Red Letter Media RotS Review Up

[Jim Raynor]

Hey, I've said plenty. I've expressed my opinion and made comments that had nothing to do with you. Just because I'm not engaging in a tit-for-tat duel of tl;dr wall-of-text bickering with you doesn't mean I have nothing to contribute.

Yeah, being a lazy smartass is really contributing.

Yeah, we really need to grasp at straws from the Expanded Universe books to refute this guy. Someone who argues that the Trade Federation should've openly screwed themselves over just to help Palpatine, for no reward. When someone fails to grasp a movie's plot at such a basic level, you don't treat him as anything other than an idiot.

Actually, in this review he wonders why Nute Gunray continues to take orders from Sidious when it's obvious he's being played for a fool.

Are you talking about the TPM review? Which specific times when Nute Gunray should've known better? RedLetterMedia himself suggests an alternative plot that has the the Trade Federation acting even more retarded.

But I thought your point was that no one else fell to the dark side except for Anakin because the movie was making some kind of point about anger, fear, suffering, etc.

See what I mean about being a smartass? The point was that not everyone who got angry or fearful at some time during the movies fell to the Dark Side, only the main character and cautionary example did. Countering the dumb criticism that Lucas was "simplistic" for supposedly equating fear to turning evil.

Dooku is a supporting character, whose background (besides being a former Jedi) were left untouched by the movie. He doesn't affect the movie's message in anyway. You're not proving anything by bringing him up.

[Jim Raynor]

Wrong, it's obviously a tool the guy uses to promote his independent movie business. That's why several people think it's absurd that anyone would go to such lengths as a 70 page rebuttal (I know that's not you) in reply. The nerd fury he generates plays right into his hand. No wonder he does such a good Palpatine impression.

Rush Limbaugh has come out before saying he does his shit for money. Glenn Beck has also said that he runs an "entertainment company" and claims that he "could give a flying crap about the political process." These shameless self-promoters still say what they say, and could very well be selectively using the "entertainment" card as a lame shield from criticism. Unless their show is on, at which point they want everyone to think that they're making good points.

And it doesn't change the fact that a lot of people are fooled, and do think that they make good points. If you follow an idiot, even someone who selectively claims that he's totally not serious, then you deserve to have your illusions shattered.

Huh? What?

What a massively inflated self-importance you have.

What massive stupidity you have.

The whole "he's not serious, he's totally joking/drawing attention/making money off of this" is nothing but a lame ass excuse selectively used to brush off criticism whenever it's convenient. It's total bullshit, and you know it.

Think about the implications of what you're saying here. If in fact RLM is just intetnionally acting like an idiot to be funny, or in it for the attention (or the other excuse in this thread, that his review is totally just a basic expression of how the movies didn't subjectively touch him), then what does that say about the bulk of his 70-210 minute review? If it's so stupid, then why do people make strained attempts to defend his points, quote him, or bring him up as an "insightful" guy or even a debate-ender?

If he's just some jackass in it for the lolz...then that completely deflates his credibility and knocks him off the pedestal that too many people have placed him on.

[Srelex]

BTW, Raynor, while this isn't really making a point either way, the guy's name is Michael Stoklasa. RLM is just his independent company, not the individual, persona or otherwise.

[Jim Raynor]

A lot of the nitpicks being brought up are pretty much exactly what I meant by "miss the forest for the trees." The the overall criticism isn't just the sum of the nitpicks, rather, they are just the various symptoms of the overall disease of bland mediocrity that pervades the PT. Some people act as if a clever (or even not-so-clever) rebuttal can be made for all of the nitpicks, that it will then somehow prove that the movies overall are actually good, which isn't actually how it works.

Try reading. Everything you said here was already brought up before, and addressed.

-Whatever is defined as "the overall criticism" should not conveniently dismiss the vast majority of the review. If his review is mostly comprised of nitpicks (especially stupid nitpicks), then it is not unfair to characterize his review as stupid nitpicking, and say that he has badly overexaggerated things.

-I've already said that I'm out to show that this guy is overrated and wrong, not that TPM is all that great.

The OT could be severely nitpicked as well, if someone had the mind to do it (I would actually suggest something like this would be far more interesting project for Jim Raynor to approach as opposed to the mammoth rebuttal to RLM he has in mind, but I doubt he has the sense of humor to actually make it a good satire).

Does your idea of "good satire" involve stuttering like a retarded idiot for 70 minutes or 2 hours?

So basically, I think if you really want to attack RLM, then you have to go after his points that have to do with dialog, characterization, what's merely "told" when it should be "shown," over reliance on green/blue screen, unimaginative camera angles, and stuff like that. Those seem to be the core problems with the PT, as opposed to something like Naboo having a water core, which is stupid, but ultimately irrelevant.

You keep thinking that I'm out to prove TPM is good, or try to "refute" subjective opinions such as whether a certain line or bit of characterization worked.

And you're really clueless if you think a few moments like where he complains about a camera angle (I know it's opinion but I just want to ask who the hell does that) form the core of his review and not the nitpicks.

[StarshipTitanic]

My point is that if it happened say 10K years ago or 1K years ago events would have faded out of public memory and became little more than stories... I can imagine that even things that happen some 500 years ago would be little more than a foot note in some history book.

I'm losing so much patience with this crap that I might start adding histrionic bold and italics to my texts but I'm going to try it once again normally:

I don't care about your assumptions. I don't care. They're your assumptions. They're not from the movie. They are assumptions. Assumptions you made up. Do I care about your assumptions? No, I don't. Because they're your assumptions.

You want me to believe that a fabulously advanced, space-faring, galaxy-spanning civilization somehow forgot how awful Sith rule is. And don't come back and say "Oh you're assuming Sith rule was awful so you're just as bad!" because we know exactly what Sith rule looks like. Racism, planets being exploded, soldiers habitually murdering people. All things we see in the original trilogy.

But that is all besides the point since without the EU we can't know how long it is since the last Sith ruled the galaxy.

Oh look, another thing Lucas threw into the script that only raised unanswered questions and added nothing to the story. It would have been pretty cool if Lucas wrote the prequels so that Sidious' scheme was the culmination of a millennia-long plot by the Sith to reestablish their dominance. But he didn't. Yet again, this is my point.

Well, the guy does say it strait up. And why would he lie?
I mean, the point of Episode 1 was that the whole thing was a stunt to make the Republic lax on their taxes for crying out loud. You would think that if a corporation can capture planets to further tax evasion they can buy off a few people.

I mean, give me one bit of evidence that he was lying and that the Republic was not in fact a corrupt bureaucratic mess.

You give me the choice of believing the words of a known liar and schemer as 100% honest or to prove a negative? No thanks to either choice.

And for your complain about the Jedi Knight text. Have you stopped to consider that it might mean "Member of the order of Jedi Knights" rather than "Member of the Order of Jedi Knights who has also achieved the rank of Knight".

Do you seriously have to attack each and every single point he made because you disagree with him? Even when you are completely wrong? It's not "the order of Jedi knights" and you know it. The organization is consistently called the "Jedi Order." They live in the "Jedi Temple" not the "Jedi Knight Temple." Come on.

[StarshipTitanic]

The whole "he's not serious, he's totally joking/drawing attention/making money off of this" is nothing but a lame ass excuse selectively used to brush off criticism whenever it's convenient. It's total bullshit, and you know it.

I know you're too furious to notice, but I was responding to some guy who thought the reason why these reviews were made was primarily to please mouth-breathing nerds when that's obviously not the case. Stoklasa wants attention so he can sell his independent movie. He got his site mentioned in fucking Robert Ebert's blog thanks to the review. That's going to get him a lot of attention and potentially a lot of sales. Hell, Ebert may love the guy's movie and give that publicity, too. Who knows.

Then you jump in and say how you're going to destroy my illusions and compare your struggle as akin to fighting people deluded by Glenn Beck or whatever. Sorry, but you're not going to destroy my "illusion" that your colossal treatise that may be read by 5 people is a massively disproportionate response to his reviews. If you found that it was a rewarding experience, good for you. Really, do whatever makes you happy, I mean it.

And post it someday.

[Bakustra]

The whole "he's not serious, he's totally joking/drawing attention/making money off of this" is nothing but a lame ass excuse selectively used to brush off criticism whenever it's convenient. It's total bullshit, and you know it.

I know you're too furious to notice, but I was responding to some guy who thought the reason why these reviews were made was primarily to please mouth-breathing nerds when that's obviously not the case. Stoklasa wants attention so he can sell his independent movie. He got his site mentioned in fucking Robert Ebert's blog thanks to the review. That's going to get him a lot of attention and potentially a lot of sales. Hell, Ebert may love the guy's movie and give that publicity, too. Who knows.

The two aren't really distinct at all, though; he probably picks most of the movies he does (latter-era Star Trek, the SW Prequels, Avatar), because these movies are already condemned in nerd opinions and so will garner mostly positive attention. If his shtick was to complain about say, The Fifth Element or the original Star Wars trilogy or classic movies, then he'd mostly get negative or mixed attention, which wouldn't help his movie. So I think that pleasing nerds, mouth-breathing, fatty, or otherwise, is crucial for him to get positive attention.

[StarshipTitanic]

The two aren't really distinct at all, though; he probably picks most of the movies he does (latter-era Star Trek, the SW Prequels, Avatar), because these movies are already condemned in nerd opinions and so will garner mostly positive attention. If his shtick was to complain about say, The Fifth Element or the original Star Wars trilogy or classic movies, then he'd mostly get negative or mixed attention, which wouldn't help his movie. So I think that pleasing nerds, mouth-breathing, fatty, or otherwise, is crucial for him to get positive attention.

I'm not going to quibble nerdiness degrees with you but I do have one question (plus a sarcastic question): Why would he, or anyone, make savage critiques of good movies? Why not also point out that if his shtick was virulent anti-Semitism then he'd get negative to mixed attention?

[Bakustra]

The two aren't really distinct at all, though; he probably picks most of the movies he does (latter-era Star Trek, the SW Prequels, Avatar), because these movies are already condemned in nerd opinions and so will garner mostly positive attention. If his shtick was to complain about say, The Fifth Element or the original Star Wars trilogy or classic movies, then he'd mostly get negative or mixed attention, which wouldn't help his movie. So I think that pleasing nerds, mouth-breathing, fatty, or otherwise, is crucial for him to get positive attention.

I'm not going to quibble nerdiness degrees with you but I do have one question (plus a sarcastic question): Why would he, or anyone, make savage critiques of good movies? Why not also point out that if his shtick was virulent anti-Semitism then he'd get negative to mixed attention?

Because you claimed that his choice of movies to criticize was irrelevant to his purpose, which is an oversimplification. If he wants a reputation that will boost his future films, he wants positive associations, and so he picks movies that are generally regarded negatively among his target audience, because he can be more assured of a positive response. It's frankly, a good idea and seems to be working well.

I'm not suggesting that he's insincere so much as saying that your post isn't really all that sensical, as the two parts are quite compatible. In fact, I don't think negatively of him because of this! (Now, making a review that approaches the length of the thing you're reviewing without going into really deep criticism, that I find faulty). (P.S.: Degrees of nerdiness is pretty ancillary to my post and focusing on it is odd.

[StarshipTitanic]

Because you claimed that his choice of movies to criticize was irrelevant to his purpose, which is an oversimplification.

I did? Some guy claimed Stoklasa's goal was simply to make Lucas-hating nerds happy and I countered that his ultimate goal was to get attention to his movie business. Even negative attention serves him in the latter case because it can still get his review spread around. Not everyone who receives the review link from someone who hates it will also hate it. And I only drew that distinction because of my opinion regarding the oft-mentioned anti-review treatise in progress. I don't know where you got an implication that I think the choice of Star Wars is irrelevant and focusing on it is odd.

[Bakustra]

Because you claimed that his choice of movies to criticize was irrelevant to his purpose, which is an oversimplification.

I did? Some guy claimed Stoklasa's goal was simply to make Lucas-hating nerds happy and I countered that his ultimate goal was to get attention to his movie business. Even negative attention serves him in the latter case because it can still get his review spread around. Not everyone who receives the review link from someone who hates it will also hate it. And I only drew that distinction because of my opinion regarding the oft-mentioned anti-review treatise in progress. I don't know where you got an implication that I think the choice of Star Wars is irrelevant and focusing on it is odd.

I'm saying that pandering is not incompatible, indeed highly compatible, with garnering attention, and you treated it as though they were separate and inherently different. I mean, it's dumb of Raynor to use that as a criticism, though the "just a joke" defense is generally a terrible one, but that doesn't mean that Plinkett is some kind of cinematic saint, descending upon the good people of the internet to anoint them with blessed oils and I can't extend this metaphor anymore.

[Purple]

I'm losing so much patience with this crap that I might start adding histrionic bold and italics to my texts but I'm going to try it once again normally:

I don't care about your assumptions. I don't care. They're your assumptions. They're not from the movie. They are assumptions. Assumptions you made up. Do I care about your assumptions? No, I don't. Because they're your assumptions.

You want me to believe that a fabulously advanced, space-faring, galaxy-spanning civilization somehow forgot how awful Sith rule is. And don't come back and say "Oh you're assuming Sith rule was awful so you're just as bad!" because we know exactly what Sith rule looks like. Racism, planets being exploded, soldiers habitually murdering people. All things we see in the original trilogy.

It's your problem that you refuse to use your brain and expect every single thing to be served to you on a plate. Do you really expect every loose end to be picked up on in a 2 something hours long movie? And what is wrong with having to speculate.

If anything, if a movie does not leave room for speculation and does not incite you to do so than it is a crap movie.


And yes, we have seen in the EU just how fast people started to call for the Empire to return. And for better or worse, even with the most modern and most perfect educational and recording techniques and technology things don't stay in the public mind that long. People have their own lives to live.

Also, I call for someone with more knowledge of the EU to get me information on when the last Sith rule was. Because I am not aware that it even existed.

Oh look, another thing Lucas threw into the script that only raised unanswered questions and added nothing to the story. It would have been pretty cool if Lucas wrote the prequels so that Sidious' scheme was the culmination of a millennia-long plot by the Sith to reestablish their dominance. But he didn't. Yet again, this is my point.

It would have been cheap in that it would have cheapened the entire character of Palpatine. Rather than a master manipulator he would have been just a tool in the plan. And it would have made all the Sith look like retards when the thing fails just 3 episodes later.

You give me the choice of believing the words of a known liar and schemer as 100% honest or to prove a negative? No thanks to either choice.

Had there been no coruption in the senate, than the entire premise of the Republic as shown to us in the movies would fall appart.
The entire premise of the movies is that the Republic is so corupt that the queen and her Jedi friends have to do it them self.

Do you seriously have to attack each and every single point he made because you disagree with him?

Yes when the points are idiotically stupid and consist of retarded nitpicks that serve no purpose other than to anger people.

Even when you are completely wrong? It's not "the order of Jedi knights" and you know it. The organization is consistently called the "Jedi Order." They live in the "Jedi Temple" not the "Jedi Knight Temple." Come on.

The Jedi are a monastic order of knights.
They are addressed by others as Jedi Knights. If an average citizen was to see a Jedi he would call him a Jedi Knight, not a Jedi + Rank.

And "One Jedi Knight and his student" would have looked horrible on the opening crawl because it would have introduced the man in a way that lets people imagine a school boy.

[Imperial528]

IIRC, the last time any large collection of worlds were held by Sith, ended on 1000 BBY, with the battle of Ruusan and the extermination of almost all Sith. At this time, the average citizen of the galaxy still didn't recognize any real difference between Jedi and Sith, and most didn't care either. By the time of the Clone Wars, pretty much the only people who knew about Sith were the Sith themselves and the Jedi Order.

[Uraniun235]

And yes, we have seen in the EU

I've only ever read one Star Wars book and that was Heir To The Empire and that was over ten years ago. I don't care about the EU and a lot of other people who like Star Wars also don't give one turd about it either.

[Purple]

Well you do have to realize that one of the major reasons for making the movies is to give new life to the EU and give the EU writers more to write about so that they can sell more books and comics and action figures.

After all, the idea is that the movie should provide an enjoyable base and if you have any questions refer to the EU. (available at the stall to the side)

[StarshipTitanic]

It's your problem that you refuse to use your brain and expect every single thing to be served to you on a plate. Do you really expect every loose end to be picked up on in a 2 something hours long movie? And what is wrong with having to speculate.

If anything, if a movie does not leave room for speculation and does not incite you to do so than it is a crap movie.

And yes, we have seen in the EU just how fast people started to call for the Empire to return. And for better or worse, even with the most modern and most perfect educational and recording techniques and technology things don't stay in the public mind that long. People have their own lives to live.

Also, I call for someone with more knowledge of the EU to get me information on when the last Sith rule was. Because I am not aware that it even existed.

No, it's bad when a movie sends you home to speculate about why things happened because they happened illogically or in a contrived way.

I'm going to just start crossing out things that you make up, don't make sense or tell me it's all in the tie-in merchandise that I'm not reading.

It would have been cheap in that it would have cheapened the entire character of Palpatine. Rather than a master manipulator he would have been just a tool in the plan. And it would have made all the Sith look like retards when the thing fails just 3 episodes later.

So the Sith are geniuses because they stumbled into power and had everything fall apart 3 episodes later? Whatever, I'm not going to discuss hypothetical plot improvements here.

Had there been no coruption in the senate, than the entire premise of the Republic as shown to us in the movies would fall appart.
The entire premise of the movies is that the Republic is so corupt that the queen and her Jedi friends have to do it them self.

Of course the movie falls apart if characters are wrong! Can't you see your own desperation? For the movie to work, we are dependent on the words of a liar. It makes the characters act like morons. It makes the movie crap.

Do you seriously have to attack each and every single point he made because you disagree with him? [You cut: Even when you are completely wrong?]

Yes when the points are idiotically stupid and consist of retarded nitpicks that serve no purpose other than to anger people.

I guess we're done here, then.

The Jedi are a monastic order of knights.
They are addressed by others as Jedi Knights. If an average citizen was to see a Jedi he would call him a Jedi Knight, not a Jedi + Rank.

And "One Jedi Knight and his student" would have looked horrible on the opening crawl because it would have introduced the man in a way that lets people imagine a school boy.

Yeah, it's not like the movies have used a word like, oh, "apprentice." Would you just drop it and admit that the reviews aren't wrong about literally every single point?

[StarshipTitanic]

I'm saying that pandering is not incompatible, indeed highly compatible, with garnering attention, and you treated it as though they were separate and inherently different.

All I wanted to do was call attention (ha) to how the reviews get attention of either sort to promote his movies. I thought some poster several pages back now was silly for accusing the guy of merely making a hatchet job to please nerds. I don't know where you're going with this tangent or why you're bothering.

[Kane Starkiller]

Which review are you talking about? Because in TPM, the one which I have gone through, he argues exactly that. He pretends to be Palpatine, and supposedly improves the story by ordering the Trade Federation to completely admit their hostile intentions and send Qui-Gon back to Coruscant to report them. It's idiotic.

How on God's green Earth is it idiotic from Palpatines perspective? He WANTS there to be an incident and a war. Therefore it would be in his interest to tell the Trade Federation to tell the Jedi they will invade the planet and send them back. It makes no sense for him to have the Jedi killed and then for Nute Gunray to pretend that nothing happened.
On the other hand, and the reviewer points this out in other reviews, there is never any motivation given for why Trade Federation goes along with Sidious and ESPECIALLY why Nute Gunray would agree to kill off two Jedi Knights, the official representative from the Chancellor. You don't want to talk? Fine don't talk and send them back. What fucking sense is there to kill them?

Already being pissed off enough to fight over taxes, having the Senator from the planet you invaded elected Chancellor, having your trade franchise threatened and your leaders put through the courts, doesn't tell you why? All of this is in the movies.

"The taxes are in dispute" in no way explains why they want to secede. Not to mention no one has bothered to answer what Trade Federation is exactly. What are their territorial claims? Does it include the "outlying" systems over which the taxation was "in dispute"? How do you jump from "in dispute" to war? Shouldn't the movie at least spend some time explaining this? Chancellors come and go why would they secede over this one? Was he going to free the droids or something?
At the end of TPM Nute Gunray is told he'd lose his "trade franchise". What does that mean if Trade Federation is actually some kind of state with its own planets? Lucas couldn't even figure out whether this was some kind of company or a political organization.

Are you for real? She successfully led an uprising against him and humiliated him. A teenage girl outwitted him and held him at gunpoint. People in real life have developed murderous obsessions over less than that.

You're not paying attention: What does that have to do with the decision to leave or not leave the Reupblic? He demanded her head in return for joining the separatists and that doesn't make a lick of sense. He wants her dead? Fine sell one of those huge donut ships hire 50,000 bounty hunters and have her killed. Why the fuck is he pestering Dooku about it?

I went over this in one of the previous threads - he's GENERAL Grievous. I mean wow, a guy with an actual top military rank can tell people what to do. Especially when he's a superpowered cyborg who can kill you with his own hands. Same goes for Dooku, a man with Jedi powers and a lightsaber on his belt at all times. A man who was the political face of the Separatist movement, and responsible for drawing thousands of worlds to their cause in the first place.

Nevermind that the Separatists aren't even "cowed and ordered around." Dooku offered a deal that appealed to them. In ROTS, the Separatist leaders outright question Grievous's ability to lead - Grievous somewhat stands up for himself but does nothing in retaliation to them.

All of this stuff is easily inferred from the movies, and your criticisms are even at odds with what was shown onscreen.

I'm not talking about "people" but Separatist LEADERSHIP. Who gives a fuck how strong he is and that he has kool four hands with lightsabers? That doesn't give you political power.
He threatens Separatists and orders them around, how did he get such power? How did Sidious get such power that he can eliminate the Separatists literaly with a press of a button when he no longer needs them? What those Separatists on Mustafar are the entirety of the civilian leadership? And there is an TURN_OFF_ENTIRE_MILITARY switch on Mustafar? Talk about fucking dumb.
This is the ultimate problem for the Trade Federation and Separatists: they were never shown to exist as an realistic entity with leaders and population and planets but rather just a tool that Palpatine used and could literaly switch off when he didn't need them anymore. With Rebellion you actually got to know them as an actual entity that went beyond Doddona, Mon Mothma or Luke Skywalker; it had a life of its own.

[Uraniun235]

Well you do have to realize that one of the major reasons for making the movies is to give new life to the EU and give the EU writers more to write about so that they can sell more books and comics and action figures.

After all, the idea is that the movie should provide an enjoyable base and if you have any questions refer to the EU. (available at the stall to the side)

Let me see if I'm reading this correctly. Lucas made the prequels so that the EU would have more material to work with, and he deliberately left holes in the movies for the merchandisers to fill in. Is that what you are/have been saying?

[Jim Raynor]

I know you're too furious to notice, but I was responding to some guy who thought the reason why these reviews were made was primarily to please mouth-breathing nerds when that's obviously not the case. Stoklasa wants attention so he can sell his independent movie. He got his site mentioned in fucking Robert Ebert's blog thanks to the review. That's going to get him a lot of attention and potentially a lot of sales. Hell, Ebert may love the guy's movie and give that publicity, too. Who knows.

So, if we're going to go down this line of thinking, that means Stoklasa is an attention who's selling himself. Does he even believe the crap he spews, which people gobble up? Kim Kardashian has done a pretty good job of gaining attention and selling basically nothing of substance. If you're right that this guy's just in it for the money...then people need to stop putting any stock in what he has to say about Star Wars.

Then you jump in and say how you're going to destroy my illusions and compare your struggle as akin to fighting people deluded by Glenn Beck or whatever.

You have illusions. Your last couple of private messages confirmed that to me. You have little idea of what your'e actually talking about when it comes to this subject. And it's not just your illusions, but all the fanboys who have rallied around him, ignorant of how poorly done his work actually is.

And post it someday.

I've already given some of it to quite a few people, including you. You seemed to have trouble comprehending a rather basic summary of just a few points. So don't smugly act like I'm holding back.

[TOSDOC]

When I was a kid watching the OT, there was no EU, and yet we didn't have any trouble understanding the plots, characterizations, or dialogues. It was all very clear cut, and presentable to all ages. There is a definite difference there. Sure we all wanted more Star Wars as books, video games, comics, and toys, but we didn't need them to further our understanding of the movies. That's the kind of movie experience I want to enjoy--I should never have to have someone tell me I need to go read a novel just to understand who someone is in a movie.

I don't know if RLM is in it for just the money or not, and I don't care. I just couldn't help but agree with some of his points--his one about the PT movies' tone was another good example. ESB's tone is set from the beginning as dark, and doesn't waver. We go from the sinister probe to Wampas attacking Luke to Luke and Han in danger of freezing. Then the probe threat again, an Imperial attack, and running from the Imperial Fleet. Luke is confronted by dark side apparitions and premonitions of his friends' pain during his training. All are betrayed, Threepio is blown apart, Han is encased in a block of metal, Chewbacca is tortured, Leia is heartbroken, and Luke's hand is amputated.

There's no slapstick comedy in ESB. The tone of the movie is steady throughout.

Interspersing Artoo's antics in the hanger in ROTS with a beheading is not the way to maintain a steady tone, nor are Jar Jar's antics in the same room with the emotions we are expected to invest in Qui Gon's death and cutting a Sith in half.

I was going back over some of the previous posts here. I know it's not quite the same topic, and would welcome a split to discuss TPM as a separate thread, but it really struck me reading the argument about the shield generator on the Naboo starship escaping the blockade. I don't know about some of you, but the shields not working doesn't necessarily make them "sitting ducks". It's the dialogue that gets me--I consider it poor writing. Try this experiment and see if the dialogue makes more sense to you where you wouldn't have any problem trying to explain or have it explained to you on a BB: replace the word "Shield" with "Thruster" or "Engine" and see if the dialogue and tension in the scene makes more sense.

[Srelex]

There was actually a fair deal of humor in TESB, but it was handled more skillfully than in the prequels, yes.

[StarshipTitanic]

So, if we're going to go down this line of thinking, that means Stoklasa is an attention who's selling himself. Does he even believe the crap he spews, which people gobble up? Kim Kardashian has done a pretty good job of gaining attention and selling basically nothing of substance. If you're right that this guy's just in it for the money...then people need to stop putting any stock in what he has to say about Star Wars.

Being an attention whore doesn't invalidate his points.

You have illusions. Your last couple of private messages confirmed that to me. You have little idea of what your'e actually talking about when it comes to this subject. And it's not just your illusions, but all the fanboys who have rallied around him, ignorant of how poorly done his work actually is.

Would you listen to yourself? "Illusions"??? Sorry, but even if I agreed with your rebuttals (and with some I did agree in part) I will never, ever buy into your inflated sense of worth and purpose regarding your crusade against a couple of movie reviews. I'll never be as emotionally invested as you are. I'll never care that you've written a (presumably dry and vitriolic from what I've seen) 70 page treatise about The Phantom Menace. I'm just not really into it that much.

So have I finally broken your illusions regarding the importance of your review of a review of a shit movie?

And post it someday.

I've already given some of it to quite a few people, including you. You seemed to have trouble comprehending a rather basic summary of just a few points. So don't smugly act like I'm holding back.

Your reply is utterly baffling to me. "Don't smugly act like I'm holding back when in fact I have!" Would you please just go away?

[Jim Raynor]

Here we have another example of a fanboy of a fanboy who doesn't know what the hell he's talking about.

Which review are you talking about? Because in TPM, the one which I have gone through, he argues exactly that. He pretends to be Palpatine, and supposedly improves the story by ordering the Trade Federation to completely admit their hostile intentions and send Qui-Gon back to Coruscant to report them. It's idiotic.

How on God's green Earth is it idiotic from Palpatines perspective? He WANTS there to be an incident and a war. Therefore it would be in his interest to tell the Trade Federation to tell the Jedi they will invade the planet and send them back. It makes no sense for him to have the Jedi killed and then for Nute Gunray to pretend that nothing happened.

Have you watched the actual movie? Did you bother trying to remember anything before you decided to post this trash? The Trade Federation was reluctant to follow through with the plans to invade Naboo. Palpatine offered to use his influence over the Senate to protect them from the law so that they would go through with it. The treaty was a legal loophole to get them off the hook. A legal loophole might screw up the courts, but people will STILL know that something dirty had gone down. Even with the Trade Federation escaping the law (for a while at least), Palpatine would be able to point out how corrupt and useless the government is. God, it's not that hard. Young children understood this damn plot.

As Stoklasa (and you in this post) are arguing, Palpatine should've ordered the Trade Federation to openly confess to military aggression, and not even TRY to dodge the law. Why the hell would the Trade Federation screw themselves over for him then?

On the other hand, and the reviewer points this out in other reviews, there is never any motivation given for why Trade Federation goes along with Sidious and ESPECIALLY why Nute Gunray would agree to kill off two Jedi Knights, the official representative from the Chancellor. You don't want to talk? Fine don't talk and send them back. What fucking sense is there to kill them?

If you were paying attention, you would've realized that the Jedi were not there to "talk". Qui-Gon calls the Trade Federation "cowards" outright and states that the negotiations would be short. The Jedi were sent there to intimidate the Trade Federation into backing down, possibly with violent force. The Trade Federation even knew it, and clearly expressed their fears to Palpatine. Palpatine gave them the momentary courage to fight. Palpatine also says that they will "accelerate" their plans by landing troops on Naboo. Accelerate existing plans, not launching an attack at the spur of a moment. The Trade Federation was already in on the plan to invade the planet, probably seeing that action as profitable.

At the end of TPM Nute Gunray is told he'd lose his "trade franchise". What does that mean if Trade Federation is actually some kind of state with its own planets? Lucas couldn't even figure out whether this was some kind of company or a political organization.

A brief look at the dictionary gives multiple definitions of "franchise," including these:

-"a privilege of a public nature conferred on an individual, group, or company by a government"
-"a privilege arising from the grant of a sovereign or government, or from prescription, which presupposes a grant"
-"a legal immunity or exemption from a particular burden, exaction, or the like"

The "trade franchise" was obviously some kind of deal or special arrangement that the Trade Federation had with the government, which made business more profitable. You don't even need the above dictionary definitions to tell what it is during the movie, just from the context.

TPM clearly states that the Trade Federation controlled territory, and shows that it has Senate representation. It's another group of worlds in the Republic, heavily reliant on the trade business.

Are you for real? She successfully led an uprising against him and humiliated him. A teenage girl outwitted him and held him at gunpoint. People in real life have developed murderous obsessions over less than that.

You're not paying attention: What does that have to do with the decision to leave or not leave the Reupblic? He demanded her head in return for joining the separatists and that doesn't make a lick of sense. He wants her dead? Fine sell one of those huge donut ships hire 50,000 bounty hunters and have her killed. Why the fuck is he pestering Dooku about it?

Murderous obsessions are supposed to make sense now? And it doesn't matter if someone else can kill Padme, the fact was that Dooku had given his word to kill her.

Watch the damn scene. Right before the line you're nitpicking, Dooku privately tells Gunray that "We must persuade the Commerce Guild and Corporate Alliance to sign the treaty." Gunray and the Trade Federation weren't outsiders that Dooku was trying to win over right then and there; they were already involved in plotting the creation of the Confederacy. The decision had already been made. Less than a minute later, in the same scene, the various leaders sit down and declare their allegiance to the Confederacy. Without Gunray even saying anything, Dooku states "Our friends from the Trade Federation have pledged their support." Gunray, was just obsessively whining like a bitch, not seriously negotiating.

I can't believe people are willing to nitpick a few throwaway words like this. But things hold up even against the nitpicking.

I'm not talking about "people" but Separatist LEADERSHIP. Who gives a fuck how strong he is and that he has kool four hands with lightsabers? That doesn't give you political power.

Nor did he HAVE political power. Read damn it, I dealt with all of this in my previous post. The same previous post that you are dealing with this time. The Separatist leaders directly questioned his ability in front of everyone. Grievous stood up for himself, but did nothing back to them. The entire meeting was about how to best protect those same Separatist leaders.

Either way, concepts such as civilian rule, who properly wields political power, etc. tend to break down during desperate total wars, especially if the war is going badly. Dooku was dead, the fleet was routed at Coruscant, the Republic's Outer Rim Sieges had been "going well," and the Separatist leaders were on the run for their very lives. Of course a strong military leader is going to start taking charge.

Talk about a dumb thing to bitch about.

How did Sidious get such power that he can eliminate the Separatists literaly with a press of a button when he no longer needs them? What those Separatists on Mustafar are the entirety of the civilian leadership? And there is an TURN_OFF_ENTIRE_MILITARY switch on Mustafar? Talk about fucking dumb.

What's fucking dumb is your inability to comprehend what is said onscreen. Sidious doesn't have a "power" or a "button" or a "switch" to turn off the Separatists. He tells Anakin to "send the message to the ships of the Trade Federation: all droid units must shut down immediately." Send the message, NOT push the button. Anakin sent an official message out from a high level command post.

Furthermore, right before he was slain, Nute Gunray says "The war is over. Lord Sidious promised us peace!" The war had been going badly, the Separatist leaders probably didn't even want to fight much longer, but Gunray was under the impression that Sidious could produce an acceptable settlement. It's not unlikely that the Separatist leaders had already sent out previous messages to their military units telling them to prepare to stand down.

This is the ultimate problem for the Trade Federation and Separatists: they were never shown to exist as an realistic entity with leaders and population and planets but rather just a tool that Palpatine used and could literaly switch off when he didn't need them anymore. With Rebellion you actually got to know them as an actual entity that went beyond Doddona, Mon Mothma or Luke Skywalker; it had a life of its own.

This is the problem with nitpicking fanboys. They unnecessarily play up problems, or even imagine problems that don't exist in the newer movies. Yet they look at the older movies with rose-tinted glasses and play up favorable things that didn't really exist or weren't present in any significant way.

"With Rebellion you actually got to know them as an actual entity that went beyond Doddona, Mon Mothma or Luke Skywalker; it had a life of its own." Yeah, like how. The Rebel Alliance was a bunch of guys who died on one ship at the beginning of ANH, one base with a number of fighter pilots at the end of ANH, one base on a frozen rock in TESB, and a bunch of warships in ROTJ. I'd like for you to explain how the Rebellion was so fleshed out, with "a life of its own."

[Uraniun235]

So don't smugly act like I'm holding back.

You are holding back. Even if you don't think the forum software can directly accommodate your alleged tome of counter-nitpicking, there are any number of free hosting or webjournal options on the Internet you could use to post as much text as you want and to which you could post a link on this forum.

Hey, maybe you think you're being considerate, I dunno, but "nuhh i wrote this huge document, maybe i'll send people a summary over PM if they ask nicely" sounds like empty huffing and puffing to most people. If it's so dynamite, you should be eager to post it, even if only to shut up the people (like me) who are going to start loudly wondering if this "seventy page document" even exists.