Movie Star Wars: The Force Awakens - *Spoilers & Rumours inside*

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Did anyone else think the soundtrack was a little... subdued?

Didn't jump out to me as much.
Thought the exact same thing and thought it was surprisingly poor from Williams. However, as I posted earlier, I actually got it off iTunes today and it's fantastic. Right up there with his best Star Wars scores. So must've been a conscious directorial/sound mixing choice. Shame. Lucas was always good at combining multiple elements and he always knew when to make the music front and centre.
 

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Thread starter #3,104
Sorry to harp on it, but...

There are no innocent people in TFA. The Jakku villagers were protecting the missing piece of the map. They were scum villagers. Protecting an apostle of the Church of the Force who are ONLY about the Jedi side of things, wanting no balance in the force even. Look at it from the First Order's perspective, and Kylo's. They are legitimately an enemy. Legitimately allied to the Resistance, which is like a splinter militant cell of the New Republic -- which is on cold war terms with the New Order. They're being treacherous.

From the First Order's perspective that is right. But from Finn's perspective?

That was Finn's perspective too being a 20-year indoctrinated stormtrooper. Just like all the other Stormtroopers following their commands, doing their jobs. They would've been ingrained to think of the enemies of the FO as enemies. The more pressing point is that in literal minutes, he went from not wanting to kill strangers, to killing his friends/acquaintances that he's known for 20 years. Not only is the change of heart, the changing of sides a bit of a reach, but the lopsided manner of that (20 years vs 5 minutes of battle), and even worse than that, validating in himself suddenly that it's ok to kill stormtrooper friends....especially when just 5 minutes before he was crying at the death of a stormtrooper!

I don't know how better to highlight that. It's like being so upset at the death of your sibling by the hands of your cousins, that you decide to join your cousins side to kill more of your siblings.
 

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Just on the use of clone/kidnapping children.

From IGN:

General Hux is an antagonist in the Star Wars Universe.

Biography
The young officer was raised by his father while the Empire was in exodus in the Unknown Regions. Hux's father was an Imperial officer at the time the Empire fell and had developed techniques for training a new breed of stormtrooper, raised from an early age to serve and trained through intense combat simulations.

When Hux came of age he made his father's training regime a reality and began a program of stealing young children from conquered worlds to raise them as conditioned soldiers. When it came time to select an officer to command Starkiller Base, Supreme Leader Snoke selected Hux.
 

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Sorry to harp on it, but...

There are no innocent people in TFA. The Jakku villagers were protecting the missing piece of the map. They were scum villagers. Protecting an apostle of the Church of the Force who are ONLY about the Jedi side of things, wanting no balance in the force even. Look at it from the First Order's perspective, and Kylo's. They are legitimately an enemy. Legitimately allied to the Resistance, which is like a splinter militant cell of the New Republic -- which is on cold war terms with the New Order. They're being treacherous.

From the First Order's perspective that is right. But from Finn's perspective?

That was Finn's perspective too being a 20-year indoctrinated stormtrooper. Just like all the other Stormtroopers following their commands, doing their jobs. They would've been ingrained to think of the enemies of the FO as enemies. The more pressing point is that in literal minutes, he went from not wanting to kill strangers, to killing his friends/acquaintances that he's known for 20 years. Not only is the change of heart, the changing of sides a bit of a reach, but the lopsided manner of that (20 years vs 5 minutes of battle), and even worse than that, validating in himself suddenly that it's ok to kill stormtrooper friends....especially when just 5 minutes before he was crying at the death of a stormtrooper!

I don't know how better to highlight that. It's like being so upset at the death of your sibling by the hands of your cousins, that you decide to join your cousins side to kill more of your siblings.
True regarding Finn, but he may have had those feelings for a while and he finally broke on Jakku (it was hard for Abrams to do this without flashbacks at the start, which ruins the flow of the movie for just one character, it was still lazy however on Abrams part), due to maybe an individual failing in the indoctrination process or during one of the screenings to reinforce the indoctrination.
 

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Thread starter #3,108
A good point posted elsewhere...

She is not seeing the history of the saber or Luke's ... she is seeing the darkside and the voices in the background Yoda and Ben are trying to be heard over the darkside. The Bespin fight, Luke hovering at the fire, the man dying in the rain, KOR in the rain, her being left behind by her family are all negative emotions that can lead to the darkside.
 

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Thread starter #3,109

Regarding when the slaughter at the "academy" occurred....

Audrey ‏@natallianovna
@pablohidalgo wait just to clarify, do you mean that it was more recent than 14/15 years ago?

Pablo Hidalgo ‏@pablohidalgo
@natallianovna Yeah. It was more recent than that.

----

So Rey was never there, and may have happened when Rey is actually around the same age she is now.
 
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Regarding when the slaughter at the "academy" occurred....

Audrey ‏@natallianovna
@pablohidalgo wait just to clarify, do you mean that it was more recent than 14/15 years ago?

Pablo Hidalgo ‏@pablohidalgo
@natallianovna Yeah. It was more recent than that.

----

So Rey was never there, and may have happened when Rey is actually around the same age she is now.
Where did you pull "Rey was never there" from those tweets?
 

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He got wipped by an amateur uneducated scrap metal collecter without balls who had never used a lightsaber before.

He's a pretty sad case. Most pathetic movie villain ever.
1. He was injured.
2. He was emotionally out of whack after what he did to Han.
3. He's scared of Rey for some unknown reason.

The Kylo of the first half of the movie was a whole lot more scary than Kylo in the second half of the film and he'll probably look clinical in Episode 8. Probably overpower Rey in their next meet up.
 

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Thread starter #3,112
Where did you pull "Rey was never there" from those tweets?
She was dropped off on Jakku as a 5-7 year old girl.
The Knights of Ren destroying Luke's "academy" happened much more recent in the timeline, when Rey was like say 15 years old.
Hidalgo is confirming that the destruction of the temple happened much more recent in time than 14 years ago.
And Rey is 19 years old in the movie. And 5-7 when dropped off at Jakku.
 

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Sorry to harp on it, but...

There are no innocent people in TFA. The Jakku villagers were protecting the missing piece of the map. They were scum villagers. Protecting an apostle of the Church of the Force who are ONLY about the Jedi side of things, wanting no balance in the force even. Look at it from the First Order's perspective, and Kylo's. They are legitimately an enemy. Legitimately allied to the Resistance, which is like a splinter militant cell of the New Republic -- which is on cold war terms with the New Order. They're being treacherous.

From the First Order's perspective that is right. But from Finn's perspective?

That was Finn's perspective too being a 20-year indoctrinated stormtrooper. Just like all the other Stormtroopers following their commands, doing their jobs. They would've been ingrained to think of the enemies of the FO as enemies. The more pressing point is that in literal minutes, he went from not wanting to kill strangers, to killing his friends/acquaintances that he's known for 20 years. Not only is the change of heart, the changing of sides a bit of a reach, but the lopsided manner of that (20 years vs 5 minutes of battle), and even worse than that, validating in himself suddenly that it's ok to kill stormtrooper friends....especially when just 5 minutes before he was crying at the death of a stormtrooper!

I don't know how better to highlight that. It's like being so upset at the death of your sibling by the hands of your cousins, that you decide to join your cousins side to kill more of your siblings.
He never said he wouldn't kill. He just said he made a choice not to fight for them. He would have known exactly what the conditioning process was like and how hard it would be to reason with any of them. They started shooting at the TIE Fighter first...that makes them fair game. The stormtrooper who died in front of him baptized him in blood into a new life. At no stage during the movie does Finn ever attack before being shot at first - he's the anti-Han.

What you are talking about is akin to that video where someone says that Luke Skywalker is a mass murderer because he blew up the Death Star. Bad guys don't get mourned.
 

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Thread starter #3,114
Just on Finn again...

His whole character was inconsistent. Not just that aspect of the story, but elsewhere too. Like him saying, "no one has looked at me like you did the first time" to Rey, but the first time Rey looked at him was with anger and suspicion. In short, he's just a sidekick thruout the story, he is fully involved in every scene where there is a plot hole, or a device to move the story along. It seems.
 

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Just on Finn again...

His whole character was inconsistent. Not just that aspect of the story, but elsewhere too. Like him saying, "no one has looked at me like you did the first time" to Rey, but the first time Rey looked at him was with anger and suspicion. In short, he's just a sidekick thruout the story, he is fully involved in every scene where there is a plot hole, or a device to move the story along. It seems.
I think he was referencing when she asked if he was with the Resistance and how she "never saw anyone from the Resistance". Still part of the first time they met
 

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Thread starter #3,116
He never said he wouldn't kill. He just said he made a choice not to fight for them. He would have known exactly what the conditioning process was like and how hard it would be to reason with any of them. They started shooting at the TIE Fighter first...that makes them fair game. The stormtrooper who died in front of him baptized him in blood into a new life. At no stage during the movie does Finn ever attack before being shot at first - he's the anti-Han.

What you are talking about is akin to that video where someone says that Luke Skywalker is a mass murderer because he blew up the Death Star. Bad guys don't get mourned.
Someone else's post agreeing with me on another forum....

Finn has this sudden awakening to the horrors of violence and leaves the FO… Why? Why now?? But, whatever. Fine. Ok. He just 'does.'

But in the process of escape, he's maiming and killing LOTS of FO soldiers. People he knew. People he knew had been abducted as children and brainwashed to serve. He goes as far as skewering one right through the chest with the lightsaber. And throughout the violence, Finn is all 'Woo hoo! High fives!' This makes zero sense.

It's a strange gap in his character. It was kind of okay when they were clones… Except, no. Still human. And kind of okay when they were recruits because then they chose to serve evil. Except no, cos maybe they don't understand the Empire as evil.

But now that we know FO Stormtroopers are all presumably abducted, brainwashed children (Sheesh, Disney… 'Go dark or go home, hey?) – and no one understands this better than Finn - it's very strange that he's not only not refusing to kill them, he's not even a little reluctant or hesitant. Not only is he not hurting with Kylo Ren-sized angst when he has to strike a brother down – not only is he willing – but he seems to actively enjoy it, like a game.

They need to deal with that. My guess/hope is that it's something like 'in combat situations when he's in actual danger, his programming just kicks in' or something. It's fixable, but needs fixed. This explanation is a bit weak and unoriginal, I know, but it could work. It's at least better than nothing. I hope we're not expected to keep watching this guy who's 'only here cos he's anti-violence' keep literally burning holes through people without any sense of conflict or explanation.

What I'm really hoping is that we see some of the violent action from TFA from Finn's POV as he's in the coma, the trooper he literally ripped through being the most haunting vision. Maz, Luke, or Rey helps him process this. It's hard and scary. But he does it. This not only brings him to terms with what he's done, it also breaks his Stormtrooper programming. And then he wakes up.

But who knows what will actually happen? They just really need to directly address it. It's a huge writing flaw right now.
 

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Thread starter #3,118
Another good point why the Finn character was poorly written...

But how about fighting with the Resistance against the FO which he obviously REALLY hate instead of making his lifequest to "protect" Rey. He's fighting for her in an emotional way, that's what they could have made different. All he want's is getting as far as possible from the FO and bring Rey with him. If there's to be any kind of romance between the two it should have grown over time for BOTH characters, along with a common goal. It shines through too much that all Finn really cares about is a relationship with Rey. He doesn't even care about if the Starkiller Base destroys the Resistance cause he came along only to save Rey.
That doesn't rhyme very well with why he abandoned the FO in the first place.

The Finn character would have made more sense if he was determined from the start to fight the one thing he hates and ran away from in the first place; the FO.
 

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My thoughts. Luke's going to rip that light sabre out of her hand with the force and threaten to kill Rey. That would be a dramatic start in any case.:D
Lukes going to tell his daughter to frack off, then the first order will come and attack them, forcing Luke into the battle.

and on fin. Shit character, even worse than the token black guy in five and six.
 

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The Kylo of the first half of the movie was a whole lot more scary than Kylo in the second half of the film and he'll probably look clinical in Episode 8. Probably overpower Rey in their next meet up.
The Kylo of the first half of the movie was the image Kylo projected. The second half was the (current) real thing.

Kylo may be strong in the force, but he does not understand how to let it speak through him. His power comes not in Anger and Hate, but in Fear. He doesn't "Feel" the force, as much as he "Wants" the force. As a 'Jedi' he was weak-minded, his failures leading to embarrassment and humiliation led him to embrace the dark-side - temporarily increasing his performance. Seduced by the easier path, Kylo WANTS to be a 'Sith', but is not necessarily evil. He tried to prove to himself through killing Han, but instead this will ultimately be what makes him rethink his ideals.

Rey may also be strong in the force, but more importantly has a natural ability to 'feel' the force - throughout the movie, she consistently embraced aggression as a conduit. When faced with the 'enemy', she - like Luke before her - will turn to dark side powers to win. The question will then be - can she resist the temptation, turning her back on her ultimate potential for the "greater good"?
 

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My only major nitpic (other than the TIEs not being based of Interceptors) is why did R2 just power up, there was really no apparent cause.
Because plot device. A small gripe of mine too tbh. As soon as C3PO said he was permanently out of commission (words to that effect anyway) when first re-introduced it was pretty obvious he'd power back up later on to offer important info. Was an obvious flag.
 
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