WRONG

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1. Well Lucas had already kicked SW nerds in the nuts with the famed SW holiday special and Ewoks so SW fans had less reason for hope. The W bros hadn’t yet done so crushed the hope of their fans yet. So there was glorious hope they could continue to distill Hong Kong action flicks, stoner philo 101 level ideas, Dark City and a wooden lead actor into action gold.

   • Hey, you stole one of my reasons why I’m right.

     • I didn’t steal anything, it was a loving homage like QT.

2. Two things. First – with this comment you are officially 1% of the way there.

   • Part of the secret is to reply to as many comments as you can. Usually it helps if you say something substantive, but sometimes you don’t have to do so.

     • Perhaps we should all have to establish our respective geek credentials first.

       • Your test will arrive via parcel post.

       • See also the Signaling post.

   • This subject is only millimeters more interesting than L. Ron Hubbard’s manifesto. I guess you could also throw in Ted Kaczynski to round it out but it really is mind numbingly tedious and can only appeal to the most intellectually servile Spock Head. There is absolutely no question that subjecting a sane human being to such stimuli would cause irreparable and observable brain damage. Simply put—it’s utterly unbearable. It could have been put to far greater use in breaking the will of prisoners at Gitmo–perhaps in the future? Unfortunately, and on closer inspection, it may end up as being a far more dangerous form of torture than water boarding and then what? Time to go on those water slides, terrorists–L. Ron Hubbard’s coming to rescue you!

     http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=If-c09lOHF8&feature=results_video&playnext=1&list=PL1E06F5E6693D3F81

     • Whoa.

       I’m meta-wrong.

3. You hint at this with your ‘Emotion’ paragraph, but: It wasn’t just that Star Wars is a pervasive part of geek culture. For a large swath of us, Star Wars /iwas/i our childhood. We had the toys. We played as Luke and Han, etc. Phantom came out when we were adults. Watching Phantom (or the re-release of the IV-VI, for that matter) was a betrayal of our entire childhood.

   The Matrix movies came out quickly enough that Reloaded was disappointing, but that was all.

   Return of the Jedi was probably disappointing to adult movie goers of the time (it certainly is no Empire), but they didn’t have the childhood investment in Star Wars.

   • You know, this part is hard because not too many 6 year olds saw the Matrix. The baseline of consumption is different.

     The flip side is that we also all had all that time to grow up and look back at the movies and gain some objectivity over our original taste for them.

4. Second, the Matrix was a far, far bigger disappointment.

   Each OM (original movie) was successful in part because it was so completely mega-cool and different than anything we had seen before. Star Wars may be the more popular, but I would argue there are timing, marketing and merchandising reasons that play into that. But here’s the thing…

   Phantom Menace was the fourth movie, and it followed a weak third movie. What’s more, it followed a weak third movie AND a string of money-grabbing “New Special Effects!” re-releases, so I think a lot of people were a little wary that PM would be a disappointment. Was Jar Jar Binks a crime against cinema? Sure he was, but the blow was softened somewhat because by then we already knew Lucas was capable of pulling an Ewok out of his hat.

   But the Matrix Reloaded, on the other hand… It just sucked, and I don’t think nearly as many people saw it coming after the first.

   • Goddamn it if you’re going to agree with me how are we going to have a 15-comment back-and-forth?

     • Patrick, it seems obvious that by agreeing with me you are being an unoriginal hack. This is a slippery slope. And Statist. Also, something something glibatarian.

       • Better?

         • Both TPM and M:RL were abortions of cinema.

         • Switching names (intentionally or no) was a nice touch, it makes it seem like there’s more people commenting than there actually are.

   • Wait…Return of the Jedi was weak? Why don’t you call my kid ugly and grope my wife while you’re at it?

     • You know, here’s the thing. Return of the Jedi cleaved too closely to A New Hope‘s basic storyline. There’sa lot of callbacks where it could have been a different sort of movie. Luke seeks training from a mentor, who dies. He confronts Darth Vader, and has to destroy the Death Star. Han goes away, then he comes back. They didn’t have to make a new Death Star at all.

       And, c’mon. Ewoks.

       • There is an alternate universe where instead of Ewoks, the script called for Wookies.

         • Yuzzem. The Yuzzem were awesome.

       • Dear Mr. Likko,

         I was, like, a twelve year old boy when ROTJ came out. That you would have me try to parse the nuance and parallels between it and “A New Hope” in (30 year) hindsight seems almost criminally cruel. Why not also punish me for my fascination with the little Reeses Pieces eating alien of early 80’s fame? And what do youhave against Ewoks? Are they any more or less believable than Jabba the Hut? Or Alf?

         I assume it is the lawyer in you that has made it impossible to allow the rest of us to carry on with our childlike wonder about the great movies (Weird Science anyone?) that we enjoyed in our youth without retrospectively pointing out the insane and rather silly nature of the whole business to begin with.

         Frankly, I object.

         • “the little Reeses Pieces eating alien”

           And in an alternate universe, these were M&M’s like they should be.

         • At the time that ET came out, m&ms had five colors:

           light brown
           dark brown
           orange
           yellow
           green

           In this alternate universe, when they went back and turned the shotguns the agents were holding into walkie-talkies, do you know what else they did?

           They went back and changed the color of some of these m&ms to red.

           And that’s just messed up.

         • I found Jabba the Hut eminently believable.

           The cute, fuzzy, slightly roly-poly, and *short* aliens taking on a bunch of dudes in space armor and actually taking them down was just ridiculous.

           I mean, the Stormtrooper armor has already been shown to be basically useless against blasters in the previous two movies. One would think, at the very least it should have kinetic damage resistance that would make it worthwhile to wear the damn stuff.

           Alf was more believable.

         • You are absolutely right, mark boggs. It is the lawyer in me that insists that every bit of joy you ever had about anything be pounded, pounded, POUNDED, mercilessly out your present existence through my excruciating and brittle opinion, leaving you an anhedonic shell of your former self. I have compelled you to read a blog post which solicits criticism of Star Wars and through the use of my superior lawyerly powers of Pop Art Criticism denied you any practical ability to disagree with me.

           Most unfair of me, to be sure. Of course, since all lawyers are jackasses I shall conform to the standards of behavior set by my brothers of the bar, and refuse to apologize. Instead, I laugh at your emotional distress, ha-ha.

         • So awesome, Burt.

   • See, I would say that the Matrix Reloaded was a guilty pleasure.

     There was the 100 Agent Smith fight.
     There was the Highway Fight.
     And I want to say that there was one more that was really good that I can’t remember what it was. The ghosts, maybe? Something.

     The biggest disappointments were two things that I can think of:

     1) Colonel Sanders’ speech
     2) Morpheus’ speech (WE WILL DEFEAT THEM WITH TECHNO! and then everyone danced for 10 freaking minutes)

     It was the third movie that was the horrible disappointment. Mostly because the first movie did the awesome thing where everyone would jump back and forth between the real and the virtual for most of the movie… and the third movie mostly took place in meatspace.

     • I remember talking to a friend about Morpheus in that movie and he was yelling “NO SPOILERS!” and I said “I’m not going to give you a spoiler… I’m just saying that after Morpheus gives a speech and if you really, really have to pee? You can pee. You won’t miss an important plot point.”

       Which, I suppose, is also something to keep in mind as an editor. “Is there any point in this film where people could get up to pee without missing anything?”

       • Great post idea: best places to pee in the cinema.

         • That’s brilliant.

           You’re now dragooned for said guest post. Hop to!

         • I am? Awesome!!!!

           (Being dragooned does mean I get the power to breath fire, right?)

         • It does.

           Your fire breathing kit will arrive via parcel post.

       • … particularly for kids flicks. whole theatres of tykes peed themselves during Harry Potter.

     • If you weren’t terribly impressed by The Matrix (many people weren’t, they thought it was just fine as a movie but not really all that)… or if you went into The Matrix Reloaded because you’d never seen The Matrix… or if you treat every movie in a franchise as an independent thingus, I could see that.

       I don’t have a problem with guilty pleasures. I don’t expect someone to give me a guilty pleasure when I’m going to see something else, though.

       • I didn’t care much for The Matrix myself, that probably goes a long way toward my position on this subject.

     • I really enjoyed the Architect’s speech, his mannerisms and his cold mechanical dislike of his client.

     • 3) The Merovingian and everything related to him.

       • This was a completely unnecessary character in the context of the movie-that-ought-to-have-been.

         I think they were thinking something along the lines of, “The Machines aren’t a uniform intelligence, they have their own individuals and some of these individuals are weird” mashed together with, “We need someone to refute free will, because we’re all Deep and Philosophical/Theological in this series, right?”… but if that’s where you’re gonna go, you need to go there. Not just “here is one weird dude talking about cause-and-effect and denying free will, uh, and he’s a computer program.”

         Instead they just used it as an excuse to have Monica Bellucci dressed in a boobage-enhancing dress.

         • Okay, you’re right. I must amend:

           3) The Merovingian and everything related to him except Monica Belucci’s cleavage.

         • There were things in that movie other than Monica Bellucci? Huh.

           I probably should re-watch then.

         • No, Tod, there really weren’t.

           By the way, Jaybird is totally wrong about the 100-Agent-Smith fight. I’m past spoiling the next post at this point, I guess.

     • Within the past year, I rewatched The Matrix trilogy and I went into Revolutions remembering that I was supposed to hate it…and I didn’t. No, it ain’t as good as the original, but it does have it’s good moments–many of the ones named above by Jaybird, to which I’ll add when Smith smirks “Upgrades” at Neo. Yeah, most people didn’ t care for that but I did.

       I haven’t felt any desire to rewatch Phantom at all, outside of the fight between Qui-gon, Obi-wan, and Darth Maul.

5. I agree that you’re wrong, mainly because we had 20 years of time to dwell on how awesome Star Wars was. All those years of going over the extension of the story in your mind really set up the fall in such a greater way.

   Really, the main measure of disappointment is the expectations, I don’t believe many people had higher hopes for Reloaded than they did for TPM.

   • We had twenty years of time to blow Star Wars up into something that it wasn’t, based largely on the fact that it was the first that thing that was what it is.

     • In terms of ‘what it is’ could not one say Star Trek was first?

       • Star Trek really *is* Space Opera.

         Star Wars was a Kung Fu movie in space.

         • Macross is the Definitive Space Opera.
           They even hired opera singers.
           –this is what happens when you try to explain something to the Japanese. They ALWAYS go someplace really weird with it (kinda like Romantic Christmas…)

         • Okay, Kimmi.

           You have a job: Guest Post for the unitiated when it comes to anime. The main thing I want to see is suggestions for what you would recommend to someone who only has two hours, suggestions for the person whose spouse is out of town with the kids and they have 10-12 hours, and suggestions for the first thing the person needs to check out once s/he is hooked.

           I have a post about Spirited Away rumbling in the back of my head but it’s never coalesced. My readers deserve better!

         • I’m still waiting for that guest post reviewing Rolemaster.

         • what’s your e-mail again, jay?

         • I’d like to see this, since I’ve been away from anime for a long time and looking at what’s on Netflix streaming is kind of intimidating for someone that didn’t keep up.

         • “Recommend something to introduce me to anime. Oh, I only have two hours.”

           Um. This is kind of like saying “recommend something to introduce me to American filmmaking, from 1905 to 2011. Oh, I can only watch one thing.”

         • AskJaybird@gmail.com

           And, Duck, if I were trying to get someone who has never experienced American Cinema before to enjoy a movie, I could do a lot worse than the original Star Wars.

         • Raiders of the Lost Ark.

         • Burt,
           I’m having trouble organizing such a post.
           Jaybird,
           sure… but if my favorite movies are character-dramas, I’m probably going to decide that this sucks (solo makes a decent anti-hero, but the rest feel pretty cardboardy).

         • If your favorite movies are character dramas, you probably are all-too-familiar with American film.

           Hrm. Maybe this is a post in its own right…

6. I’m trying to think of what you’re going to say in your next post that will explain your perspective. Here’s my guess — Matrix Reloaded had a lot more room to be awesome conceptually, whereas TPM was merely the first act of a space opera with relatively banal themes. The idea of an artificial, computer-generated world created by malevolent machines is much, much cooler than super-powered good guys vs bad guys. The potential for a really brain-blasting movie was actually higher with another Matrix film.

   Am I close?

   • Maybe we can just mashup the comment thread and call it a day.

     But yes, Potentiality is the main reason why The Matrix: Reloaded sucked worse (far, far worse) than The Phantom Meanie.

     Really, all Lucas had to do was *not* screw up utterly and completely, and TPM would have been watchable, entertaining, and nostalgic without hitting you over the head with bits from the previous movie that didn’t really belong there. In that sense, I think of the entire second trilogy as Lucas just making one basic mistake three times.

     The Matrix: Reloaded could have gone about a thousand different ways, 999 of which would have been completely cool or better, and instead picked the 1,000th way, which took the whole premise of the entire trilogy out back and shot it in the head.

7. Personally my main issue with the Matrix series was that after the Animatrix came out I came to the unpleasant conclusion that I had been rooting for the wrong side in the conflict prior to that.
   In the Matrix universe the humans kindof had it coming. I mean hell, they abused their robots and ended up with an independant robot nation. Then rather than live with it they went to war with it and got their asses kicked. Then rather than stop fighting they destroyed the world. By the time the robots had subdued them it’s somewhat of a miracle they didn’t just euthenize em for the sake of the planet in general.

   • When the Animatrix came out, I realized that I wasn’t watching a philosophical bull session but a political one.

     Worse than that, the politics weren’t politics that I shared.

     • You guys actually watched the Animatrix?

       I could barely condemn myself to watching The Matrix: Revolutions, out of a misplaced sense of trilogy-duty.

       • The Animatrix as a whole in general I was meh about but I found the Second Renaissance portions quite interesting.

     • Bless his heart, North just can’t help his commie-dem self. He sees something non-human trying to destroy humanity and he thinks “Aw, poor little non-humans, how did we hurt you?” rather than “I’d better kill that before it kills me.” Too much immanentizing of the eschaton (speaking of Matrix…).

       • Sorry about that. I was worried Bob isn’t reading this thread.

         • Plus I’m trying to up the comment count.

       • That’s an excellent rendition of Bob. But did you watch the second renaissance? Humanity doesn’t come out lookin very good in that narrative.

         • Well, that’s clearly because they’ve all become secular humanists.

       • I just ordered a book of Voegelin mad-libs, its arrival is immanent.

         • Full point!

         • *claps*

   • I had a similar experience. The machines were clearly the aggrieved party. Hell, it wouldn’t surprise me if the humans were to blame for introducing the bug into their software that makes them think you can actually generate power by growing humans.

     Or maybe that’s just a lie the resistance tells. Maybe the machines don’t want anything from humans, but realised peaceful coexistence in meatspace was impossible, so they built a virtual world to stash humans because they were too kind to wipe their mortal enemy out.

     • We’re entirely on the same wavelength here James.

8. This comment here? It’s the 20% mark.

   Just saying’.

9. Sigh, am I the only one that liked both? Sure, each had bits that sucked. I purge those moments from my memory and enjoy the movies.

   One of my favorite sceens ever is the highway chase/fight. Made half a role-playing campaign from it.

   • I liked em, not as much as you, but enjoyed watching em.

   • The highway chase/fight deserves an entire post.

     There are really good things about it, and things about it that are really lame. It’s sort of microcosm of the whole visual/direction approach to cinema of the entire trilogy.

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