Messages

I quite enjoyed Luke's character in TLJ, but have given up trying to convince anyone else of that. As soon as I report my feelings on the film to someone new, they immediately go on a tirade about Luke as if there's nothing else I could possibly dislike!

Personally, I have no tirade to hurl at anyone, I'm merely expressing an opinion and partaking in a discussion on the Last Jedi in a thread about "The Last Jedi". I thought that was the whole point?

I'm not sure how you read that as being directed at you, but I assure you it wasn't.

I quite enjoyed Luke's character in TLJ, but have given up trying to convince anyone else of that. As soon as I report my feelings on the film to someone new, they immediately go on a tirade about Luke as if there's nothing else I could possibly dislike!

[Dredd]

I stared and stared at the Dredd artwork this week. Absolutely magnificent! The Order continues to be of no interest, I'm afraid. The Terror Tale made little sense... I'll give it another read later. Deadworld is a pass until it's complete. Grey Area top class as always. Not a massive hit-rate for me right now, but I still enjoyed the prog a lot.

Now for some more quality time making Anime heart eyes at Dredd.

Good! Great! Mr. Jones is a fine director. Blue skin paint will be just fine. War robots are easy CGI and should be nice and cheap. The core revenge story is an easy sell. Can't wait!

[Grey Area]

Grey Area, man. Dan Abnett, man. Please, just more of this.

Holy crap! Now the long wait...

I wouldn't mind so much if the new ones in this film turn out to be the females of the species, though. That could be an interesting twist.

It looks kinda feminine in the latest imagery.

I too have hopes for this. The teaser left me a bit "meh", but the first trailer was sufficiently exciting that I turned it off half-way through to avoid spoilerage.

the mysteries of Snoke, Rey's heritage (I don't buy Kylo's jab)

I don't see any mystery in Snoke - Palaptine and Vader are dead so another Sith lord steps up to take power. I'm sure there's more that could be told about his background, but I didn't feel it was necessary for the purposes of the plot.

I could have done with more.

Rey's "ordinary" background is central to the major theme of the movie - anyone can use the force, you don't have to be descended from a master or to be anyone special.

*No-one* had a random awakening in all the time between RotJ and TFA?!

I wasn't actually suggesting the idea that "the Prequels were bad films" was new, I was pointing out that a lot of professional opinion writers all seemed to come up with the same idea in the same recent space of time that the PT was actually artistically significant and beloved by many despite its flaws, a notion that was marginal - to say the least - before Disney owned the property, but is now the critical consensus.

I certainly enjoyed them at the time, despite their obvious flaws, enough to buy the DVD's on day 1 even. And there is a helluva lot to like: they were a CGI-soaked spectacle of sci-fantasy that hadn't really been seen before.

I forgave TPM all its flaws *just* because of the jaw-dropping three-way saber fight at the end. Clones had a last act of epic Jedi warfare. Revenge... well, it had, erm, that quite good Order 66 bit... and the fight between Yoda and Sidious was kinda cool... but then Franken-Vader actually made me snort with laughter in the theatre...so, on the whole, not sure why I was so eager to add that one to my collection (let's say "completeness").

Nowadays, I can *maybe* watch TPM, but probably won't ever watch the other two again. The spectacle has been far surpassed, and what's left is basically awful.

All of which is why I loved TFA so much. Plenty of typically Abrams-ish plot failings, but it had everything Star Wars, and was written and directed by people who hadn't inexplicably forgotten their craft.

TLJ, not so much. Plenty to like, but a bizarre throwing-out of the all the questions asked by TFA, and an inexplicable, half-ass reset of the story. Episode 8 exited without addressing the mysteries of Snoke, Rey's heritage (I don't buy Kylo's jab), why Luke's light-saber ended up where it did, or how the First Order came into being. How did they fail so massively?

Thanks both. Seems clear which one to get.

If, say, I didn't yet have a collected _America_, is there any difference between the 2013 collected edition and the Mega Collection one (apart from the cover)..?

Great screenie. Look at that! AvP is mostly an okay film, but that final battle is amazing.

Alpha was the first miniature I ever painted, 30 years ago! Long since misplaced, unfortunately. Since I just started painting mini's again this year, the timing is very good.

I doubt I'll have the opportunity to fit a new skirmish game into my rotation, so the question is: am I going to drop 50 quid just for a bunch of Strontium Dog miniatures?

I mean, *I* know the answer, I'm just throwing it out there.

That image looks familiar. Games Workshop Dredd RPG?

I want an Obi-Wan movie for the simple reason that it would be nice to see Ewan Mcgregor get a crack at the character under a decent director, with a decent script. I fear the problem is that Obi-Wan must surely be wallowing in survivor guilt/PTSD before he finds redemption as Luke's mentor. It won't make for a happy story, will it?