J.J. Abrams Signs Up To Direct Star Wars VII

[DeimosMasque]

Pu-leeze to you. I've been a Star Trek fan for over 20 years, watched every episode of TOS, TNG, DS9, VOY, and ENT + all the movies waaaay more than I should have (I probably average the whole kitten twice a year... what? There is a lot!). Yes, Rick Berman and Brannon Braga suck. I would even call them monsters... but they didn't kill Star Trek. They left it weak and hungry, but they didn't kill it.

Abrams killed it. There is nothing "Star Trek" in the last movie. The names are there, but the characters are not (no, I don't mean actors). You can not drown someone, remove internal organs, place them in a new body, and say that you "saved" them. This is a Frankenstein monster, it is an abomination. You can play the doctor and placate it all you want, but it murdered a child and the villagers are pissed.

I'm not going to get into a debate about the movie because the truth is you're not going to convince me and I'm not going to convince you.

But what you said at the end, that is proof that Star Trek was already dead. And it was, it was dead and gone... it was never coming back until it actually came back. Berman and Braga killed it with Enterprise and the TNG movies.

 

[LadyTiamat]

Am I the only person on this site who likes Abrams movies?

Nope. I look forward to see what he does with it.

 

[eljawa]

Dear Disney,

Every single director in hollywood would of loved to do this film. Most of them must of been begging for it. You could of gotten any director, any of the oscar winning, epic making geniuses who have untouched track records that should of made you, as a studio, absolutely been drooling. WHY DID YOU GO WITH CAPTAIN LENS FLARE?

yo, no one wanted it.

People don't want to be known as the guy who killed star wars. Award winning directors don't want to be working under Disney and Lucasfilm to tell someone elses story.

Meanwhile, Abrams is known for not only being commercially successful but also Critically successful, is able to handle sci fi and special effects, and already once rebooted a loved franchise with success.

He had a lot of lens flare in one film. Get over it

So we'll have effeminate boys getting into fist fights? No thanks. There is still only three Star Wars movies.

*are

and technically you are wrong. There are 6 with at least 3 more on the way.

If you try to argue that the prequels suck then you should also argue that Episode 6 sucks, since it has all of the same problems (bad script, bad acting, lame visual style, weak directing, fucking ewoks), but isnt nearly as interesting as episode 3.

I don't think there will be as much of a "battle" as there will be wailing.
He already managed to destroy the legacy of Star Trek in one fell swoop turning it from one of the only series with some thought and care put into them for a certain subset of people into shooty things and lens-flare like every other 3rd rate "Sci-Fi" out there.

Now he's apparently gunning for Star Wars, I don't want to imagine the levels of horror...

95% on rotten tomatoes says that literally almost everyone who knows what they are talking about disagrees.

 

[blueshark217]

All I keep hearing is whining. Good directors have made shit, and shit directors have made gold. So why go ape-shit already? All we know is the director, and nothing else. I remain cautiously optimistic.

 

[wulf3n]

Abrams killed it. There is nothing "Star Trek" in the last movie. The names are there, but the characters are not (no, I don't mean actors).

Star Trek died the minute they decided to make a TNG movie. There is "nothing Star Trek" in any of the TNG films, they're just poor attempts at blockbuster action movies.

You claim Abrams killed Star Trek, but he just did succesfully what Berman and Braga had been trying to do for four movies.

 

[SextusMaximus]

I like J.J. Abrams.

He is however, one of the worst possible choices I could have thought of for this project. Has killed my interest in it sadly.

 

[Edl01]

How I think it went:
Disney: Hey want to direct the new star wars?
J.J: No!
Disney: Did we mention our big pile of money?
J.J: Where do I sign?

 

[Blood Brain Barrier]

There's nothing funny about "lens flares" since they were all over that damn movie.

But if you're looking for other reasons why it sucked and likely drove the entire Star Trek brand into the ground long-term, see here: http://whatculture.com/film/15-blunders-that-ruined-j-j-abrams-star-trek-and-destroyed-the-franchise.php

Pu-leeze. I've been a Star Trek fan for over 20 years now, watched nearly every episode of TNG as it aired. Watched all of Deep Space Nine and Voyager as it aired and even gave Enterprise a chance.

The Abrams film didn't kill Star Trek: Rick Berman and Brannon Braga did. If anything Abrams at least saved the IP from dying completely.

Pu-leeze to you. I've been a Star Trek fan for over 20 years, watched every episode of TOS, TNG, DS9, VOY, and ENT + all the movies waaaay more than I should have (I probably average the whole kitten twice a year... what? There is a lot!). Yes, Rick Berman and Brannon Braga suck. I would even call them monsters... but they didn't kill Star Trek. They left it weak and hungry, but they didn't kill it.

Abrams killed it. There is nothing "Star Trek" in the last movie. The names are there, but the characters are not (no, I don't mean actors). You can not drown someone, remove internal organs, place them in a new body, and say that you "saved" them. This is a Frankenstein monster, it is an abomination. You can play the doctor and placate it all you want, but it murdered a child and the villagers are pissed.

While this may be true, I would also say all those things about Nemesis. There is nothing that Abram's film did which exceeded the damage that horrible, ugly film inflicted on ST's heritage.

 

[Arcane Azmadi]

Oh lord oh lord why have you forsaken me?

Then again, if I'm being brutally honest here, I never expected anything to begine with. Star Wars has been dead to me for YEARS.

 

[2fish]

After the last 3 it can't get much worse....

So then the squadron of gungans (all jar jars kids so they have the same mental issues) dash into the time machine to save Luke and Leia from the Sith assassins after they start to rebuild the galaxy. Then we will make a comedy scene where they stumble into Leia/Han's first night together for an awkward rom-com moment.

I hope this movie at least feels like a star wars film.

Movie Bob I expect you to be reviewing for all types of star wars fans on this movie. The obsessed, the casual, the original trilogy diehards, the new trilogy was better wrong people, and the other factions that exist.

Thats a scripting issue not a directorial one.

Seeing as we don't know who is writing it I stand by my post. It is possible to get worse, much worse.

 

[Azex]

The only way things get worse is if he is picked to do a 40k movie too.

 

[Owyn_Merrilin]

After the last 3 it can't get much worse....

So then the squadron of gungans (all jar jars kids so they have the same mental issues) dash into the time machine to save Luke and Leia from the Sith assassins after they start to rebuild the galaxy. Then we will make a comedy scene where they stumble into Leia/Han's first night together for an awkward rom-com moment.

I hope this movie at least feels like a star wars film.

Movie Bob I expect you to be reviewing for all types of star wars fans on this movie. The obsessed, the casual, the original trilogy diehards, the new trilogy was better wrong people, and the other factions that exist.

Thats a scripting issue not a directorial one.

Seeing as we don't know who is writing it I stand by my post. It is possible to get worse, much worse.

We actually do know -- it's the writer from Toy Story 3. Good writer, but still a troublingly odd choice for a Star Wars film.

 

[2fish]

secret santa snip

Really...wow, um no idea if that will work. Maybe if they bring back the claw?

 

[Icehearted]

On the bright side (c wut i did?) his reboot of Star Trek was actually a pretty fun watch, and some of hat retro style may present itself in the upcoming movies. Abrams has demosntrated his love for movies of the 70s and 80s era, so these could turn out better than the more recent Lucas abortions.

Also lense flare, because I knew this was coming... even if you all beat me to it.

Boy I hope he's paying attention to the lens flare bitching, or he'll pull a Lucas and give nary a fuck about what the fans say and shit out another disaster.

 

[TKretts3]

The whole lens flare thing is getting older faster than the 'arrow in the knee' thing...

 

[Doug]

I'm not really into Star Wars or Trek so I wouldn't really know...is this going to be an issue for the fans?

Its probably going to be a split; alot of star trek fans don't like what he did with Star Trek - I personally thought it was fine - but given the Star Wars fans have already had everything good about Star Wars tainted by Lucas, I have no idea how they'll react to this.

Personally, I think Abrams is a good choice for Star wars, but we'll see what he does with it.

EDIT:

Cool.

Star Trek was fucking great.

... What's that? We're all complaining? Oh, OK then.

I wouldn't say it was fucking great, but I definely enjoyed it and thought it was at least 'alright' if not 'good'. But yeah, everyone just seems to be moaning and posting billions of 'lense flare' photos. Le-sigh.

Remember how Light Saber fights were actually about something?
Remember how Jedi and Sith pulling out their swords to fight actually meant that shit just got serious?
Remember how suddenly everyone drew their effing light saber at the slightest inconvenience?
Remember how that trend got carried on into every other Star Wars-product since then?
Remember how that was bloody stupid?

Yeah, I see more of that in your future, Star Wars.

Indeedie - I do think Abrams had at least some understanding of Star Trek (a hell of alot more than the people who did all the previous Star Trek next-gen movies), and I certainly think he understands more about the appeal of Star Wars than George Lucas ever did.

Personally, I would like to see someone who actually cares more about the story aspect of films rather than the visuals and tension.

Fair enough - I would argue though that the new Star Trek did at least have characters and some plot that at least made as much sense as the Star Trek universe does. I do admit he has a very definite visual style that somewhat overwhelms the story sometimes.

HOWEVER, I would add that he's a better choice for trying to clear up Star Trek than Lucas could ever manage.

To be, Abrams is good at new and shiny, but Star Wars is best when grotty and run down. Case in point - Millennium Falcon

True - I definitely think he'll be able to do the 'clean' type environments of the Empire (i.e. the insides of their ships, the death stars, etc), but I do hope he'll be able to do the 'down and dirty' environments too; come to think of it, he did have the Romulian mining ship in ST that did seem to be quite dark and dirty. We'll see, I suppose.

To quote Plinkett in his Star Trek: the Star Trek review.

"In fact, JJ Abrams should have directed the Star Wars Prequels and George Lucas should have directed people to their seats."

I have to admit, I was SO thinking of Mr Plinkett when I was thinking about this.

IF Episodes 7, 8, and 9 are good, i think Disney should give him the leyway to redo the prequels and try and salvage something from the mess George left on the whole Star Wars universe.

EDIT2:

The whole lens flare thing is getting older faster than the 'arrow in the knee' thing...

Agreed. It was funny the first time or two, now its just sad and annoying.