I think it was the way it happened more than anything.
That didnāt really worry me, but then it also didnāt make me feel much of anything.
I suspect thatās why it caused the annoyance, but in brute scriptwriting logic there wasnāt really much alternative.
You couldnāt have Ren kill luke in an epic battle, when the whole point of the movie was all about how Ren is utterly out of his depth about everything. Making him stronger than Luke would mess that up. Lukeās arc in the movie was about rediscovering his peace and reconnecting to the force, and I think the end was a pretty fitting coda to that.
5 Likes
See you write it like that and I feel like I want to watch it again. But that is possibly the story of Star Wars from The Phantom Menace onwards: the potential of the condensed narrative/character arc fails to fully manifest on-screen. Also the problem may well be me.
Yeah, itās an odd film, and I understand why there are people who didnāt like it.
I havenāt rewatched yet, though I probably will, but the more I think about it the more appreciation I have for itās subtlety (thematically subtlety at least, the dialogue is as subtle as a brick to the head) and interconnectedness.
For example, Iāve seen a lot of people complaining about Finn & Roseās storyline being pointless. And from a plot point of view, it was. But from a theme point of view - it put into flesh what Yoda was saying to Luke about how failure is a teacher. And the kid at the end, with Roseās resistance ring, thats all about how even failure isnāt always complete and how itās worth doing the right thing anyway. And the same scene at the end is also a callback to Roseās words to Finn after she stops him sacrificing himself, about how the resistance has to win through protection rather than through destruction.
Iām not saying the movie was perfect. The pacing was off, the action scenes dragged (no director in the past 20 years seems to have twigged that just because CGI lets you do outrageous extended action set pieces doesnāt mean you always need to do it) and Poe was an unlike able meathead and Leia etc kept their plan secret from him for no reason that i could see other than āthe plot requires itā. And I do believe that the new films are suffering a bit from Alien 3 disease - everyone loves Luke and Leia and Han so to show more if them we have to ā¦ make all they worked and fought for in the original movies fail and fall apartt off screen? Yay? Itās a big letdown to start on, but for a film studio making new SW movies, how else do you set things up? The old Expanded Universe of novels etc did things differently but failed awfully at solving this problem too.
1 Like
Luke spent the whole movie talking about the all the ways in which the jedi failed. He talked about the jedi going to war for the republic. It should have never been their job.
For Luke to walk out and fight all of the first order in the name of the resistance (or rebels) defeats the whole purpose. He did what he needed to do to save them and inspire them. Thatās the main point of the whole movie.
2 Likes
They havenāt been able to make Poe work for 2 movies now. Heās a character they felt they needed as a marketing tool - āWe need a new Han Solo but weāll splice him with Wedgeā - the stories havenāt asked for him and the shoehorns they used have left a mark on him. Or maybe he would work if they werenāt trying to weave so much together.
At lot of your thoughts strike me as the kind of little details that can enrich a storytelling experience, but what seems to be missing is a simple ripping yarn at the core.
The ease and capabilities of CGI leads studios to readily forget one of the lessons of Alien: that something mostly hidden is more scary than the monster fully revealed. Darth Vader silent, and shrouded in lightsaber lit smoke is far more intimidating than Vader attempting threatening puns.
See i actually saw a ripping yarn at the core - or maybe I like a lot of others (who said that they hated it) read my own story into what was portrayed. IMHO we are, finally, seeing the outcome of the original āHe will bring balance to the forceā prophecy. Palpatine tore it down, Vader continued to tear it down (unbalanced force), Luke destroys Palpatine and Vader (unbalanced force), Ben kills off students and Luke shuts himself off (unbalanced force), Rey arrises to balance Ben (balance force - but unbalanced individuals - one leaning mostly to dark, one mostly to light). I see the end of this trilogy to be something like Ben and Rey create a new Jedi Order with the original Jedi philosophy - that every force users has a level of balance between the light and the dark.
1 Like
Again the synopsis reads beautifully, but strikes me as a grand overarching narrative rather than what Iām thinking of as a simple ripping yarn told in each movie. Mostly self-contained but linked by what youāve described. The first three had it.
And sure it is hard to do well with a studio bearing down on you, trying to appeal to every demographic and market, trying to weave in the new characters you are told to make people love, to do justice to the old characters people do love, trying to create a new toy that kids will love but the parents wonāt mind too much, to tell the grander story, to tell the smaller storiesā¦ as I type this in a cafĆ© a small child is making a sound like a Porg and it has unnerved me so I might stopā¦
I may have been on my second glass of chardonnay, (in my leftie cinema), but I barely concealed a booze snort when it cut to Luke levitating. Almost as funny as Leia farting her way through outer space. No angst just incredulity.
Good take from a mate was āIt was like a nonsensical fatiguing mishmash of a dream you might have after watching yet another mediocre Star Wars film.ā.
Iām old
3 Likes
And yes, Iām aware, incredulity has no place in a galaxy far far away but come on!
I actually came out with a mouthful of opinions but after scanning through the comments am going to take on the advice and watch a second time.
I will say though, when Leah went to infinity and beyond with her Buzz Lightyear inspired, force powered fly through space I died a little and no doubt will die a bit more second time round.
1 Like
I would of had that whole Rey,snoke,Ren scene at the end of the movie. But with Luke coming in to save Rey. Luke battles Snoke, Ren battles Rey. Luke kills snoke- then Ren kills Luke. Then do the reveal about Reyās parents and him trying to convince her to join him.
That way, Luke still dies, everyone gets to see Luke use a lightsabre again. Snoke still dies but it happens in an epic way.
Iām watching it for a 2nd time tonight, hopefully will be able to make more out if after all the hype. Long live Porg!
Apart from a few bits I thought it was pretty ordinary. Seeing it again tomorrow so maybe that will change.
That whole casino/ escape sceneā¦Yikes that was terrible
Just came home from seeing itā¦WOWZA, what a disappointingly terrible letdown. I disagreed with almost every decision Rian Johnson made, no not just stronglyā¦ HATED the decisions that were made in the film. Rogue One may have had a ton of forgettable characters and clearly been redone a few times, but I thought that was better than this. The action scenes were better, the space battles were better, the land battle scenes were better, it was darker in tone, the plot made more sense and about the only area it lacked in comparison to Last Jedi was the characters and even then it feels C3P0, R2D2, Chewbacca etc were just fan service.
I actually liked the first 15-20 or so minutes of Last Jedi. Had no issue. Poe doing his thing, fine (although if I have to hear the ātoo small for our lazersā bullshit again as an excuse), introduced a few of the plot arcs and have a cool looking Dreadnaught, fine. A good, solid start. At this point hilariously the power cut to the entire cinemas which resulted in a 5-10 minute delay, which thankfully returned for Lukeās milk drinking from the tit scene which was halriously random. In fact the cinemas reshowed it like 3 times as they scrambled to try and get sound up, so our gold class cinema got to watch that over and over without sound. Classic. Porgs are cute too.
Then came the Leia sceneā¦WTFā¦itās the Jar Jar of the new generation. She gets blown up from the bridge, floating in outerspace, and then just flies her ā ā ā back into the ship. LOL. Yeah whatever, I guess she can do whatever she wants now.
Then the whole Finn/Rose going to get the Codebreaker arcā¦yeah fine, but you know the stupid part of that whole 20-30 minute arc was, it was POINTLESS. Nothing happened with that, they flew off into their escape ships anyway, the Codebreaker did nothing apart from stutter a few times and basically the whole point was a means just to get a Finn/Phasma showdown.
Yeah so thenā¦
- Phasma dies pathetically. Was supposed to be the Bobba Fett of these movies and cool side villianā¦nah, killed off after 5 minutes screen time. Whatever. Did she do anything in these movies? Nope. A silver looking storm trooper that did nothing.
- Snoke dies. I donāt care that he died, itās the fact you build the first movie up about him being this powerful mysterious Sith that fans are eager and dying to know more about, you hype him up and then kill him off with no backstory, no arc, nothingā¦just so it can be a surprise. It actually makes the TFA look sillier as a result to, rewatch that now knowing how useless Snoke is to the overall plot. Will we ever know about him or is he just some random guy? At least make his death cool or anythingā¦lazy writing and a shocking decision movie wise, after everything these movies did to hype up Snokeā¦wow.
- Knights of Ren? Nah man, killed off in a few minutes. Cool.
- Put a shirt on Benā¦ughhhh
- Another āodds of making thatā speech from C3P0. Never gets old.
- Did I see BB8 driving a walker?
- Luke milking a beast and drinking itā¦wierd. Chewy roasting a Porg whilst others watched, weird.
- Did the Death Star have to stop at the local 7/11 to refuel or is it not relevant for this particular instance of ships?
- No lightsaber duels at all. At. ALL.
- No major space battles (watching the First Order play darts with their ships all movie doesnāt count)
- Empire Strikes back in reverse, escape to planet with Imperial Walkers coming, and then escape again
- Rose sucked, bland and boring and I was hoping Finn flew into the Canon just so I didnāt have to deal with their arc anymore
- Man, if only someone thought of the hyperspace suicide thing earlier and they could have got wiped out the Death Star with one ship
- Did Luke Skywalker just have a Matrix moment?
- I guess Jediās can do anything at any moment, be someone else or project lightyears away, sureā¦why not.
- Any chance we could get an intelligent New Order commander?
- Hux getting neck crushed one scene, chatting casually next scene, then being thrown into the wall the nextā¦
- No training needed for Rey, she can do everythingā¦yep. Random unexplained hole in the ground, that doesnāt at all remind me of the training scene in Empire with the random cave.
Seriously tho callbacks are fine if it makes sense or helps the plot, but like when Rogue One stuffed up by throwing in C3PO and R2D2 having Last Jedi give the winks and nods to the older movies whilst trying to distance theselves is silly. Do we now get 27 side movies about the handkerchief that extra on the ship had? Yeah, probably. I liked Mark Hamillās performance (even tho he himself doesnāt like the story) and liked some other aspects but I think I need more timeā¦
4 Likes
Agree with most complaints but.
They were the Praetorian Guard.
Hmm donāt think so. The visual dictionary indicates the praetorian guard are made up of random unknowns. We might see the Knights of Ren in Episode IX
You just reminded me of so many things Iād immediately forgotten. It was much worse than I gave it credit for. BD8 or whatever that miracle robot is, driving a walker. Get ā ā ā ā ā ā .
Am I the only one that is glad Leia used the force finally?
I might be way too romantic about the original trilogy but the biggest let down of TFA was that she wasnāt a Jedi master after how the last film ended
2 Likes