...worth it for "I'll hold for Hux."

 

Alas I missed the first few minutes upon discovering that my 3D glasses were defective. I only caught the very end of the Poe-Hux conversation.

 

Oh man you gotta find a way to see it. It was gold.

 

Eh, he did see the dreadnought destroyed, and if that had still been there after the jump the Resistance would've been fucked. I saw it as more that Leia would have told him due to their closer relationship, but Holdo didn't know him on top of him having just been demoted.

Plus Dameron is one of those key people that had he been a traitor the Resistance probably wouldn't have made it through the first movie.

 

I read somewhere that JJ Abrams pitched Episode IX to Disney just few days ago. If that's correct then it pretty much explains every problem that this film has since apparently there is no big plan how it should all connect across the trilogy.

 

Just saw it, first thought coming out of the movie - and I dunno if it's been said already here - but how the hell do you have a Casino Planet and not have Lando running it like a boss?

The movie was ok. I preferred it to TFA because it wasn't as much an obvious rehash. I'm super unsatisfied to know nothing about Snoke or Rey's parents (is it assumed Ren was lying to her? I get the whole 'anyone can be a jedi' thing, but it just seems like bad story telling), but I def appreciated the amount of reverse lightsaber gripping XD

 

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

No, really. Are you kidding me? If they'd had the balls to do something like this, film would have been better. I thought Holdo was a traitor, because her plan - let's let the fleet slowly die so we can try to escape on unshielded transporters, effectively wiping out the resistance - was a perfect setup for the First Order to win. But apparently she wasn't a traitor, just an idiot, which means the entire plot of the film makes no sense. There was no reason not to tell Poe and if she suspected him of being a traitor, just stick him in a cell.

All of the Order's ships are slower than the resistance cruiser? They have the lock on that thing, just have a few Star Destroyers (ya know, some of those we saw above the planet in the beginning of the movie) hyperjump ahead of the cruiser and box it in, since apparently the cruiser has no fuel to waste on hyperspeed. Or send a flock of TIE fighters, since you established with fucking Poe earlier that point defenses are apparently useless when you're close enough.

Hell, they did send Kylo with two escorts and managed to blow up the bridge. Just send 300 this time. You're telling me you have the personnel to run the ship the size of a megacity, but you don't have a couple hundred fighters?

So, the very setup with the least exciting chase ever is stupid. Then they compound it with the boring sidequest where they push three political messages (animal cruelty, slavery, arms dealing) and they don't follow up on any of them, instead of picking one and sticking to it.

Holdo has a stupid fucking plan that kills most of the remaining resistance and acts shady to the point of pushing Poe into mutiny. Btw, if the cruiser needed a pilot for the hyperspace ramming, it should have been Leia piloting it. That at least would have been a fitting end. Why keep her alive? What can she, as a character, contribute at this point beyond nostalgia?

Granted, they didn't know Carrie Fisher was going to pass away, but how hard would it have been to film a stand-in from behind and imply that she piloted the cruiser that way? If Carrie Fisher hadn't died, was the plan for her to use Motherly Love to bring Kylo back into the Light in Ep 9?

It's like Rian Johnson hadn't even bothered to watch TFA before writing this garbage script.

 

I don't disagree with parts of what you said, other parts have vaguely reasonable in universe reasons why they weren't done, but as for Leia not being the one to stay behind - that would have triggered me more than Holdo staying. Leia was the biggest asset the Resistance had at that stage, given that her personal call for help was what was supposed to bring in the Outer Rim backup. I would have been especially triggered if they had had her go down with the ship after having pulled that whole space wizard princess moment earlier.

Shit, at that stage I'm not sure why Holdo had to stay behind--they just wanted it to keep running, so program that shit in. But then they couldn't have had one of the most visually beautiful moments in the entire saga, so whatever.

Actually, I am somewhat triggered by Holdo going halfway on the reveal of her plan to Poe--she was doing well by keeping the plan strictly need to know, but the moment her officers acted to mutiny on incomplete information, she should have been like, "We've got stealth tech yo."

 

Can I just say that I'm not a fan of the fighters at all? There's no point in ever building anything else because five fighters can just swing in and wreck everything, except of course when they're the First Order's and need to be covered. I felt terrible all movie because I was mentally screaming for Hux and the rest of his idiot brigade to do something half competent, instead they just acted like Disney villains.

 

As someone who generally doesn't like the SW films I've seen it twice and I enjoyed it.

Spoiler

I'll echo similar comments about Luke's Death being pointless when he tells Ren they'll meet again about a minute before he dies.

I was really invested at that part when Ren said "Let it all die." And the recurring theme of everything coming to an end was great. Until the film pretty much backflips on it right at the end with arguably only the Sith really being 'extinct'.

Curious to see what'll happen in IX and I'd probably give it a 7/7.5/10.

 

Fuck big ships with big guns. Clearly, the winning space navy doctrine is space carriers. Big parking garage with point defences that are actually effective against small craft and a legion of fighters of your own to launch at the enemy. ANH opens with a Star Destroyer failing hard to destroy Leia's apparently diplomatic ship. In Rogue One, one small ship takes out two Destroyers like they're nothing. What's the fucking point of a Star Destroyer if the two things it does is look cool and fail to be a threat?

Mass Effect does big ships right. In that space opera there's actually a point to giant ships with giant guns--those guns literally hit with the force of a nuke. Star Wars has big ships with the same pew-pew lazors that the shittiest small ship has.

 

Definitely enjoyed it in a 'turn your mind off and watch the pretty shinies' way, which is the way I take all the Star Wars movies.

That said, why did Holdo wait until *after* they started shooting on the pods before ramming the capital ship? And if lightspeed ramming is a thing, why is this not a common strategy, given they have no issue throwing away people anyways?

 

I'd guess its more about a waste of resources. Its going to destroy the ship used for the ramming, and it'd have to be a big ship in order to take down a big ship. They don't have that many ships big enough to take down enemy capital ships, so can't utilise the tactic...or so I'd guess.

 

It kinda shits on the established lore, dunnit? In ANH, Han says they need the computer to set the course because otherwise they could slam into a planet. If this is a precaution that's taken for hyperspeed, I can't imagine that no idiot has ever actually rammed a ship into a planet by accident or by design (for science!).

From there, I think this possibility would be a known phenomenon. And it's not like you need to sacrifice a ship. Just a big hunk of shrapnelly metal with a hyperspeed drive stuck at one end, programmed to enter hyperspeed on a collision course with enemy capital ships. This would be a weapon of mass destruction, ready to be launched against Death Star-like things.

Clearly, Holdo knew what she was doing and clearly, shields and size don't mean shit for defending against this tactic. Seems like this would be a game changer, but TLJ treats it like a one-off.

 

The space battles didn't make much sense. I'm starting to think it's best not to worry about them, and just fold them in with the rest of the things I didn't really enjoy.

 

Don't worry about space battles in a series directly named after them?

 

Yeah, overall I wasn't a fan of the movie which makes me feel embarrassingly curmudgeonly. Going into the movie the only character I cared about was Luke, and walking out there wasn't anyone.

 

Just saw it and I honestly enjoyed it. There wasn't too much that I had problems with.

I liked:

+Luke (I think he was the best character in the film). He sorta reminded me of crazy hermit Yoda, except we have crazy hermit Luke. I can understand how he got the way he did (everything he built was destroyed by his own nephew and he was somewhat at fault there as well).
+The force. I think this is the one movie that has given the best description of the force. I hope the go into it more in the future though (something seems to be going on there)
+Rebellion problems. I like that there were a bunch of problems with the rebellions plans. Everything wasn't smooth sailing for them.
+Snoke. I like that he died that way he did. Vader always wanted to kill Palpatine I believe. I think Ben/Kylo, who has been aspiring to be like Vader, would be capable of the conviction needed to kill Snoke (his Palpatine).

Basically, I generally enjoyed it. I hope we get more backstory though. I may have to start reading the books if they actually start to give more info gong forward.

 

There is a windup time in order to use the drive, the First Order ignored it because they thought the rebellion was faking an escape. I imagine if they fired on it from the moment it was starting the ship would have blown up before finishing the sequence.

But it probably isn't hard to do this far enough away that your target cant hit you before you hit hyperspeed.