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Madurai posted:I often wonder what happened to 70s-style dialogue direction. You can see it in a lot of movies: The French Connection, Marathon Man, Jaws, and yes, Star Wars. Actors mumble, they rush, they talk over each other--it all feels utterly natural, and Star Wars benefitted tremendously from this grounding. Somewhere around 1980, the trend shifted to more carefully-blocked dialogue. I guess it's a more theater-style approach. Something was lost, anyway. Considering the Ren Fayre stiffness of the dialogue in the prequels, it makes you wonder if Lucas watches Star Wars and winces every time some overlapping dialogue gets through. "Dammit, I've got computer-generated imagery, why haven't I got computer-generated voices?"
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Mar 11, 2013 00:18
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Rocket Ace posted:In a way, the tatooine segment works well within the framework of the rest of the movie. It emphasizes the dull tedium of Luke's life as a farmer. ANH is my favorite, and for some reason I've enjoyed the Tatooine segment since I was a kid. Maybe it's the dopey Sandtroopers who find a single metal ring and get excited about the droids. Then, after the Sandtroopers murder an entire Sandcrawler full of Jawas and reduce the Lars to skeletal remains, a person thinks they are stone cold killing machines. Once you get to the Death Star, you realize that the Stormtroopers are poo poo and can't hit anything. Maybe the Sandtroopers were elite or something.
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Mar 11, 2013 16:30
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reagan posted:Once you get to the Death Star, you realize that the Stormtroopers are poo poo and can't hit anything. Maybe the Sandtroopers were elite or something. That's why I will always love the Family Guy Star Wars movies. They are ripping on them (Stormtrooper A - Do we ever hit anything with thse? Stormtrooper B - I hit a bird once), but they do it from a position of love. They point out the flaws, but make you want to re-watch the movies again every time. Same with the Red Letter Media reviews of Episodes 1 and 2, they make you want to watch...the original trilogy again.
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Mar 11, 2013 16:34
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I always figured that the Stormtroopers just have terrible cases of stage fright and can't hit anything when they're being filmed.
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Mar 11, 2013 16:54
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The Stormtroopers were ordered not to hit the people they were shooting at in most of their appearances. The whole point of them missing was that it was "too easy," which it was.
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Mar 11, 2013 17:34
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Darko posted:The Stormtroopers were ordered not to hit the people they were shooting at in most of their appearances. That's even actually a part of the script too, so it's not like it's some ex post facto poo poo that had to be made up by a fan.
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Mar 11, 2013 18:19
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Darko posted:The Stormtroopers were ordered not to hit the people they were shooting at in most of their appearances. They were doing pretty well on Endor before they got swarmed by man-eating bear monsters.
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Mar 11, 2013 18:30
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The stormtroopers couldn't shoot the heroes because heroes in fun adventure movies don't get shot. Man those villains in all those James Bond movies sure couldn't aim! Why oh WHY couldn't Bond get shot up at least ONCE to show that the villains were actually capable? What do you MEAN the bad guys lost all the time in those gun duels in the Sergio Leone westerns? Some bad guys THEY were... etc...
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Mar 11, 2013 18:36
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Rocket Ace posted:The stormtroopers couldn't shoot the heroes because heroes in fun adventure movies don't get shot. Usually you see them shooting up extras and periphreal characters though. In ANH they kill all the Jawas and take out Luke's family, which is good at establishing their reputation. After that they're slightly more menacing than a blind Ewok with a limp and the ANH establishment is undone. You've got to establish that they're missing the main characters because that's how awesome the main characters are, not because the bad guys couldn't hit the broad side of a barn.
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Mar 11, 2013 19:25
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At the beginning of ANH and ESB Stormtroopers shoot up Rebels pretty good.
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Mar 11, 2013 19:32
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Grendels Dad posted:At the beginning of ANH and ESB Stormtroopers shoot up Rebels pretty good. Only when Vader is on screen or coming on screen. The rest of the time it's dudes in Imperial Navy uniforms piloting vehicles who are hitting stuff.
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Mar 11, 2013 19:39
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Leia did get shot by a bog standard stormtrooper though in the third movie. Granted it was one of those "hero wound to the shoulder" things, but still. As for the Ewoks, they did at least have the decency (even as just a tension-building thing) to show them getting beaten to crap for a while. You at least get the impression the after-battle party had a rather shortened guest list, so it's not like the Imperials were totally pathetic. Honestly if you weren't a hero in Star Wars your lifespan tended to be remarkably short if you were opposing the Empire. Rebel fighters were cool and all, but a drat lot of 'em bought it during the fighting every time even to "inferior" TIEs. The Rebels never managed a overwhelming victory, that's for sure.
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Mar 14, 2013 02:52
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MadDogMike posted:The Rebels never managed a overwhelming victory, that's for sure. Endor wasn't an overwhelming victory for the Rebels? Not to mention the small wing of fighters who took out an entire fuckoff battle station, and accompanying fighters, at Yavin?
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Mar 14, 2013 05:11
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Those were all very narrow victories. They were costly defeats for the Empire, but none of them happened because of being overwhelmed.
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Mar 14, 2013 05:15
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Yes, losing your leadership, second fuckoff battlestation, and capital flagship is...costly.
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Mar 14, 2013 05:19
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Kinda easy to forget that when they took on the first giant fuckoff battlestation they had something like a 90% casualty rate on their trained pilot force, so
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Mar 14, 2013 05:35
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So, why was Luke just handed a fighter ship and made a commander like a minute after he met with the Rebels?
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Mar 14, 2013 05:53
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Wubbles posted:So, why was Luke just handed a fighter ship and made a commander like a minute after he met with the Rebels? Because he's the protagonist.
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Mar 14, 2013 05:55
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Wubbles posted:So, why was Luke just handed a fighter ship and made a commander like a minute after he met with the Rebels? He wasn't made a commander at that time, but he was already a trained pilot, and those are rare enough in the perpetually understaffed Rebellion.
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Mar 14, 2013 06:02
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It seemed sort of strange to me that they'd be willing to believe so quickly that Luke actually had that training, but it doesn't really make too much of a difference anyway.
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Mar 14, 2013 06:19
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I don't remember if it's in the script or the novelization, but they put Luke through a couple quick simulator runs to make sure he actually knew how to fly. Must help that his Skyhopper (Incom T-16) and the X-Wing (Incom T-65) come from the same company.
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Mar 14, 2013 06:22
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Wasn't he also given a ship because his friend Biggs put a good word out for him?
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Mar 14, 2013 06:24
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Rirse posted:Wasn't he also given a ship because his friend Biggs put a good word out for him? That was pretty much it. There's some support for Luke having to do some sim training, but Biggs' recommendation got him that consideration. It can't have been the first time Red Squad integrated a new member in actual combat.
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Mar 14, 2013 06:41
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Wubbles posted:So, why was Luke just handed a fighter ship and made a commander like a minute after he met with the Rebels? Well, the Rebels are a ragtag group of, well, rebels - they take everything they can get. Case in point: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NFPI54fOWoo
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Mar 14, 2013 06:59
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mr. stefan posted:Kinda easy to forget that when they took on the first giant fuckoff battlestation they had something like a 90% casualty rate on their trained pilot force, so Easy to remember. 90% casualty rate out of what? 20-25 pilots? 25 figments of imagination against an enormous vessel crewed by god knows how many fake soldiers? Commanded by the 2nd or 3rd highest ranked stuffed shirt with a British accent? A huge and mobile gonad with a laser that could vaporize entire made-up planets? I know that there is a specific, real-world, and military use of the phrase "overwhelming victory", but come on!
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Mar 14, 2013 08:24
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When you have a giant planet destroying Death Star coming to destroy your planet, you send out every ship you can, even if you have to staff them with some farmer.
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Mar 14, 2013 08:26
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Wubbles posted:So, why was Luke just handed a fighter ship and made a commander like a minute after he met with the Rebels? Additionally to what others have said, Luke also helped rescuing their Princess and at the very least proved on screen that he was able to shoot down TIE Fighters just as well as Han Solo. quote:Only when Vader is on screen or coming on screen. And? He doesn't do anything in those scenes, or are you implying his mere presence is giving the Stormtroopers +1 in Aiming?
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Mar 14, 2013 11:21
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Grendels Dad posted:
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Mar 14, 2013 11:38
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effectual posted:Maybe he's the inspiration for that godawful overused battletrance spell in the EU. I thought the inspiration was Palpatine, and how quickly the Imperials fell apart at Endor after his death.
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Mar 14, 2013 13:46
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Reminder that pretty much none of the Rebel deaths at the Battle of Yavin were from any of the lasers on the Death Star but from Darth Vader and his couple regular TIE-flying wingmen.
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Mar 14, 2013 14:32
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MadDogMike posted:Leia did get shot by a bog standard stormtrooper though in the third movie. Granted it was one of those "hero wound to the shoulder" things, but still. As for the Ewoks, they did at least have the decency (even as just a tension-building thing) to show them getting beaten to crap for a while. You at least get the impression the after-battle party had a rather shortened guest list, so it's not like the Imperials were totally pathetic. Honestly if you weren't a hero in Star Wars your lifespan tended to be remarkably short if you were opposing the Empire. Rebel fighters were cool and all, but a drat lot of 'em bought it during the fighting every time even to "inferior" TIEs. The Rebels never managed a overwhelming victory, that's for sure. That stupid Stormtrooper meme is because people aren't able to follow the plot...in Star Wars. - In ANH, they were purposely letting the heroes escape so they could track them to the rebel base. That was a revelation after they already escaped. - In Empire, they overwhelmed the rebel base and the heroes barely escaped. Then C3PO got blown up by one. Then they were ordered to purposely lead Luke to Vader, so they weren't trying to hit him. Then they had a problem hitting the heroes. - In Jedi, Leia and R2D2 got shot and Ewoks got shot up. the meme mostly comes from Star Wars where the characters look into the camera and say "that was too easy" and then Tarkin says "muahaha the tracker was installed" or whatever. People still haven't noticed this 40 years later.
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Mar 14, 2013 14:40
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At the end of Empire it was also a trap, because Vader had the hyperdrive disabled.
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Mar 14, 2013 14:43
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effectual posted:At the end of Empire it was also a trap, because Vader had the hyperdrive disabled. That wasn't really a trap because they were under his control in the first place. Having the hyperdrive disabled was just a fallback option (that doesn't really make sense because he could just have had the entire ship disabled but that would make it difficult for the heroes to escape so don't ask why).
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Mar 14, 2013 15:04
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Alchenar posted:That wasn't really a trap because they were under his control in the first place. Having the hyperdrive disabled was just a fallback option (that doesn't really make sense because he could just have had the entire ship disabled but that would make it difficult for the heroes to escape so don't ask why). If they enter the ship he'd have them cooped up in one place instead of them bouncing around in Cloud City.
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Mar 14, 2013 15:55
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api call girl posted:Reminder that pretty much none of the Rebel deaths at the Battle of Yavin were from any of the lasers on the Death Star but from Darth Vader and his couple regular TIE-flying wingmen. Except Porkins.
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Mar 14, 2013 19:16
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Madurai posted:Except Porkins. Well, he was just asking for it now, wasn't he.
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Mar 14, 2013 20:21
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Longbaugh01 posted:Well, he was just asking for it now, wasn't he. How dare you speak that way of our beloved Porkins? The man had mechanical trouble. Not his fault.
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Mar 15, 2013 02:29
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Grendels Dad posted:And? He doesn't do anything in those scenes, or are you implying his mere presence is giving the Stormtroopers +1 in Aiming? If there is a giant dude behind you who has the ability to choke you out with the power of his mind you probably take a bit of extra time to aim just out of self preservation. Once they are on the death star they give no fucks though, I suppose when you don't have to wear your name on your armor you can always just blame someone else if your boss comes asking. Plus, its a well known fact that storm troopers are pretty much blind anyway: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBQaLuqwtl8 Darko posted:the meme mostly comes from Star Wars where the characters look into the camera and say "that was too easy" and then Tarkin says "muahaha the tracker was installed" or whatever. People still haven't noticed this 40 years later. That was pretty much just Tarkin covering his rear end. If they really wanted to let them go they probably would have taken more care not to crush them in a trash compactor known to be inhabited by a deadly squid anaconda thing. Every impounded ship probably got a tracker to deter mutineers, Tarkin just pulled an I meant to do that to avoid getting force lightning'd to a crisp by his boss.
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Mar 15, 2013 03:22
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quote:If they really wanted to let them go they probably would have taken more care not to crush them in a trash compactor known to be inhabited by a deadly squid anaconda thing. I always took that as an auto-system. They jumped in the trash compactor themselves, and it just started compacting on its auto cycle.
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Mar 15, 2013 03:52
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Darko posted:I always took that as an auto-system. They jumped in the trash compactor themselves, and it just started compacting on its auto cycle. Well yeah but you have an entire squad of stormtroopers there who have been ordered to shoot at and herd these guys back to their ship but do not kill, all of them with built in comms in their helmet, and who watch them jump in. You would think one of them would hit the stop button, or radio someone who could. I know that if my boss had a gun that could destroy my home planet and he gave me specific orders not to kill someone I would probably call trash compactor HQ and tell them to just turn those suckers off for a few hours.
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Mar 15, 2013 06:58
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