fandomsecrets | [ SECRET POST #3217 ]

I have no problem with you loving them. Emotions don't have any connection to quality, necessarily, and nostalgia is a powerful thing, and I love plenty of things that are not so good. And I'll even go so far as to say that there is more and more extreme bashing than there needs to be, b/c many Star Wars fans are dumb grognards.

At the same time, I think they're really not very good, and especially Phantom Menace is really bad purely as a work of film regardless of what it has to do with Star Wars. And, like, I don't think it's a crime to point that out. One of the reasons people criticize them so much is because there are a lot of valid grounds for critique.

But anyway, I hope you can enjoy them in your own way. And as usual, codicil here that I'm fairly sure we're argued about this before, so it's all good. Peace and love.

Emotions don't have any connection to quality...?

I guess maybe I watch movies for all the wrong reasons...

I mean to say, one can have extremely real emotions about things that are quite bad

And someone can also hate things just because they don't match that person's preconceptions and that person isn't willing to give them a shot on their own merits.

It's silly to try to apply some objective criteria to likes/dislikes. Especially those of other people.

Do you think that's what I'm doing? Do you think that's true of all criticisms of Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace?

If it's not, then why is that a relevant point?

I'm saying that the point you made - that emotions can make someone overlook how bad something is - can also apply in the reverse. Someone can be so emotionally attached to something they built up in their minds that they'll hate something that contradicts that image instead of giving it a fair shake on their own merits.

I don't know you, so I can't say that that's what you're doing. I'm just saying that your argument about emotions and quality is really fair.

In my experience, I see a lot of the same things that people claim to hate about the prequel films are also present in the original trilogy. But I recognize that not everyone sees it that way.

Suffice it to say, my motto is to each their own. Trying to tell someone that a movie they like is "bad" is like trying to tell someone who loves peanut butter that it's bad. It's purely a matter of taste and there's no right or wrong answer.

Sorry, that should read

"your argument about emotions and quality ISN'T really fair"

I'm saying that the point you made - that emotions can make someone overlook how bad something is - can also apply in the reverse. Someone can be so emotionally attached to something they built up in their minds that they'll hate something that contradicts that image instead of giving it a fair shake on their own merits.

I agree.

In my experience, I see a lot of the same things that people claim to hate about the prequel films are also present in the original trilogy. But I recognize that not everyone sees it that way.

There's some truth to that. I think some of it probably does come down to things like people preferring the visual style of the prequels, and a lot of it does come down to people being blinded by nostalgia. But I also think that the flaws maybe don't stand out as much because they exist in movies that are really solid from a basic storytelling perspective - compared to the real problems with especially episodes 1 and 2, which perhaps make the problems stand out in greater relief.

Suffice it to say, my motto is to each their own. Trying to tell someone that a movie they like is "bad" is like trying to tell someone who loves peanut butter that it's bad. It's purely a matter of taste and there's no right or wrong answer.

Maybe. I think at the very least, whether or not you can say it's bad as a whole, you can say that certain parts of it are bad. Certain things about it are bad. & I think that's true for Episode 1.

"they exist in movies that are really solid from a basic storytelling perspective - compared to the real problems with especially episodes 1 and 2, which perhaps make the problems stand out in greater relief."

I disagree. From a plot perspective and a story-telling perspective I could nitpick the plots and narratives of the original trilogy as easily as the prequels. I don't, because I like all the films and all films are flawed. But I could. In my opinion, the prequels actually have a more interesting story than the original trilogy.

"Maybe. I think at the very least, whether or not you can say it's bad as a whole, you can say that certain parts of it are bad. Certain things about it are bad. & I think that's true for Episode 1."

It would depend -- a lot of the things that people hate about the PT and think are bad (such as the romance) are things I like and think are good/well-crafted. I just approach it from a different perspective.

No one is "wrong" -- we just have different likes and dislikes. Different opinions.

I disagree. From a plot perspective and a story-telling perspective I could nitpick the plots and narratives of the original trilogy as easily as the prequels. I don't, because I like all the films and all films are flawed. But I could. In my opinion, the prequels actually have a more interesting story than the original trilogy.

This is the point where I'm pretty sure we have actually argued this before (assuming you're the same prequel!anon) so it's probably no point in going over it again.

No one is "wrong" -- we just have different likes and dislikes. Different opinions.

I have no problems with you liking the prequels. I'm just saying that like all films, they're flawed, and they're flawed in certain specific ways that the original films aren't. Obviously that's just an opinion - everything I say is an opinion, I'm not some kind of correct-movie-assertion robot created by God - but I think it's true.

"Obviously that's just an opinion - everything I say is an opinion, I'm not some kind of correct-movie-assertion robot created by God - but I think it's true."

I understand that. But keep in mind if you say something like this:

"I am capable of recognizing when I feel I dislike something in a movie on grounds of taste, and when I am criticizing a specific thing that exists on screen for the role it plays in the film as a work."

"I just think that, to the extent that it is objective, a lot of the criticism is valid IMO."
(I'm presuming this is you? If not, I apologize.)

It sounds as though you're saying that your criticisms ARE objective.

I'm saying that it's fine to criticize or dislike something, but just because you identified things that you think are flawed in the prequels doesn't mean other will agree or that those flaws are objectively there for everyone.

Both of those things are - in my mind - opinions. Sorry if I wasn't clear enough in my phrasing, I have a cold so I'm probably not thinking of things clearly as much as I usually would. Objective is probably not the word that I want to go with.

I just think the ability to instill emotion is part of what makes something good. Also quality is not objective, or at least not 100% so.

Quality is subjective.

Artistic merit is subjective.

The prequels aren't objectively good or bad. They're works of media and you either like them or dislike them.

I don't know. I don't want to get into a heavy debate about the basic elements of aesthetic theory, because lord knows that's a quagmire. But at the same time, I think there's a meaningful distinction between different kinds of criticism as a film. And, at least for me personally, on a phenomenological level, I am capable of recognizing when I feel I dislike something in a movie on grounds of taste, and when I am criticizing a specific thing that exists on screen for the role it plays in the film as a work.

So like, it's one thing to say that Jar Jar is a poopiehead and I find him annoying. It's another thing to say that the movie doesn't have a protagonist and it suffers from the lack of an emotional throughline. And it's not clear to me - if you're not allowed to have the second kind of conversation - how you're going to talk about movies at all, honestly.

"It's another thing to say that the movie doesn't have a protagonist and it suffers from the lack of an emotional throughline."

That's still a VERY subjective argument, though, because I've never struggled to identify a protagonist for TPM (Qui-Gon) and it has some of the most emotionally resonant moments in the entire six movie films for me (such as Anakin leaving his mother).

If you don't see those things, I'm not saying your perception is wrong. But to try to push your perception as objective fact is what annoys a lot of people.

(NA)

Really? Qui-Gon? He didn't feel like a protagonist to me.

AYRT

I guess, to me, the thing is that while it's Padmé's story (in that the central conflict is the issue of rescuing her people from the Trade Federation), Qui-Gon is the character that we follow throughout the story for the most part. I've thought of saying that he and Padmé are co-protagonists (because there are two stories here -- the issue of Naboo and finding Anakin -- that run through TPM) but I do think that Qui-Gon has a tendency to predominate.

In particular, I think Lucas did this to emphasize his absence and it worked for me because I definitely missed him in the following episodes. When he died, it felt like something had been lost (to me at least).

Just because something doesn't have a clear protagonist it doesn't mean it's objectively bad, though. Some things work perfectly as ensemble pieces.

That's true, and then that leads to a further conversation about whether it functions as an ensemble piece (and I don't think it does).

But the point I want to make, I guess, is that this type of conversation that we're talking about is a different kind of conversation than talking about whether or not Jar Jar is a poopyhead.

That is true.

Okay, but I think that film quality is much more subjective than you are making it out. There are some objectives, yes, but a lot of it is subjective. And the OT isn't perfect either, and a lot of fans hate the prequels in large part because of overestimating the OT because of nostalgia.

Okay, but I think that film quality is much more subjective than you are making it out. There are some objectives, yes, but a lot of it is subjective.

I agree with that. I just think that, to the extent that it is objective, a lot of the criticism is valid IMO.

And the OT isn't perfect either, and a lot of fans hate the prequels in large part because of overestimating the OT because of nostalgia.

I agree with that. In fact that's what I was trying to get at when I said that a lot of SW fans hate the prequels for dumb reasons.

[ SECRET POST #3217 ]

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