#disney star wars critically

[blackwomeninstarwars]

Aside from its anti-blackness/racism, the general deterioration of Star Wars as a multi-faced story results from people failing to understand the messaging behind characters like the Jedi (and even the Sith). Failing to understand, and desperate to flatten it into something so binary and unfaceted, reactionary viewpoints are the guiding principle.

So, now we've got god-knows-how-many television shows and films (canceled or completed) that problematize the Jedi (and are far too sympathetic/lenient with Sith and Empire ideology) and their philosophy, and people who unironically believe "the Jedi bad, actually" telling those stories.

And, all of this, honestly, started with (non-miniseries) The Clone Wars show, and boiled over with the Sequel Trilogy.

[my-star-war-sblog]

Imma be for real for a moment here, the fandom's and newer Star Wars media's treatment of the Jedi genuinly killed of any interest I had in it. I mean, why should I keep being invested in a media that continuously keeps shitting on my favorite characters and tries to make them worse than they are? What reason do I have to continue interaction with a fandom that's not only toxic as hell but also irrationally hates my favorite characters? And ontop of that keeps harassing anyone who does like them about how "wrong" they are? I used to genuinly enjoy Star Wars, but now? Now it's like this one estranged uncle that used to be cool in your childhood until he fell into some weird politics. All I have left over for the media and his fandom is mild disgust and annoyance. And that sucks! Because I used to really like that stuff. And I'd have loved it if I was able to continue liking it. But with the way it's going right now I really can't.

[dancingmusique]

I’m sure someone will post the actual video clip of Manny speaking about his working relationship with Amandla, but here’s a link where you can see it for yourself✨He’s such a gentleman and clearly enjoyed the time he and Amandla had working on The Acolyte.

[whereserpentswalk]

Someone used "ungood" to describe disney remakes and it's so perfect. "Bad" does not sum up the horrible soulless products created to only fulfil capitalist desires, using artists as tormented vessels, ungood captures it so well.

Artists with passion and vision create bad art. Bad art can have entertaining qualities, and value, and sparks of life inside of them. Teenage fanfic, and b movies, and a young musicians first attempt at smoke on the water are bad, and that's ok. Ungood art does not have the same saving graces as bad art. Ungood art is empty, not just failing at quality but devoid of it.

We need to start using the term ungood. Neither Star Wars episode one, nor Star Was episode nine are good movies, but they don't possess the same lack of quality. The "live action" Lion King movie, and Repo! The Genetic Opera might both be failures at putting musicals on film, but I know which one I'd rather watch, which one still has moments I love, and which one was made to make someone at Disney see a line go up.

[flilisskywalker]

Tony Gilroy: Well, Cinta and Val girlfriends lesbians I think that's the term. I don't know, I was just like, yeah, they are a couple. People fuck in space.

Leslye Headland: Osha and Mae mothers are lesbians, they are very lesbian, you can see the LGBTQIA+ all over that coven. Woman can impregnate other woman with cosmic powers because it's cool as hell.

Dave Filoni and Jon Favreau: I mean... you guys like deepfake Luke Skywalker, right?????? And Grogu? You guys definitely dig Grogu, hmm? Maybe another Order 66 flashback?

[book-stacks]

the acolyte is arguably the coolest star wars show to be released since the mandalorian and y'all had to go fuck it up

[lunarspiral1127]

As someone who did not like the show at all, I'm glad this is canceled.

The Acolyte was badly written, screwing over many likable characters by either killing them off or framing them for all the bad that happened, many plotholes and retcons, and just poorly executed. Plus, the disrespect of the Jedi and how they've been treated compared to the Sith.

[jellybellyblimp]

The Acolyte finally got cancelled and I hope all you bitches who whined and whined about how it destroyed canon or ruined Anakin all step on thumbtacks and never have a warm shower again in your life

First good live action since Andor and you all just said “Fuck anything new. If it’s not stacked with same half dozen characters I’m going to call it boring. If it executes on any CANONICAL concepts I’m just unfamiliar with I’m going to say it breaks the lore. And if it’s got any female or POC or queer characters I’m going to call it woke pandering.”

I hope your alarms all fail to go off and none of your damn cars start you deeply boring fucking losers.

Can’t have any fun in this fuckin fandom. I’m going back to my high republic books. Kick rocks.

[garden-bug]

Not to be a hater BUUUT-

Every time I hear anything abt the Ahsoka series doing ‘well’ I am baffled.

At most it was a little entertaining and some of the designs looked good. The plot and character work and just everything else was abysmal.

Oh yeah and it reminded us that The Clone Wars and Rebels was a show. That was new and really enriched the world of Star Wars.

[cienie-isengardu]

Mini rant about SW Acolyte

I wanted to avoid being negative about Disney Star Wars but oh well... Eventual spoilers ahead.

Despite my discouragement with Disney Star Wars I decided to give the Acolyte TV series a try. I ended on the second episode and have a hard time continuing - all because of the weird logic of the show. First there is a whole argument that the main character was a Jedi once and though she was not fully trained, she still could be dangerous. Especially since she is accused of murdering a Jedi Master(?). Which makes sense, all right. So the Jedi sent a Knight and Padawan to arrest the main character. Fine, right? But then Jedi put the arrested maybe-murderer-maybe-not-but-no-less-Force-sensitive prisoner on a police ship with just droids guarding the arrested criminals? If Jedi bothered to send their own people to deal with the situation, why did the Knight and Padawan not escort the arrested person to Coruscant themselves? Like any responsible person would do? 

This is a small thing, but this logic just killed my will to watch.

[idiosyncraticrednebula]

I saw a counterargument of the Wish movie that said something along the lines of, "The movie isn't Citizen Kane, so what?" Imagine typing and posting this absurd ass take and thinking it's a legitimate argument against those who criticize it. Considering that this is an animated movie released on their 100th anniversary, the fact that they delivered a "meh" at best movie should upset you when looking at Disney's movie catalog and their impact on the field of animation. If you don't hold Disney to a higher standard, they will keep putting out mediocre content, but unfortunately, too many Disney fans are sellouts to this company. Y'all wanna get mad at people for being too rough on and critical of modern Disney, but they earned this shit 100%. They became so arrogant and loved the smell of their own butthole a little too much that they did not foresee their inevitable eventual fall at all.

[raiinbowwitch]

why give disney any sort of direct attention and support when you can watch jenny nicholson's star wars hotel video, defunctland, and every other youtube video dissecting all the reasons why you should never touch their evil shit with a 39 and a half foot pole

[inquisitor-apologist]

Yo Star Wars. How come the only Black man on the show had his neck snapped in full view of the camera while all the nonblack characters got bloodless lightsaber stabs? How come Black characters always die violently?

[geekynerfherder]

Showcasing art from some of my favourite artists, and those that have attracted my attention, in the field of visual arts, including vintage; pulp; pop culture; books and comics; concert posters; fantastical and imaginative realism; classical; contemporary; new contemporary; pop surrealism; conceptual and illustration.

The art of Natalie Dombois.

[eerienostalgia]

Not my usual content but I have some thoughts on the first two episodes of Star Wars: The Acolyte

(P.s. this is unfortunately not a positive review)

WARNING: THE ACOLYTE SPOILERS AHEAD

I hate to say it but, God, I’m so disappointed.

This is a show I wanted to enjoy so terribly bad. I love the setting. I love the diversity but the writing just completely ruins it. It makes me so frustrated because I feel like Star Wars has really been lacking in having diversity in their shows, and I was so excited to see them actually create a diverse cast, but of course they had to be given a show with just an awful script.

There were so many problems thematically and narratively but I think that one that really was the most jarring was that: there was no tension the entire time I was watching it. Almost every single one of the big questions were answered in the first two episodes. All besides who Mae’s master is, but just having one singular big question isn’t enough to leave me intrigued, and with the way events have been unfolding, it will probably be answered in episode three.. There should never just be one question in a series marketed as mystery. The beauty of that genre is: all the little questions that present themselves slowly being answered *until* you reach the big question. The best shows are where you don’t even know the big question until the last half of the show.

Another killer of the tension was the amount of exposition. It’s the hallmark of bad writing to me when a character, or those around them, just start explaining their backstory, especially a backstory they presumably already know and have no reason to say out loud. This is the most apparent during that moment on the ship where Yord first confronts Osha, and starts explaining her entire traumatic history IN THE FIRST EPISODE. These scenes could have easily been flashbacks, or just, explained in a way that made sense narratively?

On that note: not to compare shows, but to absolutely compare shows, an incredible example of how backstories should be told is Andor. One fact I especially love about it, is that during the flashbacks to his childhood, either everyone is speaking a language we don’t understand or not speaking at all, and almost the entirety of it is told solely by visuals, context clues, and little off hand comments and we don’t know the full story all at once. It’s something that is gradually revealed to us. It’s a backstory that feels earned.

Think about how much more intriguing the story might have been if we didn’t know about the fire, and we didn’t know that Osha had a sister. If the narrative had let us believe for a little longer that Osha was the one killing Jedi. How long would it have taken for her to spiral? Would Sol still be able to believe her in the face of damning evidence? Who is this girl that looks exactly like Osha? Is it her? And most importantly we would have the question of WHY she wanted to kill all these Jedi in the first place! *But* we don’t get any of these questions, at least not for longer than 30 minutes, because the narrative didn’t suspend knowledge long enough to allow them to happen.

At times I also found the way characters got out of situations to be… too coincidental. Such as the fact that the designers of the ship Osha was first put on as prisoner seemed to think it was a great idea to have the escape pods right in front of cells?? As well as the fact she was able to survive the crash of said ship in the first place, seemed to get thrown out of the chair she was sitting in, blacked out, and stood up and walked away as if nothing had happened. The ship was quite literally on fire from the inside as it went down and her along with her clothing were completely unscathed? It’s just outrageous, and don’t even get me started on the fire… in the vacuum of space.

I am able to let go of a handful of incredibly lucky escapes out of situations, but the first two episodes of this show felt like it was just a series of incredibly fortunate events. Even after presumably murdering a *master jedi* she was allowed to sit in the ship completely unrestrained. I understand Osha was close with her former master but she should not have been let off the hook quite so easily, especially for a group of monks who take very seriously their lack of attachment rule. It was just so frustrating to see tension resolving itself almost as soon as any semblance of it was created.

I do believe a lot of these issues are problems of most modern TV shows now as a whole. Writers have begun to assume that the audience needs everything spelled out for them, which makes shows bland and boring. Perhaps my frustration with The Acolyte is from the disappointment I find amounting due to all of the horrible shows recently who have shared its weaknesses.

It’s so unfortunate, because I do believe this is a cast full of talented actors who were just handed an awful script. I unfortunately find myself already mourning for the show this could have been.

HOWEVER, through the sea of the multitude of negative thoughts I have concerning this show, there are a handful of positives. I think the choreography is very well done, especially compared to a lot of the live action Star Wars shows I have come across recently. I truly did feel interested during those scenes. However no amount of showy lightsaber duels will be able to overshadow horrid writing.

I believe the actors were good and did the best they could with the script they were given. I think a lot of them made some very strong character choices that made the characters pop out to me a bit more. I especially enjoyed the way Mae’s friend who made the poison was portrayed.

I also to a degree, enjoyed the sets and costumes. I found them intriguing on their own and I enjoyed the more intricate designs for the ships interiors. I just wish they had pushed the envelope more for what the Star Wars world would have actually looked like 100 years previous. To me it mostly felt the same as any other Star Wars project, which is disappointing because when you look at our world today vs. the world in the 1920s the difference is astronomical! I would have loved to see some more rudimentary versions of common place items. Perhaps an earlier version of the holograms that is blurry, or an earlier version of a droid like R2. (Which by the way, apparently the R2 units have been in production for a hundred years by the start of the Clone Wars considering they were mentioned in this show)… I digress.

The world would have been much more captivating with a stronger, more rustic aesthetic. It does the show a disservice to make it blend in so much with the previous Star Wars projects.

The worst part is that I do genuinely think these are interesting characters that could potentially be a part of a very intriguing story, but the writing just completely stifles any sense of mystery or intrigue. I want to be confused. I want to figure out the mystery. I want to feel like I am watching a story unfold rather than a series of events.

I am holding on to the hope that perhaps these two episodes are flukes and the reminder of the season is beautiful and thought provoking and action packed.

I don’t want another disappointment.

[but-a-humble-goon]

There are two reasons I never, EVER want to see Aphra make it into any mainstream Star Wars media. Firstly, I do not trust Disney to do right by her for a single second. They turned Boba Fett into a squeaky clean, toothless, palatable nice guy instead of a ruthless amoral merc. Aphra's moral compass is buried somewhere on a distant moon under a mountain of blood money and that's what makes her great. Palatable she is not. Secondly, the Star Wars fandom does not deserve her and could not withstand her. Can you imagine the same people who started foaming at the mouth and peeling their faces off in rage when they dropped a trailer with a black stormtrooper in it discovering there's a Star Wars character who is Asian, in a lesbian polycule, a gleefully terrible person and who regularly outsmarts and defeats the Original Trilogy cast Darth Vader included? And then from the other side of the aisle we'd have the folks on this hellsite tearing their hair out shrieking "nobody ever told me morally ambiguous characters meant sometimes they'd do bad things! Umm, can you say PROBLEMATIC?!" while hastily covering their screens with their hands hoping nobody sees the 300,000 word Kylo Ren fanfic.