Kilroy wrote: ↑Sun Apr 14, 2019 10:28 pm
Luke was exactly the same as Rey though. He was naive, stubborn, and angry, and it nearly got him killed in Empire. Neither Luke nor Rey are terribly deep characters. This is why their companions are actually the more interesting people. Jyn was badly written and had no personally other than shooting things. However, that doesn't make her masculine or feminine. She's just a character with a gun. I don't know Iden because I don't support EA's business practices.
I don't see anything that makes them overly masculine other than they're fighting their attackers like everyone else? It's a movie about space wars. People are going to fight. That's literally the focus of the entire plot for all the movies. Is there a way for women to fight that isn't emulating something we usually consider masculine? The whole concept seems outdated.
If any character is made masculine it's Leia in the OT. She shoots the first guy she sees, violently strangles her enemy to death, mocks her enemies to their faces, and barely shows any emotion or grief after her planet gets blown up. She's basically Indiana Jones in a dress and that's awesome.
There just doesn't seem to be any kind of wild political agenda present in these new movies. The bad guys were always space nazis. Imperial officers wear nazi uniforms. Stormtroopers are named after literal nazi stormtroopers. The good guys were always cowboys of mixed backgrounds. That's how star wars has always been.
I just don't get the complaint.
The prequels are the movies actually drenched in genuine political commentary, to the point that the Sith quote George W Bush almost verbatim and the films revolve around invading a nebulous threat and destroying the pacifists. Lucas was no stranger to inserting his political commentary in that trilogy. If you're going to complain about something like politics in new movies then at least be consistent.
EA, yeah I totally get that and understand your point of view here, everything they touch in the long run runs afoul of their "profit at all cost" practice. I noticed this when they bought Westwood studios, BioWare, Obsidion, ect. It all started out well and has quickly devolved to overt profiteering at the expense of quality content.
To help you out with the context of Iden though, Iden wasn't very interesting and even after two games and at least one novel, I think there may be another but I haven't read it, the biggest thing is she's largely finished her daddy issues by the end of the second game, sort of. Her story is a pretty typical one of "Daddy was a high ranking officer, mommy turned out to be a junkie and was absent (IIRC), Daddy was emotionally distant and treated her like garbage, though taught her responsibility, respect, dependability, and how to succeed, using her daddy issues and inferiority complex she climbed the ranks and eventually gained the respect of her father (also her immediate superior in the Empire), though never gained any emotional connection that she so desperately sought throughout the process, only to turn traitor and have that bridge burned; only to reconcile before her father's death at Jakku." Eventually she gets married to Del, one of her prior subordinates and fellow defector, Hask kills her then husband several years later and her and their daughter go to get revenge. Del was the classic "beta cuck nice guy", and she clearly wore the pants, which didn't sit well with me; but they worked well together and I was sad to see him die. As I recall the story leaves off with her and her daughter joining the resistance at the beginning of the fight against the First Order, who Hask is now a part of, also a former Inferno squad member. I'm not sure where the story goes from there, but I'd read the book if there is one for the sake of continuity.
Frankly, it took a lot for her to grow on me but I don't hate the character compared to Jyn and Rey. She's admirable, and I want to like her, but she's essentially a man in regards to how she runs her life. Which isn't something I'm attracted to, but I suspect that's the only reason I could relate, and we had a similar upbringing. Minus the junkie mom. This is a rare connection for me, as I generally do not relate well to female characters, and the way that people tend to present them basically over-masculinizes them, which in my opinion takes away from their feminine strengths. I like my women to be effeminate and complimentary to the man they (may) have romantic involvement with. Men and women are different, we are by nature supposed to be complimentary to each other, one being strong in the areas the other isn't. It's normal, healthy, and balanced. Mara and Leia were kind of on the more independent extreme (as you pointed out) than what I'd prefer, but even Mara compliments Luke in the books, and vice versa, and the characters work well together. They had healthy relationships and "real world perceived gender roles" were a non-issue. Examples of good writing, and understanding normal, healthy, relationships. I mean I guess if you overlook the fact Mara hated him at first and swore to kill him.
And Leia exhibited more balanced behavior in the books and comics, and I have to admit in EP7 when she reunites with Han, she wasn't always as you described.
Luke took three movies and countless comics, books, and games to develop as a character. Though compared to Rey, he developed quite a bit more between IV and V, V and VI his increase in maturity was huge in comparison to the prior movies also. I have yet to see Rey mature in any meaningful way and is still impetus and petulant; and clearly a natural prodigy when it comes to the force, which honestly isn't particularly interesting. We are generally in agreement here, though I would argue Luke was more frustrated with being stuck where he was and wanted to get out into the world and have a gainful career.
In contrast, Rey doesn't seem to have had much of an aspiration to start with. Then again, they were raised in entirely different environments, and Luke had some semblance of a normal stable life.
Again, the socio-political agenda is present if you know what it is. It is not readily apparent to those who either don't care, or are not paying attention to it. (This is not a dig at you, this is a general observation.) Especially if one pays attention to the Producer, director, and actor commentary on a wide range of subjects ranging from casting, their own expressed personal politics, their twitter feeds related to these topics, and the subtle memes and overt references or perhaps behaviors present in the movies. Two examples is the requirement for racial diversity quotas and specific % for actors from various nationalities that was explicitly discussed in various "forums" during production of Ep7, and Kathleen Kennedy's slogan "The Force is Female". To the entire interplay between Holdo and Poe. Never mind that in a real military scenario would that have never played out that way, and if it had she'd probably have been shot for treason on the spot if it did. Never mind the entire lack of professionalism on her part (speaking of, where was her military uniform? - side tangent) Poe would never have been demoted like that, or ridiculed as a man in the process.
I'm just saying, these things are present, and I notice them, and it ruins my immersion on top of the bad writing.
And yes, I realize that George did use past and some (then) current events as inspiration for plot devices, but he did it in a way that was less of a social agenda and more of an observation on how historically the events in universe mirrored how things play out in our history. He also used such devices tastefully, and did not have a plainly stated (or overall) socio-political agenda as far as I've ever been able to find. Therefore, it was more tolerable than this thinly veiled propaganda initiative we have today. I think this is more an issue of Disney, none of these issues ranging from bad plot points (debatable) to political subliminal or overt messages were an issue before the takeover. Disney has a long standing propaganda machine that can be observed (and has been documented) in every single Disney production ever made for the last fifty years. I also hate Disney as a company, but obviously I'm kind of between Star Wars and a hard place in this situation.
I want to be clear, these are my personal gripes with the new trilogy and much of the new Star Wars content. Star Wars Rebels thankfully and interestingly enough is entirely devoid of the socio-political issues noticed in 7-9, or many of the books post take-over release (depending on the author). I have strong opinions based on what I know of our society, the history of our beloved Star Wars and its production, and the observations therein. I'm merely sharing these opinions and observations as a fellow fan who wishes to have healthy discourse on the subject of the new content, I'm not trying to sway anybody's opinion or ram my own personal "theology" for lack of a better word right now, down anybody's proverbial throat.
Honestly I'm extremely torn with the direction things seem to be going. On one hand there are aspects (socio-political-propagandizing), overt profiteering, and to some extent harassment and demeaning of long term fans due to their not being 100% happy with things from "the powers that be" (we buy your products, so not a good business practice here), and of course yes the bad plot.
From the beginning I have hoped this not liking the movies was just "Prequel Syndrome" again, you know? Most people hated the prequels, so did I. Then the books and games came out and filled in all the plot holes and issues that I had with it, and it was better and richer than before. I'm not really getting that vibe this time around, the movies as stories are just poorly written and badly executed. There's some glimmer of hope in Solo and Rogue One movies, and the TV shows, and possibly some of the books, but I'm not certain.
I love Star Wars, my kids love it, it's something we can enjoy as a family. It's all fiction, but it's enjoyable fiction and there's so much fun to be had with it, and that should really be the focus of the people producing these products. Fun and consistency within the well established universe.
And yeah, I didn't care for the casino scene either, I think it's a dig at the weapons industry amidst the global/US gun-control push, possibly a reference to all the wars going on (War = profit; always is profitable for everybody but the loser). I would say that the rebels though are equally guilty for their weapon usage in regards to collateral damage, as the FO/Empire, warfare isn't clean and the lines are not always clear; the fact is innocent people get hurt in conflict and that's just life. Rebel extremists have also historically in SW attacked loyal imperial civilians in the past, this also is known. But never depicted on the screen, it's kinda one of those things I believe when it comes to storytelling that good doesn't commit wrongs, and cannot be shown to share anything in common with what is depicted as evil, we as people are moralistic. The Nazi's justified genocide of the Jews because they literally brainwashed their citizenry pretty effectively to consider them sub human, and blame them for the financial woes of Germany at the time. I guarantee you the Nazi's and general citizenry did not perceive or portray themselves as villains throughout the war, and Allied forces nations demonized them, and in regards to genocide, justly so. But things aren't clear cut in open conflict, covert conflict, or information warfare, that's kinda the point. History is written by the victor.
I think additionally, the casino scene is an interesting piece of information in-universe though. It makes you wonder a little, how much do the in universe corporations influence the conflict? Obviously playing both sides is incredibly intelligent, very amoral, and extremely profitable since you're guaranteed to get repeat business. And whichever faction wins, you win either way. It's smart business, not ethical business if we compare what IS definitively right and what is definitively wrong. However, one could also argue that one could also cripple the FO/Empire by refusing to sell product to them, and the Alliance/Republic/Rebels would win and good would triumph. On the other hand, logically the Empire would just take over your factories and resources and probably kill you in the process and get the materials they need rather than you profiting. So, that's kind of a rock and hard place. Then again if you supported the "good" side, you'd probably wind up out of business in the end too. So obviously enabling the conflict to continue is in your best financial and personal interest. A behind the scenes look perhaps behind the mechanics of the war machine.
I dunno, I'm speculating on this last point pretty heavily. I never really gave it much thought because it seemed pretty obvious that people will do what they need to further their own agenda given the context.