Lets talk all things Star Wars

I've been thinking about the Mary Sue concept lately. There's no doubt Rey progresses with harnessing the Force faster than anyone we've seen in SW before but I think the reason lies outside the SW universe.
Pretty much every film series (since and including the OT) has followed a formula where the next installment has to be bigger and better than the last one. If it's an action flick the next one has to have more action (like Indy), shoot em up? The next one will have a higher body count (John Wick). I used this formula myself for fanfilms, it's not a bad thing if the story has an in universe explanation (the Matrix) but that explanation will only be accepted by the audience to a degree depending on the individual.

So the OT did it by having more action, lightsabers and force use in each film as it progressed. The PT had to out do ROTJ from the beginning, which set the bar high for AOTC. By the time we get to ROTS the opening space battle is insane action! We never saw anything like it before that, same with Obi and Anakin dueling. They're jumping around like freakin superheroes.

So now we come to the ST, the formula is still being followed. The force users have to be better and more impressive with their abilities and saber fights than anything we've seen before (according to the formula). The in universe explanation is a result of trying to come up with a reason for the continuity break from previous films rather than writing an organic story. I get why, it's about the money. 4B is a lot to reclaim and turn a profit on so I don't harbor ill will towards DSW.
I think carrying this formula of bigger and better for every sequel can only go so far before it becomes tiresome and a little rediculous. I feel the same way about the MCU, the best 3 for my money are Captain America, Iron Man and Winter Soldier, after that it got tiresome for me.
 
I agree with that assessment too. You can only set the bar so high though and in any film if the audience is not invested emotionally in the characters or plot then the most insane action set piece will mean nothing.

If the audience is invested I think the vast majority of people will overlook even gaping plot holes.

No script is perfect.
 
Bigdaddy said:
I've been thinking about the Mary Sue concept lately. There's no doubt Rey progresses with harnessing the Force faster than anyone we've seen in SW before but I think the reason lies outside the SW universe.
Pretty much every film series (since and including the OT) has followed a formula where the next installment has to be bigger and better than the last one. If it's an action flick the next one has to have more action (like Indy), shoot em up? The next one will have a higher body count (John Wick). I used this formula myself for fanfilms, it's not a bad thing if the story has an in universe explanation (the Matrix) but that explanation will only be accepted by the audience to a degree depending on the individual.

So the OT did it by having more action, lightsabers and force use in each film as it progressed. The PT had to out do ROTJ from the beginning, which set the bar high for AOTC. By the time we get to ROTS the opening space battle is insane action! We never saw anything like it before that, same with Obi and Anakin dueling. They're jumping around like freakin superheroes.

So now we come to the ST, the formula is still being followed. The force users have to be better and more impressive with their abilities and saber fights than anything we've seen before (according to the formula). The in universe explanation is a result of trying to come up with a reason for the continuity break from previous films rather than writing an organic story. I get why, it's about the money. 4B is a lot to reclaim and turn a profit on so I don't harbor ill will towards DSW.
I think carrying this formula of bigger and better for every sequel can only go so far before it becomes tiresome and a little rediculous. I feel the same way about the MCU, the best 3 for my money are Captain America, Iron Man and Winter Soldier, after that it got tiresome for me.
Click to expand...

I'd say that pretty reasonable assessment. Things need to ramp up in your 3rd act of your story. So they gotta make it "faster and more intense."
 
Funny you mention, I was also thinking about this whole Mary Sue thing the other day. I came to the conclusion that I'm somewhere in the middle, I do think she is kind of a Mary Sue but it doesn't ruin the character for me, at least in TFA. I think the mistake is that there was not too much creative direction with her. I actually really liked that the lightsaber fight was simple, raw and emotional in TFA. It had lot of good visual storytelling and internalization. One of the best scenes for me is when Kylo is trying to read her mind and she pushes back. I find the novelization explaining it as "downloaded Kylo's training" unbelieveably lame and a total disservice to anything that could be set up for the character. There could have been a neat discussion in TLJ about how that moment awakened something, etc. You know, just do something with the myriad little things that could be developed.
Conversely I really disliked the ballet-type fight in TLJ. I also think that it was a missed opportunity again to do something with the characters. I thought about it the other day but Rey should have been handed her @ss to her in that fight with Kylo practically saving her and killing the guards singlehandedly. Maybe a less grandiose but more impactful scene that deepens their connection and makes Kylo's second 180 turn more impactful. Instead it's Rey who actually saves Kylo. Based on the trailer TROS seems like extremely plot driven with hardly any focus on the characters. I hope I'm wrong and they do something interesting with her and Kylo other than smashing at each other with glowsticks, obviously they wouldn't spoil stuff in a trailer, so will see.
 
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sztriki said:
Funny you mention, I was also thinking about this whole Mary Sue thing the other day. I came to the conclusion that I'm somewhere in the middle, I do think she is kind of a Mary Sue but it doesn't ruin the character for me, at least in TFA. I think the mistake is that there was not too much creative direction with her. I actually really liked that the lightsaber fight was simple, raw and emotional in TFA. It had lot of good visual storytelling and internalization. One of the best scenes for me is when Kylo is trying to read her mind and she pushes back. I find the novelization explaining it as "downloaded Kylo's training" unbelieveably lame and a total disservice to anything that could be set up for the character. There could have been a neat discussion in TLJ about how that moment awakened something, etc. You know, just do something with the myriad little things that could be developed.
Conversely I really disliked the ballet-type fight in TLJ. I also think that it was a missed opportunity again to do something with the characters. I thought about it the other day but Rey should have been handed her @ss to her in that fight with Kylo practically saving her and killing the guards singlehandedly. Maybe a less grandiose but more impactful scene that deepens their connection and makes Kylo's second 180 turn more impactful. Instead it's Rey who actually saves Kylo. Based on the trailer TROS seems like extremely plot driven with hardly any focus on the characters. I hope I'm wrong and they do something interesting with her and Kylo other than smashing at each other with glowsticks, obviously they wouldn't spoil stuff in a trailer, so will see.
Click to expand...
As for the Mary Sue points, I agree with you. I also am somewhere in the middle. I didn't mind Rey in TFA, although I do have criticisms of the movie.

Some of the biggest problems I have with the Disney era films are the newer elements that seem to be lifted from the Harry Potter universe, such as the scene you mention where Rey "downloads Jedi knowledge" from Kylo. There was a similar scene in one of the HP books/films where Harry was getting training from Snape on how to protect your thoughts from telepathy. The set up to scene was that Snape would try to break into Harry's mind and Harry would try to defend himself. Harry gets angry at one point and is able to see some of Snape's private thoughts instead. I believe that this is the origin of the scene between Rey and Kylo. Of course this doesn't give Harry any special powers as it does with Rey. But, there is a HP precedent for that as well. It is explained during the course of the books/films that Harry is more gifted at certain abilities because he has a connection with Voldemort through the attempted murder of Harry when he was a baby, the ability to talk to snakes is one such power.

Another big connection between the 2 movie series is the "lightsaber is calling to you" phenomenon. In the HP universe the magic wands have some sort of magical sentient like ability, "the wand chooses the wizard". In TFA, there is no reason at all why Anakin's light saber should be calling Rey. In fact, the only connection it should have to anybody should be Luke's sentimental connection of it being his father's saber. Or maybe it was his first saber. Or maybe because it was a gift from ObiWan. I can almost understand why RJ would want to through it off a cliff.

To sum up, it seems pretty clear, in my opinion at least, that the ST writers are looking towards new story telling concepts. Which isn't a bad thing necessarily. But it does come across as strange when these new story telling "tropes" for lack of a better word don't really fit in with what has been shown in the previous movies. It comes across as "out of place" like it doesn't belong in a Star Wars movie.
 
Hehe, just reading Goblet fo Fire for the umpteenth time...
I mean Harry Potter is basically another really long hero’s journey. I didn’t connect the plot points that you listed but you got a point (accessing Snape’s memories btw was very different in the book).
I think another shortcoming of copying ANH so closely is that ANH used the hero’s journey framework to introduce the world, Force etc so as Luke was discovering it so was the audience. Rey’s story of discovery of the Force is very similar to Luke’s but the audience already knows it pretty well so there’s not too much creative new content there.
 
Has anyone counted how many times Kylo ignites his sabre, while at the same time, spreading his legs while stomping out with one of them? I can't fathom why they made him do this, or he chose to do this. It's almost as bad as all the marvel comic book poses Kylo and Rey do because it's popular(?).

Has anyone else noticed this?
 
patrickivan said:
Has anyone counted how many times Kylo ignites his sabre, while at the same time, spreading his legs while stomping out with one of them? I can't fathom why they made him do this, or he chose to do this. It's almost as bad as all the marvel comic book poses Kylo and Rey do because it's popular(?).

Has anyone else noticed this?
Click to expand...
Well, NOW... :lol:
 
patrickivan said:
Has anyone counted how many times Kylo ignites his sabre, while at the same time, spreading his legs while stomping out with one of them? I can't fathom why they made him do this, or he chose to do this. It's almost as bad as all the marvel comic book poses Kylo and Rey do because it's popular(?).

Has anyone else noticed this?
Click to expand...

Gives me the whole “charging bull” idea
 

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