The Star War of today

[Trunkage]

Imagine that A New Hope was actually released this year, not 40 years ago. How would have audiences perceived it?

There is stil a nerd group, half of which hates anything SJW and half who think Sci-Fi isn't progressive enough. But they aren't Star Wars fans.

Personally, there are so many plot holes that would be picked apart.
The normal stupid design of the Death Star with a glaring hole no one saw
Randomly finding a prisoner on a space station measured in square miles
Terrible lightsaber fight. Also, being a main focus of Jedis, lightsabers don't come up much in this movie
Ben dying would have been better if it happened as they were flying out fighting hundreds of storm troopers. Also, great name change. Apparently it fooled everyone. Also, nice morals. Let everyone in the 'verse live under a dictator becuase, what is he scared? Jedis seem terrible
For a massive space station, there were hardly an tie fighter defences. Or Star Destroyers
Imagine if the Empire came in and did a bombing run of Yavin first to knock out any resistance.

I could go on, but I think it should be your turn.

 

[Hawki]

I'd rather not think about it.

Not saying they wouldn't tear it apart - they would - but I don't want a classic movie sullied by nerd culture. This is thankfully one of those rare moments in time where wishes are met by reality.

 

[Natemans]

Honestly the biggest problem with fandom often is its kinda a double edge sword. Sure, you'll satisfy a group of people, but then you'll get people going nuts over certain things.

The original Star Wars came out in a perfect time and place. The ironic part is that every film afterwards has been met with mixed reviews constantly.

I mean Empire was met with mixed reviews back when that first came out, but then people came around and it became one of the best sequels in film history.

Then Return of the Jedi came out and while people favored it over Empire at the time, its still gotten joked about because of the Ewoks (who I think get too much hate tbh.)

And then there's Phantom Menace which was meant to show a return of the man himself George Lucas and opinions were mixed to loving it, but also others left with the feeling of disappointment.

Then there's Attack of the Clones which I think most were not a big fan of. Well, most that I know saw it at the time. Heck, its my first Star Wars film though I was bored.


Revenge of the Sith is considered the best of the prequels by many though that suffers from some of the same problems as the other two.






And finally we come to the current films.

Many mixed on Force Awakens, saying its a copy of the originals, issues of plot, complaining about Rey being a Mary Sue, etc. (Even if I loved the film and don't agree with these. I'm just generalizing.)

Next is Rogue One which was kinda meh and mostly a boring war film with boring characters and uneven pacing despite a great spectacle of a climax.


And we come to the most controversial one: The Last Jedi. While I loved the film and had some minor issues with it, a lot of people seemed divided with this one. Whether it being the way Luke was treated, the plot itself, Finn and Rose's subplot and other things.


Solo's reaction is more nowadays met with a resounding meh. Its fine, whatever. Decent or kinda enjoyable. Despite a minority of people wanting to boycott it so they can add spite to Disney. (Which is beyond stupid. If you don't want to see a film, I got no problem with that, but the whole boycott is moronic. To quote Jay Sherman, "Just don't go.")




So based on history, part of me agrees with the question of what if the original did come out years later. And hell, that film is the one that defined Joseph Campbell's The Hero's Journey or mostly inspired by Buck Rogers, Flash Gordon and John Carter.

 

[ex951753]

Leila in Jabba the Hutt arc would pop a few veins for the "feminists".

 

[Saelune]

This is one of those 'What ifs' that requires a lot of variables to be explained. I mean, how has sci-fi proceeded without Star Wars? Did Star Trek get more or less popular? Are we using the film as is? Does it look like it was made today? Modern actors or is Mark Hammill aged down?

 

[TheMysteriousGX]

And then they rescue the sarcastic princess and she immediately starts snarking off and taking control of the rescue operation.

Yeah, the nerds that chased Kelly Marie Tran off of instagram would hate A New Hope.

 

[Chimpzy_v1legacy]

And then they rescue the sarcastic princess and she immediately starts snarking off and taking control of the rescue operation.

Yeah, the nerds that chased Kelly Marie Tran off of instagram would hate A New Hope.

Empire Strikes Back could be even worse. After all, it's pretty much 2 hours of the mostly male good guys failing.

 

[Samtemdo8_v1legacy]

I do think Star Wars Music has floundered, I don't know if John Williams will ever top this:

 

[Ogoid]

Imagine that A New Hope was actually released this year, not 40 years ago. How would have audiences perceived it?

Ok, that's an interesting thought experiment. Let's see...

Personally, there are so many plot holes that would be picked apart.
The normal stupid design of the Death Star with a glaring hole no one saw

Yes, that's a fair point.

Randomly finding a prisoner on a space station measured in square miles

If I recall correctly, Luke and Han have R2 look her location up on one of those wall socket things, though you could certainly argue that having such sensitive information readily available where any old astromech droid could simply look it up makes no sense.

Terrible lightsaber fight. Also, being a main focus of Jedis, lightsabers don't come up much in this movie

Terrible as compared to what, though? Remember, if this is the first lightsaber fight we've ever seen, we've nothing to really compare it to. Also, I don't believe the movie makes them a "main focus" of Jedi, simply their signature weapon.

Ben dying would have been better if it happened as they were flying out fighting hundreds of storm troopers. Also, great name change. Apparently it fooled everyone. Also, nice morals. Let everyone in the 'verse live under a dictator becuase, what is he scared? Jedis seem terrible

Arguably. It could certainly be more exciting, but there's a personal stake in the fight between Obi-wan and Vader, and it serves the purpose of making Luke have a personal grudge against Vader as well.

I will say that I always did find his death more silly than anything. He only stands there and lets Vader strike him, because in dying he will "become more powerful than you can possibly imagine" by... uh, becoming a disembodied voice who occasionally puts in an appearance to Luke as a ghost? Really, I never did think that makes any kind of sense.

As for the Jedi being terrible... well, again, we've really nothing to compare them to, have we? Obi-wan talks them up, sure, but then of course he would. And likewise, we have little more than his word to go on when it comes to the past 30 or so years.

For a massive space station, there were hardly an tie fighter defences. Or Star Destroyers
Imagine if the Empire came in and did a bombing run of Yavin first to knock out any resistance.

Fair points both.

Empire Strikes Back could be even worse. After all, it's pretty much 2 hours of the mostly male good guys failing.

Actually, when I saw the Special Editions in cinemas during the 90's (which might as well have been the first time I saw the original trilogy, having been just a kid the first time around and having by then nothing but a vague memory of characters and random scenes) I thought the original was, in fact, much better, because its story beats followed a logical order - from the personal (the Lars farm) to the global (the Rebellion), whereas in Empire we do the opposite, which seemed like much less elegant storytelling to me.

Also, A New Hope was a self-contained story that left room for sequels, whereas Empire ends in an outright cliffhanger, which, again, seems to me much less polished and satisfying.

 

[twistedmic]

Personally, there are so many plot holes that would be picked apart.
The normal stupid design of the Death Star with a glaring hole no one saw

I can chalk that up to sheer arrogance and poor designs. The movie flat out states that the Empire doesn't see one-man fighters as a threat so they haven't even considered someone taking a fighter up against a moon-sized battle station. And there have been plenty of fatal design flaws found in products, machines and buildings here on Earth. Remember the Samsung Note 7 and Hoverboards overheating and catching fire, multiple automotive instances of poorly placed or improperly protected gas tanks, the wrong kind of steel used in the Titanic (from what I've heard that was one of the factors that led to it sinking) and at least once case of the wrong kind of bolts being used nearly caused a building to collapse.
And given that the Death Star is the size of a moon, the chance for design flaws and overlooked weaknesses is even greater than anything on Earth.

Randomly finding a prisoner on a space station measured in square miles

R2-D2 found Leia and her location in the Death Star's computer files and told Han, Luke and Chewie where to go, they didn't just randomly stumble across the prison block.

Terrible lightsaber fight. Also, being a main focus of Jedis, lightsabers don't come up much in this movie

The force was the main focus of the Jedi and it came up several times during the film. The lightsaber was mentioned as the weapon of the Jedi but it wasn't the main focus of them. I'll admit that the duel was lacking in comparison to the later movies but to me it came off as more of a formality than an actual fight.Either that or Ben was merely stalling for time to let the others escape.

Ben dying would have been better if it happened as they were flying out fighting hundreds of storm troopers.

Fighting off hundreds of stormtroopers would have made the escape too hard. It's made obvious that Vader let them escape from the Death Star. Both Leia and Tarkin mention that they were let go.

Also, great name change. Apparently it fooled everyone.

We don't know how well known Obi-wan Kenobi was before his name change, he could have been a obscure military officer or a major celebrity for all we know. We also don't know how common Kenobi is as a last name, it could be as common as Smith is in America, or Nguyen and Wang in Asian countries.

Also, nice morals. Let everyone in the 'verse live under a dictator becuase, what is he scared? Jedis seem terrible

How is one old man going to take down the entire Empire?

For a massive space station, there were hardly an tie fighter defences. Or Star Destroyers

They didn't think they needed them. The Death Star was supposed to be the ultimate, unbeatable weapon. The station had fire power greater than half the Imperial Fleet (directly stated in the movie).

Imagine if the Empire came in and did a bombing run of Yavin first to knock out any resistance.

Why waste resources and time when they were about to pulverize Yavin 4? Bombing the base before utterly annihilating the entire moon/planet would have been pointless.

 

[StatusNil]

And then they rescue the sarcastic princess and she immediately starts snarking off and taking control of the rescue operation.

Yeah, the nerds that chased Kelly Marie Tran off of instagram would hate A New Hope.

Dunno, did Leia represent a bizarrely irrelevant side story that was forcibly inserted at the behest of a Diversity Board to score points with pundits? It's been a long time, I forget.

 

[Terminal Blue]

1) Leia is a Mary Sue. There's no way a pampered noblewoman would have the skills to shoot a load of elite stormtroopers in a gun fight. Totally unrealistic.

2) Luke is also a Gary Stu. He's a random dirt farmer who can magically fly a high tech starship in space. Totally unrealistic. I want my money back. I expect realism in my space fantasy film.

2) The film is anti-white and anti-male. All the Imperials are white men, while the rebels are like this ragtag mix of humans of different ethnicities and genders as well as freaky aliens. Even aliens have been indoctrinated to hate the white man for no reason![footnote]You know, a lot of these are snarky references to things right wingers have said about the disney star wars movies. This one is actually a snarky reference to a thing right wingers said about the original trilogy. Consider that for a second. This one is actually real. Did you notice?[/footnote]

3) The empire are represented as Nazis with their nazi uniforms and "stormtroopers". This is unfair to Nazis. You can't blow up someone's planet destroying murder-station just because they have a different opinion.. god. So much for the tolerant left!

4) Leia is too bossy. 0/10.

5) Leia's whole subplot about being captured by the empire and having her planet blown up is irrelevant to the actual plot. I mean, technically if you cut it out the whole story would still be intact and make sense, which makes it irrelevant. It just draws attention away from real characters for the sake of diversity.

6) Darth Vader is too mysterious. Like, he's just this guy who is there for no reason. How are we expected to accept who a character is if we don't know his backstory or where he came from? My suspension of disbelief is just gone!

7) The Empire had a stupid plan in trying to attack the rebel base on Yavin 4 with the death star without adequate fighter support. It indicates that the Empire is a flawed institution whose leaders can be arrogant and overconfident in a way the enemies of the Empire can exploit, and this is bad writing. Noone in movies is allowed to behave stupidly.

8) The magical exhaust port on the death star is a deus ex machina. Of course I know what a deus ex machina means, why would you say otherwise? But seriously, why would anyone building a moon sized planet killing murder station include such an obvious design flaw? It's just not realistic in this universe where a moon sized planet killing murder station doesn't collapse under its own gravity.

To break off and speak seriously for a moment though. The thing about the star wars original trilogy is that they aren't good movies. They were groundbreaking movies. They pushed the envelope in terms of film making technology (which was where George Lucas' talents and interests lay). They were fantastically creative and influential on science fiction filmmaking and aesthetic, merging science fiction, western and war movie visual tropes in a way which others would keep drawing on for decades. But ultimately, some of the performances aren't great (which is not the same as saying the actors aren't likeable, and one can really respect that George chose to work with relatively unknown actors instead of preexisting big talent), the story isn't deep or complex, the characters are cardboard cut outs, the dialogue is downright stinky.

We overlooked this because we understand that the film has an important place in the history of film, and because most of us today watched it as kids when we were easily impressed and probably hadn't seen many sci fi or action movies. Today, we're surrounded by sci fi and action movies which look pretty or push visual boundaries but are disappointingly written or have weak or cliched plots. We're burned out on those movies, and we'd be burned out on them if a New Hope was released today.

 

[PsychedelicDiamond]

That's almost impossible to say, movie would be much, much different if it hadn't been for Star Wars in the 70s and 80s. I'm gonna go out on a limp and say without Star Wars the Lord of the Rings movies wouldn't exist the way they do, superhero movies wouldn't exist the way they do, Blade Runner wouldn't exist the way it does, as a matter of fact, most Science-Fiction movies wouldn't exist the way they do (I imagine if it wasn't for the SW movies defining that genre it would have been 2001: A Space Odyssey and Alien which... wouldn't be a bad thing, actually), very likely Harry Potter wouldn't exist or at least the movie adaptations wouldn't, Indiana Jones... might still exist, I guess, but I wouldn't count on it. What I'm saying is, everything would be really different.

But you're wondering how they'd be received, had they dropped into today's (pop-)cultural landscape. Okay. I'd wager they'd still find their fanbase amon people who appreciate a somewhat campy throwback to 40 Science-Fiction serials which now, in the age of the internet, would probably be more people than, say, 20 year ago. I think that might just be the thing, Star Wars' audience now would be the Tarantino crowd, movie hipsters who'd appreciate them less for their own sake and more for what they're referencing. It'd be considered among the same lines as something like Love Witch, or Black Dynamite, or Beyond the Black Rainbow or Buckaroo Banzai, which was an awfully early example for the kind of movie. The story would be called out for lacking nuance and not actually commenting on the things it's inspired by, some would disregard it for taking something obviously silly to seriously, Hamills, Fords and Fishers performances would be considered mediocre at best and the movies would end up as mostly obscure curiosities with a small cult following.

 

[Thaluikhain]

It's a low tech silly space fantasy. Like Jupiter Ascending but with less CGI. Get the DVD when it's on special.

 

[TheMysteriousGX]

And then they rescue the sarcastic princess and she immediately starts snarking off and taking control of the rescue operation.

Yeah, the nerds that chased Kelly Marie Tran off of instagram would hate A New Hope.

Dunno, did Leia represent a bizarrely irrelevant side story that was forcibly inserted at the behest of a Diversity Board to score points with pundits? It's been a long time, I forget.

So sub in Daisy Ridley. Or L3. Assuming that that word salad of an argument has any basis in reality whatsoever.

I mean, does that excuse or justify months of sustained abuse by "fans"?

 

[TheMysteriousGX]

And then they rescue the sarcastic princess and she immediately starts snarking off and taking control of the rescue operation.

Yeah, the nerds that chased Kelly Marie Tran off of instagram would hate A New Hope.

Empire Strikes Back could be even worse. After all, it's pretty much 2 hours of the mostly male good guys failing.

And then we're just expected to watch the three male lead bumble their way through to most convoluted and nonsensical rescue mission in cinematic history while the overpowered 100 pound female lead chokes out a 1 ton slug monster.

 

[Natemans]

And now they made Kelly Marie Tran get off Instagram after tons of harassment.


God, fuck this fandom.

 

[Trunkage]

This is one of those 'What ifs' that requires a lot of variables to be explained. I mean, how has sci-fi proceeded without Star Wars? Did Star Trek get more or less popular? Are we using the film as is? Does it look like it was made today? Modern actors or is Mark Hammill aged down?

I'd think the second pillar of the nerd offs would have to be replaced. So, I reckon Doctor Who would gain prominence against Star Trek, eventually leading to Britain vs American culture war.

You can make up the rest to enhance your argument as you see fit.

 

[Hawki]

And now they made Kelly Marie Tran get off Instagram after tons of harassment.


God, fuck this fandom.

But don't you know that it's just a false flag operation? A way of making fans look bad.

...or at least, that's what some people are saying.

 

[Dalisclock]

I can chalk that up to sheer arrogance and poor designs. The movie flat out states that the Empire doesn't see one-man fighters as a threat so they haven't even considered someone taking a fighter up against a moon-sized battle station. And there have been plenty of fatal design flaws found in products, machines and buildings here on Earth. Remember the Samsung Note 7 and Hoverboards overheating and catching fire, multiple automotive instances of poorly placed or improperly protected gas tanks, the wrong kind of steel used in the Titanic (from what I've heard that was one of the factors that led to it sinking) and at least once case of the wrong kind of bolts being used nearly caused a building to collapse.
And given that the Death Star is the size of a moon, the chance for design flaws and overlooked weaknesses is even greater than anything on Earth.

Let's not forgot it's a 2 meter exhaust port on a space station the size of a moon. That's a tiny flaw to be looking for.

And note that they literally needed a space wizard to angle the torpedos 90 degrees to pull off the shot and blow it up.

Why waste resources and time when they were about to pulverize Yavin 4? Bombing the base before utterly annihilating the entire moon/planet would have been pointless.

The death star was less then 30 seconds from taking out the rebel base when Luke fires his torpedos. If he had missed or not used the force to angle them in, it wouldn't have mattered because Yavin would have been destroyed.

Seriously, people, the Death Star exhaust port makes a lot more sense then why the death star doesn't have SAM missle batteries to take down snub fighters(aside from the fact the Trench run is pretty much a giant homage/plagiarism of the 2nd half of the Dam Busters).

Or hell, we can discuss how the entire Rebel plan in RoTJ hinges entirely on the "Empires Finest Legions" inability to guard a fucking door for a few hours.