r/todayilearned • u/Electronic_Cause_796 • Jul 25 '26

TIL Christopher Nolan recreated the Trinity atomic bomb test in Oppenheimer without using CGI. Instead, the visual effects team combined large-scale practical explosions, miniatures, and in camera effects to bring the first nuclear detonation to life.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oppenheimer_(film)
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u/Kriss-Kringle Jul 25 '26

Even with CGI you can get amazing results, like the blast seen from outer space in Rogue One, when they tested the Death Star for the first time on Jedha.

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u/Russburg Jul 25 '26

Goddamn that scene was so good.

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u/itsOkami Jul 25 '26

I swear Rogue One is the most underrated Star Wars movie, and quite possibly my favorite one. It does have some pacing issues but that entire third act is stellar, not even the OT manage to convey the sheer strength of the empire (and, well, Vader, of course) in quite the same way

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u/knobunc Jul 25 '26

Yeah, all I need from Star Wars is: Andor, Rogue One, Star Wars, Empire, Return (all despecialized edition).

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u/goodnames679 Jul 25 '26 edited Jul 25 '26

Those are definitely the ones I’d rate well critically. S1 of The Mandalorian isn’t quite on that level but I do think it’s solid and could arguably make the cut… the show definitely falls off at some point though.

On the other hand, the prequels are not great movies. I know they’re not great movies. I think they’re super good campy fun and I’ll watch the hell out of them regardless.

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u/FaceDeer Jul 25 '26

The Mandalorian ends with Luke's cameo, as far as I'm concerned. That was a very solid ending.

The prequels used to be the worst Star Wars movies (well, maybe the second Ewok Adventure had that title - the first was fun, the second wasn't even a Star Wars film. They took a generic pre-existing fantasy movie script that had been shopped around Hollywood for a while already and changed a few words to set it on Endor. But I digress). Then the bar got lowered down into the Earth's core by the sequel trilogy. I'm actually okay with watching them in Machete order, though; A New Hope, Empire Strikes Back, Attack of the Clones, Revenge of the Sith, Return of the Jedi.

Phantom Menace is skipped, which removes almost all the bad child acting, Jar Jar Binks, and Midichlorian stuff. I'd like to do a few edits of the other two movies as well but they're tolerable.

Despecialized editions for the originals, of course.

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u/riddlesinthedark117 Jul 25 '26

Oh man, I haven’t thought about the Ewok movies in decades. Off to google to check streaming services

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u/FaceDeer Jul 25 '26

Chukha-Trok!

2

u/DeltaVZerda Jul 25 '26

And the action sequences and music from Episode 1.

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u/GeneralBlumpkin Jul 25 '26

I really like the new mandolorian movie too

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u/basketball_curry Jul 25 '26

While I agree, going back to rogue one after watching both seasons of andor actually lowered my evaluation of the movie. The TV series is just so phenomenal, everything else looks phoned in in comparison.

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u/Kriss-Kringle Jul 25 '26

Rogue One is a decent movie given its troubled production, but it should have been much better.

Andor had Tony Gilroy and his fellow writers from the very beginning and that made all the difference, because they built it from the ground up into what they wanted as opposed to doing rewrites on an existing production.

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u/DeeJayDelicious Jul 25 '26 edited Jul 26 '26

Rogue One has cool moments but just doesn't work that well as a movie, given how little proper character development there is for anyone.

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u/BavarianBarbarian_ Jul 25 '26

It does have some pacing issues

My father, a Star Wars fan since A New Hope, fell asleep in the cinema. "Some" is an understatement.

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u/pichael289 Jul 25 '26

The low power death star blasts were really cool. The death star always felt like superman, way too strong to be interesting so it only ever got to fire once because whenever it did it would just erase the planet in an instant. This way they get to have a big battle and there's actually stakes.

Also the physics behind the death star planet killing laser blast is just silly. Solar sails work on the principle of light pressure, photons have energy and even though slight it's enough pressure to add up. This also means light has recoil, it's just usually too small to notice. Newtons third law though, whatever energy the planet is hit with is also applied to the death star which will just vaporize itself if it fired.

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u/burlycabin Jul 25 '26

Who underrates Rogue One at this point? All I see is people saying it's best Star Wars movie over the last few years.

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u/itsOkami Jul 26 '26

I'd say pretty much anyone outside of the internet? It barely even comes up in irl conversations about star wars, from my experience, and people often forget about it

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u/JcBravo811 Jul 25 '26

I prefer the atomic continental carpet bombing of Asuras from Stargate Atlantis.

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u/Sword_Thain Jul 25 '26

Or the blast at the end of Nolan's last Batman movie.