: You need “Admin” or at least “Editor” level access to create a page. But that is by far the best way to go, because the URL for the page, unless you delete it, will be in WordPress forever. You can then go and add to the page and keep using it as a “hidden” page for as long as you want.
BTW: When I reworked the BJ site I “hid” a lot of the different elements on pages and posts because I felt for people that don’t live in WP like I do, it was just screen info overload. So at the top right of the screen, you might have to click on a tab/arrow, which will open up a menu where you can click or unclick what page elements are shown. My gut is I hid that option.
If that doesn’t make sense let me know and I’ll post a link to a screen capture or two.
Tim F.
@gene108:
I think it would be great writing. And it would explain why his hologram is so big. Compensating.
JCJ
@gene108:
I thought you were going to say like former Seattle SuperSonic Shawn Kemp
From Wikipedia:
Bobby Thomson
You have very interesting story arc ideas.
I don’t think Disney will go with the villainess. And I think the reason is the green side of the force. Rey is the most successful female super hero in history, and we’ve barely seen her story. It would be like Frank Miller writing The Dark Knight and Batman Year One before Finger had even fleshed out the character.
Turgidson
@Tim F.:
That would have made sense and I easily could have missed or forgotten it if that was mentioned, but apparently Maz’s castle was on Takodana, which isn’t even in the same general area as the Hosnian system. http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Takodana
So my comment stands – What the fucking hell.
Tommy
@RareSanity: I have heard that as well. I love my Samsung Galaxy Note II, which I know is getting dated, if not totally dated at this point. But the thing still works like a “charm” and as something of a tech nerd I’ve always wanted the “shiny new thing.”
Through much pain I’ve learned if I have software or hardware that works and I am happy with, stick with it. Some of the upgrades in both hardware and software throughout the years, didn’t always go as smoothly as I would have liked.
Bobby Thomson
@Betty Cracker: Poe is a weak character because he was supposed to die. They rewrote the script but didn’t really have an arc for him.
gene108
@Cacti:
Considering Yoda and the Jedi Council did just the opposite of that, with regards to Obi-Wan on Geonosis in AoTC, maybe it was just a hard life lesson learned.
If they had not rushed to save Obi-Wan, they would not have been pushed into jump starting the Clone Wars.
There are thousands of Jedi.
Two became Sith Lords.
That’s not a very successful conversion rate.
Bobby Thomson
@Cermet: nope.
Botsplainer
I’m not a Star Wars fan, as its universe makes no sense. It is a cruel, stupid galaxy, where governance over quadrillions is an unworkable kludge of a senate and chancellor, and that a moron thinks he can be an effective emperor. A galaxy where there’s a megashitton of AI, but guys are piloting spacecraft by manual control yokes and going into battle as pilots, not sending unmanned drones. A galaxy where it is expected that a small number of knights can use a genetic freak of nature to fight and preserve order for those quadrillions. A galaxy which forgets, mere decades later, of the dangers of authoritarianism. A galaxy where differing species on different evolutionary tracks can reach a governing harmony.
Gimlet
@rikyrah: And while tears aren’t always a reliable measure of ones actual feelings about a subject, I have no doubt that the ones he shed at today’s press conference, where he introduced new gun control measures, were real.
Horrible people!
https://www.rawstory.com/2016/01/fox-host-president-obama-put-a-raw-onion-in-his-podium-so-he-could-cry-fake-tears-for-kids-killed-by-guns/
Fox News host Andrea Tantaros suggested on Tuesday President Barack Obama had used a “raw onion” to produce fake tears for shooting victims during his press conference on gun violence.
“I feel bad about those kids in [Newtown,] Connecticut,” she added. “Your heart breaks for them. But it’s only about this that he gets so upset about. And never about terror!”
After a commercial break, Fox News replayed a clip of Obama with tears flowing down his face.
“So, I would check that podium for like a raw onion or some No More Tears,” Tantaros quipped. “It’s not really believable.”
Co-host Meghan McCain agreed: “It just didn’t seem horribly authentic. And maybe it is, I don’t know him at all.”
“It’s like bad political theater,” McCain concluded.
Germy
@Bobby Thomson: Thank you for crediting Mr. Finger instead of Bob Kane
mclaren
You must’ve seen a different movie than I did. The movie I saw was a piece-of-shit rehash of the first 1977 Star Wars film with some minor politically correct changes tossed in. Hey, the original hero was a guy in 1977, so let’s make the hero this time a girl! Hey, we didn’t have any black folks in the 1977 film, so let’s make a black guy a major character in this one! Wow, we could get all edgy and cool by having one of those storm troopers turn renegade, you know, like Rick Deckard does at the end of BLADE RUNNER!
What a piece of crap.
You people keep dancing around the essentiall shittiness of the new Star Wars film without quite owning up to it. When you say “Rey has a meta-problem,” that’s code for “Rey is a shitty fifth-rate ripoff of the original Luke Skywalker character.”
The original Luke in the original film was a standin for the audience. Someone we could identify with, who then got caught up in this glitzy amazing visually thrilling STAR WARS world. But that only worked in the first film because we had never seen this glitzy amazing STAR WARS world before. Once we got oversaturated with that futuristic visually compelling world of tie fighters and X wings and death stars and Ralph McQuarry megastructure spaceship interiors, it was not possible in subsequent films to have any of the Star Wars charcacters stand in for the audience. Because this was now a universe we were familiar with. There was no longer a “Gosh, wow! Sense of wonder!” thrill about what we were seeing. So Lucas had to substitute a big shocker (“I am your father!”) for that sense of wonder of the original 1977 film in the second 1980 film. By the time the third film rolled around, there were no more big shockers to be had and with the sense of wonder worn off, Star Wars had nothing left to offer.
Now we grind on to 2015, and without a sense of wonder or big shockers or even the original George Lucas, what do the Star Wars films have to offer?
Nothing. Absolutely nothing but a tired retread of old old old old old tropes. Here’s a desert planet, here’s a lone orphan with amazing powers, here’s an evil guy in a black mask. It’s old and lame and so pathetic and so tired and so decrepit and so worn out that you have to wonder why the fuck the entire goddamn audience didn’t nod off and snooze through the entire goddamn film.
And as far as talking about characters…?
Ha! These people are pure cardboard. And they always have been. The original 1977 film was a forgettable saturday-morning cartoon romp with characters about as deep as a credit card. The 1980 sequel gave them a tiny bit of depth, but thereafter, it was all cheesy space opera heroes and heroines. Ray guns! Blasters! Giant bug-eyed monsters! (Hey, Jabba – I’m lookin’ at YOU!) Complete crap. By RETURN OF THE JEDI, Star Wars was making the 1930s Flash Gordon serials look like Shakespeare in comparison. So search not for depth of character in Star Wars, buckaroos — you’ll not find it there.
And what does that leave?
Nothing but exciting visuals. But beyond a certain level of CGI, the visuals turn into video games. Been there, done that.
Stick a fork in this franchise. It’s done. Time to put the Star Wars franchise out to pasture. Mistuh Lucas, he dead.
Bobby Thomson
@David Hunt: two answers: 1) Abrams originally opened with a scene in which the hand floats away to a planet and then passes from hand to hand; 2) it doesn’t matter. Could have gotten stuck somewhere in Cloud City. Maybe not. Could have been found by Luke or someone else using the force, or by some random.
Larime
@mclaren: Yeah. It’s done. I’m sure they’re crying in the billion dollars they already made.
Are you ever right about anything?
Turgidson
@mclaren:
You must be a hit at parties!
Bobby Thomson
@Tim F.: Lucas is full of shit.
joes527
I thought that the big upcoming reveal would be that he is Jar-Jar.
Either that, or he-of-the-giant-hologram turns out to be 4 feet tall.
mclaren
@RareSanity:
Midichlorians.
The go-to excuse that serves as the shitty writer’s universal explanation for any gaping plot hole.
Why aren’t the Jedi allowed to marry?
Midichlorians.
How come the Force keeps getting more and more powerful as the Star Wars movies go on, with Obi-Wan able to do nothing more than suggest thoughts to storm troopers (“These are not the droids you’re looking for”) and distact guards in the Death Star, while Luke can move solid objects and Darth Vader and hurl big hulking regierator-sized stuff across the room in the second film, but by the third film the Emperor can blast death lightning out of his hands?
Midichlorians.
Why was Palpatine able to bamboozle the entire Jedi order, and how did Annakin fool his tutor and a bunch of Jedi masters in The Phantom Menace?
Midichlorians.
Why hasn’t General Leia manifested any Force abilities in the 2015 film?
Midichlorians.
Why was Poe such a crappy character without an arc in the 2015 film?
Midichlorians.
Why did Luke run away to some island on the ass end of the galaxy instead of confronting Aldo Ray or whatever the fuck his ferkakta name is, the guy in the black mask?
Midichlorians.
What’s the deal with the secret map of the Jedi temples and that ferkakta crystal hidden in the hilt of Luke’s light saber?
Midichlorians.
Why doesn’t anyone remember Luke or Han or Leia and how they saved the galaxy?
Midichlorians.
Why are we going around and around again with all this First Order shit and Starkiller Base and all the rest of the regurgitated crap from the first trilogy? Why hasn’t the galaxy moved on to democracy and stability?
Midichlorians.
And why does a gullible foolish audience of fanbois flock to such a shitty movie in 2015, showering it with praise despite the fact that it’s complete shit?
You know the answer…
…Midichlorians!
Grumpy Code Monkey
I emphatically do not want Rey to be a Skywalker. There were plenty of non-Skywalker Jedi in the past, and the prequels (which, alas, must be considered canon) make it pretty clear that midichlorians don’t give a crap about bloodlines.
Overall I enjoyed the movie a lot. It wasn’t without flaw (Tim’s critique of Poe is dead on, and it hewed a little too closely to the first Star Wars), but it was miles better than JJ’s Star Trek outings. Character development and pacing were a little odd, especially with the “let’s go blow up Death Star 3.0 right now” (that felt especially rushed and disjointed). But, solid 7 out of 10 for me, which is a huge step up from the last bunch.
I don’t think the Force is particularly strong with Finn, and I don’t believe he’ll wind up as a full-fledged Jedi; he was raised to be a Stormtrooper in the First Order, so it wouldn’t be all that surprising for him to fight skillfully with a variety of weapons, including lightsabers; just don’t expect him to deflect blaster bolts with one. Yes, he lasted more than 30 seconds against Ren, but that’s probably more down to Ren playing with him than anything else. Having said all that, Boyega has charisma to spare, and I can’t wait to see how they use him in the next movie.
My only regret is that Solo didn’t get to tell the story of how he shot Greedo first.
Lucas, unsurprisingly, isn’t thrilled with the movie, and while some of his criticisms have merit, for the most part I really don’t care. Between the “special editions” and the prequels, he burned any goodwill he had built up after the original movies. Star Wars and Empire were awesome because there were talented people working with Lucas and in some ways keeping him in check.
Mike E
This post reads like a GOS diatribe where the poster has an argument with himself, the tin man and scarecrow about why he will NEVER support Hillary.
Fun read tho!
Tommy
@Botsplainer: I am a HUGE fan of the first three movies. The next three not so much and not seen the new movie, which I have to say kudos to folks here being so good about not letting out spoilers. Much, much appreciated. With that said I CAN’T STAND the second three movies. I think they are flat out terrible. The second and third almost unwatchable. That I saw Lucas was somewhat unhappy with Disney blows my mind. Take some ownership of the shit you put on screen the last three times around gosh darn it.
But the first three, wow. I recall leaving my gymnastics class in 1977, Leavenworth KS, I was 7. The movie theater on the corner. I forced my grandmother who was in town, to take me to see the movie, and then made her buy two more tickets and we watched it a second time.
I wouldn’t say it was “life changing” but kind of close.
Heck a few years ago my mother brought over all the Star Wars stuff I had as a kid and I could literally populate an entire room with the stuff. I shutter to think now much money they must have spent on it all.
But I am also not a “super fan” and from the little I’ve read non-spoiler about the new movie, factoring in I can’t stand the last three, I feel I might be kind of lost about what is going on.
And then to a few of your specific points, I will always have in the back of my head a short segment from Star Talk. A viewer sent in a question asking Neil deGrasse Tyson if he’d rather have the Star Trek Enterprise or the Millennium Falcon, which is clearly not really a fair question, but the epic rant he went on about how Star Wars could care less about any logic, well that will be in the back of my mind.
mclaren
@Larime:
Genius argument, “box office receipts are the surefire yardstick for a movie’s quality.”
Yeah. Right.
So Transformers 2 was better than Casablanca.
You must have gone through the Express Lane at birth: 15 I.Q. points or less.
benw
@benw: First off, the original Star Wars trilogy was never really about plot. The plot was just there to get the characters to bounce off each other and get from one action setpiece to the next (very Shakespearean, you know). The enjoyment came from loving the characters and, of course, the awesome action scenes. So I was a little worried that this movie would be a “just get the old gang back together and recycle the first trilogy” lazy bone to throw to fanpersons (like me). But I really think they handled Han, Leia, and the original characters’ relationships as older people really well and introduced three new characters in Kylo Ren, Rey and Finn who are awesome. I’m looking forward to more movies with them.
Poe felt flat for me the same way that he did for Tim: not really much character motivation there. But Oscar Issac made him very likeable, especially in his affection for Finn, so he’s fine as a secondary character. BB-8 could have been cheesy but was really super cute. General Hax is a throwback to Moff Tarkin and the actor playing him should have a living playing Nazis as long as he wants to.
Rey is indeed awesome. Her rapid development in the Force felt a little, well, forced. But she is a total badass. I definitely get the sense she’ll be a Luke-like character though, obviously good the whole way, but conflicted with dark side and feelings of anger, because she’s human. But I never doubted Luke in the original trilogy, and I trust her. Like everyone else, I thought she is Luke’s daughter. But now my guess is that she’s not: I think she’s Kylo Ren’s little sister. I think he couldn’t kill her when he wrecked Luke’s Jedi school, so he hid her from Snoke. That explains his panic when he finds out she’s gotten involved in the hunt for the map. It also explains why he didn’t kick her butt in their lightsaber duel: 1. he was injured, and 2. no way he’d kill his baby sister.
I really liked the Kylo Ren character. Making him obviously want to be a totally badass SO BAD, but instead be kind of a dark side fuckup really made him interesting. His temper tantrums each time his evil schemes were thwarted were hysterical. And the stormtroopers turning around and walking away from the raging Ren was pretty funny. I think the central conflict of the next trilogy should be his. Luke and Rey are too good, and Vader and the other Sith too evil. Kylo Ren seems to be the most finely balanced between the light and dark sides, pulled in both directions. And fighting for his redemption will have real weight after he killed Han. It will be hard for him and the other characters.
Finally, X-wings and the Millenium Falcon are the coolest ships ever, and it was super awesome to have them back.
mclaren
@Grumpy Code Monkey:
Boy, that’s faint praise. “Not quite as bad as raw sewage! Yum! Gimme seconds!”
Shlockmeisters like J. J. Abrams and Akiva Goldsman and Roberto Orci and Michael Bay are the plague of Hollywood. Disney needed to shake it up and give David Lynch a shot at directing a Star Wars movie. Put the Coen brothers on it. Let Quentin Tarentino have a shot. Then you’d really have something.
Swellsman
As I see it, the movie has two main problems: (1) Star Wars is such a cultural event that it becomes hard to just immerse yourself in the movie; while watching it, I was always keenly aware that I was watching a Star Wars movie and therefore thinking critically about the evolving plotlines instead of just going with it; (2) what some call “call backs” and “fans service,” I call making the same goddam movie for a third time!
In the first movie, the heroes saved a princess and blew up a Deathstar. In the third movie, the heroes saved Han Solo and blow up a Deathstar. In this movie, the heroes save Rey and – oh yeah – blow up a friggin’ Deathstar!
Bonus problem: How does the Deathstar keep getting made? The first one was the size of a moon, and the second one is the size of – or, rather, actually is – a friggin’ planet. And every single one of these huge, expensive things has the same goddam vulnerability and every single one of ’em gets blown to pieces pretty much the minute the good guys find out about it. I mean, this is gotta be the Universe’s worst example of crony capitalism,right? Like, eventually we are going to find out that the galaxy’s one-and-only Deathstar-building contractor just happens to be the brother-in-law of the reigning Sith Lord, or Emperor,or whatever, right?
(I read a review recently that said Star Wars is a science-fiction saga about terrible parenting. It seems pretty obvious that the real Stars Wars saga is a generations-spanning epic about unbridled nepotism in awarding government contracts.)
No wonder the bad guys in these movies are always so terrified of representative democracy and so fervid to impose/maintain a tyranny; there’s just no way anybody would actually keep voting for these Deathstar-building yahoos.
lol
@mclaren:
@mclaren:
@mclaren:
@mclaren:
tldr: “STOP LIKING WHAT I DON’T LIKE!!!!!!”
Tommy
@mclaren: OK, I’ve never thought of the Coen Brothers doing a Star Wars movie. Now I should say before I go on I kind of like JJ Abrams. Just saying . But the Coen Brothers, which I own every movie they have ever done on DVD, I am not sure I can wrap my mind around them doing a Star Wars movie. I think if tasked, but knowing what I know about them, they’d never do it, is still an interesting mental exercise.
I’d think they would stay true to the “form” and the “story line.” Now clearly they have done nothing really science fiction related, but a few of their movies have spanned different genres.
I’d like to say something more insightful about this idea, but honestly I would need to think more about it.
If nothing else with the Fargo TV show he is clear to me you can take their core ideas of how a script and movie should be done and then take it out and make other movies/shows that work.
Cacti
@gene108:
Now we get extra nerdy.
The rule of two originated with Darth Bane. There used to be lots of Sith, but Bane thought it diluted their strength, so he killed the rest of the Sith Order.
And one Sith plus a newly converted acolyte was able to bring the old Jedi Order to ruin, so he may have had a point.
J R in WV
I have been a photographer for newspapers, TV and as an independent photographer, mostly many years ago with film. I’ve actually used a 4×5 Speed Graphic, both using a Polaroid back and with Kodachrome sheet film, IIRC. But mostly NIkon. Now I have a set of Nikon lenses with a DSLR body, and a collection of film cameras from pre-war Leica and Rolllei to a coldwar Exacta. And an older Nikon 990 Coolpix that was my first non-film camera.
I have remarked before how surprised I have been by the Panasonic Lumix camera I have now, with a lens by Leica of Germany. It runs from 30mm to 300 mm includes image stabilization and a night mode that tells you on the viewfinder to hold the camera as still as possible and hold the shutter button down. It then make multiple exposures as long as you hold the shutter down. Then it combines the exposure data into a single picture that looks like it was taken in broad daylight.
I’ve always been a shooter in available dark, and being able to do that now and get a great looking photo, that’s great. I’ve pushed Ektachrome and Tri-x in the soup (developer chemicals) to boost their ISO sensitivity level, now being to pick a mode and run all over the ISO increase is so good.
Sony makes great electronics, but if I was going to buy a high-end Sony I would look for one that comes with a Zeiss lens, which is competitive with Leica lenses. The only Japanese-designed and built lenses I really respect are Nikon, really. I have no actual hand-on experience with Canon, and don’t feel like I’m missing anything, really. Nikon wannabes. I know some would disagree, hard, but I don’t care.
benw
@Swellsman: Come on, man. On the first Death Star it was a thermal exhaust port. On the Star Killer it was a power oscillator. Those are TOTALLY DIFFERENT.
Also, remember that in Return of the Jedi, the Emperor personally comes to the second Death Star because it is several weeks behind schedule, which supports your theory that the Sith are really government contract awarding bureaucrats at heart.
Xantar
@gene108:
Monks choose to be celibate, cloistered off people. The Jedi are usually taken away to the temple as little kids due to an ability that they were born with and given no choice in the matter at all. And at least as far as the movies are concerned, there is no leaving the Jedi order. There’s no such thing as a person strong in the Force who is unattached to the Jedi except for the Sith.
@Turgidson:
People across multiple star systems could see the planet killer across the sky for the same reason that X-wing and TIE fighters make noise when flying across space and engage each other at visual range: Rule of Cool.
I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet
@RareSanity: In addition to all the good information you have others provided here, I would recommend actually touching the cameras of interest and seeing how easy it is to do common operations. E.g. Are you a fan of manual focusing? Some cameras are a pain to focus manually.
Also, do you want to be able to take pictures of things in crowds? Being able to hold the camera over your head to take a picture of something ahead is nice, but usually requires an “articulating” viewing screen.
Lots of cameras eat batteries very quickly. How much do spare batteries cost (if they’re non-standard) and how long do they last?
How’s the flash? Is it some tiny thing that is useless? Is there a hot-shoe for a “real” flash, if you need it?
Hope this helps. Good luck!
Cheers,
Scott.
geg6
@benw:
I’m just going to sign on to your comment. I agree with every word.
Mnemosyne
@mclaren:
Shorter mclaren: My balls shrank back into my body as soon as I realized I was supposed to identify with a GURL!!!!1!1 as the lead character. My manhood will never recover from this blow.
benw
@mclaren: we get it: Jaws was never your scene and you don’t like Star Wars.
BillinGlendaleCA
@RareSanity: I was really impressed with the camera on the LG, but I really wanted a Note Edge.
I’m shooting with the Samsung NX, great pics and I don’t miss the mirror at all(it does have the mirror sound effect).
patrick II
Dumb question.
Why would a skill/power that is passed down genetically be allowed to go extinct because the possessors’ of that power refused to reproduce? Was the jedi knighthood’s religion started by someone who wanted to end the potential of too much power in one person? Is the knighthood really a trap to end possessors of the force from passing down their power?
chopper
@Turgidson:
he’s sure got opinions, i’ll tell you what.
phein55
@Lee:
I never knew that actor, Denis Lawson, played Urquhart in Local Hero.
smintheus
It’s interesting that so many Democrats are smitten with films premised on the idea that aristocracy is the natural order of the world. Apparently you’re born into the Force.
Tripod
Typical Abrams – blast past any plot or character issues with breakneck pacing. A lightweight reboot is exactly what Disney wanted, and what they got. The least consequential Star War since episode 2.
Whatever he had in mind for story arcs are irrelevant as he won’t be back for episode 8.
Rian Johnson is very much a second act director, and I expect the next episode will be much heavier.
Also, if you think Disney’s second largest non-institutional stockholder has no input… LULZ.
My guess is Darth and Obi-Wan return – it’s what Lucas was driving at in the prequels, and the commercial considerations pretty much demand it.
OGLiberal
@Randy P: Whenever I read/hear the parsecs line, all my mind hears is Spacey reading it like Walken.
Bostondreams
For those that may be interested, io9 has an excellent breakdown of the backstory that it has pulled from the script and from the books, particularly the Visual Dictionary connected to the movie.
Fun fact: according to the novelization, Rey hears a voice in her head telling her to kill Kylo Ren when she has him on the ground.
Paul in KY
@RareSanity: I have a Nikon Coolpix S9500. Works very well for kinds of pics I take.
Paul in KY
@David Hunt: Luke had a lightsaber in Return of the Jedi.
Paul in KY
@Turgidson: I liked the way Chris Rowley did it in his Starhammer book. The weapon there converts a cubic kilometer of bedrock to energy & then uses that energy to make a star go nova.
Paul in KY
@Amir Khalid: I was sure I had seen him fronting some kind of rock band.
Paul in KY
@Tommy: I want to know what the Hell comes out the back end of those ships?! Why are people not dying of radiation/heat burns, etc.