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Cinematography of “Andor”

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Re: Cinematography of “Andor”

#111

Post by BLKNSLVR »

rendall wrote: post #70
apples_oranges wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You guys are excluding the George Lucas movies from discussion right? In my opinion nothing ever came even close and I gave up on SW after the second Kylo Ren movie. Rouge one was cool though, also first episodes of Mandalorian.. Should I really try Andor after all the bad stuff Disney made? A few days ago I watched the new LILO and Stitch and that was great, so maybe good people still work at Disney …

I felt like The Mandalorian was a step above its nearest best of Star Wars TV. Andor is a step above that.

I'm on both sides of the fence with early Mandalorian. I need to watch it again until it jumps the shark because I don't know how early it did that.

The latter episodes were incredibly laboured, with the narrative being spelt out, as if to a child, by various characters. I think it may have always been like that, but the look and feel overwhelmed the ridiculous dialogue for a while.

If they were more clever with the body language of the main character, then the others wouldn't have had to carry the direction of the storyline so heavily verbally. Again, I think this was done well early, but kinda lost in the desperation for grogu storyline and screen time cuteness.

I'd have to watch it again, and right now it ain't worth the time.

Haven't seen Andor, but now it's "on the list".

Re: Cinematography of “Andor”

#112

Post by kriro »

belval wrote: post #77
Joeboy wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Andor is a very good TV show, but it's obviously getting extra appreciation because it's part of a beloved but increasingly exhausted franchise.

It's the opposite for me. I could not be more burnt out on StarWars, when they introduced the force in season 2 I rolled my eyes and it somewhat took me out of it. The main downside of watching Andor is that you have your brain nagging you about eposide 7 making everything that you are watching pointless (the new republic is obliterated after 20-30 years). I have friends that I can't convince to watch it because they…

And this is exactly where I disagree. Andor does not stand very well on its own outside of SW (and that takes it from great tier to very good for me with the other minor squibbles that I have). If you don't know the lore, things will be less clear and the writing will feel strange at times. FWIW, I have recommended this show to many friends who never watched anything SW, they mostly liked it but found some things odd.

WARNING, SPOILERS

The story is not properly resolved. If you have no SW knowledge, the threat isn't even very clear. Some galaxy government lead by an emperor is building a weapon, shown once. If S2 is the end it's pretty unsatisfying in general. The politics are kind of unclear.

The sacrifice of Mothma is very unclear without a SW background. A senator said something and had to flee to a planet (oversimplified).

Without knowledge of R1, the killing machine super droid is down right comical/a sloppy resolve for things.

Without SW knowledge the (imo) best part of the Imperial machinery, bureaucracy, power hunger also becomes awkward at times and frankly less interesting. Syril is my favorite character and Dedra probably second. I found their arcs great, every single non-SW viewer I talked to found them "boring", "that guy with the annoying mother was strange" and "why did they have to be a couple, that's pretty unimaginative writing" etc.

END SPOILERS

My personal quibbles are that the crashed tie episode was pretty bad filler. I have not heard anyone say anything good about it.

Someone else already mentioned minor technical problems (field scene).

I found Diego Luna's acting ok but not great. It felt wooden at times. To some extend that's subjective but it doesn't compare to the lead acting I have in my personal top tier (Breaking Bad for example)

Re: Cinematography of “Andor”

#113

Post by aeve890 »

poisonborz wrote: post #67

Andor is a huge middle finger for everything that came after the original trilogy. It manages to be menacing and showing a convincing rebellion against realistic fascism - relying heavily on the tones of the old films - without any of the dumb Jedi magic, light sabers andd mystic blabble.

> without any of the dumb Jedi magic, light sabers andd mystic blabble

They have some of it too. But it's a very well crafted scene showing how normal people would react to the force weirdos.

Re: Cinematography of “Andor”

#114

Post by ghaff »

Spooky23 wrote: post #100
meowface wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I watched it for the first time immediately after finishing Andor. Definitely better than the other Star Wars films but definitely not as good as Andor. (I'm aware the showrunner of Andor co-wrote Rogue One, but Andor really seems like a different tier.)

I think for older fans we don’t get it. My son is 15 and grew up with the animated series, for him that’s peak Star Wars and I think he’s right. His buddies really loved Rogue One. The magic is its simplicity. I think like the Asimov books, Star Wars is best as fantasy history. The forward looking ones (that horrific “final” trilogy) are just awkward stories.

While you can't dismiss New Hope as it was just breathtaking at the time of its release, Empire Strikes Back was arguably peak, and you needed to wrap it up with the third movie, there's a good argument that Rogue One was the second best film after Empire. And probably Andor as a series after that. Unlike a lot of people I don't mind series wrapping up after a season or two. Even in the best cases I'm starting to lose interest by season five in a lot of cases.

(I think the prequels were worse than the sequels but they're collectively pretty unmemorable.)

Re: Cinematography of “Andor”

#115

Post by chrisweekly »

andrepd wrote: post #74
iainmerrick wrote: post #65

To address this interview specifically, rather than just gushing about how great Andor is-- One point Nuyens makes in a few different ways is that they used a variety of tools and techniques at every stage. People often have simplistic, extreme viewpoints like "modern CGI can do anything" or "CGI looks fake and weightless, practical effects are better". But here's somebody with a big part in making a fantastic-lookin…

> Massive real sets with CGI enhancements; sometimes green screens This is the definition of the Pirates of the Caribbean trilogy, and they're still some of the best-looking films I've ever seen, far surpassing the modern UE slop.

UE?

Re: Cinematography of “Andor”

#116

Post by ghaff »

apples_oranges wrote: post #31
meowface wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I watched it for the first time immediately after finishing Andor. Definitely better than the other Star Wars films but definitely not as good as Andor. (I'm aware the showrunner of Andor co-wrote Rogue One, but Andor really seems like a different tier.)

You guys are excluding the George Lucas movies from discussion right? In my opinion nothing ever came even close and I gave up on SW after the second Kylo Ren movie. Rouge one was cool though, also first episodes of Mandalorian.. Should I really try Andor after all the bad stuff Disney made? A few days ago I watched the new LILO and Stitch and that was great, so maybe good people still work at Disney …

Andor is good and you can almost ignore that it's Star Wars universe.

Re: Cinematography of “Andor”

#117

Post by wishfish »

For those people who loved Andor and its approach to the Empire and fascism, I have a book recommendation: The Rise and Fall of the Galactic Empire by Chris Kempshall. It's written as history (not a novel) with the author being an in-universe scholar who originally focused on Jedi antiquities but decided to write a general history of the Empire.

Ties in well with Andor as the book discusses, realistically, how the rot set in with the Republic. How it could be transformed into the Empire with little initial protest. How the Empire sustained itself via a mix of military control, propaganda, and moving towards making the population feel helpless and thus apolitical. And how the blind sides of a rigid, fascist system led to the Rebellion winning despite the huge power disparity.

It's the perfect companion book for the series. And is a good introductory book on how authoritarianism takes hold, how the insurgents can exploit weaknesses, and what should be done, post-rebellion, to keep the fascists from returning. I think many people, who otherwise would not be obsessive about Star Wars lore, would find it interesting.

On a side note: the book does address the events of Abrams sequel trilogy with an interesting angle. That the New Republic essentially didn't do enough de-Nazification and that led to their downfall. This approach to those terrible movies doesn't entirely succeed, but does make them a little more interesting. And matches what we've seen in real life reconstructions after the downfall of various regimes.

Re: Cinematography of “Andor”

#118

Post by ghaff »

MangoToupe wrote: post #102
fettel wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm a lifelong Star Wars fan, fell in love as a young kid. I remember being in 8th grade and being so excited for the prequels, and then walking out of the theater after Ep. 1 and feeling like something was just... wrong. I knew that it was junk, and not the Star Wars I fell in love with. And from there it was pretty much further and further downhill, with occasional glimpses of hope that were quickly dashed. I tried…

I actually greatly prefer the prequels to the original trilogy. I suspect it has to do with the fact that I was a child when episode 1 came out and I was still a child when the prequels concluded. A big part of the problem is that these movies were written, basically, for 12-year old boys. You're not going to be able to get that spark back as an adult, and it's not easy to make a movie that appeals so strongly to bot…

I think it's probably even truer of TV series than films that you can't really go home again. But then I'm probably forgetting various Disney and other films that I probably loved as a kid that I'd find it torture to sit through today.

Re: Cinematography of “Andor”

#119

Post by Spooky23 »

ghaff wrote: post #114
Spooky23 wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think for older fans we don’t get it. My son is 15 and grew up with the animated series, for him that’s peak Star Wars and I think he’s right. His buddies really loved Rogue One. The magic is its simplicity. I think like the Asimov books, Star Wars is best as fantasy history. The forward looking ones (that horrific “final” trilogy) are just awkward stories.

While you can't dismiss New Hope as it was just breathtaking at the time of its release, Empire Strikes Back was arguably peak, and you needed to wrap it up with the third movie, there's a good argument that Rogue One was the second best film after Empire. And probably Andor as a series after that. Unlike a lot of people I don't mind series wrapping up after a season or two. Even in the best cases I'm starting to los…

I agree with you 100%. I found it interesting that in this particular circle of kids, they rate the attack of the clones much higher, as the animated series is kind of a “Star Wars home” to them.

Any way you cut it, it’s really cool how people consume them in different ways, and there’s enough material that over time we can just discard garbage like 8 hours of walking through the desert.

Re: Cinematography of “Andor”

#120

Post by sdenton4 »

Kon5ole wrote: post #86

Andor + Rogue one are my favourites from the franchise. It tells a story that the 50 year olds that grew up with SW can appreciate for its depth and intrigue as well as connection to the original films, but leaving the hallowed originals mostly alone. I wish the crew behind it would be allowed to continue the story until the fall of the emperor, so we could get the whole "rise and fall of the empire" story told with…

Hmmm, rise of the empire you say? So a long hard look at a faltering parliamentary system, gradually usurped by an authoritarian and his team of goons...

Doesn't sound very relatable for today's audiences.

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