#I love him ahhh yes Lando you’re a good guy | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

movienotesbyzawmer · 5 years ago

Text

Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker

May 4: Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker

(previous notes: Star Wars: The Last Jedi)

Source: UK 3D Blu-ray

I saw this at pretty much the very first available showing, and haven't watched it since. But since I had the other Disney-era ones in 3D, and I still have the capability to watch 3D movies at home, I decided to complete my Blu-ray collection by ordering the British 3D Blu-ray, like I'd done with The Last Jedi. So now I'm going to see it at home for the first time, in 3D for the first time, and take notes like I've been doing.

My reaction when I saw this on opening night was that it was a lot of fun. I didn't think it was as good as The Last Jedi. Overall it feels like a trilogy where the first priority was to avoid the mistakes of the prequels, and the second priority was to have them be fun movies. Mission accomplished, but the actual story of this trilogy is only marginally satisfying. But I left that opening night screening excited about all the neat things I'd witnessed. And now I shall press play and do some re-witnessing…

Emperor Palpatine, the opening crawl tells us. He wasn't someone we were expecting to be part of the plot of this movie, was it?

First scene after the opening shot is a slow-mo land battle, visually different from Star Wars movies in general. Dude kills 100% of everyone then plucks a mysterious relic from a mysterious relic. He's on a Tomb-raider-y treasure hunt.

It takes him to a Tomb Raider-y lair… and there are creatures in green liquid ahhh!

"…some consider to be… UNNATURAL", that line from Episode III. Very love it. Good reference.

The image of all those Star Destroyers is super super super cool.

And now after a calculated bit of lightness in the Millennium Falcon, the good guys arrive at a super neat looking planet thing. Not even ten minutes in and we've seen three inventive new planet environments.

And now a chase, "lightspeed skipping", and each skip is a cool space place, all different, one of them has a big monster! They are tuned into what's good about Star Wars movies, these Rise of Skywalker makers.

Also, Finn and Poe seem to have settled into their roles as funny supporting-character buddies. The first movie really seemed to be beginning a more dramatic arc for Finn, but it doesn't feel like that's happening any more.

0:15:36 - Rose Tico sighting! Her arc blunted as well. Be nice if she joined them on this mission they're about to leave on.

Really kind of surprising how much footage there is of Carrie Fisher, who died years before this came out.

Okay now we're back with Kylo Ren on this planet that's the equivalent of that orc-factory in Lord of the Rings. What's he doing? Collaborating with some ukky beings. Fixing his helmet. Hm.

Bit of humor in the conference room scene, again calculated.

Back to our heroes and they're on another neat new planet with color clouds & celebratory visuals, pleasant.

0:23:40 - Very cinematic Rey-Kylo cross-galaxy conversation, cool.

Lando saves them from stormtroopers, and is therefore given the honor of the "I've got a bad feeling about this" line.

0:28:00 Speeder chase in the desert, and the stormtrooper speeders launch them up and they fly! Cool!

Hah, there's a gag where Rey fires up her light saber and Poe tries to do that too but his is just a flashlight, cute.

Okay, here's this scene I like where there's a serpent monster in their Tomb Raider cave, and Ray figures out that the monster just needs to be force healed so she does it and it helps them. Sounds corny but I like it.

0:36:00 - we see the Ren gang on a plateau and here a new music theme. I'm not much noticing the new music themes in the Star Wars movies of the 2010s, but there's one.

This scene. The Kylo/Rey meeting in the desert. It was heavily teased in the trailer and it would have been more effective if we hadn't seen so much of it in the trailer. Also there's a who-can-magic-harder duel that ends up killing Chewy, except that we don't have to believe that very very long.

"Let's do that!" about wiping C-3POs memory, John Boyega's exceptional comic timing on display again.

0:45:40 - We're on this new planet now, which is so Poe can find the person that can do a memory wipe of 3-3PO, right? It's fast-paced, this movie.

"We sent out a call for help at the battle of Krait, nobody came" says Poe. Am I forgetting that drama from The Last Jedi? I know he's talking about that final battle from that movie, but I didn't remember a despairing "no one is coming", at least not like it was a huge, shocking letdown.

I like the little Babu creature but we don't get much of it, do we

Poe is all "did she do that to us" when he sees her Force-hypnotize the stormtroopers, haha

0:58:10 - Pretty unique shot, dollying backwards facing Poe & Finn shooting stormtroopers we can't see until they fall in front of the camera

"Your parents were no one… they CHOSE to be" here's where it starts to seem like this movie doesn't like where the last movie was going & made it be different. If this were an improv class the teacher would be like, "remember the principle of 'yes AND…'"

Okay, this bit coming up where General Hux saves them & says he's the spy. It's… funny? And dumb? Maybe? Sort of a tawdry end to this character in the trilogy maybe?

"You.. Are a Palpatine." Dun dun dunnnnnnn. Okay sure I guess. This isn't what I'm into Star Wars movies for; I wouldn't have had it be about this.

They get to the new planet and Rey figures out how to use the knife tool to find where to go, it's so like a Tomb Raider game that I feel like I'm reading a cheat guide on GameSpot

Now Finn is bonding with the girl on the planet who is also a stormtrooper deserter, makes that whole Finn subplot make more sense.

Rey swiped a cool watercraft to go to the wreck of the Death Star and I just want to point out once again that I like the vehicle design in Star Wars movies.

1:13:10 - overhead shot of said vehicle is the first notable example of something that looks good in 3D in this movie. I'm inclined to say you really shouldn't feel like you're missing out if you're seeing this in 2D.

She's in a vision cave on the wrecked Death Star. She fights HER OWN SELF for a second, and bad-Rey rawrs at her in a way that reminds me of when Bilbo does that in the first Lord of the Rings movie. I liked it there and I like it here.

1:18:05 - First bit of my beloved "Han Solo and the Princess" theme, so lovely

Now Rey and Kylo are saber dueling all over this wreck with waves everywhere and it reminds me of the big climactic duel in Episode III where it seems like the duelers are going out of their way to duel in a cool looking place.

Everything gets all dramatic in a way that doesn't really get explained - Leia very deliberately says "Ben", then dies, but it affects Kylo allowing Rey to kill him, but then she un-kills him with Force magic because "I did want to take your hand" and then bounces. And it's not over with this kind of thing, because Kylo has a not-really-real conversation with his played-by-OMG-Harrison-Ford father, and he symbolically hurls his awesome saber away. So where are we now? We're in some drama, that's where. I miss cool vehicles and inventive creature design!

1:27:45 - Modded-up Star Destroyer emerges from lightspeed and it's another cool 3D effect.

And then it blows up the planet where Poe's ex-girlfriend was and it looks cool, but we could have used her to be around more. Wait, does she not-be-dead later or something? Probably.

Okay, very corny sequence happening now, it's the pep talk between Rey and ghost-Luke, it ends with a smirking Luke raising up an X-wing like he couldn't do in Empire Strikes Back, so I guess that plot point is tidied up.

Okay, we got past that drama and now there's a very simple Saint-Crispin's-Day speech riling up the troops so they can go to that mystery planet for the final battle, and interest level has picked up.

1:41:28 - Hey a shot of Rey going through a wall gap is a reference to the earlier cool-in-3D shot of the watercraft & the Death Star wreck.

And here's something that internet assholes picked on - they ride horse-things on the Star Destroyers. Lighten up comrades, maybe this just isn't your kind of space adventure movie.

Rey gets in the mystery-edifice and holy hell it's creepy! There's an audience of thousands of cultists in black stone bleacher seats, chanting in perfect unison! It's downright Kubrick-y!

They really had fun with the lighting in the Palpatine room. Also, there are red stormtroopers on the Star Destroyers and aren't they pretty.

Palpatine is trying to convince Rey that she should embrace hatred and hill him and rule the galaxy in ritual hatred with a chanting congregation of hooded dipshits. Will it work? He does have a very compelling speaking voice. But here comes Kylo! He has had a change of heart or something!

"The life force in your bond," he narrates, and then bad-magics them super hard! We never could have anticipated that evil force spells could thwart their plans.

1:54:20 - very satisfying shot of a giant fleet of good guys coming to save the day. They hit us with the idea of no one coming to save them, and just like when Han Solo swooped in in the first movie, it feels good that this time someone else did show up. And yes it includes Poe's girlfriend and that charismatic little varmint!

Super cool to see Star Destroyers get blown up.

Also cool when Palpatine super-zaps lots of good guy spaceships. Sound is neat on that also. This intense visual/aural experience is what I was thinking about for a while after first seeing this movie.

Rey beats Palpatine by having that surprise second light saber. Whatever, this is a super cool looking scene with all the bad guys in that chamber getting wasted.

Other cool battle climax imagery happens up in the sky, even though it's kind of hard to see what exactly physically happened to save Finn and those guys on the crashing Star Destroyer.

Kylo… what??? Didn't die when he just disappeared into a crevasse??? Quel surprise! He's super-reformed now and heals Rey up with his tender love for her. They kiss, their carnal desires overtaking them, they are high on the most ethical lust the galaxy has ever known! And he dies and disappears, but is visibly satisfied. I feel okay mocking this because I suspect no one likes it. And then it moves on to really cool aftermath visuals that are crazy fun to watch. They are experiencing the great victory in other planets from the other movies, and to the tune of John Williams themes from movies past.

Maz presents Chewy with a special medal, am I supposed to know what that's about? They're giving it major gravity.

So the movie, the trilogy, and the Skywalker Saga ends with a scene of Rey returning to Tatooine to bury the two important light sabers, but also whip out another one she had, and then tell a townie that she's named Rey SKYWALKER, and the final moment is of her gazing at the two suns with the Binary Sunset theme playing us out. What I like about that is that it sends the message that that moment from the original Star Wars, elevated to greatness largely by John Williams stirring theme, is the pinnacle of cinematic experiences that were brought to us by this series.

I like this movie less than any of the Disney-era movies for sure, and I think after watching it a second time, it lacks some specialness that could have allowed it to hold up better against the best Star Wars movies. But I wouldn't say it's bad, and I certainly wouldn't advise against seeing it.

#star wars rise of skywalker

1 note · View note

tomeandflickcorner · 7 years ago

Text

OUAT 7x07/08 Reaction Post

I’m getting a little tired of these midnight shifts....

Oh, so that’s how Wish Regina was defeated. How’d they accomplish that, I wonder? And why couldn’t Snow Prime and Charming Prime think of that?

So, how did Tattoo Guy die?

Well, you just got shot, guy! He didn’t want to disrupt your healing.

Ugh. What’s your deal, Rumpy Rumps? Why are you bothering Rogers/Wish Killian? Why don’t you want him finding this Eloise person?

THANK YOU! Go work for Regina, Jacinda! That’s what I’ve been saying since Day 1!

Oh, go away, Drizella! Unless you wanna tell us what this big horrible thing is supposed to be?

Wow, that’s gutsy, Lucy. Not even hiding the fact that you know your step-grandma’s awake.

So, who is this Eloise? What’s her true identity? Does she have any connection to your lost daughter?

So, this isn’t Parallel Rapunzel, it’s Wish Rapunzel. So...there were two Rapunzels? This one and the one that’s supposed to have been around during the Lost Year?

Um... is Rapunzel the witch in disguise?

So, Tilly sells Rolex watches? Reference to the White Rabbit who was always late?

Ah, blackmail. That’ll work.

Ooooh. Did the witch interfere with the security cameras? I know they can do that- Rumpelstiltskin proved that back in S3.

Speak of the devil!

So, why are you two in cahoots? What’s the story on this little allegiance?

GRIFFIN!!! (My favorite mythical creature.)

Oh, you can sing, Wish Killian.

HA! Sea shanty at last!

OOOOOHHH! So that explains the Garden Gnome!

AWWW! Was that the song your mother sang to you?

FINALLY! They acknowledge his mother! I always suspected she died, but it’s nice to have it confirmed.

Fic writers must be having a field day with this- Killian has a lullaby to sing to the CS Baby.

Ugh, Regina. Don’t ruin this for her! Don’t let whatever Drizella has over you get to you.

Tragic fake backstory unlocked.

What’s wrong, Tilly?

So who was Eloise, really?

I have a feeling she’s not really dead. The way Victoria and Weaver were talking about her makes it sound like she’s actually alive, and that they know where she is.

Does being by the water help ease your mind, too, Rogers?

Did you find something?

Huh. I guess everyone’s fears were well-founded.

Ugh. No, Jacinda. Don’t let Regina get to you.

Regina, you better make it up to Henry!

Oh, and the Ultra Super Dark One dagger.

AAAHHH! Very clever, Rogers!

Oh, spare me, Rumpy Rumps. Like you’d ever care about any version of Killian.

Wait, is THAT what warranted the infamous ‘S’ rating? How was that more revealing than the stuff we saw during the past 6 seasons?

I KNEW SHE WAS THE WITCH!

Ah. But still. We got the iffy consent issues again! A&E love those, don’t they?

Is the Witch tricking him again?

So, this is who Eloise was the whole time? What’s she going to do now?

AAAAHHH!!! WE FINALLY KNOW KILLIAN’S MOM’S NAME!!!!! YES!

So, New Alice IS the daughter like everyone thought. Okay, so why was she palling around with Rumpy Rumps?

No, she’s not who you thought she was. She’s more than that, Rogers! And I’m really hoping you realize that soon.

So....Drizella killed Tattoo Guy?

Oh, no. Well, this is a downer ending.

And now, to the next episode

Aw. This is a sweet reunion.

So, that’s the curse on his heart, then. Being together causes him physical pain.

Who gave her a fake cure? Was it Rumpy?

Wonderful. Lucy is being subjected to what her grandmother lived through. At least Lucy knows there’s someone out there who loves her.

Oh, back off, Drizella. Don’t even think of hitting on your step-brother-in-law. That’s just gross.

Good Regina. Stop the possible incest before it happens.

Haha. Okay, that was a good line. Don’t be caught monologuing.

Oh, please. She poisoned the cake, didn’t she?

Who is this guy? Nick? Who’s Nick?

Oh, he’s Lucy’s cursed father?

So, who is Nick really?

And we’re in Parallel Wonderland now.

Will we see parallel versions of Jefferson? Or the Cheshire Cat?

AHHH!!! Snowing references! Yay!

KISS ALREADY! You know you want to!

So, go with Henry to his world! Problem solved

Yeah, I wanna know who Nick is, too, Lucy!

Oh, you’re referencing the whole David/Kathryn thing. Let’s hope Jacinda doesn’t try and ‘reconcile’ with Nick. I don’t wand a complete rehash of that can of worms.

Parallel Cinder? Do you have a connection to Parallel Wonderland?

What if she didn’t stop loving him, Cinder? Maybe she’s dead? There has to be an explanation.

Nice dress, Jacinda.

No. Don’t go on a date with Nick. Don’t go down this path again, A&E! Please! I’m trying to believe you’ve learned your lesson!

Don’t eat it, Rogers!

Thank you, Regina! I’m so glad you’re awake! You can keep everyone safe until they wake up, too!

Okay, so is Drizella going to be double crossed by Gothel? Did she unknowingly bite off more than she can chew?

So, who is Nick, really? What’s his non-cursed identity?

Was that a Star Wars backpack? How’d that get there?

So... the mother is dead.

But is this Jabberwokcy anything like ole Jabber from the Wonderland spinoff?

Oh, so the Curse of the Poisoned Heart is commonplace.

Wow, Drizella gets around!

Oh. Did Drizella place the Curse of the Poisoned Heart on Henry, too? Apparently, they’re in love with that gimmick.

So, is that what’s supposed to happen if this new Dark Curse breaks? Henry and Parallel Cinder will both die?

But... does this mean that Drizella cursed Parallel Cinder’s mother, too? I thought she didn’t have magic before Regina taught her. Or was it another witch who cursed the mother?

YEAH! Deck her!

Aw. Yeah, I ship it. And they even have the spinning kiss.

Oh, so Victoria forced you into giving up your daughter.

Okay, so Regina’s going to confront Rumpy Rumps now.

Stop feigning ignorance Rumpy! You’re not being cute.

Why would you even want his help, anyway? I say forget him. You’re better off without him.

So let’s find out who Nick is...

Haha! Nice Han/Lando reference

Jack? Jack who? Jack Sprat? The Jack who jumped over a candle stick?

So, this is a friend of Henry’s that we’re only just now meeting. Okay. I was kinda hoping it was Roland or something, but I can live with that.

Yay! They’re together again! Please show, don’t ruin this moment!

Are you talking about The Dragon?

So, Regina and Henry are off on a secret mission?

Okay, you have Anastasia. Now what are you planning to do?

Oh, it was a decoy coffin. So where’s the real Anastasia?

11 notes · View notes