{"id":15335,"date":"2015-12-22T18:38:29","date_gmt":"2015-12-22T10:38:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/maddruid.com\/?p=15335"},"modified":"2016-01-05T21:20:38","modified_gmt":"2016-01-05T13:20:38","slug":"2809-mickey-thank-you-for-star-wars","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/maddruid.com\/?p=15335","title":{"rendered":"[2809] Mickey, thank you for Star Wars"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Phantom Menace<\/em> came out at the cinemas in 1999. I greeted it with such enthusiastic fanaticism \u2014 I went to the movies thrice \u2014 that I ignored its flaws for years until my cinematic taste became more sophisticated than that of a geeky teenager.<\/p>\n

Perhaps I am still suffering from the same affliction 16 years on. Nothing stopped me from waiting for December to arrive excitedly. There I was in the theater for The Force Awakens<\/em>, a grown man at risk of tearing up as John William\u2019s dramatic masterpiece blared out of the Dolby\u2019s speaker and yellow-lettered paragraphs crawled across the screen slowly.<\/p>\n

Watching the latest Star Wars<\/em> installment felt like meeting an old friend. \u201dChewie, we\u2019re home,\u201d\u009d said Han Solo as he entered the Millennium Falcon. I smiled as wide as I could.<\/p>\n

[youtube]ngElkyQ6Rhs[\/youtube]<\/p>\n

By the time the credit rolled, I was absolutely sure my latest appreciation for\u00a0Star Wars<\/em> would not have an expiry date. I love Episode VII<\/em> even as Mickey Mouse erases my teenage years spent reading about Grand Admiral Thrawn, Mara Jade, the Rogue Squadron and the Corellian life into the dustbin.<\/p>\n

The story flows well, the acting is not awkward and the jokes are tastefully delivered. It is certainly done cleverer than anything a character called Jar Jar Binks could muster. \u201dI know how to run. I don\u2019t need you to hold my hand,\u201d\u009d barks Rey at Finn as both escape from the Stormtroopers. The best comic relief comes when onboard the Millennium Falcon, Finn conspires with the droid BB-8 to impress Rey which then leads to a hilarious scene of thumb-up exchange.<\/p>\n

Nevertheless, several aspects bother me. I do appreciate the various references made to the original trilogy. These references help made The Force Awakens<\/em> memorable, especially for the fans. But at times, it is\u00a0too much.<\/p>\n

Surely we do not need yet another Death Star and surely there are other plot devices and machines to wage terror. Yet, here comes the Starkiller Base. Director J. J. Abrams and his team pre-empted this criticism into the movie by having a minor character telling the Rebellion Alliance command \u2014 now the Resistance \u2014 that the Starkiller Base was significantly bigger than the previous two Death Stars. This is a case of imagination running short.<\/p>\n

But when The Force Awakens<\/em> should have copied the originals, it does not do so. The briefing for the Starkiller Base attack scene feels rushed. It gives the appearance that figuring out the weaknesses of a killing machine of that magnitude is easy. The scene lacks the deliberation that took place on Yavin 4 during A New Hope<\/em> or in one of the Rebel cruisers in The Return of the Jedi<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Worse, despite not being a Death Star, the superweapon\u2019s weakness is very much the same as its predecessor. And oh, do not forget to disable the deflector shield too. My mind wandered to the Forest Moon of Endor for a split second before I jerked it back down to Earth.<\/p>\n

I see a parallel here between Star Trek: Into the Darkness<\/em> and Star Wars: The Force Awakens.<\/em> J. J. Abrams directed both of them. That 2013 Star Trek<\/em> was the reimagining older version with Khan screaming all the way from 1982. This Star Wars<\/em> is the stories of Tantooine, Hoth and Endor combined. Since the next Star Wars<\/em> will be directed by somebody else, I hope more originality will be in order, hopefully without the disaster of the prequel trilogy.<\/p>\n

But I do not hate the composite nature of The Force Awakens<\/em>. I am just dissatisfied with the Death Star-like weapon.<\/p>\n

Indeed, as I have mentioned earlier, I love this movie. There are various things I would like to mention but I will not lest this turns into an incoherent rambling of a fanboy, if it is not already. Despite its defects The Force Awakens<\/em> makes a great addition to the Star Wars universe.<\/p>\n

Of course, Star Wars in turn is part of the Disney universe now.<\/p>\n

When the news first broke Disney that had bought the rights to Star Wars, a little part of me died. Posters of Death Star with Mickey\u2019s large round ears started to pop-up all over the internet. With the prequel trilogy the way it was, there were fears Star Wars<\/em> would turn into something that Star Trek<\/em> fans could trivialize. I myself made snarky remarks, ruing the end of Star Wars<\/em>.<\/p>\n

But the end did not come and instead, Disney did to Star Wars what it did to Marvel and it feels great.<\/p>\n

And so, Mickey, I am sorry for doubting you.<\/p>\n

And thank you for not sending Darth Vader to force choke me for my lack of faith.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Phantom Menace came out at the cinemas in 1999. I greeted it with such enthusiastic fanaticism \u2014 I went to the movies thrice \u2014 that I ignored its flaws for years until my cinematic taste became more sophisticated than that of a geeky teenager. Perhaps I am still suffering from the same affliction 16 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[702,1758],"class_list":["post-15335","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-pop-culture","tag-star-wars","tag-the-force-awakens"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/maddruid.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15335","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/maddruid.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/maddruid.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maddruid.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maddruid.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=15335"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/maddruid.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15335\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15352,"href":"https:\/\/maddruid.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15335\/revisions\/15352"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/maddruid.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=15335"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maddruid.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=15335"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maddruid.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=15335"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}