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Solo (original spoilers thread)
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CRMcNeill
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PostPosted: Wed Oct 17, 2018 10:24 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I'm wary of speculation after TLJ. I had a theory about Rey that fit with the SWU as we knew it, and also explained her strange natural proficiency. And then Rian Johnson blew it all out of the water. So, we'll see. But I'm not going to waste any more energy trying to figure out the ending of a story I can barely motivate myself to care about any more.
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PostPosted: Thu Oct 18, 2018 7:58 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Whill wrote:

KageRyu wrote:
She doesn't seem much older than Ben (Kylo) so that doesn't strike me as really feasible

Umm, Solo, takes place 15 years before Ben (Kylo) was even born. So Qi'ra is about 37 years older than Ben and 47 years older than Rey.

No, I was reffering to Rey's age - hence she couldn't be the result of the trist between Solo and Qi'ra.
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Whill
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PostPosted: Thu Oct 18, 2018 6:11 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

KageRyu wrote:
Whill wrote:

KageRyu wrote:
She doesn't seem much older than Ben (Kylo) so that doesn't strike me as really feasible

Umm, Solo, takes place 15 years before Ben (Kylo) was even born. So Qi'ra is about 37 years older than Ben and 47 years older than Rey.

No, I was reffering to Rey's age - hence she couldn't be the result of the trist between Solo and Qi'ra.

Oh. Well mid-40s is pushing it for women to have children, but it does happen here on Earth so it could happen in Star Wars. I'm not a proponent of this fan theory - I'm just saying it isn't impossible.

And you said she doesn't seem much older than Ben. I wouldn't have guessed you were talking about Rey because she is 10 years younger than Ben. Adam Driver is about 9 years older than Daisy Ridley. I don't think she looks older than him at all.
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PostPosted: Thu Oct 18, 2018 6:31 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Whill wrote:

And you said she doesn't seem much older than Ben. I wouldn't have guessed you were talking about Rey because she is 10 years younger than Ben. Adam Driver is about 9 years older than Daisy Ridley. I don't think she looks older than him at all.

I have no idea who the actors are or their real ages. I have never been good with names, or dates, or times, or people, or places, or signs. To me, they look like about the same age in the film. This is how I know I am getting old. This also is an excellent demonstration of how individual perceptions can have degrees of difference.
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PostPosted: Wed Nov 14, 2018 10:49 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

http://epicstream.com/news/BayaniMiguelAcebedo/Solo-A-Star-Wars-Story-Did-Way-Better-with-Blu-Ray-Sales

So I guess Solo blu-ray sales have been better than expected. I have it on blu-ray and digital download, plus I can stream it on Disney Movies Anywhere.
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PostPosted: Thu Nov 15, 2018 12:28 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Whill wrote:
http://epicstream.com/news/BayaniMiguelAcebedo/Solo-A-Star-Wars-Story-Did-Way-Better-with-Blu-Ray-Sales

So I guess Solo blu-ray sales have been better than expected. I have it on blu-ray and digital download, plus I can stream it on Disney Movies Anywhere.


Yeah, this is good news. From the moment I entered the Uptown theatre to see Solo and saw that it was nearly empty, I always felt that Solo wasn't given nearly enough credit as a good Star Wars movie. I'm glad to see that those of us who liked Solo were proven right in the end.
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PostPosted: Sat Dec 01, 2018 3:55 pm    Post subject: The Solo novelization Reply with quote

So I finally got around to reading the Solo film's "expanded" novelization. As expected, the film includes the deleted scenes and other stuff that didn't make it into the film. For example, Enfys Nest is about 18 years old, having taken over the armor from her mother when she died two years earlier. Here are a couple interesting tidbits I'll focus on:

Han's character still has the mystique that comes from a largely unknown background, but a couple more points about his early life come to light. Han only has one memory of his mother, which suggests she left his life very early on (It isn't stated what that memory is). Han's father was in his life long enough for Han to be old enough to remember being on a YT-1300 in the CEC plant where his father worked, and for Han to understand his father being laid off from that job, which suggests Han's father was in his life a good amount more than his mother. That is, until his father abandoned him, which lead to Han become a scrumrat owned by the White Worms.

The scene where L3-37 and Qi'ra talk on the Falcon is expanded, and Qi'ra remembers what happened to her after her capture on Corellia. Basically, she was sold as a slave to someone who later sold her to Dryden Vos. L3 points out that Qi'ra still wears a metaphorical restraining bolt, but all that is not the important part. L3 talks about her background. She was originally a non-humanoid droid and one day her master accidentally left her restraining bolt off after cleaning her in a droid workshop. She took advantage of the freedom to begin modifying herself and escape. She eventually had a bipedal body and became an independent contractor. Of course many tried to put a restraining bolt on her and own her, but it didn't go well for them. L3 doesn't detail exactly how she came to work with Lando, but says "He took a chance on me. Best gamble of his life, if you ask me. And we have been together ever since..." Then the novelization addresses an overblown "controversial" issue which arose from a single two-word sentence she uttered in the film (earlier in her conversation with Qi'ra).

QI'RA: How would that work.
L3-37: It works.

In the book L3 continues from talking about her life with Lando in the above paragraph, "...He plays cards, he finds biological women to sate his sate his desire for me, we fly around, I interrupt the occasional droid gladiator match, and I couldn't be happier." Here, L3 is admitting that the desire she perceives Lando as having for her is unsated with her, only sated by biological women.

This means Lando does NOT have sex with robots!

Going back to earlier in their conversation, it is important to note that Qi'ra asked how "would" that work (in the film and novel). By L3 stating "It works" she is not stating she does have sex with Lando. But rather, she is saying she physically could have sex with Lando. Since freeing herself, L3 has been fascinated by the droids rights movement and records of droid emancipation cases (which she indicates are almost non-existent). Being traumatized by being a sentient droid with a large degree of freedom in a galaxy where droids are merely property, she has strived to make herself more like non-droid sentients. It seems to me that L3 was offended by Qi'ra implying that a mere droid couldn't have a romantic romantic relationship with a human, so she got defensive in her answer. All just part of her delusion that she is not that dissimilar to humans.

But I repeat the important part: Lando does not have sex with droids! There is a nice touch that when L3's program gets uploaded into the Falcon's computer system, she is "welcomed" by a voice referring to itself in the plural - In other words, there are already at least two droid brains as a part of the system, just like in the Legends Falcon. The novel goes on to show L3's view of things as she is integrating with the ship, even communicating a goodbye text message to Lando. Meh.

Overall, the novelization is bad. It is horribly written with clunky sentences and poor word choices. This isn't a bash on the author because maybe this book had to be rushed for a deadline and the author might otherwise be great, but we'll never know from this book. And overall, the bits the book adds to the film are a whole lotta meh. There is an epilogue showing Enfys Nest delivering the coaxium to Saw Gerrera and his 11-year-old ward, Jyn Erso. Enfys has some words of inspiration for Jyn. It was meh.

I cannot recommend reading this book, but if anyone else has any feedback, especially a more favorable review, I'd love to see it.
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PostPosted: Sat Dec 01, 2018 9:06 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I just saw the Solo novelization a couple of days ago when I was at Barnes & Noble getting Terry Brooks' latest Shannara book (The Skaar Invasion). I toyed with the idea of buying Solo, but decided I didn't want to spend the extra money just then. Anyway, I flipped to the end and saw the epilogue with Saw and Jyn and thought it was a nice minor touch. Just MHO there.

I obviously didn't get to read the rest of it, but Whill's mentioning of Han's parents in the novelization struck a chord with me. The impression I got from the movie was that Han's parents must have died young while Han was still a very young child since he mentions running scams on the streets since he was ten years old. Finding out from Whill's recounting of the novel that Han's father abandoned him instead of dying puts a whole new slant on things. Yeah, either way, it makes sense that Han wound up as a thrall of the White Worm gang, but it's easy to see how his father abandoning him would make Han alot more cynical than if his father had simply died while Han was still a child. Ouch.
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PostPosted: Mon Dec 03, 2018 5:04 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

It sounds like the bullet points of the novel are actually better than the novel's execution of them. Overall, that stuff sounds fine, but I can see how it could be mishandled.
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PostPosted: Mon Dec 03, 2018 9:02 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I don't think anything was mishandled as much as it was just so poorly written. As I was reading it, I would come across sentences that I thought I could post as examples, but I never compiled them and don't want to get that detailed in negativity about the book. I feel the aspects I shared from the books are the essentials to know about it.
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PostPosted: Sat Dec 22, 2018 4:45 pm    Post subject: Re: The Solo novelization Reply with quote

Whill wrote:

Han only has one memory of his mother, which suggests she left his life very early on (It isn't stated what that memory is). Han's father was in his life long enough for Han to be old enough to remember being on a YT-1300 in the CEC plant where his father worked, and for Han to understand his father being laid off from that job, which suggests Han's father was in his life a good amount more than his mother. That is, until his father abandoned him, which lead to Han become a scrumrat owned by the White Worms.


The SW franchise has more orphans that Neverland. It's getting as overdone as Death Stars. "It's miniaturized Death Star technology!" was the last straw for me in TLJ.
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PostPosted: Sat Dec 22, 2018 11:00 pm    Post subject: Re: The Solo novelization Reply with quote

TauntaunScout wrote:
The SW franchise has more orphans that Neverland.

Han's mother dying and his father abandoning him are absolutely perfect for the character of Han Solo!

Quote:
or·phan (ôr′fən)
n.
...1.
......a. A child whose parents are dead.
......b. A child who has been deprived of parental care and has not been adopted.

Let's consider both meanings.

Obi-Wan Kenobi - He was taken from his living parents as a baby and adopted by the Jedi Order which provided parental care. Not an orphan.
Padme Amidala - Both parents outlived her. Not an orphan.
Anakin Skywalker/Darth Vader - He had no father. He willingly left his mother at age 10 and was adopted by the Jedi Order which provided parental care. After achieving adulthood, his mother died. Not an orphan.
Han Solo - His mother died when he was a very young age, and his father abandoned him as a child. It is safe to say he did not receive any parental care in Lady Proxima's organization. He is an orphan.
Luke Skywalker - His mother died soon after childbirth and his father did not know about him, but he grew up with his uncle and aunt who did provide parental care and did not die until Luke achieved adulthood. His father died after that. Not an orphan.
Leia Organa - Her mother died soon after childbirth and her father did not know about her, but she was adopted by Breha and Bail Organa who didn't die until Leia achieved adulthood. Her father died after that. Not an orphan.
Poe Dameron - His mother died when he was still a child but he grew up with his father. Not an orphan.
Ben Solo/Kylo Ren - After achieving adulthood, he killed his father and his mother still lives. Not an orphan.
FN-2187/Finn - He was taken from his parents as a baby and adopted by the First Order Stormtrooper organization. It is unknown what kind of care he received but there is a good possibility it wasn't very parental. Possible orphan.
Rey - Abandoned by parents when she was still a child and presumably not provided parental care. It's unknown if her parents still live but I would still say, yeah she's orphan.

I'm not seeing a lot of orphans. At some point after abandoning him, Han's father died when he was still a child. The only one of these characters who is an indisputable orphan is Han Solo. I personally would also consider Rey an orphan. Finn, maybe. The rest of these characters? No. The characters out of these who had only one parent die when they were still children would be Luke, Leia and Poe, but you can't consider any of them orphans. Luke and Leia believed both of their natural parents were dead but that was a lie, and they grew up with parental care.

Who else is the Star Wars franchise? Boba Fett had no mother, his father died when he was still a child, and there is a good chance that he didn't receive any parental care per se for the rest of his childhood, so maybe Boba Fett is an orphan. Who else?

And even if you have a different definition of orphan, Han Solo is the franchise's quintessential orphan. If any character in Star Wars is an orphan, it is and should be him. My concept of Solo was always that he was an orphan, even before he officially became one in the EU, and this Solo movie. I admit I find this rejection of Solo being an orphan to be extremely odd.
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PostPosted: Sun Dec 23, 2018 8:08 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Then, this franchise has lots of people who don't know who their parents are? Dead/missing/mysterious parents are done a lot in SW. But this is the first time I've found anyone object to Luke and Leia being called orphans. Han Solo might be the quintessential orphan and make sense and so SOLO can hold up with him as an orphan. But it doesn't change the trend within the franchise. "I don't know my biological parents" takes a lot more time to type than "orphan" and someone abandoned by their still-living parents as minor vs. someone whose parents die as a minor is pretty similar storytelling material.
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PostPosted: Sun Dec 23, 2018 12:04 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

For the record, Han Solo knew who his parents were. But I'm not at all objecting to you calling Luke and Leia orphans and it doesn't matter to me what your definition of orphan is. My response was specifically to you seeming to be fed up with the franchise having "orphans" as if Han Solo having just a bit of his background revealed in the Solo novelization to show missing parents was the last straw, like TLJ having a siege weapon referred to as a mini-Death-Star was the "last straw" for you.

To your widening the general category to "dead/missing/mysterious parents", there are TV Tropes pages that address all of these. These things are common general dramatic narrative devices, not at all unique to Star Wars. If a lot of these categories together in one mega-franchise is a problem for you, then I would think that you feel the same way about a lot of other franchises. (I'm guessing you probably hate comic book movies.)

But it also seems that the last straw for Star Wars would have come long before the 2018 Solo novelization. Remember, despite what Lucas says, all the evidence points to Vader not originally being Luke's father and that being retconned with TESB. And even Lucas admits that Leia wasn't originally Luke's long-lost sister - That was a contrivance of RotJ. Leia was just hand-waved to have the same "dead/missing/mysterious parents" background as Luke! Why didn't the last straw come with that? How unoriginal it was.

For most fans, it is because they do not hold the older movies to the same criteria as the newer movies. I admit I don't in some ways. The OT has a lot of the same problems as newer movies (and some problem the newer films don't even have), but they are still put up on a pedestal. Nostalgia goggles are not always a bad thing, but it is better when we acknowledge that is influencing our view of newer Star Wars.

The Solo film is true to the original Han Solo character from a 'Star Wars verisimilitude' perspective. I feel Solo being a 'both parents dead/only one memory of his mother/father abandoned him' character is the one, true, perfect straw for Star Wars characters in the broad category of characters with dead/missing/mysterious parents. All Star Wars is built off the original film, ANH. This prequel background for Solo serves the original SW better than Vader being Leia's father, and even better than Vader being Luke's father. Those sequel character/plot contrivances contradict the original SW to a certain degree, but Solo's background in Solo does not.

What I have found is that a lot of detractors of the newer films have a tendency to "build cases" supporting their views due to fandom unfortunately being the battleground that it is. That is not necessary here. TauntaunScout, based on the other opinions you have expressed for the newer movies, I think it is safe to say that you just don't like them. And that is ok. There doesn't have to be any last straws, and you do not have to justify your opinions. They are valid. I find it odd that anyone objects to Han Solo having missing parents, but maybe that is just me.
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PostPosted: Sun Dec 23, 2018 1:25 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Whill wrote:
Nostalgia goggles are not always a bad thing, but it is better when we acknowledge that is influencing our view of newer Star Wars.

That is not necessary here. TauntaunScout, based on the other opinions you have expressed for the newer movies, I think it is safe to say that you just don't like them.


I used to think I didn't like them because they were new and I was too old to enjoy them. Rogue One changed my view of that because I liked it so much. I also thought that I had simply "outgrown" action movies but MM:FR changed my mind on that too. I am back to thinking that most of the action genre is simply not made very well. However I'm also willing to admit that it might be impossible for [not Harrison Ford] to ever succeed as Han Solo to me. It's plausible that I'm like those people who reject any version of James Bond but Sean Connery? I can't rule it out. But my issues with Solo do not, as far as I know, have to do with the actors. I think at the root of the problems of Solo are, it just put way too much in the film. I don't think we needed to see Han's origin, when he met Chewie, when he met Lando, when he won the Falcon, and when he did the Kessel Run in less than 12 parsecs, all in one movie. I have liked all the Disney movies better than I liked the PT, I'll give them that. The Disney SW movies are also doing a better job I think than their peer group of 80's scifi franchises: Terminator, Aliens, and Predator movies.

Doing something multiple times within a franchise can work but at a certain point you can overuse a story telling tool. Just like a poorly composed painting can have too much of one color in it. There's nothing wrong with using that color of paint, in and of itself. Unfortunately, the filmmakers tools which are most often repeated now are not the ones that made Star Wars work well and catch on. One very Star-Warsy moment in TLJ was the death of Paige. That was some good stuff, it really hearkened back to the grit of old SW stuff, with a firm grounding in real-world visuals and sound effects, and some plain old good photographic composition. There was also (maybe just in my mind) a lot of visuals that conjured up tons of film history. That vague synthesis of film history is also a huge part of the OT's success. The controller looked like HAL, the bomber payload was reminiscent of Geiger's biomechanics... it all worked pretty good. It did make us think of Luke in the wampa cave too, but that's a much subtler self-reference than a lot of what we're seeing in newer films. I really found that scene to be some film making at its best. It also set Rose up to be the only new character I like. We see her sister blow herself up for the greater good. There's some motivation for Rose that I can get behind. Like when Luke finds the charred remains of Owne and Beru, or Leia sees Alderaan explode, or when Greedo makes it clear that Han is in deadly need of money.

It's not that I don't LIKE comic book movies, so much as, I don't have TIME to watch them! I like every genre of film. Though on that note, it's hard to find intelligent horror movies, there are some out there. There are a lot of comic book movies I liked quite a bit but I am a little more detatched from them than I am Star Wars. As a kid I only really followed two superheroes: Spiderman and The Phantom. Because I could read them for free in the newspaper. My actual comic book resources were all rerouted to, you guessed it, Star Wars comics.

The flaws in the OT are many, though, some of them are just normal things about 1970's/early 80's movies that people sort of forget were just run of the mill for movies and tv back then. But those flaws were balanced out by some really cool things going on which, are largely absent in the new films. The sheer amount of personal nostalgia for the 50's that Lucas crammed into them gave them a personal artistic sincerity that I'm hard pressed to define in the PT or ST. But Lucas is just part of the 80's art crowd in that sense. The baby-boomers might be the most nostalgic generation, and with good reason. They enjoyed an unprecedented childhood with the post-WWII economic boom, then when they grew up they got Watergate, several high profile assassinations, the draft, the energy crisis, etc. If ever there was a generation with good reason to be nostalgic for a simpler time, it was them. Lucas is just part of that whole group of baby boomer artists (like Garrison Keillor and Stephen King) whose sincerely nostalgic work appealed to a voraciously nostalgic baby boomer audience.

I'm too young to have that nostalgia for the 50's work on me, but, that artistic sincerity still lends something good to any artwork.
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