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Post by Harkovast on Jul 3, 2018 6:01:58 GMT
It was £4.50. RRP was £10. When I first saw how much they are supposed to be I thought "holy shit!". It's because they talk if you have some dumb hand set thing. I suspect being way too expensive and overly complicated is another reason kids didn't want them.
Mind you, having said that I saw Rogue one figures at another shop down to £2 each (this is the none talking regular ones.) The stuff just doesn't sell. Kids want marvel toys.
And yes, there were multiple other Tico's on the rack, as well as one of her sister of all things.
Imagine if you were a kid at christmas and that was the toy you'd got. You'd wonder if your parents just didn't love you or actively disliked you.
I know in places in America they are super super cheap. The phrase "2 dollar Tico" has been thrown around. You could get a big stack of em when toys r us was going under.
So not the cheapest Tico, but it makes me laugh to see it on my shelf in my ship room.
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Post by Harkovast on Jul 4, 2018 12:32:36 GMT
""They had time for me to milk that alien but to show human emotion? Nah..." - Mark Hamill (yes that's a real quote.)
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Post by wordweaver3 on Jul 4, 2018 15:20:14 GMT
Sure he had emotions. He was depressed old man who milked aliens while they moaned pleasurably.
I know I've kinda given Mark shit in the past for not exactly being a good actor, but he was out acting Daisy so much it was shocking. It was very obvious that Daisy was reacting to "action" and expecting "cut" in many scenes. She was finding her marks and checking off her to do lists for the scenes, and we could see it. Some of that can be blamed on editing, but a lot of it is just her. Hamill had a more natural appearance, even if we hated what was happening with the character. Not saying he was perfect, but he was acting Ridley into the ground.
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Post by Harkovast on Jul 4, 2018 15:45:26 GMT
In the first Star Wars his acting wasn't so great, but Mark has become a really good actor over time.
I mean he's the definitive Joker!
I did notice how much he was makign her look like a plank. She worked pretty well alongside Fin, but here she is just blank.
Fun thing about Daisy looking for her marks. She actually fucks up her marks during the red guard battle.
At the start when all the guards run in, you can see her block a guard and push him away at the start. The guard spins around like an idiot and then swings his weapon at her.
Now Daisy was SUPPOSED to duck, but she misses her mark so the guard just kind of arcs his weapon high over her head so it hits the weapon of another guard (obviously it was meant to be that she ducks and he hits the other guards weapon to stop him attacking.)
There is another bit where a guard with two knives attacks her and one of his knives magically vanishes.
The following video will explain the magic knife. (Also when it shows the initial fight bit, watch the closest guard to the camera on the left to see what I meant about the high aiming followed by her late duck.)
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Post by wordweaver3 on Jul 4, 2018 16:30:56 GMT
The thing about the Red Guard fight is that I actually appreciated the effort to make a fight scene that we could see what was going on. Most directors now just shaky cam the entire thing and you can't break it down like that cuz you can't see what's happening anyway. Unfortunately it could have used some more work cuz all that stuff does stick out when you can see what's happening. The part where Daisy missed her mark on the duck really needed to be redone. It was the opening salvo of the Red Guard attack and it sticks out like a sore thumb.
The second knife actually disappears on screen if you watch that scene close enough. Just as Rey's body is between his hand and the camera the knife blinks out of existence. Considering the two were fighting for several different camera angles it should have been easy to work in a part where she knocks one knife out of his hand so he wouldn't have that advantage. The only thing I can think of is maybe she was supposed to die right there but someone made Rian change it, and he left that obvious mistake in as a troll.
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Post by Harkovast on Jul 4, 2018 16:56:50 GMT
I can't completely dismiss Rian doing things on purpose to troll the audience.
Yeah the Red guard fight was kind of good as an overall idae. I liked the way it was done...but it it was done really badly. All the guards running in looked cool, by Daisy knocking them over three men with one kick and all the other little errors adn strange stuff just fuck it up.
It felt like Darth Maul in episode one fight, where it was technically impress but a bit sterile, with nothing relaly at state and no emotional weight...only with worse choreography obviously.
Jackie Chan said that the thing he always hated in fights in films was when you could see the actors anticipating getting hit or waiting for the next move and I think that was a big part of the problem here, made worse by bits where the choreograph goes wrong.
Shoke should have just got guards with guns instead of this dancetroop.
If all of them had opened fire at once with blasters, Rey and Kylo wouldn't be able to block it all...especially if they had big rapid guns like that guy in Rogue One (why did he have a better gun than everyone else, anyway?)
Though I will say that I am partial to weapons that turn into other weapons. So when the guy turns his stick into a chain thing and the other one pulled the stick into two knives, I liked that.
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Post by wordweaver3 on Jul 4, 2018 19:31:52 GMT
I can't completely dismiss Rian doing things on purpose to troll the audience.
He seems to thrive on the hate. I expect he'll run for president one day.
I'm too aware of how impractical that is. The more seams you have on a weapon the more it weakens it. Like the Kurgan's take down sword in Highlander. Seems cool except for the fact that it would shatter as soon is you hit something with it.
Another thing about the red guards that doesn't make sense is why do they even bother attacking the two? Seems their job is to keep Snoke alive. Sorta failed there. So what's the point of attacking them other than to die? Will it look better on their resume for their next guard job. "Well, yes, our employer died, but we did kill the guys who got him. So that counts for something, right?"
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Post by Harkovast on Jul 4, 2018 19:50:38 GMT
Kurgans sword doesn't break cause he's the Kurgan and its the best sword.
I guess I just liked the idea of someone pulling a surprise and going "aha, you thought you beat me but what about my NEW WEAPON!"
Chen-Chen totally pulls this in Book 1.
Maybe the guards were just annoyed they were made to look like chumps, or they just didn't know what else to do. There are guards, you kill the boss....guess they better attack. (And yes, that could be the thought process of guards or the writer.)
That's kidna the thing when I say whats that the scene had no stakes to me. They aren't really fighting about anything. The bad guys want to kill the good guys cause they are annoyed the killed Snoke and the good guys don't want to die. IF the guards had just run away, it wouldn't have made any difference to the bad guys situation.
Oh I tell you what would have been cool! All the guards point their weapons and then kneel. And Rey asks whats going on and Kylo says they are bowing to their new supreme leader. That would have been much cooler than the big stupid sword fight.
There's actually a bit with this gimic in the harkovast rpg book 2. This woman kills the God Emperor (who has been lobotomised by the bad guys) and all the guards rush over but then she states that she is next in line so they are all her guards now (which is true.) The guards all immediately swear absolute loyalty to her and round up all the bad guys in the palace. The idea of guards that are loyal to the throne rather than the one that sits on it is cool to me.
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Post by wordweaver3 on Jul 4, 2018 20:12:15 GMT
I guess I just liked the idea of someone pulling a surprise and going "aha, you thought you beat me but what about my NEW WEAPON!"
Two knives is always going to be at a disadvantage against a sword, and a sword is going to be at a disadvantage against a polearm. So it's more like "Aha! You thought you beat me but what about if I give myself even less of a chance?!!"
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Post by Harkovast on Jul 4, 2018 20:47:50 GMT
But you could parry it to the side and then get in and stab em with ninja speed. Or you could lock weapons and then pull half your weapons off and its a SECOND WEAPON! OMG!!!
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Post by Harkovast on Jul 4, 2018 21:07:20 GMT
Also its meant to be that the other guy has countered your fighting style, so you switch to a new style to confuse them.
Okay maybe not completely realistic...
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Post by wordweaver3 on Aug 29, 2018 3:06:04 GMT
So there's a Plinkett review up on TLJ.
Like six months after everyone else made all the same points, but hey, better late than never.
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Post by Harkovast on Aug 29, 2018 17:08:00 GMT
Haha if there is anyone that can beat a dead horse its those guys.
It made a couple of interesting points. Firstly I never knew who Rian Johnson's dad was until now.
Secondly the fact the film is shot like a comedy was an interesting observation, cause a lot of it really is. So in a sense the awkward humour is the stuff that FITS and its the serious depressing stuff that is out of place. How curious.
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Post by wordweaver3 on Sept 3, 2018 0:02:15 GMT
Yeah, the madcap comedy observation was a good one.
He does agree with me as to where the movie should have ended.
You know what else doesn't make sense? The "cloaking device" angle. They had a device that could cloak their ships, but it didn't work if they were actively scanning for cloaked ships. If that technology exists, why aren't they always scanning for cloaked ships? Does it cost extra money to scan for different things? It's sorta like having the ability to turn invisible but you can't do it when anyone is looking. This works in a Mystery Men comedy, sooooo... I guess it was supposed to be funny.
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Post by Harkovast on Sept 3, 2018 1:10:14 GMT
Oh yeah I remember you said that about the ending!
Cloaking scans are a lot of trouble to do. "Urgh do we have to do the scan for cloaked ships? I have to get up and go over to the other computer to set it up." "Yeah, I cant be bothered either. Just do regular scan unless someone complains." "Oi! This guy with a fake sounding stutter says there are cloaked ships!" "Awww fuck...alright I guess I'll get up and do it."
I refuse to believe cloaked scans could be expensive for the First Order. They turned a PLANET into a gun and have ships larger than an entire fleet (useless ships, but very big ships none the less.)
Why don't the rebels put cloaks on more of their ships? Fighters are small, they could have cloaks, couldn't they? Seems a useful feature. Why are cloaks only now suddenly a thing? Its almost like its just being made up to service the plot as it goes along and doesn't actually make any sense. All the technology and space battle stuff in the film is like that. Like the thing that bothered me about whether or not fighters are effective against capital ships. Everything works the way it needs to in the moment to justify what the story has to do next, and will change again when something else is needed.
Cloaking devices...chases through space where the ships stay the same distance from each other...techno babble conversations...is Rian a Star Trek fan?
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