There is a genuine backlash building against The Last Jedi

^^ This guy gets it.

Not only did Luke have to be compromised to actually be in any way interesting but more importantly to provide a reason for there to be a story to tell.

If Luke wasn’t in self imposed exile because of his own failing and if he hadn’t cut himself off from the Force - then he’d just have rocked up and saved the day. Luke had to be powerless. He had to have failed. He can’t be the one capable of saving Ben Solo. All this has to be on Rey’s shoulders else there isn’t a hero journey to tell.

In fact, if you think about it, Luke’s character was handled superbly by RJ. It made perfect sense on so many levels whilst at the same time maintaining the canon and philosophy that preceded the ST. People
got swept away by the idea that the Jedi had it all wrong - that would’ve destroyed every Jedi character in the OT! Instead we see that the philosophy was right but that individuals make mistakes and their students grow beyond them. This took the story forward without ruining the past.

In having Luke’s main error just be a fleeting moment of fear it minimised the backtracking on his character development. And there had to be backtracking. ROTJ finished with a perfect Luke. He had defeated the Dark Side. In order for him to be the Luke that was required for an ST to exist, he had to make a mistake. This story ensures it was minimal.

And what of the exile? Should Luke have stuck around, saved Ben and fought alongside Leia and co? Again, we see what his power would be, the story would be over before it started. This way we see that Luke isn’t in exile because he is just depressed - but because he genuinely believes the Jedi are screw ups and must end. No other reason would work. If he was just sad that would be bad. If he was planning something to save the day it would’ve been too, little too late.

Finally, everyone that had a stab at writing VII realised that Luke would overshadow everything. If Luke is in a scene, then he dominates it. Just look at the last half hour of TLJ. Rey is confined to the Falcon while Luke confronts Ben. That isn’t what happens in a traditional hero journey. But it had to happen here because...Luke Skywalker. And so he had to be in exile in VII (Han Solo arguably was too big a character for TFA and as great as he was, took the focus away in that film), he had to be compromised in TLJ and then used minimally for IX (Force ghost).

I know a lot of people wanted a superhuman Luke doing backflips off the Falcon with his saber whilst single handedly dragging Star Destroyers out of the sky - but that wouldn’t help the story. It would be boring. What RJ gave us was a Luke that truly benefitted the story and continuation of the character.

 

Nobody wants this!!

 

I was being facetious. I’m merely referring to those who wanted an untainted Luke. He had to be diminished and compromised.

 

I wanted a story centering around Luke. Not a god Luke. I would have preferred he not die and not be a complete waste hermit loser.

 

So you wanted ANOTHER hero journey about Luke? What would’ve happened exactly?

 

Umm I said story. Hero Journey? Is this Hero Journey thing the only possible plot.

 

Yes. Do you know what the hero’s journey is?

 

How can anyone justify the Luke Skywalker's character going as far as to almost murder his nephew in his sleep because he was scared ? The calm Jedi Master Luke Skywalker that believed Darth Vader could be redeemed, and faced two of the most evil sith words to have ever lived alone ? What happened ? I can't accept he just got scared ? Fear leads to the dark side, said Yoda, right ? But in the movie this is not explored, Luke is not influenced by the dark side, he just got spooked by the evil in his nephew, and then he went to die by withdrawing from the force in the first jedi temple ? This is what Rian Johnson decided, no way this was the outcome of the setup of TFA - the map, the flashbacks, the way the story is presented.

 

The petition is a joke. Why take away Carrie Fisher's last (and best) performance? I always saw The Last Jedi as a film about letting go of the past and embrace the future. But the fans want the total opposite of that as they cling on to the past and scared of the future.

 

I completely agree.
Of course many people (mainly the OLD fans) are disappointed with the way Luke Skywalker turned out to be. They have this image of him in their minds of this perfect character who makes all the right decisions, saves the galaxy and can do nothing wrong.
In other words, he's the perfect hero.

This movie has shown that he's as faulty as any other human being and I like that, I find perfect heroes are boring and uninspirational and therefore highly predictable.
The last jedi has shunned the more predictable path some people wanted it to take, and I applaud them for having the courage and take a different approach with the characters.

 

Thanks Rian for your input. No matter how you spin this, your film was rubbish.

 

I probably won't change anyone's mind here, but Luke was almost killed when he faced them too. Then there was balance for many years, and Luke started training jedi. Then he discovered the same darkness again. He remembered that Vader was created becuase he was trained by Obi Wan (he directly references this when talking to Rey), and for a brief moment he thought that the right thing would be to end the dark side before it got to grow stronger. The movie knows that this was the wrong choice, and so does Luke. (It was this that ultimately lead to Kylo Ren). Do you think Yoda is still hanging around because Luke never has to learn anything at his old age? Like I said, I don't expect to change anyone's mind, but that's my take on it anyway.
Edit* Sorry if it came out like i was saying you were wrong to think the way you do, it's ok to disagree with the movie's choices of course.

 

I logged in this fine morning (where I am, dunno about you guys) and saw this thread....and thought whut. Just whut.

Another thread about the rt and user scores (we have the rt score thread people) and how TLJ is already "failing" at the box office only a week after release and because "muh OT generation" hates it, and they think they are 100% responsible for how it does financially. Whut.

I'm saying this one last time, except the bot stuff, other people have said that. It's been beaten into death at this point.

STAR WARS ST IS FOR NEW GENERATIONS-AKA TEENS TO CHILDREN TO LATER MILLENNIALS. THEY ARE THE GROUP DISNEY WANTS TO TARGET. NOT YOU GUYS. A NEW GENERATION OF WALKING ATMS FOR SWEET $$$!

Now let's see the main rebuttals this time.

1.monday Tuesday bo lower-Those are seen as primarily "adult" days in cinema so most "big Star Wars fans" adults have probably seen it by now or won't go alone. Also TFA opened a few days later and targeted kids when they they were freshly out of school, American kids are still in school at the time of me writing this, so they will drag their parents to the cinema to see it when schools out.
2.wider TFA comparisons, it's "doing less"-of course it's doing less! It's the first new Star Wars in two years, not ten. It doesn't have that "see Star Wars in cinema in a decade, familiar symbols like Millenium falcon and lightsabres" marketing angle TFA had. Even early projections (optimistic) on its total domestic gross have it placed at 80% of TFA. It's a similar situation to ANH and ESB (historical data backs this), the latter had a much lower opening than the former.
3.we still need to wait a few weeks to see if it'll "fail"-ugh, PT example Fair enough. AOTC had a 100$ million less domestic bo than TPM. I'm sure if we see a similar drop, of catastrophic proportions, Disney will revise their SW strategy (a little, they are a big corporations and have already shown pride in some examples) and RJ will lose his trilogy, and everyone who wants his grubby hands off SW will celebrate and spam threads telling us so.

I'm not handling foreign bo, because no one so far has mentioned them.

There is a guy on Reddit (movies subreddit) who does BO breakdowns, especially for large releases. Imma link him here next Tuesday he does his update. I've been following him for a few months.

 

Or...it could be said that Luke only had himself to care about in that moment with Vader. Yes, he got angry about Leia turning but threw down his saber - knowing that'd turn him bad. But really, it was a unique scenario where redeeming his father, believing in him, didn't have any other immediate consequences. Compare that with Luke looking into Ben's mind and seeing what he would do - murder his students (who Luke would love), kill his own family (Han & Leia) and butcher the galaxy. Personally, I can see why Luke may, momentarily, react in the way he does.

 

He didn't try to murder his nephew. He sensed the darkness in him and in a moment of weakness thought about it and changed his mind. Ben is the one going on killing sprees.

 

Damn right son. Ben flipped out, and although we don't know the exact circumstances, went on to murder a bunch of presumed innocents in response.

 

Without trying to come off as a dick, this thread is exemplary of the Age of Trumpism, and the politicization of the trivial:

"RAAAH, RAAAH, this product that I am otherwise unrelated to represents me as a person - and everybody who disagrees with me is either not telling the truth, or has ulterior and nefarious motives."


I watched Episode VII and Episode VIII at the local cinema's respective midnight premieres. Audiences reacted very, very negatively, with TLJ even provoking ironic laughter, and chants of "bantha poodoo, bantha poodoo". People who had entered the theater in costume left mid-movie. Grown men cried on our way out. - Either my experiences are very, very extreme, and not representative of the overall response - OR, in fact, there seems to be a large portion of the audience who fervently disliked what they saw.

What shall I say? Having witnessed reactions like that, I don't think one needs conspiracy theories to justify mixed scores and reactions. - Whether the negative reactions would be justified would be a different discussion; but to try to universally discredit any dissenters of one's own opinion seems fairly inappropriate.

 

I don't think this represents a problem with TLJ but with today's society as a whole.

 

"Yeah, we had to regress Luke into a prequel Jedi, ultimately stunting the thematic progression of the entire saga in the process, because of our startling lack of creativity which is given away by the fact that The Last Jedi walks back on what little nuance it had in the beginning in order to make the good guys and bad guys more separated and bland than ever. Now, that's innovation."