Quicksand Fans

Anybody else see the movie yet? Great flick, but I found it to be rather depressing. Another one ghost-written by GRRM.

Also, some folks will pick apart the (space) Battle of Scarif. Two Imperial class Star Destroyers plus the planetary garrison should have eaten the Rebel fleet for breakfast. The sheer number of TIE fighters was a total overmatch to the Rebel fleet. Plus the Star Destroyers never fire their guns through the whole thing- neither did the Rebel capital ships, for that matter.

Other than that, I really liked it. The ground battles on the "beach" were great.

"I am one with the Force; the Force is with me."

I thought the battle on the beach was very interesting. We've had snow battles, deserts, jungles now finally a beach. I could imagine that this would have been a choice VIP post to get stationed at, and humidity would have made the Assaulters sweat their cajones off. I also got a WWII feeling with the helmets and the unfastened chin straps.
I think that the "Gate" held too many fighters. Where would you have the barracks and essential facilities if it is all hanger bays? Cooped up in a TIE cockpit would not be fun. Vader's Advanced fighter was supposed to be a one off or pre production model... back in 78. Now... I think I saw two of them as trailing escorts. Still, I was very impressed.

It was very ... refreshing... to see Governor Tarkin and The Princess again after 40 years. I had initially thought that the "guy in light grey" was Tarkin, but later on I was proved to be wrong. I went in cold knowing very little of the characters.

Darth Vader

He's not in as many scenes as a lot of fans would like
But
The last 2 minutes of the film, completely reset his level of sheer awesomeness. He's clearly playing up his appearance in the corridor to increase the fear of the Rebel Troopers. But that's his nature. And FEAR is his ally. But when that breathing starts, and the lightsabre ignites... it's ON bitches Short of third film and Ewan and Hayden's fight, I never saw lightsabre blade speed like this. Think I counted 7 troopers, all armed with blaster rifles and firing.... and he just swats them aside, some back at the shooters, some into the deck or overhead, advancing like an unstoppable monster. And full-on brute force abilities. I couldn't believe when he just pinned some poor bastard to the overhead and kept going, slicing him in half AFTER going past him with a whirl of the blade. Jesus , he deflected one shot with his PALM right back killing a trooper. Then disarmed them all for faster killing. One guy tried to rush him, ended up force-choked, lifted into air, and pulped against the bulkhead. Sure, they got the plans through, but just about every single defender DIED like dogs. And they got away by a span of SECONDS.

Pretty much explains why he was so pissed off in the first act of Ep IV
CG Tarkin and Leia, for all the whines , were not THAT bad. I mean, come on. The whiners gotta know, one has been dead since 1994, and Carrie, well... she aint looked like that in a LOOONG time

I was disappointed...to the point where i took a nap during the film. Shots of star destroyers hovering in the sky and looming death star-just-outside-the-atmosphere shots notwithstanding, I couldve easily waited for this to come to redbox.
Lingering nagging question...why do stormtroopers bother with armor? They are getting dropped by a blind guy with a stick. Hell, in ROTJ, Han levels a few with fisticuffs, and ewoks did will with sticks also. It seems to do them less good than blasters in A New Hope...

The armor worn by stormtroopers is cheap, mass-produced stuff that doesn't do jack for protection. Their blasters are also pretty much quantity-over-quality type gear.
I saw a snippet of Darth Vader's fight on YouTube, and yeah, that was pretty horrifying (but awesome).

The Stormtrooper thing has been addressed in Rebels no less, by Captain Rex, and his utter contempt for 'stormtroopers'. And the gear used by clonetroopers, both for protection and weapons was clearly far superior. Never mind training.


The hallway 'fight' in one horrible shot

My question is why the speeders in 'Empire" couldn't affect the AT-ATs,

("That battle armor is too strong for blasters-- We'll have to go in with harpoons and tow-cables. Go for the legs-- it's our only shot!)

-and yet the X-wings had no problems taking them down- even splitting one in half!


Is it merely just a case of much better weaponry on the X-wings than the speeders?

I enjoyed seeing many of the pilots, including Biggs, from "A New Hope" making appearances. Was just missing Porkins, and I didn't see Wedge (if he was there). There were tons of Easter eggs and callbacks (I particularly liked seeing Ponda Baba and the messed up doctor guy again). Overall, I was very happy with the movie.

By the way, those Hammerhead corvettes have some serious engines on them.

The use of unused footage from Star Wars, with some digital magic was brilliant. Wedge, apparently his voice (the actor who did the voice in the first film anyways) is in there on comm, but I missed it. Might be in the fight chatter.

As far as X-Wing firepower, it stands to reason that a starfighter packs serious firepower, to deal with it's opposite numbers and small ships. Think what a Jug or Typhoon could do to tanks on a strafing run. Jury-rigged airspeeders with bolted-on guns? Not so much

Did anyone else notice that Ghost and Chopper from Rebels made it into the movie, too?