Become a Creator today!Start creating today - Share your story with the world!
Start for free
00:00:00
00:00:01
Somehow...Chatsunami Returned: Sequel Trilogy Retrospective || Star Wars Month
103 Plays7 months ago
Welcome to our very own podcast in a galaxy far far away as we take on the sci fi franchise that launched a thousand laser swords: Star Wars! From the three main trilogies to a lively discussion about one particular game franchise in the series, this is one themed month you will not want to miss!
In our third episode of the month, Satsunami and Andrew take on the highly divisive Sequel Trilogy of Star Wars. But what makes the trilogy so contentious? Did the Rise of Skywalker lead to the fall of the franchise? And can it truly be redeemed? Grab your nostalgia goggles as we take on the Sequel Trilogy of The Force Awakens, The Last Jedi and finally The Rise of Skywalker!
This podcast is a member of the PodPack Collective. The members are as follows:
Chatsunami
Casting Views
Nerdstalgic
2 Girls 1 Reusable Cup
Review it Yourself
Seismic Cinema
For further information, please follow the link: https://www.chatsunami.com/p/podpack-collective/
Check out all of our content here: https://linktr.ee/chatsunami
Website: chatsunami.com
Twitter/X: https://twitter.com/ChatsunamiPod
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/chatsunami/
TikTok: tiktok.com/@chatsunami
Patrons:
Battle Toaster
Sonia
Greenshield95
Danny Brown
Aaron Huggett
Use my special link zen.ai/chatsunami and use chatsunami to save 30% off your first three months of Zencastr professional. #madeonzencastr
Stay safe, stay awesome and most importantly, stay hydrated!
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction and Star Wars Month Kickoff
00:00:00
Speaker
Well Andrew, I cannot wait to show the listeners our video on Star Wars Month opening text crawl. Um, Satsu, you do realise this is a audio-only podcast? Noooooo! Welcome to Star Wars Month.
00:00:18
Speaker
Hello everybody and welcome to the third episode of Star Wars Month. My name's Satsanami and somehow Andrew has returned. Andrew, welcome back. Do it. You know, I actually expected you to have your trademark line for this episode. I've got a bad feeling about this. Yay, he said the line.
00:00:38
Speaker
That's what we pay you the big bucks for. Yeah. How are you doing tonight, Andrew? I'm good. Thank you. Yeah. We actually just finished the trilogy that we're going to be discussing last night. So fresh in the memory, both my partner and I watched that. And we're finally coming towards the end of Star Wars month. Sun is outside. The birds are chirping and BB-8 is rolling and beeping happily.
00:00:58
Speaker
Yes, but until we take him outside and give him the Odie Eller treatment yesterday, we have our third episode of Star Wars Month.
Discussing the Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
00:01:08
Speaker
Today we are indeed going to be talking about the very, very controversial sequel trilogy today. The first trilogy that was published by Disney and the first film was of course released in 2015. I have a joke. Tell you about the Rathnar, George Lucas.
00:01:26
Speaker
Oh, did you say the Raph now? I couldn't remember it's name, okay? I remember it was, I remember it was bigger than R, and it was the only R related to Star Wars thing I could think of. Do you mean the Rancor? Okay, I'll take that again from the top guys. Tell me about the Rancor, George Lucas. You know that's getting kept in the episode.
00:01:43
Speaker
But yeah. George Lucas and Ojela references aside, today we are going to be talking about the... Those of mice and men. I said Ojela before. Apologies. Not fair. Sorry for legal reasons, I just want to point out I do know that as a mice and men reference. But that's next week's month. Of mice and men, man.
00:02:04
Speaker
blame, we might never know. Of mice and mince. You know what, that was fantastic for the Pona 1, anyway. Today we are talking about the sequel trilogy, which as was saying, came out in 2015 and it was met with a lot of excitement, a little bit of trepidation given what the prequel trilogy had given us in the 90s and early 2000s. So I'm flipping it back onto you Andrew. What we
00:02:31
Speaker
your feelings when you heard that Disney had acquired Star Wars and they were going to be making a brand new trilogy? I was pretty apprehensive upon hearing the news and it kind of seemed like Disney was absorbing every major property at the time, which I mean they're not not doing that but just that they had Marvel, they had Star Wars and I don't think they bought Fox at that point, I think that was later but I was a bit kind of apprehensive about the trilogy but
00:02:56
Speaker
I got excited by the trailer and I was living in Toronto for my semester abroad back in 2015 at the time and this was like maybe three or four days before I was due to fly home at the end of my semester abroad and so it was kind of like a big goodbye thing for me, my friends, that we all went to the cinema together and so it was quite a special experience.
00:03:15
Speaker
We were all super excited. We all sang the Star Wars theme song as we were walking through the theater and people around us started doing it as well. People were laughing. They were having a really exciting time, really exciting experience. So it was pretty cool. I remember a lot of interest and excitement over these films.
00:03:32
Speaker
definitely a lot of buzz and speculation because no one quite knew where they were going to go. We knew what George Lucas had done with the prequel trilogy and everybody just kind of hoped, oh let's hope that we don't get another prequel trilogy and of course Disney were very confident saying that oh no it's going to be entirely fresh, we've got JJ Abrams on the line, he is going to direct
00:03:57
Speaker
the first film. More to come about that soon, but you know he was just fresh off the, I want to say he directed all three, but I could be wrong, but he directed most of the new Star Trek films with Chris Pratt. Chris Pine. Chris Pine, thank you. That's my rancor moment.
00:04:14
Speaker
and it got a bit of a mixed reception because it was more action-oriented but a lot of people seem to be saying that oh well although the action and the kind of humor didn't really land for a Star Trek audience it might just work for Star Wars and I'm pretty
00:04:32
Speaker
Pretty sure I could be wrong but I'm pretty sure that I watched this around I think near enough Christmas time of 2015. I could be wrong but I'm pretty sure that I went with our very good friend Martin McAllister and a couple of other people. I can't remember if Adam was there.
00:04:49
Speaker
maybe. Maybe not. Adam please let me know. But we went as a group, we watched it and you know it was a fun enough experience and I think after that first film, although there were kind of mixed views on it, I feel as if it was received a lot more positively than the films that preceded it. Which unfortunately I don't think was a reputation going forward
Fan Reactions and Constructive Criticism
00:05:14
Speaker
was it?
00:05:14
Speaker
No, the remainder of the trilogy was not received particularly well, I think by, I don't know if general public has known the right term for it, but the very loud Star Wars interested audience did not take well to the second and third films of this trilogy.
00:05:30
Speaker
I think that they had a very kind of set idea for where the trilogy was going to go and when it didn't line up with their own fan theories. And in addition to the fact that they didn't really like how the stories were written, kind of meant that the second and third film in the trilogies, or eight and nine in the overall saga, Skywalker saga, were not received well and kind of sullied through the rest of the trilogy.
00:05:51
Speaker
Yeah, I have to say there are a lot of negative connotations around these films and before I go on, I just want to point out that we may be touching on some subjects that may be a little bit sensitive to fanboys.
00:06:08
Speaker
Yes, of course. Star Wars fanboys, and for just £1 a month at patreon.com slash Justin Abbe, we too can make fun of them. Your hate, it fuels me. More, more!
00:06:23
Speaker
you strike me down, I become more powerful than you can possibly imagine. Honestly, I will get on to the fanboy backlash. Don't you worry to your listeners, but amongst the fanboy backlash, there's been rise of very well, exactly.
00:06:38
Speaker
but there's been rises in very nasty comments, especially racism, misogyny, things like that that we will probably be touching on throughout the episode. I genuinely don't remember this discourse around the prequels, but again it was a completely different landscape when we were growing up.
00:06:58
Speaker
the internet, although it was there, it wasn't anything like it was today and now that we have this technology where we're connected instantaneously and you can throw it a thought in a second, it's quite disheartening to see how harshly these films were criticised. There are critiques that can be levied against this set of films but I do not think
00:07:22
Speaker
that the response from fanboys and the more negative aspect of the fandom were warranted. Before we jump into it, what are your thoughts on that? I do think that the reaction to these films was overly harsh, and whatever you think of a movie, of an actor's
00:07:41
Speaker
part in a movie, there's never going to be reason to abuse people in real life. And that is what happened as a result of these films, that the actress Kelly Marie Tran was getting as a result of her character Rose was just disgusting. The people insulted her based on her ethnicity, based on her gender, based on her general appearance. And why would that ever be okay? Would you do that to someone in real life?
00:08:08
Speaker
probably not. And if you did in real life, you get punched in the face. And so it's just a very cowardly thing to do, to hide behind a computer and abuse people like her, like John Boyega. I think Daisy Ridley was getting some abuse. The abuse Laura Dern got as a result of this. Just because you do not enjoy how someone was portrayed in a movie, how they were utilized in a movie, does not give any reason, nor is there any reason to abuse someone. And so it was really awful. And the reputation that Star Wars fans had, which wasn't fantastic to begin with,
00:08:38
Speaker
was severely hit because of this and so now Star Wars fans are thought on the same idea as like a Rick and Morty fan or an Andrew Tate fan. It's just it's disgusting the amount of comments that these actresses and actors were getting. The thing that just baffles me is as we said you can hate a film and I mean personally there's script choices and things like that that I severely disagree with in this trilogy but
00:09:06
Speaker
I would never in a million years be like, oh yeah, it's because of this ridiculous reason or the amount of, and this is a whole other rant in itself, but if I have to see one more terrible photoshopped thumbnail that says something like
00:09:24
Speaker
Disney has gone woke or oh Kathleen Kennedy's this and that or oh my god here's that South Park reference that people keep running into the ground. If I have to see that one more time I'm genuinely gonna have a breakdown because there's just no thought behind it. It's just
00:09:40
Speaker
parroting these phrases and there's nothing constructive about it. There's no amount of people saying, oh we want this to change because of X reason or Y reason. It's just because they're saying, oh we don't like so and so for this very very stupid reason. So I feel very sorry for a lot of the actors because I know they've had positive experiences like Daisy Ridley in an interview and
00:10:03
Speaker
I'd say recently I'd said that she had very positive interactions with a lot of fans, and I'm really happy about that, that a lot of these people are having positive interactions. I'm just glad that Alec Guinness isn't here to see this. He would probably be joining in with him to be like, oh yes, it was a terrible film. Absolute garbage. We're not even dignified that with watching the film. And George was a good friend. I was in Tunisia for a while. Don't really understand why, but it
00:10:32
Speaker
It's pretty hot and sandy there. Bridge over the River Wye, if you will. And on that- Bridge over the River Wye, did I bother? And on that though, will we just jump into this and inject some positivity before we start analysing this trilogy? Yeah, I think nothing left to do but jump straight into this saga.
00:10:50
Speaker
So, grab your nearest starship and prepare to light speed into another as we dive into Star Wars, the sequel trilogy. Welcome to Chatanami, a variety podcast that discusses topics from gaming and films to anime in general interest. Previously on Chatanami, we've analysed what makes a good horror game, conducted a retrospective on Pierce Brosnan's runs James Bond, and listened to us take deep dives into both the Sonic and Halo franchises.
00:11:16
Speaker
Also, if you're an anime fan, then don't forget to check us out on our sub-series, Chatsunani, where we dive into the world of anime. So far, we've reviewed things like Death Note, Princess Mononoke, and the hit Beyblade series. If that sounds like your cup of tea, then you can check us out on Spotify, iTunes, and all big podcast apps. As always, stay safe, stay awesome, and most importantly, stay hydrated.
00:11:39
Speaker
You know all those enthusiastic international film podcasts? Yeah, this isn't one of those. Welcome to Review It Yourself, the podcast with the Psy. Film reviews with no politics, no pandering, and absolutely no point. No wacky intros, no segments, no blaring music, just rather pessimistic Englishmen talking about films with a guest. You can tell why no one's listening, can you?
00:12:02
Speaker
So before we jump into critiquing these films and kind of giving our thoughts on the sequel trilogy as a whole, I took to a very Rogue One-esque type mission where I went onto Twitter to ask people what they thought about what they thought about the sequel trilogy and I have.
00:12:19
Speaker
to say it was surprisingly more positive and constructive than I expected. So this is what I said just for anybody curious. So I said, okay, so we all know why people dislike the sequel trilogy, but for the sake of giving these movies a fair shot, what do you think works with these films? And to the sequel fans, why do you enjoy these movies? No wrong answers here. So Andrew, would you like to listen to what responses we got? No. And thank you for listening to this episode.
00:12:49
Speaker
This episode is sponsored by Apathy. For legal reasons, that's a joke. There's like a Star Wars fan out there going, aww. I only want to hear me. No, I'm very interested to hear what the Twitterverse has to say. I've never said that before. That's because it's Xverse now. Jesus. So our first comment comes from Adel Wright podcast, who says, there was something to like about all the films.
00:13:18
Speaker
I really enjoyed The Last Jedi because it implied that we were going to step away from the classic Jedi genetic line, Skywalker slash Palpatine, and say anybody can learn the Force. But then it was retconned in The Rise of Skywalker, which I feel as if that's probably going to be our most negative out of the three
00:13:38
Speaker
would say it's probably my most negative, but I don't know. We'll get there. We'll see where I end up.
Positive Aspects of the Sequel Trilogy
00:13:44
Speaker
So our next comment comes from the Space Castle show, amazing name, and they say, I think the casting is excellent. Oscar Isaac and John Boyega are two electric performers and Daisy Ridley has shown real talent. Adam Driver is just a force of nature and everything he's in. And I have to
00:14:03
Speaker
say, I do agree with that one. I do feel as if the acting in these films were the most part that I again, there's one or two that I'll get onto, but I feel as if the core cast were done particularly well. Yeah, I think I enjoyed a lot of the actors in this film. I think generally I can't really say much negative about them. I'm not an Adam Driver fan. I don't like him really in anything I've seen him in, but we'll get into that maybe a little bit later. Let the past go, Andrew. Let the past go. That's something I have to do, but I just don't know if I have to
00:14:33
Speaker
I say that every morning, I wake up for work. I'm not going to lie. That's my mantra. Anyway, this episode is sponsored by my crippling depression. Anyway, Danny Brown says, I enjoyed the sequel trilogy with the exception of The Last Jedi, which was just a bad movie all round. We will get onto that. The Force Awakens was a fun bridge back into the galaxy for new and old fans alike. Sure, it borrowed a bit, but it felt like Star Wars. The Rise of Skywalker had some great bits and wrapped the story up, which
00:15:03
Speaker
I have to say I'm surprised at the positivity there at the end for Rise of Skywalker, but you know, as I said, definitely not unwelcome. Again, we'll get into this a little bit later, but I didn't mind Rise of Skywalker as much as many. There were a lot of like, why did that happen? Why is that a thing after I left the theatre and maintained while I was watching it yesterday? But I don't think Rise of Skywalker is as bad a film as many make it out to be.
00:15:26
Speaker
Yeah, I've got a kind of similar point to that, and I feel as if this is going to be the episode that both gets us strung up. But you know what, we'll cross that rubicon when we come to it. The Geeky Dad podcast says, a few script changes would have made this whole trilogy amazing. Some of them I do agree with. My word, sorry, are they in there or not? His. Agree with himself. Yeah.
00:15:47
Speaker
High five me! Almost felt that it was written by someone that never watched Star Wars or hates it. Besides all that, I think the cast effects and the action are ace. Our next one comes from Nostalgicast that says, point one, 99% of Last Jedi, part two. Only Last Jedi appeals to me and Last Jedi is an old cap so you know he's serious about a pedestrian at best.
00:16:13
Speaker
says Kylo Ren force stopping the blaster flying through a Star Destroyer, Dark Souls 2 boss style fight at the end of The Last Jedi, Ocean Fight in Rise of Skywalker and yeah, no fly now. Well yes we will get onto that. John Frankie.
00:16:28
Speaker
Kennedy says, first one was a fun reintroduction to the galaxy, embedded in nostalgia. The Last Jedi was brilliant. One of the best Star Wars films took the passage of time seriously and explored the impact of a life. Set the story off in a new track. And I love this. This is actually amazing. So John, if you're listening to this, it made me laugh. Rise of Skywalker was, it was nice to see Lando.
00:16:54
Speaker
I thought that was really funny. Claudia the Death says, I actually like the first movie of the three, not the other. I love that they brought back the old characters. Also, cinematography is amazing. Even the second movie, my least favourite,
00:17:13
Speaker
has amazing scenery. Again, I agree. The whole battle in Crete with the red sand or whatever it is looks amazing. Monster Movie Funtime Gold says I like the new characters except for Kylo. Did you write this one, Andrew? I did not like the recycle plots. Daredevil says they look
00:17:31
Speaker
beautiful, good choice of actors, sound as always was wonderful but the scripting was awful unfortunately and all three movies actively work against one another, a massive waste of potential. And last but not least we have got Chenet
00:17:46
Speaker
ally of Gnomes who says they are beautiful visually, have excellent soundtracks and The Force Awakens was a decent Star Wars film even if it retreads a lot of A New Hope's plot. Great casting too. So first of all thank you to everybody who replied to that tweet and gave us your thoughts. Honestly it was really fun to look at what people like
00:18:07
Speaker
about this trilogy in particular. So I'm going to pass it back on to you, Andrew. What are the things that you think this trilogy does right in the grand scheme of things? I think there are quite a few things that are good about this trilogy that they do right that I enjoyed. I think the special effects were phenomenal. I don't think that I really have any criticism of that. I mean, we are now at a stage past where we were in the early 2000s where computer generated effects look a lot more convincing.
00:18:35
Speaker
than they did then. I mean, that comes to the passage of time, but I think these films will age a little bit better in that regard. In addition to the fact that they used a lot more practical effects, that they kind of combined the CGI with the practical in a much more smooth, effective way than what George's prequel trilogy did and the after effects he added to the original trilogy, I think that
00:18:56
Speaker
The tone of these films often was done quite well. I know that might not be a popular opinion, but I think that far more than the prequels and again, the original trilogy where it was a little bit all over the place, even in the original trilogy, like if you look at the tone of Return of the Jedi as opposed to A New Hope or Empire Strikes Back.
00:19:12
Speaker
It's very different, whereas even though we have different directors between these three films, I still think that the tone is generally the same. And you can kind of attribute that maybe to Disney's oversight. They're kind of cookie cutter kind of formula, but I still think that it held that consistency in that regard. The writing, maybe not always, but the tone I felt was pretty consistent. This music score, wonderful as always, it always lifts you up. The use of the old stars for the most part was well done, I felt. I think there were certainly bits that I didn't necessarily agree with.
00:19:41
Speaker
But I think generally they managed to balance the nostalgia of having the old cast with keeping it its own story with the new cast. I think they dealt with that in the best way that you would hope they would, especially with one of the key former cast members passing away partway into the trilogy. I was introduced to a lot of these actors from this movie. I didn't know who Oscar Isaac was. I didn't know who John Boyega was. I didn't know who Daisy Ridley was. I was vaguely aware of Adam Driver.
00:20:08
Speaker
I'm not a huge fan of him, but I'm more aware of him and his roles now because of these films. And I think that in general, I had fun watching these. And my partner and I watched all three trilogies over the space of, we'll say two months. And she took the most enjoyment from watching these films of all of them. We had a discussion about it yesterday.
00:20:28
Speaker
and she said she'll like watch the original films and this was only the thing maybe the second time that ever that she's watched the original films and the first time that she's going to stay awake through them and she can appreciate them for what they are and admire that there's a certain enjoyment that she did take from that but she's not super attached to it she hated the prequels with such a burning passion she thinks that they are possibly the worst film she's ever seen whereas these three films she enjoyed each one she's not going to add them to her top films all time but she enjoyed them far more than any of the other ones
00:20:58
Speaker
always surprising. Yeah, an interesting perspective from someone who's not a Star Wars fan, who's not really watched these films, and it kind of shows who the demographic really is for these new films that it isn't necessarily someone who's been a fanboy this whole time, it's to bring in a new interest into the franchise.
00:21:14
Speaker
funny enough I was in the exact same boat with that because I didn't show my partner The Force Awakens, probably should have right enough in hindsight but I'd watched it ahead of us reviewing it because I knew she wasn't really interested when she saw bits and pieces of the prequels, she fell asleep at the original trilogy, this was years and years ago when I tried to introduce this to Star Wars and yeah she wasn't a fan of that either. So we started at the Last Jedi which
00:21:40
Speaker
many people do seem to think that The Last Jedi is probably one of the worst ones and I can see in certain regards why people think that but after we sat and watched it I remember enjoying it a little bit more than I remember enjoying it in the cinema and even my partner she was like oh well I know nothing about Star Wars but I enjoyed this and then we watched The Rise of Skywalker as well when she was exactly the same she said there's a couple of weird scenes in it and everything
00:22:10
Speaker
thing, but she still enjoyed it because she had no idea about the external lore, the reputation attached to these films. Again, it gives you a whole different perspective because she gets so obsessed with looking at a lot of the fans who have dedicated blood, sweat and tears to maintaining Wikipedia articles about certain characters. I can understand why they were upset in some regards, but it's nice to be able to take that step back
00:22:39
Speaker
and then say, well, let's see from a film perspective rather than from a Star Wars perspective, how are people reacting to this film? But are there any other positives? Sorry, before we go on. I very much enjoyed BB-8. I liked a lot of the robot characters in this. I enjoyed the little cone robot in the last one. Deal. Yeah, I enjoyed BB-8. I love how expressive they were able to make this robot.
00:23:03
Speaker
more so than any other robot there. This little ball would show so much emotion from like a tilt on its axis from its like head bit to what you're talking about to flicking a little lighter up to do a thumbs up the way it did little beeps and boops to emote with that way.
00:23:18
Speaker
It was so interesting how they were able to sort of utilize this character. And I love the little story behind someone complaining that the physics didn't make sense of this ball robot moving across sand. And they're like, this is ridiculous. That's not real. It can't do that. Then the creators came out and were like, we know they can do that because we did. BB-8 was a practical effect. That's actually a fair point.
00:23:39
Speaker
Little characters that were really fun. My partner was very excited. We'd gone to see the third one together at cinema. It was the first Star Wars film and only Star Wars films thus far we've seen together at cinema. And she loved the character of Babu Frick, this little alien mechanic dude. And so throughout all three of these films, she was like, when's Babu Frick coming? And I'm like, oh, he's coming into the third one. And she's like, okay. So she was really excited when he finally came up and she was like, yay. When he finally came on screen and like every scene he's in, end up mimicking the noises he makes and just enjoying every time Babu Frick's on screen. People should be saying whenever he's not on screen, where's Babu Frick?
00:24:09
Speaker
I didn't want to make a picture reference but that's exactly what I was thinking. I wholeheartedly agree with you. Not in the Babu Fring point of thought. You don't love Babu Fring? Yeah. He's a trailer character. You know he is. He's like the porgs in The Last Jedi. You know for a fact they put them in because it's like, oh look it's this cute character and everything. Come watch our film you there. Just come watch.
00:24:33
Speaker
But going back to the positives just before we slide to the dark side as it were, I totally agree with you. I do think the soundtrack was amazing, the acting was for the most part great. All of these actors and actresses that I've been introduced to as well because I'm completely with you there. I never knew who Oscar Isaac was or John Boyega or Daisy Ridley. Adam Driver, I
00:24:57
Speaker
have seen them kind of pop up, I'm sure. I saw him on the show, Girls. Ah, that's why he had his shirt off in the last Jedi. Okay, okay, that makes sense. But I thought they did a great job. It was nice to see the old cast, but I'm a wee bit mixing that. I'll get onto that in the negatives visually.
00:25:15
Speaker
I just want to stress this. This is the most gorgeous looking trilogy out of the three. Whether you love or hate this trilogy, you cannot deny that these look absolutely stunning because I have to say, see, going back to the old trilogy, like the original trilogy, it is amazing how dated they look. I don't get me wrong, I think that's partly because of the CGI that he's put in and it's the, I want to say, 2011 version that they've put on Disney Plus.
00:25:43
Speaker
visually these films look absolutely gorgeous. They are incredible. I thought the action as well was a highlight. Apparently there was a thing I remember reading where for the lightsabers in particular they actually had glowing sticks
00:26:00
Speaker
so that it would reflect off the actors' faces, whereas I think in the prequels, and I could be totally wrong, so if there's any Star Wars fans who know better on this, please feel free to reach out. But I'm sure in the prequels they had the metal sticks on the hill,
00:26:15
Speaker
and then they would obviously add the effects in post, whereas for the sequel trilogy obviously they would add the effects in post, but they would have lightsabers that did glow so you would get that kind of real-time effect of the lighting and things, especially at the end of The Force Awakens where they're fighting in the forest. That was amazing.
00:26:33
Speaker
I'm going to say it by the way, this is my semi-controversial point of the night before we get into the negatives, but I really like Kylo Ren's lightsaber, and this guy got a lot of – well, I said this guy's if he's real, but that got a lot of crap, didn't it, when it was first revealed? In the trailer. Yeah. I remember as well people are making fun of it. I don't know why! It looks sick!
00:26:55
Speaker
I don't know. I think it looks kind of silly. I'm not a big fan of his lightsaber, to be honest. I don't know. It makes it, for me personally, I think it gives it its own sense of identity rather than being just another metal hell in the lightsaber that pops up. I can understand why people think in a practical sense it looks silly and how he didn't turn off his hand. I'll never know, but
00:27:16
Speaker
Now, I genuinely thought of what the designs were interested in, as you said as well, BB-8. Absolutely fantastic. I genuinely didn't think there would be a better droid or on par with R2-D2, but BB-8 surprisingly works amazingly. Did you watch these films with subtitles? Yeah. Did you notice what the subtitles kept calling the robots? How they spilt their names? What do you mean like R2 and 3PO?
00:27:41
Speaker
Yeah, so it would be like A-R-T-O-O. Yeah, they've been doing that for years. That's really weird. I don't know why they do it. There's always a mix. It's like sometimes it's R2D2 and then it's A-R-T-O-O. Yeah, I don't get why they do that. For any Wikipedia contributors, please let us know in the comments.
00:27:59
Speaker
because I would love to genuinely know. And don't worry, that's not going to be in the trivia episodes in a couple of weeks. But yeah, seeing no seriousness, I thought that a lot of the planets and things had a very... I mean, much like the prequels, I will give the prequels this, they had very distinctive planets as well. But I feel as if, although I can't remember any of the names of them, Preet, for example, I thought that was really cool. I was a big fan of Jakku for obvious reasons because that was kind of bland.
00:28:28
Speaker
Just Tatooine. It's almost like they should have just bid on Tatooine. I do have a couple more positives actually that I'd forgotten to mention. I quite enjoyed, and you mentioned it as well with the Unforced Awakens, with the sort of lit up lightsabers during the last fight. A lot of the fight choreography was very good in this, both the space fights and the general hand-to-hand combat, blasters, lightsabers, all that kind of stuff.
00:28:47
Speaker
I thought that it was probably the best trilogy for that, because it wasn't super goofy like the prequel trilogies often were with flying all over the place kind of thing. It felt a lot more grounded than that, but it still felt a lot more interesting than the original trilogy where often you had two old men just lightly fencing with each other. Not to be too harsh on Alec Guinness and David Prowse. So I thought the fight choreography was really good. I really enjoyed it. A lot of the space fights were really cool. The Dreadnought run, the start of the second film. Whilst I did not really enjoy Poe's back and forth with
00:29:17
Speaker
It was okay. Kind of funny, it went on a bit long, but I understand the reason it went on long was because he was stalling for time. The actual shooting down all those turrets and that kind of thing was really cool. But then there'd be other scenes which weren't as good, like the final battle where they were like storming on foot onto a ship for some reason on those horse things. But we'll get into that as we talk about the negatives. And see if there's any further ado while we jump into the negatives.
00:29:39
Speaker
No other place to go now, is there? As I said, I'm naming the starship. I'm directing it at the sequel trilogy. The biggest and I feel as if the worst sin of these three films is
Criticisms and Controversies
00:29:50
Speaker
the writing. I feel as if there's a weird mix between trying to take the sequel trilogy and make it its own thing versus trying to be a
00:30:00
Speaker
closing nostalgia blanket about what everybody loves about Star Wars because I genuinely think that the main thing they must have had on the memos was do not write this like the prequel trilogy which I feel as if is a double-edged sword because on the one hand I get what they were trying to do in the prequels and I don't necessarily agree that it was done in a good way as we spoke about in the first episode of the month.
00:30:27
Speaker
but at the same time I feel as if it was an interesting idea, there was a seed there that a better writer could have taken and made it more dynamic. But for J.J. Abrams especially, this is what annoys me the fact that he basically retread Old Ground for these films, and again this isn't really a hot take because a lot of people said The Force Awakens is just a retread of A New Hope and by the time the third film came around where he came back to direct
00:30:56
Speaker
the flow of the whole trilogy was ruined. The weird thing is as well that a lot of the external media is now having to play catch up to show how the New Republic was so incompetent that they somehow managed to let Empire 2.0 rise from the ashes.
00:31:14
Speaker
and I just feel as if that is the worst thing about this whole trilogy, that the writing's bad, the whole trilogy's disjointed because for some reason I don't know why they got Rian Johnson in to direct the second one. He wanted to make his own thing and if he was making his own standalone film that would have worked but he really damaged a lot of the reputation and good faith I feel that these films were building up from the previous one but what are your
00:31:44
Speaker
Yeah, it's a difficult one because you would say that it would have made more sense to have one director with their vision do all three films and Ryan Johnson could have done a Rogue One solo or like one of those kinds of movies that it was odd that he was brought in to do part two of a trilogy. I don't necessarily think that Ryan Johnson is to blame.
00:32:04
Speaker
for the way that the stories went. But one of the big issues I had with the writing of these films was that there were a lot of storylines that they seemed to set up that they didn't really fully fulfill or sometimes were kind of ignored or put on the back seat.
00:32:22
Speaker
I don't really feel like Finn and Poe really had much to do by the last film and I think that The Force Awakens had kind of set up Finn as being a much bigger kind of character and role within these films that people were excited that he held a lightsaber and what that might mean that you had this former stormtrooper and his storyline which kind of petered out where he kind of seemed like he was just being a bit
00:32:46
Speaker
cowardly again in the second one. Whereas you kind of felt that he already progressed in the film prior to it away from that kind of personality. So there was a bit of regression there in his character. And then you had introduced Rose as a character and then threw her to the side by the third film. You had Ray's storyline of her lineage, which kind of kept going back and forth as to whether or not it was significant in any kind of way. The whole scene in the second one where she was in the Sith cave of mirrors.
00:33:15
Speaker
I'm sorry, that's not the game of manners. I mean, it's what it is. What it seemed to me at the time was this is them doing their tree scene. When Luke goes to that spooky tree and sees himself and cuts off Knott Vader's head and sees himself, that's kind of what I felt like they were going for with this scene, that Rey had her own moment like that, and then had it again in Rise of Skywalker with evil Rey. Oh god, I hated that. Does it look like evil Kermit? She had the pointy teeth, what was that about? She looked like Bilbo when he wants the ring back.
00:33:49
Speaker
So there was a lot of things they seem to be setting up. A love storyline with Rey and Finn that kind of kept maybe appearing. There was once in the final film at one point he says there's something I've always wanted to tell you and then I don't think he ever does. Fair enough. I mean like you don't have to follow that thread and be some implication there that you're allowed to theorize yourself.
00:34:10
Speaker
Well, apparently, and I could be wrong in this, but what I heard was that the line they were supposed to put in was that Finn was going to tell her, and I don't know why he would tell her in this particular instance, but the line was supposed to be something like he would tell her that he was force sensitive, and I think the idea was that they were going to make him another Jedi or something. Of all the things, I think they actually followed up in this plot line with a Lego Christmas
00:34:38
Speaker
special on Disney Plus of all things. Oh, I liked that. Yeah, and it's so weird. It was a really good Christmas special, don't get me wrong, but to follow up that important plot line in that, and don't get me wrong, that's not the worst thing they did to Kofkoff, Fortnite, Kofkoff, but we'll get onto that in a minute. Yeah, it was weird, yeah. I think that's what he was supposed to say in that scene. Oh, okay.
00:35:02
Speaker
I feel like they had been setting up a romantic kind of storyline between the two of them that didn't really resolve. I'm all for platonic friendships within media that not everything has to be romantic. But it did seem like that's what they were leading towards. I don't know, maybe I was just reading into it wrong, but that is what I kind of interpreted. And so that was another one where it just felt like a thread that hadn't really been properly pulled. And then yeah, you've just touched on it there. But
00:35:25
Speaker
The whole thing with Palpatine, where it just kind of comes out of nowhere that like, oh, yeah, Kylo Ren just killed Snoke, this whole kind of thing. But actually, it wasn't really Snoke. It was Palpatine behind the scenes this whole time. And we don't actually get a proper, it was Palpatine. We get in the intro, a broadcast has gone over the airwaves. And then we inferred from that that it's Palpatine and the actual broadcast was published
00:35:50
Speaker
through Fortnite as a special in Fortnite. And so they put canon material into an external source that are very limited. I mean, it was the biggest game in the world at the time, but a limited number of people are going to be accessing. And so it just seemed really, really out of place, really out of touch in terms of how you should engage your audience.
00:36:12
Speaker
that you should not be explaining canon events in world lore that's important to the storyline through a video game that isn't even a Star Wars video game. Yeah that was the thing that baffled me because don't get me wrong I know George Lucas to the ire of the fans has gone on record saying oh it's just a franchise for kids
00:36:32
Speaker
what I have to say is pretty lazy argument in some regards but the fact that they targeted kids and as you said one of the biggest multiplayer games of the time and kinda now that needs to be seen, no Roblox. I mean it's still going, good on them but it's still going but yeah the fact that they announced that there was just ridiculous I genuinely don't know what they were thinking in regards to that but sorry are there any other points.
00:36:58
Speaker
Oh, I forgot to mention, I liked that it was puppet Yoda and not CGI Yoda when he made his appearance. Yeah, that was pretty cool. And then, yeah, the other thing was just the Empire's battleships in the last one. There were just there, presumably manned, who's manning these hundreds of Empire Starfleet ships that have just been orbiting this weird lightning planet. How were they built? How were they manned? How were they looked after? How did no one know about them until right now when it would have required such an immense labor force to create those? And they seem to suggest that it was just magicked there by Sith powers, in which case,
00:37:28
Speaker
What? That's not how the Force works. That's not how the Sith works. So yeah, it's just very weird how they had these ships in orbit, came out of nowhere, where they eaten the manpower from. Was it produced by Sith power? The dark side? Because like as Han said, that's not how the dark side works. A good story for another time. But just another one here.
00:37:51
Speaker
Yeah, no, I totally agree with you. There seems to be a lot of plot threads that I feel as if is definitely one of the issues from splitting up the director for these films. In particular, as I said, the fact that they went from JJ Abrams' vision of Star Wars and he set up all these mystery boxes and plot threads and then they all either got killed off
00:38:16
Speaker
by Rian Johnson or whoever was writing as well with him. And then Gigi Abrams came back and they were like, oh no, I always intended for Palpatine to come back. And you're like, oh, but it wasn't really made obvious. It's a bit like, you know, when you've got a really bad detective show where it's like a good detective show will kind of leave hints about the perpetrator's identity. You know, they'll say, oh, they left this evidence, which would suggest
00:38:46
Speaker
this character or that character, but a bad detective story essentially says, oh yeah, it was this guy all along. And it's like, well, you never really alluded to that guy. Who is that guy? For all intents and purposes, people coming into the forums would have no idea who Palpatine is. They would just think, all right, he's an ancient evil guy.
00:39:06
Speaker
but to fans you know they would be like well what the hell why is Palpatine back it definitely made zero sense and I know I've been harping on about this but I do feel as if the worst part of this trilogy is between the dialogue which don't get me wrong I'm not saying it's any better or worse than George Lucas's dialogue but between the dialogue between the drastic character shifts like as you said with Finn's character who started out absolutely fascinating it would have been great to dive into
00:39:34
Speaker
his character Phasma as well. She was a great character, which apparently she's really good in the books. But again, you shouldn't have to depend on external media to justify your characters. I feel as if, although it was good to see the old characters, I did not like the way they handled them. I felt as if they were very trigger happy or lightsaber happy to kill them off one by one. The thing is, I was speaking to someone else about this,
00:40:03
Speaker
especially about The Last Jedi where someone had mentioned how they weren't happy with Luke being this very dejected and just horrible role model now essentially. And I think Mark Hamill to some degree has come on record to say, oh I also don't like the way it was written and everything and I don't like the way that all
00:40:26
Speaker
the rhythm didn't get together in the end to have like that one last reunion but I feel as if there's a nugget in there that genuinely could have worked. The whole fallen mentor coming back as a second legend kind of thing, I thought that was a really interesting idea but just the way they went about it with the weird drink in the milk
00:40:48
Speaker
Oh yeah, the weird green milk scene was so ugh, yeah that was really out. The whole introduction of Luke on the island I don't think was very good. They immediately throw the lightsaber away, they drink the milk to try and seem gross, the fishing that he was doing, it was all just a bit like ugh. This just feels so, maybe wrong is the right word. It felt out of place. He seemed to be presenting as a Yoda type figure of his hermit, but like it didn't quite fit for him.
00:41:15
Speaker
Yeah I was not a big fan of that. When I first saw it and I saw what they'd done to the character, I could see where they were going with it but there was a dignified way that they could have gone with it because if you look at the prequels and things you can see there's hundreds of examples of Jedi especially during games like Star Wars Unleashed for example where you have
00:41:39
Speaker
a couple of mentor figures who they are completely rejected because the rebellion's not going well or they're just not at the height of the power that they used to be, but there's a way to show that without completely making them seem like an utter jump, as aware, in just this very weird caricature of someone who's down on his luck. Again, I thought there was a nugget of maybe something to salvage from that,
00:42:05
Speaker
going back to the story, you've got the parallels between the old trilogy and the new trilogy having to forcibly say, oh no, this isn't a snow planet, this is a salt planet by licking the ground. I think that's Rian Johnson. Yeah, it's really weird though. Props for having a cameo in there, but it's not even played for a lot. There is kind of played for a lot, but you're like, why would you lick the ground?
00:42:31
Speaker
No wonder this resistance is failing. Oh, so are you voicing me? Do you know, I was actually thinking about this, and I'm curious to hear your thoughts as well, but you know that way when you say, oh, you criticise a trilogy but you don't really give a possible alternative? Yeah.
00:42:46
Speaker
I will say that despite the salt thing being like, whatever, the red color kick up that they get from that is so beautiful. I didn't think, I don't think I fully appreciate it the first time I watched it, but like watching it this past week, I was like, this looks stunning. It looks so beautiful, so visually interesting and appealing. And so I really liked what they did there with that.
00:43:05
Speaker
No, I agree. I actually went to see this film in the IMAX at the time, and between that, between the light speed or the hold-all manoeuvre as they call it, which I hate to call it that, the hold-all manoeuvre where she rams into the other ship at light speed, that's an incredible scene, whether you like the logistics of it or not.
00:43:27
Speaker
afterwards, they're like, that's a once in a million thing, you can't do that. I was like, why though? Surely it's just suicide bombing people with light speed. Surely isn't that hard. I don't like the way that I can't remember his name. Is it Dominic?
00:43:38
Speaker
Yeah, I kept calling him Billy Boyd, but it definitely was not Billy Boyd. I like the fact that that was his first chain I thought, that the Empire's back again, and he's like, yeah, let's ram ships into it. Jesus Christ. Did Monaghan dominate Monaghan? Oh yeah, that is, yeah. Yeah, dominant Monaghan. It was kind of disturbing that he thought it's the best way to deal with the new Empire. But that's the thing about this film, and it is something that after
00:44:03
Speaker
kind of touched on earlier and the fact that a lot of people seemed to be very confused that the Empire had fallen and everything and you know was all happy by the end of it and obviously as soon as the Emperor fell that the Empire wasn't going to automatically fall after that so there was a lot of questions for things like where did the First Order come from and everything? What is this new Empire that's just sprung out of nowhere?
00:44:28
Speaker
And I actually remember thinking about this in relation to something like Star Trek, and I know this is the nerdiest thing ever, but bear with me. But have you seen much of Star Trek? No, not really any Star Trek to be honest. I've seen the reboot films, well two of them at least. So just to give a brief synopsis of what I'm going for here,
00:44:47
Speaker
I know that JJ Abrams wanted to do this whole Resistance vs Empire thing or rather Rebellion vs Empire thing from the original films but officially it makes no sense because the New Republic are the ones who are in charge and everything up until they decide to blow them up and say oh yeah all of their ships were just
00:45:08
Speaker
part in those planets and you're like, that makes no sense but anyway that's a whole other thing. But if they wanted to create a new Resistance, it actually reminded me of something in Star Trek where in the next generation there's Deep Space Nine and Voyager, the
00:45:23
Speaker
whole trinity of good stuff. There is an alien race, they're like a militaristic race called the Cardassians. Not to be confused with the Cardassians, I just want to point that out. Long story short, the Federation, the main good guys, they get into a war with them and they eventually agree to cease fire. They have the militarised zone, but
00:45:45
Speaker
part of their agreement essentially is that they have to give over control of their colonies across the border. But of course the humans who are living on the planet under Cadassian rule don't like this because they've made it their home and everything, they're willing to die for it, and long story short they create their own resistance movement called the Maquis, and long story short it doesn't work out for them in the long run.
00:46:10
Speaker
they get severely beaten because another alien force called the Dominion team up with the Cardassians. It was a whole mess. It was a whole mess of war. But I feel as if, and especially with JJ Abrams working on a Star Trek film, I feel as if something like that might have been better where it was like,
00:46:28
Speaker
the First Order could have been the remnants of the Empire and the New Republic weren't able to fully snuff them out, so they had this almost stalemate, and then that's when you could have Leia and Cole as the Resistance. I mean, if you want to throw her in, it's like Superman flying through space and that. Go ahead, which is another weird scene, but yeah, I feel as if something like that might have been a bit better.
00:46:53
Speaker
rather than pretending that they were the resistance at the beginning when it's like it doesn't really make up like a sense because the New Republic's there, you know? And apologies sorry for that long nerdy rant there, but I feel as if something like that would have maybe worked better. Yeah, I think there should have been a bit more of an exploration of the collapse of the society that led to the First Order.
00:47:18
Speaker
I don't think there's anything necessarily wrong with what they did, because I mean, doing that is kind of just doing what the prequels did, whereas doing what they did is kind of what the OG trilogy did. And so you're kind of caught between the two of them. And if you're going to choose to do one or the other, you're probably going to rather be like, I think we'll bank on the nostalgia of what the original trilogy story roughly was. And so I can understand certainly why they went down the route that they went down.
00:47:42
Speaker
because this trilogy was very much an homage to a film series, a film trilogy that came out 40 years prior to it. So I often take these films as being just three blockbuster movies, and that's what they are. There are plot holes in them, for sure, but I don't think that they're substantial enough plot holes that you can't just have fun watching them.
00:48:00
Speaker
And I did have fun watching these films. I mean, you're completely right in that regard though, because the sequel trilogy was always going to be between the rock and the hard place. And I genuinely do think that with the negativity around the prequels, as we said in the first episode, they had that political angle, but then they wanted a thriller, then they wanted a romance, then they wanted a comedy, you know, all of these different genres were just clashing on one another. And that was just the Jar Jar storyline. I was going to say that was just Attack of the Clones.
00:48:28
Speaker
But yeah, then you've got the original trilogy which came at a more simple time in cinema. It was, as we said last week, it was based a lot more on mythology and a lot of other films and epics that came before it and I
00:48:45
Speaker
do totally agree with you. I know why they would have banked on that one and said okay we're gonna go for the nostalgia aspect but by doing that I feel as if they've trapped themselves in this kind of bubble of they can't break out of the comparisons then. As I said although I think the battle in Crete's absolutely gorgeous looking, people are still looking at that thinking is that meant to be the Hoth planet or we get to go back on to Endor or
00:49:11
Speaker
one of the moons of Endor if you want to be specific, but we get a lot of similarities that kind of pop up in between, except for Canto Bight, but the less hit of the Canto Bight, the better. I do not like that planet, I'm going to be honest. But again, that's a weird thing as well because they try to do an interesting thing there where they talk about the wonderful joys of weapons dealings and things that they're selling to the First Order and the Resistance and everything, and that's
00:49:38
Speaker
kind of interesting but at the same time yeah, I do agree. How can you take that seriously when at the very beginning Finn looks like the Stay Puft Marshmarble Man walking through the ship as his bodysuit's leaking? What I'm trying to get at is it's like a very hard balance and I feel as if at the end of it. This isn't the Star Wars you grew up with.
00:50:01
Speaker
They're saying you're daddy's Star Wars. This isn't your father's Star Wars. I genuinely feel as if it was, then we would be in such a place of stagnation that if we had scene for scene of, because I mean we've seen that in cinema before, where they're not wanting to try something different so they just make it scene for scene, like all things, I don't know why the psycho remakes
00:50:22
Speaker
coming to mind but you know, they do it in such a similar way and I feel as if at times they lean into that but then at times they do try to pick from the prequels in regards to the more deeper themes that that was trying to tackle and failed at but I'm mashing the two together.
00:50:39
Speaker
feel as if it's admirable that they tried something different but there is definitely too much nostalgia there for it to be not considered its own thing but you know for fans to kind of look at it and go oh this is like a completely different thing and now because of that all of the between the Empire and the First Order era whatever you call that maybe the Republic era but the fact is that you now have all of these series that have to play catch-up
00:51:07
Speaker
like the Mandalorian, the Sokka that have to basically fill in the gaps and it just makes the New Republic look like absolute idiots. But then again insert real life example here, and you probably wouldn't think it's as bad a reach but I agree with you The Landry, I do think that overall it's not as bad as people give it flak for, I would say. If you're looking for a mindless blockbuster trilogy, it certainly does the job. I don't think it's anything overly deeper profound.
00:51:37
Speaker
but what I found really heartwarming I have to say is the amount of fans that I've actually seen, whether that's on Twitter or places like that, that are actually expressing their love for the franchise. And even in Comic Con when you see people dressed up as Rey or even Kylo Ren, hopefully it's not Adam Driver underneath, but you know. Yeah, it is quite nice to see that there's more positivity coming out of these films now.
00:52:04
Speaker
Yeah, I think there is certainly a fan base for this trilogy. There are people who really did go to the likes of Ray, to Finn. A lot of people did really enjoy Kylo Ren. A lot of people are very thirsty for Adam Dryer for some reason. I don't quite get it, but each to their own. Absolutely. I think you mean Ben Swore. Thank you very much.
00:52:20
Speaker
He looks such a weird shape. He has such a weird face. I don't get it personally. My partner also is just like, he looks so weird. Why do people find him attractive? That's getting into something else. Yeah, I mean Noah finds to Adam Driver. I'm sure he's a lovely person, but I think my partner also had the same reaction. She just turned to me and said, long face. I was like, yeah.
00:52:43
Speaker
There's certainly a lot of interest in these characters in that a new generation has been inspired by them. Disney World has a Star Wars section as park that's like pretty much exclusively focused on this time period within the Star Wars universe. And so it kind of maintains this continued interest.
00:52:59
Speaker
in it so that when you go to Disney World, you're seeing the Rey storyline, you're interacting with people dressed up as Rey in the Rebellion and fighting off the Stormtroopers. Because that's the thing as
Target Audience and Cultural Impact
00:53:09
Speaker
well. Do you think it's just because, and this sounds maybe a cop-out to say, but do you think it's just because these films aren't necessarily targeted towards our generation
00:53:20
Speaker
Yeah, I definitely think that's the case because I mean, I know you mentioned earlier about what George Lucas said was a bit cheap, but he's right in many ways. These are films whose prime demographic is children. I loved the prequel trilogy when I was a kid because it was cool Star Wars stuff that showed a different Star Wars story from the one that my parents grew up with.
00:53:39
Speaker
I had my own story that I grew up with. No Star Wars film is going to be for anyone in particular, like some people don't like Star Wars, but as I said, my partner's favourite trilogy are these new ones that she didn't really get invested with the other ones, whereas these she's able to. You're finding a new, not to say my partner's a child that she's the demographic, but for a new audience, they find a new audience with these films. There are people who will genuinely enjoy the prequel trilogy, still enjoy
00:54:06
Speaker
I no longer really enjoyed it. I can tolerate it a lot more than many can. I don't think it's as bad a series of films as many think it is, but I recognize now having grown past that, that it was not a good series, but I loved it as a kid. I enjoyed them way more than I enjoyed the original films. And so I think that people try to add a perspective to films which are for children, but they feel should be catering more towards their interests. There were already three films that came out the okay towards your interests.
00:54:32
Speaker
And those three films still exist. They might have been edited to hell by George Lucas, but those films still exist. If you like Star Wars, you can still like Star Wars and enjoy those films. And other property that comes out about Star Wars that you may may like, you can decide on that. Your opinions on given films does not shape the overall Star Wars universe. These are not for you. Enjoy the films you enjoy, move on from the films you don't.
00:54:54
Speaker
as a very poignant closing point that was absolutely fantastic Andrew but yeah I totally agree with you there. There is so much Star Wars content out there now and I know of people who just they have absolutely fallen in love with the series they love
00:55:09
Speaker
every single aspect of it. There's some people who absolutely loathe it and for some weird reason make a living off of exploiting that hatred which is very ironic. Hashtag dark side life. But at the same time, as you said, the three trilogies I think have
00:55:28
Speaker
completely different demographics. As we said last week, the original trilogy came out in a time where things weren't exactly, historically anyway, things weren't very positive. It was a very turbulent time to live through and this came out as a film that inspired hope for a new generation of kids and things. They looked up to Luke Skywalker, to Leia, to Han Solo,
00:55:56
Speaker
if you will. As we said in the first episode of the month when we watched the prequel trilogies, despite the obvious flaws we see now as adults, we still loved them. I still collected the lightsabers, the toys, the video games, the Lego even. Some things never change mind you, but the fact is that those films will always hold a special place in my heart for that. The sequel trilogy, while I'm probably distancing myself, I still love Star Wars.
00:56:24
Speaker
And I do think that it is a fantastic series, it's a fantastic universe, how they've built up everything around that. At the same time, they are definitely trying to broaden their reach to try and appeal to different demographics. You've got your younger audiences, you've got your shows for older people like The Mandalorian and The Nandor.
00:56:45
Speaker
got the younger ones like Rebels, Clone Wars and such. You've got all of these diverse shows and I feel as if there's only a few, I mean technically Marvels like that nowadays, but you've got all of this new content that we would have never had otherwise whether for better or for worse. But the point is this could be someone's first trilogy, this could be someone's first entry into the series. And moaning about how Rey is like this Mary Sue and everything and
00:57:13
Speaker
isn't going to change that. I'm going to be honest it's not going to change that because maybe there's some moments where she acts more talented than she might be in that particular instance. Other times she acts normal. The point is that we should be enjoying these films for what they are and if you don't enjoy them that is also perfectly valid as well because I'm not going to sit here and say oh you should enjoy them as mindless blockbusters but if you don't enjoy them that's
00:57:38
Speaker
find as well. I mean story-wise I really don't like The Last Jedi and I hate even more Rise of Skywalker but what I do appreciate is the fact that people get enjoyment out of them, they get so much happiness seeing Rey and Kylo together, whether they're fighting or whatever, could they have been done better? Yeah, sure, absolutely. I mean what fucking couldn't except for Lord of the Rignas, that is a
00:58:02
Speaker
That's the piece. Go listen to our Lord of the Rings month for more info, but yeah. In all seriousness, I'm kinda glad that Disney haven't shied away from the sequels, because I think a lot of people thought they were going to with the negative reception, but with Daisy Ridley and the fact that she's gonna be in, is it New Jedi Order that Daisy Ridley's gonna be in?
00:58:22
Speaker
I knew she was going to be in something I can't remember if it was New Jedi Order or not, but I know she's coming back to the series, which is nice that she's quite attached to them still, that she still wants to come back. I don't think that John Boyega wants to come back to the series. No, he 100% says you're not Disney plus or me, which I thought was both funny and sad, but I can understand that. Yeah, that's fair.
00:58:42
Speaker
And as I reiterated before, you might have gripes about the sequel trilogy, but at the end of the day, please, please, for the love of God, act like adults and remember that if you're throwing criticism, don't act like a prat. Don't act like a horrible human being because there's human beings behind this project.
Respectful Discourse and Upcoming Content
00:59:00
Speaker
I know Disney's like a faceless corporation, but the actors themselves don't go harassing people. Come on, guys. But on that note, Andrew, thank you so much for tolerating all three trilogies
00:59:12
Speaker
Star Wars. It's the most intensive themed month we've done, I think, just due to the amount of content we've had to get through. Oh absolutely. And of course, next week we are indeed, because it's the 20th anniversary, makes me feel old, of the Star Wars Battlefront game. So we are going to be doing a episode on that next week. And yeah, I genuinely cannot wait to hear your thoughts on whether or not this game's actually held up. Yeah, me neither.
00:59:39
Speaker
And then of course, in the final week, we are going to be jumping on the trivia quiz and I cannot wait to show you what I've got planned for that. So before we wrap up, where can these lovely listeners find your content, Andrew? Yeah, thank you so much. It's been wonderful to be on here. The listeners can find me at
00:59:56
Speaker
Green Shield 95 on Twitter or X, whatever you want to call it. And you can also find both myself and Satsanami on our other podcast, Stop, Drop and Roll Initiative, a D&D Let's Play podcast. You can find that where all good podcasts are found. And you can follow that podcast on our Twitter account at
01:00:13
Speaker
sdripod twitter and x and yeah hopefully you guys will listen to that and enjoy it there's only two episodes out currently but third one will be out soon i do promise definitely go check that out if you want to hear me speak like a very old turtle even though i think you're supposed to be young but if you want to hear that then definitely go check it out
01:00:30
Speaker
but if you want to hear more episodes about Star Wars month as well as general episodes that we've done together then you can check us out on our website chattsunami.com as well as all good podcast apps. I also want to thank our Pandalorian patrons Robotic Battle Toaster and Sonja thank you so so much for supporting the show and if you too want to be a Pandalorian if you want to have early access exclusive access
01:00:52
Speaker
and yeah, just general goodies for Chat Tsunami, then you can check us out on our Patreon page, patreon.com forward slash Chat Tsunami. But until next time, stay safe, stay awesome and most importantly, I thought this podcast smelled better on the outside. Nailed it.