Shanghai Fortress
Sep. 6th, 2024 03:10 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
iariaMeh.
I liked:
+ The friendship between Jiang Yang and Yu Yiyi was nice.
+ Yu Yiyi's sacrifice in the final battle. It made sense, was effective and well done. I also liked before that Jiang Yang saving her and then her showing up to save him, and giving him her ship because he was the better choice to fly in the battle.
+ The whole (almost) everyone dies ending was unexpected but I liked it. Everyone working together, sacrificing themselves in (mostly) meaningful ways in order to save humanity, nice nice. Jiang Yang surviving eh I go back and forth on liking it as a symbol of survival/moving forward and wishing they'd chosen to stick the 'everyone dies' ending. I thought Lin Lan's sacrifice was really well done.
+ In the end flashback Lin Lan smiles as she walks away from Jiang Yang and in that I finally saw a hint of Lin Lan/Jiang Yang that was something I wanted to see more of. Her opening up to him about her dad was also a nice moment.
+ That there were no love triangles. I was kind of expecting it from two angles but nothing.
+ That none of the main/supporting characters were put in the semi-antagonist role or screw up role. I was expecting Yang Jiannan to be arrogant and make a crucial mistake or not listen to orders etc and instead he was a profession who did his job and got things done. Nice.
What I Disliked:
+ The pacing felt off. It over all was kind of plodding and at times boring. The script felt weirdly meandering?
+ So many choices were inexplicable to me.
- The biggest was Pan Hantian choosing to self-destruct the command centre - after the alien had managed to both turn off the shield and also was already down. Maybe I missed something? If he did it to prevent the shield going down or to stop the alien from getting information, or if the alien had set it off would have all made far more sense. I definitely think I missed something because it was portrayed as a heroic self-sacrifice but all I could think was that it was really dumb. That self-destruct killed a lot of people and seemed to have no purpose.
- It also bothered me in that scene that Lu Yiyi (and Zeng Yu) hesitated to attack the alien because he was holding Pan Hantian 'hostage'. Also Lu Yiyi trying to run right past the alien to get to a thrown Pan Hantian was dumb.
- General Shao staying in the main command centre during the final offensive knowing it would be targeted first. Could they really only take down the shield from there? Did he really need that many people there with him? Why didn't they have secondary defensive line for them? It was obviously a set up for sacrifice but it didn't feel like a necessary sacrifice.
- Why didn't the aliens attack the cannon first once they got back into the city? That should have been the first place they'd want to take out!
+ The Gray Eagle group seemed set up as this elite team using new amazing technology but it just didn't land all that well for me.
+ Jiang Yang/Lin Lan were pretty lacklustre overall.
+ The Pyrrhic victor of them having to basically destroy Shanghai in order to defeat the aliens was certainly a choice.
I liked:
+ The friendship between Jiang Yang and Yu Yiyi was nice.
+ Yu Yiyi's sacrifice in the final battle. It made sense, was effective and well done. I also liked before that Jiang Yang saving her and then her showing up to save him, and giving him her ship because he was the better choice to fly in the battle.
+ The whole (almost) everyone dies ending was unexpected but I liked it. Everyone working together, sacrificing themselves in (mostly) meaningful ways in order to save humanity, nice nice. Jiang Yang surviving eh I go back and forth on liking it as a symbol of survival/moving forward and wishing they'd chosen to stick the 'everyone dies' ending. I thought Lin Lan's sacrifice was really well done.
+ In the end flashback Lin Lan smiles as she walks away from Jiang Yang and in that I finally saw a hint of Lin Lan/Jiang Yang that was something I wanted to see more of. Her opening up to him about her dad was also a nice moment.
+ That there were no love triangles. I was kind of expecting it from two angles but nothing.
+ That none of the main/supporting characters were put in the semi-antagonist role or screw up role. I was expecting Yang Jiannan to be arrogant and make a crucial mistake or not listen to orders etc and instead he was a profession who did his job and got things done. Nice.
What I Disliked:
+ The pacing felt off. It over all was kind of plodding and at times boring. The script felt weirdly meandering?
+ So many choices were inexplicable to me.
- The biggest was Pan Hantian choosing to self-destruct the command centre - after the alien had managed to both turn off the shield and also was already down. Maybe I missed something? If he did it to prevent the shield going down or to stop the alien from getting information, or if the alien had set it off would have all made far more sense. I definitely think I missed something because it was portrayed as a heroic self-sacrifice but all I could think was that it was really dumb. That self-destruct killed a lot of people and seemed to have no purpose.
- It also bothered me in that scene that Lu Yiyi (and Zeng Yu) hesitated to attack the alien because he was holding Pan Hantian 'hostage'. Also Lu Yiyi trying to run right past the alien to get to a thrown Pan Hantian was dumb.
- General Shao staying in the main command centre during the final offensive knowing it would be targeted first. Could they really only take down the shield from there? Did he really need that many people there with him? Why didn't they have secondary defensive line for them? It was obviously a set up for sacrifice but it didn't feel like a necessary sacrifice.
- Why didn't the aliens attack the cannon first once they got back into the city? That should have been the first place they'd want to take out!
+ The Gray Eagle group seemed set up as this elite team using new amazing technology but it just didn't land all that well for me.
+ Jiang Yang/Lin Lan were pretty lacklustre overall.
+ The Pyrrhic victor of them having to basically destroy Shanghai in order to defeat the aliens was certainly a choice.
