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Star Wars Prequels

First Star War Episode 7 Trailer Released 390

Midnight Thunder writes: The first trailer for Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens has been released. (YouTube link.) This is the first real opportunity to get a feeling for whether childhood dreams will be crushed or Disney, with the help of JJ Abrams, will be able to breath new life into the story without making it feel like a merchandising excuse.

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First Star War Episode 7 Trailer Released

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  • will be able to breath new life

    • by Jason Levine ( 196982 ) on Friday November 28, 2014 @01:28PM (#48480063) Homepage

      will be able to breath new life

      It actually does say "breathe." It's just hard to see that last "e" due to the lens flare.

    • Summary of Trailer (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 28, 2014 @01:37PM (#48480121)
      1. Aren't you a little black to be a stormtrooper?
      2. A beach ball droid?
      3. Oooo! Nice X-Wing shot. Okay I might go and watch this.
      4. That sword's a bit silly. You're still going to lose a hand if the light-sabre slices through the metal bit!
      5. Millenium Falcon! Woohoo!
      • by Immerman ( 2627577 ) on Friday November 28, 2014 @02:25PM (#48480459)

        4) That sword *almost* makes sense. I mean what else are you going to make an anti-lightsaber hilt guard out of except more lightsaber? Only problem is that instead of catching your opponent's blade like a traditional guard, this one just guides it directly towards your emmitter (and hands), which it will then presumably slice through without problems.

        Oh, wait, Wookipedia says they do have a lightsaber-shorting material in the universe, so wrap the mechanical bits in that and it would be a formidable weapon for lightsaber dueling, though a simple cortosis guard would make even more sense. But hey, he's presumably a Sith, and when have they ever chosen practicality over looking badass?

        • So what's Darth Vader/Anakin Skywalker's excuse? Anakin was supposedly this technical wizard, why doesn't he have a freaking 12 bladed light saber sphere? Did Vader opt for a plain light saber because he has the cool suit? Did Anakin lose the fine motor control required to construct light saber bad-assery when he was put into the life support suit? Did he just say "fuck it" because - who's he gonna fight?

          • by Immerman ( 2627577 ) on Friday November 28, 2014 @04:14PM (#48481089)

            Hey, he's at least middle age by the time we meet him as Vader - he probably reached the point where he realized his awesome saber-sphere was more dangerous to himself than his enemies and got back to the basics. Besides, his master is clearly a fan of the "tear them apart with the force" school of combat, which has obviously rubbed off on him. Lots of force-choking after all, but did you ever see him threatening anyone with his saber?

            I suspect he kept it around as a primarily as a ceremonial piece, maybe some nostalgia from the good old days. And possibly because Force users apparently have some sort of Highlander-esque attachment to ritualized sword fighting. I mean sure it's great that your sword can reflect bullets, and maybe the Force will let you sense the incoming shot at your back, but all it takes is one idiot with a shotgun and you've had it.

        • by denzacar ( 181829 ) on Friday November 28, 2014 @06:12PM (#48481815) Journal

          ...until bastards go to four blades.

          Now we're standing around with our cocks in our hands, selling three blades and a strip.
          Moisture or no, suddenly we're the chumps. Well, fuck it. We're going to five blades.

          Sure, we could go to four blades next, like the competition. That seems like the logical thing to do.
          After all, three worked out pretty well, and four is the next number after three. So let's play it safe.
          Let's make a thicker aloe strip and call it the Mach3SuperTurbo. Why innovate when we can follow?
          Oh, I know why: Because we're a business, that's why!

          You think it's crazy? It is crazy. But I don't give a shit. From now on, we're the ones who have the edge in the multi-blade game.
          Are they the best a man can get? Fuck, no. Sith is the best a man can get.

          What part of this don't you understand? If two blades is good, and three blades is better, obviously five blades would make us the best fucking saber that ever existed. Comprende?
          We didn't claw our way out of a sarlacc pit to the top of the saber game by clinging to the two-blade industry standard.
          We got here by taking chances. Well, five blades is the biggest chance of all.

          Here's the report from Engineering. Someone put it in the bathroom: I want to wipe my ass with it.
          They don't tell me what to inventâ"I tell them. And I'm telling them to stick two more blades in there.
          I don't care how. Make the blades so thin they're invisible. Put some on the handle.
          I don't care if they have to cram the fifth blade in perpendicular to the other four, just do it!

          You're taking the "light" part of "light saber" too literally, grandma. Cut the strings and soar. Let's hit it.
          Let's roll. This is our chance to make saber history. Let's dream big. All you have to do is say that five blades can happen, and it will happen.
          If you aren't on board, then fuck you. And if you're on the board, then fuck you and your father.
          Hey, if I'm the only one who'll take risks, I'm sure as hell happy to hog all the glory when the five-blade saber becomes the fencing tool for the Gal-a- "this is how we cut the hands off now"-xay.

          People said we couldn't go to three. It'll cost a fortune to manufacture, they said. Well, we did it.
          Now some egghead in a lab is screaming "Five's crazy?"
          Well, perhaps he'd be more comfortable in the labs at Coruscant, working on fucking electrics. Rotary blades, my white ass!

          Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe we should just ride in Empire's wake and make blasters. Ha!
          Not on your fucking life! The day I shadow a penny-ante outfit like the Empire is the day I leave the saber game for good, and that won't happen until the day I die!

          The market? Listen, we make the market. All we have to do is put her out there with a little jingle.
          It's as easy as, "Hey, cutting with anything less than five blades is like scraping your beard off with a dull hatchet."
          Or "You'll be so smooth, you'll make the Kessel Run in less than twelve parsecs."
          Try "Your neck is going to be so friggin' soft, someone's gonna walk up and tie a goddamn Medal of Bravery under it."

          I know what you're thinking now: What'll people say? Mew mew mew. Oh, no, what will people say?!
          Grow the fuck up. When you're on top, people talk. That's the price you pay for being on top.
          Which Sith is, always has been, and forever shall be, Amen, five blades, sweet Jesus in heaven.

          Stop. I just had a stroke of genius.
          Are you ready? Open your mouth, baby birds, cause Mama's about to drop you one sweet, fat nightcrawler.
          Here she comes: Put another aloe strip on that fucker, too. That's right.
          Five blades, two strips, and make the second one lather. You heard meâ"the second strip lathers.
          It's a whole new way to think about swords. Don't question it. Don't say a word.
          Just key the music, and call the chorus girls, because we're on the edgeâ"the saber's edgeâ"and I feel like dancing.

      • by quantaman ( 517394 ) on Friday November 28, 2014 @03:09PM (#48480687)

        1. Aren't you a little black to be a stormtrooper?

        This seems like canon, I thought all the stormtroopers were clones of Jango Fett [wikipedia.org].

      • by sexconker ( 1179573 ) on Friday November 28, 2014 @08:53PM (#48482587)

        - Unintentionally comical Sudden Black Man
        - Comical Soccer Ball Bot
        - Unintentionally comical Desert Box Cycle
        - Hilarious "trying to hard to be edgy" Cross Saber
        - Shitty voice over

        + X-Wings
        + Millenium Falcon

        On a scale of Midi-chlorians to Yoda, this trailer is a Jar Jar Binks.

  • ...YouTube's Safety Mode won't show the video in the direct link to me unless I turn the 'safe for viewing' mode off...

    • by i kan reed ( 749298 ) on Friday November 28, 2014 @01:37PM (#48480125) Homepage Journal

      Well, Star Wars has been known to have serious consequences for youth with side effects such as lifelong virginity.

    • That's okay. My IT department prevents me from viewing Youtube videos because then I would be unproductive for 88 seconds (while I am eating lunch). So instead, I'll have to spend hours trying to hunt it down on a site that I CAN access. Or maybe I'll just not watch it and post lots of comments anyway. That's how slashdot usually works.
      • That's not why... because if every dope in the company was watching cats videos on youtube it would cause to lag when IT is playing it on their lunch hour.

  • by SuricouRaven ( 1897204 ) on Friday November 28, 2014 @01:22PM (#48480015)

    "without making it feel like a merchandising excuse."

    But if it doesn't feel like a merchandising excuse, it just won't feel like star wars. Even the original trilogy had that feel. Every alien, ship and droid seems to whisper 'action figure in stores soon.'

    • by ArcadeMan ( 2766669 ) on Friday November 28, 2014 @01:59PM (#48480271)

      I still haven't received my "Spaceballs: The Flamethrower".

    • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

      To be fair, a lot of those things actually were action figures because that's how the effects were done. And puppets probably translate fairly well. But at least they didn't come off as specifically designed to be turned into a McDonald's toy. I suppose I didn't really get that impression in the new trilogy either, although part of that may be simply because I wasn't made to care about any of the characters and am not sure why I would want them as figurines. . . .

  • by bitflusher ( 853768 ) on Friday November 28, 2014 @01:23PM (#48480017) Homepage
    They also should also rename them to spoilers!
  • It Reminds me of (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Dartz-IRL ( 1640117 ) on Friday November 28, 2014 @01:23PM (#48480021)

    Sitting here, watching it, I'm reminded of how awesome the trailer was for Episode 1 a long time ago and the reaction it got.

    • by lgw ( 121541 )

      Sitting here, watching it, I'm reminded of how awesome the trailer was for Episode 1 a long time ago and the reaction it got.

      Quite so. OTOH, the Red Letter Media reviews [redlettermedia.com] (longer than the movies) were great. I hereby coin:

      Plinkett's Law: The entertainment value of a Star Wars/Trek movie plus the entertainment value of the corresponding Plinkett review is constant.

  • I just realized that all of JJ Abrams' movies are the same style. That only hit me while seeing this trailer.

    Also there's a robot playing soccer in it, and I wish Mr. Sith good luck in not searing his own wrists off.

    • by OzPeter ( 195038 )

      I just realized that all of JJ Abrams' movies are the same style. That only hit me while seeing this trailer.

      I don't know where you get that with this trailer. It looks like every other SW trailer that I have seen.

  • by gstoddart ( 321705 ) on Friday November 28, 2014 @01:24PM (#48480035) Homepage

    This is the first real opportunity to get a feeling for whether childhood dreams will be crushed or Disney, with the help of JJ Abrams, will be able to breath new life into the story without making it feel like a merchandising excuse.

    Let's face it, it is a merchandising excuse.

    Di$ney will have fresh Star Wars everything on sale.

    The movie will be guaranteed to have some cloyingly cute character which can be marketed to kids.

    Taco Bell and McDonalds will have special toys.

    They'l re-re-re-re-release extended cuts or special editions of the damned movies.

    Little children will have R2D2 pyjamas and underpants. And diapers. And sippy cups. And hats. And halloween costumes.

    Disney will eventually put out 9 more movies, of ever diminishing artistic merit.

    There will be friggin' Ewok porn.

    I'm nostalgic about the first series. I mostly liked the second series but it had some issues.

    But I tried to watch Episode I with my wife, and within five minutes of Jar Jar Binks appearing on screen she said "if he's in the rest of this film I'm leaving". So now if I want to watch it I'm on my own, and the pod racer scene is mostly how I calibrate my home theater.

    I honestly can't decide if I will see this or not.

    But let's not for a minute pretend this is being done for any reason besides the zillions of dollars Disney expects to wring from this franchise.

    If they were doing a billion a year in merchandising for Cars years after it was released, you won't believe the marketing blitz which will accompany this.

    • by OzPeter ( 195038 )

      And sippy cups.

      But nothing could beat the Buzz Lightyear homoerotic sippy cup!

    • The movie will be guaranteed to have some cloyingly cute character which can be marketed to kids.

      Like R2D2 or the Ewoks?

      There will be friggin' Ewok porn.

      Too late. Way too late.

    • by doconnor ( 134648 ) on Friday November 28, 2014 @01:43PM (#48480169) Homepage

      Unlike most media companies, Disney takes the long view of merchandising. Anyone was can make a movie that sells merchandising for a year or so, but Disney knows that for a movie to be able to keep selling merchandise for 70+ years, like Snow White has, the movie has to have a very appealing and timeless story to it. The original trilogy has that long term appeal. That is something Disney is going to try to recapture.

    • There will be friggin' Ewok porn.

      There's Ewok porn *now*.

  • by jpellino ( 202698 ) on Friday November 28, 2014 @01:26PM (#48480051)
    Nice work on the contrails. No Jar Jar. Hey, it's a teaser but I like what I see so far.
  • by damn_registrars ( 1103043 ) <damn.registrars@gmail.com> on Friday November 28, 2014 @01:39PM (#48480137) Homepage Journal
    This trailer is getting lots of hype but has very little content. I know, it's only 88 seconds long but really what is in it? Not much. Yeah. we see the Millenium Falcon again. We see a spiffy new kind of multi-blade light sabre. We see some other clever method of moving around faster than the best that us poor feeble humans can walk. We see some other nifty little robot. But none of that really tells us much about the movie itself; it could just as well be a teaser for Disney's toy catalog for next Christmas.
    • Actually, this isn't even a trailer. This is a teaser. A trailer is supposed to give you some idea of the movie's plot to get you interested enough to want to see the movie. (Ideally, this should be done without giving away the ending. I'm looking at you, Iron Giant trailer.) A teaser, however, can have a bunch of quick-shot scenes or even one mysterious, short, "what can this be" scene. A teaser is best done if it reveals nothing about the plot but shows you just enough to pique your interest.

      Thus, a

  • Looks like JJ can do action scenes but just throws in stuff "to make it interesting"...like a lightsaber cross-guard! Also the intro dialogue? Phantom Menace level bad.
    The initial shot is obviously pre-finished. It slowly builds from raw to production level scenes. I have high hopes, but it will have bad parts.

  • by kruach aum ( 1934852 ) on Friday November 28, 2014 @01:44PM (#48480175)

    That's not something you can do to a lightsaber goddammit. And why to the crossguard beams look like they're on fire?

    • by Piata ( 927858 ) on Friday November 28, 2014 @02:00PM (#48480281)
      The stupid part is it's not even an effective crossguard. There's a metal section close to the hilt so you can easily cut the crossguard off. Congrats on making a (most likely) primary antagonist look like an idiot. Unless they intented Luke Skywalker to show a juvenille Sith how moronic his added bling is in an actual fight...
    • by Baloroth ( 2370816 ) on Friday November 28, 2014 @02:03PM (#48480307)

      That's not something you can do to a lightsaber goddammit.

      Ahem [wikia.com]. Actually, it makes a kind of sense: it always bothered me how Star Wars lightsabers didn't have any kind of hilt/crossguard, which should have made it almost trivially easy for their opponent's to simply slide their lightsaber down the blade and slice off their opponents hand. Maybe someone in the universe finally realized that with a crossguard every lightsaber duel wouldn't end with someone loosing a hand?

      • That article only mentions a secondary emitter at a 45 degree angle, not 2 more at a 90 degree angle.

  • CGI (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Dan East ( 318230 ) on Friday November 28, 2014 @01:46PM (#48480181) Journal

    Most of the trailer is CGI, which makes sense at this point. The movie won't be released for another year, so this early on most of the finished shots would be fairly generic CGI stuff that was being worked on in parallel to the main shooting. The hard part is all the editing and incorporating CGI into the shots with the actors, and they've only just wrapped up the shooting this month. That's what they'll be working on for the next several months.

    One thing about the lightsaber scene, at first I was like "that's a lame gimmicky lightsaber", but then looking at it more closely, it doesn't have a pure even glow like a normal lightsaber. It looks more like fire and less refined. So my hunch is that sith guy had to figure out how to fabricate the weapon on his own without any guidance, so it's this crude, barely controlled weapon that has to vent extra energy so it doesn't blow up or melt or something. Yeah, that was a pretty geeky analysis.

    • by jd ( 1658 )

      Plausible. Also, since it's an amateur rig, the force field may well extend well beyond the blade and not just envelop it. If that's the case, the cross guard's projectors cannot be sliced off as the force field would be protecting them as well.

      Since they filmed some of the movie in Puzzle Wood and since I'm damn sure I recognize the trail, I'm going to say that's the likely location for this scene. If so, expect some seriously gnarled and twisted trees in the background. Those won't be CGI, that's really w

  • First Star War Episode 7 Trailer Released

    Wasn't singular "Star war" one of the subtitles in the infamous "Backstroke of the West" bootleg [winterson.com]? (Pic [nyud.net])

  • I was chomping at the bit for all three Lord of the Rings movies, and for every single Harry Potter movie, and I certainly enjoyed the original Star Wars trilogy as a kid.. but not so much the 'prequels', and my subject line pretty much sums up my level of enthusiasm for this. It just seems like so much piling-on the Star Wars gravy train. Also I'm still pissed at J.J. Abrahms for his piss-poor attempt at making Star Trek movies, and over time have become a little disgruntled over how Lost ended, although I
  • by l0ungeb0y ( 442022 ) on Friday November 28, 2014 @01:47PM (#48480201) Homepage Journal
    Doesn't JJ know that Ion Engines don't generate enough thrust to propel so much as a paper airplane through atmosphere, much less an entire TIE-Fighter And even if those Twin Ion Engines could generate enough thrust, TIE-Fighers don't have control surfaces or the proper aerodynamics to fly?!?!?! Is he that big of a moron or is he purposely out to make the sequels worse than the prequels? And don't get me started on the sheer stupidity and uselessness of the crossguard on that Sith's lightsaber UTTER IDIOCY!
    • After what he did with the Star Trek franchise are you really surprised?

      He's all about his big set-piece moments, internal logic or universe consistency be damned. He thinks that it looks cool so who cares if it doesn't make any sense.
    • And there's a new generation of 7 year olds who will think that cross guard is the coolest thing ever.

    • ...And don't get me started on the sheer stupidity and uselessness of the crossguard on that Sith's lightsaber UTTER IDIOCY!

      Why? In a no holds barred sword fight with medieval weapons you learn pretty quickly that the blade is not the only part of a sword that can kill you. You can do some pretty nasty damage with the cross guard of a European bastard sword (which is presumably the inspiration of that new lightsaber) and you can crack a person's scull with the pommel if it is heavy enough and the right shape. The hand guard of a Scottish broadsword makes for the mother of all knuckle dusters, you can crush somebody's larynx wit

    • by QilessQi ( 2044624 ) on Friday November 28, 2014 @02:45PM (#48480575)

      I read your entire post in Comic Book Guy's voice.

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward

      Nothing in Star Wars has ever been aerodynamic, and any realistic application of physics (without assumptions of unknown technology compensating for our perceived errors) would cause the entire universe to fall apart. Did you know that lasers are invisible and definitely don't fire in pulses that move slowly enough to be seen? If you claim that the "lasers" are actually bolts of plasma or something, why don't you allow a similar rationalization for other phenomena such as TIEs or other in atmosphere?

      Regardi

  • but it clearly just gets worse in the future. There's no doubt there will be plenty of catwalks with no guard rails and plenty of other Imperial style over substance. It's remarkable though that light sabers just get more treacherous to use. The flaming laser guard on the evil light saber in the teaser looks like a great way to lose and arm and frankly just didn't look all that cool. After not really understanding Star Trek and what made it amazing, JJ Abrams will bring his special brand of ruination to the

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by osu-neko ( 2604 )
      It's called "space cheese", and you can't ruin the Star Wars universe by adding more cheese, because the entire thing was made of cheese to begin with! It's kinda its whole schtick.
    • There's no doubt there will be plenty of catwalks with no guard rails [...]

      The imperial senate decided that there was no need for OSHA.

  • Is it just me ... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by quax ( 19371 ) on Friday November 28, 2014 @02:02PM (#48480303)

    ... or is all the whining about a *black* stormtrooper on the youtube comment thread beyond embarrassing.

  • by caseih ( 160668 ) on Friday November 28, 2014 @02:06PM (#48480319)

    Lame!

  • black space where stars don't shine scenes. And I can't wait for it to be listed on The Piratebay....

  • I'm not saying it looks bad, I'm just saying it looks like what talented college students were doing for their end of year projects...
    • I'm not saying it looks bad, I'm just saying it looks like what talented college students were doing for their end of year projects...

      That is how the original series was done. My Senior Design instructor, Tom DeFanti, and the Electronic Visualization Lab were responsible for some of the work in the original Star Wars movie.

  • oh yes (Score:5, Funny)

    by hackertourist ( 2202674 ) on Friday November 28, 2014 @02:19PM (#48480405)

    50 seconds worth of film in the trailer and it includes a bloody lens flare.

  • by joelholdsworth ( 1095165 ) on Friday November 28, 2014 @02:33PM (#48480507)
    Why does he gave a lightsabre with a cross-guard made out of two mini lightsabres? The cross-guard is to protect the fingers, not amputate them
  • by King_TJ ( 85913 ) on Friday November 28, 2014 @03:37PM (#48480857) Journal

    I've seen this trailer shared around Facebook all morning and many of my friends who are long time Star Wars fans are optimistic, based on the little bit shown.

    Personally, I feel like part of the reason the original 3 movies were viewed as so superior to episodes 1-3 had a lot to do with the limitations of the technology of the time preventing everything from being "overdone".

    Starr Wars featured enough visually amazing things (from the Imperial Star Destroyer coming on the screen and viewers slowly realizing just how massive it was, to each one of the interesting robots) that appreciating them fully required not cluttering the scenes up with too much other eye candy or content. Back in 1977, that wasn't an issue because it was difficult and time-consuming enough to create these things that nobody would make the mistake of putting too many of them in one scene.

    The computer CGI capabilities of today made it too easy to make scenes too "busy" and cheapen the value of individual creatures, backdrops, weapons, spaceships or robots. The prequel movies felt like they were trying to see how many thousands of objects they could render at the same time in some of the battle scenes. (EG. Jedi knights chopping and hacking away at robots in wave after wave.) Believability suffered.

    If they go back to simple sets like the desert of Tatooine and stop going "CGI crazy" with every single background, I think there's a good chance they'll achieve the original Star Wars feel we all know and love. (And yeah, no insipid characters like Jar Jar either.)

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