Adventure trends
- Thread starter Malrex
- Start date
Beoric
8, 8, I forget what is for
I'm using the word "elite" as descriptive and not pejorative; it was not intended to be a political statement. Star Wars ep. 1-6 revolve around princesses, senators, emperors and space wizards, all with political and/or magical power. The protagonists in Rogue One are none of those things. They are ordinary people with ordinary resources, which they leverage with whatever intelligence, imagination and courage they can bring to bear.
Rogue One is more humanistic than the SW movies that came before it. It is less mystical and more secular. These are qualities it shares with Star Trek, but not with the "Skywalker Saga". It doesn't make it better than other Star Wars movies, it just makes it different.
To be clear, one of my favorite movies is Excalibur, where everyone is an aristocrat or a wizard, it is deeply mystical and religious, and it is not remotely humanistic. Like, "The King and the Land are One!" These are not qualities I have any issue with.
DangerousPuhson
My my my, we just loooove to hear ourselves don't we?
I Think squeen's issue might have been with the statement:
"Courage & sacrifice in the face of adversity" is basically synonymous with the term "hope", and you've just kind of insinuated that there was no hope present in a movie that's literally called "A New Hope", within a franchise with probably the most famous underdogs in all of cinema (the Rebels). So when you say "courage and sacrifice are largely absent from the franchise", it makes no sense - it's like saying "The themes of war and death are mostly absent from Saving Private Ryan". It's just... wrong.
"Courage & sacrifice in the face of adversity" is basically synonymous with the term "hope", and you've just kind of insinuated that there was no hope present in a movie that's literally called "A New Hope", within a franchise with probably the most famous underdogs in all of cinema (the Rebels). So when you say "courage and sacrifice are largely absent from the franchise", it makes no sense - it's like saying "The themes of war and death are mostly absent from Saving Private Ryan". It's just... wrong.
Beoric
8, 8, I forget what is for
Well, no, they are not synonyms. A person can have hope that something will happen without being able or willing to take any personal risk to make it so.
In A New Hope there is never really any sense that the protagonists are at risk, and where there there are consequences they tend to be glossed over or minimized. So Luke's Aunt and Uncle are killed, but (a) we barely knew them, (b) it occurs off-screen, and (c) Luke mourns them for about 5 minutes and then the movie pretty much forgets about them. Their deaths are really a plot device to free Luke to go Jedi-knighting. Alderaan is destroyed, but we never met anyone from there except Leia, we are given no sense of their culture or what was lost, and like the trope says, a million deaths is just a statistic. Kenobi doesn't really die, he clearly allows himself to be hit (if he even was, he may have ascended prior to being struck), his body disappears and he ascends to Force Ghost status. Luke mourns Kenobi's death more than he does his Aunt and Uncle, but between Obi Wan's warning to Vader about becoming "more powerful than you could ever imagine" and the disappearance of the body, the audience is pretty sure that something else is going on. None of these deaths generate much in the way of pathos, nor are they meant to, because the movie is not about sacrifice or loss or the human condition, it is about faith and mysticism and rebirth/the afterlife, since you literaly have Kenobi ascending to another plane and coming back to tell Luke to trust in the Force.
BTW, none of the characters in A New Hope actually have their hope renewed. Luke was fine before the movie starts, Han was content with his lot, and the portrayal of Leia never suggests she lost hope. The "New Hope" might be the renewed hope of the rebels because of the destruction of the Death Star, except we hardly get to know them before that happens. I think the "New Hope" is Luke, the Chosen One, the one who could balance to the force (but didn't, as far as I can tell, but then I never saw ep. 8-9). Or at least I think he was supposed to be the Chosen One in 1981 when the "New Hope" title was released, before the Chosen One was retconned to be Anakin.
Last edited:
The Heretic
Should be playing D&D instead
DP, weren't the Bothans only relevant with the procurement of the second Death Star plans. They were first mentioned by Mon Mothma in RotJ.
(DP...DP...that's an unfortunate set of initials, isn't it?)
The Heretic
The Heretic
Should be playing D&D instead
This is interesting to me because it almost exactly matches the reaction a friend of mine had to Rogue One. He thought the characterization was poor and there was no character growth. He was the first to notice that tFA was a rehash of ANH, but he liked LJ quite a bit.
The Heretic
DangerousPuhson
My my my, we just loooove to hear ourselves don't we?
Yeah you're right. There are so many Star Wars superweapon briefings that I get them mixed up. So the Bothan hole isn't even an issue for Rogue One's continuity.
Nah. It's a porn term - who doesn't like porn?
The1True
8, 8, I forget what is for
The1True
8, 8, I forget what is for
I think they touched on the Bothan thing extensively in Timothy Zahn's "Heir to the Empire" series which, by GOD ALMIGHTY, should be fucking cannon.
I'm pretty sure this Thrawn thing they're rolling out with Ahsoka is going to offend me.
Rogue One was fine, but the palpably suffocating evil and oppression in Andor makes it all thoroughly worthwhile. Very much looking forward to more of that.
I'm pretty sure this Thrawn thing they're rolling out with Ahsoka is going to offend me.
Rogue One was fine, but the palpably suffocating evil and oppression in Andor makes it all thoroughly worthwhile. Very much looking forward to more of that.
The1True
8, 8, I forget what is for
To me, the benefit of a reviewer referring to the classics is that it's a touchstone. Like, based on the reviewer's opinions of these commonly experienced titles, I can judge to what degree his tastes parallel mine.
So for example, if the reviewer says he hates S3 then I know his reviews may not apply to me...
If she says that if I liked X1, I might like this; tell me more.
If it says that S1 has been tremendously overhyped, but this latest gauntlet may scratch that itch for a party-killer; much respect.
But yeah, holding up every hex crawl against X1, every commando raid against G1, every funhouse against S2 etc. is ridiculous. There need to be genuine similarities, or a noted attempt at homage by the author.
So for example, if the reviewer says he hates S3 then I know his reviews may not apply to me...
If she says that if I liked X1, I might like this; tell me more.
If it says that S1 has been tremendously overhyped, but this latest gauntlet may scratch that itch for a party-killer; much respect.
But yeah, holding up every hex crawl against X1, every commando raid against G1, every funhouse against S2 etc. is ridiculous. There need to be genuine similarities, or a noted attempt at homage by the author.
DangerousPuhson
My my my, we just loooove to hear ourselves don't we?
Good point. The most effective reviews are able to instill the experience of the thing being reviewed into the viewer/reader, and the most effective way to instill an experience is to relate it to something they already know. Isle and Keep are high-profile adventures that have been around a long time; the odds are favorable that the viewer/reader has some experience with it (in some capacity, even just having heard of it), so it makes sense that they would become the defacto benchmark for a large number of reviewers.
One thing I'm coming to grips with as I age is that people are a multi-vectored thing, with axis into the infinite. One person liking something slightly related to my own preferences is no longer as potent an indicator of being on a good wavelength/sympatico/what-have-you with someone as it once was. With how fragmented media is these days, it's kinda hard to align on as many vectors anymore.
As example: do you like comic books? > do you like comic movies? > do you like modern comic movies? > do you like Doctor Strange? > do you like the Doctor Strange Sequel? = so many points to divert opinion, and that's only in one vector of preference. What are the odds that the guy who shares my preferences about the Doctor Strange Sequel also feels the same way I do about Conan the Barbarian, or Ghostbusters, or The Real Housewives of Greyhawk?
All that to say: The "if they like X, you might also like X" statements are something I feel less and less confident about these days. Lots of predictions have been way off, because preferences are more granular than that, I think.
The1True
8, 8, I forget what is for
So true! Man, can a conversations go south fast these days due to the faulty presumption that you are gelling with a person who very much is NOT on your wavelength.
omg the Arena episode was the BEST! And the Gord cameo in S2 E4: SQUEEEEEE! I mean, they didn't say it was him, TM and all that, but we all knew!
The Heretic
Should be playing D&D instead
<uncontrollable eye twitch> Yes, let's talk about ludicrous superweapons, like Kevin J Anderson's Suncrusher in the Jedi Academy trilogy. Fun fact, that trilogy is probably the biggest reason why I am loathe to watch Rogue One. Unless I'm remembering incorrectly (it HAS almost been thirty years since I read it) one of the plot points was about how the Death Star's flaw was purposefully engineered into the final product.
Back in college I was talking at the dorm cafeteria about Heir to the Empire and how great it was that Star Wars was back as a thing. Another guy mocked the whole "Oh, there's another trilogy? Gotta have a bigger bad guy for the next one, and the next one, and the next one...". I guffawed. Later when I headed back home I borrowed my nephew's Star Wars books and read KJA's series. That guy at the dorm was prescient. The Jedi Academy was trash. <head convulses violently> <convulsing stops> I'm...I'm better now. It was the worst of the the worst. Let's introduce a Mary Sue named Kyp (KYP?!?), who JUST HAPPENED to go to the dark side and then the light side right before he died (that's never happened, ever!). Total trash.
The Heretic (Don't worry if I continue to spasm, it's nothing. Really)
The Heretic
Should be playing D&D instead
I went through a similar realization back in the late nineties. "I like Joy Division, so depressing alternative music is where it's at." "No, this didn't quite work, well maybe it has to be Goth?" "Ugh, no, this "Goth" is horrendous." "Oh I get it, I should be looking for early 80's post-punk, or post-punk inspired bands. Sweet!"
The good thing about Bryce is that he is very descriptive in his reviews. Even if you can't trust his conclusion, you are given enough information to make your own decision. I am also thankful because he expressed in words the interior criteria I had for good modules. I went through the same thing with D&D modules that I went through with post-punk. "Hey, this is site based, it should be good." "No, that's not it. Maybe it needs to be a 'dungeon crawl classic' with retro art and a letter-number designation?" "No, that's not it. Hey this guy is talking about why G1 works, and I've run G1 to great effect numerous times, maybe I should pay attention to him!"
The Heretic
DangerousPuhson
My my my, we just loooove to hear ourselves don't we?
Bryce's reviews are top notch, with only three shortcomings/areas for improvement that I can think of:
1) Spelling/grammar mistakes
2) Random non-sequiturs
3) No images (beyond a cover)
The first is an easy fix - Bryce just needs to acknowledge that the squiggly red lines under his words actually means something. The second is his style, which I get, but it could be either dialed back a bit, or at least more mainstream referential. By this I mean the random statements he interjects to punctuate a point could stand to be less esoteric. "Thus Albanion wept, for there was no heartberry pie"... that kind of shit. The third might be a format issue with the blog (which I get), but it's always kind of a shame that we never get to see the maps or the images or the hilariously-bad parts of an adventure; we're just told "go to the preview", which is fair but disappointing.
Otherwise, he nails the points that need to be nailed in an engaging and relatable way, so that's pretty groovy.
Beoric
8, 8, I forget what is for
Wait, this is really a thing? Where do I find it?
The1True
8, 8, I forget what is for
I suspect it's a point of pride now. It is troubling when he goes after a writer for poor editing, however...
Anyway, given that it takes me a several days to read through an adventure, and he's reading AND reviewing a couple a week, I'm willing to cut the man a great deal of slack. That said, my narcissism can't conceive of how a person could not reread his own writing at least once before hitting post...
squeen
8, 8, I forget what is for
Super easy: Done with that & moving on.