What Could Have Improved Canto Bight?

I enjoyed the Canto Bight scene . . . until Rose began to "splain" to Finn in a condescending way about the corruption behind it. Worse, I hated it that her speech about how she and her sister had suffered as child slaves was written to shame Finn, when he had an equally traumatic childhood. I would have preferred if both of them had discovered the corruption behind it together.

 

Nothing can save it : this planet is off-topic to begin with.

It's like having a "meanwhile in Switzerland" every 10 minutes in "Dunnkirk" or "Saving private Ryan". Sure, they got richer while the rest of the world was busy fighing WWII, but is it worth mentionning in the movie ? Don't we have a more imporrtant story to tell ?

This should have been a more "middlecass" planet :
_ we badly needed to get a glimpse of what's happening in 99% of the Galaxy, instead of visiting the 1% who don't care about the conflict.
_ we also needed a planet more appropriate for fast-paced devlopment : a Casino World is great for intrigues, politic and spy stuff, not so much for action.

@HothLeia : you forgot to mention the most cringeworthy moment of that sequence : the parking infraction stuff ! It's wrong on so many levels i don't know where to begin...

 

It needed to be cut. CTRent29 raises an interesting point about child slaves too. Why would Rose have to lecture Finn about that, given his background of a FO soldier? It's a plot thread begun in TFA and not picked up in TLJ; heck it may even have been forgotten as Finn just, IIRC, allows Rose to lecture him about something that he should already know about. It also makes saving the animals - and the emphasis given on that by Rose - rather than the children even more stupid and incomprehensible.

 

It's a great setting visually, I think the art development team did an amazing job at capturing the Star Wars feel while still managing to create something original. You could hardly tell it was Dubrovnik, which means they did a good job. It didn't look like Earth at all.

What totally destroyed my suspension of disbelief though, was the actual casino guests themselves. The police were fine, they felt like Star Wars, but the casino guests felt like they were taken from any futuristic sci-fi film. Be it Hunger Games, Blade Runner, Ghost in the Shell, Elysium, or whatever. Point is, the casino guests made Canto Bight feel like it was EARTH. And that was a shame. The Earth-like suits and dresses, the champagne glasses, the craps tables - oh god. The aliens looked so bland since they were all fair-skinned, so you barely noticed them among all the Earthy stuff.

 

Canto Bight was stupid. What does that have to with Finn, and where he comes from? I thought they were going to actually give a damn, and go iinto the mindset of his character. Not just ignore who he is and only concern themselves with putting a weapon in his hand. Finn was right in TFA. The Resistance barely has an army. He would have been better off going to the outer rim. At least there he could finally have a life that is his own.

 

interesting point @Boss Vos : too much Earth here, you summed up all, I add the "horse race" thing.
Too much Earth, not a single old alien to enjoy (twilek, zabrak, gamorrean, ...) , and not enough time to watch all the new ones.

 

If the CGI had been a 10/10 and there were less new aliens and more familiar ones (Twi'leks and a couple of Wookiees for example) then it would have worked much better for me. WAY too many new aliens in there and the designs didn't feel Star Wars to me (I had this same issue with Maz Kanata's castle)

On one hand it brought back an Attack of the Clones feel, which is a great thing following TFA's reluctance to acknowledge them.. but on the other hand these new aliens made it feel way different to previous films.

 

I don't even know where to begin... the whole thing was awkward, clunky, and really took me out of the movie.

 

It's kind of telling that most votes are for our preferred solutions, lol

The only thing that I could think of is if they're followed or encountered by F.O. forces, making the reveal that the CB residents are also funding the Resistance even more impactful instead of exposition about it. F.O. supporters or military presence (minimal) would have reinforced the nefarious nature of CB without exposition. We would assume the same without exposition from Rose, and it would be more impactful when DJ reveals that they also sneak funds to the Resistance. Other than that, most comments here are about which aliens we preferred to see.

I did hear that there was a bit more footage on CB that was cut. I wonder if there would be enough to make a 30 minute short. Faneditors get on that if the footage is ever released - CB would make a great episode of Clone Wars/Rebels, but in this case, live-action!

 

There are some moments of the Canto Bight sequences that I do enjoy. Mainly, John William's score throughout the Fathier chase sequence. That scene gives me the chills (in a good way).

But overall, I still can't get behind the sequence, even after three viewings.

We're initially thrust into Canto Bight with fun visuals and music. It's quite a tonal shift from where the film just was, but that can be forgivable to an extent. Then, almost immediately, Rose drops an exposition bomb on us. Oh......all of these people are villains...because.....you say so? Ok, I guess.....

Maybe they're bad because they threw our heroes in prison? But.....our heroes did something criminal that got them thrown into prison....

Ok, so the people of Canto Bight are horrible people. So Finn and Rose destroy their entire setting in a manner that probably would have killed a lot of innocent people.....because that's okay...??

Then on top of all that, they're sent to find a code breaker on Canto Bight who is a one-of-a-kind person with the skills they need. They can't get to him, and are thrown in prison, only to be in a cell with a random guy who just so happens to also know those same skills.


I like TLJ, but most of the Canto Bight sequence is very hard to get past.

I voted for removing Rose's exposition in favor of something more substantial.

 

The Canto Bight Casino exists so that Disney can put it in their Star Wars themepark so adults can have a gamble and Disney makes more money.
There is literally no other explanation for this planet.

 

Yes there is.

Literally.

 

It is the least imaginative location of any Star Wars movie. When you hear there will be a Star Wars casino it sounds so exciting and like it will be full of interesting creatures, strange games - but no. Instead we get a Casino mainly populated by people in tuxedos in a location where, save for a waterfall it was pretty much just Earth. Deeply unimaginative. Not to mention the planet looking like a desert from space but mainly ocean when we visit it!

Then there is the storyline that takes place on it which you could pretty much remove from the movie and it would be of very little consequence.

 

It's not my favorite of the movie. The problem with me is it goes quite fast. So fast you don't get time to absorb alot or understand alot. I don't hate it. It should've been introduced earlier but the problem with that is it can't.

 

It's missing: my dad at the sabacc table losing everything (I'm going for funny, not emo, but he was a degenerate gambler)

Kidding aside, I disagree when people call it pointless. It shows how there's a class of people living the high life off all the bloodshed no matter who is winning. I think it ties in with the fact that no other systems answer the distress call. The chase being over parking might be my only complaint though

 

It's illogical together with the chase and tracking scenes which prompted it. The writers should have come up with a better major conflict for the movie.

 

I vote "Other".
Han showing up and shooting first would have made this scene better.

I am surprised they didn't add R2-D2 to the scene and literally use him as a trash can. There's always hope for a movie "Return to Canto Bight"