nothing, when it isn't for 1.5 hours straight. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

I enjoyed Fantastic Mr. Fox. I also liked all the Wallace and Grommet movies, as well the one they made about Pirates.

hmm, this exactly the length of a Plinkett prequel video review...

Pirates!?

Hah! try three hours!



Disclaimer: I haven't watched that video and it looks really stupid

The Plinkett reviews do some analysis though of why the films are bad. They aren't just going "this sucks, that sucks", they try to justify it.

Actually, after some flat formulaic jokes about crashing into Taco Bell, about two and a half minutes in and he's starting to make some really good points about how every franchise is turning into a Marvel-style money machine.

Ah, I see. Yeah Mark Hamill was probably smart to distance himself from the movie you mentioned, they sounded like bitter and childish people who were taking their frustrations out on Lucas and just running with it.

I don't complain about grown men. I only complain about Reid, and he's a child.

(File that last one under "it made me laugh so I had to type it because that's the rule").

I laughed

I really can't stand YouTube/Internet personalities. Not saying that they don't, occasionally at least, make a good point in there somewhere.

But I don't get the whole thing where everything has a backstory like "Louis XIV - the Sun King - is resurrected as the head of the Liberal Party of Canada, and in his quest to come to terms with the modern world, he is now reviewing films, TV and games. Stay tuned for the sub-plot about his affair with his sexy anthropomorphic suitcase.".

Pretty neat, especially to see how those weird deleted scenes from ANH fit together with the film. The answer is poorly.

Anyone else notice how frequently movies today use cuts to transition? So much dialogue in these Disney mass-produced SW and Marvel films is shot reverse shot. And many other scenes have an almost compulsion to cut when there's no point to. Sometimes you'd think they don't know how to frame a scene any other way. The shot reverse shots are not even the good kind of shot reverse shot like in a Coen Brothers film, where each cut actually reveals something, I feel like many of the scenes in the newer Disney films with lots of cutting are cutting between people who have no particularly interesting expression.

Case in point:



Comparing two kinda similar scenes from The Last Jedi and Empire Strikes Back. I noticed recently that Irvin Kershner and the ESB editors did longer shots with less cutting. Less cuts makes a film feel nicer. You'll notice Leia's speech has two cuts. Holdo's has ten. Now, to be fair, part of the scene with Holdo is also about showing us what Poe is feeling during the speech. So some cuts are warranted. But some of them make no sense. Like at 0:35. They cut to show us some dudes sitting there, for what? I guess to show us they brought back a character from RotJ, but it's a fast segment that's kinda pointless. I do like the cut to the outside of the ring at 0:26. I feel like this framing is good.

Technical aspects aside, Holdo's speech doesn't make much sense. Paraphrasing: "All we need to do is survive, and we will spark the rebellion." Uh, what? How? This movie makes a big deal about needing hope. But hope is stupid unless you have good cause to be hopeful. Like an abused spouse shouldn't just hope their partner will stop being abusive. They should probably do something concrete. So making your rousing speech a ramble about a metaphysical nothing seems kinda stupid. Also, you know, the rebels who do survive call, and nobody comes. So like, that idea is stupid? I guess at the end, though, the kids on Canto Bight are super duper inspired. I suppose that mean the kids will rise up, pick up weapons and beat The First Order. Child soldiers in Star Wars, yay! But this scene and the rest are just as unclear as to what anyone's concrete plan is, long term. Apparently, in Star Wars, all you need is metaphysical beliefs to accomplish concrete goals. Or, instead of this scene and the weird pointless theme about hope, you could just make it about a fight to survive, which doesn't need a bad speech to be motivating.

Or, like in ESB, you could just have your commander give concrete instructions that make the scenes easy to follow. And you could just shoot the scene in a couple nice segments which use the medium effectively. Also, the framing (behind the pilots) makes us feel like we are one of the pilots listening. Compared to Holdo's speech, where.. idk, there isn't really any emotion to any of the shots, nor are they framed in any way which makes the scene feel personable.

Also, yes, I'm kind of obsessed with this, and I may be toying with the idea of making a video essay on this topic. So as I'm editing video and writing I'm posting thoughts here.

But seriously, I've been wanting to make one for a while. Last one to make a video essay about TLJ is a rotten egg!

Yeah it's, uh, it's a bit of a crowded field, guys.

Considering I watch about 50 TLJ essays a day I'm well aware of that. But have you noticed how many channels are using TLJ essays to get tens of thousands of subscribers for making just one video?
A TLJ essay from me could be the gateway to the creative renaissance of my life as I become a famous youtuber. Then when I release my second video, about cutting hair, I'll lose 90% of my subscribers, but at least I'll always have that spike in my socialblade graph.

Make sure you mention at length how Kathleen Kennedy is screwing up. Also repeatedly mention that she is a woman. Don't draw any direct connection between the two, but make sure you mention it a lot.

Yeah, I definitely don't get this one. Why is it even relevant? Rian Johnson was in creative control of the film, not her.

I didn't have that in my script. But I'll add it, because it will appeal to the kids. I'm planning an hour long segment where I rant about Holdo, but I'm only going to call her "Vice-Admiral Gender Studies" so people know I'm a sexist bigot without having to look up my profile on facebooKKK.

Well, it would be interesting to note when the turning point was exactly for the former rebels and Empire where women were more empowered.

implying that there are "turning points" in the sequel trilogy

It would have been before the sequel trilogy. It's pretty easy to figure out for the Empire. First they ran out of clones. Then they ran out, or low at least, of the marginally qualified men they were throwing in Stormtrooper armor.

The "turning point" was when Star Wars was bought by a company that wants to sell fascist barbies to little girls.

But you noticed how weird it was to see female First Order officers in The Last Jedi, right? It's weird because the First Order (and the Empire) represent this deeply felt cultural force, Ur-Fascism, which is essentially chauvinistic. Not that Lucas or the also-rans intended to do that, but Lucas made the Empire vaguely resemble Nazis, and Disney made the First Order vaguely resemble the Empire, and that's what you end up with whenever you do that.

So women on the bridge of a First Order ship is a lot like a car with a joystick instead of a steering wheel, or a room full of crates in a video game without any doors those crates could fit through. It just feels wrong, even if you can't quite put a finger on it.

Although /pol probably loved it, being a 4chan site full of fascists who have already been drawing Nazi waifus for years now.

Every time Reid posts something about TLJ, I get far more convinced that the only problem I'd have with TLJ would be the lack of a "This movie was made by FGR" type credit in there somewhere.

I still have absolutely no intention or desire to ever see the film, however.

Every time FGR posts something about "the only problem with TLJ is that I didn't make it", I get far more convinced that I should make a post about "the only problem with TLJ is that I didn't make it".

Meet the Parents is the best movie.

They're also nice to read before the thread takes the inevitable turn to Reddit Mirror Posts.

I think people prefer when I ramble on about Star Wars to political posting. At least we all like Star Wars here!

Most threads turn into political posting (and/or Reddit Mirroring) anyway these days (f.ex. see what happened almost immediately after your most recent TLJ post).

(Which is why my forum restructuring suggestion from early 2017 is absolutely outdated by now, because now all threads are (or will become) Trump/Reddit-adjacent anyway)

Complaining about Star Wars is how you let Disney win, man. I call for the normalization of Star Wars.

I mean the SS had some women in their ranks. But they didn't serve in combat positions, so.. yeah it's kind of weird.

A question for me is, why is the First Order just a bunch of angry white men? The Empire was too, but then again, *everybody* in the OT was a white man until RotJ tried to become diverse.

But now, the Resistance is as diverse as it can be, and the First Order is as white as it can be, except for the literally enslaved black man. So.. is the First Order a literally white supremacist group or something?

I guess I can see why the alt-right hates it, then, because the film associates them with incompetent buffoons. But to me it's more lazy and lame that they're making these associations with no context. Either the First Order should be racist or shouldn't be, but it's awkward to imply it without it being relevant.

They already have won..

TBH, nostalgia is a disease. The OT still stands on it's own, the prequels are still bad, and the sequels are still mediocre. I have no yearnings for what things could have been. In the end, it's better to have some flawed Star Wars movies to complain about than nothing. And TLJ was competent enough to be worth watching and wasn't a complete failure, but it does have some significant weaknesses. And since I apparently cared more about my childhood memories of Star Wars than I thought, it's interesting for me to compare the films and think about why.



Sorry dude! Should we discuss the ways Trump can be related to TODOA?

It's too late for me, my son. The Reid Squad has already won.

Koobie was our last hope.

What makes you think that?

Just a hunch, you know? Sometimes you can just tell these things about people..



Wot if I download TODOA, and replace every model with a JK Trump model?

In fact, I should do that, and then turn it into a Massassi holiday banner for this year. Massassi: where Trump has taken over everything Jedi Knight.

Talking about fascism and Star Wars is obviously a crowd pleaser. There’s a little bit of something for everyone.

I doubt it'd bring Koobie back.

(I actually tried to get him to return at one point, true story)