Star Wars: The Force Awakens' Full Trailer Stands Revealed

[ServebotFrank]

Also, seems like either Rey or Finn will be the new Jedi to oppose the Dark Jedi/Sith, but I do hope they don't rush it, with Rey/Finn going from regular Joe to full-fledged force user within the span of one movie, unless there are timeskips. It took Luke 3 whole movies (which in-universe spanned about 4 years) to become capable of standing up to Vader, from being unable to do anything but watch in A New Hope, to getting his ass kicked in Empire, to coming into his own in Return. I like that aspect of the OT, that it took time for Luke to grow as a person and a force user, both in-universe and in a real sense.

They mentioned in Comic-Con that they were going back to the roots of Lightsaber duels. Back in the originals, Lucas forced the actors to hold the lightsaber with two hands as if it was a giant claymore and they were inexperienced with it. Finn holding the lightsaber like he does gives credit to the idea that he has no fucking idea what he's doing and I suspect the battle with Kylo will be a very much one sided affair.

I actually expect Luke to show up to take charge at the end of the film and take on Kylo after Finn gets his ass kicked.

 

[Oroboros]

Eh, didn't really get me excited to be honest. I guess the leaked story got me bummed out that this will most likely be just a rehash of the first movie.

Spoiler: Actual spoilers

I mean really, another death star? Luke handing down his lightsaber just like Obi Wan handed down Anakins? Empire still going strong while Republic still acts like rebels, despite the rebellion toppling the Empire 30 years prior? This makes no sense.

I'll reserve judgement until I see the film, but I can't help but feel something is off.

Coming right after the last Star Trek which indulgently referenced every bit of Trek pop culture, this has me worried.

JJ supposedly had a near pathological need to control what defined star trek going forward- redesigning pretty much everything from TOS and going as far as to attempt to get a complete cessation of non-'NuTrek' Trek merchandise.

One of the common complaints I have seen repeated is that the Starfleet designs looked too slick and polished-with interiors in particular that were compared to apple products. The new stormtrooper armor is on record as being designed specifically with apple aesthetics in mind. and it's not just the stormtroopers that have been redesigned- *everything* seems to have been redesigned-both rebel and imperial.

So worst case scenario I'm fearing is that the (apparent) JJ-sci-fi-template is going to saturate the movie and make it feel more like a reboot than a continuation of the Original Trilogy, with older actors doing their "hey, remember me, I was in the old movies!" routine and transparent 'fanservice' doing more to call attention to the gap between the movies than to bridge them.

 

[FirstNameLastName]

[Jesus Christ, Snip.]

While that was an interesting read, I'm still going with the "they wouldn't have the balls to make Luke a villain" route. Maybe I'm being overly pessimistic, but I have a feeling that they'll likely try to play it safe, especially for the first in this new trilogy. And if they do make him evil in later instalments, then there wouldn't be any reason to hide him in the trailer to preserve this twist.
Besides, most (almost all) of what you just said isn't even explained in the films, so I doubt many people would understand why Luke is now evil. Having him become evil at the end could pave the way for another trilogy, but I have to wonder how long they mean to milk such a thing. I guess they'll want their money's worth.

Well that's the kicker. Most people who watch Star Wars honestly don't get it for some reason, I guess because it's a bit too subtle, especially seeing as a lot of the evidence is presented out of order, for example you don't know about the prophecy and the whole "balance" thing until the prequels, at which point it puts a whole new light on what happened in the original trilogy. It also explains certain things people have puzzled over like how Sidious was apparently so powerful (killing 3 Jedi Masters simultaneously) yet the Sith were eradicated, simply put The Force was on his side. Ditto for Obi-Wan's "cheese" move he pulled out of nowhere to take down Darth Maul. This is why I talk about having respect for the material.

Star Wars can also undergo an infinite number of cycles. I mean I've always thought having the galaxy actually ruled by a Sith Empire and having the good guys discover Jedism, and gradually work there way up through the system pretending they are Sith (much like what Sidious did in reverse) could be interesting especially if the parallels are shown. What's more even with what I said if they bring about free will in the final act (or think they did) as I explained that could still end it on a high note even without moving on to other cycles.

That said Disney's "Star Wars: Rebels" program does seem to point in the direction your talking about since I can't see Disney declaring it's own, current, stuff non-canon. This means that unless it's a kid's series that ends like "Blake's 7" (I can hear the screams of ruined childhoods already) we have several civil war-era Jedi including Anakin's Clone Wars Padawan still trotting around which plays havoc with some of the logic... though I suppose it could still be resolved one way or another, especially if it ends with the Empire dropping bodies in the final episode.... but then again... Disney. So, there are some supporting arguments to be made that they aren't going to respect the material...

While I have no real contempt for JJ Abrams, he's the guy that turned Star Trek, a story story largely about contemplating morality, science, and avoiding conflict if possible, and turned it into explosions, punching people, and other action stuff. Granted, the previous Star Trek movies seemed to do a good job of that already. Even so, having Luke turn evil seem like a bit too much of a bold move, although I would certainly respect them for such a thing. I quite like stories where, after defeating the villain, the protagonist becomes the villain in the next instalment.

Seems lame from my perspective, we already did it once in the prequels, having Luke turn evil in the new movies strikes me as a copout, it would basically be a rehash of Anakin's fall perhaps with a different motive. It's not bold, it would just draw comparisons to the prequel trilogy with yet another "good jedi falls to the dark side" that we've seen in just the movies, and a thousand times already in the EU. There's plenty of good plots without falling into one of the most cliche EU storylines out there, seriously, the new Republic EU stuff before it got wiped basically had every jedi and their dog fall to the dark side at least once, everybody wanted to do a vader style redemption arc, doing it again with Luke would just come off as silly.

Despite theuromancers weird head canon he seems to be trying to push as the actual theme of the trilogy and prequels, which I could spend all day poking holes in, Luke turning evil because of some sort of oscillating balance in the force sounds really dumb. Seriously, there is free will in the Star Wars universe, have a quote from Lucas himself:

"This is a world where evil has run amuck. But you have control over your destiny, you have many paths to walk down, and you can choose which destiny is going to be yours."
George Lucas- Time interview (Bill Moyers) 03/05/99

That's just me though, I'm not going to pretend I know what the new movies are going to be like, but another goddamn fallen Jedi arc just doesn't interest me, every hack EU writer for the last 30 years has tried the old "what if X fell to the dark side?" It's old, but I'll take that over the boring political trade debates peppered into the first two prequel movies.

I've never touched the EU, so I'll have to take your word on it being stale. Although I can see the comparisons to Anikin, although, Anikin's fall never really felt like a fall. It felt to me more like "he needs to be evil so we can shove him into the Darth Vadar suit, quick, think of something. Oh, Padme's pregnant? Good enough, I guess."

 

[Therumancer]

Your not the only one, the internet has had a very mixed reception to Finn, which of course SJWs like to brand as racist. I'm willing to give the character a chance, but I personally think they should have cast another Maori as Finn given that the guy who played Jango Fett was a pacific islander.

In the EU it wouldn't be as noteworthy because Storm Troopers were just guys recruited from various planets The Empire captured. In some of the fiction written about the TIE Fighter games for example it tells the story of the pilot your supposed to be playing and how while recruited to be a pilot, his best friend from the same planet that was conquered was enlisted into the Storm Troopers. Since there are black people on planets, there could thus be black Storm Troopers. Nowadays though it makes the Spaceballs joke about it standing out surprisingly prophetic because they did away with the EU and as they explained the army of the Empire is made up of clones, and we've seen the guy they cloned outside of his armor, in detail. The only clone that differs from this is Boba Fett which according to some off-movie explanation had more genetic diversity since a "son" was a special request from Jango as part of his payment.

Well there's a reason those dastardly SJWs consider people who take some horrible issue with a black Stormtrooper (which I'm sure is the only thing they take issue with and there is absolutely no problems with simply a black person daring to exist), and that's because you happened to miss the whole part about Jango clones being phased out of the Stormtroopers. Which sort of puts a dent in the "we're only complaining because it violates canon" excuse.

OT: Hype.

Explain to me where in either movie trilogy it says the clones were phased out? I myself pointed out that if they used EU material this argument could be made, but they decided to put a bullet in the head of the EU, and like it or not the prequels did redefine some things about the original series.

In the EU, Finn makes perfect sense, in the new canon, not so much. I can see some of the arguments about Rebels being lasting canon (other than hype to make the show stand out), but if they nuked the EU I have my doubts, especially seeing as the very nature of the series means they will have to kill everyone off, or at least the Force users. Basically anyone or anything that would have been a factor in the resolution of the original trilogy and would interfere with the new movies dependent on it. I'd imagine anything having to do with Anakin having his own Padawan which includes Rebels and Clone Wars is ultimately doomed even if Disney wants to keep it simply because that would have been a major factor in the storyline. Both Obi-Wan and Vader would have made a big effort of seeking her out, or the name would have at least come up, but the concept hadn't even been conceived of along with the original trilogy so by Disney's current logic they are ultimately going to wind up needing to condemn their own work to the *ahem* "Legends" universe.

We could argue this back and forth endlessly over what contradicts what. At the end of the day Disney created Finn, it's a done deal. A lot of people think this is a problem, and it comes down between people argueing what they see as Canon vs. SJWs trying to claim it's racism, which might be true in some cases, but for the most part doesn't seem likely.

To be honest I suspect Disney created it's own rules for what is canon, broke them on a few levels, and created Finn the way they did specifically to bait these kinds of arguments and drum up interest since people all over the fandom wouldn't be having book-length arguments on the subject otherwise. Making Finn a (former) Storm Trooper is what did it, as opposed to simply having a black character which had already been done within Star Wars.

 

[Therumancer]

Why does it feel post-apocalyptic? They make it seem like all knowledge of the original trilogy has been lost and turned to legend in less than 30 years. I don't know, the primary feeling I got from this was loss and sadness, like very thing fell apart after Endor for some reason and they're in some bizarre dark age.

That's how Star Wars works, there is no free will and things are "forgotten" due to The Force intervening to move things from cycle to cycle. This is why technology has stagnated and such as well. Don't forget that what the Sith were was also forgotten despite them having ruled a galaxy-wide empire for thousands of years, mastered all these arcane abilities, and pretty much enslaved everyone, there were cataclysmic wars and what seems to be multiple genocides committed for the greater good, and yet amazingly nobody thought to write any of this down, so when the Sith are returning everyone is dealing with "the mystery of the Sith" and going "gee, WTF is a Sith anyway".

Things move through cycles and everything unfolds as The Force intends, good and evil both getting their cycles. Things like history, logical technological development, etc... just don't happen. Despite there having been a huge civil war 30 years ago, people not knowing the details is hardly surprising. I mean consider the technology used in the prequels, Old Republic, original trilogy, and apparently in this trilogy is pretty much the same thing, it's not like say comparing the tech of the 1970s to the tech at the turn of the millennium.

I explained it all in another long ramble.

As far as it being post-apocalyptic seeming, from what little I've heard the scenes your seeing are largely set on a junk/garbage planet which is why your seeing salvage and such. That said since the universe is heading towards a cycle of evil, the cycle of good having just ended, one has to expect things to be really grim unless your one of the bad guys getting your evil on.

I could of course be wrong, but at the end of the day if they respect the universe this is going to be dark. I expect Luke to be a bad guy. To end things on an upbeat note I'm guessing the ending is going to be some kind of development of free will, and a metaphysical confrontation with The Force ending the cycles.

 

[Tiamat666]

I had high hopes for it, but unfortunately I think its going to suck for three reasons:

1. Original Cast
This is almost always a red flag. It's a sign that the filmmakers are going for fan-service and digging in the fame of the originals instead of focusing on the plot and quality of their own storytelling.

2. Death Star Thing
Seriously? Again!? R U Fukkin' kidding me???

3. Black Stormtrooper
We are Disney and we have to be politically correct about shit so here we present you with "the black guy" thereby fulfilling the minority quota. I'm sure the asian and hispanic guys will also show up at some point.
Unfortunately, political correctness rarely makes a compelling movie.

 

[NLS]

3. Black Stormtrooper
We are Disney and we have to be politically correct about shit so here we present you with "the black guy" thereby fulfilling the minority quota. I'm sure the asian and hispanic guys will also show up at some point.
Unfortunately, political correctness rarely makes a compelling movie.

Neither does an all-white cast set in a galaxy far far away. Seriously it's been over a year now, and you're still concerned about this? No, I've had it.
Some people just don't want to see a black protagonist in the Star Wars movies, and will blame it on either the clones and EU inconsistency (which they can never win), or simply state that Disney is trying too hard to be politically correct.
How fucking hard can it be to accept that they've cast a person of non-white skin tone to portray a protagonist? Oh no, you have to judge the actor and their role solely by the fact that he was cast as a politically correct person to fill Disneys quota and automatically as terrible. "There is simply no way a non-white person can play a role as perfect as an aryan person". How about you just man up and say it out loud that you're a racist that dislikes seeing people of non-white skin tones in major movie roles? That way we won't have to argue about EU continuity or whether or not Disney is playing it PC cool.

 

[Ukomba]

Why does it feel post-apocalyptic? They make it seem like all knowledge of the original trilogy has been lost and turned to legend in less than 30 years. I don't know, the primary feeling I got from this was loss and sadness, like very thing fell apart after Endor for some reason and they're in some bizarre dark age.

That's how Star Wars works, there is no free will and things are "forgotten" due to The Force intervening to move things from cycle to cycle. This is why technology has stagnated and such as well. Don't forget that what the Sith were was also forgotten despite them having ruled a galaxy-wide empire for thousands of years, mastered all these arcane abilities, and pretty much enslaved everyone, there were cataclysmic wars and what seems to be multiple genocides committed for the greater good, and yet amazingly nobody thought to write any of this down, so when the Sith are returning everyone is dealing with "the mystery of the Sith" and going "gee, WTF is a Sith anyway".

Things move through cycles and everything unfolds as The Force intends, good and evil both getting their cycles. Things like history, logical technological development, etc... just don't happen. Despite there having been a huge civil war 30 years ago, people not knowing the details is hardly surprising. I mean consider the technology used in the prequels, Old Republic, original trilogy, and apparently in this trilogy is pretty much the same thing, it's not like say comparing the tech of the 1970s to the tech at the turn of the millennium.

I explained it all in another long ramble.

As far as it being post-apocalyptic seeming, from what little I've heard the scenes your seeing are largely set on a junk/garbage planet which is why your seeing salvage and such. That said since the universe is heading towards a cycle of evil, the cycle of good having just ended, one has to expect things to be really grim unless your one of the bad guys getting your evil on.

I could of course be wrong, but at the end of the day if they respect the universe this is going to be dark. I expect Luke to be a bad guy. To end things on an upbeat note I'm guessing the ending is going to be some kind of development of free will, and a metaphysical confrontation with The Force ending the cycles.

Please don't. I get what you're saying but couldn't disagree more. The Sith were never forgotten despite being a clandestine group by design. They were known in the old republic of Exar Kun, they were known durring KOTOR, they were known (despite having vanished for a long time) in SWTOR, The Jedi of the Prequils knew what they were, and Everyone knew what Darth Vader was during the Original Trilogy. At no point in the post Original Trilogy EU do they ever forget.

The same is true for Jedi. Despite the Empire doing it's best to stamp out and erase or twist all memory of the Jedi in the Original Trilogy, People knew what they were even if their internal training was lost. Even on Tatooine, raised by guardians trying to shelter him from his history, Luke knew about the Clone Wars. This preview gives off the vibe that the history of the conflict, and the history of the Republic before was surpassed even worse after the Empire (a group actively trying to suppress it) lost. It's not a cycle thing.

Post-Infinite Empire collapse, there hasn't been a discontinuity. The Centurion-class battlecruiser from KOTOR is WAY out classed by the Venator-class Star Destroyer from the Clone wars (~10 times more powerful) which ridiculously out classed by the Imperial-class II Star Destroyer from the Original Trillogy (~20 times more powerful). Even the Nebula-class Star Destroyer of the New Republic is a match for the Imperial-Class II at less than half the size. There's no technology loss, Force caused or not.

 

[Therumancer]

Explain to me where in either movie trilogy it says the clones were phased out? I myself pointed out that if they used EU material this argument could be made, but they decided to put a bullet in the head of the EU, and like it or not the prequels did redefine some things about the original series.

Explain to me where the original trilogy said that they still maintained an exclusively clone army despite the troopers having height differences and different voices even in the rerelease. Also explain to me where it was stated that Rebels, Clone Wars, and the Battlefront games are non-canon, instead of the more commonly understood EU of the books and comics. Then explain to me why Disney would create all these properties only to declare them irrelevant.

]
Yes, I'm sure the vast majority of people whining about the existence of a black character that only violates canon of you completely discount all the canon that says otherwise are only concerned about the integrity of the canon and not him being black.

Not sure what your saying in that last paragraph (not sarcasm I don't get it) but it occurs to me that if White Supremacy was big among Star Wars fans the outcry would have already happened over Lando, Mace Windu, and other assorted minority characters that have been present for a very long time now. I doubt many people care about Finn's blackness as much as the role he's been given and the character background. If they had simply decided he was a mercenary or something without the Storm Trooper background these discussions wouldn't be happening.

When it comes to canon, it doesn't work that way. The prequels established the Empire's Storm Troopers are clones, and nothing changed that status quo within the canon thus it continues to be true. Within the EU there is tons of justification for there being general recruiting among Storm Troopers and so on, but Disney decided to throw out all of the EU, and made a big deal about doing so, so thus none of those justifications can be used.

If you want my honest opinion I think half the issue with Finn is that people are pissed about what Disney did with the EU... or excuse me "Legends" universe, and part of the point is that if they are going to ignore the limited Canon they are accepting they should use other parts of the EU as well...

 

[Therumancer]

Why does it feel post-apocalyptic? They make it seem like all knowledge of the original trilogy has been lost and turned to legend in less than 30 years. I don't know, the primary feeling I got from this was loss and sadness, like very thing fell apart after Endor for some reason and they're in some bizarre dark age.

That's how Star Wars works, there is no free will and things are "forgotten" due to The Force intervening to move things from cycle to cycle. This is why technology has stagnated and such as well. Don't forget that what the Sith were was also forgotten despite them having ruled a galaxy-wide empire for thousands of years, mastered all these arcane abilities, and pretty much enslaved everyone, there were cataclysmic wars and what seems to be multiple genocides committed for the greater good, and yet amazingly nobody thought to write any of this down, so when the Sith are returning everyone is dealing with "the mystery of the Sith" and going "gee, WTF is a Sith anyway".

Things move through cycles and everything unfolds as The Force intends, good and evil both getting their cycles. Things like history, logical technological development, etc... just don't happen. Despite there having been a huge civil war 30 years ago, people not knowing the details is hardly surprising. I mean consider the technology used in the prequels, Old Republic, original trilogy, and apparently in this trilogy is pretty much the same thing, it's not like say comparing the tech of the 1970s to the tech at the turn of the millennium.

I explained it all in another long ramble.

As far as it being post-apocalyptic seeming, from what little I've heard the scenes your seeing are largely set on a junk/garbage planet which is why your seeing salvage and such. That said since the universe is heading towards a cycle of evil, the cycle of good having just ended, one has to expect things to be really grim unless your one of the bad guys getting your evil on.

I could of course be wrong, but at the end of the day if they respect the universe this is going to be dark. I expect Luke to be a bad guy. To end things on an upbeat note I'm guessing the ending is going to be some kind of development of free will, and a metaphysical confrontation with The Force ending the cycles.

Please don't. I get what you're saying but couldn't disagree more. The Sith were never forgotten despite being a clandestine group by design. They were known in the old republic of Exar Kun, they were known durring KOTOR, they were known (despite having vanished for a long time) in SWTOR, The Jedi of the Prequils knew what they were, and Everyone knew what Darth Vader was during the Original Trilogy. At no point in the post Original Trilogy EU do they ever forget.

The same is true for Jedi. Despite the Empire doing it's best to stamp out and erase or twist all memory of the Jedi in the Original Trilogy, People knew what they were even if their internal training was lost. Even on Tatooine, raised by guardians trying to shelter him from his history, Luke knew about the Clone Wars. This preview gives off the vibe that the history of the conflict, and the history of the Republic before was surpassed even worse after the Empire (a group actively trying to suppress it) lost. It's not a cycle thing.

Post-Infinite Empire collapse, there hasn't been a discontinuity. The Centurion-class battlecruiser from KOTOR is WAY out classed by the Venator-class Star Destroyer from the Clone wars (~10 times more powerful) which ridiculously out classed by the Imperial-class II Star Destroyer from the Original Trillogy (~20 times more powerful). Even the Nebula-class Star Destroyer of the New Republic is a match for the Imperial-Class II at less than half the size. There's no technology loss, Force caused or not.

Since you apparently don't want to get into the general discussion I won't push most of it. That said, what exactly is your source on the various capital ships? Half the problem with what Disney pulled is that any such hard material by definition goes into EU sources. For my part when I talk about technological stagnation I'm looking at say the capabilities of Astromech droids, R2-D2 is running around decades (even longer if you go EU) and he's still considered to be competitive technologically. The fighters being used in the prequel series are as far as we see on screen not really any less effective than what we see later during the Galactic Civil War. I mean someone can sit down and go off about how X-wings are so wonderful, but they didn't seem all that much more effective than the Royal Naboo fighters. I also don't see any truly pronounced differences between blasters being used in the two canon time frames. Looking at the movie trailer above if that's 30 years later we should be seeing technology being used that makes the stuff in Return Of The Jedi look like technology from 1985 compared to what we have now, and simply put it doesn't look that way to me, and I can almost guarantee R2D2 isn't going to come across as a Vic 20 or Commodore 64 trying to compete with a modern 8 core desktop, I'd imagine nobody will have much problem with him working on their ships or being slotted into a fighter.

That said I have no objection to dropping it, we'll have to agree to disagree. I just wanted to defend the point you were refuting. Half the problem with the new stuff is that Disney has pretty much rendered all EU material ranging from novels to video games and the numerous tech manual/art books obsolete and unofficial with their previous rulings. I'm not even sure as to the canon status of George Lucas' own books, for example can we even say for sure Darth Vader's ship was called "The Executor"? That's from the novelization if I remember, and never came up in the movies. As far as I can tell we have "Star Destroyers" and a "Super Star Destroyer" all of the classes, names, etc... now non-canon all we can pretty much say is canon is that they have shield generators and "Turbo Lasers".

 

[smurfinaus]

Is it natural to assume after seeing the first 6 movies (im a fan of the original trilogy but i haven't followed all the canon talk etc like many people - what on earth is EU?), that Luke would have a son or daughter to pass his legacy onto at some point (even though i have read that the likelihood of direct descendants also having force abilities is still a crapshoot). I cant be the only one surprised Disney has gone with choices of leads it has :/.

 

[Ukomba]

Why does it feel post-apocalyptic? They make it seem like all knowledge of the original trilogy has been lost and turned to legend in less than 30 years. I don't know, the primary feeling I got from this was loss and sadness, like very thing fell apart after Endor for some reason and they're in some bizarre dark age.

That's how Star Wars works, there is no free will and things are "forgotten" due to The Force intervening to move things from cycle to cycle. This is why technology has stagnated and such as well. Don't forget that what the Sith were was also forgotten despite them having ruled a galaxy-wide empire for thousands of years, mastered all these arcane abilities, and pretty much enslaved everyone, there were cataclysmic wars and what seems to be multiple genocides committed for the greater good, and yet amazingly nobody thought to write any of this down, so when the Sith are returning everyone is dealing with "the mystery of the Sith" and going "gee, WTF is a Sith anyway".

Things move through cycles and everything unfolds as The Force intends, good and evil both getting their cycles. Things like history, logical technological development, etc... just don't happen. Despite there having been a huge civil war 30 years ago, people not knowing the details is hardly surprising. I mean consider the technology used in the prequels, Old Republic, original trilogy, and apparently in this trilogy is pretty much the same thing, it's not like say comparing the tech of the 1970s to the tech at the turn of the millennium.

I explained it all in another long ramble.

As far as it being post-apocalyptic seeming, from what little I've heard the scenes your seeing are largely set on a junk/garbage planet which is why your seeing salvage and such. That said since the universe is heading towards a cycle of evil, the cycle of good having just ended, one has to expect things to be really grim unless your one of the bad guys getting your evil on.

I could of course be wrong, but at the end of the day if they respect the universe this is going to be dark. I expect Luke to be a bad guy. To end things on an upbeat note I'm guessing the ending is going to be some kind of development of free will, and a metaphysical confrontation with The Force ending the cycles.

Please don't. I get what you're saying but couldn't disagree more. The Sith were never forgotten despite being a clandestine group by design. They were known in the old republic of Exar Kun, they were known durring KOTOR, they were known (despite having vanished for a long time) in SWTOR, The Jedi of the Prequils knew what they were, and Everyone knew what Darth Vader was during the Original Trilogy. At no point in the post Original Trilogy EU do they ever forget.

The same is true for Jedi. Despite the Empire doing it's best to stamp out and erase or twist all memory of the Jedi in the Original Trilogy, People knew what they were even if their internal training was lost. Even on Tatooine, raised by guardians trying to shelter him from his history, Luke knew about the Clone Wars. This preview gives off the vibe that the history of the conflict, and the history of the Republic before was surpassed even worse after the Empire (a group actively trying to suppress it) lost. It's not a cycle thing.

Post-Infinite Empire collapse, there hasn't been a discontinuity. The Centurion-class battlecruiser from KOTOR is WAY out classed by the Venator-class Star Destroyer from the Clone wars (~10 times more powerful) which ridiculously out classed by the Imperial-class II Star Destroyer from the Original Trillogy (~20 times more powerful). Even the Nebula-class Star Destroyer of the New Republic is a match for the Imperial-Class II at less than half the size. There's no technology loss, Force caused or not.

Since you apparently don't want to get into the general discussion I won't push most of it. That said, what exactly is your source on the various capital ships? Half the problem with what Disney pulled is that any such hard material by definition goes into EU sources. For my part when I talk about technological stagnation I'm looking at say the capabilities of Astromech droids, R2-D2 is running around decades (even longer if you go EU) and he's still considered to be competitive technologically. The fighters being used in the prequel series are as far as we see on screen not really any less effective than what we see later during the Galactic Civil War. I mean someone can sit down and go off about how X-wings are so wonderful, but they didn't seem all that much more effective than the Royal Naboo fighters. I also don't see any truly pronounced differences between blasters being used in the two canon time frames. Looking at the movie trailer above if that's 30 years later we should be seeing technology being used that makes the stuff in Return Of The Jedi look like technology from 1985 compared to what we have now, and simply put it doesn't look that way to me, and I can almost guarantee R2D2 isn't going to come across as a Vic 20 or Commodore 64 trying to compete with a modern 8 core desktop, I'd imagine nobody will have much problem with him working on their ships or being slotted into a fighter.

That said I have no objection to dropping it, we'll have to agree to disagree. I just wanted to defend the point you were refuting. Half the problem with the new stuff is that Disney has pretty much rendered all EU material ranging from novels to video games and the numerous tech manual/art books obsolete and unofficial with their previous rulings. I'm not even sure as to the canon status of George Lucas' own books, for example can we even say for sure Darth Vader's ship was called "The Executor"? That's from the novelization if I remember, and never came up in the movies. As far as I can tell we have "Star Destroyers" and a "Super Star Destroyer" all of the classes, names, etc... now non-canon all we can pretty much say is canon is that they have shield generators and "Turbo Lasers".

If you want, you can try to quote a single time when the Sith were unknown to the Government or Jedi at the time. I would be interested if such a circumstance existed.

You have to keep in mind that the visuals of the prequels will of course be better since they were made more recently while the actual specs tell a different story. The X-Wing is faster, with better acceleration capability, and a better hyperdrive, than the Arc Fighter. And that's just the old T-65 X-wing of the Rebellion, the XJ's of the New Republic were getting to be real heavy hitters.

You can get the specs right off the wiki.

The Centurion-class (The bad ass ship form KOTOR 2 that was held beat to hell but still kicked everyones ass)
Medium turbolaser cannon batteries (6)
Heavy ion cannon batteries (6)
Light Point-defense laser cannon batteries (6)
96 Sith interceptors

Venator-class Star Destroyer (smaller than the Centurion)
DBY-827 heavy dual turbolaser turrets (8)
Medium dual turbolaser cannons (2)
Point-defense laser cannons (52)
192 V-wing
192 Eta-2 Actis-class interceptors
36 ARC-170 starfighters
40 LAAT/i gunships
24 military walkers

Imperial-class II Star Destroyer
Octuple barbette turbolaser (8)
Heavy turbolaser batteries (50)
Turbolaser batteries (50)
Additional turbolaser batteries (26+)
Heavy ion cannons (20)
72 TIE Series starfighters
8 Lambda-class shuttles
15 Delta-class stormtrooper transports
5 Assault gunboats
20 AT-AT walkers
30 AT-ST walkers

The Old Centurion-class would have been on about an even footing with a Modern Corellian Corvette.

Ya, Disney sucks hard and I hope they end up like Microsoft in the late 90's.

 

[Yojoo]

This trailer paints a somewhat bleak picture of post-Endor Star Wars, at least more so than the bits of the EU I read did. Clearly, as expected, killing the Emperor and Vader didn't dissolve the Empire. If I had to guess by the trailer, it seems that the destruction of the second Death Star evened the scales between the Empire and the Rebellion, allowing for the Republic to be re-established with more resources, but resulting in open war. Luke being thrust into the front lines rather than given any peace would explain why he never rebuilt the Jedi Academy, and why the ideas of the Force seem once again to be more legend than reality.

That said, I doubt Luke is Kylo (even with the name similarity). That's too bold a move to make with one of the largest franchises of all time. Luke's journey in the Original Trilogy was characterized by his refusal to turn to the dark side, even when it seemingly offered him the solutions to his problems. And as bad as the Prequels were, the juxtaposition between Luke and Anakin was effective, in that Luke accepted hardship and pain rather than falling, while Anakin was seduced by the potential to solve all of his problems through anger. Making Luke fall to the dark side "off-screen" could really damage the original story beyond all reason.

 

[Ukomba]

It was good trailer, especially this part

 

[Tiamat666]

3. Black Stormtrooper
We are Disney and we have to be politically correct about shit so here we present you with "the black guy" thereby fulfilling the minority quota. I'm sure the asian and hispanic guys will also show up at some point.
Unfortunately, political correctness rarely makes a compelling movie.

Neither does an all-white cast set in a galaxy far far away. Seriously it's been over a year now, and you're still concerned about this? No, I've had it.
Some people just don't want to see a black protagonist in the Star Wars movies, and will blame it on either the clones and EU inconsistency (which they can never win), or simply state that Disney is trying too hard to be politically correct.
How fucking hard can it be to accept that they've cast a person of non-white skin tone to portray a protagonist? Oh no, you have to judge the actor and their role solely by the fact that he was cast as a politically correct person to fill Disneys quota and automatically as terrible. "There is simply no way a non-white person can play a role as perfect as an aryan person". How about you just man up and say it out loud that you're a racist that dislikes seeing people of non-white skin tones in major movie roles? That way we won't have to argue about EU continuity or whether or not Disney is playing it PC cool.

I guess you're the kind of person Disney is counting on when they do the politically correct decision making.
First of all, you're jumping to conclusions and you're wrong. I'm not racist. I quite like the character of swashbuckling Lando Calrissian. I quite enjoyed watching Will Smith playing as Muhammed Ali or Samuel L Jackson (in pretty much every role). I grew up with black people who were so close to me at the time, they were practically considered family.

Having gotten that out of the way, here is the real deal:

A black stormtrooper feels completely out of place. You have this fascist thing going on with the Empire in Star Wars, and in all three movies not once do you see an imperial henchmen that is not a "generic white guy". The whole image of the Empire is one of this uniform, conformist society where diversity and deviants are not tolerated and everybody has to fit in and get in line. Nowhere is this more evident than with the faceless stormtroopers.
Black stormtrooper comes along and all of this bleak, dark image of the Empire collapses. Suddenly its like, hey, the Empire can't be that bad! There's a black guy among them!
I don't dislike the concept of a black stormtrooper because of the black protagonist, but because it actually makes the Empire more likable by completely obliterating the image of the Empire conveyed in the original trilogy!

It simply doesn't make a lot of sense, and I hate it when stuff doesn't make sense. The fact that what doesn't make sense has to do with a black guy is purely incidental.

 

[Ragsnstitches]

I guess you're the kind of person Disney is counting on when they do the politically correct decision making.
First of all, you're jumping to conclusions and you're wrong. I'm not racist. I quite like the character of swashbuckling Lando Calrissian. I quite enjoyed watching Will Smith playing as Muhammed Ali or Samuel L Jackson (in pretty much every role). I grew up with black people who were so close to me at the time, they were practically considered family.

Having gotten that out of the way, here is the real deal:

A black stormtrooper feels completely out of place. You have this fascist thing going on with the Empire in Star Wars, and in all three movies not once do you see an imperial henchmen that is not a "generic white guy". The whole image of the Empire is one of this uniform, conformist society where diversity and deviants are not tolerated and everybody has to fit in and get in line. Nowhere is this more evident than with the faceless stormtroopers.
Black stormtrooper comes along and all of this bleak, dark image of the Empire collapses. Suddenly its like, hey, the Empire can't be that bad! There's a black guy among them!
I don't dislike the concept of a black stormtrooper because of the black protagonist, but because it actually makes the Empire more likable by completely obliterating the image of the Empire conveyed in the original trilogy!

It simply doesn't make a lot of sense, and I hate it when stuff doesn't make sense. The fact that what doesn't make sense has to do with a black guy is purely incidental.

"I have black friends, I can't be racist"... do I really need to point out the flaw with that line of reasoning? I think NLS is out of line with the accussation, but your response is a akin to "I'm not racist but..."

On topic... sort of:

You never actually see any of the rank and file Stormtroopers outside of their white armor. In fact our only frame of reference from the movies are the clones from the prequels, in which all the clones are New Zealanders (Maori), which is decidedly not white. It's implied but never stated that the empire conscripts normal folk, but there is never any clarification about whether clones are still used or not.

The empire channels fascist and imperialist themes because in recent history we have a pretty good go to archetype for evil... Nazis. But Star Wars is a "galaxy far far away" and that brings with it a whole host of potential issues we don't have here on earth.

In the star wars galaxy you have MANY different alien species. Do you know what you never see in the Imperial army? Non humans (droids don't count). The only time they resorted to non-humans is when hiring mercenaries. Meanwhile the Rebel Alliance has variety of non-human characters, though the only rebel "aliens" we ever see are Admiral Ackbar and Landos co-pilot. Edit: Forgot that Chewie counts a rebel.

So you have the right idea of what the empire is meant to represent, but fail to see how this applies to a larger galaxy with a variety of sentient species. Facism does not exclusively mean Nazi, but there is usual some undecurrent or bigotry and resentment to "others" on top of typical ultra nationalist jingoism. In Star Wars, "others" can be more then differing skin tones.

The Empire is human supremacist, not white supremacist.

The expanded universe deals with this a little more, but given that it's all non canon now you can only take it so far. However, I imagine that is still the same tone the new films will be going for, but for the record:

http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Human_High_Culture

EDIT: A little bit more. The Imperials also practiced slavery. The Wookies are an enslaved species under the Empire and they are not the only ones. They viewed "lesser" sentient species as no better then cattle and work horses.

 

[spartandude]

It was good trailer, especially this part

The Thrawn trilogy was so good. It really annoyed me that Disney decided to discard it.