TLJ and Andor are pretty much the only times Star Wars has had a story worth telling since Empire
Bad Batch has parts of a story worth telling mixed with a kids show.
BB was a kids show with an excellent story.
It couldn't do everything because it was more kids leaning like CW, but it was excellent nonetheless (and thankfully they respected Tech's death and didn't revive him)
one of the worst parts of this subreddit is the absolute rage boner for animated star wars content, so it’s nice to see some positivity, but everyone has to excuse their nice words with “for a KIDS show” as if this whole franchise isn’t for kids.
People have rage boners here? I thought they were just regular ones! >:(
Rebels and TCW have some good moments. They're obviously kids shows, but I'd put some of their work up with ATLA, for example
Rebels is good whenever it's not focused on erza or Sabine or chopper or the weird purple wookie thing I liked hera and I liked Kanan
You mean Garazeb 'Zeb' Orrelios!!! how could you be so foolish you utter buffoon to not remember this critical character that changed how the rebellion worked
Ezra is great towards the end of the series, and Sabine has some great moments in season 3
Honestly zeb had some really good episodes and story lines but he was mostly “big dumb funny guy”
lol that’s most of the characters. I love Ezra and Sabine! But I think I may be the biggest Rebels fan
Rogue One..... I thought the story was pretty well done there.
I'm not personally much of a TLJ fan (unlike many I like the Luke/Rey/Kylo stuff... it's the rest of it I find bad)... but I know others liked it.
The characters and their struggles are pretty unengaging, but by god does that movie look GOOD. Probably the best looking Star Wars movie, but TLJ is close, plus some of the best action.
Rogue One was pretty neat. Andor as well.
Never thought I’d see the day where a sequel comment gets upvotes
Social media is so interesting. 5 months ago TLJ was lauded as the worst writing ever conceived by man. Fast forward to now, TLJ apologists everywhere. Too dang funny
Nah this sub has always been full of TLJ fans
Bitch why u talking about about ‘social media’ as if it was some kind of hive mind which has exactly uniform opinions, to the point that you can call someone out on changing their mind from something they’ve literally never said. 1. People are allowed to change their opinions. It ain’t a ‘gotcha’ to say that someone has changed their mind, that’s just a natural consequence of the personal changes we all constantly undergo at every stage of our lives 2. I’ve always loved TLJ anyway
Nah. It’s just the flavor of the month. Star Wars “fans” love to hate starwars when it’s the popular thing to do. Then later they calm down and come to an individual opinion. TLJ is still absolute garbage. Sorry, just facts. Not saying you’re wrong for liking it, like what you like homie, it’s just an objective terrible movie (I like some objectively terrible movies too so no worries).
Stop being so insufferable. There have been TLJ defenders from the jump. It is one of the most polarizing Star Wars movies of all time which by definition means there are plenty who defend it. This type of bullshit I just a way for you to get some faux superiority. “Everyone is a hive mind but meeee!!!”
Your reading comprehension is trash. To be expected on Reddit.
There's no such thing as an "objectively bad movie", certainly not something like TLJ which wucceeds on all technical levels, which are the only metrics one could even begin to argue objectivity on, although they'd still be incorrect to do so.
Yeah I’m like what does objectively bad and good mean? Being back into Star Wars has made me wonder what it even means to like things at this point to the point where I’m questioning what I like. 😅 But it just seems odd to me for people to say TLJ is so bad when to me it seems a lot better story wise and philosophically wise than certainly the prequels? (And also imo ROS) it almost seems narcissistic to assume your personal tastes equal objective, so I also want to avoid doing that
There is most definitely a thing as “objectively bad movie.”
This is what an ‘objective’ review of TLJ would look like:
This movie has frames. It also contains words that may or may not be in English depending on the language settings of your device. This movie also has colours, one of which is red. Christopher Walken does not appear in this movie.
FINALLY someone is brave enough to review TLJ and actually tell it like it is! I completely agree with your review by the way. Christopher Walken totally didn't appear in the movie!
Another color in the film was blue! Hopefully they bring it back for the Rey movie.
There most definitely isn't but I'll humour you, what is the criteria for an "objectively bad movie"?
Not saying you’re wrong for liking it
it’s just an objective terrible movie
these two statements directly contradict each other lmao
How so? Something can be objectively bad and still be appealing. Don’t you have a guilty pleasure movie(s)?
if something is objectively bad, then one would be wrong to enjoy it. what you see as bad, others see as good, and that's totally fine.
me personally, there are totally movies that i enjoy despite perceiving as bad, but there are plenty of others that i'll happily consider genuinely good
You can still like objectively bad things. It just means you’re aware it’s bad, you just like it anyway.
and if you genuinely believe it's good?
Yes TLJ was brilliant. Amazing how they completely whiffed the through plot for the entire series and back seated the one interesting original character and ruined his entire arc so that Rey could play super-hero. TLJ was the worst.
I love TLJ, but its biggest flaw is definetly splitting up Fin and Poe. Fin should’ve been the one that was given the big self sacrifice, not Holdo
Nah dude TLJ has always been great. It’s just that all the old people who hated it are becoming outnumbered by the young people who loved it.
More like 1977, Star Wars was never good and that's why we like it
wtf are you on about. ANH is the perfect film for its genre and Empire is basically a perfect sequel. There’s a reason Star Wars is so iconic, and it’s because those first two movies are incredible
ANH is the perfect film for its genre, by which of course we mean the classic genre of "super-high-budget sci-fi cowboy samurai Republic-serial WWII buddhist space opera."
Empire is the perfect sequel, by which of course we mean a film that is the complete thematic opposite of the original and which ends on a cliffhanger that completely contradicts the lore from the first movie.
The movies are certainly incredible, and I am not claiming they are unenjoyable to watch or poorly made. But they go against every single rule that the YouTube auteurs like to lay down about what "good writing" is and why the modern films don't have it. Like, Ep IV has one of the most memorable Chekhov's Gun sequences in modern film when Luke is given his father's lightsaber, and again when he trains with it, and then he faces down the man who killed his father with that weapon on his belt — and he runs away. The first time he actually uses it is in the next movie, to melt some ice in a Space Bigfoot's cave. That is extremely "bad writing" in terms of violating the rules that govern narrative expectations, but those violations are a huge part of why Star Wars is good.
chekhov's gun isn't a strict rule that must be abided all the time. no narrative rule is truly "you must use this every time"
also, what lore was contradicted in empire?
A Jedi named Darth Vader, the former pupil of Obi-Wan Kenobi, having betrayed and killed his and Kenobi's friend (and Luke's father) Anakin Skywalker, of course, after the three of them fought for Princess Leia's father in the Clone Wars. This is how everyone talks about the situation in Ep IV, including to each other e.g. in the Obi/Vader fight.
Star Wars has devoted an enormous amount of screentime since in various attempts to reconcile the incompatibility of this story and of characters' Ep IV actions with the Ep V cliffhanger, some of which were very successful and others much less so.
(I do agree with you that the rules of writing are most successfully honoured in the breach! Star Wars violates them constantly and is much better for it.)
Actually, the text of Chekov's gun does indicate that it must be used every time.
The literal quote from Anton Chekov is, “One must never place a loaded rifle on the stage if it isn’t going to go off. It’s wrong to make promises you don’t mean to keep.”
Obviously it isn't mandatory, there's no penalty for breaking the rule. But it has become so ubiquitous because it is a sound principle, and ignoring it typically weakens a film.
The point is that if the weapon doesn't contribute to the story, then there's no point to including it in the first place. And in a very literal sense, there is absolutely no point to Luke getting his father's lightsaber in A New Hope. No meaningful character change or moments come from it, it is never used, and it could be removed with zero story changes.
Actually, the text of Chekov's gun does indicate that it must be used every time.
The literal quote from Anton Chekov is, “One must never place a loaded rifle on the stage if it isn’t going to go off. It’s wrong to make promises you don’t mean to keep.”
I know. but that's just being pedantic at this point.
The point is that if the weapon doesn't contribute to the story, then there's no point to including it in the first place.
in the case of star wars, it does contribute to the story. it may not see much use in a new hope but it holds sentimental significance to Luke who never knew his father and has later contribution in the sequel and greater trilogy.
holds sentimental significance to Luke
This is true in concept, but Luke literally never says a single word about this in any movie, so again, not improving the film.
has later contribution in the sequel and greater trilogy
Then, per commonly held rules of screenwriting, he should have gotten it in the sequel.
again, chekhov's gun and many literary rules are not absolute.
This "Luke shouldn't have gotten the saber is ANH" is such borked nonsense it's hard to know where to start? First off, Kenobi needs to have it because of its importance to his friend, Anakin, and it would make zero sense for Kenobi to not give it to Luke when they first begin their journey. So just from a world building/character standpoint Luke NEEDS to get it in ANH.
Secondly, the saber is the symbol of the Jedi and force users in general. Luke gets it in ANH to begin his training journey as a force user. We see him training with it as they travel to the death star. BUT Luke doesn't have any training yet, so it would be bad writing for him to suddenly be a savant. Instead, in ANH Luke uses the weapons he is already comfortable with, guns and ships. The first time Luke uses it in Empire is when he barely succeeds in forcepulling it to him to slay the Wampa - he then continues to pilot ships to fight the Empire when they attack Hoth, and then promptly flees to Dagobah to train more.
It wouldn't make sense for anyone other than Kenobi to give the saber to Luke, and it wouldn't make sense for Luke to be proficient with it until he trains with Yoda, so of course it takes multiple films for him to actually utilize the weapon.
That's like saying that Frodo not using the Phial of Galadriel until Return of the King is bad writing because it doesn't happen in the same book... even though the trilogy was all written together at once.
A) Kenobi does not NEED to have it, for the same reason Yoda doesn't have anything of Anakin's. That's utter nonsense. Yoda could have just as easily had it, as we literally knew nothing about any of them before that film came out, and anyone could have anything.
B) Yes, he's already familiar with guns and ships. Which is why him getting a sword is pointless, if he's never going to use said sword.
C) Luke trained using the lightsaber on the Millennium falcon, well before meeting Yoda. This is another sequence that is absolutely meaningless, as he doesn't use those skills Obi-Wan taught him in A New Hope OR Empire.
D) This is a hilariously bad example, because you yourself point out the difference-- those books were all written at once. It was, in fact, intended to be one book, but was split into three for length. So yes, while slightly unusual, Frodo DOES use Chekov's phial at the end of his one story. A New Hope was written alone, and should be able to stand on its own.
Lastly, you're so desperate to leap to these wildly aimless bits of 'evidence' that you missed the fundamental issue with your opening: there's nothing wrong with Luke getting the saber in ANH. But he should have USED it at some point.
The best use would be, cornered with Leia on the Death Star, Luke needs to trust in the force and deflect blaster bolts away from them, like Obi-Wan taught him. That way the lesson he learned, and the item he obtained, actually serve a purpose in the film. AND it established a precedent for, soon after, Luke similarly trusting in the force over his targeting computer.
CHEKHOVS GUN WAS WRITTEN AS A RULE FOR THEATRE NOT FILM OMG
No, it’s a descriptive terms meant to help people avoid common screen writing mistakes like setting up a big event and never letting it pay off.
WERE. Sci-fi action movies have come out since that are so much better than ANH and Empire that it isn’t even a comparison.
But like, no. I’ll give u that ANH hasn’t aged perfectly, but Empire is still an absolute banger of a movie
Eh, way better than Empire? Empire is legitimately a very good movie.
My favorite are the ones saying new Star Wars is too predictable despite the original movie being a beat for beat reproduction of the most common story format in human history
Outjerked
I don’t agree and I don’t agree with your assessment that the originals are badly written. As your only example is not doing a chekhovs gun… like that would ever make something bad for any reason?? Like narrative expectation means anything when you’re talking about writing quality? Nah man, ANH and Empire are great movies top to bottom, Return was less so, but not a bad film.
I wouldn't say never good, rather it was never that deep.
Tbh the OT too. There's nothing special about the OT as it's a pretty cut-and-dry "Hero's Journey" story. Not by any means to say it's bad, but it's pretty on-par with the PT.
The OT is well written and the PT isn’t. What’s on par?
My guy, the OT is full of just as much bad dialogue as good.
Oh good cherry pick. Some bad dialogue. Consider me schooled
The prequels never left, Disney has fully committed to them since the sequels wrapped up.
yeah happened with sequels, which were mainly dickriding OT and once people started liking the prequels and not caring about OT the new stuff is dickriding PT
Prequels? Mediocre? How dare you! Those are Shakespearian masterpieces that teach us how cool it is to be the chosen one because you can be a mass murderer and still get redeemed in the end. And you call them mediocre???
UJ/ Honestly with the Acolyte I’d say it’s not really mid but more “decent”. It does what it needs to do but I do find the character writing is lacking in my personal opinion (but that’s just me). The fight scene though? Hot damn was that top-tier Star Wars.
I like the story, but my biggest issue is that it feels extremely stretched out, it kinda feels like a movie that got made into a tv show and they put a bunch of filler.
Episode 1 and 2 could easily be combined into 30 minutes, nothing happens in episode 3, so just skip it, we already know everything that happened there, at that point they constantly mention it, episode 4 is just filler, is just them going to the place they need to, and episode 5 is 30 minutes. It feels like half a movie so far, but its 5 episodes
I agree with that. Personally I did like episode 3 because it’s, to me, a good combination of “show and tell”. We’re told some tragic event happened, then we see said tragic event but for the audience it’s becoming clear that Osha is an unreliable narrator and we’re set up for more questions to later be answered. Flashback episodes work so long as they’re not overdone to the point that the actual story is being impacted. All that said I still think some of the characters could be fleshed out more. I don’t have really any gripes with them writing wise, they’re fine and I actually felt bad seeing them die, but would like to have had more.
I like episode 3, but the problem is that the show constantly told me what happened there in the 2 previous episodes, if they didn't told me what happened it would be awesome, just be vague about it or something, or make it the pilot so it feels like the characters are referring to something we already saw idk
That’s actually what happened. I think it was supposed to be six episodes with 1-2,3,4-5,6,7,8
Makes sense tbh.
Nah, this story actually wonderfully surprised me and I'm hooked. And the new Sith is hot so your argument is invalid.
Can't sleep, all I can think about are
Bro, it's his fucking forearms for me. Like that man can get it, idgaf
Unironically this. God damn.
Whoever put him in a sleeveless duster(?) deserves a raise
I love seeing his personality as a sith… major fan of The Good Place
New chud script just dropped.
C.H.U.D./Star Wars crossover confirmed
i'd take watching Master Sol over Anakin Skywalker any day of the week.
I have been distinctly thinking that The Acolyte is just The Phantom Menace with better writing.
Yipeeeee!
Are you an angel?
We back 🙏🏼
Oh no! I hate the <insert new stars wars>!!! It hasn’t been good since the <Insert Star Wars I grew up on>!!
The story found in the prequels is so fucking interesting that it’s disappointing. The execution was simply not as good as it could’ve been
That’s what makes the contrast between prequels and sequels so fascinating. They’re both bad, but they’re bad for exactly the opposite reasons. The sequels are a terrible story executed well (except TLJ, that story is a stroke of genius), whereas the prequels are an incredible story executed terribly
What?
Consider 2 aspects of writing, macro and micro.
The macro is the overarching story, themes, storyboarding, structure, etc.
The micro is the actual in scene dialogue and characterizations.
Like the famous AOTC scene. The macro is good, they’re trying to contrast Anakins rough upbringing with his current setting and his growing love for Padme. That’s all good stuff, but what does he say?
I don't like sand. It's coarse and rough and irritating — and it gets everywhere. Not like you… you’re everything soft bites lip and stares at boobs and smooth.
Yeah. Not great.
That’s true but it also doesn’t make the sequels well executed though
This is a good take
Eh 2/3 of the prequels maybe
I don’t care if Jesus came back from the dead and wrote it I will die on the hill that tpm is a painfully boring film
See I feel this way about AOTC, genuinely shocked people find this one more exciting.
Fair. Nostalgia bias out of the way, fair.
I enjoy Acolyte, but yeah, Star Wars can really do a lot in the way of quality.
Calling the prequels mediocre is hilarious. They were far from mediocre. Shit there wasn’t one mediocre part of any of those three movies. They were unadulterated horseshit. The prequels can probably be in the conversation of worst movies ever made. I mean, there’s no argument, they’re comically bad. Like almost intentionally so.
Wrong, they got my boy doing cool shit.
Lololol
curses I was going to make this exact same meme when the show ended
Including the dialogue and performances 😀
more like awesome story with occasionally bad editing/pacing and wonderful characters
Please watch something other than Star Wars bro.
i do all the time. the acolyte is no breaking bad but i’m still enjoying myself
I’m really not sure where the hatred for the plot or the acting is coming from, but I’m glad that we’re all finally on the same page about the action
I like how it’s becoming more apparent that Charlie’s a serial liar with the pacemaker bit and his arm being “sore from the gym”. He’s so desperate not to look weak in front of people who probably don’t even care.
100%. But with better acting for the most part.
Mediocre story with cool fight scenes showed up last in 2017 or at least 2015
Prequels are peak tho
The prequels didn't have a bad story, just sub-par writing.
I mean, this story isn't finished yet so idk I'd rather reserve judgment on the writing until we see just where they're going with everything
Man…The Acolyte just sucks so hard…I mean, licks so hard
How dare you sully the prequels by comparing them to acolyte
The Prequels are way better than the Acolyte.
At least George made the prequels, opinion revoked 🙄
Mediocre?
It’s dogshit, not mediocre. Mediocre is The Force Awakens. This slop couldn’t even touch that.
Don’t lie to yourself
The first four episodes were bland. The fifth episode was excellent and you discredit your argument by implying there wasn't something good there.
TFA is such a fascinating example of a failure. Never has so much passion and talent been poured into such a fundamentally broken concept. It’s a terrible story well-told
HOLY compared to the prequels acolyte is just a bad bad fanfic Jar Jar alone beats the acolyte
3 missing replies
This has been star wars since 1999 with few exceptions