Star Wars the last jedi

[mikewint]

Just curious... where do you guys see this feminism, political correctness and social justice commentary in the Star Wars films?

I guess it depends on how hard you look and how you interpret what you do see. I guess my sensitivity to these kinds of issues began when I got out of the Army and could not get into med school because I was too old and had too much training. My MS degree, 3.9 average, military MOS meant nothing as 5 openings were being held for minorities with no regard to grades or experience. Yea I'm still PO'd.
Anyway read my #12 post:
Have you noticed, by chance, that ALL the strong characters who lead are female and ALL the evil characters are white males? Did you notice that the new leads are a young white women, a black man, an Asian woman, and a Latino. Oh yea, again the baddies are all white males. Glorious PC-dom here we comith.
I suppose that could all be by sheer chance
Oh one more thing we had 2 girls also and they both did everything the boys did and vice versus. My girls hunted, shot guns, knew the basics of auto mech, could change a flat tire unassisted, took out the garbage and so on. I have no problem with women in combat as long as they can do, do do, and meet the same criteria as a male. I do object when the Army lowers the standards women have to meet to receive the same ratings as a male.

 

[JKim]

IHave you noticed, by chance, that ALL the strong characters who lead are female and ALL the evil characters are white males? Did you notice that the new leads are a young white women, a black man, an Asian woman, and a Latino. Oh yea, again the baddies are all white males. Glorious PC-dom here we comith.

Not exactly... There are strong leading characters that are male (Poe). There are baddies that are not male (Phasma). And there are baddies that are not white (Del Toro's character). So the ALL descriptor is not accurate.

But I get what you're saying. But please understand, as an Asian-American growing up in this fine country, I've had to endure the stifling Hollywood portrayal of Asians as sleazy villains, kung-fu experts, math nerds or exotic geisha girls. So when one Asian American actor gets cast in a blockbuster with a prominent role and has no special powers or even particularly good-looking, my reaction is "It's about freaking time!"

 

[tyrodtom]

So here I am watching a series of movies that first came out the year my first child was born.
Now I'm watching the continuation of it with her and my grandchildren 40 years later.
And all of us enjoys it !!!

Not many series can accomplish that.

 

[rochie]

So here I am watching a series of movies that first came out the year my first child was born.
Now I'm watching the continuation of it with her and my grandchildren 40 years later.
And all of us enjoys it !!!

Not many series can accomplish that.

Same here, though with my Daughter who is now 20 !

There was one scene in the Ladt Jedi I thought was incredible and if it was in Alien or another Ridley Scott movie it would of been lauded to high heaven.

 

[The Basket]

But this is SJW in a nutshell. Is an Asian American girl is in a film because she is the best actress or is it because she was the first Asian through the door? Her sister in the film is played by Veronica Ngo who meets the 'good looking' quota. there was of course an Asian in Rogue One Donny Yen.

Anyhoo....What one scene was good? I may have been out taking a whizz when that was on

 

[mikewint]

There are strong leading characters that are male (Poe). There are baddies that are not male (Phasma). And there are baddies that are not white (Del Toro's character).

My most sincere apologies for what you had to endure. Not any kind/type of excuse but IMHO some of that was unconscious. One of my best friends from the 6th grade on, Richard, was Mexican and we immediately called him Pancho. It was the days of the Frito Bandito. There was no meanness or denigration meant by that name and he quickly became a very close friend who stayed at my house, ate meals with us, was "adopted" by my mother, etc. The closest I've personally come is/was returning home from Vietnam. I was spit on, called foul names, and was even rejected by Veteran organizations like the VFW and American Legion.
Water under the bridge and again IMHO pushing an exact reversal doesn't rectify past transgressions. People come up to me today and thank me for my service both the VFW and Legion continually invite me to join. I smile and say Thank You but it does not (for me anyway) rectify the past.
I digress and I'm off the soapbox---
POE - I do not consider him a strong male lead in fact quite the opposite. He is the counterpoint to the superior female leaders like Leia and Holdo. Poe's refusal to follow orders and his mutiny cost the rebellion hundreds of lives. ALL of which could have been averted if the DA male had only listened to the women AND somehow he gets away with it. He is today's world in microcosm where powerful men did bad things and got away with it until brave women, 40 - 50 years later, remembered and blew the whistle. If Poe had been in my team he'd have fallen on a grenade or got accidentally shot a long time ago.
Phasma - Again a strong lead, well female, a villian, and with that reflective armour certainly a stand-out ready to crush the rebels, then she unceremoniously get dumped into a trash compactor before the Starkiller base get blowed-up. Well now in LJ she has escaped from that fate and is on Snokes ship and she is supposed to execute Finn but Holdo's crash allows Finn (the ex-janitor remember) to knock Phasma down, break her helmet for a glimpse of her face (remember Vader's scenes) then the ground crumbles and she falls into intergalactic flames...Your typical stormtrooper fighting style...Except The ex-janitor, ex-stormtrooper with a conscience, Finn. Is she dead...now...finally?
DJ - Hard to know at this point where Dizzy is going with this character. He is IMHO a replacement for Han Solo (IV), on neither side, the rebels and the Empire/First Order are simply opponents neither good nor bad. To DJ they present opportunities for him to make a buck, much as Han the smuggler was in the beginning. So Finn and Rose need DJ's code breaking skills and, for the money he's on board but offered more he betrays Finn and Rose for a pile of credits and takes off in his POS ship. I think he'll return in force, as a Hispanic male he'll serve as a lure for the countries 58.6 million Hispanics

 

[The Basket]

Poe is the Hispanic character.

 

[mikewint]

Benicio Monserrate Rafael del Toro Sánchez is a Puerto Rican-American and Oscar Isaac is a Guatemalan-American actor both are thus Hispanic. In the order presented Poe was presented as a strong male lead and del Toro as the non-white character thus I dealt with them in those terms

 

[rochie]

But this is SJW in a nutshell. Is an Asian American girl is in a film because she is the best actress or is it because she was the first Asian through the door? Her sister in the film is played by Veronica Ngo who meets the 'good looking' quota. there was of course an Asian in Rogue One Donny Yen.

Anyhoo....What one scene was good? I may have been out taking a whizz when that was on

I am talking about the way the scene where the vice admiral takes out snokes fleet.
The effects were great and the use of a few seconds silence followed by muted sounds of ships blowing up was incredibly well done

 

[The Basket]

If you are familiar with the Rebels cartoon... Commander Sato does a similar collision. And a large object at light speed should have destroyed whatever it hits. Not chopped a bit off.
For JKim Sato is Asian and voiced by an Asian actor. So Star Wars was representing Asians before Last Jedi.

Rebels is a better showing of the Star Wars universe than the tripe we are discussing.

 

[tyrodtom]

How can you hear a ship blowing up in the vacuum of space, unless you're in that ship ?

 

[rochie]

How can you hear a ship blowing up in the vacuum of space, unless you're in that ship ?

Well yes we all know that really !

The clue is in the genre "science fiction" documentaries they are not.

Is it the greatest movie made, no !
its not even the best star wars episode, but its a pretty decent nights entertainment for me as a fan of the star wars movies (not that bothered by the whole expanded universe) since seeing a new hope when i was a 7year old kid.

 

[The Basket]

I wonder if Asian cinema go on about how many white people are in their films.
Keeps Kim Jong Un up all night with worry.

 

[The Basket]

New Han Solo film.
Early doors but the critics out saying it's garbage already even though not out yet. Based purely on trailers. I will keep judgement until I sees it. If I sees it. Not decided if I will go cinema to see it. Depends on what I hear. But not going to jump as Last Jedi has certainly made me think twice.
Oddly it's the market what decides good and bad and toy sales are below expectations and China was a flop so Disney will have to decide why that was the case. Probably not enough gay characters.
It's all about the money and Disney bought a formula with Star Wars which worked and then they tried to change it which didn't and now we face star wars films until the end of time.
Once the magic and public goodwill goes then you're flogging a dead horse and I fear Disney will kill star wars off until the last dollar can be milked.
I hope Disney realise this.

 

[DerAdlerIstGelandet]

How can anyone judge a movie by a single trailor?

 

[The Basket]

Star Wars has become politicised so there are people out there who want to see Disney fail or have an agenda.
I just want Star Wars!
Although the Han Solo actor is said to be cardboard so that could be a weak link and the film has virtually been reshot which is never a good omen.
But I will only judge when I watch the whole film. In my experience the better the trailer, the worse the film.

 

[DerAdlerIstGelandet]

Cardboard? You see him for like 5 sec in the trailor.

People just want to bitch to bitch...

 

[Ivan1GFP]

My Family saw this a few weeks back but not all at the same time.
I have already seen this mentioned a few times, so my opinions won't be new in this thread.

The Last Jedi was a fun example of a Space Fantasy, after all, that IS what SF stands for right?
As others have mentioned, don't presume you know what's going on or who or what people are just because you have seen every movie and read everything that was ever published about Star Wars. We are now playing by a new set of rules.
Leave your brain at home or turn it off as you would a cell phone at least for the duration of the movie.
If you think and analyze a bit, you are not going to be happy.

Watch this movie as you would a fireworks display.
There are lot of cool things sparking and exploding and they look pretty.
Just like a fireworks display, don't try to read a deeper meaning.
You will probably be disappointed if you do. Remember: Fireworks don't have to make sense.
Just enjoy the show while it lasts.

- Ivan.

P.S. I recently watched the JJ Abrams Star Trek movies. It seems like he has replaced the Warp Engines on starships with HyperDrives and everything ANYWHERE can be reached in a matter of a few hours. ...But at least there are a lot of cool colours and eye candy there too!

Hello Gentlemen,
I actually wrote this about a month ago in another forum but I believe it is still a pretty good summary of my thoughts on "The Last Jedi".
We have all grown attached to the old characters in Star Wars and it is kind of hard to see them "messed up" in the name of political correctness. As with many things, we don't own them though. Disney does and doesn't seem to mind using them up.

<SPOILER ALERT>

I thought the Episodes 7 & 8 were entertaining but don't fit well as a part of a bigger universe They like the more recent Star Trek movies and Discovery series are pretty light on the Science part of science fiction.
They don't even fit well within their own "Physics".
Why didn't the First Order fleet just jump a few ships through Hyperspace and cut off the Resistance fleet? The audience of this genre tends to be pretty science and tactics oriented and notice these things.
How the heck do you "Drop" bombs in space?
(Both of these questions were brought up in other forums and not by me.)
The vast distances in space are apparently of no concern if it does not support a story line.

As for race and homosexuality, I believe we are a little too hung up on ourselves and what we have on this planet.
This is supposed to be a "Space Fantasy".
What race was Snoke?
I personally never cared to find out what race was for the actor that played Poe.
expanding this a bit to Star Trek....
What race is an Orion slave girl?
How about Klingons, Vulcans, Tellarites, Gorn, Tholians, Cardassians or Ferengi?
Why does it matter? I thought we were supposed to be well above this kind of quota system.

The scenes ARE pretty though.
I guess this is a whole lot like dating a beautiful woman who doesn't have a brain in her head.

- Ivan.

 

[The Basket]

I find it odd to discuss what is real in star wars universe. It's mumbo jumbo so saying bombs don't drop in space is like saying the Death Star has no plumbing for toilets. It's all faaake!
Problem is that if it says star wars on the tin then star wars is what people want and expect. So can't blame high expectation coz that is what Disney hype is for. So if Disney don't deliver on the trade description then they can only blame themselves if some fans get upset

 

[Ivan1GFP]

I find it odd to discuss what is real in star wars universe. It's mumbo jumbo so saying bombs don't drop in space is like saying the Death Star has no plumbing for toilets. It's all faaake!
Problem is that if it says star wars on the tin then star wars is what people want and expect. So can't blame high expectation coz that is what Disney hype is for. So if Disney don't deliver on the trade description then they can only blame themselves if some fans get upset

Hello The Basket,
When there is no connection to anything we know and expect, then is there any means of actually understanding the events or being able to place them in some kind of context?
We all know there is no sound in space, but don't mind hearing the swish as a starship flies by or hearing the Death Star explode because we know there has to be some license for dramatic effect.
We don't worry too much when every space alien speaks pretty decent English because subtitles get pretty cumbersome after a while.

- But -

If bombs can "drop" in space from one ship to another, then there is a "down" and gravity. If there is gravity in outer space and a direction it goes in, then is this really space?
If their galaxy just became so small that travelling from one star system to another only takes a couple hours without FTL travel, then how is this even remotely similar to the galaxy we live in?
This is like having a story set on Earth in which a character has breakfast in London and drives to Peking for lunch and then walks to a meeting in New York right after lunch.
Wouldn't it be cool if a child could split himself in the morning so that one remains in bed to sleep more while another goes online for video games and a third copy goes to school for the day? Perhaps this can be done by beings in some universe but we would not have very much in common with them.

Heck, we have been arguing about what the properties are of midichlorians and what the force can and cannot do and whether a corpse eliminates the possibility of a "force ghost". Those are all entirely inventions of the Star Wars universe and we are trying to gather some kind of understanding of their rules and limitations.
If we spend so much time trying to quantify and understand purely imaginative concepts, then how do we ignore the things we already "know"?

Should we be concerned if the next story has Darth Vader stroll in from Valhalla and unburn himself and shed his suit?
How about Han Solo coming back into the story.... "It was but a flesh wound...."
Both of these would be cool to see but would make no sense.

....and that is why I say this isn't that far from watching fireworks.

- Ivan.