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Stephen Green says JJ Abrams never misses an opportunity to miss an opportunity. Based on the final trailer, the latest and last episode of the Star Wars series — The Rise of Skywalker — is no exception. Abandoning compelling stories that featured flawed, but heroic, characters, the greatest movie franchise in history has become little more than a social justice warrior screed. Until now, the most infamous squandered opportunity and marketing failure in business history was New Coke. New Star Wars trumps that. The fans are sick of it.
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34 replies on “Skywalker Fall: Why New Star Wars Trumps New Coke Disaster”
Bill, I wish I could be as optimistic about this generation as you are, but then we get these polls about 1/3 of Milleannials seeing communism as favorable and 70% of them likely to vote socialist.
Well, a large percentage of the Depression & WWII generation were actual members of the Communist party, or fellow travelers. Others were fans of Fascism (which wasn’t a bad name until WWII kicked off).
They pretty much wised up, though, so perhaps all is not lost.
The problem is, the vast majority of that generation was patriotic Americans, proud of their country, its history, its system of governance and everything it stood for.
Thanks to the Long March Through the Institution, I don’t think that is still the case.
IIRC, it was Dennis Ross’s quote.
On Steve’s admiration of courtroom drama (a favorite genre of mine) I watched Presumed innocent last night. Wow, a really good movie.And what make it great ties in with Bill’s comments about current Star Wars movies. I admit I have not seen all (hardly any) of the trilogies, but I pretty much lost interest once Jar Jar entered the scene.
When I was in college I took a film course, and the first one we were assigned was Citizen Kane. It delved into a man’s follies, his foibles, his will and his demons. These same issues are are evident in Presumed Innocent. As a student, I thought about it for days afterward. Today’s offerings from Hollywood dig no deeper than a slug in my garden, which I dispatch without prejudice.
Today’s cinema is plain oatmeal served up with less than subliminal SJW messages that are outright progressive propaganda. They can’t even try to be subtle. They are WAY BEYOND subtle. I’m not paying $15 for a lecture on how bad I am as a person.
Possibly done on purpose to destroy anything masculine ?? Make it go away and not expose our youngsters to that toxicity ?? Just askin’
Strong Woman ?? Meet my wife— strongest woman I have ever met… Love her to death… just sayin’
Good art is largely iconoclastic, revolutionary, or assaults social boundaries. The populace responds to good art when we chafe for a change, resist the orthodoxy, or bore of the homogeneity in culture.
SW IV was some parts all three. SW Social Justice Warrior Edition is none of the above.
Amazingly, good art, even in movies, remains good art (even if the shock value dims). Go to your local library and see if they have DVDs of old movies like Zulu, Sunset Boulevard, Africa Queen, and Network. You can save yourself the price of a ticket and see A Clockwork Orange instead of The Joker.
You can likely check them out with nothing more than a library card.
These films stand the test of time. Recent films don’t. I cannot think of a single movie released in the past five years that… Well, I’ll leave it at that. None come to mind.
Want a war movie: Saving Private Ryan
Want a romance? The Philadelphia Story
Want a thriller? Psycho
Want a drama? Citizen Kane
Get out the popcorn and settle in to your very own movie choices. Luke and all the rest are dead. We know that because it happened “a long time ago in a galaxy far away.” And we’re a lot further away now than we were in 1977.
I don’t comment often, I guess this shows what a Star Wars nerd I’ve been. I actually LOVED Rogue One and really enjoyed Solo. I’ve made myself get to mostly like the Ep I-III trilogy, lots not to like, but lots of great moments too. But this most recent one….ugh. Would have done themselves a huge favor to throw some money at Timothy Zahn to help turn his books into this trilogy. I rewatch those 8 movies with fair regularity…. But I bet I can count on one hand how many times I’ve rewatched Ep VI and VIII. Yeah, I own them…they’re Star Wars. But those DVDs will never wear out.
Agree!!! Solo was flawed but fun. Rogue One was the best SW film since Empire. Episodes 1-III have issues but are still fun to watch. 7 & 8? I can’t think of a single character or storyline that is even remotely interesting, aside from how those films ruined every character from the original movies. I saw them in the theaters, and might have watched bits & pieces on Netflix. Zero interest in seeing 9 before it comes to Netflix DVD.
And the smartest thing they could do would be to turn the Thrawn Trilogy into movies. Unfortunately, Disney has become about giving fas what they want as opposed to what we want.
I guess I’m the only one on this site looking forward to the film, then?
I took December 20th off from work to see it on opening day. I didn’t have to really, but doing that reminds me of when attending the Original Trilogy was an Event. Life long friendships began while waiting on long lines, characters you were invested in, that thrill when you finally get to watch a movie you were waiting years for.
Yeah, it’s not going to be a masterpiece. But it will be closure to a story that means something to me.
I will go see it when my brother wants to but for me its a little less the destruction of the story (because I’ve not picked up the Rey as a cheat code using Mary Sue while eating popcorn) but that the movies are old to me now. It has been too long between flicks that other things have billed my mind and I haven’t gotten that involved in the new stories to re-watch to keep up. The Marvel MCU has drawn itself out as well, and just gotten long. At least it is closed and done, so I can re-watch knowing where the end is.
I’m with you….I’m not HAPPY about how it looks like it’s going to be, but it’s Star Wars and I’m gonna do my best to go on opening day and enjoy myself.
Don’t go opening day – wait a week or two, but don’t help add to whatever artificially inflated opening weekend sales they’ll be hyping.
Spoiler: They’ll find a way to ruin Lando too.
Star Wars: Rise of the Algorithm.
People like horses. People like spaceships.
People will love horses on spaceships.
I have a way to save the franchise. Add a scene in ‘Return of the Jedi’ where Han talks about the weird nightmare he had; Episodes 7-9.
Let’s take it one step further – shorten Episode 9 to two minutes. Princess Leia wakes up, goes into the bathroom & finds Han taking a shower.
So which one of you will not be going to see this movie?
I’m in luck — my kids don’t even want to see it, so I won’t get dragged along like I do to some other flicks.
If Stephanie wants to go, I will cheerfully accompany so I can hold her hand.
The last couple of releases I went along only because my sister had made a whole gang of us join our nephews (the only ones who I thought wanted to see the movie). This always seemed to happen right around Christmas… is that when this one’s coming out?
I believe so.
I am running out of movies to look forward to. The last Godzilla was terrible. Start Trek is ruined. Star Wars, oh my Lord Star Wars! Et tu Brute? What a terrible waste of popcorn!
The worst part of killing Star Wars? I’m not even mad at this point – I’m just bored. I have no interest in seeing the final movie, although I’ll probably get the DVD whenever it arrives on Netflix. Episode 8 was a gigantic middle finger to the fans and the franchise, and there is no storyline nor character from the new films that I find remotely interesting. I grew up on the original trilogy, and for all of their flaws I still enjoy the prequels (viewing hint – Attack of the Clones was made specifically for DVD. If you skip all of the Annakin/Padme scenes on Naboo it becomes a good movie), but now all that I feel towards Star Wars is apathy.
Damned shame, because as Steve pointed out The Mandalorian looks good. Solo was flawed but enjoyable, and Rogue One was brilliant. There is hope.
What I don’t get is how does Disney doesn’t get a shareholder lawsuit for intentionally destroying a billion dollar investment
Scott, your Chicago/REO story rings true. Take my two favorite bands, Iron Maiden and Slayer. I saw Maiden twice back in the day, but over the last 30 years I’ve only seen them two more times. Why? Those two were special shows that were billed as nostalgia trips. Every other show they do gets chocked full of new stuff nobody wants to hear, with maybe 2-3 song from back in the day sprinkled in. As long as Eddie (their giant zombie-like mascot) appears on stage twice a night and they have shirts for sale with Eddie on them, Maiden can do whatever they want, fans be damned.
Contrast that with Slayer. The’ve always known that their best stuff was from their first decade, so at worst in the twelve times I’ve seen them over the years they have *never* played more than five “new” (post 1991) songs in any show. This is why I saw them twice on their farewell tour. This is why I drove three hours to see them a few years ago. And why Slayer fans have such a reputation as crazed loyal fanatics. If you want a good laugh YouTube Jim Brewer’s take on Slayer – the best version is in his special “And Laughter for All”
The point of this comment is one band had this radical idea of giving fans what they wanted. And that’s why they kept earning my money whenever they came around.
What the so called entertainment industry has forgotten is the necessity of good triumphing over evil after a harrowing stream of battles. This is the plot theme of every successful story since the first story was told. This is why westerns were so popular, James Bond was a wild success, and the first few Start Wars movies were a success. Today it’s all about sending a message. Once they understood that it’s the story that counts.
Today they send messages and fall flat on their obscene faces in a way that is not funny nor entertaining.
Have the fans go out and make thier own films so the network suits can sue them into oblivion? Last I heard Axenar was getting sue again for some reason or other.
I wish Axanar would counter-sue and force the courts to take a long, hard look at copyright law. Trek’s copyright should be expired by now, so CBS should be told to pound sand
Star Trek is currently in a copyright/trademark hell. Being fought over by a pack of power players who only know (or care) about Star Trek in that it’s a profitable franchise. And they only care enough about it to suck as much money outta it as quickly as possible.
Prelude to Axanar was amazing.
Watch it on YouTube if you can.
They got my money.
Prelude to Axanar is better than any Trek that’s been produced in the last 20 years. And I thought that Enterprise was OK
But Scott, he used to bullseye wamprats in his T-16 back home. They’re not much bigger than 2 meters.
Into Darkness should have been a remake of Where No Man Has Gone Before. Cumberbatch should have played Gary Mitchell. That Khan script was incoherent and hollow. Written by people that only have a pop culture knowledge of Star Trek
Yeah, it really felt like whoever did the new Khan only watched a few Youtube reaction videos. Those actors did a good job of mimicking their predecessors, except for Chekov – I thought that he kind of overacted the role. Damned shame the movies themselves were so forgettable.