I was wondering whether Disney would try and do any damage control. I personally doubt they will. They still think (or at least state publicly) that Kennedy and RJ created an absolute bloody masterpiece of story telling and all of us unhappy people are really just bots on the internet.

To do damage control they have to first admit they made some mistakes here or there...and that us unhappy fans are not fake bots on the internet.

Easy now, I'm a graying space nerd myself. Maybe I'm camouflaged because I'm not also on a "SJW" jag? But I think I'm still entitled to poke a little fun at my own pack. And like I said, if the graying space nerds really stop showing up en mass, Disney will take notice. They still want your money after all. That may prove as elusive as the Stern boycott that people are always trying to get going on Pinside, but time will tell.

@infinitelives, sorry for implying you've got gray hair. May your beard never grown thin!

Ugh. "Han meets Chewie and Lando" sounds like another story that no one needs to see acted out. Were they roommates at college or something? I'm not enthusiastic.

The only news I've been happy to see re: the Solo movie is that Woody Harrelson's in it. Love that guy. Not sure he fits in the SW universe, mind you, but he's usually fun to watch.

EVERYTHING MUST BE EXPLAINED

Yes maybe I'm using the wrong term. I don;t mean like an actual institutional apology and admist that it was the disaster it was, but more of just really focusing on this one being more like TFA. I feel liek whilst they may be in complete denial, JJ just has to be so goddamn pissed.

I don't know how pissed JJ is -- he was an executive producer on TLJ, and the interviews make it sound like he knew and was consulted about what was going on with the movie as they were writing it. Doesn't mean he'd have gone that way with it of course, but if he had a violent reaction to something, I imagine Disney would have paid attention.

That said, it will be interesting to see what JJ does with the next SW movie. So many big questions, chief among them being: does he have the balls to do yet another Death Star?

Fair point. Look obviously he ins't going to say he's pissed but yeah maybe he likes everything in it? It's just weird becasue it's all the opposite of what he did. Maybe when you're getting paid so much whom gives a shit and we can just do whatever they want and laugh all the way to the bank.

Sadly, it seems so. I’m still hopeful though, basically the same money as a stand-alone SW (R1) movie will lead to some questions at the corner offices.

This^^^^^ that’s why I’m a crusty angry old fan. Actually I’m 49 but still. These guys don’t care about their art anymore, it’s all about the Dollahs.

Am I the only one actually looking forward to the Solo movie?
Guess so....

I was looking forward to it till Disney decided to squeeze out the turd that is tlj.

And where the f did Nien Nunb go?
I mean he was there for the big Resistance meeting and then disappears only to show up in the Falcon at the end of the movie.

Man, save the galaxy once and you sure get a big head.
Jerk.

I think the Han Solo movie will be much better than TLJ. I'm curious to know how he became best buddies with Chewy and how he got the Falcon. Kinda like Rogue One, a sub story of the originals and much more interesting.

With Kennedy in charge I’m sure Chewy will be rescued from an animal cruelty circus operated by some incompetent white dude. I’m not even kidding, that would be my bet on how they meet in the movie.

I just cannot think about this movie without feeling a rage inside me. It is the first Star Wars movie that I saw only once in Theaters and it will be the first Star Wars movie that I will not buy. I will not trust Rotten Tomatoes critic score again. I will not see Episode 9 on opening weekend. I really hope bad things happen to Rian Johnson. It honestly feels like he intentionally wanted to piss people off. They should just scrap this as a disaster and make a good Episode 8.

I believe in the ESB It is revealed that Lando lost the Falcon to Han in a card game. This would explain why Lando was so adept at piloting the Falcon through the Death Star in ROTJ.

smart move, never trust any critic or audience score. Movies, music, video games and yeah pinball while every once and a while get something right and by that I mean it coincides with my opinion usually they are way off. The only way is to experience it for urself. I haven't seen the TLJ and I watch all films now a days at home with expectations low going in but even though from this thread and general response it appears to be "shit sandwich" I might like it.

Frankly there is too much money at stake to trust "professional critics" and it doesn't matter if it is the NFL or Hollywood. One does not exist without the other and Disney has already been on record of strong arming critics. Write something nice or no soup for you pal.

I can think of one movie site in particular where ALL the reviews are so biased its almost self parody at this point. Same movie site that is under a cloud for originator of site (who has stepped down) playing grab ass with the help. They had no less than 5 utterly glowing reviews for TLJ.

Even box office mojo which just reports the box office receipts has changed the reporting criteria making Monday now part of the weekend which has the effect of plumping up the "weekend grosses" wish I had a four day weekend!

money, money, money.

Best you can do is find a reviewer who has the same tastes you do and watch their reviews over a period of time or get down in the weeds on a site like RT and actually read the reviews written by normal people. Some of them are very detailed explaining why a movie was good or not.

Just watched the force awakens again last night. I enjoyed it so much more now that I’ve see the Last Jedi. The force awakens was a much better movie, I’m actually looking forward to episode 9 now that JJ Abrams is directing it. Hopefully they will answer a lot of the lingering questions that weren’t answered in the Last Jedi

It’s actually 16 - you left out that stable boy with the force broom.

It can't be that simple!

I can't even fathom how people have high expectations about anything Star Wars related after Episode 1. It was painfully clear after that disaster that the Star Wars we all knew and loved was dead. Episode 2 was just, so, so bad. Episode 3 almost fooled me by being "dark" but over time I realized it was just pandering. The legacy took a nose-dive long before Disney had anything to do with it. I put these new ones somewhere between your average superhero movie and the Hunger Games or Harry Potter franchise. If fine with this though. The most exciting thing about Star Wars to me in the past 25 years has been the Harmy Despecialized versions of the originals. Those are great.

Hope springs eternal; we as fans who have enjoyed the franchise for so many years reluctantly and foolishly restore our “hope” everytime a new franchise movie is announced!
“Hope” in the form of believing they will finally get it right this time around....
“Hope” that we wont have to see knock off and completely useless Emperors Royal Guards do an impersonation of the Power Rangers/1975 Kung Fu movie pose after they fail at their only job.
“Hope” that in the next installment they utilize 400 varieties of Porgs so the Pokemon Go fans can go capture them all!!

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I always felt Han was a touch to the character Harrison Ford played in American Graffiti with the Falcon being his hot rod. If Solo has a little of that, I think it will suck me in. It needs to have the Falcon winning the race that is always referenced about how he did that run at whatever his time was. Give me a gear head, bad boy, gunslinger, car movie in the Star Wars universe and I will never be able to resist. Anything else and I'll pass. Episode 9 will be wait and see no matter how much hype they do, I just don't care. Flush it and start again.

Broom kid will wind up being the first non-binary / transgender character in the SW universe. He'll probably also have autism and be allergic to peanuts just to make sure all bases are covered. Whoops, this character already has more back story than Snoke...

you gotta be careful around here with anti Prequel talk! Pinside has the highest (only?) percentage of adult males that thought those things were awesome. It's kind of like how most non South American Iron Maiden fans are here too.

Haha literally had me laughing out loud with this one. Well done

I can see Johnson and Kennedy furiously taking notes in my head as I'm reading this.

For Episode 9 JJ Abrams should turn the tables on Rian Johnson and just come up with Luke "force teleporting" somewhere, he's not actually dead after all. Hell, he can pull a J.R.R Tolkien and have Luke visit the force world only to be told he must return to win the final battle! Why not at this point, lol.

That could work so long as Luke shows up naked, like the Terminator (remember, he left his robe behind on the island). Then he can use the Jedi mind trick to score a new outfit. "I need your clothes, your boots, and your landspeeder."

The title for the next standalone SW was just leaked:

Rose Before Bros: A Star Wars Story

Can’t wait!

[shamelessly swiped from Comedy Bang Bang]

Ha! That's a good one.

I have hated Episode 1 for years (I stood in line for 15 hours for that crap and then feel asleep during the pod race) but at least it mostly told a cohesive story and told the story you wanted it to. It's flaws were a bunch of annoying characters and bad dialogue. The Last Jedi makes those same flaws with Rose and Laura Dern's character alone and those are far from the worst parts about the movie. I would gladly watch Episode 1, 2 and 3 again before watching TLJ again.

Have you forgotten the midichlorians?!? Worst idea ever. And clear evidence that 1990s George Lucas was completely out of touch with the magical universe that 1970s George Lucas created. Providing an (extraordinarily lame) clinical explanation for the mysterious, mystical force that permeates the Star Wars universe was far more egregious than whatever's off with TLJ. Still pisses me off 19 years later just thinking about it. Maybe they can retcon it and say that the Jedi Counsel had slipped into a Scientology-esque fascination with bogus pseudoscience, yet another sign of the Republic's decline?

So many people mistake Star Wars for Science Fiction instead of fantasy, just look at those in this thread that call it Science Fiction, one can forgive George for trying to introduce some measure of science into the methos. An attempt to explain the force isn’t an unreasonable thing to do.

To say those thirty seconds of TPM were worse than anything in Eposide VIII is laughable. The prequels actually ushered in major lore points that have kept the franchise fresh for over fifteen years, Episode VIII just killed off interest in the franchise of previously dedicated fans.

Episode VIII is the dog of the franchise. Fine for a single viewing (I enjoyed my single viewing, which will be the only time I watch the movie) but it abused the rules of the fantasy world so bad and insulted everyone’s intelligence so deeply while simultaneously wacking iconic characters like Luke and Akbar needlessly there is nothing left other than the Mary Sue they created.

Same here....I also want to point out, it was 1999, the very dawn of CGI and he was more focused on the look than the story (I agree, the casting, acting and dialogue sucked ass). Lastly, he created SW, so he had the license to fuck it up, it was his baby. That aforementioned license does not extend to KK and RJ. What is their excuse? Disney could have hired a dozen talented directors to helm SW, she picked young, unknown droopies she could control.
List of directors:
Ridley Scott
Joseph Kosinski (Tron Legacy and Oblivion)
Doug Liman (The Edge of tomorrow)
Terry McDonough (director of the tv show The Expanse)
Matt Reeves (Director of the last 2 Planet of the Apes)
Russo Brothers (Capt America series)
Neil Blomkamp (District 9)
Wachowski's brothers...or sisters
and if you want to go indy you can get William Eubank (Director of The Signal)

I'd even choose these 2 below before RJ and the cloudy w/chance of Meatballs dudes....(gimme a f-ing break is she for real?)
Francis Lawrence (Hunger Games series)
Robert Schwentke (Divergent series)

Oh lord not that old chesnut? That's the what we used to say to each other in high school; not late breaking news.

As an idea; completely the worst. NOOOOOO almost surpassed it but Force Poppins holds the crown.

Just to briefly piggy back on this point by kvan99 , in 1999 we were witnessing the evolution of true high quality surround sound in theaters across America. The pod racing scene was designed to feature and promote the high quality LucasFilm surround sound system that now everyone takes for granted. Just as Avatar unveiled the newest in 3D quality film, TPM unveiled the highest ever sound quality and the pod race sequence was the coming out party.

Technology advances are important, but are often forgotten by people that judge old movies by modern criteria without taking into account what was so ground breaking by them.

I couldn't agree more.

Say what you will about the prequels, but all of that established lore eventually brought us 6 seasons of beloved The Clone Wars cartoon, which is really wonderful storytelling that gives solid character development for established characters from this period (Anakin, Count Dooku, Darth Maul, Mandalorians, Plo Koon, etc). It also introduces a whole host of iconic new ones (Ahsoka Tano, Asajj Ventress, Cad Bane, Captain Rex) who are FAR MORE INTRESTING than any of the new characters from Episode 7 & 8. It's far more enjoyable that watching the prequels, and I'd highly suggest anyone who hasn't seen them to dive in. They're all streaming on Netflix.

Now that the Rebels series is ending, I can't help but think that the most exciting period that hasn't been explored (besides comics/books) is the 30 years between ROTJ & TFA. One can only hope they make a series about the period directly after ROTJ. Perhaps an altered version of the Thrawn Triology might actually make it's way into official cannon after all (assuming Thrawn survives the end of Rebels). They could explain the story Luke creating his Jedi Academy, Leia's difficulty establishing a new government, show the Battle of Jakku in all it's glory, the birth of Kylo Ren, etc etc etc. So many stories to tell. A cartoon is the best way to explore his period, because all the actors are old & a movie covering middle-aged Luke just isn't feasible. And this series would provide the die-hard fans with the satisfaction that wasn't delivered with the new trilogy. This cartoon could really be epic.

Mark Hamill has the cartoon voice work experience, and I'm sure he would love to be involved. Fingers crossed.

I actually have forgotten the midichlorians...purposely. That is a very stupid idea but easily ignored and forgotten. Snoke and Luke being needlessly dead after doing jack squat is a bit harder to forget.

So much THIS.

Next movie will have a Death Star but this time the rebels build it. And the twist will be, they were the villains the whole time.

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