Movie rant

[67ebd1ea13f0eXkilljoy98]

Like how you could tell that Rise of Skywalker was supposed to be a Star Wars movie.

Hey while certainly not perfect it’s not RoS bad. Tho I agree that ros really didn’t have much going for it, certain bits would be recognizable as a Star Wars thing but others are mediocre-bad

[67ebd1ea1410bvoodoo47]

*smiles in completely ignoring all Star Wars movies after the first 6*

[67ebd1ea14207Unknown Person]

There are only 3 Star Wars movies.

[67ebd1ea1481aJDoran]

There are only 3 Star Wars movies.

I'm not a big Star Wars fan, so I don't know the post original trilogy films too well (but I was around at the time of the original trilogy, and they were massively popular and very good, to anyone who wasn't around in the late 1970s, it must be hard to understand how big Star Wars (Episode four) was). I have seen all of the prequels, sequels, etc, and none of them (to me) even approach the original trilogy. Though I did like Rogue One.

Some mega-fans say that there were only two and a half good Star Wars film, as they don't want to recognise the second half of Return of the Jedi as being canon, because of the immense stupidity of the Empire's best Stormtrooper forces getting beaten by a bunch of three foot teddy bears armed with stone age weapons. And I do sympathise.

But to any Star Wars fans disappointed by Disney's attempts to ruin the franchise, just be glad that you're not Doctor Who fans. Compared to the way Doctor Who has been transformed into a virtue signalling pantomime with scripts so bad that they *cannot* be seriously intended to be genuine, enthralling  science-fiction, and bearing no resemblance at all to either the science-fiction and cultural giant that it was for so many decades, nor to anything that could rightly claim to be entertaining, then Star Wars, no matter how far it has fallen, has at least not fallen anywhere near as far as Doctor Who.

Doctor Who, Star Wars, The Marvel Universe, Indiana Jones, etc, how have such monumentally huge and popular franchises managed to fall so low in recent years. And WHY WHY WHY do subsequent episodes and new films, which are not aimed at the genuine fans but instead are aimed at pleasing mostly people who have no interest in watching these franchises ever, why are these so-sub par additions continually given the green light by the studio heads? You'd think at least the studio heads, who are only in it for the money, would say "Hang on, this franchise was massively popular, and made us a fortune, then we changed the formulae try to attract other demographics and earn politically correct points, and lost most of our regular viewers, and gained almost no new fans because the people we wanted to attract don't much like science fiction anyway, so AND HERE's an idea - let's go back to making the sort of films that were really popular and made us a fortune?".

[67ebd1ea1494avoodoo47]

because [Critical Drinker]MODERN AUDIENCES![/Critical Drinker]

split into new rant topic?

[67ebd1ea14b26JosiahJack]

Ah another Critical Drinker thinker.  Very insightful that one.

Star Wars, my take:
4-6 are Old Testament
1-3 are New Testament
Rogue 1 and Solo are Apocrypha
7-9 are heretical writings of much later groups.

[67ebd1ea15016Mystery User]

Some mega-fans say that there were only two and a half good Star Wars film

I was extremely close to actually write 2.5 films.... but didn't wanted to come across as peculiarly picky or even strange.

I've read online that Star Wars 3 was renamed from Revenge of the Jedi to Return 2 weeks or so before theatrical screening.

I was planned to show multiple death stars, the imperial capital planet had abbadon & much more and at one point star wars 3 shouldn't have even featured darth vader @ all but should have focused on boba fett being the main villain & vader's reappearance was planned in the 4th or 5th movie & hadn't george & marcia lucas parted ways there would have been either 9 or 11 star wars movies in more or less continous intervalls, etc. Etc. bla bla yadda yadda this is everything that i know... in my head canon ♩ ♪ ♫ ♬    star wars 3 is like in those aforementioned concepts etc. etc. etc. and in my headcanon the emperor looks like the one with superimposed monkeyeyes from empire strikes back and star wars dna is even prevalent in system shock games etc. etc.

[67ebd1ea15df4sarge945]

*smiles in completely ignoring all Star Wars movies after the first 6*

Wait, you bothered with the Prequels?

Doctor Who, Star Wars, The Marvel Universe, Indiana Jones, etc, how have such monumentally huge and popular franchises managed to fall so low in recent years. And WHY WHY WHY do subsequent episodes and new films, which are not aimed at the genuine fans but instead are aimed at pleasing mostly people who have no interest in watching these franchises ever, why are these so-sub par additions continually given the green light by the studio heads? You'd think at least the studio heads, who are only in it for the money, would say "Hang on, this franchise was massively popular, and made us a fortune, then we changed the formulae try to attract other demographics and earn politically correct points, and lost most of our regular viewers, and gained almost no new fans because the people we wanted to attract don't much like science fiction anyway, so AND HERE's an idea - let's go back to making the sort of films that were really popular and made us a fortune?".

You've fallen for nostalgia, unfortunately.

The Star Wars holiday special came out between A New Hope and The Empire Strikes Back, so there was already ABYSMAL Star wars content before the OT was even created. Long before Disney got their hands on it, you had the lackluster prequels, as well as a bunch of extended universe stuff that was very hit or miss with it's quality. In fact, George Lucas has basically been milking Star Wars since it's inception.

Marvel was never good either. Iron Man is okay, and was a pretty solid start for Marvel, but all the people complaining about Marvel "being bad now", have obviously forgotten the absolute stinkers put out by Marvel in the early days. Remember Iron Man 3 and Thor 2? Even the "Good" marvel movies have, in my opinion, not been that great. I remember going to see the original Avengers movie, after hearing it was GREAT and coming fresh from watching Firefly to see "Joss Whedon's next masterpiece", and I left the theater disappointed because it was only decent, not amazing. You can argue Marvel has declined in recent years in terms of their big tentpole films, but Marvel has been extremely inconsistent in quality since it's inception.

A lot of people (especially millenials) have this strange view that "everything is getting worse" and that good pop culture has been "eroded over time". Depending on their politics, this is usually due to either wokeness, pandering, or some combination. The reality is that pop culture has almost always been bad, people have generally always liked lowest-common denominator slop, and NOBODY who has ever liked Marvel has ever had a worthwhile opinion on media, because it's always been garbage. Marvel was designed from day 1 to appeal to everyone to maximise ticket sales. Have their been a few good Marvel films? Of course. But being a fan of "the franchise" is extremely stupid when the franchise has basically always been bad.

The red pill is accepting media's decline, but the true black pill is understanding that popular media has always sucked, it always will suck, and that's the way we like it because we keep supporting stuff that sucks.

The only way to find something enjoyable is to eschew the mainstream and look elsewhere.

Nowhere is this more prevalent than in video games. Avoid the AAA slop, that much is obvious, but you should also avoid the popular flavour-of-the-month indie puzzle game with hipster-pixel graphics. It doesn't matter if it comes from a rich studio or one person, slop sells and will always be the lowest quality content on the market. Don't fall for it.

[67ebd1ea16d88Livo]

I saw The Phantom Menace in 1999 at the cinemas as an early teen: I loved X-Wing, Dark Forces and the original trilogy on VHS. I was excited to see a new Star Wars movie on the big screen: it was a huge event, even if you divorced yourself from the marketing hype, it was a big deal. For the first time since 1983, a new (not the 1997 re-releases) Star Wars was available to watch at the movies! Wow!

Oh boy, that was my first genuine experience of a cinematic disappointment in something I enjoyed previously. Seriously, my reaction to it immediately was "That was, uh, a big disappointment, I feel very meh now...", and I felt that way well after that screening. Still do as an older millenial. I definitely soured on the franchise as a whole after that. Some of the late 90s/early 2000s games were genuinely great, but I learnt a valuable lesson in marketing hype & "corporations love making mediocre or garbage products, as long as people buy it: who cares about quality or artistic integrity?" attitude that day.

The prequels were more coherent as they were made by a single film-maker for sure, I like some parts of them, and the concepts/ideas are interesting in theory, but the scripts for them were rubbish, the filming and cinematography are mostly mediocre, and apart from Ewan McGregor, most of the acting is rough. Hell, I noticed some of these problems as a very stupid, dumb teen back in 1999, which is saying something. Also, Lucas made a ton of money from the merchandise rights for the original trilogy, he outright refused to allow the Spaceballs parody to be made UNLESS Mel Brooks gave up the right to make any toys, merchandise etc from the film.

Lucas has been a "I want every opportunity to make as much money as possible now please!"  type of guy for a very long time.

Anyway, sorry to backseat mod, but maybe splitting off this discussion into a new topic might be a good idea.

[67ebd1ea17989sarge945]

I was a dumb kid and loved the Star Wars prequels, but I have grown up since then.

That said, I will always prefer a man getting out of touch and producing crap over a faceless megacorporation running an eternal firehose of garbage to try and make a buck.

As much as I dislike the prequels, I appreciate Lucas for not filling the cinemas with crap constantly.

Which is more than I can say for Disney/Marvel.

[67ebd1ea17cf0icemann]

I really like the prequels, except for the 2nd one. Phantom Menace has the racing, excellent light sabre battles, music and Darth Maul. Revenge of the Sith is the best of the lot (of the prequels).

As for the new trilogy. First is ok, the other 2 are TERRIBLE. Hate them with a passion. They completely ruined the jedi + Luke Skywalker. Rei and Kylo are the only good aspects there.

Spinoff films: Rogue One - Love it. Excellent film. Solo: Boring. Watch once only kinda film.

Tv shows: The Mandalorian is excellent (except for season 3), Endor also great. The rest range from ok to bad.

[67ebd1ea1e365JDoran]

You've fallen for nostalgia, unfortunately.

I really, really haven't, as I will explain. I, for example, am a massive Doctor Who fan. I have most of the TV stories on DVD (both the classic series, and the 2005 onwards TV series), most of the Target novels (which are the TV stories in book form), most (maybe all, I'm not sure) of the original novels (as in the stories are original, not based on any TV stories), many of the audio original stories, and even a few of the non-fiction books (explaining things like the history of the franchise, the making of individual stories, actor interviews, etc). And I can, and do, re-watch or re-read these whenever I want to. And that is (a) absolutely brilliant, and be totally non-related to nostalgia. I can see anytime I like just how good or bad a Doctor Who story of any age or format, so I can judge it by it's own quality, and not by any vague remembrance fuelled by nostalgia.

And my own view of the modern *monumental* decline of Doctor Who (a view shared by *all* of my friends, and the official viewing figures) is based purely on fact. The TV series has gone done by an incredible drop of quality, much worse than any other franchise has suffered. To me, and *many* other Doctor Who fans, the Peter Capaldi era was the last, anything after that is not Doctor Who. I sat through the who miserable following series, and it was *awful*. And from what I have seen on Youtube reviews, it just gets worse (amazingly) from there. I haven't bought a DVD, book, or anything else Doctor Who related that is post-Capaldi, and I really don't think that I ever will.

Fortunately, I have twenty six series of classic Doctor Who, along with ten series of the modern series, very many novels (my favourite part of the whole Doctor Who franchise is the Virgin New Adventure post-1989 novel series), and audio stories, and yes, the quality of all of these do vary very much, but overall the franchise was very good, with enough good to massively outweigh the bad. I don't like either the two Peter Cushing films, nor the 1996 Paul MgGann film (though I did like McGann's Doctor, and I find Cushing to be really great as an actor), I'm not a fan of the first Doctor's (William Hartnell) era, and I've yet to find a Doctor Who game that is worth playing. I might also one day try to track down some of the Doctor Who comic books, I'm not sure why I've never looked for them.

So no, I've not fallen for nostalgia.

The Star Wars holiday special came out between A New Hope and The Empire Strikes Back, so there was already ABYSMAL Star wars content before the OT was even created. Long before Disney got their hands on it, you had the lackluster prequels, as well as a bunch of extended universe stuff that was very hit or miss with it's quality. In fact, George Lucas has basically been milking Star Wars since it's inception.

I was only referring to the official cinema films, I've never watched the TV series (real life actors or cartoons) or read the novels (apart from one, Splinter in he Mind's Eye, and I can't remember a thing about it), or the comics, etc. There might have been a million terrible non-cinema spin-offs, but I've never seen them. And the original trilogy is still really good. I have heard people say that the best parts of the Star Wars franchise are from fan-written, non-commercial  creations, the best of which are better than even the original film trilogy, but I have no experience there, so can't comment on it.

Marvel was never good either. Iron Man is okay, and was a pretty solid start for Marvel, but all the people complaining about Marvel "being bad now", have obviously forgotten the absolute stinkers put out by Marvel in the early days. Remember Iron Man 3 and Thor 2? Even the "Good" marvel movies have, in my opinion, not been that great. I remember going to see the original Avengers movie, after hearing it was GREAT and coming fresh from watching Firefly to see "Joss Whedon's next masterpiece", and I left the theater disappointed because it was only decent, not amazing. You can argue Marvel has declined in recent years in terms of their big tentpole films, but Marvel has been extremely inconsistent in quality since it's inception.

Some Marvel films were *very* good. Yes, the quality varied greatly, but the average quality was really high, easily good enough to justify fans' praise and love for Marvel.

A lot of people (especially millenials) have this strange view that "everything is getting worse" and that good pop culture has been "eroded over time". Depending on their politics, this is usually due to either wokeness, pandering, or some combination. The reality is that pop culture has almost always been bad, people have generally always liked lowest-common denominator slop, and NOBODY who has ever liked Marvel has ever had a worthwhile opinion on media, because it's always been garbage. Marvel was designed from day 1 to appeal to everyone to maximise ticket sales. Have their been a few good Marvel films? Of course. But being a fan of "the franchise" is extremely stupid when the franchise has basically always been bad.

And I have to say that your "NOBODY who has ever liked Marvel has ever had a worthwhile opinion on media," is both offensive and stupidly pretentious.  Your "But being a fan of "the franchise" is extremely stupid when the franchise has basically always been bad" is also nonsense, because many franchises aren't bad, and in fact for a franchise to survive long term usually requires it to be good enough to attract attention (and usually the customer's money).

And, like me with Doctor Who, fans of a given franchise nowadays mostly have the ability to re-view, or re-play, or re-listen to any or all of the episodes of their favourite franchises, so they don't have to depend on rose tinted memories of the older eras of the franchises. They can judge the franchise in it's entirety by viewing every aspect of the franchise that they choose, including all of it if you wish to do so. And can legitimately judge if the quality of it has gone significantly downhill.

And my own view of the modern *monumental* decline of Doctor Who (a view shared by *all* of my friends, and the official viewing figures) is based purely on fact. The TV series has gone done by an incredible drop of quality, much worse than any other franchise has suffered. To me, and *many* other Doctor Who fans, the Peter Capaldi era was the last, anything after that is not Doctor Who. I sat through the who miserable following series, and it was *awful*. And from what I have seen on Youtube reviews, it just gets worse (amazingly) from there. I haven't bought a DVD, book, or anything else Doctor Who related that is post-Capaldi, and I really don't think that I ever will,

The red pill is accepting media's decline, but the true black pill is understanding that popular media has always sucked, it always will suck, and that's the way we like it because we keep supporting stuff that sucks.

There's your pretentious drivel again. Doctor Who, Fawlty Towers, Bottom, Blake's 7, Fire Fly, the original Star Trek, Sapphire and Steel, the original Star Wars trilogy, the Twilight Zone, Danger Mouse (the original series, not the 2015 remake), Bladerunner, 2001: A Space Odyssey, Monty Python's Life of Brian, etc, all 'suck' do they? To the pretentious, maybe, but not to those who judge by quality.

The only way to find something enjoyable is to eschew the mainstream and look elsewhere.

Nowhere is this more prevalent than in video games. Avoid the AAA slop, that much is obvious, but you should also avoid the popular flavour-of-the-month indie puzzle game with hipster-pixel graphics. It doesn't matter if it comes from a rich studio or one person, slop sells and will always be the lowest quality content on the market. Don't fall for it.

No, avoiding the AAA games is not 'obvious'. Yes, some are terrible, and most are not great, but some can be great. And no doubt most indie games have a similar quality spread to the AAA range.

[67ebd1ea1f6aficemann]

Dont get me started on Doctor Who...

Was obsessed with it as a kid. Got even more into when ABC channel over here did re-runs of the entire series (Hartnell to the original end of old who).

New Who I quite liked at first, but all the lore changes / retcons just killed it completely for me. Enjoyed it up to the end of Matt Smith's era. After that meh. Still love old Who and forever will. Prefer Doctor Who as horror, edge of your seat stuff. New Who is more fantasy and become more woke as it went on. Super disappointing.

[67ebd1ea21201A Secret Member]

you should also avoid the popular flavour-of-the-month indie puzzle game with hipster-pixel graphics. It doesn't matter if it comes from a rich studio or one person

I feel attacked, i think this is a direct stab at a very certain game, namely World of Horror.

[67ebd1ea217fcXkilljoy98]

This is getting off topic and perhaps should be moved to another thread.

(Tho for a rapid-fire response to things:

Star Wars 1-6 and Rouge One are good (even with a few flaws in places), Pop Culture itself isn't bad, Marvel movies aren't all bad but certainly isn't all perfect, can't speak on Doctor Who, and lastly on the topic of a certain word starting with a w, I can't speak on that without getting political so how about we don't do that here huh?)

I realize that most people here are probably double my age but eh, figured I'd say something.

But yeah uh......something something System Shock

[67ebd1ea223bbZylonBane]

Rouge

Every time.

[67ebd1ea229a3Chandlermaki]

This is getting off topic and perhaps should be moved to another thread.

(Tho for a rapid-fire response to things:

Star Wars 1-6 and Rouge One are good (even with a few flaws in places), Pop Culture itself isn't bad, Marvel movies aren't all bad but certainly isn't all perfect, can't speak on Doctor Who

I swear that every response you post is just "um actually, X thing is good," with no further elaboration or counterpoints to back up your position.

[67ebd1ea24872sarge945]

Every time.

Moulin Rouge One

[67ebd1ea27490sarge945]

I swear that every response you post is just "um actually, X thing is good," with no further elaboration or counterpoints to back up your position.

Um actually, that response is good.

[67ebd1ea27724voodoo47]

aaand split.

[67ebd1ea27d21sarge945]

Why not call the thread "old men yell at cloud"

[67ebd1ea281e9voodoo47]

because having 100+ "old men yell at cloud" topics would be impractical.

[67ebd1ea28a49JDoran]

Moulin Rouge One

There is a Nintendo 64 game called '(Star Wars) Rogue Squadron', and it seemed like 95% of the forum posts I saw about the game instead misspelt it as 'Rouge Squadron' (and not deliberately and in a sarcastic way, as the game was very well liked and popular). It was a very common mistake, and not a big one, as you can always tell what the word is meant to be.

[67ebd1ea29830JDoran]

I've read online that Star Wars 3 was renamed from Revenge of the Jedi to Return 2 weeks or so before theatrical screening.

Yes, I read that is because (according to George Lucas, or whoever decided to change it from 'Revenge' to 'Return') it was felt that seeking revenge (as opposed to just a change for the better) was not in keeping with Jedi philosophy.

BTW, in the game Bioshock: Infinite, you briefly see into a parallel universe, and you see the outside of a cinema, presumably in their version  of France, with the name of the then-showing film as 'La Revanche Du Jedi' ('Revenge of the Jedi', of course).

And when googling for the above image just now, I read that this was likely a clue to the big twist in Bioshock: Infinite - In Return of the Jedi, Luke learns that Darth Vader is his father, and in Bioshock: Infinite Booker learns that Elizabeth is his daughter. That never occurred to me, though I have to say that to me it's not such a great or noteworthy parallel (just like to me Bioshock: Infinite isn't a great or noteworthy game - If Comstock had turned out to be Booker's father then it would have been a much greater parallel with Return of the Jedi. And yes, Booker turned out to be Comstock from a parallel universe, but that's nothing like ROTJ's twist.