Tommy Siegel | Bluesky

TranscriptA Helpful Guide To Star Wars vs Star Trek

Star Wars

[Image of Han Solo in Tommy’s style]

  • Don’t start with the β€˜first’ movie, let me tell you where to start
  • Looks like ruined farm equipment in space
  • In summary: the past was horrible
  • JJ Abrams ruined it

Star Trek

[Image of Jean Luc Picard in Tommy’s style]

  • Don’t start with the first season, let me tell you where to start
  • Looks like a cruise ship in space
  • In summary: the future is incredible
  • JJ Abrams ruined it
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[–] 73 points 1 day ago (58 children)
  • The very next guy to do it managed to be much worse than Abrams.
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  • [–] 32 points 1 day ago (3 children)

    Debatable. Anyway, the very next guy after the very next guy managed to be infinitely worse than both. What was his name again?

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  • [–] 14 points 1 day ago (2 children)

    The guys that also ruined game of thrones?

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  • [–] 7 points 12 hours ago (1 child)

    Ironically Game of Thrones was ruined because the show runners got an offer to do a Star Wars movie. They turned down HBOs offer to do more episodes of GoT and instead hurried through and botched the ending because they wanted to get started on that Star Wars project. They botched GoT so bad that Disney got rid of their movie. Serves them right.

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  • [–] 18 points 1 day ago* (47 children)

    Nah. VIII had a few missteps, but it was better then the rehashed plot of the first, and far better then the mess that followed.

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  • [–] 20 points 23 hours ago (21 children)

    What the actual fuck? Episode VIII is quite literally the worst mainline Star Wars movie made. I consider even episode IX to be better, not by a big margin but still better for no other reason than to try and salvage the clusterfuck that was episode VIII. Here's a short list of things episode VIII got wrong.

    • Threw out pretty much every story thread Episode VII set up
    • Did a complete character assassination of Luke
    • Turned Leia into a force user because, well I don't even know why.
    • The entire casino world plotline which is not just entirely irrelevant to the plot but also completely fucks with timeline of events.
    • That whole thing between the purple haired captain? and Poe. Especially that super secret plan that for no fucking reason was never explained to the rest of the crew.
    • Breaking the whole hyperspace explanation and the whole space combat consistency with the hyperspace kamikaze
    • The asian lady plot
    • The ending sets up literally nothing for episode IX

    The whole movie is one massive misstep that derailed the entirely sequel trilogy. I get Episode VII wasn't anything magnificent but the entire point of episode VII was to reaffirm to the fans (who were skeptical about the continuation of Star Wars considering Episode III didn't really leave on a high note and Episode VI kinda tied up the loose ends) that the series is going somewhere and isn't nosediving off a cliff. That's why they effectively redid the Episode IV plotline, because it was a safe starting point that sets up characters for episodes VIII and IX. Abrams even left a rough draft for VIII and IX but then Johnson was given full creative control to throw the entire trilogy draft out the window and do whatever the fuck he wanted. We don't know if episode IX could've ever been good because episode VIII fucked the entire trilogy so hard it became impossible to salvage.

    The only context in which Episode VIII could be better than IX is if you view them as individual movies and not a part of a trilogy. And you know, Episode VIII probably could've been an okay standalone film. But it wasn't. It had to respect what episode VII set up and it had to give episode IX something to follow up on. It didn't neither and for that both Episode VII and IX are worse off simply because episode VIII exists. In fact the movie almost killed the entire franchise by taking all the characters and storylines and driving them off straight off the cliff.

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  • [–] 11 points 17 hours ago (1 child)

    You're right with all your bullet points. Episode VIII has a fundamentally broken plot in many ways. The thing that it has going for it though is that it has a few actual themes that I found interesting. I like that Johnson questioned the whole light side dark side polarity and that Rey came from nobody in particular. I liked the rejection of the Skywalker family and assertion that heroes could come from anywhere. If it had followed a better movie, "let the past die" would have been a legitimate highlight for me. It didn't work in the trilogy it's a part of, but if the trilogy had been based around the VIII we got I think it could have worked as a sequel trilogy to Star Wars.

    And the thing is that I think those are about the only things I particularly like in the entire sequel trilogy besides Babu Frik (I hate how much I love that little dude), and that makes episode VIII the best of a trilogy of bland to bad movies for me. Episode VII was the best constructed of them, and it had cool stuff, but it didn't do anything that made me think "oh that's interesting" (like VIII did) because so much of it was nostalgia based 'memberberries. You're right about it being made to address fan concerns, but that was only relevant in 2015, and I'm looking back at in 2026. Episode IX was just a train wreck start to finish, and I don't particularly blame it because it had the unenviable task of following up VIII, but it's still just bad with nothing interesting to show for it.

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  • [–] 5 points 15 hours ago (10 children)

    7 put Luke on an island during a war, 8 was just doing the best it could with Abrams' nonsense mystery boxes

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  • [–] 1 point 11 hours ago (9 children)

    Really? Episode 7 forced episode 8 into such a narrative corner the best they could do was turn Luke into a green titty milk loving weirdo?

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  • [–] 3 points 9 hours ago (8 children)

    You say that like cow milk doesn't come from a titty. Like you've been alienated from the source of your food. Luke isn't alienated from nature, he's connected to all the nature around him. He knows exactly where all his food comes from. He uses the force and his knowledge to survive.

    Connecting with nature is an important part of spiritual enlightenment. The old Jedi lived up in a tower above a city. They were alienated from nature. Luke is practicing the way of the light side of the force every day. Remember, it's an energy field that binds all life together.

    You're just like Rey: alienated from the land, afraid of titties. And that is not the way of the new Jedi. Luke may be disillusioned with the Jedi as heroes and peacekeepers, but he's perfected his monk game in a way most Jedi never did.

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  • [–] 0 points 8 hours ago (7 children)

    First of all I grew up among cows, chickens and other farm animals. I've drank warm milk straight from a cows teat. I've collected chickens eggs from the nests. I've spend morning foraging mushrooms from the forest to make a mushroom stew. Unless you live in a land largely untainted by urbanism I'm probably far more connected to the land than you are.

    And your little nature spiel is irrelevant to the movie because the movie doesn't need to show cleaning out shit from a chicken coop to show how connected a character is with nature. The same way the movie didn't need to show Luke drinking green titty milk to show he's connected to nature. There was a million different ways to show that, just look at how Episode 5 introduced Yoda. Drinking milk was a deliberate decision to make him look weird because while I'm well aware where milk comes from other people aren't and they're going to think it's weird.

    And the milk thing is just a meme that everyone knows, there's more wrong with the character. Such a throwing away his own lightsaber. Which would make sense if he considers lightsabers irrelevant to the new teachings of the Jedi, except he still uses that very lightsaber when going against Kylo. And perhaps the most damning fact about how the character was butchered came from Mark Hamill who's been very public about disagreeing with how the character was written for episode 8.

    And finally, nothing you said indicates the root problem with the character was that Episode 7 stuck Luke on an island.

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  • [–] 2 points 2 hours ago (3 children)

    Sorry, I need to come back to this one, I'm confused.

    So you're a titty milk drinker, and Luke is a titty milk drinker, and you don't think there's anything wrong with titty milk drinking. But you don't like that Luke did it in the movie. Because.... why?

    Because it's socially frowned upon? You don't like that Luke defied social norms?

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  • [–] 1 point 52 minutes ago* (2 children)

    Of course because it's socially frowned upon. This isn't Luke defying social norms, Luke is not a sentient being here. Luke does what the director makes him do and the director made him to something socially frowned upon. I don't like it because the director took a character I'm fond of and turned him socially unacceptable. Let me get my point across a different way because it's not drinking the milk that I have an issue, it's the socially frowned undertone that the director made the character subject to.

    Would you be as defensive if the director had decided Luke would do one of the following:

    • rip a massive fart?
    • bit his nails?
    • pop a zit?
    • pick his own nose and eat his snot?
    • scoop out his earwax and eat it?
    • drop his pants and take a shit?
    • jerk off?

    All of those things are "normal" in the sense that somewhere in the world there's a person who does one or some or all of those things. Generally none of those things are considered socially acceptable to do in the front of others. Unless you're a 100% social weirdo there's at least one thing in that list that you think is socially frowned upon. Would you not be critical if Luke had done that thing?

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  • [–] 1 point 12 minutes ago (1 child)

    Luke has always done socially controversial things. He's always been a rebel. On the farm, he rejected his parents' expectations that he'd be a farmer, because he wanted to see the galaxy. He rejected the empire's propaganda and joined the rebel cause. He rejected anti-Force norms pushed by Han to learn from crazy old Ben. He rejected Yoda's pressure to stay and learn. And he rejected every norm of how people act in war, by choosing to give Darth Vader mercy.

    Luke has always rejected the easy and safe path. He's always chosen adventure and independence over comfort. The titty milk is consistent characterisation. He's Luke Skywalker, he does whatever the fuck he wants and he doesn't care all that much what others think about it.

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  • [–] 1 point 4 minutes ago

    So let me get this straight. If instead of drinking titty milk Luke had dropped his pants and started furiously masturbating your reaction would be:

    He’s Luke Skywalker, he does whatever the fuck he wants and he doesn’t care all that much what others think about it.

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  • [–] 2 points 7 hours ago (2 children)

    Which would make sense if he considers lightsabers irrelevant to the new teachings of the Jedi, except he still uses that very lightsaber when going against Kylo

    Nah, he views lightsabers as irrelevant, and he doesn't use a lightsaber against Kylo. He uses an illusion of a lightsaber, and he doesn't even attack with it. He just dodges and distracts. The lightsaber is nothing more than a symbol to distract Kylo. It's serving the same function as a set of jangling keys.

    And he had to have that pacifistic viewpoint, that anti-lightsaber viewpoint, because Abrams put him on an island during a war. The best answer RJ could come up with to that is that he's become a pacifist.

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  • [–] 1 point 7 hours ago (1 child)

    Would a pacifist pick up a weapon to defend themselves and even hit back? Because that's exactly what he did when Rey attacked him.

    I don't get your need to defend Rian Johnson. I have nothing against him. I loved Looper and I enjoyed Knives out movies. I'm simply calling out a stinker for what it is, a stinker. And the last Jedi is a godtier stinker.

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  • [–] 2 points 4 hours ago

    Yes, a pacifist would.

    I get that the movie has flaws, but it also has more vision and philosophy than any other Star Wars movie, and I prefer a movie with vision. The Canto Bight stuff was weak. They did a terrible job with Finn. Rose is unlikable. But the Rey and Luke stuff is peak Star Wars.

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  • [–] 17 points 23 hours ago* (last edited 22 hours ago) (1 child)

    100% this it was Rian Johnson's inability to work from someone else's starting point.

    To add to your list. Finn. Johnson butchered Finn's story so much that the actor vocally said he would never take another Star Wars job.

    He was supposed to be a Luke analog. He was supposed to be force sensitive. He was supposed to confront Phasma. The first movie projected so many hints at the path many of these characters were going to take in the trilogy. There was a parallel to Finn and Rey. Finn's force awakening literally breaks his mind control and we see Kylo sense him!

    Johnson came in and burned all of those threads.

    I accepted a lot about Episode VIII, but the ruin of the Finn stuff is where it actually became unforgivable for me.

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  • [–] 7 points 21 hours ago

    I put Finn (and Phasma) together with all the other threads Episode VII set up and Johnson wrote off. There were simply too many to mention each thread individually.

    But yeah, it was a travesty what Johnson did to Finns story. Considering how shafted he got it would've been a mercy kill if Finn had sacrificed himself in Episode VIII but even then Johnson needed to subvert expectations and continue ruining characters.

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  • [–] 12 points 1 day ago (19 children)

    Except that it ignored everything set up in the previous movie, thus causing the next movie to be an absolute mess.

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  • [–] 22 points 1 day ago* (11 children)

    The force awakens basically had that same problem though, effectively undoing everything concluded in return of the Jedi. Granted there's a time gap but there's no explanation as to why the former rebels (whatever they were called at that time I forgot) were still such a small force compared to the new big bad (something order?), not to mention why this order exists in the first place, what their motivations were, how they got their numbers and resources, etc. They're just a galaxy-level threat sprung from thin air. It seems pretty clear to me that JJ just wanted to remake a new hope with as little consideration of the conclusion of return of the Jedi as he could get away with, plot holes be damned. RJ tried to address some of these plot holes but even he doesn't really attempt to justify the something-order's existence. If the force awakens was the first star wars movie as a new hope was then it wouldn't be such a big deal, but coming just a few decades after the return of the Jedi, there ought to be some explanation for how they lost so much progress in that time, preferably in the first act. But nah, it's just "somehow the empire returned (with cool new branding)" because JJ can't write a plot to save his life.

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  • [–] 3 points 4 hours ago

    This is why I really don't care for the new through. Episode VII is a funny movie in isolation but as a follow-up to VI it makes zero sense. Says a lot about audiences that they just blindly accept its premise with no questions asked. The rebels are magically the underdogs again guys, nothing that happened in original trilogy matters!

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  • [–] 6 points 21 hours ago

    Yeah, there was so much material they could have pulled from the Expanded Universe. The New Republic era, reclaiming territory from the imperial remnants and rebuilding the Jedi Order; the New Jedi Order era, fighting off the Yuuzhan Vong and the Killiks; the Fate of the Jedi era, when the Sith make a comeback; and then there's the Legacy era after that.

    That's at least 3 or 4 trilogies right there.

    Not to mention going back in time to the Old Republic era with its wars against the Sith empires, and the Dawn of the Jedi in the Origins era prior to that.

    If they really wanted to milk the franchise, they had plenty of material to work with instead of just saying "nah" and declaring it all non-canonical, only to replace it with slop...

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  • [–] 5 points 1 day ago

    Nah, don't put the blame on ep. IX mess into VIII. It also ignored everything set up on the previous movie, and even if it didn't, there wouldn't be any need for it to suck that much.

    Now, none of that makes VIII good...

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  • [–] 6 points 23 hours ago*

    IDK. VII was disappointing, but I hated VIII so much I still haven't watched IX. But maybe picking a winner out of these is besides the point. Rogue One showed what a good, modern Star Wars film could look like, and in comparison with that, both VII and VIII are just terrible.

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  • [–] 4 points 1 day ago (4 children)
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