Request: PLEASE NO FORCE AWAKENS SPOILERS
Disclaimer: I do acknowledge that maybe I'm either just a hater in denial or a grumpy old man in a younger man's body.
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I was born in the mid 70's and I grew up LOVING Star Wars. I vaguely remember seeing A New Hope on broadcast television (with commercials because we
were poor and didn't have cable). I also vaguely remember seeing Return of the Jedi in the theatre and I distinctly remember three things:
1) Chewbacca on the big screen scared the crap out of me.
2) Even though he had a strange look to him, I wanted to be Luke Skywalker when I grew up.
3) I was young enough and stupid enough to like the Ewoks (this was more in retrospect; hey, I was a kid at the time).
Anyway, I LOVED Star Wars. Remember those old Halloween costumes with the plastic poncho-things and the plastic masks with the rubber bands that held
them on your face while choking you out? I remember being X-wing Fighter Luke one year and Yoda another year and my friend switched a Chewbacca one
with me one year. (By the way, remember those costumes? On the poncho part... why did they have a picture of the character on there rather than
making it look like the body of the character? Man, I feel old at the moment.... but I digress).
So I grew up having Lightsaber battles with my brothers and friends using wiffle-ball bats and all that. Loved Star Wars. Just loved it.
Fast forward a million years and they came out with the prequels. I was definitely "cautiously optimistic" because I was concerned that the old magic
couldn't be recaptured. I was partially right.
Episode 1: Seriously? The first seen was great because it sort of showed what Jedi's could REALLY do (with modern CGI) but overall that movie sucked
the big one (in my honest opinion). Darth Vader was really THAT annoying as a kid? Jar-jar? Really? Jar-jar? (Incidentally, had that fan-theory
about Jar-jar being THE Sith been used, this could be a completely different post... but again, I digress).
Also, Darth Maul? Really? Return of the Jedi showed us some (admittedly rare) Jedi/Sith. Darth Maul looked like a friggen cartoon character! THAT
was (kinda) the villain in the movie?
Episode 2: A bit better (thanks in large part to Ewin McGreggor... how the Trainspotting guy became an awesome Obi-Wan is beyond me... but damn he
rocked that role).
Episode 3: So good that it made me almost pissed that the first two sucked so bad. How is it possible that the third was THAT much better than the
first two. When I was on my high school track team my coach would get pissed at me when I would give a salute to my teammates during the 2-mile races
as I passed them on the track because she (correctly) told me if I had the energy to give a salute to the sidelines I wasn't putting 100% into the
race. So... I ask Lucas.... Why did episodes 1 & 2 suck so bad if you had it in you?
But again.... I digress....
Now... enter my "getting over" Star Wars....
Prior to the release of The Force Awakens there was the absolute media and more annoying PRODUCT blitz. Everywhere! EVERYWHERE!!! There is no
escaping it! I go to Target... giant friggen Star Wars displays EVERYWHERE. Even in the supermarket, there is no place to hide from Star Wars.
Walk into Toys R Us and there is an ENOURMOUS section JUST for Star Wars that looks like it is at least semi-permanent. Make-up commercials? Even
those crappy frozen ice-bar-plastic-wrapped things I enjoyed as a kid (Fla-vor-ice Giant-bars) are now called ice light-saber things with Star Wars
characters on them.
I didn't see The Force Awakens yet (although I will when the DVD comes out in May) but I'm sure it's a fine film. But now they are saying they are
coming out with about a film EACH year for like... I dunno... FOREVER!?!?!?! I'm sure many of those films will be decent as well. But here is where
the galaxy from long ago and far away loses me.....
It's just too much! When something is somewhat rare, it is special. When it is everywhere all the time, it is not.
I understand that these movies aren't meant for me... the are meant for the next generation of kids growing up and I'm sure the marketing people they
hired did their analysis and they will make a boat-load of money and I don't fault them for that.
But my personal, emotional response is that they absolutely KILLED Star Wars for me. For a movie series that I LOVED as a child, a movie series full
of characters that I pretended to be for hours/days/weeks on end... I have little if any excitement to hear about a new installment.
Again, I want to say Star Wars is not my property and if people want to make bank on it then good for them.... and of course this is not the biggest
issue I have in/with the world but it makes me a bit sad that they took the beautiful woman that was Star Wars and turned her into a cheap
five-dollar-whore.
[end rant]
edit on 8-4-2016 by eluryh22 because: (no reason given)