Star Wars day

[SimonDoom]

To me, the thing that most conspicuously distinguishes all of the movies since Ep. 6 (Return of the Jedi) is the lack of humor. It was a big part of the original trilogy. There was a wink-wink "let's not take all this too seriously" quality, with lots of wisecracks and comic relief. The way Carrie Fisher played Leia was just right: she's nominally the damsel in distress, but she's cracking jokes and kicking ass with the best of them, and THAT was way back in the 1970s. Even when I appreciated some of the new cast members and the special effects of the later movies, there was no humor in them (I will never concede that there was anything humorous about Jar Jar Binks). They were a bit dreary and leaden. Contrast the prequel trilogy with Lord of the Rings, which came out at about the same time, and in which Peter Jackson and his writers actually added some comic relief that didn't exist in the books with the characters of Gimli, Merry, and Pippin. Comic relief in something like Star Wars is absolutely essential, and Lucas forgot that.

I agree with some of the other comments about Rogue One, which I enjoyed. It's by far my favorite of all the post original trilogy Star Wars movies.

Anyway, now it's on to Cinco de Mayo (today). I'm making spicy fish tacos and margaritas in honor of the Mexican victory at the Battle of Puebla in 1862.

 

[cadeauxxx]

To me, the thing that most conspicuously distinguishes all of the movies since Ep. 6 (Return of the Jedi) is the lack of humor. It was a big part of the original trilogy. There was a wink-wink "let's not take all this too seriously" quality, with lots of wisecracks and comic relief. The way Carrie Fisher played Leia was just right: she's nominally the damsel in distress, but she's cracking jokes and kicking ass with the best of them, and THAT was way back in the 1970s. Even when I appreciated some of the new cast members and the special effects of the later movies, there was no humor in them (I will never concede that there was anything humorous about Jar Jar Binks). They were a bit dreary and leaden. Contrast the prequel trilogy with Lord of the Rings, which came out at about the same time, and in which Peter Jackson and his writers actually added some comic relief that didn't exist in the books with the characters of Gimli, Merry, and Pippin. Comic relief in something like Star Wars is absolutely essential, and Lucas forgot that.

I agree with some of the other comments about Rogue One, which I enjoyed. It's by far my favorite of all the post original trilogy Star Wars movies.

Anyway, now it's on to Cinco de Mayo (today). I'm making spicy fish tacos and margaritas in honor of the Mexican victory at the Battle of Puebla in 1862.

ROTJ as a movie certainly has it's flaws compared to the other two. I'm a bit forgiving towards it, cause 3rd movies in a trilogy usually are the weakest and hardest to pull off. Return of the King is so hard to pull off.

I'm shocked no one in this thread has mentioned Star Wars games. The 90s was a golden age of Star Wars and the games during that period left a mark. X Wing/Tie Fighter, Rebellion, Dark Forces, DF 2: Jedi Knight, Shadows of the Empire, Rogue Squadron, Pod Racer, etc.

 

[ChloeTzang]

It would've been so cool flying thru Heathrow yesterday.

 

[TheLobster]

I'm shocked no one in this thread has mentioned Star Wars games. The 90s was a golden age of Star Wars and the games during that period left a mark. X Wing/Tie Fighter, Rebellion, Dark Forces, DF 2: Jedi Knight, Shadows of the Empire, Rogue Squadron, Pod Racer, etc.

Star Wars Episode 1 Racer is my all-time favorite racing game. Nothing else provided you with the same feeling of speed, and I don’t know of any game released in the decades since that feels even remotely similar. It seems like racers went hard on realism rather than fun.

I would probably go and watch remakes of the prequels in theaters if it meant this game was remastered alongside them.

 

[StillStunned]

It would've been so cool flying thru Heathrow yesterday.

View attachment 2345163

"Alderaan - Cancelled" - even after 50 years, ouch!

 

[cadeauxxx]

Star Wars Episode 1 Racer is my all-time favorite racing game. Nothing else provided you with the same feeling of speed, and I don’t know of any game released in the decades since that feels even remotely similar. It seems like racers went hard on realism rather than fun.

I would probably go and watch remakes of the prequels in theaters if it meant this game was remastered alongside them.

It's an essential N64 title for me.

Lucas Arts was in their prime as a game developer back then. Christmas 1996, I got the N64 with only one game - Shadows of the Empire. One of my favorite memories of a holiday was the entire family sitting at the TV playing the Battle of Hoth level at the beginning. We played it over and over taking turns.

 

[dadadadiox]

I was in high school when A New Hope came out. I saw it with friends one night and returned the following night with other friends. It was an event that changed filmmaking.

Empire is still my favorite. I has been since the day I saw it. That said, the most fun I had was taking my baby brother to see Return of The Jedi. I was 22 and he was 9.

I watched my little brother get blown away. He was born that day as a Star Wars geek and he is to this day, a 50 something, 22 year army vet with multiple oversea tours to bad places. Baby bro is the biggest Star Wars & Marvel Universe's nerd I know.

I blame myself.

 

[Seadog777]

I had an awesome May the 4th with my youngest daughter.

We ate pizza, popcorn, mozzarella sticks, and drank a lot of Mountain Dew.

 

[Britva415]

I rewatched the prequels today with a friend who'd never seen them, and I forgot quite how much I love Revenge of the Sith.

I also really like Revenge of the Sith. It doesn't quite redeem the first two prequels (in other words, its own two prequels) but it wouldn't exist and its story wouldn't work without them, even though they sucked Bantha tuchis.

 

[StillStunned]

To me, the thing that most conspicuously distinguishes all of the movies since Ep. 6 (Return of the Jedi) is the lack of humor.

I just saw the opening sequence of The Last Jedi on television, and there's humour there. It's not my kind of humour, it's a very Millennial "I'm totally cool and everyone else is a stooge" kind of humour, coupled with the usual "droids as comic relief", but it's there.

 

[SimonDoom]

I just saw the opening sequence of The Last Jedi on television, and there's humour there. It's not my kind of humour, it's a very Millennial "I'm totally cool and everyone else is a stooge" kind of humour, coupled with the usual "droids as comic relief", but it's there.

I've seen Last Jedi. Maybe I'll sound old school, but I didn't see anything in it that could be validly described as "humor." The droid thing by that time was over 30 years old and tired. The kind of humor that a movie like that needs, and that the original Star Wars had in such abundance, is humor that undermines the seriousness of the events and lets the audience know, "it's OK not to take any of this too seriously and just have fun with it." Raiders of the Lost Ark had that, too. None of the prequel trilogy and final trilogy films had that in the same way. There was too much deadly earnestness from everyone.

 

[StillStunned]

I've seen Last Jedi. Maybe I'll sound old school, but I didn't see anything in it that could be validly described as "humor." The droid thing by that time was over 30 years old and tired. The kind of humor that a movie like that needs, and that the original Star Wars had in such abundance, is humor that undermines the seriousness of the events and lets the audience know, "it's OK not to take any of this too seriously and just have fun with it." Raiders of the Lost Ark had that, too. None of the prequel trilogy and final trilogy films had that in the same way. There was too much deadly earnestness from everyone.

I don't know how old you are, but I'm guess you're my generation. The thing is, though, that "kids nowadays" (probably anybody born after 1990, but I could be wrong) have a completely different sense of humour. (It's not funny, for a start.)

It just underlined that the sequel trilogy was definitely not made with me in mind. Oh well.

 

[SimonDoom]

I don't know how old you are, but I'm guess you're my generation. The thing is, though, that "kids nowadays" (probably anybody born after 1990, but I could be wrong) have a completely different sense of humour. (It's not funny, for a start.)

It just underlined that the sequel trilogy was definitely not made with me in mind. Oh well.

It raises an interesting question: is it a different sense of humor, or a more restricted sense of humor? Do young people find humor in things I don't? I'm not sure. I'm quite sure that I find humor in many things that audiences today say "aren't funny."

I think the thing people don't get today is that humor is SUPPOSED to explore and laugh at the dark side of humanity. That's the whole point. We don't laugh at people being nice and virtuous. We laugh at people slipping on banana peels, hurting themselves and hurting others, being small and petty and prejudiced, and doing bad, selfish things, and making terrible decisions. Humor is a vital human outlet for processing these aspects of our lives and our selves.

 

[StillStunned]

I think the thing people don't get today is that humor is SUPPOSED to explore and laugh at the dark side of humanity. That's the whole point. We don't laugh at people being nice and virtuous. We laugh at people slipping on banana peels, hurting themselves and hurting others, being small and petty and prejudiced, and doing bad, selfish things, and making terrible decisions. Humor is a vital human outlet for processing these aspects of our lives and our selves.

I went to see Glasgow comedian Kevin Bridges a while back, and he said that you know you're old when people stop laughing at you when you fall over.

 

[Beholders_Eye]

 

[StillStunned]

"Dear Amazon, the sex toy I ordered from your online store does not seem fit for purpose."

 

[Bamagan]

We laugh at people slipping on banana peels, hurting themselves and hurting others, being small and petty and prejudiced, and doing bad, selfish things, and making terrible decisions. Humor is a vital human outlet for processing these aspects of our lives and our selves.

The stuff you describe amused me when I was a kid, but it stopped being funny to me when I got to know more people and discovered that selfishness and pettiness and cruelty and terrible decisions were extremely commonplace in daily life, and rarely resulted in amusing hijinks. It still makes me laugh sometimes when it happens, but not from humor. As a comedic staple, well, I think many find it worn out these days, but there's always an audience for it I suppose.
About the only thing that actually makes me laugh with pleasure is clever wordplay or the visual humor equivalent, though, so it's entirely possible I'm an outlier.

 

[SimonDoom]

The stuff you describe amused me when I was a kid, but it stopped being funny to me when I got to know more people and discovered that selfishness and pettiness and cruelty and terrible decisions were extremely commonplace in daily life, and rarely resulted in amusing hijinks. It still makes me laugh sometimes when it happens, but not from humor. As a comedic staple, well, I think many find it worn out these days, but there's always an audience for it I suppose.
About the only thing that actually makes me laugh with pleasure is clever wordplay or the visual humor equivalent, though, so it's entirely possible I'm an outlier.

I feel sad to read what you say, because you are basically completely rejecting the whole idea of comedy, except in a few situations. Comedy throughout all of human history and experience is what I've described. Greek comedy, Shakespearean comedy, every great movie and theater comedy you can think of. Every great stand up comic performance you've ever seen. Every funny Saturday Night Live comedy sketch ever. Comedy is a cathartic and positive way of processing our failures and disappointments as human beings. Without it I think we'd be less happy and less human, and our lives would be less enriched with great art.

I'm surprised to see you of all people write this because you obviously have a sense of humor.

 

[StillStunned]

Also: real humour begins with the ability to laugh at yourself. That stops it from becoming an "us v them" thing.

 

[pink_silk_glove]

The stuff you describe amused me when I was a kid, but it stopped being funny to me when I got to know more people and discovered that selfishness and pettiness and cruelty and terrible decisions were extremely commonplace in daily life, and rarely resulted in amusing hijinks. It still makes me laugh sometimes when it happens, but not from humor. As a comedic staple, well, I think many find it worn out these days, but there's always an audience for it I suppose.
About the only thing that actually makes me laugh with pleasure is clever wordplay or the visual humor equivalent, though, so it's entirely possible I'm an outlier.

Certainly, different people find different things funny, not funny, more funny etc, but when a sense of humor becomes so judgemental as this, it's no longer much of a sense of humor.

Your sense of humor is what you allow yourself to laugh at. If you can't laugh at much, you don't have much of a sense of humor.

I never look at anything and say 'is it appropriate for me to laugh at this or not?' I simply laugh if it's funny or ironic enough.

That doesn't mean that I necessarily laugh out loud at a fat joke in front of my overweight friend for instance, but if it's funny, inside I'm still snickering.