Watch the new trailer for Solo: A Star Wars Story and see it in theaters on May 25. #HanSolo pic.twitter.com/vItGnE5G11
— Star Wars (@starwars) April 9, 2018
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Gotta admit — as a 21-year-old hardcore Trekkie, I loathed the first Star Wars movie, because it seemed designed to evoke every cheap, witless, strutting, shopworn emotion that I most despised in my fellow nerds. Still not a Star Wars fan, but forty-plus years later, I’m old enough to have learned that even the most evolved humans sometimes want the comfort and joy of expensively produced, predictable variations on familiar themes the entire family can appreciate. Once upon a time…
RobertDSC-iPhone 6
The guy they hired to play the main character looks nothing like Harrison Ford, so I’ve already wtitten him off. I’m only going to the movie for Lando and the Falcon.
Major Major Major Major
I’m firmly in the “let people enjoy things” camp of life.
Off to Himeji Castle now.
In Osaka we are staying right across from the grocery store in hell. Not pictured: speakers playing both J-pop and a guy excitedly announcing bargains.
2liberal
I’ve watched many of the Stars Wars movies but Last Jedi put an end to this for me. I hated this movie and won’t be watching any more of this series.
NotMax
Gotta ask what’s up with those the cheese stands alone periods in AL’s posts lately?
Leto
The word you’re looking for is fun, though I can understand how that might be an alien concept/term to most Trekkers.
Jay S
@Major Major Major Major: That looks like a 99 Ranch sale ad done up in neon.
https://www.99ranch.com/weekly-special
CaseyL
@RobertDSC-iPhone 6: He’s Alden Ehrenreich, who played the cowboy actor Hobie Doyle in “Hail, Caesar!” I adored him in that, and am looking forward to seeing him in “Solo.”
Omnes Omnibus
Lots of us are hipsters about our little patch.
At 12, the movie overwhelmed me as it did my six year old brother. OTOH, I hated Journey, REO Speedwagon, and the like. The discovery of punk, new wave, etc., was life saving.
I don’t expect you to adopt mine. I shan’t adopt yours.
Another Scott
@Major Major Major Major: Japan is so neat. We were there briefly for a conference in the late ’90s.
We went to convenience store to get some laundry detergent to wash some clothes in a sink. We didn’t appreciate how difficult it was to tell detergent from powdered bleach from who knows what else. We had to get help to figure out what to get.
Another memory is of being in Tokyo to get some fast food (kinda Korean barbecue or similar). We were standing around a rectangular counter with the stove in the center and the women working there were yelling in this ear-piercing tone. It was painful. (Apparently the culture was that women in such roles were expected to talk in extremely high screechy voices.)
Oh, and the “french bakery” stores had beautiful displays of pastries and the like, but they used very little sugar or fat in the ingredients so they tasted very bland to our spoiled palates.
Beautiful country and people. But weird in many ways too!
Have a great time.
Cheers,
Scott.
The Dangerman
I vaguely recall the first Star Wars commercial I ever saw; I thought, yeah, that’s not gonna amount to much.
Oops.
Nicole
Yeah, but for a five-year-old budding girl nerd, Princess Leia was EVERYTHING. She, Sarah Jane Smith and Colonel Wilma Deering (though only season one Colonel Deering) were my idols through a tough childhood. Though I’m not all that excited for this one because I never liked Han Solo. Nine-year-old me hated him and Leia hooking up in The Empire Strikes Back because he was always so mean to her. Ah, Han Solo. Even long, long ago, in a galaxy far, far away, he was all about negging.
I loved The Last Jedi. It said the rebellion would be led by middle-aged women, which I have no problem with.
NotMax
Both franchises have become sclerotic.
Anne Laurie
@NotMax: You’re only noticing them lately.
FYWP permits only *one* line-space between blocks of text/videos/objects. When I need more white space, for comprehension or just elegance, I use a single period to ‘force’ another open line. At one point I’d bracket such periods to shift them to the far right, but these days I have to hand-type every dam’ format instruction, and life’s not long enough.
You have a swifter fix than div-align-equal-right, end-div-align-equal-right, by all means let me know!
marv
@Leto:
Damn!
Old Dan and Little Anne
My Winnie Cooper and I used to play play Star Wars in 1980 when we were 5. She was Leia and I was Han Solo. Good times. We’re still friends.
Butthurt Jordan Trombone (fka XTPD)
nothing but respect for MY Star Wars, said the casual Trekkie. (I’ve only seen Episodes IV and VII in their entirety, and the former in 11th-grade six years ago).
NotMax
@Another Scott
A friend has long described Japan as “a country constantly on the verge of a nervous breakdown.”
:)
Bill Arnold
I liked Rogue One; it reminded me a bit of the very first Star Wars film, albeit in a WW2 mission-movie mold and less Lucas-ey. The rest, not so much, though they get watched if on TV/cable. Did not forgive the franchise for turning the force-ability into a purely inherited talent.
Will definitely watch Solo, in a movie theater.
Brachiator
I loved both Star Wars and Star Trek. Never saw any reason to have to choose between them.
I saw Star Wars when it premiered, at the Chinese Theater in Hollywood. From the reaction of the crowd and some murmurs, I understood that a lot of people saw the movie earlier in the day and immediately bought tickets for the next available show. The fans who loved it took it to heart immediately. It was a blast.
I’m curious to see the new Solo film. It’s pointless to try to get a clone of Harrison Ford. And hell, I remember when true Batman fans thought that casting Heath Ledger as the Joker was the worst casting decision ever.
Granted, he was no Caesar Romero, but still…
khead
I dunno. This hot take seems a bit chilly. I was born in ’68.
Star Wars in ’77. Empire in ’80. Khaaaaan in ’82. Jedi in ’83. Voyage home in ’86.
Seems like there is plenty of room for all kinds of folks to get their sci-fi on wrt both franchises.
M. Bouffant
All popular entertainment is irredeemable crap. That’s why it’s popular!
Jay
StarWar’s had me as the Dolby Sound rumbled, and the Tantive IV came across the screen, then the pew, pew, pew and then it turned out the Tantive IV was the little one,
They lost me at Phantom Menace, the last Star Wars movie I ever saw in Theater,
Rogue One brought me back as a willing viewer, but I’m still not a fan.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=2RDWuA0F7yU
Butthurt Jordan Trombone (fka XTPD)
@Brachiator: Luke Skywalker is the GOAT Joker. John DiMaggio and Heath Ledger are tied for second.
NotMax
@Anne Laurie
Not familiar with the innards of FYWP but you might experiment with using a non-breaking space in place of a period to populate each additional empty line.
Code (without the spaces):
& # 160;
SectionH
I was a fan of ST, but I loved the first Star Wars movie. Because it had a lot of clever lines in it, and excellent SFX? And absolutely because it had a pretty kick-ass Leia. In comparison, even as a callow teen, I found a lot of Roddenbury’s heavy-handed messaging so, uh, heavy-handed.
Can’t say I’ve watched much ST beyond the Next Gen. I’ve taken the advice of manymany fannish friends and have never seen any of the SW prequels. We saw the Last Jedi (?) in a cinema. Mr S hated it, I was mostly Meh, and I won’t get him to watch whatever the next one is, even at home.
Omnes Omnibus
@NotMax: May I ask why it matters?
RedDirtGirl
@NotMax: Huh?
NotMax
@Omnes Omnibus
Of course it doesn’t matter in any great sense; was curious if it was intentional or not. However it is visually distracting, as when a dust mote on the camera lens appears on a photograph.
Omnes Omnibus
@NotMax: I don’t see her punctuation marks as misplaced. For me, they follow the last letter in the sentence. Then again, my hipster thing isn’t doing all my HTML coding by hand.
Brachiator
@M. Bouffant:
Often,the popular entertainment of one generation becomes the high culture of future generations.
Major Major Major Major
@Another Scott: other than all the other obvious things I’d like to export to the US—no guns, good healthcare, infrastructure, cleanliness—I want the vending machines.
SectionH
@Major Major Major Major: Looks like a lot like our local 99 Ranch Market to me.
@Jay S: Ha! Although Roger Chen, founder, is Chinese, not Japanese. We’ve got a couple of Japanese mini-malls here which look similar though.
NotMax
@RedDirtGirl
Click on this screenshot to embiggen it and look above the word ‘Gotta’ in the post.
Mike J
Isn’t evoking emotion the entire job of a director?
Omnes Omnibus
@Major Major Major Major: You would miss our messiness.
efgoldman
@M. Bouffant
My daughter spent film study grad school fighting that concept, and she’s right. That kind of elitist bullshit is why so many critics are shits.
First saw SW when it came out in ’77 (already over 30). I was blown away (as was future mrs efg) by the visual effects and Dolby sound, right from the opening roll. Great script? No. Basically a space western? Yup. Westerns worked, too.
Tehanu
@CaseyL:
Me too! Physical resemblance means nothing if the actor is good enough. Case in point, Gary Oldman looks nothing like Winston Churchill — Brian Cox, who played Churchill in the other Churchill movie last year, is much closer physically; but Oldman was fantastic and Cox was done in by a terrible script. Or Steve Buscemi as Khrushchev in the hilarious The Death of Stalin (which btw everyone should rush right out and see).
As for “irredeemable shit” — they looked down on Shakespeare in his day, that’s why Ben Jonson felt he had to defend him.
Feathers
Mom drove us across town to see the original Star Wars in 70mm on a Cinerama screen. Go mom! Always liked both Wars and Trek. Never saw a reason not to fan them both.
Watch Killing Eve tonight on BBCAmerica. Very, very good first episode Sandra Oh and the princess fromThe White Princess as assassin and assassin chaser. Written by the woman who,did Fleabag, so she gets how interesting women have chaotic lives. Fiona Shaw is the head of the Russia desk, who grabs Oh, when the men ignore what she gets right, and try to make her the fall guy for their errors. It will be eight episodes, I’m in.
Omnes Omnibus
@Mike J: She was too cool for the Space Opera thing. Others are too cool for Carly Rae Jepson.
Jay
BTW, somebody’s bombing T4 Airbase in Syria,
And this is super creepy,………
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=fvqDj3me37o&time_continue=185&ebc=ANyPxKr2ZJDTqZfFkR2rshqUJaiU5X90Lif1FEvbTDoz0CwvVrJZlATxbbJuVhIyT7_zlr6tIsNH5bPPSy5vGOk5EbjTi2Sp1Q
efgoldman
@Jay:
Yup. We were dead center in a big, old fashioned theater with nobody else there on a weekday afternoon. As I said, i was already over 30, but it grabbed me like I was a little kid.
kdaug
I was Spock when I was 6.
I saw all 3 of the Star Wars movies. Fun, yes.
But highly illogical.
Butthurt Jordan Trombone (fka XTPD)
@Tehanu: It is amazing that Stalin was only the second-worst human being to ever come out of Sakartvelo.
Brachiator
@Butthurt Jordan Trombone (fka XTPD):
Except for Batman Beyond, I never watched much of the animated Batman.
I am more serious than not when I suggest that the Joker is our pop culture Hamlet. It is a challenge to actors.
And nobody did it like Caesar Romero. And he was so badass that he kept his mustache.
efgoldman
@Mike J:
And a composer, and a novelist, and a playwright, and a painter….
Major Major Major Major
@Omnes Omnibus: eh. I mostly keep it to my own home.
NotMax
@Tehanu
Bob Hoskins did a very nice turn as Chrurchill in When Lions Roared. John Lithgow, albeit somewhat shakily, managed to pull off portraying FDR without too many cracks in the facade showing. Michael Caine as Stalin, not so much.
Butthurt Jordan Trombone (fka XTPD)
@Brachiator: Cesar’s is the definitive camp Joker, but I stand by my statement.
Going back to the OP, which franchise’s low points are worse? (For Star Trek: “Code of Honor,” “Threshold,” “Dear Doctor,” and “A Night In Sickbay.”)
Brachiator
@efgoldman:
The best critics may be gatekeepers, but they are not elitist.
The best and toughest literature course I ever had was Literature X, out of the comparative literature department. It focused on comic books, westerns, pulp fiction, sci fi. You know, the classics.
Mike J
@Major Major Major Major:
I never find myself THAT desperate for schoolgirl panties.
Jager
@Brachiator: Yep, saw the premier in Boston and when it ended the audience stood up a and clapped.
efgoldman
@Brachiator:
Good for your school and the prof
Jay
@efgoldman:
Yup, one of our best friends kids are huge Star War’s fans, we tried to explain the impact to them, then even took them to the theatre ( that was doing a Geek Run),
But they still didn’t get it.
The Last Hope, was an “experience”, every film before that was just a movie.
efgoldman
@Jager:
Us too, at the old Charles Cinema (long gone). As i said, dead center in an almost empty theater.
Mike J
@Brachiator:
A guy who worked at the the first radio station I worked at did his senior thesis in music on the triple lead guitar style of Lynyrd Skynyrd.
Brachiator
@Butthurt Jordan Trombone (fka XTPD):
I’m kinda joking about Romero, because I don’t have much need to rank Jokers.
I bailed on Enterprise, which I just found to be unwatchable. It is the nature of episodic tv that you are going to have some clunkers. But I will still watch almost any Trek episode if I have the time.
NotMax
@Mike J
Howzabout live crab?
Major Major Major Major
@Mike J: coffee and pocari sweat and whatnot ?
Pretty good hot coffee for $1 on every corner!
Omnes Omnibus
I am not of these fights. Have a good time.
Jay
@Brachiator:
Funny thing, I liked Enterprise more than Voyager.
Major Major Major Major
@Omnes Omnibus: you don’t want to argue about Japanese vending machines?
They have ones with canned ramen.
efgoldman
@Omnes Omnibus:
You’re no fun
Jay S
@Major Major Major Major: Canned ramen sounds worse than Spaghettios. ETA if they can do hot coffee well surely a hot ramen vendor would be a natural.
Brachiator
@Major Major Major Major: Canned ramen? That would seem to be heresy. But it’s Japan, so why not?
Major Major Major Major
Himeji Castle.
dmsilev
@efgoldman: I’m just (barely) old enough to remember the Charles. Big screen before it was stylish. Best film I saw there was a revival of Lawrence of Arabia.
dmsilev
@Major Major Major Major:
While I’m not sure if it came from a vending machine or not, a classmate of mine in grad school was the proud (?) owner of a canned haggis. No, I don’t know why.
Major Major Major Major
@Jay S: @Brachiator: apparently the ramen is disgusting, but with surprisingly passable pork.
efgoldman
@dmsilev:
We also saw the benefit world premiere of Amadeus there, with Gwen Verdon and Milos Forman (taking notes) sitting a few seats down our row.
Got lots of great freebies in ~20 years in radio.
ETA:Had seen the touring stage version a few years earlier, at the Wilbur
Brachiator
@Jay:
Enterprise, for me, was just dull and listless from top to bottom. I hear it got better in later seasons, but I just didn’t care.
I hated the premise of Voyager, or Gilligan’s Island in Space. But I liked most of the cast of Voyager. And Seven of Nine. I loved original Trek, but I thought that Deep Space Nine was the best series overall.
mainmata
@Major Major Major Major: It’s neon madness. I would have permanent migraines if I had to work there even without the J-pop.
JCJ
@Major Major Major Major:
I got some fries from a vending machine in Japan because why not? Definitely interesting to see what they sell from those things.
? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?
@Major Major Major Major:
Gah, all that fucking neon and colors. What is it with the Japanese and cute things?
Brachiator
@Major Major Major Major: Cool photo of the castle. I know it has been demolished and rebuilt a number of times, but it is always impressive.
Major Major Major Major
@Brachiator: I believe this version is pre-Meiji.
NotMax
@Major Major Major Major
Unfortunately (?) you’re month too early for the Yubari King Melons.
;)
Ruckus
@Brachiator:
Small world.
Mike J
@NotMax: Don’t judge me.
Bruuuuce
@Butthurt Jordan Trombone (fka XTPD): Low points for ST must include Catspaw, Spock’s Brain, and The Omega Glory (despite that I tear up at Kirk’s speech about the Constitution at the end), and Voyager’s Genesis. I’m blanking on the awful eps of TNG and ENT at the moment, though the bit in Next Gen where Geordi recreates a real-life female engineer in the holodeck and falls for her simulatcrum is creepy (though overmatched when, later on, even after she sees the simulacrum, it’s implied that she later marries him). Yeah, ST’s record on portrayals of sexuality is somewhere between poor and atrocious
Thomas
Why is nobody talking about kissing wookies? That seems like the best part to me. I assume wookies understand consent though.
divF
@Major Major Major Major: Reminds me of the grocery store scene in “They Might Be Giants”.
I find the intermittent English in the signs odd.
NotMax
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
Not Japan, but if so inclined one can chew on neon-like rainbow grilled cheese in Hong Kong.
Major Major Major Major
One of my favorite jokes about Star Trek is from Futurama’s Where No Fan Has Gone Before. The whole episode is a good Star Trek home, but it starts with them deciding which six movies to watch. Fry says “you know what six movies average out to be pretty good? The first six Star Trek movies!”
Mike J
@Major Major Major Major:
Isn’t the fan opinion that the even numbered ones are good?
I do remember being in jr high when ST1 came out and everyone knew the long lingering shots of the Enterprise were fanservice but nobody in my D&D group who went to see it together minded.
Major Major Major Major
@? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?: “From the people who brought you ‘Zen’, a new groundbreaking aesthetic… everything all at once!”
KS in MA
@Major Major Major Major: Neat!
Marmot
Here’s the thing. I think I recall that you liked Silent Running, which is what I most despise in 70s nerds. Hope I’m wrong.
Having said that, all Star Wars beyond the original 3 are trash.
Mike J
@Marmot: Arguing over which sci-fi is the best? Is this testing whether I’m a Replicant or a lesbian?
Major Major Major Major
@Mike J: you’re walking through the desert when you come across a sexy woman…
Villago Delenda Est
Ahem.
“A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away…”
Being both a Trekkie and a Star Wars fan, I’ve never had a problem not liking one or the other (although the utterly idiotic Star Trek V tested my patience. Enterprise was a disaster, except for a few pretty decent episodes (the Mirror Universe two parter was very good indeed). Even though Phantom Menace sucked, I still got the DVD, because, Star Wars!
I also never understood the antagonism between some Trekkies and some B5 fans. DS9 is my favorite Trek, and I loved the series arc of B5.
Mind you, I saw TOS on NBC!
Villago Delenda Est
@Major Major Major Major: Yes, I turn her over! Definitely!
NotMax
@Mike J
¿Por que no los dos?
;)
Villago Delenda Est
@Thomas: “Will someone get this big walking carpet out of my way?”
NotMax
@Thomas
A furry bride,
A furry groom,
Another twin-sunned
Honeymoon,
Another season,
Another reason
For kissin’ Wookiees
MisterForkbeard
@Villago Delenda Est: Enterprise had SOME very good episodes – especially in the first season, when they were really milking the “no one’s done this before” premise. The episode where they had to keep running because their phasers weren’t installed was pretty great. That was… what, episode 4?
I grew up on both franchises – used to rewind and watch the Death Star Trench battle a few times a day when I was 5 or 6, and I remember watching the Star Trek movies with my dad in the theater. They’re both fun, good franchises (and the latter Trek movies were sometimes more Star-Warsy than classic Trek in any case).
I’ve also had next to no interest in a Han Solo movie, but these trailers are slowly selling it to me. I really like the ‘new’ Millenium Falcon.
efgoldman
@Mike J:
Why not both?
West of the Rockies
@Leto:
Them’s fightin’ words, mister…
Butthurt Jordan Trombone (fka XTPD)
@Mike J: Excluding Nemesis, and so far the rule is inverted for the reboot.
West of the Rockies
@<a href="#[email protected]Bill Arnold:
Don’t let Cornerstone hear that. Dude went on a tear last night over how much he hated it with the intensity of a thousand burning death stars.
efgoldman
@West of the Rockies:
Fuckem
MisterForkbeard
@efgoldman: Unfortunate. I really liked Rogue One, though it has some issues. But they nailed the important bits.
guachi
I’m indifferent to Han Solo because it’s not a story I particularly care about. It’s the kind of story that seems more suited to a novel or comic book.
Also, I know I’m going to be bombarded by CGI and that the home audio mix is going to be poor as that’s a recent hallmark of Disney movies.
NotMax
@MisterForkbeard
Whereas the first prequel crucified them.
Fair Economist
@Brachiator:
My hubby thought Janeway was a model manager and would half-jokingly say “what would Janeway do” when dealing with messy situations.
M. Bouffant
@Brachiator: We are Devo!
Major Major Major Major
@Fair Economist: it’s hard to disagree with this sentiment. She held excellent meetings.
NotMax
@Major Major Major Major
Being saddled with the worst security officer in Star Fleet, past, present or future, tends to limit one’s options.
? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?
@Brachiator:
Most certainly DS9 was the best. Even better than TNG seasons 3-6 (seasons 1-2 had some decent episodes too). They learned from their mistakes with Wesley on how to write likeable “kid” characters which I thought was a breath of fresh air. Wesley got better later on but was an annoying know-it-all shit in season 1.
This may be an unpopular opinion but I thought Wesley Crushes had lost potential as a character, given his history with Picard as well as his own father. IIRC, their relationship was written terribly (Picard and Wesley) and was awkward.
guachi
I’ve been watching Season 1 of ST:TNG in the last week and two things stood out to me regarding the characters – lots of Season 1 episodes are Riker-centered and they really did a disservice to Wesley Crusher with how annoying they made him.
efgoldman
@? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?:
IRL, a kid that age would be.
Anne Laurie
@Marmot:
I barely remember Silent Running, so you’re wrong. Although, at some point, I may’ve said I thought R2D2 was a cultural descendent of the Silent Running greenhouse robots, which was hardly a novel criticism.
? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?
@efgoldman:
Jake Sisko and Nog from DS9 weren’t. He was a poorly written character, sorry. The final slap in the face was when Wesley was put on the windowless van with that traveler alien to become a god.
And besides that character isn’t very entertaining when the narrative is confused on whether we are meant to like the character or hate him.
moops
If I get a Disney Star Wars for free on a flight I might watch. I took a free view of Last Jedi… and that did not break even for me, even when I paid zero. I lost value watching it. I would have been better off staring blankly at an empty space. My own voided mind was preferable. I don’t get what they want to convey.
moops
@efgoldman: now THAT was great cinema. They have tried to capture that scene many times and somehow mess it up.
Bonnie
You know what I hated about the first star wars movie. Until it came along, all movies cost $2.50 but Star Wars was $4! I told everyone if they go see the movie and that price all movies will go up to $4. And, they did. No $3 movies, no $3.50, etc. Everything went from $2.50 to $4. I didn’t see that movie for two years when it came to some theaters that charged only $1. But, I hate sci-fi so it wasn’t like I missed much in my mind.
Fair Economist
@? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?: Wesley was Gene Roddenberry’s Gary Stu. The fact that he was so easily dislikable shows Roddenberry had his flaws, I guess.
I was a big Trek fan as a child but I found TNG ruined it for me. I found TNG eyeroll material with things like no on-bridge conflict, Wesley Crusher, and the Ferengi, but it also opened my eye to flaws in TOS so after I saw it I couldn’t enjoy TOS so much either. To be fair, I was also becoming disenchanted with TV in general as I’d largely stopped watching it a few years before. I did become a big fan of the first three seasons of B5 later, though.
different-church-lady
@The Dangerman: Quite a while ago there was a feature piece about Lucas in the New Yorker. The story went that he did some kind of work in progress screening of the first film for friends and insiders. None of the special effects had been done yet, so Lucas had inserted black and white WWII air battles as placeholders.
Everyone there thought it was going to be a catastrophe… except Speilberg, who said something like, “That film is going to make millions of dollars.” Because even though the plot was nearly unfathomable in the pre-screening, Speilberg could still sense the fundamentals of the story were going to be very compelling.
? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?
@Fair Economist:
Even seasons 3-6 of TNG? To each his own. If you liked Babylon 5 you’ll definitely like DS9. Though TNG had continuity to it, DS9 had continuing storylines that stretched past single episodes and two-parters to multiple-season-spanning ones
NobodySpecial
Loved em both, it’s not exclusive for me. Most of my friends are equally agnostic in the ST/SW stuff as well. We play the Star Wars and Star Trek role playing games on a staggered schedule, and they’re both a good time.
MisterForkbeard
@efgoldman: My brother and I (who would have been… somewhere between 9 and 14 at the time, can’t quite remember) absolutely LOVED Wesley. I still like the character, actually – and they did some great things with him later.
NotMax
@Fair Economist
Even Wil Wheaton concluded, after rewatching the early episodes many years later, that the initial Wesley Crusher was an irritating little git.
poleaxedbyboatwork
Remembrance of Star Wars Past.
Sort’va Proust n his madeleines moment for me, this post. (T’associative train a memory is a powerful thing n triggered by the most unexpected n innocuous of impet(i); reckon since I wreck everything lingual anyways [ask anyone!], why not foist a neologism on the ravening horde just for lagniappe.)
Point being: Outta curiosity, rewatched the original Star Wars trilogy recently; had not seen any of the three since their original release. It’s allus inneresting revisiting a fixed memory to see how it fares. When I were a wee snot-nosed sprite in the summer a ’77, single mother soon to die, me not understanding anything but my own rage and frustration atta unfair world (poor me!), I saw Star Wars multiple times. Prolly a dozen or more. Avidly. Manically. Near ’bout voraciously. Growing up as a a street urchin eating gubmint cheese in the yet-to-be-(openly)-poisoned city of Flint, I remember sneaking into the theater repeatedly (just walk/barge past whoever’s sposed to be “in charge” like you own the place, like you belong there; if the angry/confused shouts come, which usually did not happen, walk determinedly with purpose unless and until it’s obvious that you cannot proceed apace n then break for the theater entrance then exit post-haste). Say what you will, and judge if you must, about the unbound ethics of penny-ante stealing (which I confess unabashedly not with pride but candor), I can say with complete pragmatist authority that it worked. Which is what nine-year-old me singular-minded fucking cared about. And I will say now, as a person far, far removed from those angry reactive days prior to my slip-shod lucky (for me!) acculturation, the silly rousing jingoistic Star Wars film was my inspiration to expand my mind and pursue a different life (all while stealing theater tickets, as well as other things — life is complicated!).
The heroic Star Wars tale twere thrilling to a insular reactive boy who, like Luke, felt trapped, buried in his pitiless seemingly unrelenting fate.
Tastes are subjective (and mine prolly suck according to some/many), but will say: rewatching Star Wars, I felt a pang of nostalgia. But little more. Nostalgia like, I regret to report, Kundera’s sense of kitsche. I was surprised, upon revisiting the original (and fully acknowledging its transformative effect upon me) and the two follow-ons, at how uneven and just, not very good it was. Rewatching the series, I confess I was disappointed.
Which is OK!
But that arc, i.e. sumpin you loved as a child don’t ring yer bell as an adult, ain’t a fait accompli, don’t think, i.e. just cuz a body revisits something, it don’ necessarily have to suffer. Might even improve! (In the Twain sense of, in paraphrase: “When I was a kid, I couldn’t believe what a ass my old man was. When I got to be 35, I couldn’t believe how much the old man had learnt!”). Have reread The Brothers Dostoyevski. Holds up. For me. Cannery Row. Same. King Lear. Neruda. Blake, The Little Prince, Rashomon, The Rules of the Game, La Strada. Aldo fucking Leopold! For me (subjective, I know!), they all hold up after having experienced them in my misspent ne’er-do-well youth. Know Star Wars is a pop culture phenom, n ain’t tryn’ta judge it unfairly, but will say: Repo Man and A Boy and His Dog, to cite two contemporaries, holds up a whole lot better’n what Star Wars do upon rewatching. For me.
ymmv
poleaxedbyboatwork
Karamazov. Oy.
Major Major Major Major
@NotMax: ISTR he started hating the character at the time in the later seasons.
poleaxedbyboatwork
In Search of Lost Time-Lords.
Life is funny. So are people. I love and cherish both.
SectionH
@NotMax: Oh hell, Wil used to attend Loscons while he was playing Wesley, and was very upfront about what the character was supposed be doing. He got a lot of respect for that too.
@Major Major Major Major: He probably did hate it. A few hundred traditional sci-fi fans who respected him as an actor/cool guy damn straight didn’t balance out all the other shit he took.
Rick Taylor
I’m looking forward to Infinity War.
J R in WV
I see that period, and I don’t care.
Jimmie crack corn, and I still don’t care.
Whatever she needs to do to make it look the way she wants it. , .
What will those do? I’ll know in an jiffy now.
So I typed 3 [& # 160;]s, a comma, three more [& # 160;]s and a period and got three spaces, comma, three more spaces period. No added lines.
g’night all……..
.
.
NotMax
@J R in WV
The non-breaking space doesn’t create a new line (using he Enter key as a carriage return does that), it populates – that is, is the only thing present within – each new line you want displayed as a new (seemingly empty) line (as stated above). Two lines:
Three lines:
and so on.
JR
@Major Major Major Major: I make an exception for Avatar. The Crash of big budget blockbusters.
Xenos
@poleaxedbyboatwork: I loved Repo Man! A few years earlier, as an 11 year old already reading Niven, Asimov, and Heinlein I was quite dissapointed that Star Wars turned out to be a fantasy story instead of SciFi. But I enjoyed Star Wars nonetheless. I just never loved it.
I got the VHS for my kids and they all loved it and watched it until it fell apart, and then I got the DVDs, and they watched them a few hundred times, too. No accounting for taste.
JR
@M. Bouffant: I’d rather read Dumas than Balzac.
Matt McIrvin
@different-church-lady: I recall seeing a video a while back about that version of the film, and how much of the story was created afterward in editing and post-production (the editing was by George Lucas’s wife Marcia, and Richard Chew and Paul Hirsch–they got the Best Film Editing Oscar for it, and on the basis of the video it was well-deserved).
The most surprising thing they mentioned was that in the final Death Star battle, the original shooting script of the film contained no mention of the idea that the Death Star was about to destroy the rebel base. Everything that appears on screen related to that was effects inserts and re-used footage with looped dialogue by offscreen characters. That’s why the details of that part of the plot seem a bit awkwardly contrived–the movie wasn’t originally written that way! But it’s also necessary to give the climactic battle the degree of suspense and excitement that it has.
poleaxedbyboatwork
@Matt McIrvin:
Imagining the confab, mid-shoot: “OK, time to film the Nauseating Star scene where everyone’s tummy hurts really, really bad. Hey wait! That’ll never answer. We gotta do better’n that! Hmm. Lesseee. The Foreboding Star? Nice foreshadowing, but not the zazz we need! Too spectral; no payoff. Oh, I know! How about the Verklempt Star? No, triple bankshot, too indirect. The Guilt Star? Be a shame to use that. The Go-to-your-Room Star? The We’re-Not-Kidding Star? What, what, what?”
Brachiator
@Matt McIrvin:
The thing that I hate about that video is that it falsely implies that the movie was fixed by the editing. Editing is a central part of film making, and is used to create the narrative. It is rare when any film simply shoots the script.
That the Death Star stuff was not in the original shooting script is interesting. What the hell were they thinking?
Matt McIrvin
@Brachiator: Yes, much of what was described there is really just normal moviemaking. But it’s interesting to see what they left out (lots of goofy footage of Luke on Tatooine that emphasizes how much of an American Graffiti character he really was).
Also, the detail that the opening crawl was originally this much, much longer wall of text that dumped all this information about the fallen Republic, the Jedi and the Sith, and was cut down largely by Brian De Palma after he complained about it in the rough cut.
Miss Bianca
@Major Major Major Major: so late to a long-dead thread, but just wanted to say “Hi there in Japan!” And that i just saw my first episodes of “Futurama” last week when i was holed up in a motel and *loved* it – laughed my ass off! Oh yeah, and some Trek TOS episodes as well – all campy goodness and fun.
Star Wars was my intro to Trek – as in, if I hadn’t loved it, I would never have given “Trek” the time of day.
Brachiator
@Matt McIrvin:
This is one of the fun things about the video. Seeing again now Lucas, Spielberg, De Palma were Young Turks, encouraging each other.
And yeah, the elimination of the Tatooine stuff makes the movie more of a sci fi film. The worlds become stranger and we get off the planet faster. The story becomes more focused. It’s not about Luke’s old life, but the new world he tumbles into. The editing creates a new story and clarifies the narrative. By reducing the clutter, it also brings Ben Kenobi into sharper focus. A first time viewer might wonder whether he will be the main protagonist.
J.
Alternate title: “Millennium Driver”
TenguPhule
@Major Major Major Major:
It could have been worse. There is a grocery store in Tokyo that played 90s American Gangster Rap (no, I’m not joking) while I was there. I think almost none of their regular customers understood the lyrics or just weren’t paying attention. I was half-convinced somebody must have spiked me with a shot of LSD before realizing that yes, I was still in Japan and it was actually happening.
TenguPhule
@Nicole:
But did it have to show them doing such a terrible job of it?
TenguPhule
@Butthurt Jordan Trombone (fka XTPD):
Every Star Trek Odd number and every Next Generation Movie has sucked.
Star Trek Nemesis was pretty much the bottom point.
TenguPhule
@Major Major Major Major:
They have ones with beer too.
TenguPhule
@? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?:
You’re supposed to hate him.
opiejeanne
@Anne Laurie: I thought R2-D2 looked like a cannister vacuum cleaner, and I’ll swear that was the model number on one I saw in a friend’s house right after the first SW movie came out.
Booger
@JCJ: Singapore :Mashed potatoes and gravy machine at the 7-11.