THREAD FOR THOSE WHO HATED THE MOVIE

This kind of hyperbole really undercuts any argument you're trying to make. Rian Johnson was already a proven talent before he wrote/directed The Last Jedi. Arguing that RJ is a bad writer is like saying audiences who don't like the film "don't get it." Both extremes are silly. You simply don't like his story choices.

 

Huh? Rian Johnson was a proven talent? You want to chastise others for saying extreme or silly things, but want to call Johnson a proven talent?

Before TLJ he had directed 4 TV episodes no writing credentials that I am aware of. He has written and directed 3 movies. Brick being so-so at best, Brothers Bloom being pretty bad, and his best being Looper.

I don't think that qualifies him as a proven talent? Unless you want to throw in the music videos he has done or his short film "Demon Golf Ball From Hell" I think it was called....

I don't think one hitmovie makes someone a proven talent. So silly and extreme statements are always getting thrown around it seems.

 

No I disliked his writing lol.

 

So if you're a body guard for someone important, you can't like them too? That doesn't seem right. I'm pretty sure the implication that some fans are body guards is that some fans take any negative feedback of the film and attack or try to convince the person, others (and probably themselves) that what that person felt and observed was in some way wrong. I don't see how that means the person who's defending that part of the movie is not a fan, that person just feels slighted that someone else didn't appreciate what he or she appreciated.

I think you're reading something into body guard that really isn't there. Body guard does not exclude fandom, at worst it implies fanboy who'll like anything, but even then it would be a bit of a stretch.

 

If he wasn't a "proven talent" he wouldn't have got the Star Wars gig in the first place. Otherwise, we'd all have a shot at directing the next Star Wars movie.
I'd also say there is a difference between being known to be a "proven talent" within the industry and known to be one by the public.

--- Double Post Merged, Mar 14, 2018, Original Post Date: Mar 14, 2018 ---

Two points.

I see it like this:

Luke thought the cyclical fight between light and dark was because of the Jedi monopolising the force. And because of this, because they became so powerful, it meant that the Dark Side would rise to be as powerful and dangerous: "powerful light, powerful dark".

That was his justification and it made sense. However, I also think this was Luke looking for a reason because of his lack of self confidence. It struck me that Luke wanted to be this wise, venerable Jedi in the mould of Yoda and Kenobi. But when he messed up he didn't know what to do to fix it. He was always "looking to the horizon" as Yoda tells him. He had too much on his shoulders and he failed to remain in the moment (a lesson Yoda and Kenobi learned and wouldn't forget). And so, he seeks to convince himself that the Jedi are better off out of it and he uses what facts he knows (see above & his knowledge of the rise of the Sith) to justify this to himself. Deep down, he was never going to abandon the Jedi way. He was fooling himself as much as anyone else when we meet him in TLJ - again, this is shown when he talks with Yoda and is aghast when his old master destroys the sacred tree! The real Luke is there all along but he is wearing a "mask". It's why he has been on that island doing nothing - how many times did he wander to the beacon in his ceremonial garb, contemplating joining the Force? He probably did it every week and then put it off....and then Rey arrived.

He's the same Luke to me. Just more nuanced & interesting.

 

Nicely written.

Your reasoning is pretty sound and much of it I got to without writing it out. It's nice to read someone else's thoughts and realize it mimics your own. It would have been nice to have had more in TLJ on Luke's fall from RotJ to the Kylo/Luke flashback to the present in TLJ. I think there's a lot to fill in, a lot of story to tell and without it many of us fans are very much struggling with accepting the leaps. I feel that TLJ could have almost been split into 2 movies (or more) to explain Luke's path from then to now. There are some revelations that I think much of the fandom needed (needs) and hopefully it comes in 9. Expecting fans to make that leap, especially with such a fan favorite, was ambitious. I found Anakin rushed too in the PT in a very similar way. Clone Wars is almost a necessary viewing to make his fall to the dark side plausible. I think Luke's character from RotJ to TLJ suffers from much of the same rush, that skips over just a few too many details to get all fans on board.

 

Thanks man, that's nice.

Yeah, I think we'd all loved to have seen Luke's development - for me, not out of necessity but because I'd just love to see it! I think the problem was that when we saw Luke last he was the "great hero" and then we had 30 yrs of computer games and stories where he remained the same hero. So when we see him in the ST it's a shock to the system. But it makes sense.

I guess in terms of the rush, it's kind of hard to prevent. Anakin's was different as Lucas made some errors and Anakin going from Jedi hero to child murdering psycho was a leap, to say the least. But I guess my justification is that these are two hour fairy tale fantasy movies. There is a lot left open to interpretation and sometimes there just isn't the time to show everything. I think another issue might've been that TFA spent the entire time keeping Luke as a mystery rather than providing us with any real background on what happened to him. Perhaps it would've been better to not build up the mysterious Luke reveal and just give us more information on what happened in that film? Hard to say, it's a balancing act. But I have to say that I loved what RJ did with Luke and it's enjoyable to think for myself about what actually happened to him.

 

If this were Episode 8 & 9 (possibly filmed together) then maybe it does work better for fans like me. This is a good post.

 

For over a thousand generations the Jedi Knights were the guardians of peace and justice in the old Republic.

Then their enemies all but wiped them out and the galaxy fell under the yoke of a ruthless Autocracy. Twice.

What's the issue with Yoda or Luke seeing these turn of events as a failure of the Jedi Order?


P.S. Sorry for questioning your posts so often.
I feel like it could seem like I'm singling you out!

P.P.S. I don't hate the movie but aren't here to dis or proselytize.
I like to understand why people see things differently and I often learn a thing or two!

 

So your counter to my "hyperbole claim" is more hyperbole. I'd rather not argue about what films you think are "so-so." Rian Johnson had written and directed three films. That's a proven talent. Sorry if you disagree.

 

So what makes him a proven talent? Just saying that it's because he got the Star Wars "gig" doesn't say much actually. Kennedy's track record on picking writers/directors so far has some blemishes on it. Gareth Edwards movie (Rogue One) needed massive re-shoots and editing in order to get it into Disney's approval. Lord and Miller on Solo? Trevorrow on Episode 9? So yeah, just because he got the gig doesn't really stand as good praise for Johnson because the person handing out the gigs has had some flubs.

Maybe it's Johnson's expertise on writing or directing other Huge Budget, Franchise films? Oh yeah there was that movie.... that had that budget of..... yeah sorry. "Looper" was his biggest budget before TLJ at a whopping 30 million dollars! So this was Johnson's first foray into a mainstream movie. His other 3 movies previous to TLJ were Indie movies... I mean lets flip this on what Kennedy has said about Female directors. She has basically said that they are waiting on a Female director that can handle the responsibility of a Star Wars movie. There are plenty of Female directors that have far more experience than Johnson, far larger resumes than Johnson, but Johnson is proven after 3 movies, none of which have a budget of over 30 million, in fact the combined budget of his movies are under $51 million.... But Kennedy can't find a "proven" female director?

So basically, again, what has Johnson done that makes him proven? I'm sorry, but you will have to go further than basically just because you say so, i.e. he got the Star Wars gig. the 3 Indie films? The lack of experience with big budget films?

For me, I always found Kennedy's pick of Johnson strange when she lays out the reasons why she won't hand a Star Wars movie over to a woman director.

And that's the problem... Balance being powerful light and powerful dark was never part of Lucas's movies. What is clear in Lucas's movies is that balance means that evil is not powerful, that while evil will never disappear, balance can only be achieved by a strong Light and a dilapidated dark. That balance is a powerful light and a not as powerful dark. What the Force does is not create powerful evil to rise and counter powerful light. The Force creates Powerful light to counter powerful evil (Anakin Skywalker) because powerful evil is a cancer on the Force.

This idea of a powerful light and powerful dark as balance, IMO, again comes from fan theories and the fandom. That when fans of the movies close their eyes and in their minds eye, role-play themselves as Jedi, they want to be able to be Jedi (the good guy), but, at the same time be able to be angry, and use lightning, and have red light sabers etc etc etc. They want to be Jedi, but, they want to get married and have sex. They don't want to sacrifice personal pleasures for the power of the Force, which is the problem with Anakin. They basically want to have the best of both worlds, so they bend their ideas of the Force around their personal ideologies instead of what Lucas has shown in his movies. I think this is the trap that Johnson falls into, why he lets Luke blame the Jedi, and why he doesn't have Yoda correct Luke, but, instead allows Luke to lay that blame of failure at the Jedi Order's Feet. Failure is a good teacher, or in other words, we learn from our mistakes, but, we first have to actually detail what those mistakes were, and what those "failures" were in order to learn. Whether those mistakes are actually part of the failure or are they just unattached correlations.

Example: If a person is constantly being arrested fro DWI's, and claims they're going to learn from their mistakes, and than go on to say that the mistake is that they're driving down the wrong streets that make them visible to the police, well than they aren't learning from failure, or from their mistakes. Or if they come to the conclusion that they are getting DWI's because they are making a correlation that cheating on their wife is causing them to get DWI's, well they aren't going to learn.

The Lucas movies never show the Jedi are monopolizing the Force. In fact, the Jedi only search within the Republic for their Padawans. They don't search outside of the Republic, i.e. the outer rim territories that are part of the same Galaxy that the Republic is in. So there are the potential for million/billions of powerful Force Users not under the tutelage of the Jedi or their teachings. That leaves at least thousands of Star Wars systems to develop their own views and practices of the Force. We are talking about one part of one "galaxy" in the Star Wars Universe where the Jedi are the main practitioners of the Force, but, logic tells us they aren't the only ones. They also clearly reject some candidates, they don't just kidnap kids, they don't snatch babies from mothers arms. So at the "height of their power" the Jedi had approx 10,000 Jedi in service. Clearly a lot of potential Jedi are not in the Jedi Order because in a Republic of tens of thousands of planets, with hundreds of billions, if not hundreds of trillions of beings, and they only get 10,000 Jedi at the height of their power? They aren't killing those that refuse to join the Jedi are they? Have you any evidence that they are destroying other groups or organizations of Force Users that try to use the Force for good?

Again, this is the problem I have with Rian Johnson and his views of the Force. It comes more from the view of a fan that wants his cake and eat it too, that ignores what came before in order for him to have his own sandbox to play in. It purposely ignores that the Prequels set up that the range of Jedi is limited to just the Republic, that the Jedi are not the Force, they just practice it, in one part of one galaxy, in the overall huge universe. They don't try to shove their beliefs down the throats of the Republic. They aren't trying to build a religion of billions. They aren't knocking on your door asking if you'd like a subscription to the "Jedi Tower".

However, the Jedi stood for over a thousand generations. They stood and protected the Republic for that period. And because of one Sith Lord, and one bad apple that made greedy choices, now the Jedi are vain? Their hubris led to the fall of the Republic? They're failures?

 

Post deleted because sum 1 else brought up the same thing.

 

...

OK, there are many female directors out there that have written and directed more films than Johnson, yet, Kennedy has said:

So why the discrepancy? What "bigger budget" movie did Johnson direct? Three indie films makes you a proven writer/director? Budget doesn't matter? Box Office response doesn't matter? Public reaction doesn't matter? Critical reaction doesn't matter?

Just making three movies, is all that is needed to be "proven".

What makes him proven? Just three films? There are plenty of female filmmakers out there that have done more than three films, with bigger budgets. So what makes Johnson more proven than any others? Just because you say so? Just because @DailyPlunge says that making three films thus makes a proven talent? Sorry, if I don't take your word for it and am looking for more substabtial evidence

 

So why did KK hire him? I mean, what is your actual point here? That KK just drew names out of a bag? Clearly, the powers that be at Disney and LFL came together with a list of upcoming directors that they thought would be a good fit. RJ was on that list. Clearly, he has talent. He successfully made good movies and was clearly well thought of in Hollywood. Looper proved he could work with big stars and make a reasonably sized budget sci fi movie. The fact is, he was signed up and managed TLJ very well - regardless of what you think of it. He made the film. He got on screen his vision. He handled the budget. So KK was right in thinking he was a proven talent. Unless you don't think making a movie, any movie, is such a big deal?

Why didn't she hire female directors? Ask her. Maybe she interviewed a few and they didn't fit like RJ did? Perhaps the more established female directors had no interest in making a Star Wars movie? I don't care really. There will be a female directed Star Wars film at some point soon. But RJ got TLJ on his own merits as a proven talent. If he wasn't, he wouldn't ever have been in with a shot.

The Force is the energy created by all living things and desires balance. The role of those that serve the light is to maintain this fine balance. The Dark Siders destroy the balance to gain more personal power. When the dark siders rule, dark outweighs the light and "evil is everywhere". But when the Jedi destroy the Dark Siders, the true balance is the equality of light and dark. Good and evil still exist. Love and hate. But it's equal. The evil simply is no longer empowered over good by the Dark Siders.

Luke's point about the Jedi is that by dominating so much, by being so powerful - they not only became blind to the Dark Side but they empowered it as well because they went too far. They thought that by maintaining the order the way they did, that they'd ensure peace. But it made them arrogant and rigid, enabling the Dark Side/Sith to rise. The more powerful the Jedi became, the more they empowered the Sith. It's no coincidence that the Jedi's demise and Sith's rise came when the Jedi were at the height of their powers.

The point about "powerful light/powerful dark" then has always existed. The more you love something, the more you hate that which threatens it. But regardless of this, you also seem to forget that it was the light (Rey) that rose to meet the darkness (Ren). And so, taking this literally, it could just simply be once again the Force doing what it did in Lucas' films and empowering the light side to take down the evil. That is what Snoke foresaw and warned against.

So all these points connect but cannot be compared in the same way.

 

My 2 Cents on this question......

Just like Ryan Johnson tried to put it all across TLJ.... It's Just a case of BALANCE. (and let's forget the persons and focus on what the persons actually did, the Movie itself)

I Liked TLJ and it's ORIGINAL Plot BUT I Firmly Believe TLJ is a great waste of exceptional Characters, Luke is portraid like a mad ermit (but so diferent from Yoda in Empire), we will never get Luke interaction in the new plot nor the retcon with the old characters, SW fans waited 40 Years to watch the final development of our loved farmboy into a powerfull Jedi Knight protector of the galaxy but that's GONE, FOREVER WASTED. Leia character choices seemed forced, R2 and T3PO are Replaced by BB8, Snoke never really counted for anything, Hux was just demoted to a Teen crying for his daddy\Supreme Leader, Knights of Ren could had potential to develop but forgotten, Chewie reduced to Porg Lover, Finn completely forgotten in the big picture. I mean i know Kylo Ren and Poe are excelent characters to work with but the new SW movies shouldn't be ALL ABOUT THEM, and i firmly believe that Kylo Ren should get "Darker", Vader Like, to became the best SW Character of all time, and TLJ portraid a very lame Kylo Ren (the naked torso scene please????).

What i'm trying to say here is that despite "The Last Jedi" being a very good Movie, it's not one of the best SW Movies IN MY OPINION (OK. it fits easelly in the best 8-9 SW Movies of all time) and it completelly wastes SW main character Luke Skywalker and for a diehard SW Fan like me that's unforgiveable!

 

What I didn't get exactly ?

Just tell me in two sentences, what can be considered as a smart move or a brilliant one because I might be dumb as Hux but I don't get it at all ?

 

Because they aren't failures of the Jedi Order. I am sorry, but, your line of questioning completely ignores the lessons of the Prequels.

Democracy isn't destroyed because a religious group has rules people don't like. Democracies are destroyed by the people voluntarily handing power over to dictators.

TLJ completely disregards the lessons of the Prequels, that Democracy dies through thunderous applause of the people. Not because a Jedi can't get married, or because a Jedi can't have attachments. Or because the Jedi are the biggest group of Force Users in the Republic. The Jedi are the victims of the peoples choice and the greed and corruption that we as people have in ourselves. Again, I am not trying to make the Jedi out to be perfect, because they weren't.

Instead what happens is that many fans don't like the rules of the Jedi based on personal ideologies, so they find ways to blame the Jedi for the fall of the Republic. Which completely skips over the fact that the people, the politicians, had become greedy and twisted. It ignores that it's the people that handed Palpatine the power, not the Jedi. It ignores that the people became complacent in the face of a fictitious boogie man (Palpatine's fake Jedi Rebellion against the Republic) which caused the people to voluntarily hand their rights over. It ignores that the people applauded Palpatine's creation of an Empire, because they could no longer vote on whether one should be created. It ignores that the EMpire was created after the Jedi were destroyed because Palpatine knew they were the only force for good that would be able to stop him, because Palptine knew he had the people under control.

So it is a major problem for me that TLJ has Luke and Yoda blaming the Jedi for the rise of Sidious, because that is not what happens in the Prequels. However, again, this story line mimics a lot of fans thoughts on the Jedi because they don't like where Lucas went with the Rules of the Jedi Order.

 

Yes, yes, @Benjamin Lewis - to @Sparafucile you should listen...

 

Gawd, I sat through 3/4 of it last night to see if I might change my opinion but, no. I'd forgotten how shocking a lot of the script is, particularly the 'humorous' elements. Also, I'm still completely taken out of the movie with the use of "bloody" and "God's speed". Additionally, I think the pan down after the opening crawl is particularly off. Nothing can or will change the fact that it's particularly poorly scripted, something that it just cannot recover from and I can't believe professional people received money for this.

Edit: Hux has undergone such a fundamental change in character that's practically a new one. And I just can't forgive RJ writing Luke's first action, after TFA's glorious set up of him, and that achingly long wait, only for him to 'comedically' toss the lightsaber. Jesus.