Star Wars: The Last Jedi

[Kevvy Metal]

I see Andrew Ellard actually gets The Force Awakens - "SW-TFA: Film isn’t a remake of new Hope, it’s mapped - likely not totally intentionally - over the whole original trilogy."

 

The "remake of ANH" rhetoric makes me want to explode with frustration. 

 

https://storify.com/ellardent/tweetnotes-572a2495b3c20ca949cccfce

[Mr Cochese]

I prefer to think of it as a major Star Wars character moment haphazardly dropped into the middle of a sea of inconsequentiality.

[Sarlaccfood]

2 hours ago, JPL said:

I don’t really need a genius of story structure to tell me that they deliberately took people’s expectations and flipped them. I think that was pretty obvious from just watching the film.

 

Personally, I think they went too far. I could understand them twisting one or two things to create a bit of shock, but to purposely throw away everything that TFA was building felt more like the director trying to put his stamp on things, rather than it being wonderful, deliberate storytelling. It felt pretty heavy-handed to me and lacked the careful measure of drama, thrills and wit that he saw.

 

I’m not totally down on the film, as I thought there were some amazing bits in there, but I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t disappointed. I’m looking forward to watching it again when it comes to Blu-ray though, and hopefully I’ll appreciate it a bit more now I know what to expect.

 

It absolutely does not throw away everything TFA built.

 

It did throw away some of JJ's mystery boxes but to say that's all TFA was does the film a dis-service. 

 

 

[K]

If I saw one of JJ Abrams' mystery boxes in the street, I'd stamp on it until it burst, then throw the remains into the canal. 

[Sarlaccfood]

Nintendo have jumped on the mystery box phenomenon now so they're here to stay.

[JPL]

14 minutes ago, Sarlaccfood said:

 

It absolutely does not throw away everything TFA built.

 

It did throw away some of JJ's mystery boxes but to say that's all TFA was does the film a dis-service. 

 

 

Maybe throw away was the wrong term. More  a complete change of direction.

 

Rey - JJ built up an air of mystery surrounding who she was, who her parents were, why she was stranded on Jakku. Johnson flips this by saying her parents were alcoholics who sold her for booze money (or something along those lines. Gamblers maybe). There's no mystery. She's just a normal kid with abusive parents.

 

Luke - JJ left it pretty open ended, but with hope and optimism that the Jedi master would return. Johnson, kills that idea dead and has Luke as a miserable old bastard who was going to kill his best mate and sister's kid. Someone who has no time for anyone.

 

Snoke - JJ's big mystery character - who was he? Where was he from? How did he rise to power? So many questions. Johnson - fuck that, let's chop him in half.

 

Poe - JJ had him as a cheeky, hot-headed scoundrel in the Han Solo mould. He gets into a few scrapes, but he gets the job done. Johnson, changes this and paints him as a reckless, selfish idiot who doesn't listen to his superiors and doesn't give a shit that he gets people killed everywhere he goes.

There are loads more things if I thought about it, but I think those get my point across. JJ built up all these mysteries, but Johnson takes them in a totally unexpected direction. Like I said, doing it once or twice would be fine, but to do it to practically everything just felt too much. It really left me feeling that it was the director making a stand over JJ's direction rather than anything else, and that pulled me out of the film.

 

Listing those out above though, one thing became clear. JJ created optimism and mystery, whereas Johnson has gone all dark and mean, showing deeply flawed characters. I suppose you could argue that gives us more depth, but personally I wanted Star Wars to carry on with the fairy tale vibe of the original trilogy. Above all I want light-hearted fun, not some high budget Eastenders in space.

 

Maybe I'll appreciate it more on second viewing. Maybe Star Wars isn't for me any more. I'm cool either way.

 

[MrPogo]

It is loads better on a second viewing. The first leaves you bitter because it shits on everything TFA promised you had to look forward to, but when you watch again without those expectations you can appreciate it on its own merits.

[Sarlaccfood]

2 hours ago, JPL said:

Maybe throw away was the wrong term. More  a complete change of direction.

 

Rey - JJ built up an air of mystery surrounding who she was, who her parents were, why she was stranded on Jakku. Johnson flips this by saying her parents were alcoholics who sold her for booze money (or something along those lines. Gamblers maybe). There's no mystery. She's just a normal kid with abusive parents.

 

Luke - JJ left it pretty open ended, but with hope and optimism that the Jedi master would return. Johnson, kills that idea dead and has Luke as a miserable old bastard who was going to kill his best mate and sister's kid. Someone who has no time for anyone.

 

Snoke - JJ's big mystery character - who was he? Where was he from? How did he rise to power? So many questions. Johnson - fuck that, let's chop him in half.

 

Poe - JJ had him as a cheeky, hot-headed scoundrel in the Han Solo mould. He gets into a few scrapes, but he gets the job done. Johnson, changes this and paints him as a reckless, selfish idiot who doesn't listen to his superiors and doesn't give a shit that he gets people killed everywhere he goes.

 

 

 

That could easily read as a list of why the film is good to be honest.

 

It is jarring though yeah.  I really recommend that second watch as others have said.

 

 

[JPL]

Is there a release date for the Blu-ray yet?

[MrPogo]

10 minutes ago, Sarlaccfood said:

 

That could easily read as a list of why the film is good to be honest.

 

It is jarring though yeah.  I really recommmend that second watch as others have said.

 

 

 

It’s almost like TLJ was crafted specifically to address the criticisms of the people who didn’t rate TFA. As such I suspect the people who loved this straight away were the ones who were disappointed in the TFA for being safe and predictable, whilst those who thought TFA was an awesome ride which delivered exactly what they hoped for are now the ones disappointed this time round. With a bit of luck JJ will include elements of both to round off the trilogy!

[Jug McKenzie]

16 minutes ago, Sarlaccfood said:

 

That could easily read as a list of why the film is good to be honest.

 

 

I’d go a bit further and say it’s what makes TLJ a great film, rather than merely a very good one that was too afraid of upsetting the expectant 40+ crowd to reach its full potential.

[MrPogo]

17 minutes ago, JPL said:

Is there a release date for the Blu-ray yet?

 

No, but TFA and Rogue One were both mid-April.

[milko]

Does TLJ canonically set Rey's parentage? I thought that was just as likely some emotional manipulation as anything. I definitely enjoyed what they did with Luke and Poe, less sure about the Snoke anticlimax but I'll take that as the ending a rubbish name like that deserves.

[Boothjan]

Were some people expecting some kind of Star Wars reality TV thing where the audience chooses what happens?  Because that would be a bit rubbish.

[Dirty Harry Potter]

I've seen it three times now (on my own, with Kids and with more kids) and I hate to say it but I dislike it a little more each time I watch it. It has some amazing scenes which make the poor ones all the more jarring.

 

Star Wars is kinda a genre all of its own. And genre's have rules - and you have to be super smart to break any genre's rules in a satisfying way. And for me at least TLJ failed.

 

I want an escapist fairy tale in space. Not a dowdy lecture on the ethics of lasers and complete disregard for any investment I have in the prior stories. I think a lot of this is the fault of Lucasfilm not having a grand vision for the rest of main saga (which seems borderline incompetent for a franchise as big as this).

 

One thing is for sure Disney have divided the fanbase right down the middle, and I'm not sure that was the intended result. 

 

 

[JPL]

17 minutes ago, jerellis1 said:

 

I’d go a bit further and say it’s what makes TLJ a great film, rather than merely a very good one that was too afraid of upsetting the expectant 40+ crowd to reach its full potential.

It's a weird one for me, as I can totally see what they were doing. If they want Star Wars to have longevity, then they needed to move away from having everyone be a hero all the time. They need characters that fail, missions that go wrong, false hope, unexpected directions. I get that and I think they should be applauded for setting things in motion that can ensure the universe grows and they have plenty of areas to explore for future instalments.

 

It just didn't really work for me in the way they did it. They didn't need to shoe horn everything in so drastically. It felt completely at odds with TFA and doesn't work as a middle segment to a trilogy. But, I guess it isn't just a trilogy any more, it's a series. One that needs depth to work.

 

Maybe they should have got this trilogy out of the way first as a standalone story. Or maybe they should have kicked this trilogy off with the intent shown in TLJ. I don't know, but yeah, I was disappointed.

[Dirty Harry Potter]

Agreed, and again I think comes down to Disney/Lucasfilm having no clear creative arc, or plan for where these new films were going. Which is kinda insane.

[robotattack]

Nothing to do with the topic at hand, but your avatar is amazing @Dirty Harry Potter

[ZOK]

3 hours ago, JPL said:

Maybe throw away was the wrong term. More  a complete change of direction.

 

Rey - JJ built up an air of mystery surrounding who she was, who her parents were, why she was stranded on Jakku. Johnson flips this by saying her parents were alcoholics who sold her for booze money (or something along those lines. Gamblers maybe). There's no mystery. She's just a normal kid with abusive parents.

 

Luke - JJ left it pretty open ended, but with hope and optimism that the Jedi master would return. Johnson, kills that idea dead and has Luke as a miserable old bastard who was going to kill his best mate and sister's kid. Someone who has no time for anyone.

 

Snoke - JJ's big mystery character - who was he? Where was he from? How did he rise to power? So many questions. Johnson - fuck that, let's chop him in half.

 

Poe - JJ had him as a cheeky, hot-headed scoundrel in the Han Solo mould. He gets into a few scrapes, but he gets the job done. Johnson, changes this and paints him as a reckless, selfish idiot who doesn't listen to his superiors and doesn't give a shit that he gets people killed everywhere he goes.

There are loads more things if I thought about it, but I think those get my point across. JJ built up all these mysteries, but Johnson takes them in a totally unexpected direction. Like I said, doing it once or twice would be fine, but to do it to practically everything just felt too much. It really left me feeling that it was the director making a stand over JJ's direction rather than anything else, and that pulled me out of the film.

 

Listing those out above though, one thing became clear. JJ created optimism and mystery, whereas Johnson has gone all dark and mean, showing deeply flawed characters. I suppose you could argue that gives us more depth, but personally I wanted Star Wars to carry on with the fairy tale vibe of the original trilogy. Above all I want light-hearted fun, not some high budget Eastenders in space.

 

Maybe I'll appreciate it more on second viewing. Maybe Star Wars isn't for me any more. I'm cool either way.

 

 

This is just a list of why the film is excellent, Jon! 

[Mawdlin]

1 hour ago, ZOK said:

 

This is just a list of why the film is excellent, Jon! 

 

I agree: I get why a mystery box or two can be great for creating intrigue and future suspense but let's say JJ had directed the entire trilogy; surely he would have reverted to type and just added some more in TLJ. Then we get Lost again.

[MardiganX]

We will never know what JJ would have done if he had the full trilogy but the only way episode 9 is going to work IMO is if JJ accepts the direction RJ took things and builds on it. If he tries to revisit things like Reys parents (which he easily could given all we got was Kylos twisted perception of things) then nothing is going to get the time it needs to breathe and be resolved well.

 

On my 2nd viewing I started to see the reasons why RJ essentially ignored JJs layups. He has left us with Rey and Kylo as the absolute centre of everything rather than having Luke or even Snoke over shadow their story. It’s a lot to take in a single movie though having a character that has been revered for decades show up as a bitter old cunt, take a big shit on most people’s expectations for him, confirm himself a failure, find redemption, appear as a legend again for a brief moment and then upload himself to the Force Cloud.

 

I have high hopes for Episode 9 because if TFA showed us one thing it’s that JJ seems to understand what made the original trilogy so special. He has a chance to not only do that again but to finish the trilogy in a way nobody expected. He just has to do what most of us have had to do and accept... it’s not going to go the way he thought!

[MechE]

5 hours ago, JPL said:

Maybe throw away was the wrong term. More  a complete change of direction.

 

Rey - JJ built up an air of mystery surrounding who she was, who her parents were, why she was stranded on Jakku. Johnson flips this by saying her parents were alcoholics who sold her for booze money (or something along those lines. Gamblers maybe). There's no mystery. She's just a normal kid with abusive parents.

 

Luke - JJ left it pretty open ended, but with hope and optimism that the Jedi master would return. Johnson, kills that idea dead and has Luke as a miserable old bastard who was going to kill his best mate and sister's kid. Someone who has no time for anyone.

 

Snoke - JJ's big mystery character - who was he? Where was he from? How did he rise to power? So many questions. Johnson - fuck that, let's chop him in half.

 

Poe - JJ had him as a cheeky, hot-headed scoundrel in the Han Solo mould. He gets into a few scrapes, but he gets the job done. Johnson, changes this and paints him as a reckless, selfish idiot who doesn't listen to his superiors and doesn't give a shit that he gets people killed everywhere he goes.

There are loads more things if I thought about it, but I think those get my point across. JJ built up all these mysteries, but Johnson takes them in a totally unexpected direction. Like I said, doing it once or twice would be fine, but to do it to practically everything just felt too much. It really left me feeling that it was the director making a stand over JJ's direction rather than anything else, and that pulled me out of the film.

 

Listing those out above though, one thing became clear. JJ created optimism and mystery, whereas Johnson has gone all dark and mean, showing deeply flawed characters. I suppose you could argue that gives us more depth, but personally I wanted Star Wars to carry on with the fairy tale vibe of the original trilogy. Above all I want light-hearted fun, not some high budget Eastenders in space.

 

Maybe I'll appreciate it more on second viewing. Maybe Star Wars isn't for me any more. I'm cool either way.

 

I guess a lot of this comes down to perspective. I liked TFA, but loved TLJ.

 

Rey - For me who Rey's parents were, was not in itself the important thing, but rather that she was trapped by not knowing who they were. Johnson leans into that heavily before finally releasing her to be whoever she wanted to be.

 

Luke - For me it wasn't about what Luke would do when he returned, but rather why had he turned his back on everyone he cared about. Again Johnson explored this in great detail.

 

Snoke - For me, the least interesting character in TFA, was only interesting in respect to his influence over Kylo. Again Johnson examines the limits of this relationship to breaking point.

 

Poe - He could only come off as a pale impersonation of Han Solo if they continued down the lovable rogue route. This is much more interesting direction to take him in without changing what little characterisation JJ gave him in the first place.

 

Finn - In the TFA he was a man who rejected who he was. In TLJ he discovered the man he wanted to be.

 

I honestly saw it as the natural extension of the characters we'd seen in TFA, albeit by a director with different sensibilities.

[JPL]

30 minutes ago, MechE said:

I guess a lot of this comes down to perspective. I liked TFA, but loved TLJ.

 

Rey - For me who Rey's parents were, was not in itself the important thing, but rather that she was trapped by not knowing who they were. Johnson leans into that heavily before finally releasing her to be whoever she wanted to be.

 

Luke - For me it wasn't about what Luke would do when he returned, but rather why had he turned his back on everyone he cared about. Again Johnson explored this in great detail.

 

Snoke - For me, the least interesting character in TFA, was only interesting in respect to his influence over Kylo. Again Johnson examines the limits of this relationship to breaking point.

 

Poe - He could only come off as a pale impersonation of Han Solo if they continued down the lovable rogue route. This is much more interesting direction to take him in without changing what little characterisation JJ gave him in the first place.

 

Finn - In the TFA he was a man who rejected who he was. In TLJ he discovered the man he wanted to be.

 

I honestly saw it as the natural extension of the characters we'd seen in TFA, albeit by a director with different sensibilities.

Which all sounds cool, but the problem is we’ve now had 2 films exploring the change in these characters. The first pulling in one direction and the second pulling in the opposite.

 

While Johnson was doing everything he could to prove he was better at writing characters than JJ, he forgot to write a story for them to be part of. JJ didn’t really do much better either, with his homage to the original trilogy. Other than the mysteries he left, Johnson didn’t have much to work with, but what he did have he threw away.

 

I agree with Dirty Harry Potter’s point, and it’s something I’ve said myself before in here. It’s obvious they didn’t have a 3 story arc in place before making these films, and to make something up as you go on something as important to people as Star Wars seems absolutely bonkers to me.

 

I think because of the time spent changing the direction, it’s ultimately left them with one film to create a compelling story and wrap it all up, and I think that’s askig too much.

[MrPogo]

It is very bizarre. They've surely at least mapped out how things will stand at the end with Rey and Kylo, but seem to have given both directors complete independence beyond that.

[IcEBuRN]

It's interesting to note that carrie Fisher supposedly had a decent part in the last film which could suggest some decent potential backstory around her,  Kylie and Rey (remember the Rey hug in tfa!), which could result in some more twists which may now be defunct. 

 

Also, while I've only seen it once, ehen klyo said reys parents were nobodies, I always assumed that could just as equally be a ploy, but I can't remember the nuance of the lines now.... 

 

Finally - upload himself to the force cloud . That really tickled me! 

[Jug McKenzie]

21 minutes ago, IcEBuRN said:

 

Also, while I've only seen it once, ehen klyo said reys parents were nobodies, I always assumed that could just as equally be a ploy, but I can't remember the nuance of the lines now.... 

 

 

I can shed some light on this (having seen it five times!) It's not Kylo Ren that says it, it's Rey. He goads her into finally admitting what she knows already ("Go on.. say it") and she finally cracks and says something like "they were nobody". He then elaborates on this a bit by describing them as "filthy junk traders", or something along those lines (bit harsh). So I think we can take the revelation about her origins as gospel, rather than waste too much time wondering if it's all just a big Kylo fib.

[IcEBuRN]

That's one fuck you jj, I'm a bit sad at then. She was totally built up, with the visions and flashbacks and stuff. I can understand how you can hand wave that away, but still. 

[Commander Jameson]

One thing I did wonder from the TFA flashback to Rey as a child watching the spacecraft take off was who was holding her hand. I thought it was the same character who was buying parts from her. I also thought that it was a female character for some reason.

[JPL]

23 minutes ago, jerellis1 said:

 

I can shed some light on this (having seen it five times!) It's not Kylo Ren that says it, it's Rey. He goads her into finally admitting what she knows already ("Go on.. say it") and she finally cracks and says something like "they were nobody". He then elaborates on this a bit by describing them as "filthy junk traders", or something along those lines (bit harsh). So I think we can take the revelation about her origins as gospel, rather than waste too much time wondering if it's all just a big Kylo fib.

Maybe she was lying to protect her identity, or them, or something. How would Kylo know who they were anyway?

[Sponge]

I can't stand all this mystery box bullshit, create a load of shit that the writers themselves haven't thought up answers for yet and throw it all at the screen and hope some of it sticks. Lost has a lot to fucking answer for.