Reversing Course: From A Certain Point of View

Don't change Rey's lineage. For better or worse, you took a chance on a narrative to tell a different sort of Star Wars movie. Run with it. It's a great narrative to use, don't chicken out. Double down if anything.

Don't un-kill anyone. Some things need to be certain or else all stakes are gone. Jedi never really die so I never understood why people get weird about those deaths anyways. Star Wars isn't comic books it works for the medium because it is a trope baked so deeply into it.

And no time travel. It's too tricky and tedious in an extended franchise (more than just a few flicks like BTTF) and in Star Wars it just seems so unnecessary. It became comical in Doctor Who under Moffat to the point I stopped caring. And so *far* Marvel has handled it decently enough but A4 is the big test.

Other than that, just keep taking chances. Propel Star Wars forward.

 

As someone who didn’t love TLJ, I hope they won’t retcon the main outcomes of that movie.
Luke is dead, so is Snoke, Rey is not a Skywalker and Kylo is the new Suprem Leader.
Retconing one or more of those things will turn TLJ in joke... completely.
I hope JJ and Terrio will find a way to tell us a compelling story that uses these elements.
I say built on them. Make them stronger. Key elements of this story. Turning points, not twists or shocking moments in the context of one single movie.

 

I expect J.J. (or any other Star Wars creator for that matter) to respect what's already established, so I'd like to avoid retcons. But if I had to say what would be the biggest problem, it would be any form of diminishing Luke's sacrifice and his overall arc. That could happen in various ways. I also don't want Snoke to come back in any form. As for Rey, I don't want them to mess with her lineage anymore, but if they retconned it, well... There are worse things that could happen, so I guess I would somehow accept it. But not her being a Skywalker, that would be too much.

Another thing that comes to my mind is the state of the Resistance - I don't want it to turn out that reinforcements didn't show up on Crait because they were stuck in traffic, lol. No, it has to be clear that if Luke didn't save the day and the Resistance was wiped out, it would be the end for the good guys.

 

That's a different thing, IMO. It's a twist and more like adding or developing than changing something. In that sense, if Poe turned out to be Kylo's brother, it would suck, but it wouldn't be the same as Rey revealed to be a Skywalker despite TLJ telling us she's a nobody. Or Snoke returning despite dropping dead in TLJ. But well, I guess it's all debatable...

 

I don't know if there's a way to "certain point of view" some of those thing.
We see Snoke PHYSICALLY bisected and then his ship is also destroyed.
We see Luke die but Jedi really never die. They just change their physical state, more or less.
Nobody seems moderately concrete as far as not being someone we would recognize.

 

Well, doesn't the movies (not sure about other canon material Jedi) imply that Qui-Gon was the first to achieve "force ghost" (for lack of a better term)? Thus, how Yoda trained Obi-Wan and how Luke learned it.

 

Let's not open the Maul can o' worms. Yes it it happened and while I am happy a good character didn't go wasted, I do hate that they made his type of wound survivable. I would feel worse about Snoke than I did Maul; because Snoke served his purpose to THIS story where as Maul really had no reason to go other than the Rule of Two and Lucas wanted MOAR VILLAINS

 

I don't expect many changes from TLJ. We may learn more about Rey's parents, but any twist there would involve a new story element and not a tie to the Skywalkers. That would be such a lame attempt at a twist that it would fall flat. Plus, JJ has known the truth since he was making TFA.

The challenge for JJ is going to be Leia. This trilogy has a plan, but it was severely complicated by Fisher's death. I suspect the biggest change will come with Luke. I think it was by design to kill him off in the middle episode to free up room for Leia to confront Ben Solo, but that obviously has to change.

Snoke being alive would just be dumb. He's clearly dead in the TLJ and bringing him back doesn't really serve any purpose except getting in the way of the characters who are still around.

 

I just happened to read an old 1999 interview with GL from Empire magazine today, and I found what he had to say about Darth Maul interesting:

Empire: A common reaction of audiences is “Maul is so cool”. So why isn’t he in it more?

GL: (Resignedly) It’s not about him… ha, ha, ha. Obviously everyone likes the villain better than they like the heroes, that’s sort of a tradition... At one point, when Obi-Wan kills Darth Maul, he just fell in the pit. I looked at it and thought this isn’t going to work because, if people like him enough, they’re going to want him to come back and they’re going to assume somehow he gets out of it. So I had to cut him in half to say that this guy’s gone, he’s history, he ain’t coming back. I’ll come up with another apprentice. The whole issue of having apprentices, poor Darth Sidious trying to replenish his apprentice supply, is one of the main plot points.
​

https://www.empireonline.com/movies/features/star-wars-archive-george-lucas-1999-interview/

 

i'd like to add to that.

i'm actually quite concerned that so many members here are so desperate for certain outcomes and are so mad at certain things we've seen in the ST so far.. that they aren't open to 'other possibilities' other than someone fixing it or ret-conning it.

we have no idea what Luke's status will be come the next movie. I couldn't care less that we saw him disappear like Yoda and Obi-wan did.. neither of those two displayed a use of the force like Luke did shortly before disappearing. none of us know what happened to him, or what he may be capable of.

Rey could be literally anybody at this point. Snoke said that he put the vision of Ben turning to the light in Rey's head.. and a few minutes later we're buying what Kylo said to Rey about her parents? nope, not me guys. I don't care who her parents were, but if JJ doesn't re-visit that subject in ep IX i'll run around the Cantina butt nekkid for a day.

Kylo is the most complex and intriguing (imo) character we've ever seen in Star Wars. I don't think we have even begun to go down the rabbit hole - that is his mind.

Snoke. without knowing what or who he was.. how can we possibly know if he is dead, or in fact if he was even alive in the first place.

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Star Wars is fantasy. sometime.. you just gotta go with it and see what happens. let's b1tch or praise the trilogy once we've actually watched it all. I do worry that if Luke or Snoke isn't dead, or if Rey is a Skywalker etc that many will see that as a fix or retcon.
Lose yourselves in the movie and go with it.. stop worrying about the past (kill it if you have to )

 

No he didn't have a purpose beyond that and for that same reason, IMO, Snoke is done too. He facilitated the rise of Kylo Ren. Kylo is in power. Snoke is dead.
But I still wish, in hindsight, Maul would have stayed dead.

 

At this point I don't think this series needs a retcon, it needs exposition. Rey's parents are nobody's as in we haven't met them yet, but they could have an interesting story in their own right (a hint of that leading into a spin off to further develop and do some much needed world building to events prior to this era would be nice). However I feel of the 3 you mention, this is the one easiest retconned. Having her be Luke's daughter however would be odd because I didn't get that impression in TLJ.

I don't care if Snoke I dead. If he lived somehow, it better be well done. As someone else stated, killing people off and having them return weakens stakes moving forward.

Luke shouldn't be more than a FG. Same as above. With Luke I would personally feel his story would be well served with more exposition, his mindset and incidents that happened prior to the flashback. I honestly don't think I'll get my wish.

Overall for me, I'll wait and see how things go before making my final judgment on the ST. Because I don't see them retconning anything, I don't see my opinion changing. If they do retcon, I could see myself liking it even less depending on how it's done. I think the safe bet is to move forward with a little exposition on a few things that are debated.

 

the thing is though.. what's a retcon? that term and 'fix' are scaring the poop out of me.

let's say for instance that at the beginning of ep IX we see Luke speaking to Yoda as a force ghost and Yoda tells him that he can go back to the real world - he's still needed there (it's an example.. please ignore the fact that it sounds like Dumbledore speaking to Harry Potter lol). So Luke re-emerges on Ach-to and quickly finds his Robe before the movie rating has to be changed.

will people in the theater be sitting there thinking "yay JJ's fixed it" or "ha! great it's been retconned" ?

i don't think that will happen with Luke lol, but i will go to the theater next year with a completely open mind.

the last time we saw Snoke he was cut in half... at the end of TPM Maul was cut in half and falling down a seemingly bottomless pit - and he managed to get into Rebels and Solo lol. it's a fantasy and anything and everything is possible.

i do get what you are saying about getting some exposition.. but i genuinely think that we shouldn't judge the lack of exposition until the trilogy has played out.

 

I'd love for JJ to take us on such an unexpected journey that all of these unanswered questions we keep on asking fade into insignificance... But of all three OP's questions the most intriguing one for me would be that regarding Kylo.