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snippy-tano · 4 years ago

Note

hey i really love your writing! i check your blog pretty often, it makes me smile :) since requests are open i was wondering if you’d be down to write something about cody and a reader who has trust issues from a pretty recent past relationship, and getting reader to open up and trust him? LMAO may or may not be cathartic for me rn. Ty <3

First of all, I am so sorry it’s taken me so long to get to this. Things have been weirdly crazy and stressful for me lately and I just haven’t been in the right headspace to tackle any of the asks in my box. But, that being said, I’m determined to get out of my funk and this ask I think was the one to finally do it!

I really hope you like this and it helps you! I know it’s always cathartic for me to write this and I hope it translates and helps you with whatever it is you’re going through.

Just know I’m rooting for you bb. I love you.

Tagging: @pro-fangirls-unsocial-life, @marvel-starwars-nerd, @mackstrut, & @dissapointingpancake

(Let me know if you want to be added to my taglist! You can find it here!)

---------------------------------------------------

Trust

The moment you laid eyes on Marshal Commander Cody, you knew you were in trouble.

With his easy but rare smile, kind eyes, and wicked sense of humor, it was easy to imagine yourself falling for him. Words were easy to find when you were with him and no one else had made you feel so at ease. He never pushed, but was a steady calming presence you had been missing, especially when you were fighting a war.

But your walls were high and sturdy. A lifetime of failed relationships always hung over your head like a curse, darkening every bright light you ever saw. It settled on your shoulders and dragged you down further and further with every passing day.

Ever since your last chance at a relationship ended, things seemed hopeless. They’d broken your trust and faith in a way that shattered your dreams of ever finding someone who would cherish you in mind and body.

After that, it was easier for you to accept you’d never experience what you so desperately wanted to feel.

Things were easier that way. Your fragile heart needed a life to recover and you decided it was easier to see the rest of your years pass you by than to subject yourself to another heartbreak.

But then along came Cody.

It was subtle at first.

In some of the very few moments you caught sight of him without his helmet, you would notice his eyes on you. But he’d always look away just quickly. It happened enough that you noticed and found yourself doing the same, wishing for even the smallest glimpse at the highest ranking clone in the GAR.

Then one day you quite literally bumped into him while leaving a briefing, causing your flimsy cup of awful caf to drop to the floor. The moment his hands gripped your arms to steady you as you stumbled, eyes searching your face for any issues as he apologized.

You didn’t know it at the time, but he’d managed to find a crack in your walls, slipping his fingers inside and slowly working his way inside. It was the start of something you never saw coming.

After a few awkward mutterings from the both of you, he had stepped back, lifting his hands away while his head ducked down. He once again apologized and you returned the sentiment. A quick word from General Kenobi seemingly broke the spell, but before you could retreat back into your comfort zone, Cody offered to make it up to you with a cup of non-GAR issued caf.

Without thinking, you had said yes.

You walked away from him with a smile tugging at the corner of your mouth.

For the next few weeks, you began to spend more time with him. You did end up getting caf together the next time you were on a short leave on Coruscant and it was easier than you expected. Cody never expected you to have all the answers, but the gentle questions never stopped.

It was effortless to open up to him, to laugh for the first time in a long time at a ridiculous story from before you joined the 212th as a civilian. The way his face had softened and his eyes had sparkled when you laughed was enough to stop your heart from beating.

No one had ever looked at you like that. It made your impossible dream seem a little more possible.

But still it was hard.

You’d been hurt one too many times, one of which was recent enough that you were still recovering. Your past was always not far behind you, chasing you through your days and your nights, refusing to yield. It was exhausting. You were so tired of running, but still you kept going.

Sitting across from Cody in that small diner on Coruscant made you wonder what it would be like to finally stop running from your past, to imagine the life you could have.

From that point on, Cody always made an effort to visit with you or spend more time with you when he had the time. And even when he didn’t have the time, he made sure to make time. You’d lost track of the times he’d dropped by your tiny closet of an office with some smuggled in sweets he’d confiscated from Waxer and Boil on a day you needed it most. It was like he knew when you needed the pick-me-up.

The first time you’d hugged him, you had been convinced he’d been killed.

They’d lost contact with him on a mission and instantly you could feel the panic seizing in your chest. It was hard to breathe and you couldn’t stop the tears from forming in your eyes.

The moment you saw him walking across the tarmac, armor dirty and scuffed, with his helmet tucked under his arm but looking relatively uninjured, you couldn’t stop yourself. You were sprinting across the pavement before you realized what you were doing.

His eyes fixed on you almost instantly and you saw the wave of relief wash across his entire body. His bucket hit the ground seconds before you hit Cody. You threw yourself into his arms and he’d stumbled in surprise, but didn’t let you falter.

You held on with everything you had, burying your face in his neck as you just held him as tightly as you could. Cody had done the same, arms locked around you as his gloved fingers wove snuggly into your hair.

He was fine.

You were fine.

After that, it was like something shifted.

Every chance the both of you had, you were placing a hand on his arm, or his shoulder, or intertwining your pinky with his. Cody seemed to have the same idea because he never left your presence without giving your elbow a squeeze or trailing his fingers along the back of your hand.

The first time the pair of you kissed, it was you who made the first move.

You’d been sitting in a quiet hallway aboard the Negotiator. More confiscated candy sat between the two of you as you looked out at the clear, empty space around you. It was late and nearly everyone was already asleep, but neither of you seemed in any rush to go to bed, so you found a quiet corner and decided to just enjoy each other’s company.

As you looked out into the darkness, you didn’t feel afraid.

Before, you’d always been a little uneasy looking out into space like this. You weren’t sure what it was, but it unnerved you. But as you sat there beside Cody who was more relaxed than you had ever seen him, eating sweets you would have never thought he would like.

That’s when you realized you weren’t as afraid because Cody showed you that you didn’t have to be afraid.

You had turned to him, eyes scanning his face as he looked out, chewing on a piece of candy. The sharp lines of his face had softened and he seemed at peace. Warmth spread through your chest and you could feel the darkness you’d been carrying for years slowly melt away, leaving nothing but a warmness you never wanted to fade.

Cody had noticed your gaze because he turned to you, eyebrows furrowed and concern flashing in his eyes.

It was in that moment that you realized what you’d done without even trying.

You’d fallen for him. And it was the easiest thing you’ve ever done. And it didn’t scare you.

Despite your tendency to overthink and overanalyze things, you found yourself not thinking when you pushed yourself forward, knocking over the bag of candy to press your lips against Cody’s. He made it easy to not think, to just feel.

Cody had seemed surprised at first if his sharp inhale told you anything, but he relaxed almost immediately, his gloveless hands coming up to gently cradle your head.

It wasn’t the first time you’d ever kissed someone before, but it was the first time your stomach flipped and your entire body practically melted. It set every single one of your nerve endings on fire and you had no desire to put them out, in fact, you wanted them to keep burning, stoking the fire for the rest of your life.

It took your breath away.

Which is why you did eventually have to pull away even though you never wanted to ever stop. You opened your eyes, chewing on your lip as you looked at a face you saw every day in a million others, but there was only one you cared about.

There was only one you loved.

Cody’s eyes opened and you were fixed with the most intense stare from the golden eyes you saw the stars in. He let out a soft chuckle when an unrestrained smile broke across his face.

You’d do anything to see that smile over and over again for the rest of your lives.

Trust has always been hard for you.

But with Cody it was easy.

And because it was easy, you stopped worrying and leaned forward again, capturing his lips again as he smiled against you.

You’d never flown higher than when the walls around you came tumbling down. Cody had given you a reason to trust again. To love again.

It would always be an uphill battle for you, but Cody would never let you fall.

Never.

#ask #askBri #commander cody #cody x reader #commander cody x reader #clone x reader #star wars #the clone wars #star wars the clone wars #tcw #sw:tcw #star wars imagines #star wars one shots #tcw one shots #tcw imagines #the clone wars imagines #cody/reader #commander cody/reader

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bluebellhairpin · 4 years ago

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Fight or Flight, Rider [8]

Poe Dameron X Pilot!Reader

A/N: This series ain’t dead yet people! And Rider isn’t dead yet either! - Nemo

Summary: Rider becomes commander of the most dangerous ship in the First Order. Poe and company freak out over a thought-loss. And some certain emo boys get a beating.

Warning(s): Mentions of Blood. There’s a dead body that shows up once too.

Series Masterlist

Masterlist

As it turned out, the entire new ship was strategically filled with - what the First Order would call - defective StormTroopers. Much like the Resistance’s beloved Finn, they didn’t want to fight.

They were waiting for their Poe Dameron to give them a chance to get away.

And they got you.

However this situation was much different to Poe’s. Instead of one Trooper, you had a huge ship-full. Instead of a TIE-Fighter you had, well, one huge ship - more like once you disposed of the Officers, you’d have the ship.

As the two unhelmeted Troopers led you through the ship, other Troopers removed their helmets in tandem, and as that spread, blaster shots and yells could be heard from the halls in the distance. It was a mutiny. Caused by little old you.

“What do we call you?” the first Trooper - MO-3679 - asked, “I don’t think ‘The Rebel’ would fit anymore.”

“Rider, calling me Rider is fine.” you said. Giving your nickname felt like the better thing to do, no where in any records was there listed a ‘Rider’, however there was a ‘(y/n)’, and you were not about to be tracked or locked up again.

Walking wasn’t really doing you too well at the moment, since you were clutching your side in an effort to try and stop the pain in your ribs. But MO said that they’d need you at the command. You knew the Resistance best, you’d know how to properly fight and escape the First Order. You reassured MO that she and the other Troopers seemed to have a good handle on the situation as it was, she still diagreed.

“Attention,” a speaker overhead crackled to life, “First Order personnel have been eradicated. Prepare for the jump to Hyperspace.”

You looked over at MO, raising an eyebrow.

“The kriff does that mean?”

“All the commanding Officers have been ejected out to space.” She said, acting like it was absolutely not something to be worried about. “So now you’re officially in command of this ship.”

Okay. That’s a touch shocking, if not unexpected.

“And hyperspace?” you asked, “This ship isn’t completed enough to be able to withstand a jump. Parts would still be exposed.”

“That’s what we wanted everyone to think,” the other Trooper - KS-6836 - answered as MO started opening the door ahead of you, “This ship isn’t just hyperspace ready. It’s shields are fully operational, as well as it’s weapons system. It’s fully functional. We just needed the First Order to not know that.”

You decided then and there to just not be surprised at anything anymore.

The door slid open with a hiss, revealing a large and rather busy-looking bridge. Troopers were manning every station, and over in one corner was a pile of white helmets. An Officer Trooper approached you, their helmet was only tucked under an arm, not on the pile with the rest.

“You’re the Resistance fighter.” They said, nodding at MO and KS, before walking back the way they came. You assumed you were meant to follow, because they kept talking. “The Resistance wasn’t entirely told what this ship was made for, so I’ll tell you now to make up for it. It was meant as a tracker. A Hunting ship. It’s untrackable, and impossible to trace.”

“It was made to destroy the Resistance?” you concluded.

You’d seen plans for smaller, lighter ships for that purpose on Nephimm. They were to be specifically made for the best pilots you’d have, to be sent out into the galaxy and battles to scope out exactly what was happening without being seen. You piloted one when you went to the rescue back on Criet.

But how did the First Order get plans so similar to the ones back on your home planet?

The Officer nodded, pressing their lips together, before breaking out in a grin.

“And now it’s going to destroy the First Order. Ironic, isn’t it?”

__________

Poe was freaking out.

Much like everyone else in the control room, his emotions had been on a roller coaster from the moment you exited hyperspace at the First Order’s end, and since their connection with Z2 ended, the room was crossed between anxious, sorrowful, and overall hopelessness.

They’d just lost their best pilot, even though no one would admit it with Poe in the room.

“General, what do we do?” Gareth asked, “We need to do something, right?”

“Of course we need to do something!” Daylen said, stepping forward to stand around the table, “Rider’s gone, so you kriffed up there big time, now we need to fix it. We go in and hit them with everything we’ve got.”

“No, we will not do that,” Leia said, leaning forward, sharing a look with Rey - who had joined them just as their feed cut out minutes ago, “We’ll wait, just a little longer. (y/n)’s strong, she might’ve made a way out.”

“You really think that?” Poe asked, voice cracking ever-so-slightly. “You really think she’s still alive?” Leia smiled knowingly.

“You don’t?”

__________

“Ren is on that ship, you know that right?”

“Of course, why did you think I’d give you the order otherwise?” you looked back at the trooper at the controls to your right, smiling. They shrugged.

“Because you’re a sadist?” they offered. You shook your head, smile falling so slightly.

“If Ren is on that ship, then we hit it and we hit it hard, right where it hurts. If we can end things here we will, and if we can’t then we still make sure they know we were here.”

“I think they’ll know when we aren’t here.” the trooper quipped again, “It’s a big ship you know.”

You turned to face them fully, wiping away the blood from the cut on your cheek that was, somehow, still bleeding.

“What’s your name?”

“TR-7182.” You quirked up an eyebrow.

“Not gonna rename yourself?” They glanced up at you, smiling widely.

“You wanna do that for me?”

“Lower the enthusiasm, cheap shot,” you scoffed, “Anyone here could rename you.”

“I can!” MO said, jumping from her place where she was at the door behind KS. You barked out a laugh, nodding at her as she continued to blabber at her new companion. She was actually rather friendly, you’d found.

“Rider, canons are hot, ready to fire at your leisure.”

You nodded at the new news, looking out at the two Star-Destroyers, with narrowed eyes.

“Shields up, now.” you said, “Fire!”

__________

“General!” D’Acy said, looking over to the huddle from her screen across the room. “The new ship - the one Rider went to destroy - it’s firing on the other two Destroyers.”

“What?”

“What we’re monitoring, it’s -” D’Acy stopped, shaking her head in disbelief.

“- The ship’s gone off radar, but the Destroyers are taking hits.” Cyro clarified, Rose poking her head over the Mirialan’s shoulder.

“They’re being… Destroyed.”

Poe went over to the screen, seeing exactly what was described.

“That makes no sense,” he said, casting a look at Finn, “Why would they fire on each other?”

“Don’t look at me, I don’t work with them anymore. Remember?” Finn shrugged. “I will say, that is a bit weird though.”

__________

“Our shields are holding well. The Destroyers have taken enough damage to cause a chain reaction.”

You nodded, talking to the trooper on your left.

“I want to see that chain go off. Fire a few more shots, then we’ll get out of here.” You said, pressing in the Resistance base coordinates into the pad in front of you. Then a thump came from the window above you. “Oh, ew.”

Groans came from the crew, seeing the frozen body of one of the Officers from before float back away again. They obviously didn’t push him out of an airlock near the back of the ship. It was a bit gross.

The ship fired again, rocking you a little with the force it sent off, and landing two hits on each Destroyer, and just like the trooper said, a chain went off, explosions of red went off all over the ships.

“Let’s beat it, kids. We’ve done our damage.”

The ship turned a little, before starting off with a slight lurch.

“Entering hyperspace in three, two, one.”

__________

Series Taglist: @demigod-dragonrider-schoolidol @writefightandflightclub @robindoesntloveme @kiaralein @danicalifxrnia @americasass-romanoff @morgannope @smolpeachees @afootnoteinyourhappiness @lonelydarlings @rae-rae-patcha @oakleyves @seninjakitey @fanfin-glutton @softly-sad @liadamerondjarin @music-geek19

Poe Dameron Taglist: @p3nny4urth0ught5 @m1rkw00dpr1ncess @hp-marvel-starwars-kotlc

Both Taglists are Open!

#fight or flight rider #poe dameron x reader #poe dameron imagine #poe dameron series #star wars x reader #star wars imagine #star wars series

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kaypeace21 · 5 years ago

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Do you have any meta/theory on the significance of the cleric/paladin d&d characters vs wizard/dungeon master. Is maybe one more Will and Mike's relationship and the other their role in the story as a whole? Sorry if you already mentioned this and this is redundant

Yeah, I’ve talked about it before. But why not talk about it again? It’s been a while- and Will’s recently published journal (plus st tweets) added more to this symbolism

The Duffers used Will and Mike’s d&d classes to say they’re soulmates! XD

Will in all 3 seasons identifies as a wizard- he even writes on the mixtape he makes “will the wise- wizard mix” (which is a different class than clerics). Even in s1 Will’s castle byer’s password was “rhadaghast” a lothr wizard.

But in s2 Mike (the paladin) says that Will is a cleric. Meaning this reflects how Mike (alone) actually feels about Will. In d&d, they have similar moral values, powers, and generally need and depend on each other in the lore of d&d. Mike says Will is a cleric,despite Will still identifying as a wizard in s3, since it shows how deeply Mike actually feels about Will.

It shows he views Will as one of the only people who understands him and views him as a his moral compass

“ strength of conviction gave many paladins a sense of common fellowship but did not always endear them to others. In many cases, paladins did not get along quite as well with other non-paladin adventurers, with the exception of clerics with similar beliefs.”

“A Paladin tries to hold to the highest standards of conduct, but even the most virtuous Paladin is fallible. Sometimes the heat of emotion causes a Paladin to transgress his or her oath (of honesty, courage, compassion, honor ,and duty). A paladin who has broken a vow typically seeks absolution from a cleric who shares his or her faith or from another paladin of the same order…

“The paladin might spend an all-night vigil in prayer as a sign of penitence, or undertake a fast or similar act of self-denial.”

“After a rite of confession and forgiveness, the paladin starts fresh.”

“Using the ‘lay on hands’ power, paladins can grant their comrades (or themselves) additional resilience with a touch of their hands and a short prayer, though they must give their own strength to do so.”

And Mike calls El a “mage” which wasn’t even a class in D&D (in the 80s)- A line he says to Max about zoomer (who he doesn’t like) …so… how much do you want to bet Mike was the one who made him and Will matching by giving him and Will “lawful good” (since this is writen in his starter kit). And he already ignored the fact Will is a wizard.

But in Will’s recently published cannon journal he also does this- he keeps Lucas (Ranger) , Dustin (Bard) and his own character (a wizard) …but he changes Mike to a cleric !!!

Because Clerics have the strongest of healing abilities

Mike thinks Will brings out the best in him. And Will thinks Mike as someone who helps him heal. So they both call each other clerics.

D&D also represents their romantic relationship

when they fight in s3 Mike says “I’m not trying to be a jerk. We’re not kids anymore. I mean…what did you think? That we’d never get girlfriends. Play games for the rest of our lives?” And the truth is that’s actually what Mike wants- which is why he was upset about Will trying to give away the d&d game . And why he still has all of Will’s d&d pictures on his basement’s wall (which he’s kept on his wall for years- despite removing the old poster from the wall). And during Hopper’s speech, when it pans to Mike , Hopper says “I miss playing games every night.”

* He also caresses Will’s d&d drawing- when he thinks he’s dead- and has a binder filled with every d&d drawing Will has ever given him.

In the first ep - Will admits he rolls a 7 (since he couldn’t lie to Mike)- and in the last ep of s1 (they show us Mike smiling at Will right before Will rolls a 14- since they’re 7s together.) Mike even apologizes to EL saying “sorry I sound like a 7 year old.” When talking about how all 3 can play with toys & right after talking about Will visiting to play. and mentions Will’s rolls as a way to convince Lucas to help him look for him.And Mike even mentions Will rolls as a way to convince Lucas to help him look for him in the first ep.

Mike in the last ep in s1 ,writes a d&d story for Will. in ep one Will tells Mike “it was a 7, the demogorgan it got me.”At the end of the season Mike writes a whole story of him and his friends killing a 7 headed monster, and showing the decapitated head of the monster to king Tristan (Will). Similar to how at the hospital he tells Will to not worry cause “it’s dead now”. This is right after Will rolls a 14 (cause Mike and Will are 7s together). And Mike who is a fan of starwars has King Tristan give them medals after killing the monster. Cause he wants Will/king tristan (instead of Leia -a girl) to present him with medals and be his romantic love interest (and praise him for being a hero)…

In the pilot, they even say Will uses d&d to “escape” his insecurities about his sexuality “like mike” & Mike uses d&d to “escape” his insecurities about not having a gf. * And no, dustin & Lucas didn’t use d&d to “escape” anything- in the pilot script.

Mike angrily yells “El’s not stupid. It’s not my fault you don’t like girls” to himself- cause Will hit a nerve when saying mileven was ruining their friendship - because a part of Mike is trying to use El to put distance between him and Will . Dustin in s1 foreshadows the fight, saying “all you want to do is spent time with her… and you know it and he knows it. And nobody says anything until you’re yelling at eachother like goblins with intelligence scores of zero.” (Another d&d ref/ ‘love makes you stupid’ ref.).

And also, maybe a part of him resents how Will is making him feel. So he says this whole speech , in the garage, to himself - to keep his romantic feelings for Will under control ( expecting Will to agree with the heteronormative statement). Which is why he was so shocked when Will (who he assumes is straight) and he expects would agree - instead says “yeah, I guess I did. I really did.” (about never getting gfs but instead being together for the rest of their lives).

And the “crazy together” scene (which is romantic since both Mike & Flo both equate love making you ‘crazy’. Flo says “ only love makes you crazy and that damn stupid”). And the ‘crazy together’ scene also has a zoom-in on Mike’s d&d game.

(x)(x)

Mike and Will both love each other (and El is just confused). He wants to be with Will- but he’s scared. The Hopper dialogue even says “Lately, I feel like you’re pulling away from me or something? I miss playing board games every night.” Mike was upset when Will gives the game up- but Will says “I’ll just play with yours when I come back… if we still want to play?” In other words- the ball is in Mike’s court- if he wants Will, he has to initiate it. Because Will assumes he was “stupid” to think he had a chance. Mike is also acting “stupid” because he’s pushing away Will despite loving him, and hurting him in the process (the opposite of a cleric).

But Mike in s4 will admit his feelings to Will… since after Will says this line, Mike asks

“Yeah, but what happens if you want to join another party? ” (find someone else (‘another’) before that- the other ‘species’, or just someone else: girl, guy or otherwise?”

But Will decides to make himself vulnerable and just be honest, and shyly admits “Not possible” (much to Mike’s happiness)

so yes- this tweet is about byler

They even answered the question of ‘what makes Mike crazy’ with one’ joke’ response - of Will asking about d&d. And in a separate post made fun of mileven by ending it with “can we just play d&d?”

And when, Mike and Will open up to each other about their mental-health issues, that’s when they both agree that no matter what they’ll be together- “crazy together”. It’s a double entendre - they’re crazy cause they’re in love- but also “crazy” and will be “together” to help each other through their issues. This theme is double-downed on in Will’s cannon journal (where it’s established “crazy together” is shown to be Mike & Will’s thing- not mileven’s). As Mike tells Will to tell him when he’s having ptsd episodes since- they're “crazy together”.

*Will draws Mike’s d&d character next to the sticky-note. And we also see throughout Will’s whole journal- Mike’s d&d character is always by Will’s (d&d character’s side). And on the cover of his journal Will ONLY draws his and Mike’s character- cause they’re “crazy together”.

Mike specifically says to get him when he’s having ptsd episodes about the mf (which represent Will’s se*ually abusive father- theory here/ here).

That’s what love is - like Flo said only love makes you “crazy” and “stupid” and this is only applicable to byler. Mike and Will love and bring out the best in each other- heal each other. Being “crazy together” to Mike is about being selfless and wanting the best for you partner’s happiness no matter what- with mileven it was simply a way to excuse his poor behavior to El (under the guise of ‘love’).

For all the supernatural stuff to stop , Will has to face his trauma and heal. This involves having a strong support (of friends and family) and Will learning to not hate himself any longer, because of his past abuse and sexuality. And to stop correlating his love (for Mike) with his past abuse/trauma (represented by the monsters. And Mike and Will have to embrace their love for each other. And let go of their shame. When Will ‘dies’ in s1, Mike hugs his mom ,and Heroes plays, and the lyrics are “and we kiss as though nothing could fall and the shame… was on the other side.” In s1 the term “other side” was used to describe the upside down. So it’s saying Will’s shame relating to Lonnie will eventually be on the other side, and so Mike and Will kiss ‘as though nothing could fall’. In Will’s journal he even draws Mike’s d&d character again with the caption “never Kenny Roggers”. This is because Jonathan asks ‘who would you rather be friends with David bowie or Kenny roggers?”. And Heroes was originally sung by David Bowie- making the byler hint of this being ‘their song’, more apparent. The cannon Will-comic is even titled the “other side” and Mike is on the opposite end (‘the other side’ waiting for Will who is trapped in the upside down looking up at the imposing figure of the demogorgan). The demorgogan in blue light and mike in opposing red light. The monsters Will created are based on the d&d game and his prior abuse at the hands of lonnie. But byler’s love is also represented by d&d- and thus the only way to stop it.

gif credit: cath-avery

#byler #byeler

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dr0wning-in-hell · 5 years ago

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Empress - Kylo Ren

summary : Supreme Leader Snoke is dead, leaving Kylo as the new heir to the throne. When he overhears his head general talking with the knights of ren about how they want you for themselves he can’t help the anger that floods through his body.

word count : 1k+

warnings : cursing, angry!kylo, fluff

pairing/characters : kylo ren x empress!sith!reader. general hux, mentions of snoke

prompt : ---

A/N : im in such a big starwars mood and I figured it was high time I started writing for them as well. If you have any requests for them please send them in! also please look at this set i made on urstyle, it’s kind of what I think kylo’s s/o would wear if she were empress.

new masterlist | color prompts | prompt list

Supreme Leader Snoke is dead. Kylo Ren and the scavenger girl killed him and then she left after he offered to train her in the ways of the sith. Yes, Y/N was a bit upset of their growing relationship, it was hard for her to see the man she loved worry so much over this little girl. A little girl who was trying to destroy everything he had built. Either way you were proud of Kylo as he was now the new heir to the dark throne.

It had been about a week since he had become the Supreme Leader, and as he walked down the halls of his spacecraft everyone made way for him. As he went to turn a corner he heard the familiar voices of his knights and General Hux. In any other situation he would have walked right past them but when he heard them talking about Y/N, his queen, he stopped dead in his tracks. Kylo listened to what they were saying, and the longer he listened the angrier he became. They were talking about what they would do with her if she were not his, and it made him sick to think that the people they both ruled over talk about her like she was just some sort of object.

When he decided it was finally time for them to stop their conversation he turned the corner sharply, quickly drawing his saber and igniting it. With one hand he pointed it at Hux and with the other he had used the force to cage the knights against a wall.

“You will never speak about Y/N that way again, do you understand?” He growled in a dark tone that could make a whole planet quiver.

Hux’s face went ghostly pale, the lightsaber was so close to his face he could feel the heat radiating off of it. “Sir, we- we only just-” He was abruptly cut off but his superior.

“You were talking about Y/N, your Empress as if she were an object made pleasure. Imagine if she had heard you, you’d be dead by now at her hand if she heard you speaking of her the way you were.” He released his grip on the knights who now fell to the ground and withdrew his lightsaber. “If I ever hear you speaking so poorly about her again I’ll let her deal with you. Don’t do it again.” With that Kylo angrily walked back to his shared quarters with her, wanting to just be close to her.

As soon as he entered the room Y/N could immediately feel the anger boiling off of him. She was in the middle of being fitted for a new gown, one she would wear when her and Kylo had to travel to other planets to discuss future arrangements with their leaders. Y/N released her seamstress as she had just finished up the final touches to the dress, she bowed to the Supreme Leader before scurrying out.

Y/N turned around and folded her hands in front of her stomach. Kylo was mesmerized by her beauty, her elegance. He had no idea how lucky he was to have her by his side as they ruled the galaxy together.

“My love,” Y/N started out saying as she took a few steps towards the angry man in front of her. “What’s wrong?” She placed a gentle hand to his cheek which he gladly welcomed.

“Hux and the knights were saying nasty things about you.” Kylo was slowly calming down, but soon the anger rose again as his mind replayed the words they were saying. “They were talking about you as if you were just a whore, a piece of meat they could take a bite of whenever they wanted.” He pulled away and balled his fists at his side. “No one gets to speak about you that way, you’re mine. You are my queen, my empress.”

Y/N was a bit taken back at that last sentence. He hadn’t asked her to be his queen or empress yet, though he did have a plan made to ask her if she would officially be the queen to his king, but this was not the way he wanted to break the question.

“You- you want me to be your queen?” Y/N breathed out. Kylo turned to her quickly, his eyes widening at the realization of what he had said.

“I- you weren’t supposed to find out this way,” Kylo walked over to one of the drawers on his side of the room where he pulled out a large black, velvet box. He turned to Y/N with the box in his hand as he walked to her, “I was going to ask you in a few days when we went on our next trip, but I guess now is the time.” He opened the box, revealing a beautiful crown filled with diamonds that just so happened to match the exact dress she was wearing. “Y/N, my love, I want you to be my empress. I want you to rule the galaxy with me.”

Y/N’s shaky hands lifted the crown from the box as she looked at it. It was stunning, and a lovely gift. She nodded as she looked back up to Kylo. “Yes, yes I’d love to Kylo.” She wrapped him in a hug which he melted into as he pulled her closer to him.

“I know you’re still thinking about what those immbisuls said, but know I am your queen. I am your empress.” Y/N said as she pulled away from Kylo just enough to look into the eyes she could spend all day staring in.

“My empress,” Kylo smiled a rare, genuine smile at the sound of that, “I think that fits you quite nicely.”

And it did, she was the Empress to his Emperor.

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beesonestopcurioshop · 5 years ago

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By the pricking of my thumb, something wicked this way comes.

Chapter 5: Clean Slate

Photo/Gif Credit: @murphyaddiction

Warnings: Still quiet in this area. Unless you count anxiety.

Beta: @ugly-crying-over-bucky-barnes

Note: Hey everyone! Here’s a little something for this story. It’s a little shorter than usual, but I wanted to get something up. I really enjoyed it because we get to learn a little bit more about Ellie girl. I hope you enjoy as well. As always, I hope you’re all safe and healthy!

••

Ellie began to fidget at the thought of being alone with the obvious matriarch of the family. She didn’t have anything to be nervous about, but there was particular scrutiny coming from her that had her on pins and needles.

“Come. Sit. I’ll whip something up quick for that cheek and eye.” Polly turned to her herbs and began blending a mixture.

“Thank you. You’ve been very generous. I don’t know how I’ll ever repay you. Or Mr. Shelby for that matter.”

Polly was mixing a salve paste to place on her cheek. She was sure it would bring out the pain along with the swelling. She shot a look in Eleanor’s direction and watched as the girl gnawed on her lip and looked at the table. There was a storm in her head. Hearing the men talking in the other room she decided to distract the girl.

“So, you have had quite the eventful day, haven’t you?”

“You would be very correct. I can’t wait to go home and sleep.” She laughed gently.

She turned around and brought the salve over to the seat next to Eleanor. “Alright, my dear. This won’t fix it, but it will help with the tenderness along the way.” She dipped her thin fingers into the paste and brought it up to the angry-looking cheek.

Ellie winced at the contact. She was lucky enough that nothing was broken. She was not looking forward to dealing with it every day. The mixture, however, smelled lovely. Some clove for the angry nerves, lavender to soothe her, and a touch of something she couldn't quite make out.

She took to analyzing Eleanor. The young woman’s chestnut waves had a few ringlet curls thrown into the mix. Both eyes were a hickory brown, and when one of them wasn’t swollen and angry, they appeared to be wide and inquisitive. She seemed positively charming, in the most innocent of ways. Polly almost dared to use the word magical.

There was a feeling that sat low in her gut when she looked at her. It wasn’t a feeling that made her nauseous, but it intrigued her. She glanced toward the ceiling sending a message to the universe that it had her attention. ‘This poor girl is wound tighter than a spring.’ The older woman wanted to alleviate some of the pressure building beneath the surface.

“So how long have you known our Johnny?”

She grinned looking up at Polly. “Oh, dat heathen? Probably since I was about fourteen?” Her eyes widened at the fact that she’d known Johnny for ten years now.

Thinking back to simpler days brought a soft smile to her lips. Her eyes drifted off to a faraway girl that hadn’t been around in some time. She was a wild girl back then. There was a lot more she could get away with because she “didn’t know any better”. Running around with boys twice her age seemed to be one of the biggest. Her mother had a heart attack nearly every time she noticed her prancing around with them.

“I think I met Johnny on the edge of a clearing to a field of wildflowers,” she chuckled and continued, “very cliché, right?”

Rambunctious and loud, Ellie had run out through the trees not looking where she was blasting off to. She had toppled into a much younger Johnny. With her velocity, they both plummeted to the ground.

“By Jesus, lass! What on Mother Earth are ya runnin’ from?”

Ellie sprung up. She scrambled to gain her footing like a foal. The raw umber colored orbs darted around looking for the opponent in the obvious game she was playing. She didn’t seem distressed in any sense except that she might lose the game she was in. Something screamed out from her soul that it was gentle, caring. She was worried about losing her intense game, but she was more worried about the man she overturned. “I’m sorry, mister! Are you okay?” Her small palm reached out to him with a kind dimpled smile to greet him. Grasping her hand, he allowed her to help him up.

“I’m okay...?” He let the unspoken question linger on the air.

The loose medium brown curls shook as the girl brought herself back to the current situation. “Oh! Eleanor, sir.”

“Well, Eleanor girl. What brings you out to this side of the field?”

The soft smile that lingered on her face as she came out of her reverie pulled a small grin to Polly’s lips.

Eleanor’s parents weren’t Romany, but they floated around often. They had stayed in Small Heath until 1911 when she was sixteen. She didn’t want to leave. There was something that was hiding just out of sight in the shadows that was drawing her in. She couldn’t quite put her finger on what it was. Small Heath, for being very industrial, had a magical air that surrounded it. The city had a way of pulling even the most strong-willed people in. She wasn’t quite sure how she had managed to win her argument of staying. She was shocked that her parents hadn’t fought harder to force her into coming with them.

There had been a lot of shouted words and hurt feelings. She wished they hadn’t left it stubborn and proud. She hadn’t heard from them since the war began. It wasn’t for her lack of trying. She searched high and low for them. The environment, political and public, was rushing downhill quickly and for a split second, she was ten again. She wanted the protection and safety of standing behind her dad’s legs or her mother’s skirt. She quickly realized that she wouldn’t find that again anytime soon.

During the few years before the war, she had run into Johnny again. She had just turned eighteen. She was struggling to make ends meet. The world was dipping further into the madness of war. He took her under his wing. He had kept her safe. He had given her a place to rest her head. Raised her like a sister. She always said she would forever be in his debt. Yet he never stopped looking out for her. Even now at twenty-four years old with her own home and lead on life.

“Well, it sounds like Johnny has treated you well. Kept you safe. Have you been in Small Heath since you were fourteen?” Polly worked on smoothing out the amount of salve on her cheek.

Ellie chewed on her bottom lip. “My parents and I were here from about thirteen until I was sixteen. They wanted to leave. I didn’t. I somehow won that argument. About a year later I realized the error of me ways, and I tried to find them.”

Polly nodded solemnly, slowing her hand motion, “I’m guessing you couldn’t?”

“Yeah. Hell, Johnny even tried to help once I ran into him again. His connections came up wit nothin ‘.”

They both became quiet. Stuck in their thoughts. Polly finished her cheek. She closed up the little tin that she put the salve in and slid it across the table to Ellie.

The scuffling sound of chairs on the hardwood floor brought the women back to the present. The men would be coming out soon.

“I want you to put that on your cheek and eye for about a week. If it’s not better, come back and we’ll see what I can cook up.”

Ellie nodded, taking the tin and placing it in the small pocket in her skirt. The door opened and Thomas spread his arms wide, keeping them from coming in contact with the wall. Oceans crashed into the earth as they made eye contact. She could have sworn the ground beneath her trembled. Her rosy lips parted slightly from the weight of his gaze.

Thomas stepped out followed by Johnny. “So did you ladies find something to talk about?”

“We did, Tommy.” Polly nodded with a smile that seemed like she was implying more than just a simple conversation. Eleanor shuffled her feet. The sooner she was home and in bed, the better.

“So Mr. Shelby,”

“Thomas, love.”

Her words faltered, “Uh, Thomas,” she said it as if she was gauging the word on her tongue.

“Do I have a clean slate or am I needed for more questions?” Her fingers began to fidget with the end of her sleeves. Catching the action, Thomas paused. She looked at him with hopeful doe eyes. He let a fraction of a smile crack through.

“You’re okay. Johnny says you’re trustworthy, so I’ll believe him. I am gonna walk you home though.”

She nodded. The unspoken ‘for now’ hung in the air. There was still some proving left to do. She said her goodbyes to the other two. Thomas went and stood by the door as she made her way to get her coat from in front of the fire. She was just happy she would be mostly warm for the walk home. He grabbed her coat from her and made a motion for her to hold out and arm.

“Let’s get on, eh?”

••

Thank you for reading!

Taglist: @hazelnmae @boogiewrites @reyloshipper-starwars @deanscroissant @ugly-crying-over-bucky-barnes @justanothershelby @parochialism @smallheathgangsters @cilliansky

Anyone who wants to be added, just let me know!

#bytheprickingofmythumb #Tommy Shelby #tommy shelby x oc #Peaky Blinders #peaky blinder fanfic #peaky blinders writing #thomas shelby #thomas shelby fanfiction #thomas shelby fanfic #thomas shelby x oc

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be-the-spark-flyboy · 4 years ago

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heyy congratulations💕✨!! can i actually have a (male) ship for all the fandoms (if not, just do oscar characters (you have immaculate taste in movies, by the way)). im an entp and my star sign is capricorn. im very all over the place with my thoughts and i like talking a lot. like i already know this request is gonna be super long just ‘cause i ramble (im glad tumblr doesnt have a character limit anymore). in fact, i’ll send this short part in first and then the rest so you can like hide it under the cut or something. im so sorry 😂

so, my ramblings are probably why im considered an extrovert even though i feel like i might be an introvert sometimes. in my free time, i really like trying new things. i have a lot of hobbies that i pick up and drop at random but ive always been really into music (i think im a pretty decent singer. not good enough to make a career but enough to surprise people during karaoke).

ok, i feel like i kind of have to say this because the biggest stereotype of entps is that we’re argumentative... but im not that. i try to be very openminded and i hear people’s arguments before deciding on a stance (a lot of times, my opinion changes every time i talk about the topic. unless the topic, itself, is dumb. then i’ll be comedically stubborn (cereal’s a fucking soup, ok?)) and i’m also weirdly sensitive to other people’s emotions and i try not to say stuff that i know will offend them. i do thoroughly enjoy correcting people though. and debates are still very fun for me... a lot of times i come off as enfp/infp because im very excited/bubbly (when im horny (all the time)) and im very caring with my friends/family but i did my research and im definitely entp. im hella disorganized and i hate commitment (once i like you, though, prepare for me to sacrifice my life for you).

im good with other people’s emotions but the part i struggle with is managing/expressing my own. ive been told by multiple people that im very cold, which always surprises me because i try to act really “out there” with friends. i never dont expect them to see through it. most of the times, though, im not sure what people think of me. i kind of have a lot of different personalities that just ~materialize~ when im talking to a different person (woo defense mechanisms). one thing people dont realize is that im sarcastic but only with people i like. oh... yeah, when i have a crush on someone, i like to tease them. but im also stupid so sometimes i end up offending them instead of being lighthearted like with my friends (sometimes, but rarely, i will go too far with my friends too. even when i try not to). its my way of trying to reach out to them and show them im cool but it painfully backfires every. single. time.

uhhh, last thing, im a switch but definitely more on the “bratty-sub” side than the dom side. sometimes i go full on sub (degrading, praise, worship, bondage, etc) and i come back from it and im super confused because did that just happen?? this is just for your consideration, but usually, i really like hate to love type situations because the whole like “arguing as flirting” thing is just 👏🏻🥵 but im also really into best friends to lovers because in real life, i usually wouldnt like someone romantically unless i could potentially see them as my best friend, platonically.

ok, so. i just stalked your ENTIRE page and i ship you with llewyn because youre really sweet (you deserve each and every follower, by the way. id die for you) and i feel like he needs that in his life. i also think maybe nathan(?) could work because he could learn a lot from you, emotionally. if not, i was thinking abel too. IDK. for starwars, poe because you seem just sane enough to stop him from like killing himself on accident because hes so dumb? also i could totally see you two as “arguing for a good amount of time before getting together” BUT i could also see “we were good friends before getting together” which- 😫😫 having to pick a scenario from my two favorite tropes for you and poe is a good sign for me. same reasoning for anakin. i think mando could also really appreciate your presence on his ship because youre kind and could take care of the child. for marvel, you lowkey could be really good with peter parker or scott lang (one of the soft, silly boys).

sorry for making this so long 😂

Thank you!! And don’t apologise it was an entertaining read🤣

---

MCU:

I ship you with...

Bucky Barnes 😎

It takes a while for Bucky to feel comfortable around you. He sees you with Sam often when you’re having one of your movie marathons or you’re just hanging out. He really wants to talk to you but he’s shy?? You find him attractive but then he is also intimidating.

Then Sam interferes and his solution is to set up a blind date for the two of you. It’s a little awkward in the beginning but you find his shyness endearing as hell. As time goes by, his true self shines through, you realise he is such a romantic and he always finds a way to sweep you off your feet. Horny all the time? He’s literally a super soldier so the stamina...

Star Wars:

I ship you with...

Finn🥰

Imagine, you always lean on each other to vent about things and gossip about other people. Rey is busy as hell and Poe is a dumbass (the the topic of the vent most of the time). Plus he’s General now so a distraction from all the work is very welcome and hence a lot of meet me outside i got a bottle of whisky texts from him. Eventually that turns to just hanging out because he wants to spend time with you.

He probably knows everything about you because he loves to listen to you ramble about anything and everything. Hence he’s one of the few people who you feel comfortable enough to be yourself. And then that turn to making out under the stars on a picnic mat and the rest is history.

Oscar Issac Characters:

I ship you with...

Nathan Bateman😈

It’s almost like you have a seventh sense to detect Nathan’s true emotions despite how much he tries to cover them up. He hates it. So he’s mean to you hence creating a vicious feedback loop of hatred. Queue 100k enimies to lovers slow burn But eventually things work out and Nathan learns to open up a tiny bit to you.

Bratty sub you say? Nathan loves a partner who bites back. Speaking of, on the rare occasion that the two of you show face in public, no one can stand to be around you two since you are always bickering. But trying to one up each other is just your love language.

#Followers Celebration: ships #Bucky Barnes #Finn #nathan bateman

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forgottenvoice · 5 years ago

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Hey guys if you disagree please tell me why I am interested to hear y'alls point of view but this is just my thoughts on diversity in stories.

I honestly have never understood the big deal about diversity in tv, stories, and video games. When I turn to any of those mediums I have never cared or even thought about the physical characteristics of the people playing the roles. I take that back. I care about what the character looks like only in a few situations. A) does it makes sense for either the time or the setting. Like if I was watching a show following the Americans in WW1 I would be pulled out of the experience if all of a sudden there were female American soldiers fighting along side the men because it doesn't make sense historically ( yes I know there were some women that fought in WW1 but not in enough numbers to make it a common sight). B) if the movie is an adaptation from a book I want generally consistent characters so that I can easily recognize them from the second they are on screen. Otherwise I literally dont care at all what the main characters look like, as long as that isn't their only defining feature and they are not given exemption from criticism just because of their characteristics. For instance take Rey from starwars, when I saw all the ads back before the first movie came out, I was excited, not because she was a female but because I love star wars. When I saw the movie I felt I had some valid issues with the way the character was written. I think it doesn't make alot of sense that she was able to beat kylo (a highly trained force user) just days after she found a lightsaber for the first time. However when I raised these points on my previous account I was nearly crucified for hating on women. I dont care what gender Rey is I just wanted a great story. If it had been a guy playing her I still would have had the same issues. I think that's my biggest problem with the way diversity in entertainment is being handled. It seems like writers are making characters come from some under represented group and using that as an excuse to have lazy character design. I want a good story first and foremost and when writers make the defining feature of a character their physical appearance then most of the time it comes at the expense of good story. Like I don't care when the main guy is gay but if that is all you thought of when designing him and so instead of having meaningful character development you decide to just throw in a bunch of gay makeout scenes of course i will be mad, not because of what's happening on screen but because of what is not happening, a compelling story. If I am going to spend money buying a movie or a game I want to be captivated by a story, not be constantly reminded that the protagonist is a black female. I don't think diversity makes up for lazy storytelling. Now before I get hate here too, I can think of countless diverse characters that I love, princess leia, asoka, the entire cast of jumanji 2 and so many more. As long as your character has something else to offer the story other than the statement "I am *fill in the blank with whatever diversity option available," then I am all in on the story.

#star wars #diversity #goodstories #bad character #politics

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paigesturning · 5 years ago

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The Force Arises - The Martyrdom of Jedi Master Luke Skywalker, and the Rise of the Orthodoxy

(Author’s Note: This is... sort of a fixit fit, I guess. I was, let’s say, displeased with The Rise of Skywalker, and wracked my brain trying to figure out what I would have done if I had been handed three movies that happen at the end of the “Orig Trig”. So, I did a ass-ton of worldbuilding. This happens at some point between Ep. 6 and Ep. 7 (I think like 15 years before the start of Ep. 7???). Aside from trigger warnings, I think that’s about all you need to know, but to be clear: I do not care what the cannonical words for everyday objects are. If it looks like chocolate, tastes like chocolate, feels like chocolate, and is made like chocolate (for example), I’m gonna call it chocolate. Not whatever word starwars picked for chocolate. Maybe that seems glib, but seeing as this isn’t even close to being cannon, I was more focused more on putting pen to paper than cannon lingo. TW: Poisoning Via Drugs in Drink, Gun (blaster) violence, Political propaganda, anger issues)

Today was Luke’s Birthday. Not so special, it happens once a year. Approximately. It was, however, a nice excuse to go out and do something nice with his coworkers, students, friends, and most notably, his sister, who is often far too busy with presidential matters to return his calls. As he sat on the bench and waited for the speeder to pull up, he unwrapped a candy and popped it into his mouth. They were bad for him, he knew, but today was a day for celebration, and you only turn 79 once.

After all, today, more than most days, even more than most birthday, he was acutely aware of how old he was. It didn't bother him that much, he was leaving behind more than a legacy, he also was leaving behind the Jedi. Even if they were divided slightly on how to handle the force, (and he found himself concerned with the rigidity of the Orthodoxy) division brings balance, a lesson that he learned, in hindsight, all those years ago on Dagobah. Soon, he knew, he would be leaving everything in the young, capable hands of the next generation of Jedi, a generation of well equipped do-gooders who could go out and, if possible, stop wars instead of fighting them.

But then, the galaxy is big and wars waged by the rich are hard to stop.

Speaking of young, capable Jedi, it was at this moment that the speeder pulled up next to him.

"Master Skywalker," the young man in the backseat said as Luke pushed himself to his feet on his cane, "would you like help up?"

"No need to be so formal," he responded, getting into the vehicle. "Call me uncle today at least. It's my birthday after all!"

"Alright. Uncle it is then," Ben said, with a little smile, "How are you feeling today, Uncle?"

Luke took a deep breath in. “Peaceful,” he said with a sigh.

Ben laughed, “That’s new. You’re sure you’re feeling okay?”

Luke side-eyed the youngster. “I become less peaceful by the second. Shall we?”

Ben nodded and snapped his fingers. The Chauffer pulled away. “I’ve been speaking to Master Gueyn and Master Snoke. They suggested that the division between the Reformists and the Othodoxy is causing a general weakening of the force among new padawans, and that they’d like to meet with you at-”

Luke cut him off with a raised hand. “You know it’s my day off, right, Ben?”

Ben began to say something but cut himself off, filled with a visible anger that Luke recognised in himself. “Of course, Uncle.”

“It’s fine, Ben. I just want to cut down on shop talk if we can today. It should be a day for relaxation,” Luke said with a gentle elbow into Ben’s side, “For all of us, right?”

Ben swallowed and took a breath, calming himself. “Of course Uncle,” he repeated.

Luke looked out the window. They were passing the ever-extravagent Skywalker Plaza. He rolled his eyes. They were silent for a moment, but Luke spoke up again. “Ben, I - I am so proud of you. You’ve come so far in just a few short years, and I’m proud that I was around to train you into a Jedi.”

“I… Thank you, Uncle,” Ben replied, caught off guard.

“And I just want to… Ben, you spend so much time with members of the Orthodoxy-”

Ben groaned, “We’re doing this conversation again?”

“They never wanted me to take you on for training, and I just-”

“The thing you just want is for me to listen to you just because I owe you for training me, right?

“No, I-”

“Because you’re the hero and they’re not.”

“I’m not saying that they’re bad people,” Luke said softly, trying to calm Ben down, “I’m just concerned that you’ll burn yourself out trying to live up to their standards, when they already have their mind made up about you.”

Ben said nothing, and didn’t look at him.

“I’m sorry I brought it up. I want good things for you, and I don’t want you to have a hard life. But even with everything I know, I can’t decide for you what can make you happiest. I’m still here for you.” Luke held his hand out for his nephew to take.

“I’m sorry as well,” Ben said, “I shouldn’t have gotten so upset. Such displays of emotion are unbecoming to me, and the Jedi order. I’m sorry. Let’s just enjoy this evening.” Ben looked at Luke and gave a weak smile. He did not take his hand.

It was in this moment, as they pulled up to the restaurant, that Luke felt something in Ben, an apprehension that he hadn’t noticed before. “Ben, is everythi-”

“C’mon you old man, waddle on over and give me a hug.” Luke heard as the door opened to let him out. He turned to see President Leia Organa-Solo hovering in her chair, drifting closer to the transport. Luke got out of the transport and bent down as best he could to embrace his sister.

Ben gave a curt bow, “It is nice to see you mother.” She responded with a smile, and bowed her head in his direction.

Chewbacca walked over, and they headed into the restaurant.

The presents were pretty typical, which wasn’t to say they were unpleasant to recieve. Leia gave him the same gift she always did. A 48-pack of chocolate treats from Ermaron-3, brought with her from home (plus a calendar that marked which day Leia’s birthday would be). Chewie had been continuing the work he and Han had after the war ended, and brought Luke more records detailing the history of the Jedi. Mostly policies and ledgers, as always, but as far as Luke was concerned, it was all important, all valuable knowledge. Everyone else, as requested, had donated to a charity Luke had picked out earlier that month. An orphanage, run by non-Jedi affiliated priests from the Medichant Order.

Not too long after he started eating, Luke leaned over to talk to Leia.

“I think I’m getting old. I’m tired already.”

She snorted, “I’m not even that old, and we’re twins. I won’t blame you if you want to say you got pulled away for work.”

Luke shook his head. “There’s something I wanna talk to you about. Jedi politics stuff. You’re the general, not me, you know? I just thought I could get some advice.”

It wasn’t true exactly. More than anything else, he wanted to discuss Ben with her. If they could both be there to help make sure Ben was staying sane, not pushing any emotions down too hard, and all that, it would be way less likely that he’d snap. But Ben was sitting right on the other side of him. He could hardly mention it without embarrassing his nephew unless he waited until Ben went to the bathroom.

Except, he wasn’t getting up. It wasn’t of place or anything, but as time went on, Luke started feeling more and more tired. More than that, his vision began rippling, distances started being confusing, and he felt dizzy. Something was very wrong.

He turned to Ben. He needed help. He could trust Ben. “Begggg, Innie… Bem. Ikahhhn…” he wasn’t able to get the words out right. Why couldn’t he talk?

Ben looked back at him and smiled toothily, and it was like Luke’s stomach dropped. “Everything okay, Uncle?”

Luke stuttered out some nonsense. Ben picked up Luke’s water and smelled it, and winced with a laugh. “Guess you broke out the strong stuff, eh? Do you mind if I finish it off?” No, it was water. Luke tried to tell him so, but when he shook his head, Ben just raised his glass to him, and downed the rest.

“Right well, the birthday boy has overindulged, it looks like. I’ll take him home,” Ben said as he handed his mother a card, “Pay with this. I’ll grab it for you tomorrow morning before you leave tomorrow?”

Leia nodded and took the card.

“Alright, we’re heading back, it’s getting a little late for my uncle. Remember, everything’s on me, so don’t indulge! Have a nice night! And one more toast to Master Skywalker before we get out of here!” Ben announced.

The door to the restaurant closed on the sound of everyone cheersing for him.

“Right. Get in, Uncle.” The transport was waiting for them. How did the driver know to prepare it?

“Doesn’t look like he can even try to talk anymore. How about that?”

“Whatever, just give me the antidote,” said Ben from the front seat.

“I still think it was dumb that you drank it.”

“Didn’t want anyone else to. Besides, I wanted to divert suspicion from the drink.”

A scoff. Were they moving? When did Luke get into the transport?

“Ha, no, he’s fine! The Master just overindulged in celebration. Stay safe tonight!” Ben called at a small group of Padawans that seemed to be sneaking out for the night. They must have been at the monastery again but when?

Luke hadn’t even formed the thought when he was thrown onto his bed.

“You know Uncle,” Ben said, his voice tinged with malice, “for all your talk of being able to choose your own destiny and the power of emotion, this proves it’s all nothing. This is not my doing. Tonight was powered by the two strongest forces in the galaxy: fate, and simple, cold, calculation. But you’re about to-”

“Are you done monologuing, or can we just finish this?” Luke couldn’t look over, and couldn’t see at the angle he was at, but he knew the sound of a blaster pistol being unholstered and unsafetied from the time spent with Han.

“FINE. Fine. Go ahead.” Ben’s voice was close now, Luke could feel his breath on his ear. “I’d like to tell you that the poison will dull the pain. That you won’t feel anything, you know? But I wouldn’t know. I’ve never died before.” He heard Ben stand back up now, “Be one with the force.” he said harshly, and then there was the report of a blaster, and then nothing.

It was on the news the next day. Jedi Master, and savior of the galaxy, Luke Skywalker, was assassinated in his bedroom when his nephew, Jedi Knight Ben Solo, brought him up to his room after his birthday. The assassin had panicked, killed the Master, and wounded his nephew.

People, on smoke breaks that day would laugh mirthlessly. “Can you believe it? Savior of the universe, killed by one of his own, on his birthday no less.”

The Orthodoxy wasted no time releasing the the Jedi Council’s official statement. A heretical Reformist insurgent, imagining himself to be wronged by the Jedi Order, nay, the Force itself, had broken into Master Skywalker’s room, and murdered him. They sprayed their so-called “symbol” on his wall after doing it, too, and that’s how you know it’s them.

Later, a person would be standing in their kitchen, listening to the report. “That doesn’t sound right,” they’d say, “I thought the assassin ran after killing him? Because his nephew was there?”

“Now’s not the time for conspiracy theories, the man is dead,” their husband would say tiredly, “can we just talk about something else? Everyone at the office was discussing it all day.”

Leia gave a speech that was, as always, incredibly moving, focusing on how the small actions of the many outweigh the large actions of the few, and how Luke wouldn’t have wanted the Reformist movement as a whole to be blamed for his death. “After all,” she said, “he was Pro-Reform himself!”

What was more widely-circulated was the interview with Jedi Knight Solo, in his place in the infirmary. “I couldn’t see it coming,” he said with eyes red from crying, or lack of sleep, or both, “It was so jarring. It’s exactly the kind of thing that you imagine when you’re training but… I hate to say this, so close to his death, but I keep wondering if maybe I would have had the discipline to sense the assassin’s presence if I had been trained in the traditional way. With the Orthodoxy.” He teared up, “I don’t care, I just wish I could have saved him. I… L-leave, please.” As soon as he was out of the infirmary, a week and a half later, he replaced the seat left empty by Luke’s absence.

In the month and a half that followed, there were six Reformist deaths attributed to gangs of orthodoxy supporters in the public, two of which were a Jedi Knight and her Padawan. Eighteen more Reformists were arrested by the Jedi Council.

It only took a half a year for the Council to declare all Reformists to be heretics. The public, angered by the death of Jedi Martyr Skywalker, was spurred on by this, and raided the monastery, purging it of Reformists completely.

A statue was erected in the square in front of the temple. It’s Luke, with his arms firmly in front of him, holding his lightsaber, his robes flowing around him. It was constructed out of pure marble, and stands at a mighty forty-seven feet tall. Along the base, there’s an inscription.

“In memory of what he sacrificed for the mighty Orthodoxy, and the Force. May he forever be one with the force.”

#star wars #fanfic #fixit fic

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yellow-saber-blog · 7 years ago

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The Star Wars Fan Wars or why some fans hated The Last Jedi.

If you are into StarWars or into films in general you are probably aware that the SW fandom is currently divided into two groups - those who hated the TLJ and those who loved it. Or so it would seem....I am pretty sure there are many people, like me, who stand in between: people who acknowledge the film’s flaws but who still find things they enjoy in it. But one thing is certain - those who stand at the extreme lines are very vocal about their opinions and are often pretty rude towards each other.

I am writing this post here on Tumblr because I want to address a particular issue that is bothering me a lot and that is: how people who liked the TLJ are labeling those who didn’t like the film as “butthurt fanboys” and discredit their opinions and feelings as being simply “broken expectations”.

I want to defend those angry “fanboys/girls” a bit, because it seems that some fans miss the point of why others hated TLJ. Lots of the complains people have, even though often expressed with anger and harsh words, are legit.

Now, before we go further, I want to address another issue that people neglect - personal oppinion vs facts.

Now imagine you are going to buy a shirt in the store with your friend. You both like clothes from the StarWars brand. They now have a new collection of shirts. You absolutely love that new blue shirt but your friend doesn’t like it at all. This shows your different taste and leads to your opposite opinions on something that is subjective. No one can convince the other that their opinion is right or wrong because that is the nature of subjective opinions and personal taste.

The same is with movies - someone will enjoy a film that another will hate and both are free to express their joy or frustration as much as they want without trying to discredit the other.

Now there is another aspect to things - the facts. As much as you like that new shirt’s design if you look at it closely, you might notice that it’s not sewed properly or that there are some other defects on it. You can still like it or buy it but you cannot deny the fact that there are defects on that shirt and that is not made as good as it could have been done.

The same thing can be said about the TLJ - that film is not stitched up together as good as it might have been. You can still enjoy it immensely but you will be lying to yourself if you insist that this is a good movie because it isn’t. The script, the pacing and the inconsistent tone of the movie are some of it’s bigger problems. When audiences go to see a StarWars film made with billions of dollars from some of the best in Hollywood, they naturally expect to see a decent, competent movie. You can’t blame people for complaining when they are given something far less professional than promised.

I think we can all acknowledge that TLJ has weak points in terms of storytelling, consistency and basic logic. That being said, we should also all acknowledge that visually this film is magnificent and one of the best looking StarWars films. Those aspects we can consider facts about the film. You will be insulting a lot of classic movies if you insist these things aren’t true.You can still love or hate the movie all you want but you should at least acknowledge those basic truths about it. So objectively this film deserve probably around 6/10. Definitely not the best of StarWars. But it can still be your favourite SW film, nonetheless.

Now lets get to the point - why some fans hate this movie? The main reasons are simple and I will list them in no particular order:

- Silly side story - the dump and illogical things that happen with the Resistance and all the subplots revolving around Poe, Finn and Rose. The movie just doesn’t know what to do with them. The plan about going to Canto Bight gets stupider the more you think about it. General Holdo’s motivations and character in general are simply weird for a Resistance leader. Everything there feels like a filler episode of a TV show. Is that all they could come up with? You might at least understand why such a silly plot makes some people angry or irritates them. StarWars never had any super complex plot points - but no matter how simple those stories might have been, they were at least bound by a basic logic and overall narrative purpose. ( and they were much more fun to watch)

- The First Order start to feel like a joke. Snoke is killed without explaining anything about him at all, Hux is more like a comic relief and not like a serious bad guy. The whole First Order feels underwhelming. The Dark Side has always been very cool and a bit frightening. Now is more like a bunch of idiots with cool looking ships.

- The bad treatment of the original characters - Luke is misused and his character is completely changed without proper explanation or motivation. I won’t even go into details about Luke because it will take me ages. Leia, in turn, is given close to nothing to do and her “force flying” appears to be more laughable than impressive. Yes, there are some good scenes with Luke and Mark Hamill is amazing in the part but the negative things are just overshadowing the good ones.

To those reasons you can add other complains that people still have about Rey being a Mary Sue, about Snoke being useless, about Kylo Ren’s still unclear motivations and so on.

But let me condense it all in it’s basic essence - Disney/Ryan/Kathleen Kennedy and whoever else was involved - they all tried to be original in the wrong places and changed things they shouldn’t have changed AND at the same time they were unoriginal and silly in story points they should have changed or be creative with. Let me elaborate:

Luke won’t train Rey the way you think. Luke is not the hero you might expect to see. He is actually responsible for the fall of Kylo Ren and he did things against his character because you won’t expect that. And when Luke finally decides to do something he just Force project himself to have a “surprise” at the end. And dies. Basically Luke is written to be nothing you expect him to be, so you will be surprised. But the truth is: no one wants to be surprised by Luke or see him as a broken old man, no one wants to see their beloved characters killed off in such ways as Han and Luke. Give the audience the Luke they love and know. Surprise the fans with new characters and plots points without ruining the things fans already love. That is what will make people happy, why is it so hard to understand?

The "This is not going to go the way you think” theme goes on - Rey parents will be nobodies because you won’t expect that. Snoke will die, because you won’t expect that, Holdo has a secret plan all along because you won’t expect that. These choices are not about being original or creative, they are just doing the opposite because they want people to get something “they don’t expect”.

JJ and the marketing team created all that mystery around Rey and Snoke, it’s not just the fans’ imagination going wild. Still they didn’t deliver anything intriguing about those “mystery boxes”. I am personally ok with Rey’s parents being nobodies - I actually expected that to be the case. But you can’t blame people for wanting to know more about Snoke. When the first Star Wars films were out it was enough to say “this is the Emperor” and he is the bad guy. Now we have 6 movies and even more canon books and tv series. You have all that existing history there. The context of the story is different. It’s normal for people to want to know where those new powerful characters are placed in the history of the story. If you give them no answers about Snoke, you make the character pointless to the fans. So he is just a tool for Kylo to rise to power? But it’s Star Wars - people want to have something more to the story than just unexplained and undeveloped characters.

Still with the new characters, people are more perceptive to changes therefore one can do something really bold with them and change them upside down and get away with it. But the characters we grew up with - they need to be consistent with what we know about them. There is the balance between things you can twist/change and things you should respect and honer.

Now despite all the “ this is not what you expect” ideas, the creators of the film have the same story points as the Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi - we have a space chase, a white planet battle with walkers, an exotic world where we meet someone who will betray our characters, Rey will face Snoke as Luke faced the Emperor and so on. Those story similarities are the things they could have made completely different and be as creative as they want with those. Yet, they chose the similar plot points and visual elements to echo the OT but changed the characters from the OT. Why??? That is a very dump decision if you know anything about StarWars fans or if you know anything about people expectations and behaviour in general. Disney are not trying to win Oscars with this, they are trying to please the audience. But something in their research tables and marketing graphics went totally wrong.

There are at least 100 ways to write that same story both pushing forward the new characters and honouring the OT characters. They killed Han in an idiotic way, Luke is now gone in a poetic but useless manner. All those misplaced creative choices make the new films out of balance. They talk about balance so much in the story but they cannot achieve it. The balance between new and old, between the old generation and the new, between creativity and honouring the established lore. This imbalance it the real problem of the new trilogy. And this is a REAL PROBLEM no matter if it personally bothers you or not. If it doesn’t - good for you. But don’t disregard the opinions of those who are bothered by the unbalanced new trilogy and don’t call their complains “whining” or “lack of vision”.

You can enjoy the characters and the movie despite those problems but to deny that those ARE problems is a bit naive and short-sighted.

At this point it seems that Disney have no real idea of what they are doing with this franchise. At times it’s apparent that they are more concern with marketing and money rather than making a good film product. But is that really true? I am sure no one at Disney wanted to make a bad movie on purpose. But it turned out to be a rather messy one. One can make huge mistakes with the best of intentions.

They are nuances to things - nothing is black and white. Neither “playing safe” nor its opposite “disregard the film legacy” are good choices.

I just want to conclude this post by saying that people who grew up with StarWars don’t take this universe lightly. Life might suck big time but when you go to your StarWars corner of the galaxy, things should be better there. When someone hurts a character you love from your childhood you have the right to be angry, you have the right to complain, you have the right to demand a better treatment of that character.

We should all demand to be given better movies, better treatment in general as audience. I am sure there are many new, original and great stories that are not given green light so we can have more Marvel, more DC, more Star Wars. Therefore Star Wars movies should be made worthy of their title, of their popularity and of the resources poured into them. The hardest thing in all aspects of life is to get the balance right.

I really hope that Lucasfilm are making something better for the final movie, something that will bring fans back together.

I personally consider everything from TFA until now to be alternative universe and this is how I am fine with it. But still I would prefer to see a movie with a more intelligent script and not a filler subplots.

How many times per day we say to each other the same thing - do not disregard people’s feelings and opinions just because they differ from yours, don’t attack or insult those people because what they say makes you feel uncomfortable.

We all love the same thing lets be more civilised about it.

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thestarbirdfromtheashes · 7 years ago

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Jyn and Cassian Survived Conspiracy Theory Meta

Updated November 23, 2017

I have put together a number – and I do mean a number – of thoughts regarding the possibility that Jyn and Cassian survived Scarif. As this is a meta, it is just (mostly) all my thoughts and desperate hopes and me probably reading way too much into things. After all, “Rebellions are built on hope,” so I am going to continue to hope we see Jyn and Cassian again in another movie.

Cut for length. Very, very long length. (Seriously, it is exhaustive. I even lay out counterarguments.)

@starwars, I have no problem tagging you here, even though I doubt you’ll ever read this. Just want you to know there are still a lot of die-hard Rogue One fans out there, and we still think about these things. I’m a 20-year veteran of the franchise myself, and I’ll be a fan of it -- and Rogue One in particular -- for life. I put this together because you can still bring back Jyn and Cassian if you want to. I’m a writer myself, and I know nothing is impossible in your own universe. You brought back Darth Maul. You can bring back Jyn and Cassian. Save the dream, Star Wars.

Now that my transparent plea is that’s out of the way, let’s get going.

Original discussion post here.

Note: I used the e-book for citations. They don’t always line up because I was a little hasty with them, but they’re only off by a page. I didn’t figure you guys would be too concerned with that, though.

The Theory I’m Using: Jyn and Cassian survived because of Jyn’s kyber crystal necklace. The argument is stronger for Jyn’s survival than for Cassian’s, but I still have some arguments for his survival that I will also lay out.

The Kyber Crystal’s Dubious Purpose in the Overall Plot

a. At the very beginning of Rogue One, we see Lyra give Jyn her kyber crystal necklace and tell her daughter, “Trust the Force.”

i. This is never brought up again.

b. Chirrut can sense the crystal and says, “The strongest stars have hearts of kyber.”

i. This is never brought up again.

ii. I've always interpreted this as just a comment about Jyn’s character: Jyn is the star, and the kyber crystal is next to her heart, or that kyber crystals are resilient and strong and so is Jyn.

c. Jyn was able to smuggle the crystal into her cell on Wobani, when she wasn’t able to smuggle in anything else.

i. Why would the stormtroopers have let her keep it? They’re ruthless and awful. There is literally no reason to explain this.

d. Jyn holds the crystal at least twice, but no one sees it except the audience.

The Question

Why bother with the kyber crystal at all, if it doesn’t serve a purpose? Jyn is not religious, as far as we know. Jyn doesn’t express a deep connection with her mother and mourn her, thus feeling the need to touch the crystal to connect back with Lyra and comfort Jyn. In fact, Jyn is upset with her mother for sacrificing herself and going back for her husband, and thus, leaving Jyn at a young age. As a storyteller, you cannot bring an item up, make A Big Deal over it, and then not explain it or refer to it. The kyber crystal serves absolutely no discernable purpose in the movie.

The Conspiracy Theory

Articles here and here will get you up to speed on what I am going to write about. I believe, along with many others, that the kyber crystal necklace is what could be used to bring Jyn back. I believe it could also be used to bring Cassian back, should Lucasfilm/Disney decide to be generous. And here’s why: the necklace does nothing in the movie. There is no point. Ergo, we can only believe that it served some other purpose, which is what the Uproxx article says: “…the film has an emergency ‘Jyn lives!’ switch built right into the narrative.”

MY ARGUMENTS (AND COUNTERARGUMENTS)

The Success of the Movie I will admit to knowing little about the effect Rogue One had on the regular Star Wars fandom, other than that it was a huge success, it made a lot of money, and a lot of people say it’s their favorite/"the best" of all the movies. (It was also referred to as such in an early review online, I believe.) There is speculation within the fandom that LFL/Disney misjudged how popular the movie would be, and didn’t or couldn’t predict that. On this, though, I call BS. Really, LFL and Disney in particular, a company that rakes in millions upon millions each year, didn’t forecast if Rogue One became successful, didn’t plan for it, didn’t run ANY numbers or scenarios for what might happen if it did? Disney loves money, so why not capitalize on it if it DID surprise them and hit big? So maybe, is it possible that they thought it could be really popular, and that is why they built in the kyber crystal necklace? Hedging their bets in case people loved the movie? As we know, the earliest draft of the script had Jyn and Cassian surviving, but it was never filmed because LFL/Disney green-lighted Gareth Edwards’s desire to kill everyone off. We also know “Gareth always wanted to bring Jyn home” (I can’t find this article again). Movies have test audiences, so is it possible that the test audience reacted in a way that changed some of the movie to what it is today? Is it possible that the test audiences really liked Jyn and Cassian together, which was something LFL/Disney were unsure of and thought could go either way with resurrecting him or not? This is a weak point in my argument, but I bring it up because of a fact about Return of the Jedi. There is a line from Han Solo that does not make sense. He says about the Falcon, “Yeah, I just got a funny feeling. Like I’m never gonna see her again.” This is because Lando Calrissian was originally supposed to die, and the Falcon was supposed to be destroyed, in Jedi, but test audiences reacted so badly, George Lucas changed it and had him live. Yet the line stayed, and it doesn’t make sense now. Remember, too, that Poe Dameron of the sequel trilogy was supposed to die, but test audiences liked him so much that he stayed – despite no explanation of how he got off Jakku. (Thanks, @rebelle-capitan!)

Regarding the movie’s popularity again: Given that I am deep into the RebelCaptain fandom, I don’t really have any barometer for how popular the ship is outside it. Do people like Cassian and Jyn together? Do they view them as “together”? I don’t really know. Do enough people like them to warrant LFL/Disney resurrecting Cassian, too? Again, don’t know. I know we don’t have a ton of fic out there, so maybe not. Then again, I don’t have any idea of how much is “a ton” of fic for a particular ship, and what determines a ship’s popularity in regards to amount of fic (if this sort of abstract data were even able to be gathered, and were actually valid). This leads me to my next point:

Jyn Erso & Cassian Andor as a Couple (“RebelCaptain”) Yes, LFL/Disney have never explicitly stated that Jyn and Cassian are a ship. They have also not stated that they aren’t. They have absolutely no reason to state either way, and determining romantic involvement is sort of up to one’s own discretion, to a point. Also, making part of the movie officially romantic would probably detract from the overall seriousness, tone, and message of it. Do Jyn and Cassian ever kiss? Do they ever express feelings for one another? No and no (although we can theorize that a kiss was cut from the elevator/turbolift scene). They don’t do any of these things. It could also be argued that they’re not the type of people to express feelings verbally, and as we know from the book, “There wasn’t the time.” Yet these two speak volumes with their faces and actions, and after their argument in the shuttle when fleeing Eadu, when Cassian gathers the army for Jyn and confesses to her, the movie is shot romantically. I’ve seen good, solid metas on Cassian’s actions pointing to him falling in love with Jyn, and there is the joke in the fandom of the army being akin to “his engagement present” (see this amazing meta by @ladytharen). People who are against the ship can say what they like, but the fact remains that the scene in the turbolift is shot incredibly intimately, and the looks on their faces (especially Cassian’s) are breathtaking. Jyn’s arm is over Cassian’s shoulder. I’m no movie expert, but this is one of the most romantic scenes I have ever watched, and certainly the most romantic in all of Star Wars. Why shoot it that way if Jyn and Cassian are not meant to have feelings for one another? Also, that scene appears to be a reshoot -- so it’s important and is there for a reason. A reason that was thought of later, after the original cut of the film. Maybe the romance-that-is-not-officially-a-romance was simply to make the story more interesting; maybe not. Maybe it means something more; maybe not. But if they weren’t meant to be romantic, wouldn’t they have been smiling at one another over their triumph in the elevator, rather than looking regretful in Jyn’s case, adoring in Cassian’s? Another thing: Jyn and Cassian were originally supposed to die apart. Cassian was supposed to die with Kaytoo, and Jyn was supposed to die elsewhere. But they didn’t. They died in each other’s arms, Cassian’s hand sliding up to Jyn’s shoulder, fingers digging in as his eyes close.

Another important point: going from the novelization, when Cassian falls from the data tower, Jyn’s instinct is to jump after him. If they are only “platonic war buddies,” as Rogue One: The Ultimate Visual Guide author Pablo Hidalgo claimed before taking it back to say that “what happened in the elevator is their business,” then I would think Jyn’s instinct would be to mourn the loss of her comrade and keep going for the sake of the mission. But that is not her first thought. In fact, as she watches Cassian firing at Krennic and his Death Troopers,

“Jyn started to call to him, but he cried out louder, ‘Keep going! Keep going!’ She reached a trembling hand toward her pistol. She could die. So could they. She knew she had to climb. The decision was taken from her. [Cassian is struck and falls] She nearly loosed her clutching fingers, nearly followed him into the abyss, but a swell of vertigo shocked her out of her horror and impelled her to cling more tightly to the stacks. Cassian was dead, like so many others.” (257)

WHY? Why write it that way, in the official novelization, which is sanctioned by LFL/Disney and heavily skewed toward Jyn and Cassian having feelings for one another, if they are not to be a romantic couple? Jyn has seen “platonic war buddies” die plenty of times. I’ll bet she has not once wanted to kill herself over them. Hasn’t felt “horror” since she was a kid. I’ve read Rebel Rising, and I believe she steeled herself against all that pretty young. But Cassian though…his “death” gets to her. First she forsakes the mission to reach for her pistol to provide additional fire to protect him, and then she AGAIN considers forsaking the mission when he appears to die. When she sees him alive again at the top of the tower, “He looked like a man who had fallen twelve stories and clawed his way back to the top. He looked as beautiful as anyone Jyn had ever known” (275).

Increased marketing visibility for Cassian See this post. Rogue One has always been Jyn Erso’s story, a story of a strong female protagonist leading a band of unlikely heroes. However, I have noticed that as time has gone on, Cassian has had an increasingly prominent role in the marketing. The official synopsis, dating back to the April 4 DVD/Blu-Ray release, is thus: “From Lucasfilm comes an epic adventure – Rogue One: A Star Wars Story. In a period of great conflict, a group of unlikely heroes led by Jyn Erso, a daring fugitive, and Cassian Andor, a rebel spy, band together on a desperate mission to steal the plans to the Death Star, the Empire’s ultimate weapon of destruction. 2016 Lucasfilm Ltd.” Cassian didn’t used to be right up there next to Jyn. Now he is. They are both well liked. Maybe it’s just me, but if I read that synopsis without knowing anything more, I sure as heck would expect some sort of romantic subplot.

Felicity Jones It is well-documented on the internet that Felicity Jones has a sequel option clause in her contract. That’s old news. She’s the only cast member who does. I don’t know anything about Hollywood contracts and if a sequel option clause means a bit role or a starring role, but I’m betting not all clauses are created equal. There are theories that she could be in the new Han Solo movie or in a possible upcoming Luke Skywalker movie. Or, I say, a Rogue One prequel or sequel with just her after the kyber crystal saves her life. Or…maybe something even better…. (Or, “it could just be a way to obscure her character’s fate because she does have a two-movie contract, or to use archival footage of her later.” Thanks again, @rebelle-capitan!)

Diego Luna As I said, I don’t know anything about Hollywood contracts, if they’re set in stone or can have addenda, but I do know Felicity is the only cast member to have the sequel clause option in her contract (as stated above). Diego, however, has supposedly been sighted on the Han Solo set, and indeed “fueled speculation” about his involvement. The first link is from May; the second is from January. None of this is new. My point is, I find it interesting that we heard there was a potential for him to be involved in the Han Solo film in January of this year, after Rogue One had only been out a month – but he didn’t have a sequel clause in his contract…? Or was that information just not made available? I don’t know how The Hollywood Reporter works, and if they could have missed something like a sequel clause in Diego’s contract, but they’re the ones who reported on Felicity’s contract. (Or perhaps Disney leaked the information about Felicity’s contract and kept tight-lipped on Diego’s. Who knows?) That first article, from May, also mentions (BS) criticism of Diego’s performance by The Washington Post and Entertainment Weekly, clearly comparing Cassian to Han Solo. I don’t know if there’s enough (unfounded) criticism of Diego’s performance for LFL/Disney to not want him back for a Rogue One sequel, or if they just blew it off because other than some nods to the Original Trilogy in superficial aspects alone, Cassian was never supposed to be like Han. I really sort of doubt LFL/Disney would not want Diego Luna back. I mean...really. Also, if Diego is indeed going to be a part of another Star Wars movie that takes place before Rogue One, it means that the character of Cassian was well enough received to warrant additional movie reprisals.

Oh, and Diego also commented on the afterlife in this article from September 2, and mentions the Force.

Also: don’t forget that Diego had a blast with Rogue One, and is a HUGE Star Wars fanboy.

“Welcome Home” and Cassian’s Two Deaths These always make me ache when I watch the film, but I also find them curious. After Cassian gathers an army for Jyn, “‘I’m not used to people sticking around,’ she said, by way of an explanation [for her staring at him]. She didn’t know if Cassian really understood, but he said, ‘Welcome home,’ and she knew she was” (191). In the movie, we get the “orbiting” of Jyn and Cassian around one another (which I believe is also referenced in the book, about Cassian being pulled into Jyn’s orbit), and we also get Cassian’s eyes slipping to Jyn’s lips for half a second (blink and you’ll miss it). Why have him say this, welcome her to a home when she hasn’t had one in years, just to have them both die at the end? It could be argued that just Jyn will live, and come back to the Alliance -- which is home, as Cassian said. That line could be a hint for that. Or, it could be nothing but a RebelCaptain moment (and therefore downright cruel to us shippers given their canon demise).

Cassian falls from the data tower and appears dead, both to Jyn and the audience. Then he “claws his way back up to the top” and saves Jyn’s life. He comes back for her a third time. Then he dies for real. Why, though, did Cassian fall from the data tower and appear dead -- only to die for real minutes later? Was that just cruel storytelling? No. Cassian fell because he had to. As heroine, Jyn had to face off against Krennic, the villain. They needed to have a confrontation. Cassian’s presence would have made no sense. He would have had nothing to do, and therefore, he had to fall and appear dead. The bonus of this is, of course, that he has a dramatic re-entrance, and we get the pure joy of seeing Jyn’s face light up when she sees him again. We also experience that joy ourselves because we like Cassian, and we like Jyn and Cassian together, and we want them to live and be together. It doesn’t happen, which makes the fact that Cassian appeared dead only to reappear alive, all the more tragic. His fall serves two purposes, and that’s pretty good storytelling. (Although I still think having Cassian say “Welcome home” only for them to die is still just plain mean.)

Cassian’s Injuries I have always thought that it was not physically possible for Cassian to climb up the tower after Jyn with the injuries he appears to have. He hit two beams going down and crashed onto metal grating. In the book, it simply states that he falls into an “abyss.” It doesn’t go into detail about him hitting beams on the way down. It talks about how much pain he’s in, but it doesn’t say he knew he was dying or anything like that. Also, it says, “The last time Cassian had hurt so bad” (280, emphasis mine), indicating that Cassian has been hurt this badly before, not that this current injury is the worst. He survived the previous one, so why not this one? I say that unless his wounds were much more serious than the movie or book would have us believe (which I don’t at this point, given that the book says his breathing is “regular” on page 282, then he and Jyn are breathing in time with one another on page 283), he would not have been able to climb the tower after Jyn. Or, again, cruel storytelling by deciding that he could appear dead and his injuries were grievous but he could climb up the tower anyway for his dramatic re-entrance and even more dramatic, emotional death.

Cassian’s and Jyn’s Deaths (and Why We Didn’t Get a Kiss) When the other members of the Rogue One team die, the wording in the book is very clear, even to the point of using the actual word, “died.” However, Cassian’s death is written thus: “When Cassian Andor died, he would be ready, and he would be content.” Now, before that, though, it says, “He stowed thoughts of old missions and thoughts of the future away [‘a woman he might have known and understood’ (280)]; decided to focus on what he could see and hear and smell for the last moments of his life on Scarif.” One could argue that that says enough, that he is going to die then. But people also think they’re going to die and then don’t, so… Cassian’s death is not written from his perspective like all the others’. Yes, Rogue One is Jyn’s story, so their demise is written from her perspective…buuuut we still don’t technically read Cassian’s actual death.

When it’s Jyn’s turn, the world is first emerald, “then a clean, purifying white,” and the narrative goes into all the things Jyn has been as a person. “Soon all those things, too, burned away, and Jyn Erso – finally at peace – became one with the Force” (284). We can look at “burned away” as being literal, as in they burned up in the explosion or superheated water; we could also look at it as imagery if the kyber crystal theory is to be believed. And here’s the crux of the theory: Jyn “becomes one with the Force.” She does not explicitly die. While this is difficult to rationalize given that “becoming one with the Force” is reserved for Jedi and means turning into a Force ghost, what reason would there be for this? It was written that way for a purpose. When Chirrut dies, his last line is, “I am one with the Force and the Force is with me” (261). As we know, Chirrut is not a Jedi, but he is Force sensitive. So, maybe this is a clue in the novelization. (I’m also going to point out here that Qui-Gon Jinn was a Jedi who still had a body even after he died and became one with the Force, and I believe that was supposed to be explained, but I don’t know where and what the explanation was. I’m not familiar with that era.) Wookieepedia also uses the same wording for Jyn: “becoming one with the Force.” On Cassian’s page, it says, “the Death Star destroyed the base, killing them and the other rebels in the area.” Pretty compelling, obviously, and so is the fact that their date of death is listed on each of their pages. Still…that “becoming one with the Force” wording is very intentional, and thus very interesting.

The Kiss: This is just a wildcard, but the turbolift scene was so intimate and so romantic that we all wondered why there was no kiss – especially when you see Jyn’s arm on Cassian’s shoulder. Is it possible there wasn’t a kiss because there is going to be one in the future? This is so weak, but we can all dream. From @rebelle-capitan again: “There’s also some really awkward editing where Cassian is leaning in, there’s a blip, and then he’s leaning back a little and his head is tilted differently. I think this indicates that a kiss was cut.”

How Jyn and Cassian Could Have Survived Check out these articles here and here (referenced above as well). I like the idea that the kyber crystal pressed between Jyn and Cassian could also save Cassian. It could explain why they hugged. But, they could have also hugged just to hug, because they were going to die, and it would have been awkward to just sit there together. Still…she could have leaned her head on his shoulder, or he could have had his arm around her waist, or…anything else. But that hug is very close, very tight, and we see Cassian’s fingers run up Jyn’s back and then grip her hard, digging into her back as he closes his eyes. We also see his eyes open as they die, and I always wondered about this. @sambargestuff says, “Cassian’s eyes widen in surprise (rather than fear) as the light hits them, as if something was happening that he didn’t expect or understand.” She goes on to explain more: “So, when the Death Star fired on Jedha, the city was the blast site and it was like ground zero of a nuclear bomb; immediate destruction/vaporization of everything in that place. The deaths at Saw’s hideout were the result of the shock wave; the crust of the planet lifting off and burying/crushing as it rolled back on people. There was no expansion of light or the beam vaporizing as it spread out over the planet surface. That clearly doesn’t happen on Jedha.

On Scarif, the blast from the Death Star clearly takes off the top of the data tower on its way to the planet surface and ground zero is actually in the ocean. Jyn and Cassian are on the beach, watching the shock wave come towards them from the ocean. So, they should have been engulfed in planetary crust and water (although you could argue the water vaporized, I suppose) and yet they were engulfed by a white light. Cassian’s eyes widen in surprise (rather than fear) as the light hits them, as if something was happening that he didn’t expect or understand.

So, what if that white light was the Force, engulfing our heroes (something mystical about Jyn’s kyber crystal) and keeping them safe, moving them through space and time, making them Force ghosts, whatever? The book doesn’t say Cassian dies, only that he was ready to die. Jyn doesn’t ‘die’ either, she becomes one with the Force and her faith carries Cassian.

Continuity errors or conspiracy to launch Jyn and Cassian on us again in the future? Think about it.”

Another idea, from @grexigone: “So…bearing the Reddit post in mind, should the kyber really protected them, then it’s possible that the so called kyber-protection-bubble was strong enough to stand the heat wave (and the high tide afterwards) which could means that not only the explosion was not *that* strong to kill them, but they might actually survive the said explosion and return not as Force ghost but as an actual living human being.”

The Death Star’s Poor Aim Continuing on this point, that’s another thing I always wondered about: why did the Death Star fire directly on Jedha City and yet miss the Citadel Tower? Didn’t Tarkin say to target it? HOW could it possibly MISS? It fires way out into the ocean, kilometers away from Jyn and Cassian. An easy explanation is that it gives us the heartwrenching ending of Jyn and Cassian clutching each other together as they await death, and honestly, that’s probably it. But what if it was intentional? What if it was so they would have more time together so the magic of the kyber crystal could work so they could come back?

“Her Faith Carried Him with Her” “She believed someone was out there. Maybe it was even true. He did want it to be true. With all his heart, he did. Her faith carried him with her.” (282)

It’s interesting that these lines are all set as their own paragraph, meaning each one has more impact than if they’d been written as one paragraph. We can view “faith” as tying up to “believe” two paragraphs above, but “faith” is a pretty strong word to use, and with this theory, I’m reading faith as Star Wars faith, i.e., the Force, rather than her faith in the plans being received by the Alliance. So...the Force. Jedi. Lightsabers. Kyber crystals. If “Her faith,” meaning the Force and her kyber crystal necklace, “carried him with her,” is it not possible that if Jyn survives via the kyber crystal, Cassian is also “carried” along because he was in her embrace? I have always found this line odd, because to me, it is awkwardly worded, especially given that the narrative is Cassian’s.

Don’t forget, too, that Lyra said, “Trust the Force” when she gave Jyn the necklace, and Chirrut said, “The strongest stars have hearts of kyber.” This is weaker, but just a thought: both times Jyn touches the crystal in the movie are in a quiet moment, but they’re also right before she looks up at Cassian. Maybe it’s a hint, and a piece of her “carrying him with her.”

Jyn’s Potential Force Abilities From @rebelle-capitan: “Okay, so the books indicate that Lyra had an unusually strong connection to nature, which was what made her a) be a geologist and b) made her seek out other Force worshippers. I see this as being Force sensitive, though not strong enough to be a Jedi. Like Chirrut is sensitive, he can feel the Force and use it to ‘see’ (he can feel kyber crystals, which are basically living things), he’s just not strong enough to manipulate it and be a Jedi. Okay, so Lyra is maybe Force sensitive. Several times in the book, Jyn is mentioned as having a peculiar reaction to Chirrut when he’s ‘using’ the Force. She can feel her necklace react to him and when he starts praying, I think on the way to Eadu, she starts getting a massive pressure build up in her head. Now, I don’t know about new canon, but in Legends stuff, the emergence of latent Force sensitivity tends to occur during times of stress and includes pressure in the head, particularly when others are using the Force. Kyber crystals were things that only the Force sensitive could feel, and a Jedi typically communed for hours, even days, before their crystal chose them. Also, Jyn shows multiple instances of latent Force ability, such as shooting a stormtrooper she isn’t looking at, possibly being able to pick up Cassian’s emotions (several times, it’s as if she’s reading his mind, and in the novel she knows he’s following her to Scarif partially for absolution despite the fact that they never discuss it), and she’s able to convince a lot of people to blindly follow her seemingly through sheer force of will. She ‘prays’ at the shield gate, as if actively using the Force to sway things their way. So I’m leaning toward Jyn being Force sensitive. She wasn’t in any sort of a position as a child to be recruited by the Jedi, and around the time she would have been, the Jedi were slaughtered. So she’s been untrained all this time. IMO, her abilities start coming out when she encounters Chirrut. Whether she could use them to survive Scarif, let alone save Cassian as well, I don’t know. But if Maul can survive being chopped in half and falling down a big reactor shaft or whatever, and if the Force can create Anakin out of nothing, why not save two people on a beach from the fallout of the Death Star’s reduced-power blast?”

Lyra was originally a Jedi in an early draft, if you didn’t know. (Thank you to @simishipsrebelcaptain for that info!)

The Original Script and a Comment by Director Gareth Edwards The original script has Jyn and Cassian surviving Scarif, but the writers claimed they couldn’t figure out how to make it work, and director Gareth Edwards wanted to kill the whole crew off anyway. LFL/Disney green-lighted it, so they did. BUT, “Gareth always wanted to bring Jyn home.” I can’t remember where I read that, but I did read it in an article online at some point earlier this year.

Why is There No Book about Cassian? / Why Kill Off the Only Spies We Have in New Canon? I find it very interesting that Cassian is a very complex character deeply embedded in the Rebellion, with “the good guys,” yet he has no backstory besides the comic about how he met K-2SO. Someone on Tumblr mentioned that Cassian is the one character who could easily fit into the tapestry of the Star Wars Universe, as he is embedded in the Rebellion and a spy. (If this was you, please tag yourself and include that post if you can/want to!) Why kill him off when we could have seen more of the Rebellion from an everyman’s point of view? All we have right now are heroes’ POVs and the dead cast of Rogue One. I’m very familiar with the old Expanded Universe, and I don’t recall any spies, or any information about spies. My knowledge is a bit rusty, but nothing sticks out. Spies are something Star Wars hasn’t really delved into. It would be amazing to see more stories about them, and killing off the lead characters in the one spy story Star Wars has effectively kills off any potential for future spy stories – especially since Rogue One was immensely popular. I just don’t think another spy movie (or even book) would be well received, because it’s not Jyn and Cassian, and it’s not the Rogue One crew. (Jyn was also very well received.) There’s also a lot of toys and marketing and, well, MONEY to be made, and Disney, a well-known lover of money, just…ended…it…? What if there is no book on Cassian because he is going to come back later, and everything just hasn’t been decided yet? What if Cassian has another role to play?

The Bothans Died, but the Rebel Spies Didn’t In Return of the Jedi, Mon Mothma says, “Many Bothans died to bring us this information” in regards to the second Death Star. The opening crawl of A New Hope makes no mention of rebel spies dying. Just that rebel spies got the plans. Just sayin’.

The Argument that “They Don’t Appear in A New Hope” This comment is from the Rogue One production team, and it was given as justification for why they killed the entire cast off. It is extremely weak, given that a number of new characters (e.g., General Draven) and ships (e.g., the U-wing) were invented for Rogue One and don’t appear in A New Hope, and old characters like Mon Mothma are even at Yavin Base and still don’t appear in A New Hope. Just putting this in here briefly in case anyone wondered. (I have more on this, but this isn’t the place for it.)

Returning to the Drawing Board This is weak, but here it is anyway: I think it’s maybe possible that once Episode IX is out, LFL/Disney will want to return to the drawing board for things that did well. After all, they love returning to the OT. Disney also always returns to its own hits time after time and keeps marketing that stuff over and over. Maybe Disney left Rogue One with a loophole so that they could return to it if they needed it.

If Darth Maul Can Survive Being Cut in Half… …Jyn and Cassian can survive with a crystal imbued with the Force between them. Granted, Darth Maul’s survival is old canon, but…

Delicity Keeping Cassian/Diego around would also be easy for LFL/Disney, because he’s already a known quantity for Jyn/Felicity. They worked extremely well together and had amazing chemistry, and one could theorize that in the reshoots, Jyn and Cassian were brought closer together. Cassian’s role was also expanded in the reshoots. His character was changed, and new scenes were added (e.g., The Ring of Kafrene). Is it possible that Diego and Felicity had such amazing chemistry together that the production team decided to make something of it? After all, the turbolift scene appears to be a reshoot, and their deaths were reshot, and what purpose did the turbolift scene serve other than to be romantic? Besides the cynical response, which is, “To pack a bigger emotional punch when they died.”

Another point of note is that even though Rogue One is about Jyn, the publicity tour did include Diego. Maybe that’s just how these things go, or I don’t know, some other reason, but...this picture, really? That’s a pretty incredible picture for two actors who are not playing romantic leads. Also, the fact that the fandom did come up with a cute amalgamation of their names, when they are not and have never been a romantic couple like Hollywood couples who get these cute names, speaks volumes to me as tribute to how well they work together and what good friends they became during the shoot.

And that’s it! You’ve reached the end! I know, I can’t believe it, either.

Special thanks go out to @sambargestuff, @rebelle-capitan, @grexigone, @simishipsrebelcaptain, and @jenniferjuni-per for contributing ideas and helping me out with this! Extra thanks to @rebelle-capitan for beta’ing.

“Captivated by dream logic, knowing it was untrue, she thought: If I make it to the light, I can escape forever.” (256)

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81scorp · 5 years ago

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Constructive criticism: Transformers 2

(Originally posted as an editorial on Deviantart Apr 24, 2015. It has not been changed from how I originally wrote it.)

Before I go into Transformers 2 I want to talk about the X-Men and Spider-man movie that came out in the early 2000`s.

Spider-man and X-Men are in my opinion a good start. Not just to the whole "let`s try to make a serious comicbook superhero movie and not turn it into a big, campy, live-action saturday morning cartoon joke" genre, but to their own, respective movie franchises as well.

"What about The Crow and Blade?"

Yes, those were good, serious comicbook movies but they didnt start a big, new wave of good comicbook superhero movies, they were more of a prologue.As I was saying: X-men and Spider-man were a good start for their movie franchises. They weren`t perfect. The filmmakers were a little new to the universe and how to translate it into something more cinematic, but it worked well enough. In the sequels things worked a little better. The directors, writers and actors had gotten more familiar with the characters, the world they lived in and things seemed to work smoother. Not just in how close it was to the material they were adapting but in general. Then they screwed it up in the third movie.This is kinda how I feel about the first Transformers movie. The first one was a good start. It made sense how we in the beginning spent more time with the humans and didn`t get to the Autobots until a little later, and I liked most of the humor.

Though I think it would have been better without the scene where Bumblebee urinates on Agent Simmons. Just saying.

And in hindsight they could have dialed down the male gazing too. But unlike Spider-man and X-men, Transformers decided not to take what it had learned from it`s first experience and see if it could do better. No, instead Michael Bay and friends said: "Why wait for the third movie? Let`s screw it up now!" And so they did, and people still paid money to see it, myself included. Yes, I am ashamed. And yes, I know, the script was written during the writer`s strike and it`s possible that Michael Bay was involved in writing it but, come on! Even if you haven`t read books on script writing you can still see that the dumb decisions that they made were really dumb decisions!

Though in defense of Michael Bay, from what I`ve heard, he wanted to do a personal pet project after Tranformers, but was contractually obligated to do a sequel if it did well enough at the box office. Maybe he knew it was bad and screwed it up on purpose so he wouldn`t have to do more Transformers? That`s just wild speculations from me though. Let us, in my very subjective editorial, see where it went wrong and how it could have been fixed.

SPOILERS in disguise The Male gazing

They could have dialed it down or removed it completely.

Bumblebee

I get why he was mute and talked through soundclips in the first movie, because his voice thingy was damaged and also so he could be a sympathetic character for the audience. But why didn`t he talk in this movie? His voice came back in the end of the first one. Heaven forbid he actually has any character developement. He could have talked, he just doesn`t have to talk that much. And he could still use soundclips sometimes when he feels it suits the situation. Like: when they`re about to enter a dangerous place he could use the "I´ve got a bad feeling about this" line from Starwars. And then there`s the scene where he cries like a sprinkler when Sam tells him he can`t follow him to college. Yes, I get it, they wanted to have some comedy, but they could have done that better. They could have done it like this: When Sam says to Bumblebee that he can`t come, his reaction could be "Oh... OK, I... I understand." But by the tone of his voice and body language we can tell that this saddens him. And when Sam goes away Bumblebee could play "All by myself" on his radio.

Giving Bumblebee such exaggerated, emotional reactions just makes me feel that Bay only thinks of the Transformers as silly, one dimensional, cartoon characters. Disney characters (in good Disney movies at least), The Transformers in the cartoon and the ponies in My Little Pony, Friendship is Magic have a little bit more depth than Bay`s Transformers.

Covering up the events that happened in the first movie

I can believe that such a thing could happen in the Men In Black universe where they can erase memories and stuff, but in this movie? Instead: the army`s official story to the public could be: "Yes, this battle did happen but now all the giant robots (both the good and the evil ones) have disappeared. We don`t know where yet, but we`re working on it."

Mikaela detailing the motorcycle

Yes, Megan Fox is a physically attractive woman, but that is pretty much it, and this scene is, besides pandering to horny teenage boys, also a big research failure from the filmmakers. That`s not how you detail a motorcycle, it is usually done with more protective clothing. So either:

A: have her detail a motorcycle the correct way, or

B: have her change the oil or look at the engine of a car.

Skids and Mudflap

Sigh... these guys. One stupid, racist caricature wasn`t enough, there had to be TWO. They already had Bumblebee with them on their journey so they only needed one of these guys, it would be less work for the animators and should also make it cheaper. Instead of being a stupid idiot he (since there is only one of them now in this hypothetical example) could be a competent warrior and the comedy could come from that he has gotten a few expressions and a few facts about earth wrong. For instance: when they get to the pyramids he could say: "So this is where Lenin is buried" (Lenin was mummified after his death after all). And here`s a funny exchange of words they could have in one scene:

Skids/Mudflap: Let`s kick some Donkey!

Sam or Mikaela: I think you mean "Ass".

Skids/Mudflap: Meh, Tomayto, Potahto. And instead of being illiterate: he couldn`t read the text because it was ancient cybertronian.

Arcee

There are female autobots in this movie. Not many though and they don`t have much screen time (About 39 seconds, less than a minute, out of the movie`s 2½ hours runningtime. And that includes scenes where they are in their motorbike forms doing nothing.) and one dies near the end. (If I`m not mistaken there were more than one in the beginning of the movie, but I don`t remember seeing the other female autobots in the rest of the movie and I don`t remember if

anything was mentioned about what happened to them.) Arcee appeared in eight episodes in the cartoon BTW.Arcee should have had more screentime, and she didn`t have to die in the end. Personally I wouldn`t mind if it was she that joined Sam, Mikaela, Bumblebee and Leo on their journey to the pyramids instead of Skids/Mudflap.

Inconsistent laws of physics

A while ago I watched a video where some guy listed things he hated about this movie. One of them was a scene where a helicopter carries Optimus Prime`s lifeless body and drops it on the ground like a giant pile of scrapmetal. He felt that this was Bay being completely disrespectful to the character. Personally I thought Bay just wanted to bring in in a little realism. Prime was heavy and those wires couldn`t keep him up forever. However, earlier in the movie Sam is being thrown around by Decepticons and falls from heights that would have killed an ordinary human. If you`re gonna have realistic (or at least believable) laws of physics in your movie, keep them consistent.

The Big giant fight near the end between the humans and the Decepticons

It went on a bit too long. It could have been shorter and some of that time could have been given to Prime`s battle with the fallen, which was a little too short.

The immature humor

There are a bunch of things that I`d like to collect in one common category.

Sam`s mom running around high on campus: While I`m OK with the scene where she mentions that someone offered her brownies, the scene that comes after where she attacks/tries to get a piggyback ride from someone on the school`s lawn just felt like an unnecessary stretch of that gag. Lose it.

The dogs humping each other: Was not necessary in a 2½ hours long film that cost 200 million $ to make. Lose it.

Wheelie humping Mikaela`s leg: Instead he could have rubbed his head against her leg like a cat, and her reaction could have been flattered, yet weirded out. Or: she could be just weirded out. Or: just lose this joke completely.

Leo running out from the bathroom with his pants down: Instead he could run out (with his pants on) and shout:"I need your help! My friend just fainted in the bathroom!" (Yes, I know, the museum was closed so he`d very likely still get arrested, but still.)

Jetfire: I`m OK with him being old, but does he have to be a caricature? And I`d lose the parachute fart joke.

Devastator`s "balls": Lose it!

Robot heaven

The Autobots are not biological beings but they are sentient so I could buy this, but it was introduced very late in the movie. Instead: Sam doesn`t have a near death experience and the matrix doesn`t have to crumble to dust in his hands earlier in the movie. (Thus shortening the long running time by at least a few minutes.)

-Transformers Dark of the Moon-

My brother rented it on DVD and I gave it a watch. Slightly better than Revenge of the fallen but still not that good. Giant robots was not enough to distract me from the movie`s Bay-isms. Can`t really come up with ideas of how I would have changed it except two things:

Bumblebee`s voice

Like I said, his voice was fixed so why keep the soundclip thing? In the scene where he says Goodbye to Sam he could have done it in his original voice since it was an important moment for at least one of them.

Sam clearly acting suspicious when the watch-decepticon takes over his body

Like when he summersaults over a table for comedic effect. Was that really necessary? He could have acted normally and, at most, only have a few facial tics.

And that`s my list.

#transformers #editorial #constructive #criticism #rise of the fallen #81scorp

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literature-works · 5 years ago

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A Different Type Of Soldier Chapter 4

StarWars FMA Crossover

Story Summary: In a period of civil war, the Empire pushes the Rebel forces towards the outer reaches of the galaxy. With the Jedi Master Van Hohenheim captured and the Rebel forces stretched to their breaking point, there doesn’t seem to be any hope for them to take down the Empire. But a forgotten insignificant clone might be the answer the Rebels were looking for.

Chapter Summary: The Captain's mission does not go to plan at all as Rebel forces pick off the Battalion's units one by one.

Chapters 1/ 2/ 3/ 4/ 5/ 6/ 7/ ?

AO3

The Commander stared down at his writing desk with a tired look in his eyes. He had stayed up for the past few nights finalizing his research and now, he knew it was finally done. He smiled as he signed his number on the bottom of his journal and tossed the pen down on the desk. It was officially finished. A relieved chuckle left his lips as he leaned back and massaged his tired face. He did it, he really did it.

There was a sudden knock on the door and the Commander looked to see the familiar face of Lieutenant Pitt walking into their shared room. The blue stripes to his armor were already faded from a few months of wear but they suited the tall clone. He wore them well. The Commander himself had to get a new uniform once again because of his growth spurts. It had been nearly a year since he received his last one and he had quickly outgrown it in typical clone fashion. He was now over 7 years and stood several inches taller like a regular eighteen-year-old. Unfortunately, he was always going to be a head shorter than Pitt who liked to still poke fun about him being the baby of the unit as he was in fact the youngest and probably always will be.

“What are you so happy about, Cap?” Pitt asked him as he ducked in through the doorway. He removed his helmet and carelessly tossed it on his bed.

“Looks like you could finally get a good night's sleep now. I am done, finally done with all of this bloody paperwork,” he chuckled happily. “I just sent the growth results to General Greed and we are all set for the Harvest this year.”

“It’s done?” Pitt asked in amazement as if he wasn’t expecting it to have been approved. The Commander was working on this project for nearly six months with the help of Pitt and Desden. It was a long time running but they finally finished it. Desden had taken the opportunity to replicate the seeds for the harvest trade. They had crates full of them stored in the warehouse to trade with the local farmers when the time came. The Captain couldn’t wait till it did because then, the town would get the help they needed and rightfully deserved.

“Yes.”

“I can’t believe it,” Pitt huffed in disbelief, “You really did it.”

“Yes,” the Captain repeated with his knowing smirk.

“So when does the convoy head out?” he asked curiously.

“I was talking to the rest of the Battalion after explaining the situation and we determined that it would be best to start the harvest this week. It’s last minute but the farmers had already reaped their crops and the earlier we get them the seeds, the more time they would have to sow and collect another harvest before the frost. However, the exact time we leave is up to you,” the Captain grinned. The Lieutenant’s mouth dropped open in shock as he realized what he was saying.

“What?”

“Congratulations, Lieutenant Pitt, you are the Convoy Commander of this year’s Harvest. I am sure you will do perfectly fine arranging the vehicles, getting all of the gear loaded, and deciding routes and travel times.” Pitt let out a pitiful wail as he realized all of the work he had to do and the Captain took the opportunity to laugh at him.

“But, Sir, I am awful at making convoys. You remember the first time I did it?” Pitt gasped. “Now I swear you just like to dump all of your work on me.”

“You would be very right about that,” ED-0001 chuckled as he relaxed in his chair. “I do love to dump my work on you. However, I also got wind that the Commander of Blue Lion Company is in desperate need of a replacement and their company has been skimping on leadership for a long time. He is getting old and looking for someone to take his spot when he leaves. I made a bet, he took it. If you can run this convoy you got the position if you want it. Well, after all the paperwork of course.”

“Sir-“

“Don’t call me sir.”

“Captain, I literally just got promoted, why would you want me to do it again so soon?” he asked him. ED-0001 smirked. When he had first arrived at the unit PT 3149 was the most pitiful excuse for an officer anyone could find in the far reaches of the Galaxy. He was getting pushed around by the lower enlisted soldiers for no good reason at all. The Captain thought he was going to be another spineless soldier but after one conversation with him, he knew he couldn’t be farther from the truth. Pitt was a natural born leader and the Captain knew he was going to do great things. The only thing he needed was confidence, a bit of assertiveness training, and the opportunity to succeed. Captain ED-0001 was going to give him all those things.

However, instead of telling his subordinate all of that, the Captain simply shrugged with the stupid happy grin on his face.

“You will figure it out eventually, but first you need to figure out our Company’s routes this year,” he said only to earn another respectable groan from Pitt as he flopped helplessly back on his bed. Even though he was fully on it, his long legs hung off the bottom of the bed making him look more like a giant than he already was.

“When we get so lost we can’t even find our way back, we will then see my ass being demoted for not getting the quota in.”

“If anything like that happens, we need to make sure that the villages are set first. We cannot have the Rebels taking advantage of them because of our mistake,” the Captain warned.

“I don’t understand why the villagers would ever side with them, especially after all of the aid we have given them over the last year,” he replied. “The Rebels couldn’t even protect the capitol when it was attacked. They ran away when all of the Jedi were killed like cowards. The Emperor’s the only one who tried to stop it. If you think the villagers are going to side with the genocide causing Rebel’s that’s a bunch of-”

“Hey, I am just saying it’s a possibility,” the Commander interrupted him. “With the way the Avarice Battalion were treating the villagers before, blood seeking cowards doesn’t sound like a bad choice. If this harvest runs smoothly and they villagers accept the trade, we probably don’t have to worry about Rebels or hostile civilians for the rest of our lives.”

“That means you should do this convoy just to make sure I don’t mess up,” Pitt suggested wryly. The Captain glared at him and walked over to grab the clone’s helmet, dropping it down on his chest. The Lieutenant let out a grunt as it hit him and groaned as his hands latched around it.

“No, that means you gotta get your ass in gear and get me those convoy plans. When you are done I will send them out to the other Companies to let them know we are leaving,” he smirked. The Lieutenant grumbled something to himself about the work load before slamming his helmet back over his head and walking out off the barracks room. The Captain chuckled to himself as he watched him go. “Don’t worry Pitt, everything will be fine.”

……………

The Commander walked through the motor pool where all his men were trying to load the carriers with the bushels of seeds they had produced. They had ten villages to cover in a span of only a few days in order to collect their crops for the legion. He needed to make sure that they were ready to leave as soon as possible. Though the Lieutenant was getting the entire convoy set up as best as he could, they were already behind schedule. The other units had already headed out on their routes and Green Lion Company was left in the dust still loading their cargo and doing last minute maintenance on the vehicles. The Captain had full faith in Pitt’s leadership, but he had a little less faith in the people seeing it through.

“Sit on your own time!” he scolded a group of troopers that were hiding behind a few empty storage crates to avoid work. At the sound of his voice and at the sight of his red pauldron on his uniform, the soldiers were sent scurrying back to their own work. He knew that being the Commander was definitely intimidating to the privates who had very little rank and little color to their armor, but sometimes it really came in handy. Though an officer usually wasn’t out in the motor pool at all, with how far they were behind schedule, he needed to make sure all hands were on deck. If they didn’t make this trip on schedule they would not only miss their deadline but also miss giving the seeds to the villagers at prime planting if they were to get another harvest in before the snow fall. If the villagers went hungry again for the winter because some of his troops were slacking off he would rip his company a new one and starve them too. He picked up an empty storage crate himself and tossed it onto its nearby assigned freighter.

“Hey!” he heard someone call out angrily. He turned his head to see RD-9999 yelling at the other privates who were mulling about. “Why the hell is the Commander loading these crates? Get off your asses and help load them!” The Captain found the crate he was carrying lifted out of his arms by quick soldiers and he was grateful to see even more soldiers getting to work.

“Sorry sir, I have been trying to get them to work but when one group works another sneaks off. It’s hard to keep everyone together,” the Private apologized and the Captain waved him off. You couldn’t get all of the lazy eggs in line but most would do. Though the Red headed storm trooper was still as hot headed as ever, the Private was really getting himself and the other lower enlisted in line. They had come a long way since the Commander had first gotten to the unit and that was enough to sate his aggravation with the slack in the work.

“Put these to the back of the carrier. We would need to unload the seeds first and then we can fill the crates with the crops,” he told Private Red who then relayed it to the soldiers who were stacking them up in the ships. They all answered with a quick Yessir before the Commander was on his way again. As he was passing the gate once more he heard a sudden static come from the inside of his helmet.

“Captain ED-0001, this is Private BX-5757, over,” he heard the young soldier’s voice come in through the radio in his armor. The Commander lifted his wrist and pressed a button on his plating.

“BX 5757, this is ED-0001, Come in.”

“Sir, we have received contact from Red Lion Company. They have sighted small groups of Rebel forces on their route, over.”

“What is their status? over.”

“Sir, they have not received hostile contact. Captain SD-0103 of Red Lion Company advises armed guard on the convoy, should we prepare?” The Commander frowned as he looked up and out of the motor pool’s fences. Their outpost was located on a rather flat terrain where they could see effortlessly for miles around however, they weren’t nearly close enough to any village to see any significant detail. They had not received alert of Rebel’s approach to the planet but they could have easily flown in under the radar with how spread out their forces were. The Commander didn’t think the Rebels were stupid enough to make a direct attack on the outpost. He would have waited to see what was to come of their sudden appearance on the planet, however they needed to make the convoy now if they were going to make the quota. After giving one more look at the empty vastness of Resembool’s farmland, the Commander returned to his radio.

“BX-5757, I will order the company to the armory after they are finished in the pool. Tell Captain SD-0103 to watch her ass, do you copy?”

“Yes Sir, I copy.”

“Good, relay this to Lieutenant PT3149, over and out.”

The Commander frowned as he looked back at their progress on the carriers. They were still far behind and now they needed to get more things done to arm everyone. He straightened himself out and marched to the center of the motor pool.

“COMPANY! FORM UP!” he bellowed and suddenly there was a flood of privates running towards him in their shiny white unbeaten armor. The commander waited for them to get into formation in front of him, which took a little pushing and shoving. Though all of the soldiers were older than him by at least a good two years, they were still bumbling fools, maybe even fresh out of the academy. Once they were all done jostling around, the Commander sighed to himself as he looked upon part of his subordinates. They all waited silently for what he was going to say.

“I have just received a transmission from Red Lion Company. Apparently, they have spotted a small group of rebel forces on their convoy. Security codes are now being changed from low to high. I need all of you to stay alert while working out here and on the convoy. Resembool is one of the largest sources of food for our legion. If it goes down our Avarice Battalion and many more will surely starve. We need to protect it. We also need to finish our mission and fulfill our quota,” he sternly told them. He got some quiet whoops from the formation. They were bloodthirsty and eager privates, and Edward didn’t blame them. They didn’t get to do much on the quiet planet. However they gravely misunderstood the idea of combat. “After you stop lollydagging and start actually working for once and get these carriers fixed and filled. All of you need to go to the Armory and take up your assigned weapons. This convoy preparation is lagging. Now get your butts in gear. Fallout,” he finished.

The formation dispersed faster than it was gathered and the Commander watched the soldiers haul ass back to the carriers to finish their work. He was at least glad to see that they saw the severity in the issue. He needed to get this company on route as fast as possible. All of the other companies were already beating the early fall heat and trying out the new trading system. With the Rebel’s spotted in the north he knew something was up. All of the Lion Companies out right now are in danger. The sooner they got done the sooner they would be out of danger. If the Rebels were only in the northern quadrant, he knew that they were at least safe. But he didn’t know how fast those bastards could travel.

………

“Sir-”

“Lieutenant for fucking sakes don’t call me sir. I don’t need it from you,” the Commander scolded the lower ranking officer as they roared across the landscape towards their next village on route. They had finally taken off and were able to pass through several of their villages already. It had only been a day and they had yet to see any sign of the rebel forces they were warned about. His men were all on edge, expecting an attack at any moment, but if they weren’t then he would be concerned for them.

All of the villages they visited had traded rather eagerly with them after he had explained the situation and the seeds to them. The seeds, if planted within the next few days, would give them another harvest before the end of the season. He was glad to see them take them and promised the same next year.

“Captain, Blue Lion Company just spotted the rebels on their route,” Pitt told him.

“Did you talk to Red Lion recently?” he asked.

“No, they didn’t respond to our transmission. We tried to reach Yellow Lion as well but to the same result. Do you think they made hostile contact?” The Commander frowned as he heard this suggestion. The radio transmissions were not poor at all across the planet of Resembool as there were very few mountains to block their signals. They should have been able to reach the other companies even as far away as they were. He didn’t want to admit it to Pitt, but there was definitely something wrong with this scenario.

“How much crop do we have?” he asked the officer.

“Excuse me?” Pitt said, as if he didn’t hear him right.

“How much crop did we collect? We went to six villages already so we should have a substantial amount. How much do we have?” he repeated. The lieutenant looked down at his clipboard which papers were battering hard in the wind that was rushing through the carrier’s open doorways.

“One thousand four hundred and forty bushels, Captain.” The Commander cursed as he heard that number. They needed two thousand bushels to get their portion of the quota. They needed at least two more villages to reach that. They needed to finish their route. If they had a surplus at the previous villages he would have taken their troops straight back to their post. However, they needed their quota or else General Greed would pull another one over on them which would be far worse than any rebels could do to them, or even worse it could have been Lieutenant General Lust. In many cases, more than there should have been, Clones and Storm Troopers who did not fulfill their missions were scrapped, regarded as waste and killed for treason in others. However it was just stupid of him to lead them right into the enemy where there could have been ambushes set up all along their route.

He worried about the other companies in the Avarice Battalion. Resembool was an important planet, a strong hold in the support of the Central Troops however it lacked protection. Only soldiers from the Extravagance Corps who specialised in supply, transportation, and support were stationed there. Though all of them knew basic combat skills, they had little protection from the Vainglory Corps who made up nearly the entire infantry of the Central Army. The Avarice Battalion’s main objective was to feed the legion. Now that Red Lion Company and Yellow Lion Company were unresponsive, it was assumingly left to only two small companies of only forty men to protect the entire planet from the Rebel forces. Since the Central Empire took over the planet, they never made an appearance on Resembool until today, and the Commander found this extremely unsettling.

“Lieutenant, what should we do?” the Commander asked suddenly which greatly offset the man more than anything.

“W-what- Sir, I know I am the convoy commander but… I think you should decide for this one. It could get serious-”

“I am not asking you as the convoy commander. I am asking you as a friend, Pitt. What should we do?” he rephrased.

“I… I…,” Pitt stumbled not knowing what to say. It was unheard of that a Commander would ask a simple Lieutenant anything on their opinion. Soldiers of the Central Army weren’t supposed to have opinions. After a little bit he cleared his throat. “Honestly I think we should follow through with this. Though they are out there, we are armed, we can fight. We won’t go down easy. We weren’t programmed to fail.” The Commander smiled at that comment and chuckled.

“You’re right with that,” he laughed.

“Captain, you made something great and giving it out to the villager’s definitely will make great progress in this bare planet, not to mention make our quota that much easier to obtain. We didn’t come all this way just to pass up our balls in the hallway. If they come we need to show those scum what we can do, what we are really fighting for.”

“Very well,” he agreed. “the next town over should be Xenotime and then Liore. Let’s finish this thing.”

……..

The town of Liore was very quiet and Captain ED-0001 didn’t like it. The shutters were locked on some of the houses and the square just seemed abandoned. He could have assumed that it was because they were coming to take away a portion of their crops and that they didn’t want to be pillaged again like all of the previous times, but even for that the town seemed too eerie. He had his men unload the seeds and put them on small transports so that they could move them through the village. The quicker they got this over with, the better it would be for all of them.

“I don’t feel good about this,” the Commander said to Lieutenant Pitt as he hopped off of the carrier they were riding with his blaster rifle in tow. He never really liked blasters. They were too impersonal when you killed someone. It just felt senseless. He used it to get out of the academy he was placed in and never touched one since. Pitt nodded his head as they watched the company line up the small transports. “We might have to make a run for it after we get the crop.”

“You know I can’t run,” Pitt told him nervously, referencing his developmental defect that resulted from his giant frame.

“Well try as fast as you can, if you can’t make it I will carry your ass back to the post,” the Commander grumbled. He didn’t even look at his subordinate when he said that as his eyes were too busy scanning the building’s windows. They were all eerily vacant.

“I will hold you to that,” the man smiled.

The Commander and the lieutenant started to walk towards the trading post at the end of town with first platoon in firing squad formation. He thought it to be best if they weren’t just bunched up in a mess where the potential Rebel forces could have just dropped a grenade on them and be done. The Commander ordered First platoon to head out first with Blue squad and Red squad spaced out on the left and right correspondingly. Second Platoon will follow and third would guard the carriers. He knew that in this way it could have been more difficult to take them out as a group and have to try individually. However, he just hoped that his precautions didn’t have to come into play. This was their last stop on their route, their last few pounds of crops they needed to gather. This was the last place they needed trouble.

Their squad lead the officers to the door, quickly securing the area around the shop. Lieutenant Pitt handed him the clipboard that he carried at his side at all times. It held the inventory that Sergeant Supply provided on their seed and crop counts. It was updated every hour and after every trade just to ensure its accuracy. He did not want to lose anything and did not want to take any extra risks. He took it and looked it over once as the Lieutenant took up a position by the door.

“I got us covered out here, make it quick,” he told him.

“Quick is my middle name.”

“You have yet to tell me your real name you know,” the Lieutenant smirked and the Captain glared at him.

“Well you have my middle name now,” he snipped but the Lieutenant just waved him off. The Commander took in a huge breath as he carefully opened the door to find the shopkeeper waiting lazily behind the counter like nothing was the problem until he saw their helmets. The Captain recognized the man as the same person who gave them trouble when they had first began designing the seeds and it seemed he wanted to stir the same trouble there. The man was absolutely mad during the whole exchange. He started cursing the existence of the Central forces and seemed even ready to fight him one on one though armed with nothing but his bare hands. They were definitely really upset by the Battalion’s past treatment even with all of the aid they had provided to make up for it. The Commander had to calm him down from an angered rant to even explain to him what they were trying to do. He was very offset by this idea however luckily agreed to listen. The Commander tried to give the man his description of the genetically altered seeds but the man had absolutely no knowledge of science. He thought he was trying to trick him and the Commander had to constantly rephrase himself to get the point across. It was taking nearly twice as long as it should have and he felt his nerves reach their breaking point. He mentally apologised to the Lieutenant for not listening to his orders on being quick about it.

“And why do they grow so fast?” the man asked for the thirteenth time. The commander took in a deep breath to calm his annoyance with him.

“Okay, think about it like a vehicle right?” he said stiffly. “It can keep going until it runs out of fuel just like you keep growing until you reach a certain age. We just made these seeds more efficient to reach that point faster, like me. I grow to a normal maturity of 24 years of age in only ten years. This seed can be fully grown in only a month.”

“And-” the man started in for another question but he angrily cut him off.

“Look the whole idea is that we are trading you this seed for the food so that you could plant it and get another harvest in before the frost. Why is that so hard to understand!”

BOOM! There was a loud explosion from outside that rattled the entire shop and sent both him and the keeper to the ground. The dull sound of blasters firing and screaming of orders could be heard through the walls and the Commander had a sinking feeling in his stomach. He stumbled to stand up but another explosion sent him back into the counter. The Rebels were here. They were waiting for them, all of Avarice Battalion was getting hit and they were the last target.

“But where were they hiding?” The commander mumbled under his breath. The Rebel forces couldn’t have flown in or else they would have seen them and his troops would have signaled. He felt himself freeze up as he realised that they were already in the town. He was an idiot, he walked the entire Green Lion Company right into the middle of a trap.

He quickly tried to unhitch his rifle from its sling but before he could reach it he was pulled back, an arm reaching around his neck choking him. The Commander gasped as he tried to pull the store owners arm off from around him but he wouldn’t let go. It only got tighter

“That was a mighty fine deal you had there but your stupid troops have been ravaging our towns for too long,” the man grunted through his teeth as his arm tightened around his neck. If it wasn’t for his helmet he guessed he would have felt the man’s blood thirsty breath on the back of his head. His lungs burned for air and he felt himself gag as his lungs started to give out. The man was stalling the whole time. He was stalling him in the store so that the Rebels could have gotten into position. He couldn’t believe he was that stupid to fall for it.

The Commander struggled to reach down to his belt and grab his rifle where it was still slung. It was bulky and he managed to misfire into the wall of the shop as he tried to swing it around his side. The bolt sizzled harmlessly into the wall creating a scorch mark where it had hit. The Commander felt the arm tighten even more and he thought his neck might have snapped under the pressure as the store owner realised what he was doing however the man was too slow to stop him. With blind aim behind him he pulled the trigger purposefully and suddenly the arms fell slack and he gulped in air greedily through the filters on his helmet. His throat was on fire as if he drank an entire flask of Lava. Though he definitely just saved his life, quite literally his neck, he didn’t even want to look behind him to see the man he just shot.

Suddenly the door to the shop opened and the Commander raised his weapon at the person charging in. Before he pulled the trigger however, he stopped himself as he saw that it was Pitt. The man started to pick him up in a rush, jabbering about something incoherent to him.

“The squad, it’s gone! We don’t know where they are coming from-”

“The buildings. We need to find cover. We need to get back to the carriers,” he ordered him. The Commander pressed the button on his communicator and brought it up to his face.

“Third Platoon, this is Captain ED-0001, get the carriers running! Get everyone on the transports, do you copy?” he yelled into it. There was static filled silence and he felt fear lick his nerves. He pushed the button in and tried again. “Third Platoon, this is Captain ED-0001, get everyone to the transports, do you copy?” But it was to the same result. He looked over to the Lieutenant who was checking the doorway to see if the coast was clear to make it through. The Commander didn’t even have to look very far to see some of the soldiers from their squad laying flat on the ground, red coating their white armor. He rushed over to the Lieutenant and grabbed his shoulder.

“Pitt we need to go, now,” he told him. The man nodded his head and they rushed through the doorway. They ducked behind some barrels that were outside the shop. The sound of blaster fire was loud and near deafening in their ears. They tucked their knees into their chests so that they were completely covered behind the barriers. If their legs were shot then there was definitely not way they were getting out of there.

The commander peered out from behind the barrel and he saw some rebels race across the street in their stupid blue uniforms. He never knew why they wore something so bright with little armor at all but it surely made their jobs easier when they had to be. He shot a couple blasts out of his rifle and the two men fell amongst the white armor of his own fallen soldiers. They wailed and cried from their injuries but were incapacitated from the fight.

He felt his breath hitch as he realised how many of his own men scattered the street. It looked like nearly all of first platoon was gone. He couldn't hear fire from the left or right meaning that his two other squads were gone. Third platoon was unresponsive so he could only hope that second was holding out. He just didn't understand. How could the rebels have killed so many of them if they were so spread out. The mortars couldn't have wiped out his entire platoon, it wasn't possible, and the rebels riflemen were terrible shots. There was no possible way, unless….

“They have a sniper,” Pitt exclaimed as he fired a few shots into the fray.

“Where?”

“Up in the second story window, few blocks down lefts side!” With his directions, the commander quickly peered around the barrels they were behind and scanned the buildings. He caught sight of an open window on a cottage few blocks down. He could just barely see the tip of a blaster sniper rifle sticking out of it when red hot bolts fired in the direction he assumed were his men. Unfortunately, he wasn’t naïve enough to think that they missed. He quickly picked up his communicator and tried to contact them.

“Second Platoon, this is Captain ED-0001 come in,” he said into his communicator. There was static and he felt himself hold his breath. Was anyone going to pick up? Who was left? Just as he was about to try again he heard a scratchy voice through his helmet.

“Sir, this is Sergeant DD-9980, they are creaming us out here. We have nowhere to go, stuck on the corner of third, dead end alleyway, over.”

“There is a sniper up in the cottage across from you, do you think you can get them?”

“Negative, they have us pinned down, we can’t move-”

“What about your other squad?” the Captain asked.

“They’re all dead, sir! Mortar fire got ‘em. They’re gone!” The Commander sucked in a huge breath and looked over to where the Lieutenant was covering him. She could not have put it any better. They were getting creamed.

“Sergeant, try to get your men out, I will try to take care of the sniper,” he told her.

“But, sir-”

“Over and out, Sergeant,” he finished. He reached over and grabbed the Lieutenant’s blue pauldron and shook his shoulder. “Come on, we need to get over to that building. I need you to cover me until I get to that wagon over there. I will suppress fire till you follow, alright?”

“But Sir-”

“Don’t call me sir, Pitt,” he scolded him, “not now.” The lieutenant nodded his head and shifted his fire to the buildings on their right. The commander noticed that there were some Rebels camped out in the windows. He would have to make his run quick. As soon as Pitt started firing, he was out running towards the wagon in the middle of the street where a whole bunch of rubble was piled up from the previous motars. He ducked and dove behind the structure and assumed his own position to cover his friend. He motioned for him to follow him and he started to fire at the men in the lower windows. He managed to get one of them but his fire soon caught their attention. Pitt slammed into the wall of the rubble next to him, slouching real low as his tall figure could barely fit behind it. He was panting heavily, the short run having winded him too easily.

“Where to now, Cap?” he asked as he peered over the wall of their cover just to almost be shot in the head. The Commander yanked him down out of the way as he got up and shot another soldier out of the lower cottage window.

“Where the second artillery round hit, there was some upturned stone and a fountain that would provide enough cover for us. It’s farther than it was to get here. Can you make it?” he asked him.

“Ye-yeah, I think I can do that,” the Lieutenant huffed as he tried to calm down his breathing. The Commander glared at him and grabbed the chest plate of his friend’s armor, bringing him right close to his face.

“Can you make it?” he asked him more sternly. There was brief silence but the Lieutenant nodded his head.

“Yes, definitely.” The Commander looked him over once but then nodded his head in return. They needed to make it. If they didn’t take out that sniper they were all dead. The Lieutenant picked up his rifle and began to fire rapidly, giving the Commander enough time to sprint off towards the new designated destination. He saw a few rebel soldier approach on land and he gave them a few blasts to the chest as he scrambled into their new position. It was a rather large outcropping of rubble, the stone was turned up in just a way that if you stood in the center you would be protected on nearly every side they could have easily placed at least three storm troopers there. However, the Commander was still questioning how far the sniper could see down the street.

The Commander quickly set up a position and motioned Pitt to follow like before. He started to fire at the last few Rebels. He didn’t hear firing from any other forces. He didn’t know where Second Platoon was, if they were still there or not. They were approaching where the Sergeant said they were but he couldn’t see her or her subordinates anywhere. As he shot another Rebel out of the cottage he heard a sudden yell. The Commander felt his heart freeze. He didn’t even have to look to know what happened. The lieutenant was hit. Pitt was hit. He dared himself to glance over and saw the Lieutenant lying just a few yards away from the makeshift cover with a pool of red blooming on his white and blue armor from his hip.

“PITT!” he screamed not knowing what to do. He saw the man’s panting breath’s through his armor. He couldn’t run fast enough. The Commander cursed himself as he wrapped the sling of his rifle around his arm and fired one last shot, clearing the windows of the Rebels in the southern section they were running through. He quickly pushed himself up and sprinted out to where the man had fallen.

“I asked you if you would make it!” The Commander growled as he fell to his knees next to him. The coast was clear but he didn't know for how long.

“I will never lie again,” the man wheezed as he held his wound. It didn’t look like it hit anything vital, but it needed to get medical attention quick. The Commander touched it lightly and the man winced.

“Shut up you idiot,” the Commander scolded him and quickly lifted the man up slinging him over his shoulders. The man weighed a ton since he was so tall, but he forced himself to carry on. The man yelped as his wound was digging into his shoulder. Sprinting as fast as he could, he carried the man to cover and nearly threw him in before tumbling in after him. The lieutenant screamed as he landed, his wound jarring even more, spewing out what little part of it wasn’t cauterized by the heat of the bolt. The Commander scurried over to him, keeping his head down incase there were any bolts aimed for it.

“I hate being so fucking slow,” he groaned as the Commander started to rip off his armor to get a better look at it. Luckily their black under armor was designed to also work as a compression bandage and it was skin tight. He tossed the heavy armor to the side and looked at him. He was bleeding, badly, but it seemed to be only a couple inches deep, the armor taking most of the blow. To have penetrated their armor the bolts must have been high caliber or else they would have just dispersed like a huge sock in the stomach, leaving you breathless, but alive. The commander reached into his small personal medical kit and pulled out some creme to cleanse the wound as much as he could at that moment.

“Shut up, you will live,” he huffed at the lieutenant as the man started whimper as he massaged the paste in as best as he could. It was nasty stuff and burned like hell, but if it kept you alive for a little longer they would do anything. “I promised that I would get you out of here didn’t I? Even if I had to carry you.”

“Cap…,” the man mumbled after a long pause where the Commander was able to bandage his wounds up a bit. “I don’t think any of us are getting out of here.”

“Don’t say that, Lieutenant-”

“You know it’s true!” Pitt retorted.

“Yeah? Well I still don’t need you to say it!” he yelled at him. “I am going to get you out of here! We will find second platoon and -”

“Sir-”

“Don’t call me Sir!” the Commander shouted. However just as he finished he heard a hot sizzling crackle through the air. A red bolt of fire pierced his shoulder right between his plating and he was sent flying backwards with the force. He screamed as he felt the bolt burn his skin, his muscles, and even his bones as it went straight through him. He hit the ground in a daze and everything went quiet for a minute. He growled obscenities and he rolled over like a worm, pain igniting in his arm like he never felt before. He fell back to the ground helplessly as he tried to get up but his right arm was a dead weight. He hit his head back off of the stone. The Commander cursed the high heavens as he grabbed his right arm in his left and dropped it, knowing it was completely numb.

“Sir!” he finally head the lieutenant scream.

“Fuck off Pitt!” the commander cursed at him, fire and anger breathing out his nose. Keeping his head down he crawled back over to where Pitt was laying, rubbing dirt in his wound along the way. He go to Pitt’s side and flipped over on his back. “Lieutenant, I need your communicator-”

“My.. but why-”

“I can’t move my arm,” The commander admitted to him.

“Your arm-” the lieutenant started but cut himself off as the commander nodded his head. He couldn’t feel it at all. He didn’t know if it was because of the bolt’s energy, his adrenaline, or because it really was busted but he couldn’t use it. He would have used his own communicator but he couldn’t push the button if it was on his left arm and his right was out of use. Pitt, after a moment of acceptance, leaned over and held his arm near the commander’s face. The Captain pressed the button with his working hand and called into it.

“Green Lion Company, this is Captain ED-0001, I am ordering all remaining troops to find safety. Get out of here if you can and return to the post, do you copy?” he said to anyone who would listen. There was static, but the lines were all silent. He felt a lump in his throat stick and he tried to clear it as he pressed the button again. “Green Lion Company-”

“Sir,” he heard the Lieutenant’s voice mumbled through his helmet. The commander looked up from where he sat and over to his partner. The blue emblazonment and pauldron symbolizing his rank and position stood dirty, bloody, from their failure of a mission. The commander could almost see the hurt in the clone’s eyes through the dusty helmet on his head. They were pained, but not of his wound, of something even more substantial than that. “Sir, I… I think we are done.”

The commander felt his entire being go numb as he looked around. The village that they were planning to feed, to save in a sense, stood in rubble from the fire fight. There was broken down buildings, fires scattered. Their mission had left the town in desolation. All he wanted to do was to change it, to make it better, but now like Pitt had said, they were done. He didn’t know how many soldiers died so far, but he knew in his heart that Green Lion Company was no more. He heard the patter of feet behind him and the light humming of charged weapons. He looked behind him to see the disgusting blue uniform of Rebel soldiers, pointing their blasters at them. Doubting they were set to stun, the Commander saw the Lieutenant raise his arms in the air. The Commander of Green Lion Company, Captain ED-0001, regretfully followed suite. They were through.

#literatureworkfanficiton #different type of soldier #chapter 4 #fanfiction #fullmetal alchemist #starwars #Star Wars

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captainignatiuspigheart · 5 years ago

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Every year the horror of a new year looms over the horizon like a Death Star, and the Lego Star Wars Advent Calendar does the vital of work of dampening that future and smoothing the way towards a cheery Christmas. They’ve been releasing them since 2011, which is about five years more than I realised, but it does help account for why I’ve got so many of the internal trays to use for part sorting.

On the part of the Lego designers, it’s a mighty challenge to produce new, cool-looking micro versions of the spaceships and locations we’ve become intimately familiar with. I’ve often been impressed with a new way to construct a Millenium Falcon from seven bricks, or by the splendid Bespin microscale city we got last year. Along with the dinky models we also receive an assortment of minifigures from across the Star Wars universe, building up to a special Christmassy figure on day twenty-four.

Indecision

I had grumpily decided after last year’s calendar that I wouldn’t get another Lego Star Wars Advent Calendar because the minifigs and especially the Christmas figures had declined so badly. In fairness, the series began with Santa Yoda, followed by an R2-D2 snowman and Darth Maul, Santa Fett, Darth Vader and so on. This year we got a Porg. Porgs are ace, and I really wanted one because you don’t get many of them in sets. However, it’s just one unique piece (its head) and the rest are generic parts. Kinda feels like they’ve given up. I’d forgotten entirely what the Christmas 2018 figure was – so much so that I missed it out of the pic below – but it was a snowman with a rebel helmet: cack, and barely up from the BB-8 with a Santa hat from 2017. Nonetheless, when I discovered I could get 2019’s calendar for just £12.50 due to some neat Top Cashback thing, I dove in again.

Lego Christmas Figures

The Full 2019 Line Up

Day One: First Order Star Destroyer

Day Two: the Batstarship

Day Three: First Order Stormtrooper

Day Four: Megatron

Day Five: Poe’s X-Wing

Day Six: Resistance shuttle

Day Seven: Lunch

Day Eight: grandparents’ rock garden

Day Nine: Luke the Angry Fisherman

Day Ten: Jakku Quadjumper

Day Eleven: Death Star trench tower

Day Twelve: Death Star operative

Day Thirteen: ENORMOUS mouse droid

Day Fourteen: Johnny 5

Day Fifteen: Roger, it’s Roger, OK

Day Sixteen: Droid transport (from the rear cos I couldn’t figure out what it was)

Day Seventeen: Hint – there are droids inside

Day Eighteen: Rebel meatshield

Day Nineteen: Mynock!

Day Twenty: Hoth base

Day Twenty-One: Bespin Cloud Car

Day Twenty-Two: Cloud Car pilot

Day Twenty-Three: HUGE Christmas Gonk droid

Day Twenty-Four: Santa Porg

Perhaps it was how this calendar began that made me feel I’d been cheated. Day one is a First Order Star Destroyer – an almost entirely flat grey thing (I’m not a huge fan of Star Wars Lego anyway, just because it does tend towards a vast expanse of grey, or perhaps black), followed by a rather flimsy Kylo Ren shuttle. Getting a First Order stormtrooper next was OK, but it just didn’t feel special! (I’m fully aware this is an adult man grumbling about this not being good enough… but I really look forward to this stuff, and when it’s great it can give me a tremendous feelgood boost). I still don’t know what day four was. The outstanding builds are the Cloud Car, Quadjumper and Mynock – the rest I either struggled to identify or felt rather repetitious. The Christmas Gonk droid is cool too, even if he is larger than a minifigure (he’s actually been packed away into our vast box of Christmas Lego for rebuilding next year along with the rest of the Christmassy Star Wars folk).

Looking back at them now I’m not certain why I enjoyed this so little. The minifigs are fine – getting an old man Luke was cool, and the Bespin Cloud Car pilot is superb. But we’ve had much of this before – I think this is the third Death Star technician, at least the second Rebel commando and I’ve lost count of the soldier droids (not sure they should count as a minifigure anyway). I did appreciate not wasting one or two doors on gun racks, which is a lovely change from usual. It felt bland and the designs particularly phoned in this year. My other half and I usually alternate opening the doors each day, but we were leaving it unopened for whole weeks, and that also made me rather sad. I slightly regret selling on the Harry Potter advent calendar I also bought for half price, as several friends have reported it being good, even though I’ve no love for the franchise and half of it seemed to be flags. What we did get was a bunch of spare parts as usual, a handy internal tray which gets used for general brick sorting, and the satisfaction of dismantling the stuff I didn’t care for.

Lego Star Wars Advent Calendar contents across the years

2011

2012

2013

2014

2015

2016

2017

2018

Every year has had the occasional spectacularly crap minibuild, but on balance the range of figures, including really cool figs like the Kanji Club guy from 2018, IG-88, ewoks, jawas, Sabine Wren, Unkar’s Thug… well, they’ve been ace, and this year feels so generic. Last year we even got a character from the little-known Lego Freemaker Adventures! It’s odd, considering that we’ve recently had Rogue One, Solo and the new trilogy that so little of the amazing stuff in them has made it into last year’s calendar. Maybe next year, having no movies out will offer some space to bring back the best and weirdest figures and sets in the franchise – The Mandalorian please!

Now I shall go and dismantle all the minibuilds and feast upon their parts.

Lego Star Wars Advent Calendar 2019 (75245) review, in which an old man grumbles about a child's toy not being up to scratch :) #lego #starwars #christmas @Lego https://wp.me/pbprdx-8w4 Every year the horror of a new year looms over the horizon like a Death Star, and the Lego Star Wars Advent Calendar does the vital of work of dampening that future and smoothing the way towards a cheery Christmas.

#advent calendar #Lego 75245 #Lego Blog #Lego review #Lego Star Wars #Lego Star Wars Advent Calendar #star wars

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stoodlemayer · 7 years ago

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Predicting "The Last Jedi"

The trailer for The Last Jedi is out! Tickets are on sale! I've unsubbed from r/StarWars because I'm on spoiler alert! That means it's time to start guessing how much The Last Jedi is going to make at the box office!

Back when The Force Awakens came out, we all knew it was going to be big, but we were struggling with how to define it. When you're working on box office projections, you look at the soon-to-be-released film, compile a list of similar films to compare it to, and then use the box office performances of those films to come up with a guess of how the film in question will perform. For example, I would bet that 99% of people coming up with box office projections for Blade Runner 2049, a sequel to an 80s sci-fi thriller, compared it to Mad Max: Fury Road, a sequel to an 80s spec-fi action film.

There was nothing for The Force Awakens.

There was some who immediately wanted to compare it to Avatar. It too was a major blockbuster that had a December release, so surely The Force Awakens would perform similarly. A smaller opening weekend compared to your summer blockbuster—Avatar only made $87 million opening weekend—but it'll make up for that with long legs. But that comparison didn't feel right. Compared to The Force Awakens, Avatar had been a quiet release. Star Wars hype was everywhere leading up to December. With every trailer, the fanbase would get more excited—from what we could tell, every problem and quibble we had about the prequels was being addressed. Industry tracking about audience awareness indicated that 100% of Americans knew that a new Star Wars film was coming out. You would've had to live in the mountains with no internet or human contact for at least five years to not know that a new Star Warts film was coming out. The hype was real.

Yet people still persisted in comparing The Force Awakens to other December releases. No December release had an opening weekend over $100 million, they'd say. Maybe Star Wars can, but there's no way in hell it'll cross $200 million. The most it could do was $175 million, and that's if the pun-intended stars aligned. r/boxoffice was convinced that anyone who thought it could hit $200 million on it's opening weekend was a fanboy, and had no idea what they were talking about. It's not that these people were necessarily wrong or foolish. They were trying to apply conventional wisdom to a film that increasingly looked like it would have an unconventional performance. I bucked the conventional wisdom. and sometime in November I had settled around a $215 million opening weekend. But as the opening day approached, I had good reason to doubt my numbers. A contact in-the-know offered insight into Disney's internal numbers: The Force Awakens had already sold $175 million in tickets for opening weekend, and we were still a week-and-a-half from release. After the initial sale of tickets in October, ticket sales had seemingly flatlined, but as we approached opening day, people were buying tickets almost as fast as theaters were putting them on sale. To this day I'm surprised this info never leaked—there's a reason why I noted that my $215 million estimate was conservative.

A few weeks before The Force Awakens opened, I was talking with the theater's then programmer and its former programmer—these were the guys who scheduled the showtimes and did the internal box office projections for our location1—and one posited the theory that we needed use a "historical comp" for The Force Awakens. Conventional box office prediction looks at recent releases; anything older than three to four years is out of date. Even comparing The Force Awakens to Avatar was pushing it, and the only reason Avatar was even brought up was that people were struggling to come up with recent films that felt like an accurate comparison. During our conversation, we concluded that the only film that had the same cultural awareness and hype was The Phantom Menace.

The only thing you can use to predict Star Wars is Star Wars.

When Rogue One was getting closer to release, I decided to test this theory. Management at the theater was prepping for Rogue One to be only slightly smaller The Force Awakens. I argued that The Force Awakens was a statistical outlier. Since we couldn't find good comparisons for The Force Awakens, we then shouldn't use it to make predictions. It was its own beast, and to even think that anything would come close again in the near future was foolish. I decided that the best comparison film was, of all things, Revenge of the Sith. I felt that Revenge of the Sith had two things going for it. 1) It had been received warmly by the fanbase. 2) The latter two prequel films had little appeal in the general audience. Rogue One's marketing, and Disney's own expectations, made me think that they were expecting this film to appeal mainly to the fans, and not so strongly with the general audience. And since the fans had been energized by The Force Awakens, Rogue One would be greeted by an appreciative audience.

BoxOfficeMojo has a handy little feature that lets you adjust a film's box office gross as if it had been released a different year. The tool is by no means scientific, but it's good enough for what I needed. I adjusted Revenge of the Sith to get a 2016 estimate and got this: Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith - $380,270,577 Actual / $513,157,600 Adjusted to 2016. Rogue One would go on to gross $532,177,324, a variance of $19,019,724, or 3.574%. So, while not perfect, it's pretty damn good.

At the time, I hadn't thought to try and use Revenge of the Sith to estimate an opening weekend gross for Rogue One. How audiences see movies has changed since 2005—over time, opening weekends have increasingly represented larger and larger chunks of the total gross. So, instead of looking at Revenge of the Sith's opening weekend numbers, a better idea would be to apply a multiplier to the anticipated total gross. If you've never followed box office results before, a multiplier is basically another way of saying how much of the film's total was made on opening weekend. For example, a multiplier of 2 would mean that a film's total gross will be double what it made opening weekend. A multiplier of 3 would mean its total gross would be three times the opening weekend numbers. In short, a higher multiplier is better. The average 'well-performing' blockbuster typically has a multiplier in the 3.0-3.5 range. So, if we take the adjusted Revenge of the Sith gross, and divide it by your average multiplier, 3.3, you would get an approximate opening weekend total of $155,502,300. Rogue One made $155,081,681. So while the math is by no means perfect, it can at least get us in the ballpark.

So now, for The Last Jedi, the trick is figuring out what exactly we should use as a comparison. So let's look at all the Star Wars films, in release order and with adjusted grosses:

Star Wars: The Force Awakens - $936,662,225 Rogue One: A Star Wars Story - $532,177,324 Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith - $380,270,577 Actual / $513,157,600 Adjusted to 2016 Star Wars: Attack of the Clones - $302,191,252 Actual / $449,906,100 Adjusted to 2016 Star Wars: The Phantom Menace - $431,088,295 Actual / $733,743,200 Adjusted to 2016 Star Wars: Return of the Jedi - $252,583,617 Actual / $700,506,300 Adjusted to 2016 Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back - $209,398,025 Actual / $682,158,400 Adjusted to 2016 Star Wars: A New Hope - $307,263,857 Actual / 1,234,649,200 Adjusted to 2016

Here's that info as a handy dandy chart:

"Star Wars" Box Office Grosses (Adjusted)

While we might be quick to jump on the first obvious trend—that the second film each trilogy sees a considerable drop—I think using that to deduce potential box office numbers for The Last Jedi is a trap. The drop from A New Hope to The Empire Strikes Back is a whopping 44.75%, and Attack of the Clones sees an equally stunning 38.78% drop from The Phantom Menace. If The Last Jedi were to see a similar drop from The Force Awakens, the box office gross would only be $545 million. There are easy explanations for the earlier drops. Not only did The Empire Strikes Back receive a mediocre response upon its release, A New Hope was such a massive hit, anything following was going to see a considerable drop. And Attack of the Clones was not only poorly received, but many in the fanbase felt like they’d been burnt by The Phantom Menace. However, a $545 million gross would align this film with the performances of Revenge of the Sith and Rogue One. If this ends up being the final result, I see two possible reasons: Critics and the fans find The Last Jedi to be lacking, or the potential gross of the average Star Wars film is around $550 million. Either way, a result like this would be troubling for Disney and Lucasfilm.

However, I think we can take a more optimistic appraisal. First, both The Force Awakens and Rogue One were well received by fans and critics alike, so there's definitely more goodwill going into The Last Jedi. Secondly, Deadline already has tracking indicating that presale tickets are outperforming Rogue One, and are "just under" The Force Awakens. Finally, I think we should look more closely at the box office performances of The Empire Strikes Back, Return of the Jedi, and The Phantom Menace. Why these three films instead of any of the others is simple. Both A New Hope and The Force Awakens are such extreme examples, that it's best to consider them to be statistical anomalies—including them would only skew the results. Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith had been released to a leery fanbase and disinterested public after The Phantom Menace. While there is definitely an instinct to lump in The Phantom Menace with the other prequels, from a box office perspective, the film was largely unaffected by the scorn it developed among the fanbase. And Rogue One was intended to be a "smaller" release compared to the "Saga" films. That leaves The Empire Strikes Back, Return of the Jedi, and The Phantom Menace. If these three films are indicative of the average performance of a Star Wars saga film, than the average potential domestic gross is around $705 million.

But how about the opening weekend? The Force Awakens had a multiplier of 3.78 and Rogue One had a multiplier of 3.43. I would hazard a guess that The Last Jedi will perform closer to Rogue One than it will to The Force Awakens—it was the sequel many had been waiting over 30 years for, it was destined to over-perform. So let’s guess that a typical Star Wars film performs with a 3.4 multiplier. So, a $705 million gross with a 3.4 multiplier gets us an opening weekend number of $207 million.

The method used to get these numbers is by no means scientific, but this gives us decent guidance for The Last Jedi, and possibly for future Star Wars releases.

#Box Office #Star Wars #Star Wars: The Last Jedi #The Last Jedi

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