Well, this is perhaps a follow-up to my previous journal entry, viewable here: https://www.weasyl.com/journal/119499/the-degradation-of-cinema-as-we-know-it

I decided to make this entry after this topic had been banging around in my head for sometime once again, supplanted with much newer stuff, such as those newer movies I've watched this year.

As stated, it seems that what came out of Hollywood these days had been nothing but terrible movies with terrible ratings to match. This came about after I've recently watched two new Star Wars movies both last year and this year respectively: The Last Jedi, and Solo: A Star Wars Story. Both movies were regarded as... well... some of the most terrible Star Wars movies that came out in recent years. Solo was even regarded as the worst Star Wars movie since the Star Wars Holiday Special. So bad, in fact, that Lucasfilm decided to put Star Wars spin-off movies on hold as they try to figure out how to change the way they approach spin-off movies in the future.

Here's the thing, though. I watched The Last Jedi, and I really thought it was fantastic. Sure, it's not the best Star Wars movie ever, but not the worst either. Similarly, Solo blew me away. I really think it's a pretty decent action movie in its own right, and it's refreshing to watch an unconventional Star Wars movie for once, with cinematography more akin to modern sci-fi movies with shaky cams, compared to the more rigid cinematography of the original Star Wars movies. Personally, quality-wise, the quality is no different from the original Star Wars movies, or even the prequel movies for that matter; just slightly enhanced by the ever-evolving CG technology.

Which gave me a new thought regarding movies today. Movies haven't changed much -- storylines, production values, etc. are the same as they were before, and newer technologies like CG allowed filmmakers even more creative freedom of telling their story to the audience. Times, however, have changed. People have changed. People demand for new stuff. We grew tired of the same old same old that we saw on the silver screen. The standards just keep rising every year. Filmmakers are forced to innovate in order to keep piking the interest of these moviegoers. It's a huge upbringing that very few filmmakers could fulfill, if ever.

It's these rising standards that is one of the reasons for the perception that movies these days suck. I mean, think about it. What if A New Hope had only just released today? It would've also been similarly critically panned by the press as well, because it's similar to those hundreds of other sci-fi movies that people had watched then. Back in its time, A New Hope was a blockbuster hit; the epic scale of the space battles blew everyone's minds away. It was unlike something people had seen before. It was something new. The Last Jedi and Solo aren't new. They're just yet two other Star Wars movies set in the same Star Wars universe. And therefore, people grew bored. Perhaps it's just a case of the franchise having just jumped the shark, I guess? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

By the way, speaking of terrible movies, there's a reason why Hollywood still kept churning out more terrible movies every year, even to this day. Believe it or not, there will always be a niche audience somewhere out there who will truly enjoy these utter disasters of a movie, even as far as proclaiming them as the "best movie ever". As long as people buy the tickets and the Blu-Rays, Hollywood will always get its money back. It's no wonder we have people like Jackson Murphy who once made a ruckus on the Internet by giving Adam Sandler's Jack and Jill, regarded as one of the worst movies ever of 2011 and critically panned by everyone else, an "A". O_o While giving actual blockbusters like Inception a "C", "D", or even an "F". (WTF?) Recently, he even highly praised The Emoji Movie as well, giving it the most positive review ever. *Facepalms*