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Star Wars: Solo (Spoilers)

Discussion in 'Movies, Music and TV shows' started by Red Aviary, Jun 2, 2018.

  1. Red Aviary

    Red Aviary Hogdorinclawpuff ~ Prestige ~ DLP Supporter

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    Finally got to see Solo yesterday. There's some discussion of it in the Episode VIII thread but I thought I'd make a separate one. I'll go through the movie point-by-point.

    - I didn't like Qi'ra (I guess just spelling it "Kira" isn't good enough). I don't like Han's whole background revolving around this woman, and it kind of dims his later relationship with Leia in my eyes. I especially don't like the loose ends her story ends with.

    - I honestly thought the scene with Han signing up was setting up a joke about his last name. Like maybe the guy would come with some synonym for "solo" that would sound worse, and so Han changes it to "solo." At least then it'd be a name of his own choosing. With some recruiter giving him the name it doesn't feel very special. Han is just like "whatever, I'll take it."

    - I liked the scenes on the planet with the battle and trenches and everything. Those few scenes seemed like more of a war movie than most of the other Star Wars movies ever manage. However, I don't like how we don't see any of Han's flight training, just jumping from his signing up to him already having been kicked from the program down to being a grunt.

    - I liked Woody Harrelson's character, but didn't really like his partners. Monkeys/apes kind of weird me out, so I wasn't very enamored with the four-armed chimp thing, and the woman just seemed generic and boring. They could've been cut.

    - I didn't mind the circumstances of Han and Chewbacca meeting, and I thought Chewie had a lot of cool parts in the film. However, I don't like Han actually speaking the language, or any species but a Wookiee even really being capable of producing it right. I know it's really a man making those sounds, but in-universe I thought only a Wookiee's mouth/throat were capable of producing the language correctly, even if others could understand it. Also I guess Chewie eats people? I mean they're not the same species, and they were starving him, but still.

    - The pacing of the movie is all over the place. The whole first heist seemed kind of rushed and thrown in. I think the whole movie should've revolved around a greatly expanded Kessel heist.

    - The villain had a lot of potential I think. He was nicely threatening at times. But in the end I think he fell flat. He didn't get enough screen presence. The other villain just seemed completely useless, and the "twist" with her was pretty crap.

    - I thought Donald Glover did a pretty good job. I've got my issues with his music and such, but ignoring all that and just based on his performance I thought it was good for a Lando with a decade or so shaved off.

    - I hated the robot entirely. I'm at least glad her screentime was fairly short, but her causing that massive riot on Kessel was just stupid. Her relationship with Lando was also completely weird. At times he seems pretty uncomfortable with her, then he gets a little too emotional with her being shot. There have been some "man-machine interfaces" in fiction, sure, but L3 wasn't even like an android, she was a toaster with legs. Whole thing should've been rethought.

    - Continuing on the point, C-3PO does argue with the Millennium Falcon's computer in TESB, so I kind of like the idea of there being an origin for it somewhere in there. Just don't like this method of execution.
    - I think the Millennium Falcon itself was a bit too new and shiny. Lando calls the ship a "hunk of junk" in TESB, so I took it to mean the Falcon was really dumpy even when he owned it, but that doesn't seem to be the case. I don't think they needed that big escape pod in the front either. I did like how Han kind of had a sentimental reason for liking the YT-1300 design.

    - On the Kessel Run. I may not have been wholly paying attention to the explanation of the Maelstrom, so I won't speak on the gravity well and the giant space monster thing. However, I do wonder how Han expected Obi-Wan to know about the Falcon doing the run in twelve parsecs when there were just a handful of witnesses to it.

    - Going back to ANH, parsecs are a unit of distance, not time, as everyone since 1977 has ceaselessly pointed out. I'm guessing it was just George Lucas making a mistake in the script originally, trying to come up with something more "space-y" sounding than just twelve seconds/minutes. Some have interpreted it as intentional, with Han trying to bullshit Obi-Wan and failing, though I think it was a mistake personally. The EU retconned it so that the Kessel Run is some kind of obstacle course where you try to find the shortest distance between A to B, and this movie keeps that explanation, at least in broad strokes. I guess the alternative would just be to accept it as a mistake and ignore it, so whatever.
    - I kind of liked Beckett and Han outplaying each other, and Han "shooting first," but disliked, again, the masked girl whose name escapes me and her whole thing. I think having Han aid the Rebellion (or just a rebellion) here undermines his role in ANH.

    - Holy shit, having Darth Maul pop up here of all places is just ludicrous. I went with my parents, who pretty much only watch/care about the movies, and explaining all the Maul stuff between TPH and Solo was a real chore and really put it in perspective how fucking stupid it is. Not only that but Maul took away from the other guy even more as the villain. And why does Maul even activate his lightsaber? It's like they thought they couldn't have a Star Wars movie without a lightsaber in it. I'm surprised they didn't shoehorn C-3PO and R2-D2 in somewhere too, but this does seem to be the only one without them in it.

    - Why is Lando willing to offer up the Millennium Falcon in the game again when part of L3 is now part of it? Even if he's confident in his victory with the cheating, it seems like he doesn't care that much, which makes his whole thing earlier seem pointless.
    The thing is, when I walked out of the theater I didn't necessarily feel like I wasted my time. I guess I did like it, in broad strokes, but now that it's had time to sink in and I've sat here looking at it piece by piece, it really falls apart in my mind.
     
    Last edited: Jun 2, 2018
  2. Chengar Qordath

    Chengar Qordath The Final Pony ~ Prestige ~

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    Pretty sure Han could speak Wookie language according to the old EU-canon, just that he didn't speak it particularly well because human throats aren't designed for it. Which the movie seemed to keep, given the way his attempt at wookie-ese turned out according to the subtitles. The pronunciation is horribly mangled and the vocabulary is spotty, but he managed to get the point across.
     
  3. quixoticcool

    quixoticcool Third Year

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    I think the movie would have been a hell of a lot better if they shaved off at least 30 minutes of film, 2 hours is just too long. I think if they cut Kira, L3, and Infys to focus more on Vos and Beckett it could have really improved the cohesiveness of the story.
     
  4. s0ng2Sing

    s0ng2Sing Third Year

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    I think that Woody Harrelson and Paul Bettany were probably the two best played characters in the film. I thought Beckett's death was actually very well done. Bettany as Dryden was also a good choice. He played a very good Star Wars gang leader without going over the top. Menacing and yet somewhat charismatic, he pulled me in somewhat.

    I think they may have been better off with a different plot or at least made it more streamlined. I also didn't like how much of the focus of the film was on Han's ex-girlfriend that he left behind, that plot element seemed to take up too much of the film for how little I cared about it.
     
  5. KHAAAAAAAN!!

    KHAAAAAAAN!! Troll in the Dungeon –§ Prestigious §– DLP Supporter

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    I loved every minute of it, tbh. And I was incredibly impressed that Emilia Clarke actually managed some nuanced facial expressions, which I have long thought were beyond her.
     
  6. point09micron

    point09micron Groundskeeper

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    In 20 years the special edition will have Woody shooting first.
     
  7. Red Aviary

    Red Aviary Hogdorinclawpuff ~ Prestige ~ DLP Supporter

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    This guy did a pretty good breakdown of the movie. I've enjoyed other videos of his in the past too if you're curious.
     
  8. Warlocke

    Warlocke Fourth Champion

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    Poe's law is kickin' in hard, today. I better go take a nap and hope I can distinguish between reality and satire when I wake up.
     
  9. KHAAAAAAAN!!

    KHAAAAAAAN!! Troll in the Dungeon –§ Prestigious §– DLP Supporter

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    Fully serious. I thought it was great fun.
     
  10. GiantMonkeyMan

    GiantMonkeyMan High Inquisitor

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    I thought it was a very 'ok' movie. Like, if it wasn't a Star Wars movie it would have been a pretty average heist movie with a sci-fi setting. There were plenty of elements I thought they could have done better or were a little dumb but overall it was enjoyable enough.
     
  11. h2o

    h2o Professor

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    So apparently Solo's poor performance may have put a hold on future Star Wars spinoffs.

    Like many other fans, I didn't want this Solo movie, I won't watch it and so far Disney's handling of Star Wars makes me glad that there will be less movies coming out. Focusing in on Ep 9 is good even though I seriously doubt it can revive my lost interest in Star Wars after TFA & TLJ.

    I think one of the biggest problems for Disney now is that they've killed off the OT fans favorite characters. I heard Billy Dee Williams (Lando) might come back to reprise his role but he's just nowhere near as popular as the original trio, also he's over 80 years old now; that doesn't mean he can't put in a great performance but it does probably limit him to just making one last movie.

    Yes yes, there's lots of fans who love the new characters (Rey), but can they honestly carry a whole new trilogy? The biggest attraction of TFA was seeing Han & Chewie back in the Falcon (That scene from trailer actually got me really hyped), and then for TLJ it was finally getting Luke back in action (Was actually less hyped for this, thanks to TFA being quite a stupid and bland movie). If OT fans don't come out for Ep 9, if they don't buy the merch; will Disney be content with the reduced profitability of the franchise going forward to make the huge investments another trilogy requires?
     
  12. ScottPress

    ScottPress The Horny Sovereign –§ Prestigious §– DLP Supporter

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    As far the new characters, I loved Fin in TFA. They fucked him in TLJ with a shit plot. I liked the Finn/Poe bromance and I think if these two had gone to Canto Whogivesafuck instead of the Asian girl it would've been less unbearable.

    Rey is ugh Mary Sue, but she had some good character moments in TLJ and they were good because of Kylo, who I like.

    Also Hux is the best.

    New SW isn't exclusively a dumpster fire. The problem is that the few good bits are buried deep within that dumpster fire. I never had the nostalgia boner for the OT, so I guess I was the target audience of TFA, but then TLJ absolutely slaughtered my interest in Disney SW.
     
  13. Red Aviary

    Red Aviary Hogdorinclawpuff ~ Prestige ~ DLP Supporter

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    Pretty much the only positive things about TFA, I thought, were the things they could expand on more in a sequel. And TLJ fucked that up, so my interest in this new trilogy is completely gone. Rogue One was probably the best out of this new batch so far, and it had quite a lot of problems too.

    I don't like the idea of an Obi-Wan movie, and that's because any premise seems like it would have to take place during his exile on Tatooine. And if he went on these movie-worthy adventures while he was in exile, then it'd make the whole idea of him being in exile to begin with seem kind of pointless. Maybe a Clone Wars era movie, but they've kind of filled in a lot of blank space with the cartoons, and I'm not sure how receptive an audience would be to going back to the prequels.

    A Boba Fett movie could have merit I suppose, but it would have to be done really well and I don't see Disney achieving that kind of quality based on their performance so far.

    I'd be fine if Disney completely stopped making Star Wars movies altogether at this point. Actually, I'd be fine if we could let Star Wars fade out of the public eye for a decade or so, like it kind of did in the period between RotJ and the early 90s.
     
    Last edited: Jun 22, 2018
  14. ScottPress

    ScottPress The Horny Sovereign –§ Prestigious §– DLP Supporter

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    Btw just quickly checked Wikipedia. Solo is a 500mln dollar movie (huge production budget plus reshoots, marketing and distribution costs) and box office is right around three fiddy, so Disney is looking at an at least 100mln loss. It didn't break even, let alone make a profit, and I can't see home video sales pulling in a lot. SW toys aren't selling either. Add to it the EA fucking of the brand, KK's, Johnson's and Abrams's generally distasteful attitude towards people who didn't swallow "The Force is female" hook line and sinker...

    How pissed do you guys think Bob Iger is right now, having overseen the 4bln SW acquisition and then allowing KK to fuck it into the ground?

    My heart is content when the meme fields bring a rich harvest of trolling crops.
     
    Last edited: Jun 21, 2018
  15. Nevermind

    Nevermind Headmaster

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    So, this is a thing now.

    upload_2018-6-21_20-11-25.jpeg

    A bunch of whining fanboys with a hilariously overblown sense of entitlement are trying to remake The Last Jedi.

    If you like a good laugh, take a look at the website and their highly complex, state-of-the-art pledge system.

    This shit is either a really convincing piece of performance art or idiocy and naïveté on a genuinely impressive scale.
     

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  16. Nevermind

    Nevermind Headmaster

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    Update: The pledges from the glorified number generator are about to hit $300m, and there is genuinely no way to tell how much of it is “serious” money and how much of it comes from people who simply find the whole thing funny.

    Personally, if this is indeed a serious project (at least in the minds of its creators), I’d like to see them go ahead with it, if only to see at which point Disney eventually Alderaan’s it.


    Actual Solo commentary: A friend of mine recently watched Solo, and she absolutely hated the film. This is the first time in ages we have actually fundamentally disagreed on a film (last time was Spectre), and we got a good discussion out of it. To sum it up, I still like the film, even though I could appreciate some of her points (which mainly amounted to the mechanical issues mentioned above and in the other thread, plus an intense dislike of the Maul cameo and, intriguingly, Donald Glover’s performance as well as the role the dice played in the story), and I really wish it would have done better.
     
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