Star Wars Episode VII thread

[Sava]

I thought JJ Abrams was a good director until I saw the last star trek movie. I now think he's a bit of a con artist. Honestly, they should just have Timothy Zahn write a screenplay of the Thrawn trilogy and be done with it. The material's there. I think they lend themselves to movie format. But it makes too much sense and therefore cannot happen.

Agree 100%

[Hauldren Collider]

Yes. And ?

Another for instance:

In the original series, Uhura was meant to be and intelligent African woman- not some standard American Playboy centrefold wannabe (no disrespect to Ms. Saldana- I'm sure she did the best with what she was given).

This is rich. In the original series, Uhura was a zero-dimensional radio with a face. She just relayed messages to the captain. She made no decisions and she used the translator to talk in other languages. In fact, it was so bad that Nichelle Nichols actually was going to quit the show because her role was so one dimensional and boring. The ONLY REASON she stayed on the show is because Martin Luther King, Jr. literally called her up and told her she had to stay because she was the only black military officer in all of television.

So many rose tinted glasses about the original series. Seriously, watch it again. It really was awful in a lot of ways. Groundbreaking, yes, and excellent in a lot of other ways, but the newer series are just better constructed. Saldana's Uhura is orders of magnitude more important, competent and dynamic a character than the original Uhura.

[self biased]

am I the only one who thought the thrawn trilogy was awful?

[DinoDoc]

Yes.

[Buster Crabbe's Uncle]

Apparently. You're the first person I've seem say so, and Warsheads talk about Thrawn a lot.

[Hauldren Collider]

am I the only one who thought the thrawn trilogy was awful?

They're the only star wars books that are even readable.

[DinoDoc]

They're the only star wars books that are even readable.

Also untrue.

[Lancer]

From what I can glean from the plot it occurs among the stars, and there are wars.

[self biased]

They're the only star wars books that are even readable.

that's not really high praise; you're basically saying thrawn is the least worst.

Most of the star wars eu stuff I've seen reads like bad fan fiction.

[Buster Crabbe's Uncle]

It is bad fan fiction - just from people who got paid to make it.

[molly bloom]

This is rich. .

Is it ? Thanks. Of course 'rich' is good in your world view, isn't it ?

Uhura was a zero-dimensional radio with a face.

As opposed to all those other high powered women of African origin in the shows at that time ? Of course, I forget, you weren't even a fart at the time, let alone the result of a 9 months long constipation.

The ONLY REASON she stayed on the show is because Martin Luther King, Jr. literally called her up and told her she had to stay because she was the only black military officer in all of television.

Teaching your grandmother to suck eggs must be a favourite pastime of yours.

Read this and then get back to me :

'Toms, Coons, Mulattoes, Mammies and Bucks: An Interpretive History of Blacks in American Films'

Donald Bogle


I've met Ms. Nichols. Very charming she is too. She remembers it slightly differently from you :

Nichelle Nichols played Nyota Uhura on Star Trek. She didn't like television work and wanted to get back to the theater. So she told the producer, Gene Roddenberry, that she planned to leave the show after the first season. He begged her to take the weekend to reconsider.

She agreed. Later, Nichols attended a fundraiser. Martin Luther King, Jr. was there. He approached her and expressed that he was a huge fan of her work. When she informed him that he planned to leave the show, King implored Nichols to stay. Lt. Uhura, King argued, wasn't a servant or some other black stereotype, but a professional and a leader.

http://www.neatorama.com/2014/01/20/Star-Treks-Nichelle-Nichols-Remembers-Martin-Luther-King/#!JwRvE

So many rose tinted glasses about the original series.

Not mine. A high profile African woman, a high profile Russian and a high profile Asian of Japanese origin all on the bridge of a starship. You might want to read some of the standard science fiction works of the time, and what someone such as Samuel R. Delany has to say about them.

It was a mighty white world out there... in outer space.

Seriously, watch it again.

I have watched it many, many times. On television, video, youtube, the Gold Key series, the cartoon in the 70s... more teaching egg-sucking....

Saldana's Uhura is orders of magnitude more important, competent and dynamic a character than the original Uhura.

Gosh, what might have changed in the intervening 50 years, with regards to roles for women, DIMBOT ?

Ms. Nichols would never have been mistaken for Puerto Rican. Her character was meant to be African, and not some stroppy pouty centrefold who threatens a hissy fit if she can't get on the same starship as her boyfriend.

[Buster Crabbe's Uncle]

molly, this is like what Louis Armstrong told the lady who asked him what jazz was. You're never going to teach the kids about Trek - it's not shiny enough for them.

[Sava]

ST:ToS is awesome. It still is awesome. It holds up very well.

I've watched it within the last few months.

[Elok]

I should add that more or less every TOS episode was produced on a very tight schedule with a pitiful budget and fifty-year-old SFX technology. For a two-hour movie, years in the making, with a multi-hundred-million dollar budget and a modern arsenal of computer artists to depict almost any conceit imaginable with near-perfect realism, the bar should not be, "Welp, it's not as dumb as the Spock's Brain episode, so you nerds have no right to complain." Nuh-uh.

[Buster Crabbe's Uncle]

Star Trek (qualifiers are for kids and non-fans; it was Trek, and the others need qualifiers in the name) wasn't done even faintly on the cheap. The budget was big-ish for its time. It was just finite.

The end result also looked like (top of the line for TV) 60s special effects, and the kids can blow me if that isn't good enough for a 60s TV show.

...

Besides that, complete agreement, and the hostility isn't directed at you, Elok.