J. J. Abrams Promises The Rise Of Skywalker Isnt a Remake, Will Honor All Star Wars Films

Don't worry JJ, to me TFA isn't a remake of ANH. I think there are two or three scenes that make me think of ANH, but I consider more an homage than a simple copy.

 

And...three years later...yup.

 

I agree. To me it isn't either

 

How exactly is the plot of ANH and TFA similar?

In ANH, the rebels are trying to smuggle information vital to their immediate survival with the Empire pursuing them to either get it back or to discover their base and destroy it, or both.

In TFA, the rebels are searching for Luke Skywalker who has vanished and is needed as the threat to the new republic from the FO is growing. The FO is also looking for Skywalker because he represents hope for the Jedi order being reborn and protecting the new republic. It is also a personal vendetta with the FO's main henchman Kylo Ren. Unlike in ANH, the precious maguffin isn't used to set the final act in motion.

Sand planet, droid and superweapon are the only similarities, and they aren't used in the same way. Of course fans noticed a very strong familiarity. But for me, it was the characters which were able to establish themselves in this scenario which were the main feature of the movie. And that goes for ANH too. The actual plot of that movie was never really the distinguishing feature. It was just a series of adventures, and adventure in a captured space ship, then and adventure on a desert planet, some more adventure on a fleeing space ship, a battle station, more spaceships. It probably wouldn't have mattered too much how they plotted it (although the writer of The Phantom Menace might have felt the same way too so perhaps it should matter a little bit at least).

The story is about Finn defecting, he and Poe forming a friendship, then he and Rey forming one, Han proving to actually be a good father figure (which provides nice tension when we discover his son is the one who betrayed Luke etc and claims that he's not such a good daddy), Leia still having hope for her son and faith in her brother, and so on.

A New Hope and The Force Awakens both climax with a superweapon being destroyed. But ANH stops there while TFA provides another climax of Rey prevailing against Kylo. And then adds the coda of discovering Luke in his "I feel responsible so I've walked away from everything" state (which some fans seem to completely ignore and claim TLJ changed, which I will never really understand)

 

Interesting choice of words regarding the Skywalker Lightsaber - it 'Lives' - in my personal theory this will be significant, and also perhaps why they maybe looking for Vader's lightsaber...

 

It isn't just Starkiller Base/Death Star that's similar, though.
'Message in a droid' - straight from ANH.
Droid falling into the hands of a desert orphan
Desert orphan finding out they have 'the Force'
Rey is very obviously Luke as a female version

And now post TROS...Adam812...yes, Ben should have lived, not just because he became Anakin version 2 (only he wasn't mourned, or seen as a FG), but because his death essentially wipes out the entire heroes' bloodline and thus ultimately renders all their sacrifices pointless.
Moseley909....sadly your fears about TROS turned out to be true.

 

TFA wasn't a "remake" of ANH; it was JJ Abrams and Lawrence Kasdan's attempt to recapture their own personal 'initial feelings' upon seeing ANH for the first time, which is why it was structurally and tonally similar to that film.

With TROS, JJ has, by necessity, a much different "agenda": he has to tie together 8 previous films while still delivering something that is satisfactory in and of itself.

 

In short : mission impossible

 

Difficult, yes; impossible, no.

The inclusion of Palpatine, Lando, Luke, and Leia (through unused footage) will help accomplish the goal of tying everything together; making the film satisfactory in and of itself is honestly the bigger challenge, but is one that I think JJ, being the filmmaker he is, will in fact be able to more or less accomplish (because there's no way you can please everyone, but if you please enough people, there's no reason why you can't say that you were successful in making a satisfactory movie).

 

Yeah, that choice of words seemed curious to me too. Why not just say it was fixed? So, it suggests there is a great deal more to the story. However, one would think Rey sets out to fix the saber shortly after TLJ but TROS takes place some time after TLJ. Does this mean Rey went without the Saber for sometime if we are to see how she repaired it or will there just be hints on how she repaired it during the time jump between the two films?

The fact that touching the saber triggered Rey's visions suggests there are more to kyber crystals than we currently know, so there could certainly be some significant information in that regard revealed in TROS.

 

Daisy shouldn't have even said anything about the fate of Anakin's lightsaber in TROS during the panel, because she ruined a "money shot" moment for the Teaser.

And I don't think the "how and when" is important at all to TROS' story in terms of the saber being fixed.

 

hmmmm no... TFA was not all about Star Killer base. SKB didn't who up or was even mentioned until the 2nd half of the movie

 

While TFA was not a copy of ANH, at least JJ is aware of some of the criticism and has done something different to try to avoid it this time

 

I'm really hoping this feels like a new story, I do worry with with the likely redemption of Kylo this is straying very to ending leaving the galaxy in exactly the same spot as when Return of the Jedi ended.
If the film ends with Kylo/Ben(instead of Anakin/Vader) sacrificing himself to destroy Palpatine, leaving the last remaining Jedi ( Rey instead of Luke) to rebuild the Jedi Order while our plunky band of Hereos (Resistance instead of Rebellion) have after defeating the bad guys (First Order instead of Empire) have to now rebuild the Republic.

I'm really hoping this isn't how this Trilodgy ends.

 

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If the movie does have a Ben Solo redemption, it would make sense to keep him alive at the end. Redeeming himself through death would be too much like ROTJ.

The movie should also end with the Jedi Order already established. The broom boy scene planted a seed for this. If there is a big enough time jump we could see the message of the broom scene materialize.

 

SW has always been more a character study than a plot driven movie franchise. I actually think the plot of TFA is lifted from ANH, but it’s the characters are what keep it fresh. TLJ is structurally the same as ESB, but it’s the characters arcs that are different.

That is why SW (for me) can get away with multiple Death Stars and rehashed plot points, because they are just window dressing to the real story regarding the characters.

I expect TROS to be very much in the same vein as ROTJ in terms of the structure, but I don’t know what to expect concerning Rey, Kylo, Luke and now Palpatine. Those characters and their possible arcs are what matters to me.

 

I was really hoping this was where they where going to go with episode 9, having Rey training a new order of jedi between 8 and 9, you could then have had New Jedi vs Knights of Ren which would have been cool and different.

However from what we've seen and heard Rey is going on an adventure with Finn and Poe, the trailer also didn't given any clues that Rey had been training Jedi, and Lukes voice over seemed to talk about the thousand generations living in Rey, not Rey and pupils. So the evidence seems to be pointing towards Rey been the sole Jedi/padawan at least at the start of the film.

Course we don't know enough about the film at this stage, to rule it out, but if I was a betting man I would put money on Rey been the only Jedi light side force user for most of this film, maybe then in the 3rd act we will get Kylo turning to the light or some one else showing force powers.

But I am really concerned that this film will end in exactly the same way an place as Jedi and people will excuse it as rhyming. I want this trilogy to feel like the proper 3rd act of the story not a repeat of the second act I hope JJ finds away to do that.

 

Will TROS also honor the Star Wars TV shows? I'm assuming there will be a large montage at the end of this film.