Unpopular Opinions: Star Wars

Since last year I’ve been slowly working my way through the Star Wars universe in chronological order. I just watched Solo, so Rebels is next on my list. Watching the story like this has given me an appreciation for Star Wars that I hadn’t felt in a while. But as I watched Clone Wars, I felt it coming back. In honor of the love we have for Star Wars, I wanted to share a few potentially unpopular opinions. 

Prequel trilogy is good

I’m not sure where the idea came from that the prequel trilogy was sub-par. We knew it’d have a tragic end, as it’s established as the prequel to everything that happened to Luke, Han, and Leia. Maybe it’s the nostalgia I hold from seeing these movies in theaters with my dad and brothers, but I was excited for each movie to come out and I genuinely enjoyed them.

Sequel trilogy isn't that bad

When Disney announced they had acquired Star Wars and were going to start a sequel trilogy, I was as excited as anyone. When I went to see The Force Awakens, I was excited to see the return of classic characters and new characters interacting with them. Like any sequel, it was never going to be perfect, but I liked it. I’ll admit that the overarching story of the sequel trilogy didn’t really mesh well as a trilogy. However, as three individual movies, I still liked them. Even went to see The Last Jedi for my bachelor party.

Disney didn’t ruin Star Wars

People will complain that Disney ruined the Star Wars franchise. But for those who don’t have the time or the access to read all the books, Disney saved Star Wars. At least as far as content is concerned. Before Disney, there were six movies and an incomplete Clone Wars series. Even if you don’t like the sequel trilogy, if it weren’t for Disney, we wouldn’t have any continued Star Wars content. Because of Disney, we have The Mandalorian, The Bad Batch, Rogue One, and other fan favorites. Also, we wouldn't have Galaxy's Edge at Disney Parks.

The Mandalorian Season 1 was too slow

Now speaking of fan favorites, I really struggled with The Mandalorian, at least during season 1. It was the nature of the old west-ish vibe they did, I think, but the series moved slowly. Maybe it’s like how I didn’t care for much of the Netflix Marvel series… it’s kind of hard to watch a 13 hour movie (or 8 hour movie in the case of Mando). Then again, I enjoyed season 2. And that was before I even knew Ahsoka or Bo-Katan. Maybe I’ll enjoy season 1 more when I rewatch it.

The Clone Wars was too complicated

I’m not sure what Cartoon Network exactly had in mind when they started this series. In true Star Wars fashion, episodes were not aired in chronological order. This made it really hard to watch in some ways (I had to keep close tabs on the order of episodes closely). There were also so many moving parts in the series with countless Jedi, Sith, Republic, and Separatist forces. If I ever watch this show again, I’m going to just pick one character and watch their story (there’s a good chance I’ll do this with Ahsoka before her series airs).

At the risk of inciting controversy, put your Star Wars unpopular opinion in the comments. May the force be with you.

Unpopular Opinions: Friends

Friends is a consistent feature of our home. When Netflix took down Friends and it went to HBO Max, we ended up buying the complete set of DVDs from my brother. Consistent with our love of Friends, we definitely have some opinions about the series. And some of them definitely fit in the “unpopular opinions” category. 

Ross and Rachel weren’t good together

They were cute at the beginning of their love story; it was intriguing and engaging watching them pine for each other… but then they both got insecure in turn. Insecurities happen in new relationships, but then things got out of hand. I honestly don’t even care about them in the last episode because I’m not convinced they could survive as a couple after the series finale. They weren’t the core couple of the show; Chandler and Monica were. 

Emily wasn’t a bad person

Look at it from her perspective. Your fiancé says his ex-girlfriend’s name at the altar and then he gets on a plane headed to your honeymoon destination. Awkward. I think it was a totally reasonable request for him to not hang out with her. I would have a hard time with my wife hanging out with an ex-boyfriend too. That being said, I judge Emily for going through with the wedding when she knew she was going to freeze him out. Also, I think it was unreasonable to expect Ross to move across the city and never see Rachel (she was his sister’s roommate; they were bound to bump into each other). So her expectations were skewed, because she was upset. Honestly she needed a chance to calm down and definitely some couples therapy.

Janice was the best!

If I knew her in real life, Janice would drive me nuts as a friend (my wife has said I’d feel the same way about Phoebe, whom I love). But as a character on the show, she’s amazing. She’s genuine, loving, and forgiving. She made the mistake of cheating on Chandler, but she even tried to make up for that. That’s admirable! When it came down to it, she genuinely cared for and loved Chandler, which he didn't have much in his life before her.

It didn’t matter if they were on a break

The ongoing discussion twenty years later is whether Ross and Rachel were on a break. It doesn’t matter! If Ross were right and they were on a break, he slept with someone two hours later. How insensitive and awful is that. Also, Rachel and Ross needed a proper conversation about the whole thing, instead of Rachel’s eighteen page letter. Maybe even a long term therapist if they wanted to stay together. That kind of hurt (whether you label it as infidelity or not) doesn't go away from just one conversation.

Ross was the worst

He is absolutely insensitive, rude, and obnoxious. Ross was so good during season one, silently pining after Rachel. But then after that he went utterly die hit. Example: while he was dating Julie, he was obnoxiously cutesy with her in Rachel’s face. Even though he didn’t know Rachel liked him, why would you be flaunting your relationship in her face?

Rachel and Joey were good together

I’ll admit their chemistry as friends was better than their chemistry as a couple. However, Joey treated Rachel so much better than Ross did. She was the first girl he’d ever really been in love with and he treated her as such. That's amazing! Their story was out of nowhere and I’m totally fine that they didn’t end up together. However, they were good to each other and that’s one of the most important parts of any relationship. 

Unpopular Opinions: LOST

This coming weekend is the tenth anniversary of the finale one of the largest fandoms I’ve been a part of: LOST. It feels like it was surrounded by controversy the whole time the series was around. A shipwreck, a mysterious island, time travel, conspiracy theories, and purgatory. I’d never been part of a fandom with such intense theories along the way and I’m not sure another will ever compare. But with a fandom that was so critical with its theories during its run, it was only natural that the show ended up with a lot of criticisms by the end.

The series ending was good
The series finale was NEVER going to appease everyone. In particular, the flash-sideways were widely misunderstood. Throughout the series’ run, a theory kept popping up that the Island was purgatory. Repeatedly, the writers said that wasn’t the case. However, in the final season a “flash-sideways” timeline came into play. It was assumed to be a result of time travel, but in the series finale it was revealed to be a form of purgatory. Let me repeat, the Island WAS NOT purgatory. The flash-sideways WAS purgatory. I never understood why people struggle to understand that.

Not all the questions needed answers
Similar to the series finale controversy, after the series was over I felt like all I heard were complaints about how there were still so many unanswered questions about the show. What was the heart of the Island? What’s the deal with Libby? Who built all the Egyptian-esque ruins?  The writers said that some of these (like Libby) were supposed to be answered, but due to actor availability and such they weren’t able to. That being said, not everything needed to be answered. If we got a massive info-dump in the final episode, it would’ve been boring. Personally, I’m okay with the Island still having an air of mystery in the end.

Nikki and Paulo weren’t so bad
The problem with Nikki and Paulo is that they appeared out of the blue and tried to take center-stage after months of being invisible. At the time, the writers were trying to appease viewers by exploring more of the other survivors and their stories. I think it backfired because they tried to make Nikki and Paulo main characters. If they’d been recurring characters, like Rose and Bernard, who periodically appeared through season 3-4, it would have been better. Also, they just didn’t bother me as much as they apparently bothered other people. Just would have been better if they introduced obscure survivors periodically like they did with Arzt or Frogurt.

Ana Lucia was a good character
I’m not saying you have to like her, but she was a great character. In fact, I started re-watching the series during social distancing and my wife (who’s only watched bits and pieces) had an immediate dislike of Ana Lucia. I feel like that was pretty common back in the day. But it’s not because she’s a bad character. If anything it’s because she’s a good character. I think you’re meant to hate her at first and you may never actually like her as a person… but as her complexities and backstory get revealed, she gets more depth and substance. And all in the course of one season.

I liked Season 3 (with minor exceptions)
Season 3 of LOST started to drag on, especially in the first half. It’s because of all the filler and lowered ratings that the show runners got the deal to end the show after a total of six seasons. It gave the writers a chance to play out their preferred end game, instead of fishing for stories (that’s how Jack’s tattoo backstory happened….). But other than a few filler episodes, like the tattoo backstory, I liked season 3. The pacing kind of failed at times, but when doesn’t it? Every show has downtime. You can’t expect every episode to be groundbreaking.

Time travel from Season 5 was genius
I mentioned this in a post about time travel, but I really enjoyed the time travel in LOST. I don't have a problem with the Back to the Future time travel set up, but there's something about LOST that makes sense to me. And yet the time travel arc from LOST got quite a bit of flack. But to me it gave the show a needed change of pace and it gave them a chance to tell the stories they wanted (like Rousseau and DHARMA) in a way that would have been impossible. Or at the very least, disjointed and awkward. Instead, we got to see DHARMA close up and personal. I'm still not sure I like how they did Rousseau's story (I was hoping for more mystery) but it was still good, as far as time travel.

Man in Black wasn’t such a bad guy (at first)
I’m not sure this one is so much of an “opinion” as an observation. Toward the tail end of season 6, we got the backstory to the “villain” of the story. But the thing is that he didn’t start as a villain. In the flashback episode that gives us backstory for Jacob and the Man in Black, we see how the “Mother” treated them. If anything she was the bad guy of the series. She killed Jacob and MIB’s mom and took the babies, she killed a village of people on the Island for digging a hole, and she refused to let MIB leave the Island. At first, before becoming Smokified, MIB wasn’t bad. He just wanted to see what was in the outside world. He wanted to know where his birth mother came from. It wasn’t until he was pitted against Jacob that he started being a bad guy. And he did all his bad guy deeds out of desperation, to find a way to leave the Island finally.

What do you think? Did you watch LOST until the end? Where would you disagree? LOST is still one of my favorite shows and I don't think there could be another show like it. It's always worth a re-watch.

Unpopular Opinions: MCU

I started off this week with a countdown on Facebook to Black Widow and the launch of MCU Phase 4. I feel it's only appropriate to pair that countdown with a reflection of sorts to the history of the MCU. Phases 1-3 had movies, shorts, Netflix, Hulu, and network shows. Now we're moving into an area consolidated to movies and Disney+. So as part of my reflections, here are a few of some unpopular opinions about the MCU thus far.

Iron Man 2 and The Incredible Hulk weren’t so bad
They are two of the lesser loved MCU movies. They’re not fantastic blockbusters, but they aren’t as bad as people make them out to be. The big problem with Iron Man 2 is that they bit off more than they could chew (Black Widow’s introduction, Whiplash, Justin Hammer, etc.) but it didn’t make the movie bad. On the other hand, I think the big problem with The Incredible Hulk is how it kind of came out of nowhere and became irrelevant afterwards. It assumed you knew the backstory of The Hulk and it kind of just threw us in there. Also, especially since they re-cast Bruce Banner, the movie kind of became inconsequential. We’ve seen Ross since then, but the Abomination and Betty just disappeared (although the Abomination was mentioned in Agents of SHIELD).

Iron Fist was good
I think the biggest issue people have with Iron Fist is how it’s so different from the comic book character. So to be fair, I’ve never read the comics. Maybe that’s why I enjoyed Iron Fist. Danny Rand was a refreshingly chill character compared to Daredevil, Jessica Jones, and Luke Cage being so angsty. Also, as far as Season 2 is concerned, it was one of the shorter seasons of any Netflix MCU show, so I think that helped keep the pacing up. The 13-episode Netflix seasons made them feel like 13-hour long Marvel movies. And that got kind of exhausting. So even shaving off three hours made it more manageable.

Daredevil Season 1 wasn't so great
Before I watched Daredevil, I heard how great it was. But I was disappointed. Matt Murdock was cool and I liked Daredevil as a character and a concept. However, as the season went on, it felt drawn out. Like I said with Iron Fist, the 13-episode seasons often felt like a super long movie. I much preferred the shows where each episode felt like a self-contained story with an over-arching plot. In my opinion, Jessica Jones, Runaways, and even Cloak & Dagger did a better job at that.

Agents of SHIELD Season 1 was good

I've heard a lot of complaints over the years about Agents of SHIELD's bumpy start. As the series started in the post-Avengers/MCU Phase 2 era, they took some time figuring out their footing. Until the Winter Soldier tie-in episodes, the series didn't have an over-arching story per se. It kind of just seemed like an MCU cop show, where each episode was its own story. Maybe it's just because I had lower expectations that I liked it? I don't know. But it's still my favorite MCU TV show thus far, ever since I started binging seasons 1-2 during grave shifts.

Captain Marvel is good
I don't know what it was about Captain Marvel that got people up in arms last year, but I liked it. Granted, the 90s nostalgia helped, but it added a story into an era of the MCU that we'd never seen before. Also we got some backstory with Nick Fury and Phil Coulson (though I'm still kind of bitter that we didn't get as much Coulson as I wanted). Maybe the details of Fury's eye injury wasn't important, but it was a fun addition. In addition, the plot twist was unprecedented. Everything I'd read had the Skrulls as bad guys, so we were set up for the Kree to be the good guys. But we'd also only seen the Kree as the bad guys (in Guardians, in SHIELD, etc.) so I didn't know what to expect. All that made the experience more fun for me. Honestly, my biggest disappointment with Captain Marvel is that she didn't have a bigger role to play in Endgame, after all that buildup.

Black Widow isn't necessary
Don't get me wrong; I'm looking forward to seeing Black Widow. However, I'm skeptical about it. My worry is that the whole movie will be pure fan-service for the people who've wanted a female-led Avengers movie. Representation matters (as Joe explained this week), but it has to be done right. If Black Widow is done right, it'll be great. My fear is that it's just a cash-grab and it won't matter after it's done. We've had lots of standalone MCU movies over the years (Ant-Man, Doctor Strange, etc.), but none of them have been filler; they've all been relevant to the universe. But since Natasha is dead... how is her standalone movie going to relate to the future of the MCU? I'm skeptically optimistic, but mostly skeptical.

Unpopular Opinions: Disney

Disney Plus has been out for two months, giving us all plenty of time to binge Disney classics, Disney Channel series, and some classic Marvel cartoons. Disney might have become the overlord of almost all popular media, now owning Fox, Marvel, and Star Wars (among other franchises), but at least they’re a benevolent overlord. That being said, I have some grievances about Disney (or at least about Disney fans). So here are a few of my thoughts.

Frozen Wasn’t Groundbreaking
Back in 2013 when Frozen was released, it became this big phenomenon seemingly overnight. I’m not going to bash on Frozen, because it was a genuinely good movie. However, it didn’t deserve the over-hype that it got… never mind how it’s basically become its own franchise in the 6 years since. I can think of countless Disney movies that are equal to Frozen or even better. Big Hero 6, Princess and the Frog, and Tangled are among the animated features that deserve more credit than they were given. To be fair, I could also just be really tired of “Let It Go”.

Tarzan is NOT Elsa's brother
After Frozen came out back in 2013, the internet began overthinking the movie and tying other Disney movies together with it. Part of it probably came from a shot of Rapunzel and Flynn on their way to Elsa’s coronation. So people started theorizing her relation to Anna and Elsa, that their parents shipwrecked on the way to Rapunzel’s wedding, and Ariel’s capsized boat is really the King and Queen’s ship. The icing on the cake was the theory that the king and queen survived and had a baby, Tarzan. Despite it being “confirmed” by a Disney writer, it doesn’t make any sense. Tarzan is from a completely different time period and his parents don’t look like Anna and Elsa’s parents. So I can’t accept it, no matter how popular the theory was.

Disney Princesses Aren’t Passive
A huge critique of Disney Princess movies is how passive they are. This is especially the case with older Disney Princesses, like Snow White and Cinderella. Yeah, they weren’t out there fighting sea demons (like Moana), shooting ice out of their hands (like Elsa), or swinging a sword or frying pan (like Mulan or Rapunzel), but they were tough. Snow White and Cinderella endured abuse from their step-mothers and even did it with optimism. Especially with the awareness brought to abuse nowadays, this is a big deal.

Too Much Live-Action Too Fast
To be clear, I have zero problem with Disney’s live-action remakes. I’ve thoroughly enjoyed Cinderella, Beauty and the Beast, and Aladdin (just to name a few). The problem is that instead of getting one remake every year or every other year, we’ve been getting them released faster than I can keep track. Just this year we had Aladdin, The Lion King, and Dumbo (not to mention Lady and the Tramp, if we include Disney Plus originals). They’re just losing their impact on me. Maybe if we could just slow it down a little?

Disney Didn’t Ruin Star Wars
I don’t understand the hate that the new Star Wars movies get. Maybe I’m not cinema savvy, but I’ve enjoyed the Star Wars movies I’ve seen thus far (I’ve yet to see Solo or The Rise of Skywalker). In my possibly uneducated opinion, I’m just glad there’s more Star Wars to be seen. If it weren’t for Disney “ruining” Star Wars, the last we’d have seen of Star Wars on the big screen would have been Revenge of the Sith. Instead, because of Disney, the legacy of Star Wars gets to continue for generations to come.

Check out some more unpopular opinions for Harry Potter

Unpopular Opinions: Harry Potter

Not to get political, but like most geeks I have some very strong opinions on some of my favorite fandoms. This problem would have never happened 30 years ago, but now with the internet and social media, it happens all the time. Everyone has an opinion nowadays and some of them are basically geek blasphemy.

Snape's Obsession with Lily
The first one I want to address is probably my biggest Harry Potter pet peeve. From “Always” to the doe patronus, I have issues with Snape’s obsession with Lily Evans Potter. I have no doubt that he loved her and that his childhood crush was beautiful. However, when he picked between the Death Eaters and the girl he liked. He made his choice. Later when she married James, he still carried a torch for her. Not going to assume it’d be easy for him to get over her, but he stayed in love with her for 20ish years after the fact. Sorry, but if I found out that a childhood friend of my wife was in love with her 20 years out of high school, I’d find it creepy.

Bonnie Wright wasn't a bad Ginny
I didn’t even know it until after the Harry Potter movie series was completed, but apparently there’s some hate on Bonnie Wright as Ginny. I had absolutely no problem with her as Ginny. If anything, I have problems with how she was written. I feel like Ginny had a much bigger role in the books. She was a side character in the first four books, but she was present and she had a purpose. And then with the DA in “Order of the Phoenix” and dating Harry in “Half-Blood Prince”, she was meant to have a bigger role. Instead she was shown as just another DA member until the attack on the Ministry and she was basically invisible to Harry until they started making out.

“The Cursed Child” is basically Fan Fiction
I know JK Rowling technically signed off on this play, but I take issue with it still. To be fair, I haven’t read it or seen it. To also be fair, nothing I’ve read makes me want to read or see it. Apart from the fact that it wasn’t actually done (or commissioned) by JK Rowling, the type of time travel it exhibits is in direct contradiction to what JK Rowling establishes with the Time Turner in “Prisoner of Azkaban”. That’s my big issue. Time travel (wibbly wobbly timey wimey)

Mixed-Houses are NOT a Thing
I don’t know where “Gryffinpuff” and “Slytherclaw” originated, but I have a strong distaste for them. I think they grew out of hatstalls like Harry and Hermione. However, even those difficult cases were still eventually sorted by the Sorting Hat. Let me be clear: Hogwarts has FOUR houses. A student may have traits that overlap with different houses, but the actual house they belong to is ONE SINGLE HOUSE: Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw, or Slytherin. There is no Divergent house in Hogwarts.

Time Turner COULD NOT Save the Dead
How many memes take a poke at the fact that the Time Turner was used to “save” Buckbeak and Sirius, but not Harry’s parents? They bug me to no end. If you pay attention to what’s going on in “The Prisoner of Azkaban”, you can see that they’re not changing history, they’re creating it. This goes back to my big problem with “The Cursed Child”. This is book canon, but it’s more explicitly shown in the movie. If Harry and Hermione were changing history by using the Time Turner, then no one would have cast the patronus the first time around. It’s a closed loop. End of story.

Any issues you have with the Harry Potter fandom/universe? Any unpopular confessions bursting to come out?

I’m also working on some more sorting posts. Any fandoms you want sorted?