So many of the Star Wars harassers defend their predations by saying "But TLJ was bad!" and a lot of folks take the bait and argue, "no, it was actually Very Good."
Here's the thing: THERE ARE LOTS OF BAD MOVIES. Why does *this* one, assuming it's bad, vex you so?
Here's the thing: THERE ARE LOTS OF BAD MOVIES. Why does *this* one, assuming it's bad, vex you so?
Loads of movies are bad. Indeed, some very popular and lucrative movies are bad. So why does this one get its own hate campaign? Or, say, the new Ghostbusters? Or even Twilight? What else do they all have in common? Hmmmmm?
As a critic I can debate the merits of these films--I think, on its own terms as pulp sci-fi, TLJ was pretty good. But it's also not the point. Abusive people like to use innocuous justifications for their behaviour ("I just wanna say it was a bad movie!")
Well, my dude, no one's stopping you from having an opinion. What's weird are the petitions, the all-male rewrites of TLJ, and the harassing-actresses-off-social-media business. It makes one think this is about more than your subjective opinion on the film's quality.
Long story short, though, there are tons of shitty movies about and for men. People get to have those as guilt-free "good-times-at-the-movies" type films. We don't have this kind of cultural spasm every time Michael Bay sharts something onto the silver screen.
And yes, hate to break it to you folks, but considered in the most high-falutin' cinematic terms *all* the Star Wars movies are kind of sucky. Read Pauline Kael's New Yorker review of a New Hope; she'll crush your dreams from beyond the grave more efficiently than I can.
But bad movies are okay, just like bad games and bad books serve a role as cultural junk-food; a nice treat at the end of a long day. And so what if some of them now tell junky but tasty stories about women? Where, really, is the harm?
Oh, but you really want me to know that you hated The Last Jedi and thought it was a bad movie? Well...
