Likes: 
Faceplams: As of this moment, I think this is my order:
TESB > ANH > RotJ > TROS > RO > TFA > TLJ > RotS > Solo > AotC > TPM
Active Member
As of this moment, I think this is my order:
TESB > ANH > RotJ > TROS > RO > TFA > TLJ > RotS > Solo > AotC > TPM
RA-MEN ROPPAI
The more I analyze it, I think I only stayed (or still am) a Star Wars fan because of the Expanded Universe. The Thrawn and X-Wing books hit at a perfect time in my life. I still play Star Wars Galaxies. The main universe, prime universe, whatever it's called has always felt like "wasted potential", if that makes sense.Originally Posted by allegate
Active Member
totally get that. the stuff that makes sense still, you know.
Active Member
Best to worst:
ESB
AHH
RO
TLJ
ROTJ
ROTS
TFA
Solo
TROS
TPM
AOTC
Last edited by GulDukat; 01-02-2020 at 03:52 AM.
Active Member
Sad thing is I really liked the first two movies in this new trilogy and it ended on a sour note. I hated the first two prequels but thought ROTS was decent.
Administrator
The similarity of Revenge of the Sith and The Rise of Skywalker abbreviated titles is super annoying. Always takes me a few extra moments to tell ROTS and TROS apart.
Active Member
Just focus on the first word/letter. For me, it's ROTJ and ROTS that I often have to do a double-take.
she/her/hers
ditto. i feel like it'd be easier to type "rise" than "TROS"
xScott
Anyone read the latest on production issues? It's from Reddit so make of it what you will ...
Poor JJ, sound like he tried his best, but corporate politics...
r/saltierthancrait
Long
7
13
Here's what I've been told from a source that worked on TROS.
u/egoshoppe21h
Since shortly after release weekend, I’ve been corresponding with someone who worked closely on the production of TROS and works for one of the major companies I cannot disclose here. I have verified the source to my satisfaction. To protect the source, I am rewording what we spoke about over the last two weeks and am submitting it to you in bullet point format I have written based on what they told me. The TLDR is that they were upset with the final product of TROS and wanted to share their perspective on how it went down and where it went wrong.
The leakers for TROS had an agenda and are tied to Disney directly. My source confessed that they have an agenda as well in that they struggle with ignoring what’s been happening to someone who they think doesn’t deserve it.
JJ always treated everyone on and offset with respect so my source’s agenda is that what Disney has done to JJ and how much they screwed him over should be something people are at least aware of, whether you like him as a filmmaker or not.
Disney was one of the studios who were in that Bad Robot bidding war last year. Disney never had much interest in BR as a company but they did in JJ because they saw WB (who JJ went with in the end) as a major threat.
JJ is very successful at bringing franchises back like Mission Impossible, Star Trek and Star Wars. WB is struggling with DC and aside from Wonder Woman, DC is still seen as a bit of a joke in its current state by the GA.
WB wants Abrams for some DC projects. My source said that this generation’s Star Wars is the MCU, and Marvel’s biggest threat is a well operational DC. They want to keep DC in the limbo that they’re in right now. Abrams jumpstarting that franchise with something like a successful, audience-pleasing Superman movie makes them nervous. Their goal is to make JJ look bad to potential investors/shareholders.
My source mentioned this shortly after the premiere: “The TROS we saw last night was not the TROS we thought we worked on”.
JJ was devastated and blindsided by this. He’s been feeling down over the last 6 months because of some of the ridiculous demands Disney had that changed his movie’s story. While the scenes were shot, a lot of the changes were made in post-production and the audio was rerecorded and altered. My source said they’ve never seen anything like this happen before. He’s the director and he wasn’t in the know about what they were doing behind his back.
Apparently, JJ felt threatened over the month leading up to the premiere.
Rian was never meant to do IX despite some rumors that he was.
JJ was brought back by Iger, not KK. Disney insisted on more fan service, less controversy.
JJs original agreement when he signed on was indicating he would have way more creative control than he did on TFA. It became evident this wasn’t the case only a couple of weeks into shooting when the trouble with meddling started.
JJ wanted to do some scenes he thought were important but Disney shut it down citing budgetary reasons.
May 2019: JJ argued that those scenes were crucial. He had to let go of one of the scenes. The other scene he insisted on was approved at first. He did reshoots and additional photography in July. The new scene was shot at BR in October.
The “ending that will blow your mind” was a part of this. Older actors were included like Hayden, Ewan and Samuel and anyone who wasn’t animated. The force ghosts weren’t meant to be voices because they shot that footage on camera. The actors were in costumes. Rey was supposed to be surrounded by the force ghosts to serve as sort of a barrier between her and the Sith surrounding them.
My source thinks but can’t 100% confirm that this is because of China. It’s an office talk of sorts. Some VFX people claimed they got a list of approved shades of blue they could use on the Luke force ghosts. Cutting this out was when the bad blood turned into a nightmare for JJ because the movie he was making was suddenly unrecognizable to him in almost every way.
My source knows JJ well enough to know that he’s just not the yelling type but apparently in a meeting he yelled something along the lines of “Why don’t you just put ‘directed and written by Lucasfilm’ then?” My source wasn’t present for that exchange but knows some who were.
Disney demanded they shoot some scenes that would have things in it for merchandise. “They fly now” is one of them. It’s also JJ’s least favorite scene. At a November screening of a 2:37 cut, he cringed, groaned and laughed when the scene was on.
My source says that JJ was most likely not joking when he said “you’re right” in the interview where they asked him about TROS criticism.
JJ’s original early November cut was 3 hours 2 minutes long.
In January, JJ suggested that they turn this into two films. My source told me this well before Terrio mentioned it in an interview a couple of days ago. When Disney said no, JJ was content with making this 3 hours long.
Over a period of 9 months JJ started realizing that one by one his ideas and whole scenes were being thrown out the window or entirely altered by people who have “no business meddling with the creatives”.
They were not on the same page when it came to creative decisions and it became obvious that Disney had an agenda in addition to wanting to please shareholders. Disney could “afford messing up IX for the sake of the bigger picture” when it came to protecting things unrelated to IX.
The cut JJ eventually and hesitantly agreed to in early December was 2:37 minutes long. It wasn’t the cut we saw which he wouldn’t have approved of (and which is 2:22 long). Apart from the force ghosts, there were other crucial and emotional scenes missing. The cut they released looked “chopped and taped back together with weak scotch tape” (JJ's words).
The movie opened with Rey’s training. Her first scene with Rose was shortly after Rey damaged BB-8 during the training. Rose made a silly joke about how Poe is going to kill her for damaging BB-8. There was a moment where Rey took a minute to process what just happened when she saw that vision during training. She looked distressed and worried. The next scene was noise as the Falcon was landing and Rey runs over there. Those two women who kissed at the end were visible in this shot and they were holding hands. One of them ran towards the Falcon as it landed.
Kylo on Mustafar scene was 2 mins longer. There was a moment where Kylo seemed a bit dizzy and his vision was shown as blurry for a second. Almost as if time half-stopped while everyone in the background was slow-mo fighting. Kylo hears Vader's breathing, then shakes his head and time goes back to moving at a normal pace and he jumps right back into the battle (the scene from the trailer where he knocks that guy down which did end up in the movie later).
They cut some of the scenes from the lightspeed skipping segment. Some of the planets that were cut were Kashyyyk, Naboo, and Kamino.
The scene where the tie fighters are chasing them through the iceberg - those corridors were inspired by a video game JJ used to play in the 90s called Rebel Assault 2 (the third level in the game with the tunnels on Endor specifically).
Jannah was confirmed to be Lando’s daughter.
Rey not only healed Kylo's face scar but she killed Kylo when she healed Ben. Kylo ceased to exist when Rey healed him. My source mentioned that some people assume it was Han Solo who healed him but that isn’t true and that wasn't Han Solo. That was Leia using her own memories as well as Ben's to create a physical manifestation of his own thoughts to nudge him towards what he needed to do. That was her own way of communicating that with him. And it wasn't possible without her dying in the process. She made the ultimate sacrifice for her son and this flew over people's heads with the Disney cut.
The late November cut (the last cut JJ approved of) had scenes with Rose and Rey still. JJ wanted to give her a more meaningful arc. Disney felt that that was too risky too. My source mentioned that Chris Terrio said that it was because of the Leia scenes but this is only partially true because she had four other scenes including two with Rey/Daisy that Leia was not in.
Finn wanting to tell Rey something was always meant to be force sensitivity. In the 3 hour cut, it’s explicitly stated. There was a moment when Jannah and he were running on top of that star destroyer and Finn needed to unlock or move something and he force-moved it and acted surprised when it happened. This was replaced with a CGI’d BB-8 fixing whatever he needed to fix on there.
Babu Frik was nearly cut because some execs at Disney thought he would be the new Jar Jar. They are really surprised that people love him this much. He was JJ's idea and was created in collaboration with some artists and puppeteers. The personality was all JJ.
There were a bunch of scenes where Rey and Kylo (separately) went through quiet moments of reflection to deal with what they were going through. On her part, her going through the realization that there's something sinister about her past. Him going through regret and remorse but trying to shut it out. My source said that the Kylo scenes were especially amazing because of Adam's performance and how he managed to portray that inner turmoil. It provided much more context and added deeper meaning to both his battle with Rey and the final redemption arc at the end. It didn't happen so suddenly and it was more structured than what we got.
The Kylo/Rey scene where he dies was at least 4 minutes longer with more dialogue. Ben was always supposed to die. Source also added that if he wasn’t, then that might’ve been in an earlier draft which they haven’t read. The first draft they read included Lando (the first few didn’t). The Reylo kiss and Ben’s death was not part of the reshoots. It was a part of the re-editing. Even the cut that JJ thought was coming out earlier this month had a longer version of that scene than what was shown in the theatrical cut.
JJ was against the Reylo kiss (or Reylo in general). This was Disney's attempt to please both sides of the fandom.
JJ was not happy with where TLJ took the story. The final result is a mix of that story and the story told by Disney and whoever they tried to impress (“certainly not the fans”). JJ is gutted over the final result. Star Wars means a lot to him. He had to sacrifice large chunks of the story in TFA but he was promised more creative control on TROS and instead the leash they had him on was only tightened as time went by. A source said that this is the one franchise and the one piece of his work that he didn't want to mess up and instead it turned into his worst nightmare. When he found out that he was blindsided with the cut they presented, he said "what the fuck??" when Kylo was fighting the Knights of Ren at the end and the Williams music that was used for it was not what he wanted at all. He seemed to think it was out of place.
JJ's cut still exists and “will always exist”. We most likely will never see it unless “someone accidentally leaks it.”
Ok, so there you have it. If there are questions, I will try to follow up with my source but it’s up to them if they want to share more so I cannot guarantee an answer.
Edit: I forgot one thing that the source wanted included, concerning FinnPoe in TROS:
The source asked about FinnPoe after seeing Oscar Isaac's comment about how Disney didn't want it to be a thing. This is true. JJ fought to make this happen. This is why Oscar is blaming Disney. It's not just a random throwaway comment. He knows for a fact that it was Disney because these discussions happened. The main cast is insanely close with JJ and are just as pissed, though seemingly more outspoken about it than JJ. During TFA, Disney was hesitant to hire John Boyega because a woman was front and center so they deemed that risky enough so bringing in a male lead who's black made them nervous. JJ fought to make that happen for about nine months before getting approval. The same issue came up when JJ fought to have Finn&Poe in TROS but he lost that battle as he lost many creative battles for this film. Many people, JJ included, came to the realization during this production that the story really is told by shareholders/investors instead of the creatives or anyone at Disney specifically. He tried to make a lot of things happen and was shut down because of this. They had him on a leash and many blame TLJ for the stricter creative approach
Active Member
One thing I'm always feeling bad about is the actors themselves whenever there is a movie or a franchise that I actually like, yet you hear all these furious things from behind the scenes. It must suck a great deal to keep promoting something you actually don't enjoy in the end or can't really stand behind eventhough you gave it your best. Sucks for JJ as well and should make fans even more angry. Let alone that Star Wars is like a dream come true for most people... a dream ruined it seems.
Good thing people like Driver, Isaac and Gleeson are already great actors with a proper back catalogue and praise so they don't have to rely on this clusterfuck, if it truly has been one like many sources claim.
BUT none of the above sounds like it would have made the movie and overall story significantly better. Director's cuts rarely save a movie, but of course can make it more enjoyable (e.g. Alien 3), but they will always be flawed. The biggest fault you can give this trilogy in my books apart from it being totally unneccessary in terms of continuation of the "Skywalker saga" as they say, will always be how rushed and carelessly it has been handled. Or let's say carelessly handled, but ultimately focused on by-products like action figures, comics and books that now need to fill the gaps. I think you can't stress enough how badly this was done.
Last edited by dlb; 01-03-2020 at 10:10 AM.
xScott
Unless your Mark Hammil, then you can say whatever you want, because what's Disney going to do, fire you? (his words, not mine)
Last edited by SM Rollinger; 01-03-2020 at 10:19 AM.
Stubby Member
It's so bizarre because there is no indication Rian had to deal with any of that on TLJ (nor did JJ on TFA, or at least to anything close to that degree).
In fact, in the TLJ documentary you see Rian discuss how the Thala siren scene is probably going to get cut due to budget, and then cue him losing his mind when it actually gets approved and you see the helicopters dragging in the puppets over the water (a ridiculous thing on its own but that's neither here nor there).
So why the hyper interference now? It seems plausible enough that a lot of that happened, but have they not learned anything from how Marvel Studios operates? Was the attitude towards the salvation of Rise so bleak that they just said fuck it allowed other interests to drive the decision making knowing they were fucked no matter what?
By all accounts they started this with the best intentions of hiring young talented science fiction writer/directors and letting them do their thing. And they were able to do their thing for the most part, but unfortunately with no true communication, gatekeeper, or person to align the tracks (whether the story group was incompetent or not allowed to do their job is an interesting question), and things went haywire and you ended up with three films in a trilogy that don't particularly connect at all or make sense together.
Say what you will about each film, but I don't think anyone can argue this was a good cohesive trilogy. Who is ultimately to blame for that? Is it JJ for creating such a poor mystery box foundation? Rian for running amok in TLJ and trying to direct the best star wars film he thought he could instead of a 2nd film in a 3 film trilogy? Is it KK for failing to provide the necessary cohesiveness and guidance? Is it Disney for interfering and having an agenda with the output? The likely answer is some hybrid version of all of the above, with no one to take true accountability for its failures. But yet there was accountability with Rogue One, and Solo, and even with Trevorrow, so even within that it's very hard to gauge why and how some of the gatekeeping there was done effectively, but then thrown out the window on other even more critical moments with VII-IX.
I firmly believe this will be a case study in long form storytelling for years to come. It's obvious that all three scripts or at least detailed treatments should have been done from the outset and involved all the directors together. It's also obvious that there should have been a guardian installed to keep the creatives connected in their thought process ala Kevin Fiege. Whether this should have been Lucas, or Filoni, or whether Kennedy felt this was even a job that needed doing, one that she herself was doing (well or otherwise), or whether she trusted someone else to do it who failed her is an endless debate with no true answer right now.
I just hope we "the proverbial storytelling/moviemaking we" learn something from all this and it has an eventual purpose in helping to grow the model so new things can be achieved in its ashes.
If you look at so many of the other world building failures that have occured in the last decade plus (the sony spider-man saga, the post TDK DC endeavours, the up and down roller coaster of the x-men success and failures, etc), it does show how damn hard this is to do effectively and continuously within the hollywood bureaucracy. It's a herculean task to have everything lineup so perfectly again and again and again. But clearly, as per Marvel, it can be done. Let us be acutely aware of the failures so that the model can be evolved moving forward with a continuing pool of brilliant talent to support it, rather the perpetual feeling of a sports team that is in a constant rebuild that eventually fails only to be rebuilt again, this time with even less risk and creatively, attracting nothing but mediocrity.
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keep in mind that not everything is a conspiracy theory, even if you want it to be. yes there could be some truths in there but separating the wheat from the chaff is important.
Active Member
It is LUDICROUS that no one mapped out a story for the trilogy first. I enjoyed it well enough but it could have been so much better. I read stuff on twitter about John Boyega being annoyed about his characters neglect and I really don’t blame him. Finn could have been so much more.
my trilogy order : TESB, ROTJ, ANH, TFA, ROTS, TROS, TPM, AOTC
i haven’t included The Last Jedi because I only saw it once at the cinema and haven’t seen it since and don’t have any massive desire to, but I might like it more if I did.
I was talking to my husband about the comparison between the original trilogy and the newer stuff and he said there just didn’t seem to be any filler or unimportant characters, everything seemed to have a purpose and seemed better plotted
Last edited by WorzelG; 01-03-2020 at 12:40 PM.
Throbbing Member
Well put.
Who is ultimately to blame? George Lucas is who. He owned up to this years ago during his interview with Charlie Rose. He used a certain analogy to describe his selling of the franchise to Disney. Now, one full weird-ass trilogy later, George almost seems like a prophet with that particular analogy.
What do you think would have been a solid ending? What would you have liked to see from the 3rd film?
Active Member
1. Build upon TLJ
2. Something original (no Palpatine)
3. No J.J.
Active Member
It is extremely baffling, but to be fair, the original trilogy wasn't planned out in advance either (that's why Luke and Leia kiss in TNH, for example), but it worked because it was still an indie project, Lucas putting his own money into it and having basically everything ride on TESB, and he oversaw everything as a heavy handed producer.
The new trilogy lacks vision and direction, just stuff happens.
It's painful how quickly Disney burnt through the SW goodwill, I remember when they went nuts and announced like 2 movies for every year, with all kinds of character prequels and garbage. I'm glad at least that's not happening.
Active Member
would have been nice to have three years between each movie instead of two, for starters.
Memb, Member, The Membest
That's really it? The final Star Wars?
I wholly agree that Palpatine thing is cheap and wasn't necessary. If he wanted that jedi power all along, then why didn't he get it from Luke and Vader in ESB? The Force took a weird turn from a power that helped great fighters fight even better to woah, i can skype(tm) people (dead included) without smartphone.
When i saw the crumbled Death Star in the stormy sea, i almost pictured older Jar Jar Binks appearing and saying "Heya, let mesa show yousa how to swimsa". Spoiler: that not happened.
BADGERS
So apparently my wife had no idea I hated this movie, and it turns out she really love it/Adam Driver and she's going to go see it again and I have no idea what to say lol
xScott
About the only goodwill they have left from me is because the Mandalorian was just so badass, and it can still fit in with MY head cannon while I ignore stuff like Rebels and the sequel trilogy and yes Dark Empire because besides the Eclipse and World Devistators, bringing back Palpatine was always a stupid idea, even back in the 90s.
(The last Vader comic series was good too, so that can also stay)
Active Member
How do you build upon a movie where nothing happened? Nothing changed. Imagine being the writer for ep IX, then you ask for a tl;dr about TLJ, and they tell you that some random animals were freed on some random planet (and was probably later captured again), and Luke, who was never around, is not around anymore. Oh, and the Supreme leader is now Kylo, so we have an evil sith instead an evil sith. Everything else is basically where we ended in TFA. Good luck, build upon that mate!
What do we expect when we make excuses for a multi-billion dollar company? Both TLJ and ROS was a piss in the face, just with different flavors. As for TFA, whether you liked it or not, it has the excuse for being the first in the trilogy. Even if it had shit ideas, two movies are more than enough to iron them out. This trilogy being a joke is not on TFA; TFA gave us many likeable new characters, and that's is already plenty enough for a good foundation. Despite TLJ and ROS, I still like Rey, Kylo, Finn and Poe. I just wish it wasn't so blatant that this franchise is about Darth Vader, and Luke Skywalker, and Palpatine, and Han SOlo, and Leia and the Imperial March and the Force Theme. Even our main characters are just supporting acts for some nostalgia inducing bullshit.
They should grow some balls, and get as far away from the main trilogy as possible. 500 years after or before, with brand new faces.
Only By Night
Hey, at least she recognizes the best aspect from any of these movies.
RA-MEN ROPPAI
I'm going to see it (again) today with my dad and son. If it wasn't breaking a tradition, I'd skip it. We've seen all 11 (soon to be 12) films together in the theaters.
Active Member
Considering how awesome Knives Out was, shame Johnson didn't stay for this movie. TLJ>TROS, not even close.
Unintelligible Whispering
The more I think about these movies and what they presented, the more disappointed I get. I was worried back when they announced a new trilogy immediately upon ownership of the franchise.
None of this was necessary. We never needed to revert to Empire versus Rebellion.
There is absolutely nothing going on here that enhances the universe to any notable degree whatsoever.
You can't fucking tell a story worth a damn when you're too busy commenting on your own legacy to one degree or another.
Creative bankruptcy: The trilogy. All of these actors deserved better.
Active Member
I tend to agree. I give TFA a pass because it was the first chapter and so much fun, I loved JLJ, but this new movie was a real letdown, and kind of ruined this sequal trilogy for me, as a single body of work.
Throbbing Member
Went to see it last night - as a casual fan I had a blast. Sure I have complaints like there has been for TFA & TLJ, but I do like these characters and have enjoyed watching them in this Trilogy. Adam Driver was fantastic as was Daisy Ridley and I'd give it a rewatch when it hits the streaming services.
Active Member
I finally saw this on Monday...I didn't hate it. I hated TLJ, and this movie had some really stupid things happen (Chewie being dumb, space horse on a Star Destroyer, landing exactly where the dagger was, etc.). The first half (or third) seemed super rushed, and it's obvious they cut a lot of footage. Not having a plan for this trilogy is super apparent and not cohesive, and it's really disappointing to have a huge pop culture icon like this tarnished IMO. This trilogy could have been so much better with proper planning, this is Disney's and KK's fault.
Active Member
spot on:
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