Star Wars: Episode 7: The Force Awakens

I don't even know if I should bother writing about this, but well... may as well I guess?

Star Wars: Episode 7: the Force Awakens has the distinction of being better than 50% of the previous films. And while it deserves a hearty congratulations for having achieved that much, I do think that it needed to be a bit better than that.

Don't get me wrong. It's a passable film. The action clips along at an acceptable pace, the characters are distinct enough for me to remember most of their names and there wasn't anything offensively bad about it. But that's about it. It gets a passing grade, but nothing beyond that. Honestly, I don't think I'll remember anything beyond the major plot points one week from today.

So before I inevitably forget about this thing, let's talk about it.

The perspective I'm writing from is that of a former fan. In my middle school years, I was all about Star Wars and I read every single Extended Universe book I could get my hands on, even the ones by Kevin J. Anderson. That enthusiasm was beaten to the ground by the Prequels. I liked Knights of the Old Republic 1, but generally speaking I haven't cared about Star Wars in some time, even though I still happen to know a fuckload of stuff about that universe.

So why didn't this movie win me back into the fold? Let's see...

Spoilers ahead, I guess.

1) Shoddy writing.

I think this is the first JJ Abrams product I've actually watched so I can't really compare this to his other works, but I had trouble swallowing the motivations and actions of some of the characters. I'm going to focus mainly on the Storm Trooper deserter, Finn.

Finn here deserts the First Order because he realizes that the Empire is cartoonishly evil and decides that Killing Is Wrong. In order to escape from the Empire, he proceeds to shoot up a hangar bay full of his former comrades, seemingly killing about 30 or 40. So errr... this individual in the military got upset about the direction his government was taking and decided to go ahead and murder a bunch of his colleagues. So... does that mean our main protagonist is basically the Empire's equivalent to the Fort Hood Shooter then?

 This wouldn't be so bad if the issue were raised or acknowledged somehow, but it's not. Bad guys called Finn a traitor later on, but he is all too happy to just go ahead and shoot or stab them. Never once is the idea that one of these other Storm Troopers might also be closet dissenters or other people who were conscripted away from their families at a young age just like he was. Finn just kills them.

Why make him a Storm Trooper in the first place if these issues weren't going to be dealt with? Why give him that back story if it wasn't going to affect his character development at all? I think this Abrams guy just liked the visual of the Storm Trooper deserter, but really just did not adequately think it through.

2) Shoddy dialogue.

If I were to describe the dialogue in this film it would probably be something along the lines of "Badly Written Joss Whedon". Everyone is trying to be snappy and clever, but no one is saying anything worth remembering. While sometimes a line hit home ("That's not how the Force works"), the movie is filled with awkward garbage lines about boyfriends and fixing compressors.


At one point in the film, Finn is watching an X-Wing blowing up TIE Fighters from the ground (ignoring the fight all around him) and gasps: "Wow, what a great pilot!" on behalf of the audience. The fact that the guy is blowing away six TIEs in 5 seconds already is showing that, but I guess Captain Obvious needed to make sure the audience was making the right conclusions here.

3) Not giving a fuck.

There are certain details about this universe that I could tell you, even though I haven't really thought about it for a solid decade.

For instance, there's a scene where Finn and the pilot guy escape in a TIE fighter. While in said TIE, they don't wear space helmets and are able to breathe. But TIE Fighters aren't supposed to have life support. That's why their pilots wear those bulky black outfits. Because they'd suffocate without them.

"Well maybe they got air after twenty years," you say. Except that the other TIE pilots we see in the movie are still wearing the black fighter outfit that they were wearing in the original films. Why are they still in bulky space helmets with very distinct oxygen tubes if they've got atmosphere inside of their fighters? Wouldn't they wear the grey uniforms, like their colleagues on the Star Destroyers? Why give them atmosphere in the fighter if they aren't going to use it? And no, if it were a special TIE then they should have fucking said it was a special TIE. Or just hijacked a shuttle instead. Shuttles have air.

You may think this is quibbling and nitpicking, but this is the thing: Getting this shit right is a sign of love and care for the setting. It's a sign of attention being paid to detail. If Abrams can't give enough of a shit about the Star Wars universe to offer an explanation as to why that TIE fighter had life support, then why should I give a shit about the Star Wars universe either?

So the conclusion:

What this movie is is a cash-in sequel designed to rake as much money out of its name as possible.

Does that mean it was a bad movie? No. Again, it's passable. But I nevertheless left the movie feeling quite thankful that I've stayed well-clear of whatever the hell this man did to Star Trek. There's more ...

Harry Potter, Medium Swapping and Continuity

So this is sort of bothering me, and so I will sound off on it here.

Today Harry Potter and the Cursed Child had its cast announced. Here they are:

So beyond the Ron with hair that is distinctly not red, you've got yourself a black Hermione who apparently did not magically fix her teeth in her teen years.  My first reaction to this was a definitive: "Huh?" This bothered me a lot more than I thought it would and, after much reflection, I think I've determined the reason why: The stage is a visual medium and JK Rowling is slapping her fan base in the face by insisting on making her sequel on it.

Stick with me and I'll take you through my reasoning. 

First, let me talk about why I think this matters.

For an established character, the image and feel of a character counts. For instance: Jean-Luc Picard is bald. If (God forbid) a 'sequel to the Next Generation' series were pitched featuring Picard with a full head of hair, then I would feel quite justified in screaming bloody murder. Once a character is established to look a certain way in a certain continuity, then you've gotta stick with it. If you put Fabio in Picard's shoes then I don't feel comfortable or respected as a fan in the setting.

Now the question of race and superheroes has been popular in the media lately. I hear a lot about the idea of a black James Bond or Spider Man for instance. And you know, I'm not against either idea. Just make them in their own continuity. I mean, fuck, you're resetting Spider Man every two fucking movies anyhow, so why not give it a try? And hell, don't those kinds of movies shift continuity every time they change their lead actor anyhow? 

But in any case, the point I'm trying to make here is this: I would not care about this issue if the above Hermione were in an alternate universe adaptation of Harry Potter. The distinction I draw is that this is a Hermione who's supposed to be in a direct sequel to the books.

Anyhow, so now let's get the author's position:

This makes sense to me. I actually avoid racial descriptors when I describe a characters too, which I've observed has resulted in arguments in what people think a given character actually looks like. I think some degree of ambiguity in that regard is sort of necessary, particularly in a book where we're expected to relate to and invest in certain characters. I get that.

For me it goes like this though: I open Chamber of Secrets and read: "Hermione snatched the timetable back, flushing intensely." (75) All human beings have the blushing reaction, but for what should be obvious reasons it's not very distinctive on a person with some colour on their face already. You can't tell when a dark skinned person is blushing as easily as you can a pale person. Hence why I always pictured the gal as being white.


"But that's just your perspective and it's subjective," I hear you say. And well yeah, of course it is. The Hermione in my head is indeed a white girl, but if she's black in yours then that's your prerogative. I don't think it would effect our mutual enjoyments of the books.

But that's the thing, isn't it? This isn't a book. It's a play. A horrendously expensive and inaccessible play that a pauper like me can never hope to see on stage, but nevertheless: a visual medium. We aren't in the Theatre of the Mind any more, we're in real space. The "you can picture whatever Hermione you want" argument breaks down because for this play, which is billed as a sequel to the Harry Potter books,  there is now just one Hermione. The one on stage. And the lady they're putting on stage looks absolutely nothing like the Hermione I've imagined.

"Wait a second," I hear you say, "Why should your white Hermione take precedence over my black one?" And you're right, I can't give you an objective reason why that should be. But note: the argument works both ways. Before everyone would read the books and make their own world. When the movies came out, mileage varied. Many people (including me) thought Emma Watson was a bit too pretty to be Hermione for instance. And for me, Kingsley is always going to be a Samuel L. Jackson type figure. But nevertheless: Previously, what was a point of contention like that could always be resolved with the words 'but well, in the books we can make our own sense of it'.

But now there is no book. There's just a play. (And hopefully a script that they'll eventually publish for us poor commoners)

And that brings me to a fundamental conclusion about all of this: Making the sequel to a fabulous series of books into a London-only stage production is a huge disservice to the fans. It's whimsical on the part of the author, it's anti-democratic and it flies in the face of the magic that the Harry Potter books really allowed the reader to do within its pages.

JK Rowling can do whatever she wants, of course. But you can't do a medium swap like this and not expect to irk people like me. There's more ...