EP IX Politics

New Republic has been devided already few years before ep VII, it was just a shadow of a state.
It has been devided between populist words(which believed in liberal democracy which ment weak central goverment), and centrists worlds which believed in centralised government on expense of acuiescence with the Old Empire's ways of governing.Plus autonomic dominions , clusters of some planets with shared interest.

Within this, there was a third element, a large capitalists with its interests, arms manufacturer Companies, and other to, which had interest in war and were financing First Order, They even built sister-companies in First Order held space and produced state of the art weaponry for the FO.

Kylo is not plausible leader. In The novel TLJ, Hux is expressing his secret (quite realistic) thoughts about incompetence of Kylo to be New Emperor.

I think its possible we will never see a superstate such was the Republic and the Empire anymore.

I think in fact Disney and LSL abandoned polithics subtleties of His Majesty George Lucas, and went into sandbox.No state polithics, only character arcs, fight and Force.

On the other hand they positioned, by some observers, very active on leftists propaganda, in which humans are stupid racists, aristorcracy should be decapitated like in French revolution, capitalist are pushing war for their profits, and all have equal chances to be superheroes.

So, in my eyes stance towards polithics in new trilogy may seem correct from everyday's polithcal life point of view, but not for Fanthasy world.

Yes Empire was racist elitists regime but they were dangerous and clever and Superior, that's why people feared to see them on the film and it worked well.And the Skywalkers drained their power from divine influence, born trough ancestry, which worked very well since its fantasy.

Kylo and Hux,as well as FO polithical and military incompetency (lack of plausability)is bad for the trilogy.Just as is this general random movement towards personal powers.(though this is just impression).

In my eyes.

 

It simple terms it's all 1 big mess.

 

That's sort of what I expect.

Politically, I expect two things, both born of power vacuums:

1) The obvious vacuum in Snoke's death. Kylo assumed control in the chaos that ensued, but I think he'll have to fight to keep it.

2) A galaxy in chaos with little structure. Some planets likely will try to govern themselves (Mandalore comes to mind) but mostly I expect that a criminal faction may come in and begin taking things into their own hands. We've seen little of the Scum of the universe in this trilogy, unless you count the Canto Bight arms dealers- who, by the way, could totally be the faction that tries to rise to power (much as I might want a new Hutt cartel to fill that role instead).

 

EpIX would most likely focus in characters (again), but I hope that whatever comes next (animated or live-action series) would focus on wars (in the stars) between different factions. For example, if there is a an animated "Resistance" series, it could focus on how the Resistance would have to gain support of local governments and factions to build an army against FO. It would distinguish the show from the "Clone Wars" (two superpowers fighting) and "Rebels" (a small group on a ship doing their own missions).
I personally enjoyed the parts of the "Clone Wars" where the Republic and the Confederacy had to fight for individual plantes by bribing, gaining support, infiltrating governments, fighting proxy wars etc. I want to see some more of that.

 

the setting is broken...and it cannot be fixed

the resistance plotline destroyed any hope of ever fixing it.

weeks to conquer a Maclunkey galaxy?...rey destroyed the worldbuilding of star wars with that one line

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the skywalkers being divine influenced killed star wars worse than kennedy ever did

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mod edited - keep it civil please

 

There's no more republic. The fleet was wiped out with Hosnian Prime. There's parts of the Resistance/Rebellion left, but at the end of the film there's not much left. It's safe to assume that a few weeks after The Last Jedi the First Order would be in control of core worlds. However, it's unlikely they'd control as much of the galaxy as the New Republic.

Each cycle of the conflicts starting with the trade federation war has made centralized control smaller. Ultimately every conflict has reduced the size that's under control.

 

The Empire was bigger than the Republic.

 

I believe the minimal politics was highly intentional. I think Disney thinks "The PT was like watching C-Span, booooring!" and they intentionally steered away from debates/ideology (as well as kids, Gungans, and ewoks).

I, for one, completely disagree with this view. I think that it's very important to know the reasons behind the conflict, and I think the PT did a fine job of establishing those reasons. Without knowing what you are fighting for, it is just a kaboom-a-thon.

 

I DID NOT!

 

Yeah but we got Porgs, Fathiers & stable kids who never trained but can use the Force.

 

Broom kid didn't do any more than Rey did at first, and nothing so out of the ordinary that we should be lambasting him for.

As for politics, I wish we could see more, but I think they'll leave that to the EU books and comics. Heck, maybe this trilogy will end with no new Republic formed and instead break it down into smaller governmental clusters.

 

Why can't you just type Starkiller Base? It takes less than five seconds. Or are you texting on a 1990s 2G phone?!

 

He grabbed a broom. He actively used the force. U have 2 train 2 do that.

 

Or he's just self-taught. The Force surrounds and connects everyone and everything. Thinking it only belongs to those who train or are Jedi is one of Luke's main points.

Narrative-wise it's to show that there are people out there, ready and willing to be trained. That the Jedi will survive outside of one family's legacy. Do I think it should have been the final shot in the film? No. But I also understand why it was.

Back to the politics, fleshing out what I said above, it really makes no sense for the galaxy to go back to the Republic. They tried, it failed, and then it died. Narrative-wise it neuters the entire point of the ST, since it would be ending exactly how the OT ended and we don't want that.

But this is background noise to hone in the main focus - the characters. As such, I think we need to look at Leia and her legacy.

Throughout the OT, Leia's goal was to defeat the Empire. In this Disney Era, her goals were fleshed out to 1. establishing the New Republic and 2. Raising her family

With the destruction of Hosnian System, one of Leia's life-long goals has been ruined. All she has left is her family, and we see how well that's going: Ben's a mass murderer (if not personally at least by association) and Han and Luke are both dead.

Where does that leave us? I see a few possibilities.

First is bringing back the New Republic, but I already spoke on that above.

Next is that the First Order wins. A dark ending and one I personally could find very interesting, but that leaves us with an ending too closely related to ROTS. This isn't a terrible thing, ASSUMING THEY EXPLORE THIS ON-SCREEN. It feels like a far-fetched idea at first, but I think it's more likely than that.

Lucasfilm has the next decade or so of Star Wars movies figured out, with RJ's trilogy and the GoT people's series of movies (with the fan's eternal hope for an Obi-Wan film - or trilogy).

But what happens afterwards? If we go back to the Saga films, enough time would have passed for this new government to develop and show off the changes without it being too much like the OT.

The actors would be young enough to play their characters again but not old enough to have fully grown children (or even teenage children). This would let them carry on a whole separate trilogy without the Old Guard there, for better or worse. That also means they could become an Old Guard with a more diminished presence later on since we would have seen 6 movies with them already.

On the other hand, if there's a major timeskip between TLJ and IX, we might see that anyways.


The last (Jedi!) idea I have is the one I mentioned above: smaller forms of government. While this would downsize the scope moving forward, it could instill a sense of desperation that the PT and ST have lacked in some capacity. It also means that the threats come from a known place, instead of saying "Unknown Regions!"

This way doesn't entirely destroy Leia's dreams - in fact, it might be the fulfillment of it. The smaller, separate governments would align with Leia's Populist ideals explored in Claudia Gray's Bloodline. This in turn would make Bloodline feel far more relevant to the story than it already is*.

This way would also mean that Kylo's fate isn't determined by the above: If Kylo lives if the New Republic is rebuilt, it feels like he got away with everything without paying any visible price, and many fans would HATE THAT.

If he dies after becoming the Ultimate Villain and destroying all vestiges of the New Republic, then Leia's life becomes tragic and Han's sacrifice would have been useless*.

The smaller, separate governments mean that Leia's dream can still live on and so Kylo's fate is determined by his own story, not Leia's legacy.


Anyways I'm rambling now and things are making less sense in my head, so it's DEFINITELY time for me to stop...


*What I mean by this is that while Bloodline felt good it revealed good information about the First Order, I was curious as to when this political aspect would play in. I thought it might in TLJ, and it really didn't. But maybe RJ was playing the long-con, setting up how the story should end even then.

*Yes, I know many fans want Kylo to die for killing Han. I think that's a little shortsighted. We want Han to live on, and the best way for him to do that is for his death to be ultimately meaningful. Han knew that he might die stepping out on that platform, and he did it anyways. Kylo killed him, but if Ben is redeemed, Han's faith and choice to sacrifice himself was right too.

 

No, they are my real initials.

 

The lack of cumbersome exposition is a strength of the ST, not a weakness. The PT had almost all convoluted exposition, very little character development. Do you ever feel any real empathy for Anakin in the entire trilogy? He's never developed with the kind of care and precision that Rey is rendered with in Episode VII.

The general plot however is beautifully set for Episode IX. Kylo rules the galaxy, the Republic is ruined and lost forever and only a tiny speck of hope exists in the Resistance, as it clings to life and looks to Rey to guide the galaxy back to the light.

All kinds of things you can do with that setup and I'm not sure another massive scene with politicians, trade tariffs and political posturing is at all necessary to make a good film.