Why so serious? The Star Wars movies are not exactly a joke

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Why so serious? The Star Wars movies are not exactly a joke

28 December 2022

American filmmaker Rian Johnson, who directed the 2017 Star Wars film The Last Jedi, the second instalment of the sequel trilogy, has defended his use of humour in the film, something fans of the long running space opera, have berated him for.

Humour, and a spattering of comedic scenes, says Johnson, are part and parcel of the Star Wars experience, considering the intent of the series was not serious:

“For me, everything in the movie is ‘Star Wars,’ and everything in the movie I can trace back to deeply, in a deep way, what ‘Star Wars’ is for me,” Johnson told GQ. “Everyone has a different take. I know there are ‘Star Wars’ fans who somehow think that ‘Star Wars’ was a serious thing, like the Batman movies or something. I was so young that when I watched ‘Empire Strikes Back,’ it had this deep, profound impact on me, because it was terrifying, because I was just young enough to not experience it as watching a ‘Star Wars’ movie, but to have it feel like too real.

If The Empire Strikes Back was anyone’s introduction to the franchise, I doubt they’d walk away from the film saying it wasn’t serious. Sure, the whole construct is science-fiction and fantasy, but Empire Strikes Back struck me as being nothing but serious. A New Hope, on the other hand, seemed like a more balanced film, even though a number of dark themes were present.

It was really Return of the Jedi, the concluding episode of the original trilogy, that introduced (at times) a less serious intent to the sci-fi saga. Ewoks, anyone?

Personally, of the sequel series movies, Last Jedi was the one I liked the most. The best of what was really a bad batch of films, to be precise. Even the prequel series, which had plenty of naysayers, held more allure.

Interestingly the Metascores — being an aggregate of ratings accorded, in this case, by film reviewers — give Last Jedi a score of 84. The first title in the sequel series, The Force Awakens received a rating of 80, while the truly awful (sorry) Rise of Skywalker scored a paltry 53.

In comparison, Empire Strikes Back — which many people consider to be the best of the Star Wars films — has a Metascore of 82. If we use Metascore as our go to metric to assess the Star Wars franchise, then Last Jedi outranks Empire Strikes Back. What’s happening there, then?

I know not everyone sees eye to eye with film critics, but if Last Jedi was as bad as people make it out to be, surely the title’s Metascore would have been far lower than that of Empire Strikes Back. And for anyone who’s curious, A New Hope — the first Star Wars movie screened in 1977 — scores a 90. Exactly right, if I may say so.

A trailer for the third and final series of Star Trek Picard

15 October 2022

The third series of Picard, another of the Star Trek franchise stories, goes to air in February 2023.

It seems to me the Star Trek stories get better as they go, if the trailer is an accurate indication of what to expect. Most of the original Next Generation cast are also set to appear alongside Patrick Stewart, who now portrays Admiral Picard, as they confront a mysterious enemy intent on destroying them, and the United Federation of Planets.

Stewart officially announced the season soon after, with filming ending in March 2022. The return of other Next Generation cast members was confirmed a month later, and [series showrunner Terry] Matalas hoped to make the season a satisfying ending for Picard’s story and the whole Next Generation cast.

Andor will take you back to the Star Wars you grew up with

24 September 2022

The trailer makes Andor, the latest Star Wars streaming series by Disney, look fascinating, but as we all know, trailers sometimes over-sell the story they’re promoting.

Set in the five year period prior to Rouge One, Andor however promises to take us back to the Star Wars we grew up with, says Michael Idato, writing for The Sydney Morning Herald.

At the centre of the series is Cassian Andor, and his involvement with the then fledgling rebellion against the Galactic Empire:

The “Andor” series will explore a new perspective from the Star Wars galaxy, focusing on Cassian Andor’s journey to discover the difference he can make. The series brings forward the tale of the burgeoning rebellion against the Empire and how people and planets became involved. It’s an era filled with danger, deception and intrigue where Cassian will embark on the path that is destined to turn him into a rebel hero.

Andor has been screening since Wednesday 21 September 2022. Jack Seale, writing for The Guardian, describes it as the best Star Wars show since The Mandalorian… once it gets going:

In its third instalment, Andor finally becomes the gritty, kinetic spy thriller it has been billed as, after a surfeit of thoughtful world-building. Thankfully, somebody at Disney+ has their head screwed on, because Andor has debuted with a triple bill. Make it through that opening marathon and you have what’s shaping up to be the best Star Wars show since The Mandalorian.

Book plotlines tropes and clichés a publisher may reject

13 August 2022

The world is full of writers and the stories they’d like to write. American author Joseph Epstein, writing for the New York Times, quotes research suggesting eighty-one percent of Americans think they “have a book in them”. That’s a lot. Unfortunately, aspiring writers vastly outnumber book publishers, meaning many manuscripts stand to go unnoticed and unpublished.

It might not seem like much help, but Strange Horizons — a magazine publishing speculative fiction — once put together a list of the types of sci-fi stories that they’ve seen submitted too often, and subsequently did not feature. I suspect they’re not the only publishers seeing such ideas either. Knowing what might be rejected then, might help you write something that won’t be.

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books, novels, science fiction, writing

Everything Feels Like the End of the World by Else Fitzgerald

8 August 2022

Everything Feels Like the End of the World (published by Allen & Unwin, 2 August 2022), by Mornington Peninsula based Australian writer Else Fitzgerald, seems like a book title for the times some days.

Winner of the 2019 Richell Prize for emerging writers, Fitzgerald written a collection of short stories, exploring a number of chilling dystopian futures for Australia, set both in the near and distant future:

Each story is anchored, at its heart, in what it means to be human: grief, loss, pain and love. A young woman is faced with a difficult choice about her pregnancy in a community ravaged by doubt. An engineer working on a solar shield protecting the Earth shares memories of their lover with an AI companion. Two archivists must decide what is worth saving when the world is flooded by rising sea levels. In a heavily policed state that preferences the human and punishes the different, a mother gives herself up to save her transgenic child.

Nanci Nott, writing for Artshub, describes Everything Feels Like the End of the World as an engaging collection of speculative short fictions:

Each tale is intensely personal, vibrant with specificity, and written with precision. Characters don’t just exist within their settings; entire worlds inhabit these characters. A master of minutiae and memory, Fitzgerald creates an intricate universe of befores-and-afters, sacrifices and consequences, mundane joys and darkest days.

Belated birthday greetings to George Jetson born 31 July 2022

1 August 2022

I’ve seen a few episodes of The Jetsons, a futuristic carton show that first aired in the 1960s, but had forgotten, or maybe not even known, the setting was 2062. The twenty-fifth century somehow felt more like it. After all, a flying car that compacts down to the size of a briefcase when not in use? Come on, we’ll need a few hundred years to make that a reality.

But according to intenet pundits, George Jetson, husband to Jane, and father of Judy and Elroy, was born in 2022. Some have suggested 31 July as his actual birthday, though series creators have yet to confirm or deny that is the case.

Vale Nichelle Nichols AKA Lieutenant Uhura of Star Trek

1 August 2022

American actor Nichelle Nichols, perhaps best known for her role as Lieutenant Uhura, the communications officer of the USS Enterprise, in the original Star Trek TV series and later movies, died aged 89 over the weekend.

Star Trek fans doubtless have many favourite Uhura moments and lines, but this isn’t reality, this is fantasy, from The Search for Spock, the third Star Trek film starring the original cast, has to be up there with the best of them. See also this IMDb photo gallery honouring Nichols’ life and work.

A trailer for Nope, the 2022 film by Jordan Peele

22 July 2022

Nope, trailer, being released in many parts of the world today, is the third feature of American actor and filmmaker Jordan Peele, and is being billed as a sci-fi horror comedy:

After random objects falling from the sky result in the death of their father, ranch-owning siblings OJ and Emerald Haywood attempt to capture video evidence of an unidentified flying object with the help of tech salesman Angel Torres and documentarian Antlers Holst.

But what does the title Nope mean? That, nope, there are no aliens in the film, because they don’t really exist in the first place? Nope, I don’t think so.

Peele chose Nope as the title because he wanted to acknowledge movie audiences and their expected reactions to the film. He also said, however, that he had considered titling the film Little Green Men to reference a theme in the film about humanity’s “monetization of spectacle.”

Star Wars Fan Film: A Blaster in the Right Hands

20 June 2022

A Blaster in the Right Hands, a Star Wars Fan Film, poster

Made in 2021, A Blaster in the Right Hands, a fan made Star Wars film, is a treat for admirers of bounty hunters in the long running film series. A Blaster in the Right Hands is the work of Australian filmmakers Lunacraft Productions, and was filmed, I believe, near the NSW town of Picton.

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film, science fiction, Star Wars

What If the Future Never Happened? The Daniel Johns story

1 June 2022

To accompany his latest album, Never Future, Australian musician Daniel Johns, formerly of Silverchair, will be releasing a short film (trailer), set in 1994, based on his experiences as a fifteen year old fronting Silverchair, which will feature orchestral reinterpretations of the band’s hits.

In a press release, Johns described What If The Future Never Happened? as “a grunge, sci-fi short adventure inspired by the pop culture I was immersed in before a curious case of child stardom”. It follows a hypothetical timeline wherein Johns’ trajectory was interrupted by “a mysterious figure from the future”, presumably stopping him from making the leap to stardom.

Johns, who will be portrayed by Australian actor Rasmus King, in addition to making a cameo appearance himself, describes the film as “at once the most honest and most fantastical thing I’ve ever done”.

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