Ender's Game

[Sava]

The only thing I can possibly think of is that I thought that Revenge of the Sith was actually very good and rate it the equal of Return of the Jedi (****ing Ewoks). I wasn't as down on Attack of the Clones as most people (though it was pretty below average - at least the love scenes), but The Phantom Menace was just bad.

Interestingly (I just checked Rotten Tomatoes):

http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/star_wars_episode_iii_revenge_of_the_sith_3d/

III - 80%

http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/return_of_the_jedi/

VI - 79%

Hmm... I don't have a particularly strong disagreement to your thoughts on this. ESB is king... hands down. ANH is the original goodness. I always thought of RotJ as the weakest of the three. I agree that RotS is the best of the prequels... there is enough good space shooty action in it. I would say I find it about as good as RotJ. Sure.

AotC is also pretty decent if you skip through every Anakin and Padme scene. Their romance is so horribly acted and contrived. I understand that you need to explain Luke and Leia... but Anakin and Padme could have just as easily had a random hook up with her getting preggers... that would have made the movies a lot better absent any decent acting in those scenes.

[Imran Siddiqui]

Unfortunately you need Anakin to fall in love with Padme so that Palpatine (another reason RotS is awesome - because he's a badass in it) can tug at those heartstrings.

[Imran Siddiqui]

I got it!! (Maybe, it's been a while since I saw Clones) Just take out the dialogue in the "love scenes". Have Anakin and Padme do their playful things and have them sit there curled up in front of the fire, but no talking. It'll be clear from the curled up-ness that they are together. Maybe have Anakin mutter to himself "what am I doing; no emotional attachments" when he's by himself. That'd likely make AotC 10x better.

[Sava]

We're all entitled to our opinions. From everything I had heard previously, I was expecting to really be impressed. Which might have been the problem. Then you watch that 33 episode and you think, YA, this is pretty damn good. But the next few episodes really didn't measure up and were mediocre at best. Eventually I may go back and watch a few more.

**** your opinion on BSG.

And Syfy or whatever... they have great series. I loved Eureka. Warehouse 13 is fun. Alphas is decent (Gary, the autistic guy, he's one of the greatest characters ever). Lost Girl is great... if just for the eye candy. Defiance is surprisingly good... but would have been a much better HBO series.

I mean... Mia Kirshner




Julie Benz... an absolute 10 IMO




and Stephanie Leonidas




Dear Lord. It might be the hottest group of women in television right now.

[Donegeal]

Ender's Game will be promoted at Con-con this year

http://www.comingsoon.net/news/movienews.php?id=105901

[Donegeal]

Any publicity is good publicity?

http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/2013/jul/09/enders-game-boycott-card-anti-gay-views

[Elok]

The weird thing about that is, I've read (conservative estimate) half of Card's books, and would be totally unaware of his hostility to gay rights if it weren't for people protesting against him on the internet. I've never read coverage of it in any paper, or seen or heard about it on TV or radio news, since even an A-list sci-fi author is barely a D-list celebrity. I can only remember reading homosexuality being mentioned once in all the Card books I've read--and there was no implied moral judgment. He slips in messages about all kinds of other moral and religious issues, up to and including Bean expressing pro-life sentiments in one of the Shadows books, but nothing about gays. I guess he's being cantankerous about it on his official blog or something?

[Donegeal]

Opens tonight/tomorrow.

[Elok]

It's at 65% on RT right now. Gonna go see it Monday, and while this may be silly for a movie whose book I've already read, please conceal all spoilers if you see it first.

[Sava]

The movie looks good.

[regexcellent]

The one homosexuality reference in any of Card's books that I read was in Treason and it was weird and creepy but not hostile.

[Dinner]

An entertaining and good book but we shall see if the movie lives up to the book.

[Elok]

The one homosexuality reference in any of Card's books that I read was in Treason and it was weird and creepy but not hostile.

Never read Treason, but in The Gate Thief (not that great, and rehashes some old Card ideas) they briefly wonder if a teenaged character is gay because he shows no interest in dating. No moral judgment given or implied, that's it. The one reference to homosexuality I've ever encountered in his works.

[Donegeal]

Some of the reviews say that it's not a 'Movie that appeals to your inner child, it's a movie that appeals to you inner child's adult'.

Going to see it Friday, time and sleep permitting.

[Elok]

Just came back from the theater. Pretty silly, reminded me of a high school drama production at points, where characters show up on stage, spit out their lines and trundle off to make room for the next pair of characters. What I call a "checklist conversion"; they made sure to include certain scenes and high points from the book, but neglected to stitch them into a coherent plot.

Also, Asa Butterfield's performance was good. It wasn't his fault that the director insisted on shooting Visine into his eyeballs with a firehose for every ****ing scene.