Star Wars: The Last Jedi

[austinjimm]

SHE MUST HAVE HIDDEN THE PLANS IN THE ESCAPE POD.
SEND A DETACHMENT DOWN TO RETRIEVE IT.
THERE'LL BE NO ONE TO STOP US THIS TIME.
.
SON OF A BIOTCH---
.
FISTS WITH YOUR TOES!!!

[ligedog]

I know I'm wading in at the end of long conversation but what the hell.

Totally loved "The Last Jedi". There were a few plot holes -

Why didn't the rebels jump their capitol ship away as a decoy immediately when they were doing their little subterfuge with the transports? If the ship had enough juice to jump into a destroyer (or whatever) it probably had enough to jump to juice to jump to another system and lure the New Order fleet away but overall it hangs together. A few thoughts: Old Luke - totally believable - has anyone ever known an old hippie aka aging idealist? Eventually you can get pretty worn out with things - might even start milking goats or weirder creatures - and you get pretty weird and crusty. And Luke was already pretty out there in RotJ. Whatever had turned him into a what he thought a Jedi was didn't exactly make him someone who was going to be able to deal with society after they won easily. I never saw him really mellowing out after all the Yub Yub. He's also half trained and very aware of the fact and apparently no one else seems to get that. Yoda - always playing mind games with Luke - if Anakin in the first series was too old to train what did that make Luke? Yoda always seemed to feel Luke needed to be guided by whatever methods would work if that includes lying about burning sacred texts its right in his wheelhouse. I even like the goddamn porgs - it fulfills Lucas's desire for comic relief without a. the porgs save the day a la the ewoks or b. a bunch of robots stepping in poop with out any relation to anything or c. horse toothed aliens in 50's diners.

Edited to take out any potential spoilers!

[Settembrini]

It's pretty much the ultimate stereotypical Baby Boomer conceit - at least from the Gen Xers' perspectives - that they can get away with neglecting and lying to their children with no consequence at all so long as it was in the service of their greater good. That's pretty much the central theme to all the great music of the late 80s/early 90s from Nine Inch Nails to Nirvana to Guns n' Roses to NWA to Public Enemy and etc., etc.... "You've been lying to us, everything is all screwed up."

The conversation here between DungeonMonkey and JC Boney pretty much mirrors Ben's conversation with Luke in Return of the Jedi and is essentially the larger conversation Conway was talking about in a nutshell.

RotJ came out in 1984. The Boomers were looking about, in their late 30s, with a nice job, a couple kids and another on the way, content and pleased with themselves, saying, "We did it. We saved the world." The Last Jedi came out now with the Gen Xers in their early 40s looking about and saying, "You know you guys really did leave a lot of crap for us to clean up after you. I thought you said you fixed this shit." The Boomer just shrugs his shoulders and says, "Don't forget to pay my pension."

What you are saying here, Rogatny, would lead me to think I should avoid listening to Gen Xers, because they are still hung up on something with their parents, so that they are incapable of producing anything that is not about their conflict with daddy.

That's sorta a weird defense: Johnson hates Luke because of his own daddy issues. Johnson hates Star Wars, and so should I, because of his daddy issues.

We should all hate friendship and goodness, because boomers lied to their children? Really?

I say, get over yourselves and your parochialisms (which totally, as you say, sound like a 90s thing, rather trite & quaint, no?), and look at the human condition. Friendship and Hope are way beyond generational shennanigans.

[Wheggi]

So I finally saw this last night and I have to admit I’m a little bummed: I could have watched Darkest Hour.

The Last Jedi was not a good movie. I did like some of the ship battle scenes, but the writing and acting were really lousy. There was also a bit of politics that were put in for the sake of promoting an agenda, which really is a buzzkill. And call me oblivious, but did I miss something? I keep seeing all these fans of the franchise talk about some big reveal that totally ruined Star Wars for them, but for the life of me I don’t know what it was.

I dunno. I’d say as an adult I’m not who these movies are made for, but I liked Rogue One. Maybe this one was just a dud.

- Wheggi

[Geoffrey]

Luke being a loser for most of the movie (and for years beforehand) is what a lot of fans are saying has ruined Star Wars for them. Loser Luke is the Jar Jar Binks of The Last Jedi.

I'd say, Wheggi, that "dud" aptly describes this movie. I suspect that it will be typical of Darth Disney movies: largely without magic, but not unwatchable like the prequels (Rogue One being the miraculous exception).

Star Wars: A+
Rogue One: A
The Empire Strikes Back: A-
Return of the Jedi: B
The Force Awakens: C
The Last Jedi: C
Revenge of the Sith: D
Attack of the Clones: F
The Phantom Menace: F

[Wheggi]

That’s what all the whining is about?

I thought Luke did the exact same thing as obiwan Kenobi and Yoda. Both of them were Jedi masters who had a bad day at the office and retired to become hermits.

Seemed to me to be the most likely scenario the writers would take.

[bobjester]

That’s what all the whining is about?

I thought Luke did the exact same thing as obiwan Kenobi and Yoda. Both of them were Jedi masters who had a bad day at the office and retired to become hermits.

Seemed to me to be the most likely scenario the writers would take.

Whining? I guess.
Since you put that into spoilers, so I will too.

The reasons Luke went & hid in the corner of the galaxy is what infuriates the long-time fans. I cannot believe that the most powerful Jedi in the universe would go into hiding because he would almost kill his own nephew in his sleep as a child, after his faith in the Force and that his father could be redeemed against all odds. He gained too much by the end of the OT to have regressed that far. That alone is so anti-Luke as to make many fans ask why Rian Johnson & Kathleen Kennedy would write it that way.

Now, if RJ & KK had written a plausible reason why Luke would go into hiding, that would have been more believable.

The reasons the new fans give for Luke turning tail & regressing is because he's 'only human' and any one of us would have done the same doesn't ring true for the Star Wars mythos. In Star Wars, he learns, In Empire, he progresses in training and in Jedi he eventually masters the Force. Neither Yoda or Ben regressed. Yes, they went into hiding, but they did so for very good, specific reasons. Yoda hid because the Sith side wanted to hunt him down and kill him. Ben went into hiding to watch over Luke on Tatooine. Luke went into hiding because of fear? That is not good enough. The love that he had for a father he never knew was so strong that such familial ties would have mandated that he stay by his nephew's side and guided him through hell and back.

[Wheggi]

See Bob, I thought by the way all these uber-fans were going on that the big reveal was going to be HUUUGE. You know, like Luke banged Lea back in the day before they knew they were brother/sister and she had Ren, making her Kylo's half-sister/cousin, or that Luke was actually Sith Lord Snope (which could have been a pretty awesome story twist, now that I think about it). Some weird, off the wall shit like that. As it is right now I'm still not seeing the issue with the twist in this new movie. Wasn't even a twist, just a logical progression of what may have happened in the 30 or so years between RotJ and this new movie.

But again, I don't have much emotionally invested in Star Wars, so my perspective may be different.

- Wheggi

[bobjester]

See Bob, I thought by the way all these uber-fans were going on that the big reveal was going to be HUUUGE. You know, like Luke banged Lea back in the day before they knew they were brother/sister and she had Ren, making her Kylo's half-sister/cousin, or that Luke was actually Sith Lord Snope (which could have been a pretty awesome story twist, now that I think about it). Some weird, off the wall shit like that. As it is right now I'm still not seeing the issue with the twist in this new movie. Wasn't even a twist, just a logical progression of what may have happened in the 30 or so years between RotJ and this new movie.

But again, I don't have much emotionally invested in Star Wars, so my perspective may be different.

- Wheggi

All of that you wrote just there, would have made a better TLJ movie.

[Chainsaw]

See Bob, I thought by the way all these uber-fans were going on that the big reveal was going to be HUUUGE. You know, like Luke banged Lea back in the day before they knew they were brother/sister and she had Ren, making her Kylo's half-sister/cousin, or that Luke was actually Sith Lord Snope (which could have been a pretty awesome story twist, now that I think about it). Some weird, off the wall shit like that. As it is right now I'm still not seeing the issue with the twist in this new movie. Wasn't even a twist, just a logical progression of what may have happened in the 30 or so years between RotJ and this new movie.

But again, I don't have much emotionally invested in Star Wars, so my perspective may be different.

I was hoping Jar Jar would finally be revealed as the sith lord orchestrating it all... oh well.

[bobjester]

That is fucking brilliant! I love it!

[T. Foster]

For me, the problem with the First Order replacing the Empire, Kylo Ren replacing Darth Vader, and Luke Skywalker becoming Yoda isn't so much that it undermines the hopeful spirit of the original trilogy by positing that nothing changes or ever improves as that it's just very lazy and formulaic storytelling - a reboot/reimagining of the original trilogy masquerading as a sequel. Focusing on the in-universe dynamics that led to such a situation - whether it's consistent with Luke's character to have become a disillusioned hermit, etc. - is giving it all too much credit. Any in-universe answer is just post-hoc handwaving; the real reason Luke is a hermit who's reluctant to train Rey in TLJ is because that's how Yoda was in the first trilogy, and they want to repeat those story-beats with a "modern" twist. It's such a squandered opportunity. But, hey, maybe the Han Solo movie will be good in the same way Rogue One was.

[bobjester]

This is an entertaining, satirical review:

[Falconer]

Over the years, I’ve found I care more about characters than plots. This was my beef with the LOTR movies. The plot was more or less intact. What bothered me was when Aragorn, Boromir, Faramir, and Théoden did not resemble Tolkien’s characters. Likewise, I turned off John Carter after the first 20 minutes established that the character was very different from Burroughs’ character. The rest of the movie could have brought vistas and action and Dejah Thoris’s ass and also plot, but, I knew I wouldn’t like it. I don’t know if that seems weak to anyone else, but, for whatever reason it is critical to me. Likewise with Luke, whom Hamill has repeatedly stated he disagrees with the new direction of the character, because Luke was “the most optimistic, hopeful character in the Galaxy,” and, “A Jedi is optimistic. A Jedi has tenacity. He never gives up.”

[Blackadder23]

For me, the problem with the First Order replacing the Empire, Kylo Ren replacing Darth Vader, and Luke Skywalker becoming Yoda isn't so much that it undermines the hopeful spirit of the original trilogy by positing that nothing changes or ever improves as that it's just very lazy and formulaic storytelling - a reboot/reimagining of the original trilogy masquerading as a sequel. Focusing on the in-universe dynamics that led to such a situation - whether it's consistent with Luke's character to have become a disillusioned hermit, etc. - is giving it all too much credit. Any in-universe answer is just post-hoc handwaving; the real reason Luke is a hermit who's reluctant to train Rey in TLJ is because that's how Yoda was in the first trilogy, and they want to repeat those story-beats with a "modern" twist. It's such a squandered opportunity. But, hey, maybe the Han Solo movie will be good in the same way Rogue One was.

I still haven't seen TLJ, but I agree that this is the basic problem with the Disney SW movies. With all of published and cinematic science fiction to borrow from - not to mention other fiction, or even real world events that could be adapted as science fiction - did they really have to make it "Empire" vs. "Rebels" again? I understand that the title requires a "war" of some kind, but couldn't it have been a different type of war? A massive Borg-type alien invasion maybe, or the New Republic fighting pirates, or even a civil war handled better than the one in the prequels. Recapitulating the conflict from the first trilogy was the laziest choice imaginable, and practically guaranteed these movies would feel far too similar to the originals.