Star Wars VII: The Force Awakens—non-spoiler discussion

[Primula Baggins]

I agree. It isn't and never has been a tiny minority in this country. The Internet gives them echo chambers to gather in, and microphones when they want to use them, amplifying their voices beyond what used to be possible. And people who share aspects of their beliefs hear their message and think, hey, that's great—racism isn't my fault! It's "those people" who are the racists!

[Voronwë the Faithful]

On a happier note, I finally got a chance to watch the trailer, and was suitably chill-induced.

[Primula Baggins]

Yes! I have a good feeling about this.

[Beutlin]

I have never said that racists are a tiny minority in your country. What I said was that on the internet you have tiny minority of “sincere” supremacist white-nationalists who fear that children movies such as the upcoming Star Wars films are ploys of Jewish world dominance, deployed to extinguish the white race. There are some connections between these people and Trump supporters but to equate the two groups is politically disingenuous at best. If you search for the hashtag #BoycottStarWarsVII on Twitter you will have a hard time finding a lot of boycott-positive tweets. The vast majority of tweets containing the hashtag criticize the racists, make fun of them and/or laud the diverse cast of the upcoming movie. For me this all seems so redundant really. One might as well bring a major story about vegans complaining online about the building of a new slaughter house, or radical feminists boycotting porn.

Again, it would be an interesting story, if Trump (or anyone else of similar political prominence) announces tomorrow that he dislikes the casting of Boyega because of his race. It would be an interesting story if sequels with a more “diverse” cast generally underperform among the white subsection of the audience. If Star Wars VII bombs this December (lol), and the main reason for that is the absence of angry white males who avoided the cinema, yes, then it is an interesting story. But as long as you only have some white supremacists vocally complaining about it, whom nobody would recognize without the help of 4chan trolls, it is a “controversy” story, generated by news outlets who have outsourced their editorial process to Twitter (a world revolving around controversy and moral posturing) and thereby hope to generate clicks (and thereby revenue) by publishing such revelatory information, and not a real news story.

Okay, I am done with osgiliating this thread. As the official Star Wars denigrator of this forum I am trying to find complaints about the new trailer. It is a good trailer however. I’d say the first trailer (not the teaser though) was better, at least for nostalgic Star Wars fans. One major gripe however: The bad guy’s voice (the dark helmet guy) sounds laughably bad.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

Japanese trailer, with some new footage:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_cont ... dAUiyeJMFQ

[River]

So I watched that with the kiddo standing right next to me. Her response to the opening "Who are you?" line was "You'll never guess."

[Teremia]

Wait, River--did your kiddo just leapfrog from toddlerhood to tweendom without us noticing???

[Frelga]

I know, I had that moment of "Wait, how old is she?"

[Impenitent]

Heehee! River, you have a dynamo on your hands.

[River]

She will be three in a matter of weeks. She is quite the handful at times.

[Lalaith]

In my experience, that is pretty much exactly how she'll be at 13. I found that at about 11 or 12, they began acting like they had when they were toddlers. So just add or subtract 10 years, depending on where you are in the range.

[Alatar]

Remember the supercut Fan Trailers for LotR? Here's one for TFA.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

Coolness!

[Lalaith]

Cool! This is really the first I've seen any of the trailers. (I know, I know. College classes, people! I only have so much time to screw around on the internet. ) So the supercut is a mashup of all available trailers/footage?

[Alatar]

Yep!

[Lalaith]

Awesome!

I'll share it, but I suspect the main people I know IRL who love Star Wars have already seen it.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

Or at least have seen the individual trailers used to make it.

[Lalaith]

I know, for sure, they've seen all of those. I just didn't know if they've seen this compilation. It's nice to have it all in one place.

[Frelga]

The Radicalization of Luke Skywalker: A Jedi's Path to Jihad

From introducing him to us in A New Hope (as a simple farm boy gazing into the Tatooine sunset), to his eventual transformation into the radicalized insurgent of Return of the Jedi (as one who sets his own father’s corpse on fire and celebrates the successful bombing of the Death Star), each film in the original trilogy is another step in Luke’s descent into terrorism. By carefully looking for the same signs governments and scholars use to detect radicalization, we can witness Luke’s dark journey into religious fundamentalism and extremism happen before our very eyes.

When we first meet Luke Skywalker, he’s an orphaned farm boy with barely any friends, living with his Aunt and Uncle, and wanting to join the Galactic Academy like all the other guys his age. You see, Luke didn’t become a space terrorist overnight, but he did exhibit signs that would make him a prime candidate for terrorist recruiters.

Via (who else) Yonatan Zunger, whose commentary is also well worth reading.

[Dave_LF]

It really is surprising how little time (0?) the original trilogy devotes to backstory. Not a word about why the rebellion is rebelling, or what exactly Leia is princess of (is that even a real title, or a style taken ironically by a rebel fighting to take down the aristocracy?). An honest viewing of Ep. 4 free of prejudice toward the handicapped would leave you with no idea who to root for, right up until Alderaan is destroyed.