The Star Wars Thread

[The Unknown Poster]

17 minutes ago, JCon said:

I truly liked how they connected Rey and Ren. The ability to see one-another and communicate directly was very unique.

If the future is without Jedi (or a Jedi order) and it's just a pair of Force-sensitive entities bordering on dark and light, I'm okay with that.

I didnt mind that at all because it creates a deeper connection between those two.  As I recall, Snoke said he was the one creating that link.  Which again shows us how powerful he is. 

In TFA, Kylo clearly knew who she was both by his reaction to being told of a "girl" on the planet and demanding to know "what girl".  And it was cut but originally when he's reading her mind he says "it IS you".  Han also reacts oddly to her saying her name (and her name was changed before filming from Kira which could be just a routine change or because they would reveal her real name was Kira).  So I strongly believe JJ has different ideas for these characters than Rian showed us in Jedi.

The idea that the Jedi were wrong is fine with me.  Luke as much as says so.  And the OT supports this.  because Yoda and Ben are both against Luke leaving his training to help his friends.  Yoda is even against training Luke altogether (though that begs the question as to why he waited so long then but this might be accepted as Yoda doubting himself in the wake of his perceived failure in the PT).   Yoda & Ben both want Luke to fully train and kill Vader, not turn him.  So OT shows us they are still committed to THEIR Jedi ways.

But Luke isnt.  Its this way that the PT supports the OT because Luke is very much like his father.  He is emotional, always looking ahead, somewhat easy to anger and frustrate.  He believes in love and forming relationships and wants to be heroic.  So the idea that Luke would bring about a new Jedi order based on his beliefs is easy to buy.

And Yoda destroying the force tree and, presumably the books, is a way for Yoda to finally admit he was wrong.  In Luke's own perceived failure, he turns away from HIS beliefs and now feels the Jedi have to end because neither the original teachings or his own can work.  Yoda is reinforcing to Luke that its not a failure of his teachings and he shouldn't go back to the past.

At least thats how it works in my head.

Kylo being Dark pulled to the light and Rey being light pulled to the dark works for me.  But her being a Skywalker works for me.  I think they didnt do that because they over-reacted to people saying TFA was  rehash.  But a rehash that works is better than a "new" direction that doesnt.  Rey and Kylo both being SKywalkers works for me because its a continuation of Anakin, the Chosen One.  His son who redeems him and his grandchildren who represent a new age of Force user and a new age for the "Jedi".

Rey rejecting Luke and teaming with Kylo while Kylo rejects Snoke and teams with Rey works if Snoke remains this unbelievably powerful entity.  And let the next film include Luke realizing this and helping them, completing their training so they can defeat Snoke.

[JCon]

Let's not forget, that the Dark Side went through this reckoning quite a while ago. The Sith were big and eventually were taken down. That's when it was decided that there would be one Sith Lord and one Sith Apprentice. And, although it took a while, the Sith became ever-powerful again.

It makes sense that the Jedi would do the same.

[Logan007]

One of the biggest issues I had with Luke, is the whole "sneak into his nephew's hut like an assassin to try and kill him because he's turning to the dark side".  That's not Luke.  And Luke isn't about giving up either.

What he should have done was have Ben turn on Luke and have a battle at the Jedi Academy.  Luke wins but can't kill his nephew, then the other apprentices that he's turned as well knock out Luke and burn the temple down.

This movie just felt so....un-Luke like.

[The Unknown Poster]

11 minutes ago, Logan007 said:

One of the biggest issues I had with Luke, is the whole "sneak into his nephew's hut like an assassin to try and kill him because he's turning to the dark side".  That's not Luke.  And Luke isn't about giving up either.

What he should have done was have Ben turn on Luke and have a battle at the Jedi Academy.  Luke wins but can't kill his nephew, then the other apprentices that he's turned as well knock out Luke and burn the temple down.

This movie just felt so....un-Luke like.

Yup.  Like what the heck was Rey's Force Vision about in TFA?  Its meaningless now, at least as we stand.  Because the key things were the lightsaber calling to her, her flashback to the temple burning, and the hints of Vader vs Luke from Empire.  All of that hinted at something that was not remotely addressed or added to in Jedi.

I can buy Luke snuck into Ben's hut to read his mind.  But the idea Luke had a momentary lapse where he considered killing him?  Not a chance.  Not ever.  The entire point of the OT was that the biggest, baddest, most evil dude in the Universe was vader and the good guys had only ONE chance to kill him, Luke, but Luke refused. 

Their point is Snoke was in Kylo's head already and Kylo thinking Luke was there to kill him is what put Kylo over the edge.  But its rather lame story telling.  Didnt Snoke say TFA that Luke cannot be allowed to return or something like that?  It makes far more sense that Snoke would set up Kylo to kill Luke in a surprise, not the other way around.

You can read between the lines with every interview Mark Hamil gives that he didnt like it, didnt buy it and its ****. 

[JCon]

2 hours ago, Logan007 said:

One of the biggest issues I had with Luke, is the whole "sneak into his nephew's hut like an assassin to try and kill him because he's turning to the dark side".  That's not Luke.  And Luke isn't about giving up either.

What he should have done was have Ben turn on Luke and have a battle at the Jedi Academy.  Luke wins but can't kill his nephew, then the other apprentices that he's turned as well knock out Luke and burn the temple down.

This movie just felt so....un-Luke like.

I blocked that whole part out... And now you've brought it back!

 

It made no sense. And clearly, Ben was conflicted, just like Grandpa, so ,why couldn't he be saved like Anakin was??

 

Who's going to save ME now from this movie?!

[wbbfan]

7 hours ago, Logan007 said:

Same, hate the casino story line.

 

If Obiwan and Satine were her parents...she'd be as old, if not older, then Luke.  Grandparents yes.  Parents no.

grand parents might indeed work better. 

18 hours ago, JCon said:

That would be some timeline. Bring back the Mandalorians!

 

Side note: I thought Rey looked much older in this film. Something about her face in the first one made her look exceptionally young but she seemed to age about 5 to 8 years by The Last Jedi. 

Hell ya to the mandalorians! I suspend my belief for laser cannons talking frog people and hokey super power religions Im willing to be flexible lol. 

Really I just wish for resolution in some great character story lines. Oh and wookie jedis, I wish for wookie jedi/sith.

Also, Id love to see the next series work on different angles in the star wars universe. Sith/smuggler protagonist etc. I also have a huge nerd boner for the EU. 

[Wanna-B-Fanboy]

On 18/12/2017 at 2:15 PM, JCon said:

I'll add, this could be my least favourite of all the films. That includes Jar Jar Binks and midichlorian ruining, Phantom Menace. At least, that had an epic lightsaber duel. This had.... ?

Did you go to the bathroom during the snoke scene?

[JCon]

1 hour ago, wanna-b-fanboy said:

Did you go to the bathroom during the snoke scene?

They didn't fight each other. They used lightsabers but there was no duel. 

[Taynted_Fayth]

Always wondered why/how Luke just put it upon himself to somehow spy on Bens dreams as he notices he's struggling with some internal conflict. If that was common place when there is concern with a padawan you would think Yoda/Obi-Wan/Qui-Gon Jinn/Mace Windu or anyone else who came across a young angry and scared Anakin all those years ago would have said oooh snap we got a future darth vader up in here, lets light saber his ass now.

Didn't like the comedy, too much too often,  felt like they were trying to make a marvel SW. And I think force floating Leia in space was my least fav part of the movie,  really started to lose interest after that point

[The Unknown Poster]

Saw it again. I dislike it less. Which is faint praise. And likely owing to a magnificent performance by Mark Hamill. Truly a great performance with lousy material. 

Plus I do like the cast a lot. 

But it remains very disjointed. It undermines the OT. I think the bad guy should have been Palps in some way. If snoke was actually Darth Plagius who survived Palps betrayal and Palps has a presence as a force ghost especially as a relation of Rey’s. It connects all three trilogies and it makes the OT connect to this Trilogy better. 

As it is, we had the happy ending of Return and how on earth did Snoke and the first order rise?  

Luke is critical of the Jedi from the PT era and rightfully so for allowing Sidious to rise and turn Anakin. But he did the same thing. He said he knew Snoke had already turned Ben so that means Snoke was a known bad guy back when Luke was training Jedi. Why would he allow that?  

Luke would never abandon the fight either. Knowing Ben turned, he would never run off leaving Leia and Han’s son to run roughshod with a band of Jedi trainees. It’s almost irredeemably bad of Luke. 

I can buy Luke hiding if he felt HE was somehow the problem. In Jedi he even says I shouldn’t have come, in jeopardizing the mission. But hide out of shame? Come on. 

It just makes no sense. 

Even small things seem designed to minimize the previous films in favour of the new kids. His line about not being afraid enough when he saw the same power he saw in Rey, it doesn’t make sense. Firstly he momentarily considered killing his own nephew. But imagine if that line was I saw this raw power before, in the Emporer...in my father. And I wasn’t afraid then. I saw it in Ben and I see it in you. And I’m afraid. 

Way meatier. Pays heed to the precious films.   It’s a great line because Luke told Yoda one empire that he wasn’t afraid and Yoda replied “you will be”. 

They showed Luke’s ship on the island. That seemed like a foreshadow. Luke should have actually showed up. What difference does it make?  To show us he’s so powerful he can force project?  Great. 

Instead have him actually show up. Have him force repel all the blaster fire. Have him crush a walker with the force. Have him toss aside another. And then engage in an epic duel with Kylo. Show us Kylo gaining power through his hatred. Have Luke sort of lose because he won’t kill Kylo but is shocked and overwhelmed by the dark side in Kylo. Kylo escapes. Luke is hurt and then realizes Kylo cannot be saved.   Even better have liea pleade with luke to save him and then she realizes he can’t be saved and her admitting this to Luke absolves him of his guilt. 

Get rid of the whole casino sub plot  Maz admits she could do the job but is too busy with a union despite? Okay we get it  funny funny  but what’s more important?  Pointless cameo  

or have describe someone they need and when they go on the mission to find him (maybe he’s in prison), it’s Lando.  Del Toro is awesome minus the stuttering but that whole subplot was terrible

This was a scrip with some good stuff but it was half baked and needed more time. 

[17to85]

Well finally got around to watching this movie... and I really do believe there was a good movie in there but peeeyeeeewwww the writing in that movie was just awful. 

I don't even know where to start there are a lot of things I really disliked about the movie. I don't outright hate the movie as a lot of people do, I actually felt that they did justice to Kylo Ren and I did overall like the ending of the movie (despite the flaws there too) but the first 2 acts? god awful and mostly because of the writing. 

Poe becomes and unlikable insubordinate who fucks everything up, Finn has a completely useless storyline that accomplishes nothing, seriously if he was never in the movie it wouldn't have changed anything about it. Luke is done OK at times but ultimately too wasted. You build up Snoke as an all powerful big bad in the universe and then have him die like a ***** without ever explaining a single thing about him. I can live with his death like that to further Kylo's character, but you can't just say he's the biggest baddest dude around and not give us any further information. 

Far too much telling rather than showing in this movie. 

I also hated the bullshit forced tension of a space chase. The resistance ships are faster than the first order ships and that's how they get away, OK I can buy that, but you're telling me that they can't pull away after that much time and actually get out of range? That's soooooo lame and symptomatic of the poor writing in this movie. 

In the climax if they were determined to have Luke die than I woulda had him show up in his X-Wing at the end and **** **** up and then actually duel Kylo Ren and not waste the opportunity to give the "If you strike me down I shall become more powerful than you can possibly imagine" speech. Since they are so determined to rehash things from the original trilogies that was a wasted opportunity in my mind. Which brings me to another point, yes we all like Yoda, but I can't help but think it would have been more impactful to have Obi-Wan show up as a force ghost to Luke instead. 

So yeah, I don't know a whole lot about Rian Johnson but the problems with this movie all seem to be his fault. Bad writing, bad directing, no one to blame but him. 

[JCon]

17 minutes ago, 17to85 said:

...it would have been more impactful to have Obi-Wan show up as a force ghost to Luke instead. . 

Yeah, but that would have cost a lot. They took the easy, cheap laugh, way out, as they did with the rest of this movie.

[17to85]

10 minutes ago, JCon said:

Yeah, but that would have cost a lot. They took the easy, cheap laugh, way out, as they did with the rest of this movie.

ehhh I know Alec Guiness is long dead but they could just got Ewan McGregor for a cameo. It wouldn't be the biggest gripe people had about the movie, not by a long shot. 

[Atomic]

You know I thought Ewan McGregor did a fantastic job in the prequels.  That trilogy gets a lot of hate but I liked McGregor.

[The Unknown Poster]

When watching it i really thought we’d see Ben and Anakin. Luke walks away from Yoda and I thought Ben would appear to him. He’s walk away and anakin would appear. 

Ewen is dying to reprise the role and did a voice cameo in TFA so why not?

i like Kylo but without Snoke he’s a weak, frustrated angry kid. There isn’t a lot of steam behind Kylo vs Rey with these two characters.  Luke vs Snoke?  Sure. Absolutely. But they screwed that up. 

[Brandon]

I couldn't get through all the whining comments from the nerds in this thread.   Dear lord cry babies because they kill off original characters.  I remember reading on here when people cried about TFA being to much like the originals?

As possibly the only non nerd cry baby on here,  I thought the movie was absolutely amazing.   2nd best Star Wars flick after Empire Strikes Back.

Bluto saying it was slow and boring?  GTFO here....  everyone in the theater today were shocked that 2.5 hours went by so fast because it was so exciting.  I couldn't think of any points in the movie that dragged.  Way more action then I expected and the action was great.

Wtf people expected? Luke being the main super hero?  He's friggin ancient and had a nice scene at the end.  

The comedy bits were great and not forced. 

The only complaints I would have which were very minor was the Leia flying through space looked funny,   the mechanic girl falling in love with Finn and the lack of Jedi training with Rey. 

Overall great movie and such a breathe of fresh air that I did not expect. 

[johnzo]

Saw it again tonight, liked it even better. 

Thing I caught this time that I missed before was Kylo Ren's offhanded thing about Rey not being able to project herself to him, the effort world kill her.  That's why Luke died /disappeared / whatever at the end ... he used too much Force.

And holy crap those scenes on Krayt were beautiful .. white salt churned to red then scorched to black, the silhouetted walkers, the command ship overhead .. Luke going out to meet them ... just gorgeous.  

Also really liked the parallel between Star Wars and this movie with the Jedi .. both times, the old Jedi sacrifices himself in a distraction so the next generation can get away aboard the Falcon.

The magic of this movie for me is how it showed me these old Star Wars story beats and makes them both familiar and surprising.  It wasn't a comfortable pair of old shoes like TFA was.

 

 

[17to85]

It's not whining or nerd rage to point out poor writing. That's my big gripe with the movie. Could have been a really good movie but lazy writing held it back and made the first two thirds of the movie pretty lame and it only saved itself to me with a good ending. 

[MOBomberFan]

Luke was one of my childhood heroes, right up there with Michaelangelo, He-Man and Lion-O... so I was pretty sad to watch him go without getting to see him really wield a lightsaber one last time...  I left the theater feeling a bit disappointed, even. However, showing up in an X-Wing and force-crushing AT-ATs into scrap metal is best left for the video games. The clever distraction, leveraging Kylo's fear of what the oh-so legendary Luke Skywalker could do against him, was the slick Jedi move to make. It's fantastic that both the audience's and Kylo's expectations of Luke allowed the force ghost twist to work and surprise a lot of people. We all expected fireworks, and when the AT-ATs were blasting away we thought that's what we were getting... instead, as Johnzo pointed out, we get the nod to the original trilogy with the master sacrificing himself for the apprentice as they flee aboard the Falcon. Right now, Rey has about as much Jedi training as Luke did at this point of his adventure, but no Yoda to train her. I'm eager to see how she's going to develop her skills enough to fill Luke's shoes as galactic hero and living legend. Supposedly she swiped the codexes? I didn't see that...

It was a fun movie. Benicio was great but I'd have traded him for an 80 year old Billy Dee Williams in a heart beat. Space Leia was goofy but whatever, it's still better than Ewoks pwning storm troopers Home Alone style or Anakin losing his epic final duel because "higher ground"

[johnzo]

I'm really stoked that Rian Johnson is getting a whole Wars trilogy to himself.  

I'd like to see the Star Wars movies go like the MCU where there's lots of different takes on it .. the psychedelic all-the-colors 70s space rock Guardians of the Galaxy, the epic giant blockbuster Avengers/Civil War movies, the zippy comedies like Ant-Man and Deadpool ... even Dr. Strange had a cool feel all its own, with all those Dark City x 10000 effects...

Marvel has done a good job differentiating the feel of the MCU movies and I'd like to see lots of filmmaker nerds who grew up on Star Wars re-interpreting it and freshening it in the same way.

[johnzo]

And just one more thing I noticed on second viewing: this is really a film about women trying to teach men lessons.

Rey tries to reawaken the conscience in  Luke and Kylo Ren, Leia and Admiral Holdo teach Poe to know when to hold em and when to fold em, Rose teaches Finn that it's not about who you fight, it's about who you fight for. 

 

Edited January 1, 2018 by johnzo

[The Unknown Poster]

18 hours ago, Brandon said:

I couldn't get through all the whining comments from the nerds in this thread.   Dear lord cry babies because they kill off original characters.  I remember reading on here when people cried about TFA being to much like the originals?

As possibly the only non nerd cry baby on here,  I thought the movie was absolutely amazing.   2nd best Star Wars flick after Empire Strikes Back.

Bluto saying it was slow and boring?  GTFO here....  everyone in the theater today were shocked that 2.5 hours went by so fast because it was so exciting.  I couldn't think of any points in the movie that dragged.  Way more action then I expected and the action was great.

Wtf people expected? Luke being the main super hero?  He's friggin ancient and had a nice scene at the end.  

The comedy bits were great and not forced. 

The only complaints I would have which were very minor was the Leia flying through space looked funny,   the mechanic girl falling in love with Finn and the lack of Jedi training with Rey. 

Overall great movie and such a breathe of fresh air that I did not expect. 

It’s possible to present a different opinion without tying to insult and belittle people first. As it is, you’ve undermined your position.   Blah blah blah. 

Glad you enjoyed it.

[The Unknown Poster]

1 hour ago, johnzo said:

I'm really stoked that Rian Johnson is getting a whole Wars trilogy to himself.  

I'd like to see the Star Wars movies go like the MCU where there's lots of different takes on it .. the psychedelic all-the-colors 70s space rock Guardians of the Galaxy, the epic giant blockbuster Avengers/Civil War movies, the zippy comedies like Ant-Man and Deadpool ... even Dr. Strange had a cool feel all its own, with all those Dark City x 10000 effects...

Marvel has done a good job differentiating the feel of the MCU movies and I'd like to see lots of filmmaker nerds who grew up on Star Wars re-interpreting it and freshening it in the same way.

I agree that they can go in multiple directions and will. I’m not as exited for rian getting his own trilogy now as I think he failed in some basic story telling ways. But within the Saga they shouldn’t be going in a new direction. It’s a saga for a reason. I think TLJ is the least cohesive chapter of the saga and that’s too bad. 

[Brandon]

2 hours ago, The Unknown Poster said:

It’s possible to present a different opinion without tying to insult and belittle people first. As it is, you’ve undermined your position.   Blah blah blah. 

Glad you enjoyed it.

Just trying to incite nerd rage

I watched it in Polo Park with D-Box....  dbox is quite fun!

 

[kelownabomberfan]

On 12/19/2017 at 6:04 AM, Logan007 said:

No they didn't.  No one replied.

just came back from seeing the movie and I believe that there were replies coming in.  I fully expected Lando to show up, but that was just me being nostalgic for Billy Dee.