Star Wars Episode VIII: The Last Jedi

[The Legendary Shark]

List of highest-grossing films in China.

[Tiplodocus]

Second visit today at an IMAX. Still loved it. Snoke looks miles better on the bigger brighter screen.

[TordelBack]

I've done two IMAX trips myself now, 3D and 2D: they were both stunning experiences. Trying to squeeze in at least one more before its too late. Now without question my 4th favourite SW movie. Can't see Solo affecting its ranking, TBH.

(V-IV-VI-VIII-I-VII-R1-II-III)

[SIP]

Now, without question, my least favourite Star wars film.

This film has actually managed to largely kill my 41 year passion for Star Wars, which I generally just cannot believe. I still think it's just completely awful in almost every way (liked Kylo.....that's it)........that's me almost certainly done with "modern" star wars.

I just need Lando to be revealed as a paedophile in episode 9 and that's my childhood completely, well and truly,  defiled.

Cheers Disney!

Ps. Saw it twice.......first time I was bored and disappointed.....second time just completely disappointed and let down.

Bur.....I still have Indy......Crystal Skull may have been poor but at least it didn't thoroughly betray the integrity of it's characters.

[SIP]

And as orders go.....

VI-V-IV-III-II-VII-I......................R1 (horrible)...VIII (travesty).

[Krakajac]

Largely agree with you, SIP.  The Rotten Tomatoes audience score appears to be levelling off at about 49% - which is pretty dire when compared to other SW movies.

[Professor Bear]

Funny how the score levels off only after Disney have finally stopped trying to force Rotten Tomatoes to change it themselves through their allegations that an alt-right conspiracy was responsible for the low audience scores.  A cynical man - and lord knows I am not a cynical man - would almost think that Disney was aware of a way to game those review scores, hence its public comments on the matter, but now they've stopped drawing attention to that method and the scores go up.
That's a weird coincidence, isn't it?

This film has actually managed to largely kill my 41 year passion for Star Wars, which I generally just cannot believe.

To be fair, it's not so much the film as the fact that without at least one of the original trio, there's nothing left for OT fans to come back for, except maybe to see the Millennium Falcon get blown up in part 9.  Essentially, the story they've been following all these years is finished.

[Eric Plumrose]

Crystal Skull may have been poor but at least it didn't thoroughly betray the integrity of it's characters.

Marion's being a smitten kitten was absolutely one of the worst things INDY IV inflicted.

[TordelBack]

Essentially, the story they've been following all these years is finished.

On this at least we can agree!  The story actually finished in 1983, it's just taken us this long to get to a new one. Did folk really go into these movies hoping for a satisfying continuation of their characters' stories? I can't see how that could have been, and still allowed new characters to be important. Our heroes had to fail and die, or there was no need for new ones: in the execution I though the ways in which this happened were true to the characters,  and remarkably heroic.

Personally I'd have started the sequel trilogy at about the point we are likely to find ourselves at in Episode IX, but I don't have billions of dollars to invest and hungry shareholders to feed. Now that they've chewed through most of their insanely expensive IP inventory, I'm interested to see where Disney take their investment.

OTOH circa 50% approval seems a fair representation of this thread. 

Still,  Indy V on the way,  that's bound to be ace,  eh?

[TordelBack]

Crystal Skull may have been poor but at least it didn't thoroughly betray the integrity of it's characters.

Marion's being a smitten kitten was absolutely one of the worst things INDY IV inflicted.

Really?  I absolutely loved that bit. God that woman's smile could power cities.

[Colin YNWA]

To be fair, it's not so much the film as the fact that without at least one of the original trio, there's nothing left for OT fans to come back for, except maybe to see the Millennium Falcon get blown up in part 9.  Essentially, the story they've been following all these years is finished.

You say that as though its a bad thing. Lets move to new stories.

I do love a bit of Star Wars film rating. So my (Jedi) order is...

ESB > SW > LJ + RotJ* >>>>>>> R1 >>>>>>>>>>> AotC > tFA > RotS > PM

As ever I reserve my right to change my mind at the drop of a hat (the second trilogy scores as I've only watched them in chunks via my kids watching of them *they love them* and so are a little wonkily based on exciting snipets here and there.

*I'm still flimflaming over this one. I think I prefer LJ but I keep meaning to find time to watch Return again to make my mind up.

[JamesC]

To be fair, it's not so much the film as the fact that without at least one of the original trio, there's nothing left for OT fans to come back for, except maybe to see the Millennium Falcon get blown up in part 9.  Essentially, the story they've been following all these years is finished.

You say that as though its a bad thing. Lets move to new stories.

I do love a bit of Star Wars film rating. So my (Jedi) order is...

ESB > SW > LJ + RotJ* >>>>>>> R1 >>>>>>>>>>> AotC > tFA > RotS > PM

As ever I reserve my right to change my mind at the drop of a hat (the second trilogy scores as I've only watched them in chunks via my kids watching of them *they love them* and so are a little wonkily based on exciting snipets here and there.

*I'm still flimflaming over this one. I think I prefer LJ but I keep meaning to find time to watch Return again to make my mind up.

ROTJ is my favourite one but it's worth noting that it's the film that suffered worst from the 'Special Edition' releases. I can't watch the SE version so stick to my original cut VHS instead. In the SE the pacing of the whole Tattoine section (which for my money is one of the greatest Star Wars sequences of them all) is completely ruined, as is the Sarlaac scene. They also ruined the ending.

[TordelBack]

Ugh,  yeah,  the RotJ SE (and especially the v. 2.0 stuff) is mostly terrible. Yow-Yowza's teeth being the worst offender (completely undercutting the grimy threat of Jabba's Palace) closely followed by Force Ghost Hayden.  Not sure the pacing is badly affected,  though -  it was already pretty poor.

[IndigoPrime]

Here, I'd say ESB > SW > TLJ > TFA == R1 > ROTJ >>>>>> TPM >>>>>>>>>>>>> ATOC >>>>>> [many days later] >>>>>>> ROTS.

But then I'm no SW nut. I like the originals for what they are, and had the toys etc. as a kid, but they were just another in a long line of things I enjoyed at the time. These days, they're fine. In all honestly, the wife and I enjoyed re-watching the Back to the Future trilogy more (and SW, as I've said before, is very weird with its Smurfette syndrome).

I quite like the new ones. They desperately need better script editors, but show me a modern film that doesn't.

[SIP]

In total agreement on the jedi SE, all completely unnecessary.

I have high hoped for Indy V, I really do. I'm waiting on an announcement that it will be Spielbergs next project. Bottom line is they have already stated categorically that Indy will not be killed and that Lucas would be on board. For me that's good enough.

As for crystal skull, I thought if you took some of the sillier sequences out (monkey swinging), got rid of all the mac double/triple agent stuff.....it's a fairly decent adventure film. I'm certainly not a hater on that film, and liked the happy ending.

With regards to the character progression of the original trilogy heroes I'm not sure why we must expect them to fail and die? Why? They could have been used in great ways without any of the misery and death. Any writer worth his salt could have done that. Why must they effectively ruin the characters for me and Rob me of my 1983 happy ending? That didn't need to happen.