no because when i was watching the clips of my school president prom night on stage day 1 without subs, the group performance that was most fun to watch was Stand By Lor right? such great dance moves, very groovy, very traditional vibes in places (aka satang & ford's vocals).

BUT THEN I SAW THE SUBTITLED VERSION OF THAT PERFORMANCE I AM LOOSING MY MIND OMG do yourself a favor and watch this

rotj: my thoughts

positives and negatives. spoilers ahead

so, i wasn’t gonna write one of these but i felt i needed to get some stuff off my chest so i can move on. i was just gonna pretend this movie didn’t happen but i think i can come to eventually accept that it did now that i’ve had time to digest everything.

POSITIVES:

- honestly... from my first viewing there isn’t a lot i like. but i’m sure this will improve the more i watch the film and actually have the chance to form an opinion on more things within such a hectic onslaught of information. - i laughed. c3po and that little fixer dude were genuinely funny (to me). dio (sp?) was super cute too. tbh i never cared much for droids (my obi-wan is coming thru here) but i actually enjoyed them so that’s a win for me - very pretty film. visually spectacular.  - fast-paced. not boring for a second (to me). kept me entertained. - rey’s yellow lightsaber. i actually liked this even tho it doesn’t match up with current canon (yellow being for temple guards). it reminded me of bastila and i was just waiting for her to show it off as a double-sided saber... which i didn’t get but it still looked like it was built for it so i’ll take the win. - the idea of palpatine being powerful again but it would have been cool to see a younger version of himself - rey and ben teaming up and the intimate moment they shared which felt genuinely beautiful and was one of the highlights for me

now here’s the ISSUES i have off the top of my head, some of them having been mentioned on this blog before:

- the trio. everyone else has already said it. forced and uncomfortable. it felt like they were setting up a love triangle for the first half of the movie as well, which was weird. when they had poe and rey have those ‘moments’ or when they bickered with each other i was like ‘they better not be tryna spring up some hanleia dynamic on us for the last film between these two’ especially while also baiting finnrey (which is never touched upon again after the first half of the movie, yikes)

- towards the end of the film, i turned to the person next to me and said “this reminds me of a video game plot” - i couldn’t pinpoint exactly why that was, but it was just a feeling. and not a deep, thorough video game plot either. another reviewer said something similar. it’s just... very shallow, expository and it feels like it’s dragging you and the characters through very railroaded and forced missions/battles. i mean at the start they’re really just looking for something, going to someone, that person says they need to talk to someone else for the thing, they go to another person, etc. which is a type of mission device used in games as well. it also felt to me like one of those japanese otome games where rey is the bland female character that all the male characters fall for (poe, finn, kylo) and she gets her pick of which one she wants to romance, which was cringe.

- i didn’t hear the characters. i only heard what they were forcing the characters to say in order to progress the plot or explain the plot. the characters themselves became faceless inserts for exposition. so many times i heard a character say something and thought... that was a jarring piece of dialogue that seems both out of character and unnatural to say at that point in time.

- although i said being fast-paced could be a positive, it was largely a negative for me. at one point it felt like slide transitions were happening at minute intervals. a major plot point would be revealed and then no time is given to process, it’s onto the next major scene. this left everything feeling very rushed and messy, which i believe is due to half the film being cut for time constraints.

- each character is either twisted into an unrecognisable character, or ignored/not given the time they deserve. rey? blank slate female protag with a famous bloodline and who barely reacts to the things going on around her (leia dying, ben dying, she disregards her ‘friends’ on multiple occasions). like others, i always defended rey’s abilities, but this film is too much. she has been made a mary sue. finn? rendered nothing but the ‘friend’ pining after a girl and only briefly gets time with his own story which is never fully explored in this film by any means. poe? turned into a grumpy, seemingly jealous ‘friend’ with a shady past that felt like they were trying to make him the ‘han solo’ of the trio rather than going with what we already know about his character. leia? now this is hard, and i respect what they tried to do, but i still felt like her death could have been done a bit better rather than the quick ‘shock’ moment it was. also the stuff with luke training her is a no for me. way too shoe-horned and part of what made leia cool to me was that she was a skywalker but didn’t need to be a jedi. her powers were elsewhere. kylo? don’t get me started. rose? who? she may as well not have been in this movie with the way they ignored her character and showed how little the other characters care about her. it broke my heart.

- rey palpatine? though i’m a rey kenobi fan, i was happy with rey nobody. i liked what it stood for. i didn’t mind the idea of rey palpatine in theory, but the way they force-fed this to us in the film rather than building it up left a bad taste in my mouth and i’m going to have to pass on it. if they wanted to have her related to palpatine, they should have just made her a clone imo. it would have matched with what was being built up prior (in tlj with the clones in the cave), it would have explained her ties to the dark side, it would have completed the palpatine/skywalker poetry, and it would have still been congruent with her being a ‘nobody’ since that’s essentially what clones are seen as in star wars. also we wouldn’t have to think about the fact palpatine got laid. laboratories were already set up in jakku by palpatine. cloning itself was shown in rots anyway (snoke) so? 

- although i’ve wanted ben to be redeemed... it still felt too rushed in this film. also, he does display some toxic tendencies as kylo ren towards rey (trying to manipulate her to go with him) which didn’t sit well with me but i didn’t really see ben/kylo ren in his scenes sometimes anyway, since he was also forcibly used to give exposition to us/rey. i did like his scene with his mother and father in the film but i just needed more than that to really feel his redemption rather than the quick switch we got. 

- i originally wasn’t okay with the whole ‘bringing someone back to life through the force’ thing since i always liked the idea palpatine was just saying that to honeypot anakin, but decided i’m willing to accept it as a unique ability they had for each other due to their force bond. but then... ben dies anyway. and it’s done in such a way that leaves you feeling ‘wtf just happened?’. it was random, forced, didn’t feel necessary and it just... happened. no one reacted to it. he wasn’t referred to or mentioned after this. the last skywalker goes out just like that. poof. okay. so was this a shock death or was jj genuinely trying to appease people who didn’t think ben deserved redemption or to live? either way ben lived such a sad, cruel, manipulated life that his death seemed unfair and we’re all supposed to think this movie is hopeful and celebrate a few minutes later? i don’t think so. in fact, everything that happens after that scene feels incredibly uncomfortable because of the massive tonal shift.

- the kiss. ok don’t hate me. i enjoy reylo. but i honestly think the kiss wasn’t exactly... needed? maybe it was just because everything else felt so forced but it felt a little forced in this scene for me. for me, the hug ben gave rey just beforehand spoke more volumes of their intimacy. i did mention their intimate moments above as a positive, so i still like this overall moment (in addition to the moment rey heals him). but the hug spoke enough to me that it would have been nice to keep it more subtle yet obvious enough (thanks to their acting) that they cared deeply for one another. but then again, this is what i felt before i knew ben died, so. idk. i guess it would suck for ben to die without having kissed rey? how about just don’t kill ben off. have them hug instead of kiss and then leave us to fill in the gaps as they both live. how about that.

- the rey skywalker thing is embarrassing. and rey ended up alone in the desert... just how she started. i just can’t. by the time this came on the screen i was ready to leave. i only stayed because i HOPED there would be an after credits showing her on the falcon, or her training finn to be a jedi, or her speaking with any of the force ghosts (luke or ben or anakin).

- speaking of which. why were there no force ghosts in the scene where she fights palpatine? we just get voices? that scene really lacked impact and the whole fight sequence just felt blah. palpatine came back super strong and then he was gone in moments. there should have a) been force ghosts or some kind of visual presence of the jedi to help rey whether physically or just boosting morale and b) ben should have fought palpatine with her.

- why is rey alone in the desert? i honestly didn’t think this meant she was going to be a hermit until i came online and saw that’s what everyone else thought. but just... why? why is she not passing on the jedi ways she fought to keep alive? or the knowledge she has gained/kept in the sacred jedi texts she stole? surely not. surely that is her plan. surely ben saved her not just because he loved her but also because she can carry on the skywalker legacy NOT by dying alone in a desert but by training new jedi. (which, again, SHOULD HAVE BEEN FINN AS THE FIRST NEW JEDI!) or better yet, a new type of jedi that don’t follow toxic ways but that incorporate both the light and dark side of the force like she does? and calling THEM skywalkers? but nope. instead she ended up back where she started. except with less personality this time.

- i can’t talk enough about how cool it would have been to have jedi!finn at the end. talk about coming full circle from the promo baits they had for TFA of finn with the lightsaber. AT LEAST GIVE US THIS.

- the whole movie just felt like a massive disrespect to the previous film. everything rian built was trampled on, retconned or ignored. say what you want about tlj and rian, but this is what happens when you ignore or try to retcon the preceding film whether you like it or not. everything feels messy and the plots get screwed up. this movie would have been largely different (better) had they not tried so hard to pretend tlj didn’t exist. even if you didn’t like it, take the plot and mould it into something you do like. don’t just toss it aside and lose all sense of continuity between the films. i don’t blame jj for this exactly, but rather the disney committee that were too afraid to acknowledge tlj’s existence due to the reception it got from fans and thus felt the need to have jj ‘fix/retcon’ things rather than build upon/improve things.

- oh yeah hux. that happened, i guess. i thought it was weird and it kinda sucked that they did that. who cares about the new guy? general pride or whatever? no one. surely making general hux more menacing couldn’t have been THAT hard. but no. we get a rather silly death instead. alright. at least he can forever be known as the petty king of star wars.

- there’s probably more. i could write an essay but i’m getting tired of complaining already so i’m leaving it here. if you happened to read this far and want to talk about it with me some more, my DMs are open!

overall, i just hope some canon content is going to be released, either in the form of a book or a comic, that explores more of this following the movie. i want to know more about finn’s story. i want to see whether rey does stay on tatooine or whether she trains jedi. i want to see whether she communicates with ben through the force, or just, y’know, any closure on that would be nice. i want to see the director’s cut with the other half of the movie. then, perhaps, i will know peace.

Painting and drawing: my forever home <3

This has been my forever home, safe place, and at the same time a not so TOTGA (The one that got away).

I get to express myself and release some of my creativity on to paper, canvas, iPad, or whatever surface I could paint or draw on! Also, since I have fandoms, I make a lot of fan art if I have the time to do so. Usually I use watercolors, pencils/graphite, ink, acrylics, and gouache. There are so much art mediums I want to explore, especially oil paints but it’s absolutely daunting, but I am definitely down for a challenge!

Now my favorite subject to draw are people and landscapes, I don’t know why but there something so therapeutic when painting a person’s skin tone, finding the right shade, and looking at their features. As for landscapes, that’s what I started drawing as a kid, besides the Power Puff Girls and SpongeBob Square Pants. But there something so comforting about painting the horizon and looking how nature is so beautiful and coming to life on paper.

But I also enjoy using colored pencils, markers, and sculpting clay! For colored pencils, that’s what I was used to use when I wanted to color in coloring books, which made me like using them now although not as much as paints. However, I use them for tiny details for my watercolor paintings. As for markers, that is what I usually use them for calligraphy nowadays because they just look so cool – at least for me. And finally clay, I started become a little serious with sculpting when I was 12 and continued on as a 13 year old. When I was 15, I was so proud that I was able to make Mockingjay pins when I was ultra-hyped up for the Hunger Games.

The photos I have put above are some of the works that I’ve made over the years and honestly, they’re all my babies. Although most of those clay pieces were done when I was 12, I can’t wait to get back to polymer clay sculpting again!

And finally, the most recent, Digital Art. I started when I was 15 with a drawing tablet connected to my laptop, and now I have upgraded to an iPad. I must say it had a big learning curve, but thankfully it still ended up nicely.

(insert digi art pics)

If you’re wondering what’s the reason why I put in “TOTGA” for art, is because there have been times where I just lose my passion for it, but thankfully I grow back to it again *plays black swan by BTS* but in all seriousness, there have been many days where I just give up on it because I feel like I’m not improving nor have I had the time to paint for myself. But I do truly hope I will never lose my passion for this because a part of me would pass away if ever my love for it would fade. It’s a frustrating thought process, if you ask me.

(now if you’re wondering why I said playing black swan by BTS because it is a song about losing one’s passion of something and it feels as if it’s one’s first death)

But for real, I am so lucky to have art in my life, because it lets me breathe and lets me be creative. I’ll leave you with a quote by Robin Williams from “The Dead Poets Society”

““We don't read and write poetry because it's cute. We read and write poetry because we are members of the human race. And the human race is filled with passion. And medicine, law, business, engineering, these are noble pursuits and necessary to sustain life. But poetry, beauty, romance, love, these are what we stay alive for.””