New account is voidify
you woundt be troper without it, dosent it?
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Working in sanitation doesn't necessary mean he was a janitor. There are tons of jobs that fall within sanitation that aren't being a janitor.
edited 9th Feb '16 10:20:28 PM by higherbrainpattern
He's the trash man. He comes out, he throws trash all over the base.
He knew the base. He knew where the Thermal thingy was in the base he just didn't know it was the only thing keeping it from exploding.
Same with Phasma. He knew where she was and he knew she could disable the shields. The only thing was that it could have not worked and Phasma could have started shooting at them instead, although you could argue Finn knew Phasma enough to know she'd try to keep herself alive rather than futilely dying.
He could be a sanitation worker, flight controller, AT-AT driver, whatever. That's not the problem, it's that all we saw of him was as a storm trooper up until he reveals he knows about Starkiller base. It's a straight up Ass Pull because it wasn't foreshadowed at all before its relevant. It's not even treated as a surprise, it's as though anyone who does anything for the First Order knows about it. And there's no indication that Phasma would even be on Starkiller base to begin with, we last saw her on the command ship.
Hell, even in the debriefing they are able to render a detailed schematic of the superweapon and all Finn has to do is point at an enormous structure as a weak point. Any half-decent engineer could probably have assessed the exact same thing.
It's kind of funny, there's that big joke where Finn says they'll figure out what to do using the Force and Han exclaims "That's not how the force works!" It seems like the only way to explain all these convenient breaks is "Eh, it's the force."
edited 9th Feb '16 10:53:42 PM by KJMackley
Could a half-decent engineer have figured out how to get in and out?
Maybe you'd be less disappointed if you stopped expecting things to be Carmen Sandiego movies.
Well, the starkiller look something a half-assed enginner would build
Actually, getting in was Han's doing with that fancy low orbit hyperspace exit. If Finn didn't claim he could drop the shields, they might have organized a fully armed strike team and drop the shields the messy way. Who knows, it could have been more efficient than what they ended up doing.
My Hair Provides Affordable Healthcare
This discussion reminds me of the Star Wars: Infinities comic series that explores different outcomes of the OT films (i.e Luke failing to destroy the Death Star, him dying exposure on Hoth, and Jabba accidentally knocking Threepio over while negotiating with Leia).
Come to think of it, the real jarring issue that people should look into would be how exactly did Poe survive a trek across the desert, evade the First Order orbiting above, and make it safely back to the Resistance just in time to return to action at Takodana? Hero of Another Story?
I bet that the First Order takes a Roman Legions approach to their stormtroopers, using them for other, civilian works whenever they're not fighting.
It's finally here!
Star Wars has always been full of coincidences. The ones surrounding Finn are par for the course at worst.
For example, C-3PO and R2-D2 just happen to be independently captured by the same group of Jawas, who then just happen to have their next stop be the moisture farm run by Luke's aunt and uncle, who just happens to be in the market for at least 1 protocol droid and at least 1 astromech droid at that exact moment.
That's 3 coincidences that all had to line up in the right way just to get the droids and Luke to meet.
To name one example regarding Finn, just happening to work at Starkiller Base isn't actually all that improbable. Given the colossal scale of the base, I could easily see a situation where there aren't any First Order Stormtroopers who haven't been stationed there at some point.
And his dialogue at Maz Kanata's place. ("There can be no fight against the First Order." "You don't know the First Order like I do", "We all need to run") and him immediately recognizing the destruction of Hosnan Prime as the work of the First Order makes it clear he knows of Starkiller Base. So it shouldn't be a surprise when we later learn he was stationed there.
A coincidence? Sure, but not particularly improbable by Star Wars standards.
In my experience there's no such thing as luck.
I think Wack'd meant getting in and around the station. Which Finn did while leading Han and Chewie around the base, without being detected, because he was familiar with the layout of the place.
Star Wars has always been more about chance encounters mixed with characters deciding their own destiny. 3PO and R2 split up only to reunite at the sand crawler, maybe a coincidence but not exactly a vital plot point (had they not split up they likely would have been caught together anyway). Them being sold to the Lars, it's really only convenient knowing what we know now about who Luke is. But the original astromech bought was broken and 3PO had to point Owen in the direction of R2. Obi-Wan being nearby when Luke is attacked by Sand People, well they were tracking R2 who was deliberately looking for Obi-Wan.
Even if you treat Finn's astonishment at the Starkiller destruction as 'I know what that is," it's still revealing things after the fact. In fact, he has the same expression as everyone else.
Not really. He's worried about Rey. Everything about his face and his demeanor reflects that fact.
One person's "chance encounter" is another person's "contrived coincidence". It mostly just depends on how much you enjoyed the overall product.
Almost all of Finn's dialogue in Maz Kanata's castle make it very clear that he knows exactly what the First Order is capable of. To the point where he outright says, "You don't know the First Order like I do, we all need to run".
His first piece of actual dialogue after seeing Starkiller Base fire involves him identifying the First Order as the culprits. And it should be noted that at this point all anyone at Maz Kanata's castle knows is that they've just seen a streak of energy go across the sky.
So I don't see how the idea that he was once stationed on Starkiller Base, likely the largest First Order facility by several orders of magnitude, should be seen as especially convenient when practically the whole point of his character is that he knows what the First Order is capable of and is absolutely terrified of it.
edited 10th Feb '16 1:37:52 PM by Falrinn
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x7 — Ever notice how much Luke Skywalker sounds like Marty McFly in those HISHE vids? The voice actor who parodies both characters doesn't differentiate between them very much...
"Doc, I felt a heavy disturbance in the Force!"
edited 10th Feb '16 2:34:22 PM by pwiegle
This Space Intentionally Left Blank.
But none of it is treated as a plot point or a surprise. If Finn is specifically scared of Starkiller base, rather than just afraid because he's a defector, then there should be cryptic hints beyond general fear. Instead Starkiller base is revealed at the mid point and Finn is informing people about its weakness as though it was established knowledge that he was stationed on it.
That's why the movie is so inferior to ANH. The Death Star is mentioned in the opening crawl and the narrative goes there early on. The means of defeating it is the plot coupon that gets the entire story in motion, and become vital to the final victory.
I guess at the end of the day, the difference between our views is that when I sat down and watched TFA for the first time, Finn having key knowledge of Starkiller Base didn't bother me and it seems to have bothered you. We could argue back and forth until the final twilight of this universe, but nothing either of us says is going to change what our initial reactions to the movie were.
And initial reactions are something that are hard to move away from significantly for anyone, and when I enjoyed something I'm going to have an especially strong resistance to changing them. Heck, with the PT I've went from enjoying them as a child, to hating them as I grew up, and then declaring peace on the subject over the last couple years just because I no longer have any desire to crap on something I once enjoyed.
Finn is afraid of the First Order for a magnitude of reasons. His knowledge of Starkiller base having not been previously established doesn't particularly bother me. I think TFA is a great movie, on par with both ANH and Empire, but anyways. *shrugs*
Believe it or not, I enjoyed the film well enough when I first saw it, but in a discussion of the films merits I really can't think of much that stood out as exceptional or well done. Even the acting, while it doesn't get as bad as the previous films could be it doesn't reach the emotional highs of those films either, not even of the prequels. Not even Han's death, which was at best inoffensive.
The only thing that I thought was above average was Mas' speech about how every generation has evil they must face.
I liked Mas' speech too. It reminded me of Jolee Bindo a little.
while I enjoy the movie, I feel MKJ is right in some things, like how Finn just stump with everything he need and his knowlage of the starkiller come of as asspull.
On the other hand I feel Finn entratain it, maybe because he dosent feel like OT derived chararter, which is really welcome at this point.
"My Name is Bolt, Bolt Crank and I dont care if you believe or not"