PapersAndPaychecks wrote:
Or at least, a collegial disagreement about a matter of popular culture.
Close the cage.
PapersAndPaychecks wrote:
I accept that Star Trek Beyond is a better exemplar of what I mean ...
I am not sure that it is, but okay.
PapersAndPaychecks wrote:
... but I maintain that TLJ does subvert Star Wars, in unexpected ways, at the plot level. Rey turns out to be a Force Superuser despite her parentage, and not because of it. The maverick hotshot Rebel pilot leading the raid on the Imperial starship turns out not to be the hero. The big bad guy gets killed halfway through the trilogy. It does contain Star Wars tropes but it's just not made of the same stuff as the preceding films.
There is nothing unusual particularly about Rey not being descended from another Jedi. In fact, that is normal in the
Star Wars universe [e.g. Anakin], and Luke and Leia are exceptional in having Jedi parentage. Major villains being killed off before the end is no big deal either, as that happens repeatedly in the prequels (Maul, Jango, Dooku, Grevious). These were, however, things that TFA set up as being important, and then were subverted by TLJ, a bait and switch if you will. Poe's "growing up" is probably the most original element and is again a subversion of expectations created by TFA, but it is not very well handled either, which brings me to my core objection ...
PapersAndPaychecks wrote:
And that, I think, is why it was so disappointing for the (apparently substantial) proportion of the audience who wanted them to make the same film again.
I certainly did not want to see the same film again, and I very much doubt that there was a substantial proportion of the audience who wanted to either. Star Killer Base was accepted with a sigh, but often pointed to as the weakest element of TFA. Everyone was primed for something new, but what we got was a lot of retreaded and reworked elements of
Star Wars in a not very good film. [e.g. Rey and Ren team up to beat Snoke, mirroring Vader's offer to Luke to team up and beat the emperor, and with predicable results: Rey and Ren become opposed, just like Vader and Luke would have].
Now, it is possible to argue that in subverting basic ideas about
Star Wars [e.g. Yoda's ghost using lightning to burn down the Jedi temple, laughing all the time ... I really thought he might turn out to be Snoke in disguise at one point] that the film was something new and (more importantly) better, but purposefully subverting the themes of
Star Wars is not taking the franchise in a new direction, it is writing
Elric in response to
Lord of the Rings.
[i]It is a joyful thing indeed to hold intimate converse with a man after one’s own heart, chatting without reserve about things of interest or the fleeting topics of the world; but such, alas, are few and far between.[/i]
– Yoshida Kenko (1283-1350), [i]Tsurezure-Gusa[/i] (1340)
