The Last Jedi - General Movie Discussion

I think this movie got a bad wrap, but I agree with you that this movie was legit and I'm excited for the next one.

 

I don't really enjoy The Last Jedi, but I respect what they tried to do with Luke, Kylo, and Rey. The plots of Poe and Finn were pointless to me.

 

In Mark Kermode’s review of TROS - “I interviewed Rian Johnson recently and I asked him about how it felt being in the middle of that storm [of vitriol] when it all happened and he said ‘I feel nothing but positive things about it. It was the best experience of my life. I absolutely loved it. I got to make a Star Wars movie and, yeah, people had loads and loads of opinions. Some of them very hostile and others are very positive. I have nothing bad to say about it at all.’”

 

After having seen the last chapter, my already positive feelings towards TLJ got even more. First and third chapters are packed with action than sometimes doesn't even allow you to breath, TLJ is an interlude that finally allows you to stop, think, listen to people conversations and thoughts, it allows you to get to know them and their purpose better and settles the field for anoher acceleration (TRoS).

I prefere much more this kind of structure than "oh no, they build anbigger other slightly Dearh Star", which, for all who are chriticising every single aspect of this new trilogy, I believe is a macroscopic flaw of the OT.

 

I agree, and TLJ is easily my most favorite SW film to date. However, it is worth remembering that the second act is very different from the third one (and the first) story-wise, and it is only in Act 2 that you can take the time to be introspective and "deep". The 3rd Act, by contrast, has to bring the plots and arcs together for a grand (typically rather dumb) climax and you pretty much HAVE to do a "we must accomplish the thing before the time runs out" (or similar) kinda thing to give it all a satisfying conclusion. In other words, you have to do a Death Star in the last chapter of a space-fantasy-war-story, so that aspect of TRoS' "problem" is a structural issue and not a design flaw issue, if that makes sense?

(Also, note that this doesn't apply to the PT as that trilogy was in its essence introspective and a character study. Here, the "we must accomplish the thing before the time runs out" element was defeating Anakin before he destroys everything rather than defeating a Death Star. But yeah...)

Personally, I thought TRoS pulled off the end pretty well and while we're tired of Death Star-like problems to overcome in SW, the internal story logic of escalating the problem we fixed before was cool. I liked the Star Destroyer fleet version of the Death Star and I thought it made a lot of sense (even though I would have preferred it if the ship guns were scaled down a bit so that each SD only fired a single reactor beam, but that's a matter of personal taste).

...and I'm ranting

 

I definitely think TROS cleared up many unanswered questions or things that I had wondered after finishing TLJ!

--- Double Post Merged, Jan 7, 2020, Original Post Date: Jan 7, 2020 ---

I agree! ESB was good for storyline, character development, and that's the way I see TLJ. TROS clears up many unanswered questions, and I believe is not an ideal way to end the trilogy and the Star Wars adventure over all, but it didn't disappoint.

--- Double Post Merged, Jan 7, 2020 ---

I believe the additions of Poe and Finn essentially mirror the original trio with Han and Luke. Rey being in the middle, similar to Leia. I feel like this was done to keep some similarity to the original trio, a reckless pilot, a man looking for good in all, and a young girl finding her essential purpose. It could be seen as an homage to those we originally loved from the beginning.

 

I'm talking about the plots of the characters, not the characters themselves. I enjoy the characters, but the Finn and Poe plots in this movie were pointless, at least to me.

 

Poe was supposed to die 10 minutes into TFA and, as much as I love Oscar, it should have happened. His character really did nothing when you think about it.

TLJ seems like Rian had to cram in Poe when JJ changed his mind about the character. In other words, my bet would be there was at least a detailed outline of TLJ that had no Poe.

Also seems like he got told by the studio to include Maz somehow, thus our characters can magically contact her and only her.


After the awful experience that was TROS, I am more convinced that Rian would have made a much better film without JJ or the studio. Even though I didn't like his constant attempts to subvert expectations, he's clearly a much better/original filmmaker.

And the Luke trick at the end is far and away the best new force power these films produced. And it is a pretty logical progression of force ghosts, etc.

Too bad it wasn't even mentioned in the TROS crawl or anything.

 

Really?

Poe was one of my favorites charaters in TLJ.
He goes from an arrogant boy to an inteligent leader at the end of the movie. He learned about leadership with Leia and Holdo. For me that was fantastic.

 

Before I finally go and see TROS, I want to say that one of the things I actually loved about the TLJ is how - despite being a middle episode - it kind of felt like a conclusion. It works I think with TFA as a 'duology', and could have ended there with just an implied sense of further imagined adventures, which continue ad-infinitum in an imagined space opera serial. As a duology, it can be compared to how the much more standalone ANH concluded (conclusive but open-ended enough to just suggest more). But for me, neither of them need sequels (or prequels for that matter!).

By the end of the 'duology', Han is gone. Luke is gone. Kylo tempted Rey to join him and failed, Rey tried to tempt Kylo back and failed - and having dispatched his master, he now takes his place as Supreme Leader. And we finish with 'broom boy' and the hope of things to come.

Sure, there are open-ended plot threads and we're left with just a small band of 'rebels', but those just suggest an ongoing battle between the good guys and the bad guys that can take place in our imaginations. No need to make them, we just understand that's the way it goes, in true Flash Gordon style.

I realise the more closed ending of TLJ is a reason why some people didn't like it - but the idea of TLJ as the final part of a duology works for me, and if for some reason it had been announced that Episode 9 wasn't going to happen, I would have been fine with that.

Of course, it HAS happened, and I have long had a theory/suspicion that Ep9 may work structurally as a STANDALONE film at the end of the trilogy, in an inversion of the OT structure where ANH was the standalone film which starts the saga, followed by the ESB+ROTJ 'duology'.

Anyway, as yet I haven't been to see TROS so have been avoiding the forums like the plague recently, but this was just a thought on TLJ I've wanted to post for a while, so wanted to sneak in and do so before I see the next installment (which is going to be early for me... I'm sure I didn't see TFA and TLJ until February/March time!)

 

I remember watching a documentary on para social relationships- the relationships we have with media figures and fictional characters despite having very little actual interaction with them and how we project our own attributes on them. For some, a character may be:

• A figure of optimism and a role model to aspire to be
• A brother that someone never had
• A 'father' that someone always wanted
• A substitute friend when someone is socially isolated

In fact, when we build such a relationship with a character and they do something that goes against this image we have created or against our own moral standards, it has the same impact as though it was a 'real' person.

--- Double Post Merged, Feb 10, 2020, Original Post Date: Feb 10, 2020 ---

Ridley Scott directed the film Alien and helped create and promote that franchise but he still made Prometheus and Alien: Covenant- films that I loved but ultimately proved to be divisive among the fans. To imply that the creator of a franchise like Star Wars is not as likely to make such errors or choices that would be considered divisive is itself fallacious.

As for the throwing out of the EU it was a sound decision. Whereas something like the EU would make narrative sense in settings like Warhammer 40K in which information and history is being constantly manipulated, in this setting it was understandable to streamline the narrative. The problems came about when it was thought that these ideas could not be used.

--- Double Post Merged, Feb 10, 2020 ---

I kind of like the milk scene. As the Force is derived from the spiritual essence of living things, arguably the cow feeding Luke could be symbolic of some kind of fertility or nature goddess. One such goddess being Lat (Egypt), the goddess of childbirth and milk; another, Hathor, the cow goddess was portrayed breast feeding King Amenhotep III at the Luxor temple followed by several cows ready to get milked in order to feed the newly born as depicted in the Queen Hatshepsut's divine birth scene.

http://jguaa2.journals.ekb.eg/article_4793_1737073a09c5b8b4740c14fa3d56056d.pdf

The planet itself could be a representation of this with the sea being symbolic of amniotic fluid, the hollow in the tree representing a womb and the recess and Luke and Rey being spiritual fetuses awaiting rebirth.

 

I forgot I posted this last year, so here’s my verdict. I’ve gone from mixed towards TLJ to thumbs up!

My 2 beefs with the movie was the death of Snoke and how it felt underwhelming after his buildup in TFA. With the re-introduction of The Emperor in TROS, now I look at Snoke much differently. He’s no different than Darth Maul or Dooku as he’s just a plot point in the ST, not the main villain.

My 2nd beef with TLJ is I never felt a payoff to Luke’s character. TROS gave me that payoff as we got old Luke back. Now I have no problem with TLJ grumpy Luke because you see the 3 story arc now.

TFA MIA Luke
TLJ Disillusioned Luke
TROS Optimistic Redeemed Luke.

I definitely look at TLJ much differently now in context that the full story is told. It was a downer in 2017 that left me empty. Now it’s an interesting part of the story that I know will payoff in TROS.

 

I really like TLJ. Still not as much as TFA. For bringing the magic back, TFA was and is right up there.

But I predict that history will tell on TLJ sooner rather than later. A think a lot of people will wind up wondering why they gave it such a hard time and/or entertained so much of the worst excesses of the managed negative reactions to it.

 

I think you're right to a degree. I hated TLJ for 2 years and considered it the worst of the series, but I recently did a re-watch of all the films chronologically (minus TroS of course, which I still haven't seen) and found I thought it was better than TFA; although I still have issues with it. Most of my issues with it come from it not capitalizing or following through on what it sets up. There's also a serious lack of tension with the space chase and the emergence of the FO, which I think wasted a lot of potential. However, now instead of being dead last in my ranking, it now falls somewhere in the middle. I really enjoyed the dynamics of Luke/Rey (after he agrees to train her) and Rey/Kylo, however, I still would change Luke's characterization to one where he's in isolation because he's in a state of self-reflection and learning.

 

I love the praetorian sequence. Those guards just do something for me...

 

My sons and I are having a debate. In the rainy night fight between Luke and Rey, Luke slips and almost falls on his back... is it Luke or Rey that stops him right before he hits and gently lets him down?

 

It's Luke himself. He's using the Force to stop his fall. You can clearly see this by looking at Luke's hand.

 

If I'm not mistaking, that scene represents the moment when Luke opens himself back up to the Force, a sort of accidental Force Push in responce to a Ray-fuled crisis. A show-don't-tell moment in Luke's arc.

 

That moment already happened earlier. First he used the Force to contact Leia and then he blew up Rey's hut.