I know this is a controversial topic, so let's keep it as civil as possible. And be wary that this will be full of spoilers.
So, what do you think of the Disney era of Star Wars now that we're five movies and a few TV series into it?
I have mixed opinions, so I'll start with the positive things I think about the new movies.
Rogue One is amazing. It's without a doubt my favourite Star Wars film. Even though I'm trying to stick to the positives right now, it's a lot easier to talk about what I didn't like about this movie because there's so little of it. And it basically comes down to the shoddy CGI recreations of Leia and Tarkin. When you first see Tarkin, the camera is behind him and it's just the reflection of his face in the window. If they had left it at that, it would have been a perfect homage to Peter Cushing's character. But then he turns around and is a major character throughout the whole film. It's bad enough that I think it's disrespectful to recreate actors performances (especially when they're deceased), but they didn't even do it well. The CGI looks like something out of Shrek.
The Leia puppet is a bit more forgivable because Carrie Fisher was still alive at the time and it's only seen briefly, but when taken with the excessive Tarkin scenes it's harder to ignore how bad it looks.
The only other thing I could complain about is Vader is a little bit...
sassy when he says "try not to choke on your ambitions." Besides those things, it's a nearly perfect movie.
The Force Awakens was promising but was held down by way too much nostalgia and in retrospect had no payoff. I really appreciate the diverse cast, and the few original things the movie did were really great. But most of it is just a retelling of A New Hope and making classic references. It planted the seeds of something that could have been good, but just like everything Jar Jar Abrams has ever made, it failed to deliver on any of that early promise.
And that's pretty much it for what I've liked, really. The Last Jedi had some cool set pieces and at least tried to do something interesting by subverting conventions, but the movie itself was terrible. Finn and Rose's story was the worst because everything they did was totally pointless in the end. It's really upsetting that Kelly Marie Tran got so much hate for her role in the movie because it wasn't her fault (plus a lot of the hate was from racist/sexist "fans":wink:. She did her best with what she was given, but what she was given was awful.
Vice-Admiral Holdo gets a lot of hate too, but she's actually the only protagonist I like because she's the only one who acts reasonably in the whole film. People complain that she could have avoided the whole mutiny plot if she had just told Poe about her plan, but Poe had literally just been demoted for insubordination at the start of the film. She had no obligation to tell him anything, and especially not her secret plan if she didn't think he could be trusted.
Really, I think Poe, Finn and Rose should have been discharged for their actions, but the movie hand wipes it all away because they're supposed to be the heroes who literally do nothing heroic in the whole film. They're actually traitors whose actions made everything much, much worse. Holdo sacrifices herself in the most badass way possible to save everyone after the "heroes" screw everything up, so as far as I'm concerned Purple-hair Laura Dern is
my hero.
And then there's The Rise of Skywalker. Just... ugh. I'm not even going to talk about this one. I think most people can agree that it's the worst of the new trilogy. Everyone has their own reasons.
As for Disney's output outside of the movies, I have watched the first season of The Mandalorian and enjoyed it quite a bit. I love the western aesthetic, and I do eventually want to get through season 2 because I think Rosario Dawson as Ahsoka looks awesome.
I also watched Obi-Wan Kenobi but didn't think it was very good. Having Leia and Ben go through so much together really doesn't align with what is implied about their relationship in A New Hope. I will say, though, that Hayden Christensen absolutely nailed it as Vader this time. He totally redeemed his performance in the prequels. I always thought the transition from his voice as Anakin to James Earl Jones as Vader in the suit was too jarring in Revenge of the Sith, but when his mask is damaged and you can see half of his face and
both voices coming through overlayed on top of each other... it gave me chills.
Besides that, though, the series did everything it could to not do anything at all because it had to leave things in the same state as they were at the end of RotS.
I don't have any interest in the Book of Boba Fett because I hear it isn't very good and I never really got on board with how much fans idolize him anyway. He has cool armor and that's about it. Maybe he does more to justify his status among fans in the Legends universe, but I've never followed that side of the franchise outside of a few books and games.
As for what's upcoming, I'm interested in the Ahsoka series because, again, Rosario Dawson looks perfect in the role. But for as much as I loved Rogue One, I'm not interested in Andor at all. He was the dullest character in the whole movie and now they want me to care about him through an entire series? Nope. If they made a series about Chirrut Îmwe, the blind monk from the film, I'd be totally on board.
The rest of what Disney has released or announced hasn't made any impact on my radar, so I won't go into it.
I will end on a positive note, though. Jedi: Fallen Order is an awesome video game. It combines Star Wars plus metroidvania and soulsborne gameplay into something glorious. I can't wait for the sequel and hope that Cameron Monaghan gets to make a live action appearance as Cal Kestis at some point.
Edit: Oh, I completely forgot about Solo. But I guess that says everything I need to say about Solo
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