Yeah it always feels so dumb its essentially having the advantage in numbers and then deciding not to use it. One against many is a trope they always wanna use to show how skilled the hero is, unfortunately though there is really no other way for choreographers to do it though. So you almost cant blame the choreographers for it. It's the writers fault. You cant win one against twenty, you will just get swarmed, no matter how skilled you are, so the only option is to choreograph it that way. Though some are better than others at making it seems less obvious that people are literally just stood around doing nothing in the background waiting for their turn. The throne room fight in Last Jedi is definitely an egregious case of it being painfully obvious that people are standing around waiting, as there are long camera shots where you can see someone just standing there, including one where someone in the background is just doing spins. I think that was a combination of bad choreography and bad camera work that could of done a better job at hiding the people just waiting.
@@marcusc9931 Which is why surrounding is a good strategy. Because then the first one can be someone the hero/prey cannot attack back because it's in their back. (maybe I should have added "and where the hero stands still instead of trying to get out of the encirclement") But if they come one after the ohter, every single one of the 20 is the first guy!!
Shad: Kylo Ren moonwalk attack. Tyranth: Ok. Which one is that? Oh, I knew exactly which one Shad meant. This one convinced me that Rise of Skywalker is not a movie, but a social experiment that shows fans path to the dark side. I started to watch the movie, and I feared that it will be as bad as the last one. The opening titles start with "The dead speak!", explaining Palpatine's return with some dumb brodcast - my fear turns to anger. Then the opening scene comes with this moonwalk attack and my anger turns to hatred. And then the rest of the movie was just pure suffering.
People: Episode 7 isn’t that bad, it’s actually one of the best of Disney Star Wars Me: Ok yes it’s one of the best of Disney Star Wars but you need to watch the original 6 movies again then watch 7. It is bad.
Out of curiosity... what if in the highlander scene he's not forcing the sword against his shoulder but the arm? I'd need to test this out, but we see him grab the arm. If the arm was grabbed at the elbow and then pulled in with the forearm pressed to his chest and the sword behind the head is just to cut off further avenues of attack... there might be plausible reasoning. Just food for though
I've been working as a live combat choreographer, particularly with swords, for several years now, and just recently directed my first cinematic fight, for which I was blessed with a great team. I now have the experience to understand just how different a beast the two approaches are. Among my demands was NO SHAKY-CAM. I also wanted long, uncut shots as much as possible so that the fight story is clear and to show the skill we have. Even with the humor injected, I wanted it to be an entertaining and intense fight. My inspiration was yhe fighting in Richard Lester's Three Musketeers and Four Musketeers, fights I suggest y'all look at, Shad. I've learned as much from good fights as bad. We're now in the editing process; I am hoping that what I learned shows ⚔
Haha, I actually wanted to write about the old musketeer fights in a comment but decided it would blow it up too much: Those choreographies had their own hilarious failures, but e.g. a fight in a tavern gives so much opportunity not only to throw a nicely grilled bird in someones face, but also to have a table or barrel etc. that blocks the way so that 20:1 scenes do not feel like twenty 1:1 scenes. Or the "hide behind a pillar" games...
@@VK-sz4it I will probably share it via RUclips, FB, or such. It's just a short film. One of the faires at which I work has had not path fights for the past couple of years due to having too small a cast to gaurentee adequate safety, so during our rehearsal season this year I contrived to create a cinematic fight to post (because my cohorts and I miss path fights, and so do many of our patrons who have asked about the lack of such.) It's my first, as I said, so I am expecting to learn alot from the final product, i.e. learn alot from my mistakes. We had 4 weekends of composition and rehearsal, and filmed everything, the fight and bookend scenes, in the space of about 10 hours, which wasn't enough. Still, I am proud of my group. They put in alot of work and dedication, some of them for the first time on a project like this. 😊 I hope to have it ready in the next three or four weeks. Editing is something I'm having to learn, too, and we won't be able to go back and do any pick-up shots or reshoots.
Thank you! I loathe, detest and despise shaky cam. Same with motion blur, depth of field and all the other things your brain naturally edits out. In a 2D representation that simply is unnecessary and distracting. Jump cuts are another. I want to see the fight as a coherent whole, not tiny snippets from 16 different angles in 30 seconds. Then again, I'm old, grumpy and English so may just be set in my ways :P
@@MrGrimsmith I don't like the overuse of those elements, either. Tools that get turned into toys by the undisciplined. To be frank, if I could use film instead of digital recording, I would do that, too, but our budget is nil.
There was a single unbroken second in that entire thing and it was that wide shot where one was backing away, waiting for the other guy to chase him and swing the sword.
Honestly I wonder who was at fault for that mess because both Gwendolin Christe and Rory McCann have other fight scenes in the show that were really well done and had decent choreography and editing. And they can't use a height difference as an excuse like Lord of the Rings for the hobbit fights, does because Christie is only three inches shorter than McCann.
@@Ghostly_FilmProduction It's been spelled out Killer Bee several times. In fact, on Narutopedia it's Killer B and shows "Viz: Killer Bee." so the OFFICIAL Viz translation has it spelled out "Killer Bee." It's very much NOT "Killa B" and never has been. Perhaps you were just joking, in which case, whoosh, right over my head... but I felt the need to point this out.
Robin Hood The Men in Tights has a longer bind but it is entirely comical - after all, in the same sequence they stopped behind curtains to duke it out with shadow puppets.
Hot Shots: Part Deux had a comical sword fight scene in the end between the US President and Saddam Hussein. They even did a similar joke where the fighters move offscreen and all you see is the shadows on the wall, then the actors walk back into view drinking water/Gatorade while their shadows keep fighting in the background 😂
I saw Zoro on the thumbnail and wanted to go ballistic, but turned out ok :) And yes, I know that in that scene the swordplay itself was dumb, but Zoro v. Mihawk is this kind of scene where rule of cool just overrides all de-faults.
@@larifax-8107 cause it wasn't halfway, the move is meant to be unpredictable, but they were also still grounded so maneuvering through his technique to cut him faster than he can perceive makes a lot more sense which is why i found it weird they turned that moment into a jumping practical moment instead of letting them be superhuman and just full send with some speed that would at least be captain america type speed if they don't want to make it too quick. (till i realize they did the super speed thing with kuro so I do wish they'd have at least gave some to zoro and mihawk for their clash)
Their critique is certainly not unreasonable, but it seems sort of beside the point. A realistic sword fight would have felt out of place in that show.
Man, I'm so happy that Galadriel wont be on this list! She's SUCH a good fighter with Absolutely NO Plot armor and/or random BS that makes Legolas say "wtf?"
I always like the two different reactions we get for stupid things with swords be it choreography, design or fails. Shad laughs and the ridiculousness. Tyranth always seems genuinely offended by it. Like he has to close his eyes and take a deep breath because its destroying his soul. He's far less amused, more like deeply and exhaustingly exasperated.
Nah, literally pointing it forward and killing the guy makes way more sense. They're killing them all in this scene, anyway. Despite that you'd probably think Jedi may have a sort of Batman-esque no kill rule, maybe... they don't lol. So if Batman was in this, yes, absolutely just turn the lightsaber off and on again. Probably punch him in the "face" (in quotes because of the helmet/mask) and knock him out while it's being turned back on with the other hand. But if you're killing them anyway? Nah, just tilt it forward.
@@richdurbin6146 I'm pretty sure light sabers are the opposite, where they have an "on" button that needs to be maintained (whether through physically pressure on a button, or via something like the force for a throw). That's why all the various times where people get their hands/limbs cut off and their saber goes flying, the saber immediately turns off
I wonder what Shad thinks of using psychic powers to fight with swords, like how Darth Treia has 3 different lightsabers all fighting in different forms at once and she controls them with the force
In the Highlander scene Connor is holding Duncan's sword arm so Duncan wouldn't have been able to lift the sword. Still a weird technique but, to be fair, Connor WAS holding Duncan's arm. It's been 2 decades at least since I seen that movie but isn't Duncan supposed to be a novice swordsman in this scene? An expert can use stupid showy techniques against a novice pretty easily.
Correct, he's gripping Duncan's sword arm as we see when he shoves him away, thus preventing the counter move like you said. And if he lowers the blade to do anything else, it frees Connor's blade for the shove and decapitation strike we see at the end. Still a stupid move, but with I can kind of see it working in a way
@@markusf.9871 I loved Highlander as a kid. Both the movies and the TV show. I'm not a nostalgic person so I'll be happy with my memories of it rather than going back and watching it again.
@@markusf.9871 The idea of Highlander is what really sells it more than the movies and show itself. Immortal beings that have some supernatural strength, and have been alive long enough to have immense fighting experience, that can only be killed by beheading is one of the most badass premises you will hear. It could really use a modern entry with better choreography and a better writer. And yeah when it comes to that move itself, it is a barely plausible move that reeks of "Martial arts and sword fighting movies need a move the protagonist learns at some point that is incredibly effective and they use it to win the climatic fight/a major fight" idea that lots of those movies had around that time.
@@markusf.9871 It didn't. I recently watched the fightscene in the underground parking in the first movie and it was so incredible bad....wide, slow swings, aiming for each others swords, all that unncecessary jumping and running...its like kids would do a sword fight
Even worse examples of staying in the bind are some of the fight opening dialogues in the newest mortal kombat game. The characters will run or fly at each other, then clash their FOREARMS together in a bind, and then proceed to hold that bind while making threats at each other. It's the most cringe thing I've ever seen in my 44 years on this planet.
As a kid whenever I went to my Grandads house he'd put on swash-buckling Errol Flynn movies or things like The Vikings. Can you do some analysis of older movie fights? I feel like they had far more flare than things like the modern Star Wars. Edit: I know they won't be great - but the focus on the action rather than quick cuts and individual 'moves' was somehow better in my memory.
The Ben Solo "posing block" is the worst one for me. He literally stands with his sword to his back, and the guy swings at his lightsaber on purpose. If you want to see some cool and somewhat realistic sword fight scenes, check out "Hard Blade - 3D Animation" by Zen.
The thing is. Even hitting the lightsaber could be deadly there. It would be incredibly hard to hold that and not have it pushed into yourself by any attack as you have 0 leverage and strength when just holding it behind your back like that so the saber would be pushed into the back of your head and that is that for you.
That last one from was the worst for editing (House of the Dragon?). The Galadriel falling off the horse attack was the most ridiculous. It’s incredible that the Anime jump attack looks more realistic than these two high fantasy fight scenes…😅
Galadriel wasnt a human. She wasnt even a common elf. She was fucking ringbearer, ultimate sorcceress. On that horse she have on herself bilion of buffing spells. Baaaah her horse propably have more buffspells than rest of her army.
@@prasaite It really is ridiculous what they did to her character. The took an awesome strong female character and turned her into a feminist trope of ‘strength’. But it’s also what we’ve come to expect from the Hollywood elites - simultaneously destroying genuine feminine beauty and strength wherever possible.
There a much latter fight with Mihawk that translated to TV has the potential to be the most unintentionally hilarious fail ever. Bro has his opponent, who stands 0 chance, in front of him. He decides to go for the laziest, most telegraphed horizontal slice in history, so the other character can survive, and he ends up cutting a mountain sized iceberg in pieces. For the plot.
wasn't he trying to cut Luffy in that scene? So he was kind of serious, although a lazy slash indeed. I specifically love that scene when he attacked Whitebeard, then all Warlords and even admirals paused to watch him do it, only to be stopped by one of Whitebeard's commander - Diamond Jozu. It was an amazing scene, demonstrating clear power scaling among characters. Although a bit anticlimactic in my opinion.
@@markgregorygacosta531yeah… I’m saying this not to be an ass, but if there’s something you should not try to use to power scale anyone in One Piece is Marine ford. Because stuff there that is clearly Oda writing himself Into a corner and rolling with it. Obviously Sengoku shouldn’t have trouble in killing Luffy. The problem is… he can’t. He tried and failed. Akainu should not be able to be there removing half of Whitebeard’s face and piercing him through without haki. But he is. Let’s not even talk about Crocs, bro lost to pre Gears Luffy in Alabasta and was kicking everyone in Marineford.
i think what you missed about the highlander thing is that Connor is holding the other guy's elbow down and controlling his arm. That said, I have no idea how the other guy's sword went from being below Connor's blade to behind it by just pulling the elbow down, which is probably why there is a cut there in the scene.
I give that one some grace. It had two valid narrative points: 1. Luke wasn’t really there and so couldn’t make the physical block. Dodging the blade like that helped to preserve the illusion of his presence as he bought time for the Resistance to escape. 2. Kylo was completely unhinged and came into the fight with plain brute force instead of skill. Luke’s dodge worked as a taunt, an expression of disdain for Kylo’s skills. This served to keep Kylo focused on Luke alone, distracting him from considering what the Resistance could be doing in the meantime.
A small vindication of the Equilibrium bit. The scene shows that the first slice only cuts his holster, causing it and the pistols to drop. The second slice cuts his chest, and although we never get to see his frontal view to assess the damage, he's not split in half, no pool of blood forms around his torso (or anywhere), and no organs are seen falling to the floor (It's an R-rated movie, so these could've been shown). However, that vindication ends with the third slice... He drops to his knees, waits *9* seconds, _slowly_ turns his head sideways, and his face slides off in one of the worst CG effects I've seen.
That's a common movie trope I've noticed any time there's a part of a person being sliced off - there's ALWAYS a bizarre, gravity and physics defying delay to the cut-off piece falling from the body. Perfect example is the Resident Evil movie "Laser Room" scene - the first to die gets a laser beam through her neck, which SOMEHOW the cut only appears in a slow-reveal rather than being instant - and her head somehow remains attached to her shoulders and ISN'T immediately removed by her blood pressure (she doesn't actually bleed AT ALL from the decapitation), one character gets literally cut in two at around mid-torso height whilst JUMPING and somehow stays intact for the entire rest of the jump, LANDS back on his feet which are somehow STILL WORKING and only THEN after yet another pause does his top half fall sideways off the bottom half.... it's honestly THE most ridiculous scene in a movie I think I've ever seen.
Absolutely loved that scene! I've always had a thing for spears, so I loved that character. No idea how it would hold up in retrospect, but man, that's so good 'memberberries.
I love excessive cuts. A scene from a cop show my mom was watching recently cracked me up. They had a close up of a gun, showing the guy cocking the hammer. Before the hammer was all the way back, they made 2 quick cuts, still showing the gun close up, but now the hammer that they had just shown being cocked was not. Pointless cuts causing a continuity error, priceless
The Bad: The Last Jedi when Kylo Ren literally stabs the floor fighting the Praetorian Guard The Good: ROTS Anakin vs Obi Wan when Anakin grapples Obi Wan into a behind the back block (just before the narrow hallway)
The ROTS fight was even better than just a grapple, there was also a counter grapple there. Anakin grabs Obi Wan’s hand, Obi Wan counter grapples, and Anakin blocks behind his back. It’s a ridiculously cool move and you appreciate the technical details even more when slowed down like in Shad’s analysis.
@@gameragodzilla Yep. For all that we can criticize the Star Wars Prequels for wooden dialogue and awkward acting, George Lucas actually DID put a lot of thought and effort into making them. While he made flawed movies, they're flawed movies with a core story of Anakin's rise to prominence and fall from grace that's actually pretty awesome under the Lucasian delivery.
@@hariman7727 Thing is the Prequels are authentically Lucas. Like Lucas gives a shit about them and puts effort into them. The main thing he lacked was someone to patch up some of his weirder ideas and polish up some of the bad execution, which had on the OT. But beneath all the problems was always a very compelling story, one that I appreciate more as I grow older. Disney Star Wars, on the other hand, is entirely corporate. Nobody making it really gave a shit beyond just making money, and a lot of stuff is just lazy or rushed.
@@gameragodzilla Agreed. The worst part of Disneywars is that there was NO plan for the sequel trilogy. They just passed multiple movies between directors and assumed it would work out. That's how we got The Force Awakens, which was all setup and no payoff, and then The Last Jedi, which was a sequel to seven movies that only exist in Rian Johnson's head.
If I remember correctly the idea behind this was to show that they know each other so well that they couldn't start with the attack because it would give the other one an opening. Still putting flashy effects over it, play electronic music to the clip and loop it was the most logical thing the internet could came up with.
@@bruticus1496 no, the whip can only pull not Push. So nothing prevents the sabber from spliting the whip guy i n half. The turn off turn on move is something i always wonderd about in many other blocking situations between two swords. But i asume it takes to long to be effective. After all you are defensless while its off.
@@myowndata If the other guards weren't standing around waiting for their turn, then freeing the lightsaber would be top priority. In addition, later in this very same fight Kylo turns a lightsaber on and off rapidly. Only if we had evidence that some logical thought went into this fight scene would it be reasonable to assume that lightsaber activation doesn't work the same the other way around.
That moonwalk fight was clearly a CGI/green screen screw-up. Adam thought he was doing something very different there, probably taking a few steps forward or trying to stabilize himself and stabbing a guy running up behind him. I'm guessing the editors changed it to make him look like a more aggressive fighter instead of just reshooting the scene, making it look even dumber.
The Kylo Ren moonwalk attack could have been saved by a minute's thought about the battlefield and giving him a reason to spin around: Spin to dodge a blaster bolt, deflect a few back at the attackers in one direction while backwards-rushing the last guy. Simple. If you want to work a horribly impractical but cool (in your head at least) move into your combat choreography, it's not that hard to try and justify it in the fight. But that would require using your brain, something the RoS team all seemed to have trouble with.
They made lightsabers into sci-fi clubs😭. This is, for me, they're non-canon. Early Disney Star Wars is of course an exception but back then of course they at least spent time with coreography
The Equilibrium scene seems ok to me. The belly slash could have power behind it, especially with the spin. The downward slash across the chest looks weak but it could be more of a block/preemptive strike to prevent a downward counter. The way he stepped to the side while making the downward strike makes me think of it as a defensive strike. Furthermore, the angle of the wrist for the face slash seems pretty solid.
@@KoleTheSilent Is he supposed to grab the sword and reset into a proper chudan no kamae while his opponent is actively swinging at him? The whole sequence takes up a couple seconds.
@@Milocinia Get this: he could have rotated his hand 180 degrees before grabbing the sword. Besides, it is a choreographed fight, meaning the decision to have him reverse-grip was made well in advance. Its not about whether or not the technique was plausible, its about said technique being intentionally made worse in an effort to get "cool points".
@@KoleTheSilent He could've, then again it would've taken him longer to rotate and be in a fighting stance, his sword would've been way out of line for attack and defense if he rotated his hand 180 degrees and the sword was wedged in a body which would require his hand to rotate further in a compromised position to draw it out. It would take a lot longer to do with his back facing his opponent with no way to make a quick defense or attack. At best you reset the fight, at worst you are in a severely compromised position. The option you suggested is far worse than having a reverse grip on the blade.
Equilibrium - it's an over the top extremely quick move (mostly thanks to editing as Shad pointed out) "the rule of cool" should be applied (I hate the reverse grip trope though) Highlander - Connor was also holding his arm down so he couldn't do as much as one might think, you can se Connor grabbing and pulling down. Does it make the whole manouver less stupid idk
...And it's not even put in there for no reason. Pulling the sword out of the dead guy is most easily accomplished by holding it in a reverse grip. The scene itself is fantastic with how abruptly it ends.
So I'll give you one bad and one really good "sword" moves in movies. The worst I have ever personally seen is from Ahsoka. In the episode where she's having hallucinations she fights Anakin. While dual wielding lightsabers Ahsoka does a spin move, but stops halfway so her back is turned to Anakin and swings behind her back at him. It's hilarious. As for the good example. In the Rurouni Kenshin live action movies, during Kenshin's fight with Saito, Saito tells Kenshin that a sword with a blade on the back will only end up hurting himself. Then in the next binding moment Saito puts his whole weight into the bind to cause Kenshin's sword to cut himself. It's a really solid moment that could literally only happen in Rurouni Kenshin.
After watching all ten fight scenes I have to say I didn't think any would beat Disney's Star Wars sword fighting, but the Game of Thrones and Rings of Power sword fighting scenes shown in video this were worst.
To be fair. Equilibrium never was about realism, there is literal gun MA. It was made to make every guy watching go "Hell yeah!". Same with this scene. Yes, reverse grip is bad, but what if it was intentional. Like fighting with one arm behind the back, saying to opponent "Im literally him, i can beat you even while holding this sword upside down, just because im that cool". And that's cool
The official/unofficial term is "Gun-Fu". Inspired by the western akimbo-style movie gun scenes, the Chinese director (can't remember his name) adopted it and starts incorporating them into his gun totting action movies. Can't remember what movies, but I do know Chow Yun Fat is the main lead. From there, the "Gun-Fu" style became the "best new thing" in action movies, mainly China, and the Director got famous and went on to make The Equilibrium, bringing the Gun-Fu style to the mainstream western audiences. So yes, it's so cool, it went around the places like migratory birds.
Exactly he is completely wrong on that one. It is absolutely rule of cool. Also yeah comment on the katana fight when in other scenes he "outshoots" like 100 people .. :D
Interesting "fact" that I've heard but can't confirm, is that the fight scene was intended to be longer and more "epic" but they were pressed for time so they decided to just skip that one and go on to the main baddie. 😂 Equilibrium used to be my favorite movie when I was younger. I came for the Gun-Fu, I stayed for the shockingly compelling story about what it means to be human.
As a sidenote, we have the flip, flip side as well, where Jackie Chan absolutely rules, the fights that are so GOOD bad that they become awesome. When they intentionally use bad and ridiculous moves, but they do it so well, that it doesn't go bad. "shaky cam" Oh gods, Tyrant, HUGE thanks for saying that. I remember back in the 80s when my brother studied towards movie directing/moviemaking for a while, and one of his textbooks literally listed shaky cam as the poor man's artificially created action or tempo, and how it was to be avoided at all costs except in a rare few cases where it actually belonged. "worst" Kylo bend over posing... Because that one has absolutely no justification no matter what. The Mulan thing can happen if both are too angry to fight properly but also good enough to not fail like that. The jump attack is just weird. Have to agree with Tyrant here that if they wanna go full anime, then DO SO, not this weird lameness. And the Kylo moonwalk... Uh... No, just NO. There's no reason what so ever for it. "Gunfu" Go watch the anime "Madlax". The series also does the unthinkable, it actually gives a good reason for gunfu working well. Reverse grip katana slice, nah, this is fine. Not because it's good fighting or anything, but because it could theoretically happen, out of convenience. "highlander" We may not be seeing or interpreting it correctly, but it sure doesn't look good. Flux capacitor is endlessly more realistic... ;) "hits down, the blade goes up" It looks like he MAY be slicing LOW, as in not "clubbing" downwards swing, but instead forward down long cut, effectively hitting the sword from underneath with the edge upwards. Doesn't exactly make it better, but it's a superhero setting so meh. Lots of much worse scenes. At least there's a tiny tiny chance that you could make it work theoretically. The Kylo stuff is just plain mentally challenged. Galadriel scene is just weird. Her moves are all POSSIBLE, even if not generally a good idea(it's the kind of stuff you can see from steppe horsemen competitions in central Asia), but the setup and editing makes it just... Whaaat? And oh wow, last Star wars scene is making me happy i haven't seen the last several movies. Yes, she could have just cut down forward. And IF that for some reason was not an option, she could just turn the blade OFF!!! Turn it off and disengage! But okay, this one can be POORLY excused by "heat of the moment, not thinking straight". Oh, and ASOIAF, it's more like classic stagefighting rather than fighting, so i don't actually think it's terrible. Not that it's far away but, there's worse. So no, the worst one is still Kylo bending over followed by moonwalk. After that it gets difficult.
Yesterday i had a really quick conversation with a teacher because i was talking about a sword i made and it lead to "dose star wars have good flight scenes" And in my head i was thinking "this conversation is sponsered by shadaversty "😂 So thank you shad for helping me educate people and have fun.. Of course i have learned from others but i think you have done the most fight scene analysis
The pathetic thing is that these multi million dollar movies could easily hire a sword fighting expert from, say, the Royal Armoury, who'd be very happy to train the actors in real fighting techniques, but no. They want the ridiculous flashy moves. To be fair, though, the general public eats that shit up and loves it.
Honestly, I also mostly prefer flashy, since idk about swords and stuff... but it depends on how bad it is. Like, if ~I~ notice it's bad? It's AWFUL. Like the Kylo "back block." There's a HUUUGE difference between like the Anakin and Obi-wan random flourishes in Episode 3, and everything under Disney lol. And honestly, a lot of the Episode 3 stuff? It's "bad sword fighting" but eh. I mean, just watch Shad's Autopsy to see why even HE likes it and you'll see why it's still SO MUCH BETTER and the "random bs flourishes" are ok. It LOOKS cool AND the stuff in-between (the actual fight moves) are mostly good, so it's just like double good.
@@Paradox-es3bl Yes, I enjoy some of the Star wars sword fighting. That fight between the Sith guy and Liam Neesen and Obi Wan (apologies to Star Wars fans for not knowing the names) is very entertaining. I've watched it multiple times and love it. I daresay there are ridiculous moves in it, but I haven't noticed. Perhaps we have to just ignore the flourishes and only point out the truly illogical mad moves when they crop up.
@@jeffreybarton1297 The Prequel fights are still the golden age of lightsaber fights for Star Wars. It is fast, flashy, and tactical, and still holds up for the most part under scrutiny. Pretty much all other light saber fights for what they made afterwards just completely deteriorate as soon as you disect what they are actually doing.
@@dallinadams9422 I haven't watched anything after episode 7. Seen plenty of clips, though, which reassure me that I did the right thing in abandoning Star Wars.
I think Galadriel's upside-down thing is even worse than it might seem at first glance. Horses tend to spook if you do something really weird while riding them, unless you've acclamated them to whatever the specific thing is. How likely a horse is to freak out varies from horse to horse, but I don't think any horse would be ok with its rider flipping upside-down like that unless it has been specifically trained to tolerate that sort of nonsense. This means that Galadriel didn't flip upside-down on a whim to dodge an arrow; is a technique that both she and her horse have been training for.
I find it more offensive to make their Opponents stood there and get cut when she is telegraphing her next move few seconds ahead. I thought you would either dodge it, or Raise you weapon and point at her straight.
We don't know if you _can_ switch off a lightsaber while it is in a bind, we haven't ever seen anyone do that. You have to account for them not being swords, they are unknown technology that we don't fully understand.
@@WJS774 Beg your pardon but actually we DO know that they can. In Dark Tide II: Ruin Corran Horn does it in a sparring match with Mara Jade and later does it when fighting Shedao Shai.
In the clip from Iron Fist it looks like the broken sword piece was going to go in left leg but ended up wounding the right leg! And that might have been a bit cruel of Shad to subject Tyranth to scenes of Rings of Power! Poor Tyranth's eyes!
@@LucasR.O I defend the Prequels because George Lucas was trying really hard to deliver the epic underlying story of someone with a massive amount of potential to be a hero falling to selfishness and cruelty by a combination of his own actions and the manipulation of others. It's the same as Final Fantasy X, where the story is good, but the delivery is hilariously inept.
Disney's Three Musketeers (1993). I would definitely suggest reviewing Disney's Three Musketeers. Not only is it a genuinely good movie in my opinion, but from what I remember it has many good sword scenes. There are lots of sword scenes, some great moments, and some moments that are great because they are terrible and know they are terrible or comical. I can only think of one that was possibly just bad bad, which was D'artagnan fighting from atop a stone railing. Take a look and see what you think!
4:00 Don't get me wrong, I hate those movies. But, for this specific thing, it is true that canonically Kylo Ren is an insecure poseur, desperately trying to be as cool as he thinks his grandfather was. And, poseur or not, he severely outclasses these force insensitives. So, it might actually make sense in universe that he would do incredibly dumb things he thinks look flashy.
I have a safe bet that the Prequel trilogy ones would rank the highest, mostly at least. Yes, the original trilogy is THE fight scenes that started it all but other than that, not as good as the later prequel trilogy's (as weird as it sounds)
@@LastGoatKnight Prequels also have many bad lightsaber fights. Like the one where Mace Windu goes arrest Palpatine. Not level of sequel-bad maybe but bad regardless.
@@tabull8180what annoyed me about that one was how good it canonically should have been. Palpatine is a full master of all seven forms of lightsaber combat. Mace Windu is so good, he created his own fighting style, Vaapad. He has to be one of, if not the best lightsaber duelists ever. It should be a clash of the titans. But it looks like a pair of geriatrics swatting eachother with walking sticks.
Got to side with Shad here. The Equilibrium one, while bad, isn't atrocious. The other guy standing there for hits 2 and 3 could potentially be chalked up to shock from the first hit landing. At least it goes fast enough that I can justify it that way. It's a dumb movie with a lot of stuff that is stupid fun, this is no exception. Aside from all the Star Wars sequel ones (which I agree, can't stand them, even coming from a lifelong Star Wars fan from the 90's), the Highlander Endgame one I remember always wondering how viable it was as a kid when my interest in swords first was developing. I even tried replicating it with my pvc pipe swords with my brother and I came up with the same conclusion of "this is dumb, how is it this difficult to beat?" The Rey being caught in the whip one is even worse than you pointed out. Yeah, with regular swords you could tip the sword down to get the whip to slide down but with a lightsaber you have an entirely different option: TURN THE SABER OFF. Flick the blade off and on again, it disappears, the whip loses contact, and you have your saber in position for a strike with your opponent dealing with a whip weapon that has no momentum for a return strike or block. We even see how fast the saber can snap off and on later in the scene when Rey throws the saber to Kylo so he can instantly impale the one guard in the face. If you want an interesting good take on a Disney lightsaber fight (even if it is animation rather than live action), I would recommend the Obi-Wan vs Darth Maul fight from Star Wars Rebels. This is old Alec Guinness-style Obi-Wan fighting against an older Maul in what is the best throwback to the classic Samurai films that inspired Star Wars to begin with. The whole duel only lasts 3 moves but the buildup to it is full of storytelling beats. The two face off in their classic Clone Wars era guard positions before Obi-Wan shifts his to what Qui-Gon used to do, suggesting he's changing the lightsaber style he's planning on using. Maul sees it and recognizes it, adjusting his own stance to attack around the style Obi-Wan looks to be using. Maul attacks twice, Obi-Wan defending both, and Maul goes for the same hilt-to-face smack that he defeated Qui-Gon with by stunning him into a set up for the killing thrust, but Obi-Wan had prepared for that and instead sidesteps and slashes straight through for a killing blow. Rather than a long drawn out fight scene with nonsense moves, every little movement in this one counts and tells a story. It's pure samurai dueling through and through.
The first hit in Equilibrium is a full 180 degree spin into slash across the chest. The guy is effectively dead on his feet and just standing there to be finished off. I really don't have any issues with that scene
One of my worst ones is the middle of Rey's first lightsaber fight with Kylo in Force Awakens, where he's pressing her back, they get their sabers in a block and then, in the middle of the block, he starts trying to recruit her and offers her more training. And in the middle of this same block that he is being very courteous and patient with, she takes a moment to center herself/draw on the Force/remember she's a female protagonist in a modern Disney movie and therefore has omni-power. There's around half a minute of this where they are in the middle of this block and neither are doing anything dynamic.
Regarding the Highlander one, I don't know if it matters, but it looked to me like the guy with the swords behind him also had grabbed the other guy's arm to ensure that he can't move it.
Oh I'm with Tyranth with that GoT scene. The number of quick cuts give so much motion sickness and vertigo, and it blatantly tells you the choreography was screwed up (and probably just awful) and they were trying to hide that. On the fence between that one and the Rings of Power scene just because of how literally physically painful it is.
OMG that upside-down riding is sooo bad! I think I nominate that one because of the wasted potential. If they had placed an Orc there with e.g. a big hammer that would have forced her down, that would make sense. Then add another Orc which she instinct-hacks at, but only get his leg or something so the Orc drops down screaming in pain - that would have been a realistic situation, easier to do and also less visually awkward.
The worst: Everything disney! Two observations: Highlander: It was like 15 years ago so I don't remember the movie but isn't it possible Connor is jokingly suggesting to Duncan he should cut his head off? Iron Fist: To add context, that show was so under-funded the actors supposedly had to come up with all coreography minutes before filming!
With the Connor vs Duncan move, Connor has the sword trapped between his sword and his shoulder while he's holding Duncan's forearm. That's how he's supposed to be immobilizing the sword, anyway. Then he shoves him off and attacks while his back is turned. Not saying it's good, just thought I'd point out what you guys weren't accounting for on the movement of Duncan's sword.
If Duncan moves his sword down he gives up the binding on his side as well and Connor could just go for the head, swinging it around (given he steps or at least lean backwards at that time) - which would be a blow to the neck - beheading the enemy while Duncan would need way more time to move his sword back into a position he could deal a stab (with Feder oc way harder in very close distance) or swing. With sharp swords he may would been able to slice or cut the side while moving his blade back. In real life this move would be "risky" at best, not worth the attempt as it is doomed to fail or give both sides unbearable wounds. In Highlander, two "immortals" who can only die by beheading it makes way more sense....
It's more of a Sabre fighting, but I hope it qualifies: Polish movie “The Deluge” from 1974, entire scene of duel between Michał Wołodyjowski and Andrzej Kmicic in the rain. Beyond that, many of the old school actors from the black and white era had actual fencing knowledge. Like Basil Rathbone for example was two-time British Army Fencing Champion, and taught fencing to Errol Flynn and Tyrone Power. For example their (Tyrone Power and Basil Rathbone) swordfight from the 1940 "The Mark of Zorro".
About sword binds, have you seen "Vampire Hunter D: Bloodlust"? Fantastic movie, but both times D and Meier Link fights, most of the fight is a bind. The last one is especially crazy.
The Kylo hold back really baffles me and is my least favorite one. Its one of the clearest examples of moments where the enemy is written to be brainless and have no combat sense, as they have so much time and could strike in so many places where the lightsaber is NOT protecting. Ugh. Also, awesome video, love this ^-^
Jet Li sword duel with europian sword master in Fearless, he made a lot of fancy moves, but He was able to sell it. That is how you make nice fluid one.
Is the way as how WWE wrestlers sell their moves and make the Audience scream. Even though some of those moves are actually ridiculous in a real fight. For example "The People's Elbow". The Rock even admitted the move was intentionally ridiculous, and didn't think people would actually buy it when it created it.
Binds do happen sometimes in sparring with a sword… a lot of people I used to train with hate me cause I never let them do the movie trope of binding for minutes on end; I always slipped right through the bind near instantly to attack them
In training people I use backward stabs for two reasons… either one the cool factor when I know I’m that much faster than them; or two when doing it a lot slower to explain to them the flaws about it
American Samurai has a bad one. It's a 90's martial arts movie starring David Bradley (not the guy from Harry Potter) & Mark Dacascos. Dacascos is a yakuza member who trained as a samurai and fights in underground death matches in Turkey. In his second to last match, he faces a Chinese fighter who uses a Wushu-like acrobatic style. In the middle of one of their sword exchanges, the Chinese fighter knocks Dacascos' blade aside, then turns his back and goes to run up a wall and backflip off of it. It goes about as well as when Neo did it in the Matrix, except they're fighting with swords this time and he ends up getting decapitated.
Yes, this needs to be a series. You’ll make all your viewers very happy. I don’t know if it’s good or bad, y’all experts will have to tell me, but the fight between Inigo Montoya and the Dread Pirate Roberts from The Princess Bride would be one I’d love to see you break down.
Also want to add that I nearly died laughing when you said the fighting wasn’t even the worst part of the Disney Star Wars movies. Couldn’t agree more, it was trash on every level from writing to acting to editing.
The thing about Equilibrium is that it's all about the Gun-kata...if you were expecting good swordplay for that one scene? Oh you have the wrong movie. Also there is a bit of difference between Gun-Fu and Gun-Kata...the differences are pretty minor but they do exist, and what John Wick does is more tactical Gun-Fu than fantastical Gun-Fu.
That Game of Thrones fight looks like it was filmed with a mobile phone... Also to add to the Rings of Power scene, the time it took for Galadriel to ride while hanging from the horse was plenty of time for any of the Orcs who are just standing there gawking to attack the horse and there would have been nothing Galadriel could do to stop that and to stop the horse from just falling on top and crushing her...
Love the channel, if I might make an editing suggestion. At first blush the diagonal line looks cool, but it really shoves Tyranth into a corner. He has a larger upper half of the screen, but the upper half of the screen has more dead space that he can't use. The lower half of the screen is where all of the hand gestures take place, giving T a crowded feeling and allowing Shad to dominate the screen. A thinner, vertical bar might be the best option here if your goal is a balanced perception of you both.
The worst one to me was the moonwalk, because it would have taken almost no effort to make it better. Just have Kylo do something as he's walking backwards; deflect some blaster bolts, throw debris with the force, ANYTHING to justify him facing that direction, and suddenly it's a decent move.
I really enjoyed this video, Shad. You should definitely make this a series. This was my introduction to Tyranth, who I think is very likeable. I love that you included several Star Wars clips, they deserved to be included. I wanted to say, about the clip you chose from the throne room fight scene in "The Last Jedi. When the guard trooper wrapped up the blade of Rei's lightsaber, she could have totally just turned her lightsaber off, right? I would like to say what was truly great about "the Rise of Skywalker): It totally s*#ts all over "The Last Jedi." If I had to pick a worst scene from what you guys played, I pick the last one, from Game of Thrones. Quick-cut fight scenes are the worst. I really liked this idea, showcasing the worst sword fights. While I'm comfortable analyzing sword fights from movies, my real expertise is Chinese Kung Fu films. I thought of a knife fight scene that I remember as being really good. The fight between Tommy Lee Jones and Steven Seagal in "Executive Decision", I think it was. If I had to recommend one Chinese Kung Fu film with great sword fighting in it, I would choose, "Shaolin and Wutang". Great video, Shad.
With the highlander part, you guys are forgetting that the blond dude is holding the other guy's right arm. Just watch it again and see how he's manipulating his right arm. He can't do the move that you're proposing, because his arm is held by the other dude
For me the worst is when the hero fights against 20 enemies to show how strong they are - and then every enemy comes 1 after 1 after 1.
Nobody wants to be the first guy?
@@marcusc9931 that counts for the first guy, but not for the rest of the them.
Yeah it always feels so dumb its essentially having the advantage in numbers and then deciding not to use it. One against many is a trope they always wanna use to show how skilled the hero is, unfortunately though there is really no other way for choreographers to do it though. So you almost cant blame the choreographers for it. It's the writers fault. You cant win one against twenty, you will just get swarmed, no matter how skilled you are, so the only option is to choreograph it that way. Though some are better than others at making it seems less obvious that people are literally just stood around doing nothing in the background waiting for their turn. The throne room fight in Last Jedi is definitely an egregious case of it being painfully obvious that people are standing around waiting, as there are long camera shots where you can see someone just standing there, including one where someone in the background is just doing spins. I think that was a combination of bad choreography and bad camera work that could of done a better job at hiding the people just waiting.
@@marcusc9931 Which is why surrounding is a good strategy. Because then the first one can be someone the hero/prey cannot attack back because it's in their back. (maybe I should have added "and where the hero stands still instead of trying to get out of the encirclement")
But if they come one after the ohter, every single one of the 20 is the first guy!!
Gotta honour the queue numbers they drew.
Shad: Kylo Ren moonwalk attack.
Tyranth: Ok. Which one is that?
Oh, I knew exactly which one Shad meant. This one convinced me that Rise of Skywalker is not a movie, but a social experiment that shows fans path to the dark side. I started to watch the movie, and I feared that it will be as bad as the last one. The opening titles start with "The dead speak!", explaining Palpatine's return with some dumb brodcast - my fear turns to anger. Then the opening scene comes with this moonwalk attack and my anger turns to hatred. And then the rest of the movie was just pure suffering.
People: Episode 7 isn’t that bad, it’s actually one of the best of Disney Star Wars
Me: Ok yes it’s one of the best of Disney Star Wars but you need to watch the original 6 movies again then watch 7. It is bad.
Out of curiosity... what if in the highlander scene he's not forcing the sword against his shoulder but the arm?
I'd need to test this out, but we see him grab the arm. If the arm was grabbed at the elbow and then pulled in with the forearm pressed to his chest and the sword behind the head is just to cut off further avenues of attack... there might be plausible reasoning.
Just food for though
This is at 66 likes 😂 PERFECT!
@@princestarfy4098 Cope more. lmao
Whoever did the choreography for the Kylo Ren Moonwalk Attack just wanted to show that reverse grip can work if you have The Force.
Missed opportunity... why is the diagonal bar between Tyranth and Shad not a sword or lightsaber?
That's a fantastic idea
@@knightjack Already made a mock up ... before I realized you can't post pictures in youtube comments ... D'oh
Why is it even there? They are sitting next to each other!
@@MAGAMANIt gets each of them a closer up focus and cuts out the dead space between them.
Yeah this is a dope idea 💡 100 million percent agree it should be a sword or lightsaber divider
“He’s posing like he’s about to take it from behind.”
A good visual metaphor of Star Wars fans under Disney.
Perfect time to add a large fart noise to that scene.
>does the moonwalk twirl
>HEE HEEEEE
>Brrrapppp
I've been working as a live combat choreographer, particularly with swords, for several years now, and just recently directed my first cinematic fight, for which I was blessed with a great team. I now have the experience to understand just how different a beast the two approaches are.
Among my demands was NO SHAKY-CAM. I also wanted long, uncut shots as much as possible so that the fight story is clear and to show the skill we have. Even with the humor injected, I wanted it to be an entertaining and intense fight. My inspiration was yhe fighting in Richard Lester's Three Musketeers and Four Musketeers, fights I suggest y'all look at, Shad.
I've learned as much from good fights as bad. We're now in the editing process; I am hoping that what I learned shows ⚔
Haha, I actually wanted to write about the old musketeer fights in a comment but decided it would blow it up too much:
Those choreographies had their own hilarious failures, but e.g. a fight in a tavern gives so much opportunity not only to throw a nicely grilled bird in someones face, but also to have a table or barrel etc. that blocks the way so that 20:1 scenes do not feel like twenty 1:1 scenes. Or the "hide behind a pillar" games...
Was it for some new movie, short film or only the fight utself? Will we be able to see it?
@@VK-sz4it I will probably share it via RUclips, FB, or such. It's just a short film. One of the faires at which I work has had not path fights for the past couple of years due to having too small a cast to gaurentee adequate safety, so during our rehearsal season this year I contrived to create a cinematic fight to post (because my cohorts and I miss path fights, and so do many of our patrons who have asked about the lack of such.) It's my first, as I said, so I am expecting to learn alot from the final product, i.e. learn alot from my mistakes. We had 4 weekends of composition and rehearsal, and filmed everything, the fight and bookend scenes, in the space of about 10 hours, which wasn't enough. Still, I am proud of my group. They put in alot of work and dedication, some of them for the first time on a project like this. 😊
I hope to have it ready in the next three or four weeks. Editing is something I'm having to learn, too, and we won't be able to go back and do any pick-up shots or reshoots.
Thank you! I loathe, detest and despise shaky cam. Same with motion blur, depth of field and all the other things your brain naturally edits out. In a 2D representation that simply is unnecessary and distracting. Jump cuts are another. I want to see the fight as a coherent whole, not tiny snippets from 16 different angles in 30 seconds.
Then again, I'm old, grumpy and English so may just be set in my ways :P
@@MrGrimsmith I don't like the overuse of those elements, either. Tools that get turned into toys by the undisciplined. To be frank, if I could use film instead of digital recording, I would do that, too, but our budget is nil.
Holy the GoT fight was insane. 17-18 cuts in 7 seconds is MENTAL
There was a single unbroken second in that entire thing and it was that wide shot where one was backing away, waiting for the other guy to chase him and swing the sword.
Exactly. I remember thinking that the whole fight was little rushed, but this level of awfulness has completely escaped my memory.
Taken 2 has entered the chat...
Honestly I wonder who was at fault for that mess because both Gwendolin Christe and Rory McCann have other fight scenes in the show that were really well done and had decent choreography and editing. And they can't use a height difference as an excuse like Lord of the Rings for the hobbit fights, does because Christie is only three inches shorter than McCann.
Yeah, I was watching that part at 2 times speed and so I joined Tyranth in having a headache lol.
RORONOA ZORO: Are they saying my 3-sword technique is not effective?
KILLER BEE: You use three? I use seven swords during a battle
Killa B*
@@Ghostly_FilmProduction It's been spelled out Killer Bee several times. In fact, on Narutopedia it's Killer B and shows "Viz: Killer Bee." so the OFFICIAL Viz translation has it spelled out "Killer Bee." It's very much NOT "Killa B" and never has been. Perhaps you were just joking, in which case, whoosh, right over my head... but I felt the need to point this out.
GRIEVOUS: I want a word on that.
Yup
@@MrRodrigomarcola Guys just look up Erza from Fairy Tail
Robin Hood The Men in Tights has a longer bind but it is entirely comical - after all, in the same sequence they stopped behind curtains to duke it out with shadow puppets.
I mean it has better flight scenes than serious movies haha. The Little John bridge flight is a classic
Hot Shots: Part Deux had a comical sword fight scene in the end between the US President and Saddam Hussein. They even did a similar joke where the fighters move offscreen and all you see is the shadows on the wall, then the actors walk back into view drinking water/Gatorade while their shadows keep fighting in the background 😂
The best sword fight has to be Spaceballs.
@@dustinmillar120 I assume you mean fight. I don't remember any flights in it. Though I also basically don't remember it.
@@Paradox-es3bl you never know in that movie haha, but yes, thank you
as an aspiring fantasy author, not locking swords in the bind is one of the most valuable things this channel has taught me 👍
Shad over here with his Twilight vampire bait. That was gold, man. You made so many people upset 10/10
Team Tyler's Van!!!!
I saw Zoro on the thumbnail and wanted to go ballistic, but turned out ok :)
And yes, I know that in that scene the swordplay itself was dumb, but Zoro v. Mihawk is this kind of scene where rule of cool just overrides all de-faults.
Also, the guy playing Zoro is experienced enough to do bad swordplay entirely on purpose.
I dunno, i didn't watch the live action, but that is definitely not how it happened in the anime/manga
@@esteban-zamorayeah cuz in the anime Zorro was stopped by Mihawk halfway through a „beyblade spin“ what’s the problem?
@@larifax-8107 cause it wasn't halfway, the move is meant to be unpredictable, but they were also still grounded so maneuvering through his technique to cut him faster than he can perceive makes a lot more sense which is why i found it weird they turned that moment into a jumping practical moment instead of letting them be superhuman and just full send with some speed that would at least be captain america type speed if they don't want to make it too quick. (till i realize they did the super speed thing with kuro so I do wish they'd have at least gave some to zoro and mihawk for their clash)
Their critique is certainly not unreasonable, but it seems sort of beside the point. A realistic sword fight would have felt out of place in that show.
Man, I'm so happy that Galadriel wont be on this list! She's SUCH a good fighter with Absolutely NO Plot armor and/or random BS that makes Legolas say "wtf?"
*Guyladriel, Mighty Morfydd Power Elf
*Guyladriel, Mighty Morfydd Power Elf
@@TheXpompier it's even funnier the second time!
She's so stronk she doesn't even need to use her muscles to win. She just lightly waves her hand around carelessly and it works. SHE IS SO TALENTED :D
@@Blibersthanks for your addition. Literally.
I always like the two different reactions we get for stupid things with swords be it choreography, design or fails. Shad laughs and the ridiculousness. Tyranth always seems genuinely offended by it. Like he has to close his eyes and take a deep breath because its destroying his soul. He's far less amused, more like deeply and exhaustingly exasperated.
And I am kinda both. I laugh and afterwards I am getting angry because someone tried to sell that shit to me.
He can feel his brain cells slowly giving up and leaving.
Shad is more pompous, Tyranth is more of an everyman. This channel is best with Taranth to balance out Shad's side of it.
You missed the obvious with Rey's lightsabre caught by the whip: _it's a light sabre -- _*_deactivate it!_*
Immediate and total disengagement.
I suppose deactivating it could cause the whip tip to flick randomly in your direction.
Nah, literally pointing it forward and killing the guy makes way more sense. They're killing them all in this scene, anyway. Despite that you'd probably think Jedi may have a sort of Batman-esque no kill rule, maybe... they don't lol. So if Batman was in this, yes, absolutely just turn the lightsaber off and on again. Probably punch him in the "face" (in quotes because of the helmet/mask) and knock him out while it's being turned back on with the other hand. But if you're killing them anyway? Nah, just tilt it forward.
I always thought a skilled force user could simply use the force to press the “off” button of his opponents light saber in mid block.
Those light-whips are the dumbest thing. I know they aren't lasers, but it's still silly. Plasma doesn't really make sense, either.
@@richdurbin6146 I'm pretty sure light sabers are the opposite, where they have an "on" button that needs to be maintained (whether through physically pressure on a button, or via something like the force for a throw). That's why all the various times where people get their hands/limbs cut off and their saber goes flying, the saber immediately turns off
You don't understand! That moon walk thing is a tactic to confuse the enemy! It clearly worked!
Lol
To be fair, if I was an actor/extra and an extremely highly paid person did nonsense like that, I'd also just want to end it as quickly as possible.
I’ve heard so much about the sword fights in Princess Bride being great. Would they be worth looking at?
I think Jill Bearup has material on them.
Without doubt this film contains the best sword fight committed to film!
I would like to see that and sword fights from Dragonheart in their own fight scene autopsies.
I wonder what Shad thinks of using psychic powers to fight with swords, like how Darth Treia has 3 different lightsabers all fighting in different forms at once and she controls them with the force
A idea for a video: do a pot lids actually work as shields
In the Highlander scene Connor is holding Duncan's sword arm so Duncan wouldn't have been able to lift the sword. Still a weird technique but, to be fair, Connor WAS holding Duncan's arm. It's been 2 decades at least since I seen that movie but isn't Duncan supposed to be a novice swordsman in this scene? An expert can use stupid showy techniques against a novice pretty easily.
Correct, he's gripping Duncan's sword arm as we see when he shoves him away, thus preventing the counter move like you said. And if he lowers the blade to do anything else, it frees Connor's blade for the shove and decapitation strike we see at the end. Still a stupid move, but with I can kind of see it working in a way
Highlander did not age well.
@@markusf.9871 I loved Highlander as a kid. Both the movies and the TV show. I'm not a nostalgic person so I'll be happy with my memories of it rather than going back and watching it again.
@@markusf.9871 The idea of Highlander is what really sells it more than the movies and show itself. Immortal beings that have some supernatural strength, and have been alive long enough to have immense fighting experience, that can only be killed by beheading is one of the most badass premises you will hear.
It could really use a modern entry with better choreography and a better writer.
And yeah when it comes to that move itself, it is a barely plausible move that reeks of "Martial arts and sword fighting movies need a move the protagonist learns at some point that is incredibly effective and they use it to win the climatic fight/a major fight" idea that lots of those movies had around that time.
@@markusf.9871 It didn't. I recently watched the fightscene in the underground parking in the first movie and it was so incredible bad....wide, slow swings, aiming for each others swords, all that unncecessary jumping and running...its like kids would do a sword fight
Even worse examples of staying in the bind are some of the fight opening dialogues in the newest mortal kombat game. The characters will run or fly at each other, then clash their FOREARMS together in a bind, and then proceed to hold that bind while making threats at each other.
It's the most cringe thing I've ever seen in my 44 years on this planet.
As a kid whenever I went to my Grandads house he'd put on swash-buckling Errol Flynn movies or things like The Vikings. Can you do some analysis of older movie fights? I feel like they had far more flare than things like the modern Star Wars.
Edit: I know they won't be great - but the focus on the action rather than quick cuts and individual 'moves' was somehow better in my memory.
The Ben Solo "posing block" is the worst one for me. He literally stands with his sword to his back, and the guy swings at his lightsaber on purpose. If you want to see some cool and somewhat realistic sword fight scenes, check out "Hard Blade - 3D Animation" by Zen.
The thing is. Even hitting the lightsaber could be deadly there. It would be incredibly hard to hold that and not have it pushed into yourself by any attack as you have 0 leverage and strength when just holding it behind your back like that so the saber would be pushed into the back of your head and that is that for you.
@@adarian He really gets into the position to _take it from behind._
Thank you so much for recommending that video. I hadn't seen it yet and it's refreshing to say the least
@@adarianthat would be true for a sword fight. But he's a space wizard lol he probably just used the force like they do in every fight they're in.
I hate that one so much
Normally it would recoil onto his back and stab himself too
That last one from was the worst for editing (House of the Dragon?).
The Galadriel falling off the horse attack was the most ridiculous.
It’s incredible that the Anime jump attack looks more realistic than these two high fantasy fight scenes…😅
Galadriel wasnt a human. She wasnt even a common elf. She was fucking ringbearer, ultimate sorcceress. On that horse she have on herself bilion of buffing spells. Baaaah her horse propably have more buffspells than rest of her army.
@@prasaite It really is ridiculous what they did to her character. The took an awesome strong female character and turned her into a feminist trope of ‘strength’. But it’s also what we’ve come to expect from the Hollywood elites - simultaneously destroying genuine feminine beauty and strength wherever possible.
@@Nathan-vt1jz And amazon suprised "How the hell we fuck down the most epic story ever", It's almost like black skined lesbian Jesusia Christ
Yeah the Netflix one piece was fine
@@prasaitewhile zoro from one piece instead human either but greater
Props for including the moonwalk. That's my choice because it's not even an attempt at some sort of fighting, it's a dance move.
I just hear HEEEE HEEEE each time I see that moonwalk dance.
How in the world did they come up with this choreography?
It makes a lot more sense if you start playing "Thriller" in your head.
There a much latter fight with Mihawk that translated to TV has the potential to be the most unintentionally hilarious fail ever. Bro has his opponent, who stands 0 chance, in front of him. He decides to go for the laziest, most telegraphed horizontal slice in history, so the other character can survive, and he ends up cutting a mountain sized iceberg in pieces. For the plot.
wasn't he trying to cut Luffy in that scene? So he was kind of serious, although a lazy slash indeed. I specifically love that scene when he attacked Whitebeard, then all Warlords and even admirals paused to watch him do it, only to be stopped by one of Whitebeard's commander - Diamond Jozu. It was an amazing scene, demonstrating clear power scaling among characters. Although a bit anticlimactic in my opinion.
@@markgregorygacosta531yeah… I’m saying this not to be an ass, but if there’s something you should not try to use to power scale anyone in One Piece is Marine ford. Because stuff there that is clearly Oda writing himself Into a corner and rolling with it.
Obviously Sengoku shouldn’t have trouble in killing Luffy. The problem is… he can’t. He tried and failed.
Akainu should not be able to be there removing half of Whitebeard’s face and piercing him through without haki. But he is.
Let’s not even talk about Crocs, bro lost to pre Gears Luffy in Alabasta and was kicking everyone in Marineford.
i think what you missed about the highlander thing is that Connor is holding the other guy's elbow down and controlling his arm. That said, I have no idea how the other guy's sword went from being below Connor's blade to behind it by just pulling the elbow down, which is probably why there is a cut there in the scene.
Finally starting to get shadiversity recomended, got like 4 in a row, happy days
In that last scene, the editor wanted to be a part of the fight so much that he did more cuts than the characters on screen
Luke doing the limbo to dodge Kylo Ren’s lightsaber in TLJ is extremely bad.
I give that one some grace. It had two valid narrative points:
1. Luke wasn’t really there and so couldn’t make the physical block. Dodging the blade like that helped to preserve the illusion of his presence as he bought time for the Resistance to escape.
2. Kylo was completely unhinged and came into the fight with plain brute force instead of skill. Luke’s dodge worked as a taunt, an expression of disdain for Kylo’s skills. This served to keep Kylo focused on Luke alone, distracting him from considering what the Resistance could be doing in the meantime.
A small vindication of the Equilibrium bit. The scene shows that the first slice only cuts his holster, causing it and the pistols to drop. The second slice cuts his chest, and although we never get to see his frontal view to assess the damage, he's not split in half, no pool of blood forms around his torso (or anywhere), and no organs are seen falling to the floor (It's an R-rated movie, so these could've been shown). However, that vindication ends with the third slice... He drops to his knees, waits *9* seconds, _slowly_ turns his head sideways, and his face slides off in one of the worst CG effects I've seen.
That's a common movie trope I've noticed any time there's a part of a person being sliced off - there's ALWAYS a bizarre, gravity and physics defying delay to the cut-off piece falling from the body. Perfect example is the Resident Evil movie "Laser Room" scene - the first to die gets a laser beam through her neck, which SOMEHOW the cut only appears in a slow-reveal rather than being instant - and her head somehow remains attached to her shoulders and ISN'T immediately removed by her blood pressure (she doesn't actually bleed AT ALL from the decapitation), one character gets literally cut in two at around mid-torso height whilst JUMPING and somehow stays intact for the entire rest of the jump, LANDS back on his feet which are somehow STILL WORKING and only THEN after yet another pause does his top half fall sideways off the bottom half.... it's honestly THE most ridiculous scene in a movie I think I've ever seen.
One of my favourite fights is the sword vs spear in Hero when Jet Li is fighting Donnie Yen in the rain, whilst an old man plays sitar.
Absolutely loved that scene! I've always had a thing for spears, so I loved that character. No idea how it would hold up in retrospect, but man, that's so good 'memberberries.
It's called a guqin
@@yesway980 thank you. I didn't know that. I've learnt something new today.
I love excessive cuts. A scene from a cop show my mom was watching recently cracked me up. They had a close up of a gun, showing the guy cocking the hammer. Before the hammer was all the way back, they made 2 quick cuts, still showing the gun close up, but now the hammer that they had just shown being cocked was not. Pointless cuts causing a continuity error, priceless
The Bad: The Last Jedi when Kylo Ren literally stabs the floor fighting the Praetorian Guard
The Good: ROTS Anakin vs Obi Wan when Anakin grapples Obi Wan into a behind the back block (just before the narrow hallway)
The ROTS fight was even better than just a grapple, there was also a counter grapple there. Anakin grabs Obi Wan’s hand, Obi Wan counter grapples, and Anakin blocks behind his back. It’s a ridiculously cool move and you appreciate the technical details even more when slowed down like in Shad’s analysis.
Ok
@@gameragodzilla Yep. For all that we can criticize the Star Wars Prequels for wooden dialogue and awkward acting, George Lucas actually DID put a lot of thought and effort into making them. While he made flawed movies, they're flawed movies with a core story of Anakin's rise to prominence and fall from grace that's actually pretty awesome under the Lucasian delivery.
@@hariman7727 Thing is the Prequels are authentically Lucas. Like Lucas gives a shit about them and puts effort into them. The main thing he lacked was someone to patch up some of his weirder ideas and polish up some of the bad execution, which had on the OT. But beneath all the problems was always a very compelling story, one that I appreciate more as I grow older.
Disney Star Wars, on the other hand, is entirely corporate. Nobody making it really gave a shit beyond just making money, and a lot of stuff is just lazy or rushed.
@@gameragodzilla Agreed.
The worst part of Disneywars is that there was NO plan for the sequel trilogy. They just passed multiple movies between directors and assumed it would work out.
That's how we got The Force Awakens, which was all setup and no payoff, and then The Last Jedi, which was a sequel to seven movies that only exist in Rian Johnson's head.
worst seems to be the last one... can't see shit with all this cuts... didn't remember it that way lol
I'd say the anakin vs obiwan move, in which they both spin their lightsabers around without the blades touching is pretty bad...
If I remember correctly the idea behind this was to show that they know each other so well that they couldn't start with the attack because it would give the other one an opening.
Still putting flashy effects over it, play electronic music to the clip and loop it was the most logical thing the internet could came up with.
The "Rings of Power" scene is worse than you said; Galadriel swung the sword backward against her mount's movement.
For good moves; almost anything with Jet Li, or Jackie Chan.
Wut
The Lightwipe got me angry. A child would realise what to to in that situation.
Everybody on set had to knew how stupid this was.
Turn off the saber!
@@bruticus1496 no, the whip can only pull not Push. So nothing prevents the sabber from spliting the whip guy i
n half.
The turn off turn on move is something i always wonderd about in many other blocking situations between two swords.
But i asume it takes to long to be effective.
After all you are defensless while its off.
@@myowndata look at Star Wars vision samurai episode or the realistic saber dual
@@myowndata If the other guards weren't standing around waiting for their turn, then freeing the lightsaber would be top priority. In addition, later in this very same fight Kylo turns a lightsaber on and off rapidly. Only if we had evidence that some logical thought went into this fight scene would it be reasonable to assume that lightsaber activation doesn't work the same the other way around.
That moonwalk fight was clearly a CGI/green screen screw-up. Adam thought he was doing something very different there, probably taking a few steps forward or trying to stabilize himself and stabbing a guy running up behind him. I'm guessing the editors changed it to make him look like a more aggressive fighter instead of just reshooting the scene, making it look even dumber.
Not really surprising given that movie was a joke in every aspect. Of course the fight scenes are horrible, but I forgot just how BAD it was.
May i suggest the final Katana fight at the end of Half Past Dead. It's a Steven Seagal movie and it is MADE of stupid.
Can you guys review the sword fight between Iñigo Montoya and Wesley in "the princess bride"?
The Kylo Ren moonwalk attack could have been saved by a minute's thought about the battlefield and giving him a reason to spin around:
Spin to dodge a blaster bolt, deflect a few back at the attackers in one direction while backwards-rushing the last guy. Simple.
If you want to work a horribly impractical but cool (in your head at least) move into your combat choreography, it's not that hard to try and justify it in the fight. But that would require using your brain, something the RoS team all seemed to have trouble with.
21:30 My best guess as to what happened to make that blade go into the air? it actually bounced off the ground real good and flew in the air.
There's a scene in _Highlander: The Source_ (2007) where a guy runs around another guy so fast that he spins him into the earth like a screw.
I was sure they would add this one to the list
27:00 the editors are the real pro fighters here. Why? cause they were able to get more cuts in than the actual scene has 🤣🤣🤣
In the TLJ throne room fight, one of the guards literally throws his weapon to the side and lets himself get stabbed.
How many of these will be from Mouse Wars? I'm guessing maybe half 😂
They made lightsabers into sci-fi clubs😭. This is, for me, they're non-canon. Early Disney Star Wars is of course an exception but back then of course they at least spent time with coreography
The Equilibrium scene seems ok to me. The belly slash could have power behind it, especially with the spin. The downward slash across the chest looks weak but it could be more of a block/preemptive strike to prevent a downward counter. The way he stepped to the side while making the downward strike makes me think of it as a defensive strike. Furthermore, the angle of the wrist for the face slash seems pretty solid.
All of this may be true but the scene still fails to acknowledge the lesser-known technique of holding the damn sword the correct way.
@@KoleTheSilent Is he supposed to grab the sword and reset into a proper chudan no kamae while his opponent is actively swinging at him? The whole sequence takes up a couple seconds.
@@Milocinia Get this: he could have rotated his hand 180 degrees before grabbing the sword.
Besides, it is a choreographed fight, meaning the decision to have him reverse-grip was made well in advance. Its not about whether or not the technique was plausible, its about said technique being intentionally made worse in an effort to get "cool points".
@@KoleTheSilent He could've, then again it would've taken him longer to rotate and be in a fighting stance, his sword would've been way out of line for attack and defense if he rotated his hand 180 degrees and the sword was wedged in a body which would require his hand to rotate further in a compromised position to draw it out. It would take a lot longer to do with his back facing his opponent with no way to make a quick defense or attack. At best you reset the fight, at worst you are in a severely compromised position. The option you suggested is far worse than having a reverse grip on the blade.
@@Milocinia woosh
Equilibrium - it's an over the top extremely quick move (mostly thanks to editing as Shad pointed out) "the rule of cool" should be applied (I hate the reverse grip trope though)
Highlander - Connor was also holding his arm down so he couldn't do as much as one might think, you can se Connor grabbing and pulling down. Does it make the whole manouver less stupid idk
...And it's not even put in there for no reason. Pulling the sword out of the dead guy is most easily accomplished by holding it in a reverse grip.
The scene itself is fantastic with how abruptly it ends.
Love your guys content....just found your channels ...keep up the good work
So I'll give you one bad and one really good "sword" moves in movies. The worst I have ever personally seen is from Ahsoka. In the episode where she's having hallucinations she fights Anakin. While dual wielding lightsabers Ahsoka does a spin move, but stops halfway so her back is turned to Anakin and swings behind her back at him. It's hilarious.
As for the good example. In the Rurouni Kenshin live action movies, during Kenshin's fight with Saito, Saito tells Kenshin that a sword with a blade on the back will only end up hurting himself. Then in the next binding moment Saito puts his whole weight into the bind to cause Kenshin's sword to cut himself. It's a really solid moment that could literally only happen in Rurouni Kenshin.
After watching all ten fight scenes I have to say I didn't think any would beat Disney's Star Wars sword fighting, but the Game of Thrones and Rings of Power sword fighting scenes shown in video this were worst.
Ok
To be fair. Equilibrium never was about realism, there is literal gun MA. It was made to make every guy watching go "Hell yeah!".
Same with this scene. Yes, reverse grip is bad, but what if it was intentional. Like fighting with one arm behind the back, saying to opponent "Im literally him, i can beat you even while holding this sword upside down, just because im that cool". And that's cool
The official/unofficial term is "Gun-Fu".
Inspired by the western akimbo-style movie gun scenes, the Chinese director (can't remember his name) adopted it and starts incorporating them into his gun totting action movies.
Can't remember what movies, but I do know Chow Yun Fat is the main lead. From there, the "Gun-Fu" style became the "best new thing" in action movies, mainly China, and the Director got famous and went on to make The Equilibrium, bringing the Gun-Fu style to the mainstream western audiences.
So yes, it's so cool, it went around the places like migratory birds.
Exactly he is completely wrong on that one. It is absolutely rule of cool. Also yeah comment on the katana fight when in other scenes he "outshoots" like 100 people .. :D
Interesting "fact" that I've heard but can't confirm, is that the fight scene was intended to be longer and more "epic" but they were pressed for time so they decided to just skip that one and go on to the main baddie. 😂
Equilibrium used to be my favorite movie when I was younger. I came for the Gun-Fu, I stayed for the shockingly compelling story about what it means to be human.
Yup
@@zacksilverstone7642 John Woo is the Hong Kong director of the gun fu stuff you're thinking of.
Kurt Wimmer was the director of Equilibrium.
18:23 i think he still had grip on the opponents arm in this scene. THat's how he spins his opponent.
As a sidenote, we have the flip, flip side as well, where Jackie Chan absolutely rules, the fights that are so GOOD bad that they become awesome.
When they intentionally use bad and ridiculous moves, but they do it so well, that it doesn't go bad.
"shaky cam"
Oh gods, Tyrant, HUGE thanks for saying that.
I remember back in the 80s when my brother studied towards movie directing/moviemaking for a while, and one of his textbooks literally listed shaky cam as the poor man's artificially created action or tempo, and how it was to be avoided at all costs except in a rare few cases where it actually belonged.
"worst"
Kylo bend over posing... Because that one has absolutely no justification no matter what.
The Mulan thing can happen if both are too angry to fight properly but also good enough to not fail like that.
The jump attack is just weird. Have to agree with Tyrant here that if they wanna go full anime, then DO SO, not this weird lameness.
And the Kylo moonwalk... Uh... No, just NO. There's no reason what so ever for it.
"Gunfu"
Go watch the anime "Madlax". The series also does the unthinkable, it actually gives a good reason for gunfu working well.
Reverse grip katana slice, nah, this is fine. Not because it's good fighting or anything, but because it could theoretically happen, out of convenience.
"highlander"
We may not be seeing or interpreting it correctly, but it sure doesn't look good.
Flux capacitor is endlessly more realistic... ;)
"hits down, the blade goes up"
It looks like he MAY be slicing LOW, as in not "clubbing" downwards swing, but instead forward down long cut, effectively hitting the sword from underneath with the edge upwards.
Doesn't exactly make it better, but it's a superhero setting so meh. Lots of much worse scenes.
At least there's a tiny tiny chance that you could make it work theoretically. The Kylo stuff is just plain mentally challenged.
Galadriel scene is just weird.
Her moves are all POSSIBLE, even if not generally a good idea(it's the kind of stuff you can see from steppe horsemen competitions in central Asia), but the setup and editing makes it just... Whaaat?
And oh wow, last Star wars scene is making me happy i haven't seen the last several movies.
Yes, she could have just cut down forward.
And IF that for some reason was not an option, she could just turn the blade OFF!!!
Turn it off and disengage!
But okay, this one can be POORLY excused by "heat of the moment, not thinking straight".
Oh, and ASOIAF, it's more like classic stagefighting rather than fighting, so i don't actually think it's terrible. Not that it's far away but, there's worse.
So no, the worst one is still Kylo bending over followed by moonwalk. After that it gets difficult.
The first rule of anime is that you dont ask questions.
"The first rule of Disney is that you don't ask questions." FTFY.
@@TeronRedoran Disney could do good Fight Sequence if they hire the right people. Shang-Chi had pretty good fight choreography.
Yesterday i had a really quick conversation with a teacher because i was talking about a sword i made and it lead to "dose star wars have good flight scenes"
And in my head i was thinking "this conversation is sponsered by shadaversty "😂
So thank you shad for helping me educate people and have fun..
Of course i have learned from others but i think you have done the most fight scene analysis
The pathetic thing is that these multi million dollar movies could easily hire a sword fighting expert from, say, the Royal Armoury, who'd be very happy to train the actors in real fighting techniques, but no. They want the ridiculous flashy moves. To be fair, though, the general public eats that shit up and loves it.
Honestly, I also mostly prefer flashy, since idk about swords and stuff... but it depends on how bad it is. Like, if ~I~ notice it's bad? It's AWFUL. Like the Kylo "back block." There's a HUUUGE difference between like the Anakin and Obi-wan random flourishes in Episode 3, and everything under Disney lol. And honestly, a lot of the Episode 3 stuff? It's "bad sword fighting" but eh. I mean, just watch Shad's Autopsy to see why even HE likes it and you'll see why it's still SO MUCH BETTER and the "random bs flourishes" are ok. It LOOKS cool AND the stuff in-between (the actual fight moves) are mostly good, so it's just like double good.
@@Paradox-es3bl Yes, I enjoy some of the Star wars sword fighting. That fight between the Sith guy and Liam Neesen and Obi Wan (apologies to Star Wars fans for not knowing the names) is very entertaining. I've watched it multiple times and love it. I daresay there are ridiculous moves in it, but I haven't noticed. Perhaps we have to just ignore the flourishes and only point out the truly illogical mad moves when they crop up.
@@jeffreybarton1297 The Prequel fights are still the golden age of lightsaber fights for Star Wars. It is fast, flashy, and tactical, and still holds up for the most part under scrutiny. Pretty much all other light saber fights for what they made afterwards just completely deteriorate as soon as you disect what they are actually doing.
@@dallinadams9422 I haven't watched anything after episode 7. Seen plenty of clips, though, which reassure me that I did the right thing in abandoning Star Wars.
@@jeffreybarton1297 Save yourself the suffering. You really aren't missing out.
I think Galadriel's upside-down thing is even worse than it might seem at first glance. Horses tend to spook if you do something really weird while riding them, unless you've acclamated them to whatever the specific thing is. How likely a horse is to freak out varies from horse to horse, but I don't think any horse would be ok with its rider flipping upside-down like that unless it has been specifically trained to tolerate that sort of nonsense. This means that Galadriel didn't flip upside-down on a whim to dodge an arrow; is a technique that both she and her horse have been training for.
Elves also often rode without saddles too, like Legolas did in The Lord of the Rings books. So hanging by the stirrup would be nigh impossible.
I find it more offensive to make their Opponents stood there and get cut when she is telegraphing her next move few seconds ahead.
I thought you would either dodge it, or Raise you weapon and point at her straight.
Turns out Kylo's just looking for Backshots and no one wants to endulge. Poor guy 😢
This needs to be a series.
When Whippy-dude caught Ray Palpatines' light-sabre, why didn't she just switch it off and back on again?
We don't know if you _can_ switch off a lightsaber while it is in a bind, we haven't ever seen anyone do that. You have to account for them not being swords, they are unknown technology that we don't fully understand.
@@WJS774 Beg your pardon but actually we DO know that they can. In Dark Tide II: Ruin Corran Horn does it in a sparring match with Mara Jade and later does it when fighting Shedao Shai.
@@WJS774 in "The Acolyte" sexy-Asian dude killed "Girlie-ferret" by popping her three times by "switching " off and On "
@@WJS774 Erm.. In the " Acolyte", we saw Asian-dude stab " Feral-Girl" , after the "bind" , by switching his light-sabre " Off and On ".
Because Disney doesn't understand how lightsabres work
In the clip from Iron Fist it looks like the broken sword piece was going to go in left leg but ended up wounding the right leg!
And that might have been a bit cruel of Shad to subject Tyranth to scenes of Rings of Power! Poor Tyranth's eyes!
The last three Star Wars movies were absolutely trash! And I thought the prequels were bad 🤦♂️🤷🏼♂️😭
The prequels at least had badass music and really cool lightsaber fights
@@LucasR.O yeah that’s true.
@@LucasR.O I defend the Prequels because George Lucas was trying really hard to deliver the epic underlying story of someone with a massive amount of potential to be a hero falling to selfishness and cruelty by a combination of his own actions and the manipulation of others.
It's the same as Final Fantasy X, where the story is good, but the delivery is hilariously inept.
you gotta review the highlander fight scenes. And finally I'm glad that someone reviewed the horrific scenes in equilibrium, that movie sucks so hard
Disney's Three Musketeers (1993). I would definitely suggest reviewing Disney's Three Musketeers. Not only is it a genuinely good movie in my opinion, but from what I remember it has many good sword scenes. There are lots of sword scenes, some great moments, and some moments that are great because they are terrible and know they are terrible or comical. I can only think of one that was possibly just bad bad, which was D'artagnan fighting from atop a stone railing. Take a look and see what you think!
4:00 Don't get me wrong, I hate those movies. But, for this specific thing, it is true that canonically Kylo Ren is an insecure poseur, desperately trying to be as cool as he thinks his grandfather was. And, poseur or not, he severely outclasses these force insensitives. So, it might actually make sense in universe that he would do incredibly dumb things he thinks look flashy.
You should rank the lightsaber fights in Star Wars movies worst to best
I have a safe bet that the Prequel trilogy ones would rank the highest, mostly at least. Yes, the original trilogy is THE fight scenes that started it all but other than that, not as good as the later prequel trilogy's (as weird as it sounds)
@@LastGoatKnight Prequels also have many bad lightsaber fights. Like the one where Mace Windu goes arrest Palpatine. Not level of sequel-bad maybe but bad regardless.
@@tabull8180what annoyed me about that one was how good it canonically should have been. Palpatine is a full master of all seven forms of lightsaber combat. Mace Windu is so good, he created his own fighting style, Vaapad. He has to be one of, if not the best lightsaber duelists ever. It should be a clash of the titans. But it looks like a pair of geriatrics swatting eachother with walking sticks.
@@tankythemagnorite9855 We just have to be happy for those good ones we got
Empire wins, hands down (Pardon the pun)
Got to side with Shad here. The Equilibrium one, while bad, isn't atrocious. The other guy standing there for hits 2 and 3 could potentially be chalked up to shock from the first hit landing. At least it goes fast enough that I can justify it that way. It's a dumb movie with a lot of stuff that is stupid fun, this is no exception.
Aside from all the Star Wars sequel ones (which I agree, can't stand them, even coming from a lifelong Star Wars fan from the 90's), the Highlander Endgame one I remember always wondering how viable it was as a kid when my interest in swords first was developing. I even tried replicating it with my pvc pipe swords with my brother and I came up with the same conclusion of "this is dumb, how is it this difficult to beat?"
The Rey being caught in the whip one is even worse than you pointed out. Yeah, with regular swords you could tip the sword down to get the whip to slide down but with a lightsaber you have an entirely different option: TURN THE SABER OFF. Flick the blade off and on again, it disappears, the whip loses contact, and you have your saber in position for a strike with your opponent dealing with a whip weapon that has no momentum for a return strike or block. We even see how fast the saber can snap off and on later in the scene when Rey throws the saber to Kylo so he can instantly impale the one guard in the face.
If you want an interesting good take on a Disney lightsaber fight (even if it is animation rather than live action), I would recommend the Obi-Wan vs Darth Maul fight from Star Wars Rebels. This is old Alec Guinness-style Obi-Wan fighting against an older Maul in what is the best throwback to the classic Samurai films that inspired Star Wars to begin with. The whole duel only lasts 3 moves but the buildup to it is full of storytelling beats. The two face off in their classic Clone Wars era guard positions before Obi-Wan shifts his to what Qui-Gon used to do, suggesting he's changing the lightsaber style he's planning on using. Maul sees it and recognizes it, adjusting his own stance to attack around the style Obi-Wan looks to be using. Maul attacks twice, Obi-Wan defending both, and Maul goes for the same hilt-to-face smack that he defeated Qui-Gon with by stunning him into a set up for the killing thrust, but Obi-Wan had prepared for that and instead sidesteps and slashes straight through for a killing blow. Rather than a long drawn out fight scene with nonsense moves, every little movement in this one counts and tells a story. It's pure samurai dueling through and through.
The first hit in Equilibrium is a full 180 degree spin into slash across the chest. The guy is effectively dead on his feet and just standing there to be finished off. I really don't have any issues with that scene
One of my worst ones is the middle of Rey's first lightsaber fight with Kylo in Force Awakens, where he's pressing her back, they get their sabers in a block and then, in the middle of the block, he starts trying to recruit her and offers her more training. And in the middle of this same block that he is being very courteous and patient with, she takes a moment to center herself/draw on the Force/remember she's a female protagonist in a modern Disney movie and therefore has omni-power.
There's around half a minute of this where they are in the middle of this block and neither are doing anything dynamic.
Regarding the Highlander one, I don't know if it matters, but it looked to me like the guy with the swords behind him also had grabbed the other guy's arm to ensure that he can't move it.
Oh I'm with Tyranth with that GoT scene. The number of quick cuts give so much motion sickness and vertigo, and it blatantly tells you the choreography was screwed up (and probably just awful) and they were trying to hide that. On the fence between that one and the Rings of Power scene just because of how literally physically painful it is.
You guys wouldn’t understand… the force is not within you
Please do the two movies called "the hunted".
The "knives" one and the "katana one".
They are excellent for this channel content.
OMG that upside-down riding is sooo bad! I think I nominate that one because of the wasted potential.
If they had placed an Orc there with e.g. a big hammer that would have forced her down, that would make sense. Then add another Orc which she instinct-hacks at, but only get his leg or something so the Orc drops down screaming in pain - that would have been a realistic situation, easier to do and also less visually awkward.
I can't imagine it was comfortable for the stunt-double to do that ridiculous move.
The worst: Everything disney!
Two observations:
Highlander:
It was like 15 years ago so I don't remember the movie but isn't it possible Connor is jokingly suggesting to Duncan he should cut his head off?
Iron Fist:
To add context, that show was so under-funded the actors supposedly had to come up with all coreography minutes before filming!
With the Connor vs Duncan move, Connor has the sword trapped between his sword and his shoulder while he's holding Duncan's forearm. That's how he's supposed to be immobilizing the sword, anyway. Then he shoves him off and attacks while his back is turned. Not saying it's good, just thought I'd point out what you guys weren't accounting for on the movement of Duncan's sword.
If Duncan moves his sword down he gives up the binding on his side as well and Connor could just go for the head, swinging it around (given he steps or at least lean backwards at that time) - which would be a blow to the neck - beheading the enemy while Duncan would need way more time to move his sword back into a position he could deal a stab (with Feder oc way harder in very close distance) or swing. With sharp swords he may would been able to slice or cut the side while moving his blade back.
In real life this move would be "risky" at best, not worth the attempt as it is doomed to fail or give both sides unbearable wounds.
In Highlander, two "immortals" who can only die by beheading it makes way more sense....
The thing about the Highlander Endgame scene, is does McCloud still have hold of Duncan's arm? That could justify it in my opinion.
And seeing it play out still makes me think it could work.
I am also thinking that Connor is referring to what Duncan does at the end .
It's more of a Sabre fighting, but I hope it qualifies: Polish movie “The Deluge” from 1974, entire scene of duel between Michał Wołodyjowski and Andrzej Kmicic in the rain.
Beyond that, many of the old school actors from the black and white era had actual fencing knowledge. Like Basil Rathbone for example was two-time British Army Fencing Champion, and taught fencing to Errol Flynn and Tyrone Power.
For example their (Tyrone Power and Basil Rathbone) swordfight from the 1940 "The Mark of Zorro".
26:11 or..... just turn le lightsaber...... OFF....... and then on again..
*sees thumbnail*
No Shad! You already started enough chaos last night! Have mercy, I beg of you!!!
If you know, you know.
About sword binds, have you seen "Vampire Hunter D: Bloodlust"? Fantastic movie, but both times D and Meier Link fights, most of the fight is a bind. The last one is especially crazy.
The Kylo hold back really baffles me and is my least favorite one. Its one of the clearest examples of moments where the enemy is written to be brainless and have no combat sense, as they have so much time and could strike in so many places where the lightsaber is NOT protecting. Ugh. Also, awesome video, love this ^-^
It would actually be extremely hard to hit only his blocking lightsaber and not at least hit his back with the tip of your blade.
I would love to review the sword fight in live action rurouni kenshin live action
I KIND OF LIKE YOUR NEW ARMORS! XD
Disney's Star Wars is full of bad sword fighting in live action.
Jet Li sword duel with europian sword master in Fearless, he made a lot of fancy moves, but He was able to sell it. That is how you make nice fluid one.
Is the way as how WWE wrestlers sell their moves and make the Audience scream. Even though some of those moves are actually ridiculous in a real fight.
For example "The People's Elbow". The Rock even admitted the move was intentionally ridiculous, and didn't think people would actually buy it when it created it.
Binds do happen sometimes in sparring with a sword… a lot of people I used to train with hate me cause I never let them do the movie trope of binding for minutes on end; I always slipped right through the bind near instantly to attack them
In training people I use backward stabs for two reasons… either one the cool factor when I know I’m that much faster than them; or two when doing it a lot slower to explain to them the flaws about it
American Samurai has a bad one. It's a 90's martial arts movie starring David Bradley (not the guy from Harry Potter) & Mark Dacascos. Dacascos is a yakuza member who trained as a samurai and fights in underground death matches in Turkey. In his second to last match, he faces a Chinese fighter who uses a Wushu-like acrobatic style. In the middle of one of their sword exchanges, the Chinese fighter knocks Dacascos' blade aside, then turns his back and goes to run up a wall and backflip off of it. It goes about as well as when Neo did it in the Matrix, except they're fighting with swords this time and he ends up getting decapitated.
I absolutely loved that movie as a kid. Yeah that moment was pretty dumb.
when you see that a video has been uploaded 46 seconds ago
This guy is the actual first ^
When you see that a video has been uploaded 14 minutes ago
@@Blibers when i don't see the video because reading comments
Yes, this needs to be a series. You’ll make all your viewers very happy.
I don’t know if it’s good or bad, y’all experts will have to tell me, but the fight between Inigo Montoya and the Dread Pirate Roberts from The Princess Bride would be one I’d love to see you break down.
Also want to add that I nearly died laughing when you said the fighting wasn’t even the worst part of the Disney Star Wars movies. Couldn’t agree more, it was trash on every level from writing to acting to editing.
The thing about Equilibrium is that it's all about the Gun-kata...if you were expecting good swordplay for that one scene? Oh you have the wrong movie. Also there is a bit of difference between Gun-Fu and Gun-Kata...the differences are pretty minor but they do exist, and what John Wick does is more tactical Gun-Fu than fantastical Gun-Fu.
That Game of Thrones fight looks like it was filmed with a mobile phone...
Also to add to the Rings of Power scene, the time it took for Galadriel to ride while hanging from the horse was plenty of time for any of the Orcs who are just standing there gawking to attack the horse and there would have been nothing Galadriel could do to stop that and to stop the horse from just falling on top and crushing her...
Love the channel, if I might make an editing suggestion. At first blush the diagonal line looks cool, but it really shoves Tyranth into a corner. He has a larger upper half of the screen, but the upper half of the screen has more dead space that he can't use. The lower half of the screen is where all of the hand gestures take place, giving T a crowded feeling and allowing Shad to dominate the screen. A thinner, vertical bar might be the best option here if your goal is a balanced perception of you both.
The worst one to me was the moonwalk, because it would have taken almost no effort to make it better. Just have Kylo do something as he's walking backwards; deflect some blaster bolts, throw debris with the force, ANYTHING to justify him facing that direction, and suddenly it's a decent move.
My favorite duel is, of course, in The Princess Bride when Inigo and Wesley fight.
I really enjoyed this video, Shad. You should definitely make this a series. This was my introduction to Tyranth, who I think is very likeable. I love that you included several Star Wars clips, they deserved to be included. I wanted to say, about the clip you chose from the throne room fight scene in "The Last Jedi. When the guard trooper wrapped up the blade of Rei's lightsaber, she could have totally just turned her lightsaber off, right? I would like to say what was truly great about "the Rise of Skywalker): It totally s*#ts all over "The Last Jedi."
If I had to pick a worst scene from what you guys played, I pick the last one, from Game of Thrones. Quick-cut fight scenes are the worst. I really liked this idea, showcasing the worst sword fights. While I'm comfortable analyzing sword fights from movies, my real expertise is Chinese Kung Fu films. I thought of a knife fight scene that I remember as being really good. The fight between Tommy Lee Jones and Steven Seagal in "Executive Decision", I think it was. If I had to recommend one Chinese Kung Fu film with great sword fighting in it, I would choose, "Shaolin and Wutang".
Great video, Shad.
A good one? The Three Musketeers from 1973 and The Duelists from 1977
Rings of Power can be nominated to the top tier with every single sceene a character grabs a sword...
With the highlander part, you guys are forgetting that the blond dude is holding the other guy's right arm. Just watch it again and see how he's manipulating his right arm.
He can't do the move that you're proposing, because his arm is held by the other dude